Board of Education Meeting - August 11, 2025

001questions of >> Good evening. I now call the board of education regular meeting to order at 5:30 p.m. Is there a motion to approve the agenda for Monday, August 11th, 2025? >> So moved. >> Is there a second? >> Second. All those in favor say I. I. >> All those opposed, same sign. Tonight, we would like to take a moment to recognize our former superintendent Dr. Lou Finch, who has recently passed away. Here to speak um is former board member Ron Olsen. After Ron's comments, we will observe a brief moment of silence in remembrance. Thank you, Ron. Thank you, uh, President Garlock, directors of the board of education. Dr. Grober, I appreciate the opportunity tonight to speak about, uh, Dr. Lou Finch. Uh, as you stated, I was a member of the board of education

002from 1989 through 2001. And in 1994, we had the occasion to start looking for a new superintendent after Dr. Steve Dashner had gone on to another job. We uh hired a consultant, conducted a national search such as you have done recently and to our surprise, well really not our surprise, we did get a lot of great applications, but one that kind of piqued our interest was Dr. Lou Finch. And the reason he piqued our interest was he had just served tenures in two very large school districts. uh the Anoka Henipin School District in Minnesota and the Jefferson County, Colorado School District in Colorado. We um interviewed four or five people. Dr. Finch was one of them. And we learned right off the bat that he was very interested in getting back to the Midwest. He

003and his wife Arty had roots here and uh was was very interested in the in the school district and a lot of it because of the reputation of the Cedar Rapids Community School District. Um from the first interview, you could tell that Dr. Finch had great passion and dedication and love for public education and from for what he knew of the Cedar Rapids Community School District. But one thing that really stood out about Dr. Finch was he was an excellent communicator. In fact, one of the first actions that Dr. Finch did was uh in 1994 after he was hired and the week before school started, he had an all hands-on deck meeting of staff and faculty and he not only uh arranged to have that, he had it at the arena of the five seasons

004center and which is now the uh Alliant powerhouse. And during that time and during that uh presentation, he talked about his background, his love of education, and his goals for the Cedar Raps Community School District. Lou was very passionate, as I mentioned. I'm going to use that word several times here. If you were at a reception or any kind of party or anything and Lou Finch was in the room, you can be sure that he was going to come up to you, introduce himself, and talk about the Cedar Rapids Community School District. And this passion for uh education and communication continued throughout his tenure. And I think one of the results of that was in the year 2000 the successful passage of the what was at that time the largest uh bond issue in the

005state of Iowa school bond issue. I think it was only about 48 million. I say only because that's comparative to what uh what we what we're talking about now but that was a very large one at the time. Um Lou's um I was going to mention that one thing that affected Lou when he was here at the school district was an event that happened in 1999. And that was the Coline shooting at Coline High School in Jefferson County, Colorado. And the reason he was deeply affected by that, I think, is because he had just left there several years ago. Still had many connections with staff and faculty. Um Lou's uh I was going to mention also that Lou is so passionate and dedicated to education after I left the board, I'd be sitting in a

006coffee shop and Lou would spot me and walk over and first thing he would do after we talked about the Hawkeyes or maybe what was happening at the state legislature, it always turned to education and particularly the Cedar Rapids School District. um education. Um this happened even con after he after he uh became director of the urban education network uh which he had a long tenure with that. Also I want to go back to to the noa henipin school district. He was the longest serving superintendent at that school district. I personally am very grateful for Lou Finch's uh tenure and service to Cedar Rapids Community School District. He had a steady hand. He had great leadership and he really had a heartfelt love for public education and for the Cedar Rapids Community School District. His

007uh service of celebration of his life is going to be held um Saturday at First Lutheran Church at 11 o'clock with a visitation at 10:00. Thank you for the opportunity to present these comments. Thank you, Ron, for that very nice remembrance of Dr. Finch. For those of us who were around back in those days, we all I'm sure we all have a special memory of Dr. Finch. He um was a part of all of our lives at at one point or another. Tonight we have five public hearings for the Cedar Rapids Community School District. The first one is the new elementary school at Harrison Elementary School site. The second one is a new elementary at the Van Beerren Elementary School site bid issuance number one. The third one is a new elementary at the Hoover

008Elementary School site bid issuance number one. The fourth one is the issuance of approximately $120 million school infrastructure sales, service, and use tax revenue bonds. And the last one is the to continue participation in the instructional support program. Board Secretary Hogan, have we received any written correspondence relating related to the public hearings on tonight's agenda? Yes, I have one written objection to Harrison >> and that's the one that we all have at our chairs. Okay. >> Yes. >> Okay. Thank you very much. Board members, you should find that from SACE CR Heritage. Do we have anyone who is requested to address the board this evening regarding the published hearings relating related to the new elementary school at Harrison Elementary School site project? >> No, we do not. >> The affformentioned public hearing is now closed.

009Do we have anyone who has requested to address the board this evening regarding the second published hearing relating to the new elementary at the Van Beerren Elementary School site bid issuance number one. >> Yes, we do. >> And how many one? >> Okay. With one speaker, we'll be you'll be given up to five minutes for your remarks. Please respect the time limit. Uh, board secretary Hogan will serve as your timer and indicate when your time is expired. So, >> Steve Dodie. My name is Steve Dodie and I live at 2718 28th Avenue Southwest, which is uh which is the property that was or that is to the west of the proposed uh bus lane or bus street to the new Van Beern school. Um I just want to uh bring up to the to the

010school board though that that I I'm I'm hoping and I hope that you're considering to uh sign the purchase agreement to the 27th Street property. That is that is a much better access. It's a much better design than uh than the original proposed entrance that that would have had gone through Van Beern Park and interrupt the traffic of family uh members members of the city that uses that park. and it would have been a hazard for any kind of a traffic lane or street to go through that park and interrupt and you know interrupt the u the amount of people that uses that. So So I'm hoping that the um that the school board considers signing the purchase agreement to that. So thank you very much. >> Thank you. Do we have anyone who is

011requested to address the board this evening regarding the second published hearing relating to the new elementary at Hoover Elementary School site bid issuance number one? >> We have nine. >> Okay. With nine speakers, you will each be given five minutes. Please respect your time limit and board secretary Hogan will serve as your timer. Can you call our first speaker, >> Joe Broka? Good evening. My name is Joe Brokhaw. I live at 33 Roxberry Drive, which would be directly south of the proposed Hoover School building. While we acknowledge the efforts to work with the Roxberry neighbors, the current concerns do not adequ ad adequately address the significance concerns of the community. The proposed location of the new school would result in the permanent loss of our scenic view of the green space, which is home to

012a diverse array of wildlife, including deer, fox, duck, and geese. The existing walking trail would also be removed from its current path. The construction of a 28- foot tall building would drastically alter the landscape, negatively impacting our quality of life and property values. We have raised several alternative ideas, but each has been dismissed without sub without substantial consideration. We are deeply concerned by the statement made by by Chad and he said this in front of about 20 people that the school would be built regardless of the community community opposition. This sentiment suggests our input is not being valued. We understand the need for a new school to support our students and teachers and we are not opposed to the project itself. Our primary concern is the chosen location which we believe is unfair to the

013Roxberry neighbors. The proposed site sacrifices our property values and quality of life for the sake of convenience. Had had we been aware of these plans prior to our home purchase last August, I would not have purchased our home. The school is planned as a designated community school which explains its large design. We support this concept believe but believe the school can be built in a location that does not come at the expense of the surrounding neighborhood. We respectfully request that you do not approve the current plans for the new school. We urge the committee to develop a new plan that offers substantial benefits to the surrounding neighborhood and not just the preferences of a select few. We're committed to working together to find a solution, but at this point we feel our concerns are not

014being taken into consideration. So far, no concessions have been made that are in our favor. We believe a collaborative approach is essential for a successful outcome that serves the entire community. Thank you, >> Mark Kramer. Mark Kramer and I live uh just south of the new school proposal. And first off, let me say we have no opposition to a new school building. That's a wonderful great future idea. But what we don't approve is this design that they put in that moves a drive between our backyard and the school building. And not that it's the drive is there, but it's 26 feet wide. And they want to put it like five or 10 feet from our property lines, which is way too close in our opinion. They did try and move it a little bit so

015they could maybe create a burm or a privacy fence, but that's not really what we're looking for. >> The couple of examples I noticed that exist over at the West Willow school building that's exists now was that they put excuse me, this drive was to be used for the bus school buses to drop the kids off at the West Willow. They just came off the uh public road, widened the street where the buses then would, if you will, park, and then drop the kids off there. Considering this school has uh currently only has two buses that come in. Now, it's pretty much a landlocked building as far as the lines of the school go because the building is there are other building, school buildings are all around it. So, it's not like the school can

016expand very much as far as population growth goes. It could a little bit due to apartments building, but the landlocking prevents really much expansion school buswise. So, my point there is that the two school buses we're talking about can surely fit on the widening of why they could drop off. It's not like Widley's got that many cars on it. They put two roundabouts on there to allow for a smoother flow of traffic. And they put one right at the corner of the elementary building, which I personally I thought that was not a good idea with elementary kids running around. But I will say so far has not been a problem. They have school guards out there and it's worked very well. The uh another concern I had but I understand from them was that they're

017going to remove there's currently two baseball fields in the green space that Joe had talked about. They're going to remove those and not replace them and instead they want to put in simply soccer fields. But you know baseball is a national sport in the summertime. I just find it hard to believe that there's nobody in that building that wants to play some sort of ball. Currently, there's a trail around that building, sorry, around the green space that should be replaced, but there's no plans for it in in what we've seen so far. It would be nice if there was some sort of trail put in. And if we had more input as the people around and the concerns about it, maybe we could have been included and put these things that were concerned to the

018neighborhoods and the people that use these. There are really quite a few people, adults mostly that use these trails. Now, the school uses the trails during the school day. I'm retired now, so I get to watch. They use them as probably a gym class or something. I don't really know how they use them. It looks like most the kids are using them walking or running around. Anyway, there's no plan for a trail and I think that's a big mistake. And then uh they I we asked them if they couldn't come up with other options available for moving this building around and they've insisted no, they couldn't. And all I'm asking for you to do is not kill this plan, but we need to postpone it or table it until such time as the public has

019input into it as to what we would really desire to see there. Now, they have met with us a couple of times, but in each case, they pretty much been again whatever we suggested for improvements or to meet our needs and demands. And I see I'm done with time, so I will let you go. Thank you very much for your time, Abigail Cornell. Hi, my name is Abby Cornnejo. I have been an ELLL teacher in the district for the past six years and this will be my third year at Hoover. I also live down the street from Hoover on First Avenue. I'm here in support of the new building. As I live in the community, I also walk the trail every morning with my dogs, as staff and students can tell you. But ultimately, that's

020something I am okay with because our students desperately need a new building. As you know, our building is overcrowded. We don't have central air. Our gym, our lunchroom are so hot that ideally you would wear tank tops in the winter because it gets so hot. The heat in the winter causes our uh plumbing for the in the school to cause the hallways to smell like feces. It's very disgusting. No student should have to learn like that. Some facts about our kids are that we have 174 students who ended the year receiving ELLL services. 57% of our building speaks another language. 29% speak Swahili, 18% French, and 14% Haitian Creole. And our students, they are resilient, amazing, and they deserve a new building. Whatever the cost is, we need to do whatever we can to give

021them a bigger, safer, cleaner building that they can be proud of and learn in. They deserve the best environment possible, and they deserve it now. So, please vote in favor of this. Thank you. >> Thank you, Sarah Hensman. Good evening, directors. I'm Sarah Hinsman. I'm an alumni of Hoover Elementary and currently a neighbor. Um, since I spoke at the last meeting, I have fielded an interesting question. Uh, and that question is, why didn't we get involved sooner regarding the rebuilding of Hoover? Um, and I think the implication was we should have gotten involved years ago when the intent to rebuild the school was like first floated uh as an option. Well, our essential answer is as my other neighbors have already said is that we are not opposed to a new school. Um, I think

022that we as neighbors assumed that you, I sort of use in the general sense as in the district and the project partners would make the best decisions um, for all parties involved. Um, that you would notice that on your site map there are homes uh, surrounding that property. And perhaps you would take a moment to put yourself in our shoes. U, maybe I'm naive, but that's the type of community that I hope that I live in. And I can't help but feel that maybe if we had been approached for our direct buyin um before this first plan went to draft that we might now have a completely different site plan than what we have currently. But nevertheless, here we are. To me, the five feet increase in distance isn't enough of a compromise, especially compared

023to the outcomes that we can see with our own eyes at other schools. Um, we appreciate that some of you came out to talk with some of us um since the last meeting, but it really hasn't repaired our concerns or the situation. Personally, I'm accepting that this is what it's going to be now and that you will keep your word on replacing the memorial and prioritizing neighborhood involvement in the outdoor elements. I expect construction is not going to be fun for us or anybody that's uh in the school population, but that the district will do its best to manage any issues that could arise. I'm also trusting that when the project is complete that I will be able to say that all the trouble that we went to work with you uh will be worth

024it. Um when you build a relationship, you learn some things. I learned that there is currently a policy against memorials on school grounds and I do not agree with a rationale for a policy like that. I think it is possible to consider how respectful, equitable, and uplifting memorial spaces can be created when a tragedy occurs at a school. Um, planting a tree, creating a garden, or paving a trail are acts of service that have impacted Hoover in a positive way for over 30 years. And there are so many other creative options that can support healthy grieving. So I ask you to please revisit this policy. I also learned that the interior plans for the new elementary schools do not include a stage. Stages are valuable community space for performances, presentations, and discourse. They are a

025space that signals children to engage their creativity and express themselves. There was a stage at Hoover, my elementary school, and I was on it every day. Being comfortable on a stage mentally prepares students to embrace the performing arts, especially when these activities become more elective in higher grade levels. And I think that spaces dedicated to the performing arts are culturally essential in every school. If there's a gymnasium, there needs to be a stage. I think that most of us have a positive relationship with a school from our past or our current school if you're a student. And I recently saw a meme online that said something like, "I'm so old they tore the school down." And this speaks to something I'd also like you to consider. Uh there is a history within these buildings. There

026are core memories, lifelong friendships, sparks of career inspiration, or maybe even a presidential visit. I think it is of value to collect and perhaps incorporate historical information, objects, and media as these schools are replaced. Um these are places of importance to the community, and their history should be preserved if the building needs to change. So, please explore these options as the project continues. My memories of Hoover are so overwhelmingly positive, and nothing can change that. It would hurt me deeply if any of my neighborhood advocacy were mischaracterized as negative or hostile towards the school or anybody that goes or works there. Now, um, I like to think that we are your benevolent guardians. And I want you to remember and prioritize your neighbors as you continue to redevelop other schools. Remember that real people make

027their homes beside these schools. So, please remember our interests as if they were your own. Thank you, >> Kelly McMahon. Good evening, board of directors. My name is Kelly McMahon. I reside at 5508 Dostel Drive Southwest, Cedar Rapids, Iowa 52404. And I have been an educator at Hoover um what was Hoover Elementary School, now Hoover Community School since the fall of 2011. And as many of you know, I'm an obnoxiously persistent or I should say persistently obnoxious advocate for my students because this is all about our students. So in the fall of two or winter I guess it was of January of 2018 that is when the master facilities plan of recalling for redoing our elementary schools was passed under director um Dr. Buck as our superintendent and the board of directors at that point

028in time. In that plan Hoover was supposed to be rebuilt. It was put in place as a third phase but actually but had been discussions about moving it to the second phase because of our awful cafeteria where last year we had a kindergarter fall down and roll down multiple steps. Fortunately they did not get hurt but it is a safety hazard. the lift does not work. So, we, you know, with children that have mobilities, um, safety things, they may not be able to eat in the cafeteria, which is the case for a child from last year. And I wonder about, um, potentially some of our kindergarters coming in this year. In the fall of 2019, when the final um, approval for the new West Willow was up on the agenda, I came before the board

029again and spoke about the need for that plan to be implemented immediately because Hoover could not wait. I also knew that Van Beern could not wait as there were apartment complexes going up in our neighborhoods that did not have the ability for those students to be absorbed in our schools. And I shared at that point in time that the wonderful boiler system had overheated and killed the classroom pet the hamster which unfortunately Mr. Stone got the picture of and I said thank goodness there were no students in the building at this time. From that point in time, I chose to serve on the master facility committee that was put together for the last um bond as well as approval of the new trailside and um the Harrison um Madison merge which is you know finally

030going into place. And I advocate at that point in time for Van Baron, not for Hoover but Van Baron because I knew what they were going through with those apartment complexes going up. there was no space for those students and our students deserve top-of-the-line facilities. I also understood when you address Van Beern, you'd have to address Hoover as well because all the housing that's going up in the West willow district as well as another apartment complex that's supposed to be going up in the Hoover district. This is something that has been in the works and discussion since 2018. Unfortunately, I was a minority voice on that task force and it was not addressed. But when you look back at it, I can tell everyone I told you so. But hey, that's something I like to

031just be able to point out from time to time. Since then, there have been numerous schoolboard meetings talking about what's happening and stuff like that, including last summer when it was finally like, "Yep, we understand Van Beerren and Hoover have to be addressed." The city the investment that the city has put into housing to address the transient population on the south west side of Cedar Rapids has made those schools with West and Cleveland not able to absorb the children that are going to be living in those um homes. So we had to do it. There have been numerous schoolboard meetings which I have not been able to attend because we have our BLT meetings on the Monday of the month and other reasons. But I made sure to watch them because they're online and so

032I could stay in the loop about what was going on, what is happening. We cannot delay this building. It must be done now because if you delay a new table, then that can delay the opening of a new building. And then we're going to have a problem about what comes to be on August of 2027 when the new building is supposed to be open, when the current building is supposed to be closed and torn down. So, we have a parking lot for all the kids and staff and everyone to go through to be able to start school on time in August of 2027. We know this is Iowa. We know what happened with West Willow. There was weather impedes construction. We cannot wait. There is more housing going up. Van Beern, Hoover, and West Willow

033need this to move forward tonight. Our kids deserve it. Our families deserve it. And I understand we're not all getting things. I'm gonna lose a very nice large classroom. The new building is not going to have the beautiful classroom that I currently have, but I understand that's a sacrifice I have to give up for my students to have what they deserve, and we must move forward with it tonight. So, I urge you to please approve this um item number two on the agenda. So, thank you. Next is Reverend Staca Fine. >> Hi, I'm Reverend Stasia Fine. I'm a parent of two Hoover students. I coached soccer at Hoover 10 years ago. Um, also helped with the Boy Scouts. My grandmother lives in the Van Burn area and so I'm very aware of the sentiment of

034homeowners. Um so this is a conversation that my not just me in the family is really discussing what is happening. Um I first want to thank you for Hoover Community School. I love the school and I personally think it's the best school in Link County. Um best elementary school in the county and I talk about Hoover Community I've been talking about it for the last 10 years. um what a fantastic amazing school this is. I personally think that this new building will increase home value and the reason is because I know there is an excellent administration, there is excellent teachers, there is excellent staff, there are amazing families involved in this school and if the building reflected what was inside of it, everyone would want to buy a house next to Hoover. Um, and I

035think the building makes people not know what a beautiful treasure exists within the school. And I think the school deserves that that statement and I think our kids deserve it. Um, I want to talk about soccer over baseball because this is a global school and as a global school, soccer is the more more beloved sport over baseball. Baseball is the all-American sport and it is it is important. Um but for the majority of this community, soccer is how they connect with their um extended family back home. Um the children that have moved here from other countries, that is a sport they are familiar with. And so having a soccer field is more important. I coached in that field behind all your houses with no soccer, nothing. And we did it. We figured it out. And

036I watched the comparison about kids interest in soccer versus baseball. And it was troubling for me to see these two B baseball fields when my kids needed a soccer field. Um, regarding arts and music, I know there's not a stage, but the music and the arts are fantastic at Hoover and they actually value them and they lift them up. They're culturally sensitive and they're relevant. Space to dance and move um I think has a greater significance than having a stage. Um, also there's a lot of kids who are autistic. My son is one of them. And um kids who are autistic, the stage isn't it's more intimidating to them than being on the floor. Um so I can tell you when my son went and gotten an award at an assembly, um being on the

037floor made it so he could get the award. If he had gone up on a stage, he would he wouldn't have gone. My son has 102 degree temperature every single time he has to stand up in front of a group of people to perform. Um, so I know and his doctor says, "Oh, that's not a real that's an anxiety thing." So, so they're building a school that fits the needs of the community. Um, the best concern as a parent driving in. Um, one of the frustrating things for me is if you need to pick up your kid early before the school day is over, it's difficult to do so. So like my children have therapy and extra needs and I don't want to take them out of the school day and so I try to

038plan it towards the end of the day but there's competition for those times. So you have to move your you know pick up your kid early. Well because of where the bus comes in you can't pick your kid up early. So they the buses even though there's only two large buses and then there's a couple of community minivans. even though there's only a few of them, they need to be in a separate place so that parents can come early to take their kids to therapy and get in and out of that space. And it just it it's a different type of flow. And so even though it's not a normal busing, they're they're thinking about those needs. Um let's see other things people said in regarding postponing it. Um, I get the lack of feeling

039heard. So, I I say I wanted to go and knock on all of your doors, but I'm a parent and I understand that that wasn't my job to do that. So, I I I get that. Um, but also like this building is in really bad shape and I really I'm not saying it just to make the school sound good. I really think it will improve your home values if the building reflects the quality of education that's happening. And I really think like everyone should send their kids to Hoover. So thank you for this wonderful school. >> Next is Liz Wel. all for letting me talk tonight and for all you do for the Cedar Rapid School. My name is Liz Wyber and I am a fifth grader at Hoover. I am here tonight to explain

040why Hoover needs a new building. Our content buildings is so old that we don't have air conditioning and the gym or lunchroom or gym is so small. We can't have Fridays exam go for together. They have to split us up into three groups. All we don't have any enough classrooms this year is class is outside and trailers. I have to go outside back for for >> all the to >> normal things like lunch, jam, all and music. But unlike my other classmates, I I'm really dyslexic and I have to go back outside reading and math. I'm also to speech play. My friends and I have all very classes and visible and bigger classroom. And my friend is he can't walk. So, we kind of need a bigger lunch, but not that much stairs cuz he

041doesn't can't really walk stairs anymore cuz something happened to the Z. And thank you for listening to me. >> Sarah Wyel. Uh my name is Sarah Wyel and I live on First Avenue. This will be my ninth year as a Hoover parent. Um that was obviously my daughter Liz who just spoke if you couldn't tell by the curly hair that she's mine. Um, I just want to address a few of the issues that have been brought up so far. Um, the one about possibly having the buses on Johnson Avenue dropping off or Riley when Liz was actually in kindergarten or alternative kindergarten. She did that at West Willow and then would get bus back to Hoover. One of the times she was bus um the bus decided that he didn't want to drive into the

042parking lot and deal with our Hoover parking. So they dropped her off on Johnson Avenue and as a kindergarten expected her to walk into the building by herself and get to um after school. I don't remember what the after school program was called back then. She didn't make it. Uh, one of the teachers just happened to be out in the parking lot still helping and had to help her get into the building and get her to where she was supposed to be. Luckily, um, Principal Stone called me before I heard anything about it from Liz that she got lost and he was already on call with the busing to make sure that didn't happen again and it got addressed right away that she would get brought. Uh, they still, I think, parked on Johnson for

043the year, but the bus attendant had to physically walk her to the door and hand her off to a staff member. So having the buses on the street, I mean, if that happened to her, I can't imagine it happened with loads of kids trying to get them in and off the field. And then um it's already been addressed, but um soccer. Uh my son's going to talk next here about the soccer club and how as um a Hoover, he did soccer this year also at Roosevelt and so many of his friends from Hoover, like that is their main sport. So having soccer fields there is going to be helpful for them. And then I was going to talk about Liz's friend too. Her one friend is um there's four of them that have been together

044since kindergarten that are all in special ed together. But the one boy cannot do stairs. And so we do not have adequate place for him to do lunch at Hoover. So they rotate the four of them. Each day, one of the kids stays and has lunch upstairs in either Principal Stone's office or in Miss Dumbler's office. And they rotate who has they kind of fight over him who gets to have lunch with him. But they each take two well Liz and her other friend each take two days and then one other girl takes another day. But he's never been able to go downstairs and have lunch with the other kids, which isn't really fair to him either. And he's the sweetest little guy. And then as far as like I understand they're going to lose

045the baseball fields and it's not going to look as pretty, but I know we still have plans to have the gardening club. My husband volunteered this last year with the gardening club. So, they're still going to have stuff out there. I know it's not going to be the same, but we're not looking to take stuff away. We're just looking to add more stuff for the kids for Hoover. And I think that's all here on my notes for now. I will let Brandon take over for me. Brandon Wyel. My name is Brandon Wyel and I used to go to Hoover. But so about like the soccer stuff, it would probably be best for us because when I played, we used to be like during like recess, we pretty much just play like on the grass where

046the grass was. we didn't really have like a certain like soccer field and then when soccer club came I'm pretty sure I remember we they pretty much I don't know if they did like cones or they just painted like a part for us like in the grassy area but then we didn't have like a regular just soccer field for all of us and it's not like really that nobody really plays baseball in for Hoover ever I've noticed Thank you. >> Is that it? >> Okay. >> Yep. Do we have anyone who is requested to address the board this evening regarding the second published hearing relating to the issuance of approximately 120 million school infrastructure sales service and use tax revenue bonds? >> We do. We have one >> with one speaker. We will all lot

047you five minutes and Carlo will be your timer. >> Kevin Ymore. Thank you very much. Um, members of the um, board, um, my name is Kevin Wymore and I live at 451 Pine View Drive Northeast. I wish to, uh, offer some short remarks regarding the uh, save bond revenue hearing. Um, as you know, the amount of the bonds is $120 million, which as I understand it is uh greater than the uh total amount of the uh prospective bond vote in November. So, this is important stuff. So, in 2020, the Cedar Falls School District decided to spend $33 million in save funds to build a new high school building. Cedar Falls High School's enrollment is about five times that of five times as large as that of Harrison Elementary in Cedar Rapids. Yet, the Cedar Rapids

048Board intends to spend significantly more than $33 million to merely remodel and repair a much smaller school, Harrison Elementary. And I do understand uh the uh artistic and historic and architectural value of Harrison Elementary. Um but I still uh offer this question. Why is that? why the the very great cost per student um disparity there. Um, and also I'm concerned, frankly, with the just flatout, you know, uh, return on investment, uh, of this. Will spending $40 million in remodeling and repair, etc., uh, increase the 37% uh, math proficiency rate uh, at Harrison Elementary? I certainly hope so, because if not, why are we doing it? Um, so I'd like to know a lot more about uh where these uh millions of dollars will will go and if I missed a tour um maybe you could

049offer another one. Um and in some all of this new spending uh again I stress that the non non-n November bond vote uh spending appears to be eclipsing the uh November bond vote uh amount. So, uh, last tally that I've seen, uh, that the total amount of these two categories, uh, does in eclipse $300 million. And so, in some, all of this new spending comes at a time when voters are, uh, struggling with higher household costs such as insurance and property taxes, etc. And in your own survey, um, after the last, uh, bond defeat, uh, voters who voted no last time said your spending amount was too expensive. And so, near as I can tell, $300 million is more expensive than uh, $220 million. So, that's all I have. Thank you very much. >> Thank

050you. Do we have anyone who is requested to address the board this evening regarding the second published hearing relating to continued participation in the instructional support program? >> No, there are not. >> The aforementioned public hearing is now closed. Next, we will hear from those who have requested to address the board. Board Secretary Hogan, do we have any requests this evening? >> We have three. >> With three speakers this evening, you'll be given up to five minutes for your remarks. Please respect the time limit allotted to each speaker. Board Secretary Hogan will serve as your timer. If you've submitted a request to address the board and choose to refrain from speaking in the interest of equality and fairness, you may not yield your time to another speaker. to abide by the open meetings law. There

051will be no dialogue between board directors and the public during this time except to clarify the nature of questions or comments from the individual speaking. We ask that the audience and speakers refrain from using inappropriate language and outbursts as a matter of respect for all in attendance. The board has zero tolerance for profanity, vulgarity, demeaning language, or threats of any kind. Lastly, I'd like to remind our speakers that the board cannot address personnel and student matters. The board policy outlines a process for addressing and resolving these concerns. We ask that speakers refrain from using personal names and information during public comment. Before we begin, I'd like to remind our speakers to state their name and address when they're called to the podium. Board Secretary Hogan >> Storm Ziggler. Good evening, Storm Ziggler, 4132 Windfall Drive

052Northwest. Uh, at the last board meeting, you heard from directors, parents, and students who are deeply invested in our music programs. I know that the board and district leadership share that commitment and want every student to have access to a strong, thriving program. The urgency you heard last time reflects a decline in opportunities that I have witnessed in my three decades as choir director at Kennedy High School. With natural turnover in district staff and board members, I fear that we may have lost sight of once what we once had. We lack perspective on the current state and don't fully see the causes of this decline. I can't provide a full picture in five minutes, but I'm going to try to set the scene for you. All three levels of programming have been impacted in our

053high schools. Enrollment reductions have led to staffing cuts, the loss of ensemble opportunities for students, and a reduced ability for our high school programs to compete on par with other 4A programs around the state. The greatest factor in the success of our high school programs is the preparation that students receive in earlier grades and it is there where most of the damage has been uh most severe. We used to offer instrumental instruction in fifth grade. Today, we are the only metro area school district that does not. Our students start to be at least a year behind their peers. Recent cuts also eliminated small group lessons in some middle schools, forcing band directors to teach full classes of students with no prior in uh individual instruction while trying to cover every brass, woodwin, and percussion instrument

054all at once. This has resulted in inequitable opportunities for students based on the school they attend. In the vocal area, the programming at our elementary and middle schools is also not equitable. Depending on which elementary school you attend, you might have music every three days or every four days. You might have an opportunity for a public performance or you might not. At our middle schools, a patchwork of music offerings has been created to deal with behavior issues from our seventh and eighth grade students who refuse to participate in music in a productive way. In vocal music, you might be in a choir with kids who are really interested in singing. Or you might be in a quote dumping ground class where kids who have no desire to do music are placed because our schools do

055not have adequate staff to offer them an alternative. In addition to the daily classroom chaos this has created for some of our middle school teachers, this also impacts recruitment to the high school programs. When we approach middle school students about singing at Kennedy, we first need to convince them that things will be very different up at the high school before they even will listen to us talk about the actual opportunities that we have for them. To be very clear, this is not a reflection of bad teaching in our middle schools. It's a result of a bad system. A major contributor to the decline has been the loss of a district level voice dedicated to arts education. We once had a full release fine arts coordinator who served as a knowledgeable resource to district administration, oversaw

056programming, professional learning, community partnerships, among many other duties. That position was eliminated long ago. Today we have curriculum leads without release time to do the work and all of that work simply cannot be done. I have been a part in my 30 years of four district efforts to address these issues. Each ended when personnel at the district level involved in the initiative uh changed or left the position. Last year we saw the return of a district activities director position after a year'slong absence. Uh this position gave arts teachers someone at the district level with a focus on the arts as part of their work. After one year of learning the system and the challenges I've spoken of tonight, the position was again lost due to cuts. In my view, there are three actions that would

057make the most immediate impact. Number one, evaluate music curriculum delivery at the elementary and middle school levels to address inequities in time and access and reconsider the middle school music requirement. By seventh grade, most students know whether or not they want to participate in ensemble music. Reinstate a district level leader for fine arts. Could be an administrator or a release time teacher leader with a clear focus on arts education. Develop a district-wide K12 music recruitment plan so all students receive the same information about opportunities and building leaders don't have to manage at peace meal. With the clear support of parents and students and the creativity and focus of district leadership, principles, and music teachers at all levels, we can create a plan that ensures every student has the opportunity to reach their musical potential. Cedar

058Rapids used to be a place that attracted students and staff because of our K12 music programs. We were the model in the state of Iowa. We can get there again. In an era where districts are competing for students, we can be part of the solution that keeps students in our district and draws students in from other districts. Your teachers, parents, and students are ready to roll up their sleeves and get to work. We hope that you all will join us. [Applause] Eric Kristofferson Good evening. Uh my name is Ericson, 5616 Shadow Lane. My wife Lydia and I have two daughters, one at Harding and the other at Kennedy. Like so many here tonight, supporting our public schools is a passion. I served as Violet Gibson PTA president for four years. Co-founded the Charger parent brigade

059at Harding and currently in my second year as president of the Kennedy PTO and my first year as vice president of the Kenny Kennedy band parents. Tonight, I'm here to talk about the state of the musical arts in our schools. As you heard last month and tonight from other parents, educators, and students, there is much improvement needed. Music is not just an art form. It is a language. It is a science. It is a discipline. And for our students, it is a gateway to creativity, confidence, and connection. Research consistently shows that students who engage in music education perform better academically. They score higher in math and reading. They develop stronger memory and attention skills, and they're more likely to graduate. Music is emotional. It gives children a voice when words fall short. In a world

060where mental health challenges are rising, music offers a safe space. Music is cultural. It teaches students about the world, about history, about diversity. Through music, they learn to appreciate different perspectives and traditions. Yet, despite all these benefits, music programs are often the first to face cuts when budgets tighten. That's not just unfortunate, it's shortsighted. A study by the USC School of Music had the following conclusions. Music education was linked to higher scores in positive youth development, including competence and confidence. Students engaged in multiple forms of music education over longer periods scored higher in measures of emotional and social development. Do we have good music in our district? Absolutely. Just look at any of the performances put on by our high school choirs, bands, and orchestras. However, the outlook for these programs is poor. Not because

061of the efforts of those leading them, but because the base of music education upon which they rely is eroding. Hours in the music room at the elementary level are declining. Some elementary schools are now having music every fourth day versus every third. Positions have gone unfilled or had hours reduced. Directors who teach one type of music are being asked to teach another. I assure you, teaching someone how to sing is not the same as teaching them violin or the tuba. We have middle school groups playing the same music year in and year out due to lack of funding for new music. We have heard a lot in the past 18 months about college and career pathways. There are over 100 distinct musical career paths spanning creative, technical, business, educational, and therapeutic roles. The college and

062career pathways program is starting in the high schools this year. If you offer a strong foundational music program in the elementary and middle schools, you can start students on 100 potential pathways in kindergarten. Every learner future ready. Learners who are future ready must possess the following. Competence, confidence, and connectedness. All of these can be achieved through a strong and wellsupported musical education program. In our current environment of charter schools and private school vouchers, it is critical that the programs in our public schools that offer connectedness be placed at the forefront. I urge this board and the administration to look into everything I have mentioned tonight. The study I mentioned is just one of many that all support strong music education from an early age. The examples I cited of issues in our elementary and middle

063schools are not fabricated. They have been provided to me by concerned parents and faculty across the district. I believe at the last meeting it was offered to those interested to join an advisory group in October. I appreciate that offer, but this issue is foundational and warrants specific targeted focus and greater speed than a general advisory board will provide. Myself and those assembled tonight are ready to aid in this process. We are doing our part as parents and educators and are willing to do more. We need the same from our board and administration. We are organized and will continue to bring light to this issue at future meetings and in the press until distinct action is taken. Thank you for your time. [Applause] >> Meera Gibson Gibbons Gibbons. Sorry about that. Hello, my name is Mera

064Given and I live at 2222 First Avenue Northeast in Cedar Rapids. I'm 14 years old and I'm a sophomore at Washington High School and I've been playing the violin for 12 years. Four years ago, I started a nonprofit called Mir Gibbons Violinist. And since then, I've played over 300 free concerts at senior living centers and schools, including many in the Cedar Rapids Community School District. Prior to its closing, I served as a mentor at the Harmony School of Music, a free music school that worked to supplement school music programs, and also to prepare younger kids for joining their school orchestras. There, I learned firsthand the incredible positive impact that music can have on a child and an entire community, and also the barriers that many face to getting a meaningful music education. I started my

065school orchestra career in sixth grade at Franklin Middle School. At that time, I had been taking private lessons for many years, and many of my peers had never held a violin before. But nonetheless, the program was very beneficial to me as well as the other students. However, I first started noticing this the discrepancies between my orchestra program and others at my first honors orchestra festival. I noticed that I was one of the few students in my district at the program and kids from districts such as Lindmar dominated the top chairs. I was confused at first because I knew the kids at my school were just as passionate, talented, and hardworking as the kids from any other school. After a bit of research, I discovered that programs such as Lindmar's orchestra program started in elementary school.

066Not only that, but they also had a plethora of other opportunities that my school lacked. just a few of them being a chamber orchestra, a full-time teacher, which allowed them to have longer private lessons and orchestra daily, and they had been having after school prep sessions in which they practice the music they were going to be playing at the honors orchestra festival. Ever since I started playing in my school orchestra, I've noticed the gap slowly widening. For one thing, the size of my eighth grade orchestra was less than half the size it was in sixth grade. My high school orchestra is wonderful, just as my middle school orchestra was. that no matter the teacher or the students in an orchestra, without funding and prioritization, it's impossible for an orchestra or its students to reach their

067full potential. And it's not only me who has noticed this. I know many high achieving students who also participated in arts programs, as most do, who fled the district when they realized that they were at a disadvantage in terms of the arts and music programs. When these students leave, the school and district are left much worse off because of it. I love my district, but I also struggle sometimes, as I know many others do, because I know that my family spends thousands of dollars just to supplement my music education with private lessons, youth orchestras, and summer camps just to make up for the opportunities I'm losing, which I know is impossible for most kids to do. I will always do my best to support and advocate for my orchestra and arts programs, but neither me

068nor anyone else can make any real changes without district support. It's time we realized that the arts are just as essential to achieving high test scores and high graduation rates as academics and sports and started actually working to build a stronger and better music program in our schools. Also, I have a longer presentation on suggestions for moving our orchestra programs forward printed if anyone is interested. Thank you very much. [Applause] Thank you to everyone who spoke this evening. We'll now give the meeting over to Dr. Grover to share her superintendence report. >> Thank you, President Garlock. See, want to first uh start with kind of be jumping all around a little bit uh Justin. So, just bear with me in regards to the prepared uh slides that we have. Uh first of all, I just

069want to acknowledge our uh family members from Hoover tonight. Um and Chad is not here. Um but I do want to just say that as one of our priority areas, priority area number four, um prior area number three in regards to partnering with our staff as well as our community. What beautiful opportunities we have in front of us tonight. I do want to thank our students who showed up here tonight. Um Liz and Brandon, thank you for your uh voice, your voices. Um so we really do care about our students, our staff members, our families, as well as our neighbors. And as Kelly mentioned, um the topic of Hoover um Elementary School has been going on for for quite some years now. I'll never forget uh the night that the board approved last August uh

070for us to move forward. The room, it cheered uh and it roared. And so, of course, we wanted to to go to work. uh to and they did a great job in terms of developing the plans for Hoover. Um and maybe we should have moved faster in regards to including our neighbors. Certainly um a noted uh lesson that we can take forward with us as we continue to work on our projects. But I do want to say here that we are committed uh to continuing to work with our families. We've already sent out um an email to our uh neighbors to let them know about some of the changes that have already been made. We have an FAQ to address some of their questions and I won't go through all of those. We've emailed those

071out. Um, but I do think the unifying piece is that everyone knows that Hoover is a special place. Um, and we're going to figure out how to do it together. There have been um several different solutions that have been put forward. We have meetings scheduled in August, September, and October to continue to work through the plans. Those dates have already been uh publicized uh for you. And so we hope that our neighbors will continue to come out and be parts of those conversations um on August the 18th um from 5 to 6:30, September the 15th as well as October the 13th. We hope by October the 13th we'll have a clear plan of action. Um yes, we could have easily just went ahead and decided what to do um with the trails uh with the

072memorials, all those things, but we do want your input. Those three meetings will allow um a significant opportunity for our neighbors to be involved in that process. So, thank you. I do want to also um kind of move us forward in regards to um our um music program. I I personally believe that every student should be involved in at least one extracurricular activity um in the fine arts. Uh it certainly gives us that um chance for our students to do so. Um and I think it's a special demand that's been placed on us here tonight. Um, and I really do appreciate coming forward with solutions when we're thinking about evaluating our programs um, through and through u making sure that we have a district level representative. I I support that wholeheartedly um, and how we

073think about that uh, and coming up with a plan of action. Uh, we will have our first discussion um, around this in September um, at our SIAK meeting and we will continue to send out uh, information and I'm excited about what we can do together. I was at a superintendent meeting in the state uh last week. There are over 40 openings across the state um looking for music teachers. So, we understand what that does to our programs. Um but I'm excited tonight um that we do have a group that's organized and we can get it figured out uh for Cedar Rapids. So, I'm excited um for the plan that we can come up with together. Um, as we think about getting ready for back to school, um, I want to note, uh, switching gears just

074a little bit, but it's just important, um, an update for our safe and secure learning, uh, as it relates to measles, uh, information. If you've been paying attention, uh, to the news, uh, with the cases now appearing within our community. We're working closely uh, with Lynn County Public Health uh, to keep our students and staff safe. Um we just want to send this um notice out uh to our parents uh to make sure um that your um child if they have any um symptoms that please keep them home and we're giving um advanced notice here. Um and we're also uh wanting to provide a reminder that Iowa law requires that the MMR vaccine for uh school attendance unless you have a valid um exemption. Anyone not vaccinated uh who is exposed will need to stay

075home for 21 days. And we don't want our students to stay at home. um they will there will be opportunities information was sent home where you can take care of the vaccines and I think that's for all of us. I actually called my mom looking for my records this week. And so it's very important that we all have that. Um priority area number two as we're thinking about uh prepared for life um and just like uh what was mentioned here tonight um as we think about our students preparation. I always say this at every graduation that it doesn't just start at high school, it does start um at the early grades as well. So thank you uh to all the teachers that have poured into the lives of our students. One great example of that

076uh would be our students over at Metro High School um who had the opportunity to go on a Prague trip um where um they were able to uh represent Cedar Rapids and the state of Iowa by sharing their experiences in STEM education while engaging in an international career and college readiness experience. and students um explored the Czech Republic's second oldest university and learned about geoinformatics and 3D printing hubs um which they have some of that over at their um organization. We'll share more in the future, but um what a great experience for our students. Um as we move forward to again um as we think about our partnerships and making a difference again uh thinking about uh activities, thank you to a group of teachers from Cleveland Elementary School uh who worked along uh with

077uh Hannah Stoki um for her basketball camp. So thank you. A teacher organized this for our students. Um as we know Hannah is an alum from Washington High School. the students learn different basketball skills and also learn the importance of teamwork and leadership. So we are in back to school preparation. Um we have the opportunity to meet with members of our community cabinet here this last week and thank you to all of the people that serve on that. If you're interested in serving on our community cabinet, we meet uh once a month um along the superintendent along with our other staff members. We have board board of education representatives too. Uh we talked about um our district priorities uh specifically looking at our behavior matrix and our commitments there um as well as the culture

078and climate of our school district. If you're interested in participating, send me an email. We'd love to get you plugged in. Also, this past Friday, our district leadership team, um that's all of the district administration as well as our campus administrators. We were able to gather over at Trailside, what a beautiful facility that is. Um and we discussed our upcoming vision. Uh we also had some visits from uh community partners along with our school foundation uh to talk about their support. Tomorrow we look forward to welcoming our new teachers to our school district. I think we have about a hundred new teachers this year. Um and the rest of our teaching staff will return on August the 18th. Um physically responsible. Want to give just a quick update on our bond. Um so thank you

079to um all of our communities um who community members who have supported us through sponsorship as well as um our main focus right now is around petition signatures. Our board of education who's been out collecting signatures as well. U my last count that we had we're about 4700 signatures looking for people to turn some sheets in this week. Um we need to get to 5,500. Uh we'd like to get a few more. Um we will be at the farmers market this weekend. Um, and so and it's been nice to kind of see some of the the believe in CR school t t-shirts around town. I just happened to pass someone on the highway. I was like, "Oh, yeah, that those are our shirts." So, thank you uh community uh for getting out getting those signatures.

080Uh we love to see you at the farmers market uh this Saturday where we'll be out talking about our school district and getting signatures. Um also, thank you for the organizations. Um some of our latest supporters u came from the NAACP, Newok Co. Foundation 2, Young Parents Network. Thank you to all of the folks. And you're probably wondering um how you can get involved. Of course, um you can go to the beliefnschools.org uh where they are kind of handling all of that. Yes, they'll take donations, but they also take uh just support. If you want to host a meeting, we can come to your company organization. Um as well as if you'd like to write a statement of support, I think they will take those. Also, just a few reminders and a few thanks. Um,

081every year you hear us talking about annual verification. Annual verification is very important. Let us know um, our students that are returning back to our school district. We want to make sure we have a seat for you. Um, that our staff as well as our resources are in the right place uh, to be able to manage our students that are coming back. I do want to report for our parents uh, 82% completion rate right now across our district. So, we just have a few more parents. If you have not completed that verification uh, form yet, please pause like right now. you can go ahead and complete it. Um, I do want to say that we have nine of our schools that are over the 90% mark and we have three at 100%. Make your school

082be one of the ones that are at 100%. Um, I also want to say our back to school nights. Uh, they are coming up. So, all around the district. So, please uh check with your uh school as well as our district website for back to school nights. pretty much anything you need to know, you can go to our back to school page thanks to our communication team and hopefully you can find a list of back to school events as well as school supply list, lunch menus and more. So that helps to represent our excitement that the time is near to almost back to welcome our students for the 2526 school year. And that concludes my report tonight. >> Thank you, Dr. Grover. Do we have other board reports? Director Taminsky, >> I'll apologize in advance.

083It's a little bit long uh just because it covers uh two months. So since our last report to the board, the superintendent's core committee on for policy and compliance oversight met twice on June 9th as well as July 10th. So at our June 9th meeting, uh Liz and Chris Gibson, director of student services, updated the committee on the anti-bullying harassment policy, which will be amended to reflect legislative changes. Liz presented key points from that legislation, which is House File 865, and stated they would be brought back with suggestions at the July meeting. Liz and Chris also proposed student cell phone provisions uh based on state legislation, and that is House File 782. Uh Chris presented supporting data um and research, and Liz addressed options. The committee requested feedback from staff and families. The committee also

084reviewed uh the district's donation and fundraising regulations with input from Karen Swanson from the Cedar Rapids Community School Foundation. The committee is advancing recommended changes to Dr. Grover who will then make a recommendation to the board uh regarding uh regarding other possible changes to the board manual. Updates from IASB based on the Iowa legislative session will soon arrive u providing further guidance. Um that would be our June meeting. In our July meeting, uh the committee reviewed the provisions of the board manual concerning equal education and non-discrimination. Uh the consensus was not to recommend any review or revisions at this time because they are not due for updating under the cycle for regular reviews and they comply with law. Uh the committee then reviewed changes to provisions on compulsory attendance, chronic absenteeism, and truency. The committee

085approved the changes suggested by staff and Liz Jacobe to bring the provisions in line with the legislative changes and that would be House File 865. Uh next, uh with the help of Jennifer Vanfleet, who recently took over as executive director of student services, the committee reviewed feedback from staff and families on a newly required policy for student use of cell phone devices. The committee agreed the draft should go to the board for first reading with the possibility of changes depending on additional feedback. And then finally, the board agreed IASB's sample provisions on bullying and harassment should replace existing provisions in the board manual to bring those provisions into compliance uh with state law. So, as you can see, that committee has been quite busy and it will continue that work. I think we've got a

086meeting coming up in just another week. So, that's the report. >> Thank you, Director Taminsky. Any other board reports? Director Humbles. >> Uh, Friday I had the opportunity to go to Hoover Community School. I had gone earlier during the week to do something else and was invited back uh to participate in the school supplies distribution and I was there from 4 to 6:00 and it was nonstop and it was very hot in there. Um, But it was so great to see how many families uh participated. I think there were nearly 400 students that re receive school supplies. So, I want to thank Hoover for inviting me. Uh, and and we see that need that I've always been in support of Hoover Community School had gone on their initial visit when they developed the community school.

087And to let you know, I mean, I met a lot of parents and Dr. Grover, >> I did get a lot of signatures for the bond. So, thank you and and to see that we are serving our community. >> Thank you, Director Humbles. Anyone else? Okay, very good. Moving on to our consent agenda. Are there any items on which a director has comment or question or requires that the item be pulled from the consent agenda for a separate vote? >> I do have a comment on item 10. just wanted to make sure that there is a place where the community can receive updates and information about that. Um so if there's something already in place for that then would you make that known. If not then maybe something in the future near future so we

088can um have transparency with that. Thank you. >> I was also um had a comment on >> 10. Oh, >> so director Round Tree, what were you talking about? The the culture and climate the >> No, I'm sorry. No, yes, the Yes, that one. >> So, >> what are you requesting again? >> Right. >> Just so that there's some a place for the community to be able to get updates about the outcome of that so that there's transparency on that issue. >> Okay. Yeah. It will follow the standard protocol that we have for RFPs. So, it would have to come to the board for approval. >> Yes, that's fine. >> Yep. Anything else? >> Yeah, I had a comment on uh item number five, the policy manual, since uh Dave was just speaking to that.

089I was curious if we um as we're thinking about uh the policy number 0612, I was looking through the anti-bullying harassment policy. I'm wondering if we have any um I know many districts are looking into incorporating like social media use and ethics around AI use in their schools and guidelines for that type of um those types of uh you know technologies. So I'm wondering if we have any how we're how we are we incorporating any type of curriculum or were there discussion around how we may be navigating that with uh teachers and students both you know ethics around social media and um AI use in the classroom >> there did that come up in your um committee >> yeah Liz will help us out. Okay, wonderful. >> First, I want to make sure I understand

090your question, director. Um, so the board policy manual consists of policies, regulations, and procedures. It does not preclude any sort of um operational guidelines or supplements to those to the board manual. Um, I think what you're asking is whether or not the board manual will include more specifics about AI and social media. Is that accurate? >> Um, maybe. I'm thinking of it with specifics to uh anti-arassment and bullying. So, incorporating, you know, online safety, cyber bullying, privacy, that type of thing, um, within our schools so that we can be on. So, it I'm not sure where that falls, but I didn't see it addressed in the policy or maybe I missed it. So, I didn't know if that was um something we could consider or if uh just maybe would be brought to the committee

091next time for discussion. certainly um an important topic and it's certainly something the committee could um examine and I think the question will be um whether the policy manual as as worded is general enough to encompass what you're discussing um and then to use more operational guidelines to >> Okay, >> but but I appreciate the differentiation. It's definitely open for discussion as far as from from a compliance standpoint certainly. >> Okay. >> Um so there are pros and cons and yeah I think >> I'll put it on the agenda. >> Okay. Okay. No worries. I appreciate the clarity. And then I had one more one more question. Just clarity on um item number 12. There are a lot of items this time. Okay. So the scope of services. This is in reference to the Eastern

092Iowa Arts Academy partnership. So, it looks like it's a 10-year partnership and there was an outline of kind of what that looks like year-to-year and what services are being provided. And then I was looking back to see that we had listed nine CRC SD elementary schools, three middle and maybe reference to high schools. Is um I was hoping that we could specify somewhere or get clarity on which schools are participating. I couldn't find that anywhere who who this contract with Eastern Iowa Arts Academy is serving. Um because I didn't see that noted. >> Okay. There there are two items on here regarding the Eastern Iowa Arts Academy. >> It's the first one, not the not the Harrison. >> Okay. >> Or not the Roosevelt. >> Um >> that was a separate one with Roosevelt. >>

093I believe that this one is a result of the the um purchase of the building last year. Yes. This is part of that agreement and it just vaguely listed I believe >> elementary, middle, and high school and there was a nine and a three in there. I didn't know which schools those were and if we had that stated anywhere so we could specify who the partnership was with or serving. >> Is that that's >> Yeah, we could bring it back for a follow-up item. Okay. >> Thank you. >> Okay. Thanks. >> I mean we can get you that information of the specific schools. Yes. >> Yeah. Other comments, questions. Okay. Very good. Do we have a motion to approve the consent agenda as written? >> Some moved. >> Is there a second? >> Second. >>

094All those in favor say I. >> I. >> Those opposed, same sign. >> Thank you. We will now move on to administration. We have seven items tonight. First is the approval of a property purchase agreement at 261227th Street Southwest. Are there any questions from board members around that property purchase? I guess I would just offer a comment. Thanks to the team for working with the the neighbors um and coming up with this alternative uh at Van Beerren at the Van Beern site. It um alleviates several concerns that the neighbors had in that area and it actually ends up saving us some money in the long run by purchasing the property. Um do we have a motion to approve? >> So move. >> Is there a second? >> Second. >> All those in favor say I.

095>> I. >> Those opposed, same sign. Next is a resolution supporting the proposed issuance of approximately 120 million school infrastructure sales services and use tax revenue bonds. Are there any questions? Do we have a motion to approve? >> Some move. >> Is there a second? >> Second. >> This is a roll call vote. Director Taminsky. >> I, >> Vice President Roundtree. >> I, >> Director Humbles, >> I, >> Director Bayers, >> I, >> President Garla. >> I, Our next item is the approval of an engagement letter for the physical plant and equipment levy, general obligation, school capital loan notes, bond council. Any questions from the board members about this item? Do we have a motion to approve? So moved. >> Is there a second? >> Second. >> All those in favor, please respond by saying

096I. I. >> Those opposed, same sign. Thank you. Our next resolution is fixing the date of sale of approximately 15 million $15 million general obligation school capital loan notes series 2025 approving electronic bidding procedures and approving official statement and taking additional action thereon. Do we have questions or comments on this item? Do we have a motion to approve? >> So moved. Is there a second? >> Second. >> This is a roll call vote. >> Vice President Roundtree. >> I. >> Director Humbles. >> I. >> Director Buyers. >> I. >> Director Tammenky. >> I. >> President Garlock. >> I. Next is the approval of underwriting proposal physical plant and equipment levy general obligation school capital loan notes for sole underwriter. Are there any questions from board members on this item? Do we have a motion to

097approve? >> So moved. >> Is there a second? >> Second. >> All those in favor, please respond by saying I. >> I. >> Those opposed, same sign. The next resolution is to continue participation in the instructional support program. And for this, we will actually hear from the business services team. >> Good evening, board of directors. I'm Crystal Brahman. I'm the accounting manager here and um Carla asked me to present on the ISL update. So, I'm just going to go through some general information about the instructional support levy. Um, so we're currently in our existing 5-year instructional support levy. It ends June 30 of 2026. So, we're just looking to renew that. Um, for FY26, we have $9 million. 1.4 of that's coming from property tax and 7.6 million coming from income sax. Um and just

098as kind of a reference in FY25 about 274,000 of that was property tax. So as income tax decreases our property tax will increase. Um in FY25 the ISL levy supported 76.4 FTE for direct instruction and instructional support staff. Um it's also a big contributor to our technology department. It provides critical staff. All of our help desk employees are paid out of our ISL. Um, it covers annual costs of core systems and software, telecom services, internet access, and then a bunch of contracted technical services such as Seesaw, Aea Learning Online, Pairk, Atlas, and Teach Boost. And then in addition to the staff and service, it also prep pays for curriculum and other supports to instruction such as career development support, workplace learning, the I Ready curriculum, um the bridges math, CKLA amplify science curriculum, ELLL supports,

099a lot of our testing and testing materials and also our homeschool assistance program. So that is just a general overview. Are there any questions? >> Thank you. questions. Anyone? >> Um, of these of this list, are there any um new programs this year being introduced or expanded uh with these funds or are these all current? >> Nope. Just continuation. >> Just continuation of Okay. And then do you have a breakdown of the 76 FTE like who that encompasses? Is that somewhere just for transparency sake? >> I can get it. Yeah, it's it's a lot of um Paris support, kindergarten paris support comes out of ISL. >> Um help desk um some of our technology um some of our secretarial support here at the ELSC. I can get you a breakdown. >> Okay. It's helpful to

100just understand that overview of that. Thank you. >> Yep. >> Okay. Thank you very much. Do we have a motion to approve this resolution? >> So moved. >> Is there a second? >> Second. This is a roll call vote. >> Director Humbles. >> I. >> Director Buyers. >> I. >> Director Tammenky. >> I. >> Vice President Roundtree. >> I. >> President Garlac. >> Hi. Our final administration item is a presentation of the Harrison Elementary School updates. um updates followed by the preliminary approval of the site project. I will turn the meeting over to Chris right now. >> Thank you guys. Thanks for allowing us to come and share the update for the Harrison project. I'm going to introduce Jim Hullbach. He's from Leget Architects and he's on the design team doing all the hard work

101for the Harrison. >> Uh thank you. It's a privilege to be back here. We presented this project uh early in the year and uh I can say it's substantially similar, but I'm going to go through things in a little bit more detail tonight. So, appreciate the opportunity and uh you know, I always I'm impressed when students address the board. That's that's got to be an intimidating thing to do. So, you've got impressive students. Uh you also have impressive staff. the district level staff that we've been working with, the operations facilities, custodial, everybody else, the building level staff that we work with, they are truly engaged in this pro process. Uh it makes our job easier, it makes our job more effective. So, uh you have outstanding students, you have outstanding staff, faculty. Um so again,

102it's a privilege to be here. Uh real quick, uh short agenda. I'm just going to talk through some design things. Uh I do have the updated construction cost estimate and I'm going to talk about schedule uh briefly uh just to kind of orient you on the site. The uh existing building is shaded on the right hand side there. The Northwest Recreation Center is is shaded on the the top of the image there. That's the north. Uh and then the white C is the addition that we're proposing for Harrison. And in the middle you can see a courtyard which we'll talk about in a little bit more detail in a few minutes. Uh you can see that we're expanding the existing parking is kind of in that southwest corner. So we're expanding that both to the

103east and to the north uh to accommodate some higher numbers of parking. And I apologize this is a little bit tight um putting everything on the slide here. So I'm just going to talk through it very briefly. Uh you kind of enter at the south uh the the six o'clock there. Uh there's an administrative office. There's a secure entry as you go clockw clock clockwise around the building. The cafeteria is on the southwest corner. The gymnasium is on the west side. That is also going to be the storm shelter. So, you know, everybody in the building is going to go to that shelter uh in in the event of a storm. At the upper left or the northwest corner, that's a couple of prek classrooms that we added to the program and then a kindergarten

104pod adjacent to them. uh they they do have a the opportunity to have their own drop off and pick up there in that corner. And you can see that that kind of movement goes around that courtyard uh element in the existing building. We've got a couple of uh classroom pods on the first floor and then those are mirrored up above on the second floor. So if you move to the right hand image, that's the second floor. We've got three classroom pods up there. Um we've got kind of a dynamic space in the middle, what we're calling the learning stair. I'll show you an image of that. That's going to be kind of the heart where there's circulation throughout uh people passing through throughout the day. This is a blowup of a couple of the classroom

105pods. Um just so you can get a little bit better idea of what's going on. Uh all the classroom pods have four classrooms. They all have two what we're calling curriculum support spaces. U those are targeted to be kind of a half-size classrooms. They could be used for special ed breakout um other you know interventions, those sorts of things. And then they all have toilet rooms. They all have a collaboration area. I'll show you a couple of images of the the collaboration areas in a couple different spots. But the thing I want to highlight here is um on the right hand side you see the first through fourth grade pods. On the left hand side you see the fifth grade pod. And our team worked very hard to make sure that it doesn't matter whether

106you're in the existing building or the new building. You're going to have the same experience. You're going to have the same quality of light, acoustics, air quality. the space, the the daylight, all those sorts of things, all the types of spaces. So, I'm very pleased with how we were able to kind of work within the footprint of the existing building and come up with the the pod that you see there on the right. This is the kind of view from the south uh east corner. So, you know, where a lot of the traffic will see it. Uh you can see on the right hand side, that's the existing building. Uh we are maintaining that facade. Uh it'll get cleaned up, the masonry will get repaired. And then you can see to the left that's the

107addition the entry to the building the primary entry to the building is in between those two. So we want it we want people to experience hey the historic nature of the existing building and then the the kind of modern take that we hope complements that. This is the southwest corner. So that's the cafeteria on the other side of the windows. Um this is also kind of the drop off lane. although you're facing into traffic, so you come down, loop around and park or uh park against the curb to drop off. Uh we're hoping to get, you know, traffic off of the street. So that's one of the things. We've got a lot of stacking space there. Uh and then we also uh I didn't talk about it when I had the plan up, but the

108cafeteria and the gym are positioned. I know you probably don't do this as much at the elementary level, but if we needed to isolate those spaces for some evening use where people are in those spaces but don't have access to the rest of the building, we're able to do that. And then this is just kind of a closeup of the the primary entrance. And again, the the goal is that you have um most your traffic in through here. You've got the secure entry where you can control people coming in through the office uh that you commonly see. And um and then you step inside into that that space that I'll show you in a second between the two, the existing and the new. Uh I hope most of you have already seen this. This is

109actually a couple of snips from a brochure that your communications team put together talking about some of the things that we're doing to preserve the history. Certainly that east facade, you know, maintaining the character of that. The the three vestibules, I'll call them historic vestibules to the north, east, and south are all being maintained. We're replacing the doors, but we're saving the floors, saving the interior doors that are still in in usable condition. They've got some cool old hardware. Uh there's a couple other elements that we're taking from different places in the building, and we're going to create a little gallery upstairs. Um like for the the transportation mural that's hanging in this building right now, so it can get relocated. We're going to take a couple of the old uh kind of neat old

110windows and put those kind of as art pieces on the wall. Also, there'll be a gallery area upstairs. And again, that's a that's kind of a continuing conversation that we're having as far as the historic preservation. >> I just wanted to take a moment to talk about the um concern that was brought up about saving some of our materials at the Harrison School. Um, the design team and the operations team do plan to meet with the Cedar Rapids Historical Preservation Commission, the Cedar Rapids Historical Society, and SaveCar Heritage Group along with the district legal council in the near future to evaluate what items could be potentially saved or salvaged for those groups to use. This renovation of Harrison gives new life to a historical building while providing an equitable educational experience for all of our

111students. This means modernized learning environments inside the historical elementary building. It is the intention of the district to maintain as much of the historical building as possible while being fiscally responsible and at the same time providing an equitable learning experience for all of our students across the district. I'll turn it back over to Jim. >> Thanks. Uh so I'm going to go through uh just some kind of quick renders. So again, this is you set foot inside the door. You can see on the right hand side, that's the old exterior west wall of the existing Harrison as it stands today. Um, we're doing some things with some of the stone entries that we're not going to use uh for, you know, passing through anymore. So, we're going to do some like a built-in bench. So,

112you can see there on the left hand side on the lower level is the media center, which we think is going to be a nice uh multi-use effective space. And then on the upper level is the art room for the building, which we're calling the treehouse. And hopefully you can see a little bit of that uh that tree theme coming through. Although again, these are um not photorealistic renderings. These are just more a quick take on it. Uh this is the view inside that media center. Again, anticipating some pretty flexible furniture. So there's a lot of different things uh that you can do in that space. Uh one of the things I really like is this big wall of north windows. Um north is the good kind of light, right? It's not the glare, it's

113not the heat, it's the diffuse light. So having that opportunity to to be in that space and have all that light, I think is going to be really powerful. And speaking of the courtyard, I think that's going to be a great feature. Uh this is a secure courtyard for the building. It's a combination of soft space and hard space. So in the upper left where you can see kind of the bright colors, there's some playground equipment there. That's the the soft play place surface. And then on the bottom there's some hardscapes, some benches, some seating, um things where you can do some kind of outdoor classroom type activities. And here's a render of that so you can get a feel for it. Uh I probably shouldn't show this because Chris doesn't probably isn't going to

114let me put a tree in the uh in the courtyard, but uh it's in the render. So uh talking about the again the that kind of core heart area that we're calling the learning stairs. So, the the two columns you see here, again, that's part of the existing exterior wall. There's some arched windows there. They don't go all the way to the ground. We're going to go ahead and chop those down all the way to the ground, and those are going to become circulation uh between the the existing and the new. And again, there's some area here for some uh formal informal learning, but I expect there to be a lot of traffic and activity. Again, the the pod circulation, you don't have to circulate through the other pods. So, there's going to be a

115lot of lot of movement back and forth through this space. Uh this is the cafeteria again that you saw on the southwest corner. Uh again, I think with some flexible furniture with there's a drop down projection screen. Uh I think this is going to be a highly functional space that you can do a lot of different things. Uh and hopefully also keep everybody's belly filled so they can stay focused on the the task at hand. Uh this is what we're calling the large motor skills. So this is the kindergarten version of that collaboration space that is going to be in all the pods. And you can see we we had a have a fun little wall here with some niches. I think you have that at some of your other buildings. So there's a nice

116surface that, you know, kids can can roll around on or scoot around on or spill stuff on. But this is outside of the the typical classroom spaces. And again, each of the classroom pods has has their version of this. And this is kind of for the other grades. So this would be uh first, second, third grade because they've got the cubbies. at uh fourth and fifth grade we go to a locker. So um but you can see again it's just a kind of an informal space. You know you pull people out of the classrooms. These these are all situated directly outside those four classrooms so there can be supervision and and flow back and forth. But again and then uh the pods we're also doing you can see a little bit here kind of a

117color scheme. So you know again they're so equitable. I think they're going to be so similar that we need to make sure everybody knows they're in the right part of the building, right? Because you can walk into a space and it's going to look familiar. But hey, if you're part of the green pod and you're in the and you see a bunch of yellow uh floor tile and paint and things, maybe you should uh think about reevaluating where you're headed. And then again, the most important part, the classrooms. And again, I'm very pleased with u kind of the the equity that we're seeing. And um this one happens to be in the uh existing building, but uh again substantially similar experience for those students that are going to be in the uh in the addition.

118And you can see again flexible furniture, you know, kind of that prototypical teacher wall, teaching wall, that prototypical set of casework that's going to give the the staff and the students that equitable experience are all part of that um for for each and every classroom. Um moving on the we continue to see upward pressure on the cost of things. Uh I think that should come as no surprise. Um you can see you know schematic design we were too early so we gave you a range. We started to dial it in uh during design development and kind of hit the top of that range. We added a little bit of square footage for that that prek. Um and then as of um the end of last month, so this is you know already 12 days old.

119Um we are at $41,26,47. Now this is an estimate of probable construction cost. Uh you know market conditions change um for better for worse. You guys have some really nice big projects for the contracting community up here. So you know we we hope we're hitting a competitive bid window. Uh we believe we are with the possible exception of a couple of the couple of the trades. Um, so we're anxious to to get this thing out to bid and and see where we land. Uh, I will say, you know, the scope, the scale of this project, the the ability to work for the the local community schools. Um, it's it's certainly attractive project. So, we expect to have have a a good amount of interest. Uh, schedule. I've got a couple schedules on the bottom here.

120Uh, I think if we can if we can get approval tonight, we're going to plan to go out for bid tomorrow and then, uh, have bids due on September 9th. So you can ignore the bottom three. Um that was if we were trying to hit an October meeting and I think we talking you know we'll have an adequate bid window and uh hopefully with good interest we'll be able to get bids uh on the 9th and then turn that around and come back to request approval for that project on the 22nd of September. And then uh again assuming things go well we will hopefully start to get somebody under contract and start work in October. The construction period is scheduled to go through the end of June for substantial completion. Um that'll give the contractor

121time to finish things up for final completion. That'll give the operation staff time to to get everything moved in. And then uh the little green square in the the bottom right there is obviously the the goal and target and that's to uh have students operating and staff teaching in the building in uh August of 2027. So, I'm available to answer questions uh and go back to any slide if there was something you that caught your attention that you want to ask a question about or otherwise. >> Thank you, Jim. And thank you, Chris. Um I have a question then I'll turn it over to the rest of the board. The courtyard um has some green space and some potential outdoor learning possibilities. Can you give me any idea of how big that space is? Uh,

122probably not. What's the um I mean I can tell you like this is a six foot wide pair of doors. So, >> okay. >> You want to extrapolate that across? >> Okay. Thank you. >> Playground area. So, this is designed to be the um >> prek playground area. And so, the playground area would be very adequate to the plate same playground size of the other schools. >> Okay. That's just that where you see the two obstacles, the two play stations. The rest of that is obviously got more space than um I wish I knew the square footage of that. I can get this. >> Yeah, I'll I'll get that to Chris and he >> Okay. Okay. Chris, you know, my question is going to be like, do we have any sort of green space outside

123of this that could be an outdoor classroom? And if we don't, can we get there? I don't know how much space there is outside of the actual building on that site. >> So, unfortunately, this site doesn't give us a lot of green space. You can see what we have there. But in that where the activity center is, just to the left of that is the exit what will be the new playground. And there is some areas where we have some some grass um and some greenery. And one of those hillsides that we're going to carve in a um outdoor classroom space. >> Okay. Okay. Um, we're intentionally trying to leave that hill so we can create kind of a seating on the slide with some play yet have that out as well. >> Okay. Excellent.

124Good. Thank you. Other questions, comments? >> I was curious about the just on the topic of the courtyard. Well, first I love that there's a combination of these natural elements with the existing brick and it's just beautiful. Um, that courtyard, I'm trying to like map the building in my head the last time I was there. I'm not sure where that is. Um, is it accessible to the community? Can can the neighborhood access that space and utilize that uh playground and green space as well? >> So, not the courtyard. It would be unless the you know district decided to open up and have people pass through the building uh to get to it. Um the northwest playground I I would expect and again this is the one that's targeted for like the second through fifth graders

125there that it's directly west of the Northwest Rec Center. um that I presume the neighborhood would be um would be in and about uh regularly. >> Okay. And then um you know, we're I'm trying to Thanks for the note about just salvaging some of those materials. I'm a thrifter at heart, so I'm in the business of salvaging. Um I want to make sure that you know, if if there are things that we're not keeping that we can um you know, reuse them in some capacity or considering that. So, uh there was a note from a community member about those. I think it was on the last page maybe the glass diamond pattern window that's very unique and there was some note about it in here how you're maybe taking that and putting it elsewhere in

126the building. Um I'm not sure sure if those are one and the same but maybe you can speak to uh looks like you know we need to consider light air quality the um ability to retain heat um which those may not provide. So maybe you can just speak to that process with those windows and >> and what that looks like. Sure. So, the windows that we were saving are not these. Um there's some others like inside even from like a corridor into the gym. There's a couple of those that are um not exactly like this, but they're still kind of a cool window that has good character. Okay. >> So, we're saving those. These we're actually replacing uh with modern, you know, aluminum windows, um insulated glass, like you talked about the the temperature, but

127also keeping moisture out. Um, but we are going to mimic the mutton pattern and the this the shape and the color and everything else. So, my intent is that if you drive by, if you walk up to the building, you would not um recognize that these were not, you know, kind of the historic original Okay. >> windows. Um, but these are these are lead single paint in pretty rough shape. So, >> yeah, I appreciate that. Other questions? >> Go ahead. >> I You might not know the answer to this question if you didn't know the answer for the um for the courtyard. Like what's the total square footage of the building as it sits right now? >> It's a little It's like 105,000 square feet. >> Okay. >> So, >> and I think what you're

128pointing out, you know, I'm looking at the the photo of the after hours entrance. you've got the cafeteria right away and then so I think maybe that courtyard it's certainly in view like if there's afterhour events it seems like that you'll have access to the gym and cafeteria to be able to maybe give give some access to at least to see what those places are like but having had young kids able to play in a courtyard I can appreciate that design I think that level of safety is significantly increased I think that will give young parents um peace piece of mind. And then that space that you've got outside, so it's behind the rec center is another outdoor. Yeah. So, so still plenty of space for kids to play. So, great. >> Director Round Tree,

129did you have a >> Yes, I was getting ready to ask, but then No, you're Yeah, you kind of took my question. Sorry, >> you're fine. I But I I missed the gem, >> but he when he said gym, then I assumed we had already seen it. >> Well, I didn't have a I didn't have a little quick render of it. >> Oh, okay. So, >> yeah. So, the the gym is is straight west of the courtyard that we were just discussing. So, and again, that's a storm shelter. It's a pre-cast box. >> It does, you know, we're allowed to do a little bit of windows in there. So, we've got some storm rated windows on again on the north to get a little bit of daylight in there, but for the most part, it's

130that's that bunker um you know, with its own HVAC and water service and things that that's where you go if things go really wrong. >> Nice. That is good. uh the rec center that's over there. What are we doing behind there? What do we have access to? You mentioned something. >> Um so straight west of So that's that's district property, but straight west of that is where the the playground is going to be for the second through the fifth grades or you know, operationally whoever they send out there. But um there'll be some asphalt, you know, basketball court, uh those kinds of things. And then the the soft play surface with some with some playground equipment for some uh large slightly larger kids. >> That's nice. Okay. Thank you. >> Can I ask one follow-up

131question? I saw the music room. So curious like we were hearing earlier this like does the school have a stage? Is it in the gym? Um and just kind of curious about like the art spaces for elementary. >> That's a very good question because I was wondering is there like a music studio? Did I see there? There is a dedicated music room. Yes. >> Yeah. Okay. >> What's in it? >> Uh I didn't highlight it. It's um above the the courtyard um kind of on the kindergarten end of the kindergarten pod. >> So is there a stage or anything like that? Then it's just >> There's not a stage. I don't believe we have any built-in tears in there. Um just the sound, you know, control and then the extra wall around it to to

132kind of isolate that sound. And then uh there is a spot in the gymnasium. We do not have a stage that's part of this uh project, but my understanding is the district has a stage that they can uh bring in and set up for, you know, specific events. >> We don't have stages in our other new elementary, do we? Or do we? >> We do. We have um the the it's a Murphy bed stage, so it rolls up and down. What we found is it is a little undersized and doesn't work really well for us. And so we do have a uh a bigger stage that we can bring out and set up. >> Okay. Okay. Thank you. >> To the earlier comments, I'd be interested just any research or understanding around stages and what

133that represents in our elementary schools if we are, you know, focused on building that um trajectory into the high school um within the arts space. So just something to consider or maybe look into as we're building these spaces. It's worth noting like earlier when we heard about just the anxiety of just getting up on stage. So I think prior to that I was thinking like the stage would be a ne necessity but I think just for kids to be able to perform and to gather for arts I think is clearly the most important thing. So >> we were all just at the Harrison stage recently. Um there's that beautiful work around the edges and so I mean seeing those kids up there Yeah. brought me back. Well, yeah. And then maybe working with some of

134our music directors, too, to just kind of get a feel for what works, what they have noticed, what works, what they desire to have in that space that they're working so hard in. I'd be interested in you guys checking with that. >> I I remember, Director Buyers, at that Harrison event, remember how the kids got onto the stage, though? There was a a little stepping stool that someone was like having to help them with, >> just hoisting that. Yeah, we're going to need some help with >> hold holding your breath. Yeah, >> I did have another thought on the um mural. I remember so captured that on the news very delicately taking the mural out um preserving it and relocating it looks like to the new second floor gallery area. There was talk um from

135students and staff of how that mural maybe doesn't um land as well today with students. It's not as uh it doesn't resonate with them. um you know, it's not as relatable in a way. Um not that we want to do away with that in any capacity, but I just want to um toss out the idea of maybe in the spirit of collecting incorporating history within our buildings, maybe there is a a new version of this that could maybe be a timeline of um the history in the space uh that would bring us up to modern times. I don't know where this is exactly, but uh you know, again, I'm looking at this steamboats and whatnot. I can understand where the kids might be coming from. Um, so if there's something we can do to kind

136of make it feel like their own and like it is a a bit more modern touch on it, it'd be open to discussion on that. >> Thank you. Other comments. Thank you very much. >> Thank you. >> Do we have a motion to approve the preliminary approval for the site at Harrison? >> So moved. >> Do we have a second? >> Second. All those in favor, please respond by saying I. >> I. Those opposed, same sign. >> Okay, we will move on to learning and leadership. We have one presentation tonight. We are going to be hearing from Janessa Carr with our school resource officer update. Okay. Um, good evening board of directors. My name is Janessa Carr and I'm the safe and secure learning environment administrator for Cedar Rapid Schools. I'm just here to give

137you a quick uh summary on some of the comparisons from 2023 2024 school year um until this uh past school year and then give a little bit of a historical perspective that I know was requested um earlier today. And so um we have some good things to report. So um from last school year to this school year, we saw a 49.3% decrease in charges um for our students. And just to be clear, when we're talking about charges, we're talking about um what is recorded as an arrest. Um just to be clear, that does not mean a student is put in handcuffs, but it is a charge. Okay? It is something that goes on their record. So, I want to be clear about that. Um and then we saw a 34.78% increase um in diversions. So,

138just to be clear about diversions, those are interventions aimed at directing students away from formal uh criminal charges. So, huge wins and gains um in that SRO data report. Um when we're looking at who made that initial call to the SRO, we see that right now admins are the highest. So they're about 70 uh% um school admins and then um next to that is teachers and then after that we're seeing parents and then students being the lowest uh referrals for who's calling um the SRO. Um when we're looking at charges broken down by demographics um because when we look at uh the you know the history in the school district um race was a a concern and seeing um black students over represented. Um, I want to share some decreases that make a difference. Um,

13965 um 38% reduction in students who identify as black charge. So, when we're talking about um 2023 to 2024 school year compared to this past year, that's a 65% decrease. Um, that is that is huge. Um, so I hope that's something that we can celebrate. Um, and then we've seen the 9.52% reduction in students with an IEP charge. We um need to continue to grow in that area. Um, but that's also something uh to win or to call a win. Some other things that are really um important to note just because I know that um racial disparities were brought up as a concern. So, I just think it's important to um address that. Um it it'll always be important that we monitor um this data um including by race. That that will always be important.

140Um it's also important to recognize that SRO's are one piece of a much uh larger system. So only focusing on SRO's oversimplifies the issue when we're talking about um our this SRO data report. Um we spend way too much time asking questions after a charge is made. Um as a school community, we must stay focused on the root causes. Okay? So why are students um being charged? What behaviors um are leading to um the charges? Um we need to begin to ask harder questions. um why are we seeing um specific demographics of students engaging um in violent or disruptive behavior? Um what supports are missing? And then where are the families at in this process when we're talking about this SRO data report? So, it's just really important that when we're looking at this data,

141we're thinking about the whole picture um and who's possibly missing from uh this report. Um when we want to we want to continue to see good things happening. Um I want to talk about some of the initiatives to reduce racial disparity. So some of the things that as someone who is leading this work um and takes this work very seriously some of the differences that I think um and why we are seeing the differences in these numbers. So we've had an increased uh partnership with um the Cedar Rapids Police Department and Foundation 2's group violence inter intervention program as well as juvenile courts. Um and so we we meet twice a week. This was the first school year that we have met two times per week all school year. Um that is a huge thing

142because when they are coming to us with information, we are able to intervene so that it doesn't result in a charge. When we find out that two groups of students who are not getting along, students who identify themselves as a group, as a gang, okay, I want to be very transparent about that. Students who identify as belonging to a group are planning to meet up at 3 PM. I'm able to call Foundation 2 and say, "Hey, we need to meet here to intervene." Foundation 2 is then able to call the parents and say, "Where is your child right now?" Um, those are those are huge incidents that could would have resulted in possibly 15 to 20 students of color being charged if we would not have prevented that incident. So, I want to stress the

143importance of um that partnership um with CRPD and Foundation 2 in juvenile courts and that we all have a goal um to reduce some of these outcomes for kids. And that is the narrative that um we need to continue to push out. Um we've also added a student safety and success advocate position um for this school year. And so what we're seeing is that um you know, a lot of these students that we've been concerned with um the concerns are are lowering. So, we're not just talking about middle and high school students. We have fourth and fifth graders to be concerned about so that we can see some change at that middle school level. And so, that position is meant to help um with that fourth those fourth and fifth grade students at risk and

144help with the family supports when we're talking about reducing violence. Um it's not just SRO's and schools. We have to get families on board and we have to look at both partnering and also accountability. Okay. um we're leaving a lot of this um these outcomes only on um police um school staff and and that's not okay. Um if we want to see a a difference in this area, it is going to require a school and community approach and you guys are seeing that happen with our increased partnership between school Cedar Rapids Police Department and foundation 2. That is a huge um change in our system. Um and we also want to bring um increased restorative practices. So, uh, one of the things we plan to do, especially at the middle and high school level, um,

145any students who are going, you know, into inschool suspension, making sure that that, um, process is restorative. So, um, I'm actually working on a a draft for, um, Riyle so that all of those in those behavior texts who are doing that in school suspension have that restorative uh, you know, that component to that prior to a kid uh, going back to class. Um, and then another thing we did this past year is we improved our district review process. So when um you guys all know um former Carl Warner in that process, we now have like formal referrals. So when students go back to the building, they're going back with recommendations. They're not just going back to the building with a consequence. They're going back with a formal recommendation for the recommendations to the building, the

146recommendations to the family, and the recommendation for the referral. So whether that's a referral to tanner or ASAC or another outside um organization. So lots of really uh great things happening in our system and as we continue to look at this data um whether it goes up or down we want to continue to see it decrease but we cannot forget the importance of this being a community and holistic approach. It is not just um the job of SRO to um for this um this data to get better. So I just want to be very clear um about that as someone who does um this work every day. Any questions? >> Thank you Janessa. I know how hard you've worked on getting this data together and on working on this data so that it all is

147moving in the right direction. As you said, it is a reflection of the community and community organizations are helping with um everything here. So, I appreciate all your work, comments or questions. >> Yes, I am. So, um Go ahead. >> Go ahead, Director. Well, I just wanted to say thank you for the work that you're doing and making a difference and that we're including everyone and it's not just about the SRO's and to see that you have uh student safety, the advocate uh getting the families on board. I think that and the restorative practices. So, you put together a program and we can see that it's made a difference. So, thank you for all the work that you're doing. And it's not just you, your team. Yes. >> That is doing it. Thank you, >>

148director. >> Yes. I I love the improvement that I'm seeing with this presentation from the last one. It really speaks to the hard work that you have been putting into and I know that it's a team, but it's you leading this work and it's really wonderful. I love the community approach that you guys have adopted because that's what it's going to take, right? We talk about the village, right, and helping us raise our kids and and steer them in good directions. And so the partnerships that you have been added to this, um, I believe is going to help a lot. Um, when I used to work at Washington High School and I get to see firsthand encounters with students in SRO, um, this have come a long way. Um, and so I I'm sure that

149the SRO's that are in our district and our schools appreciate the partnership as well. Uh, families, that's another amazing thing, right? That that speaks to the whole community picture, having families involved with this as well. Where's your child? I love that one. Where's your kid? >> Yes. Right. >> Those are the questions. >> Okay. I I like that. And so, continue to do the good work. Um, I I'm happy with what I see. Thank you. Thanks, >> Director Tinsky. >> The um the section that you have that says who made the initial call to the SRO, is that approximately where you would expect to see it? Do you think that those are good numbers? Because that's showing that they're escalating the proper way. >> Yes. And that's exactly what we I don't know if I

150should say that's what we want to say. That's what we should expect to see. Okay. Just because if we're talking about um including an SRO, they shouldn't be included in any low-level behavior. It really is things that are kind of top tier safety concerns and most of ours would be um if they're getting involved there's usually some sort of physical aggression um you know assault or something like that um escalating to the admin level. >> Yeah. Okay. Great. Thank you. >> Thank you. I got one more quick question. Are you looking to bring any more partners on with this holistic approach? >> Absolutely. We always absolutely we are always open to um bringing in more partners. The biggest thing is we need partners who want to work with all. And so that's really important is

151that understanding that every um partner that partners with us for safety has a has a role. Um and so we just need to be make sure we're bringing in partners who are very collaborative and open um to working with um uh police as well. >> Okay, got it. Thank you. >> I kind of have a three-part a couple questions and a thought. Um but I do want to say this like two times a week. That's amazing. Um, and that's that consistency really matters and I'm just really excited to see that we have this like the school community approach and the accountability piece. It's really big. So, um, I'm not that familiar with the selection process. So, without having background, I'm assuming we hire SRO that are have interacted with youth, good at communicating, you know,

152cultural competency, all those things. um can you speak to kind of like what that process looks like, that selection process, um briefly, and then just if there's any like annual trainings that they might go through to be on the up and up of educational new things in education. >> So, I can't speak to the full selection process really just because they typically are going to hire um officers who've been um police officers on the street first. They won't hire someone who wants to become an officer and then they're going right into being a school resource officer. So, I can't speak to that. I do know that they have like annual trainings. They do have restorative practices that they have to do and they have um uh things that they have to do with um CRPD,

153but I can't speak to every single training that they're doing um in their SRO programs. >> Okay. Um and then I was just as I'm thinking about my earlier comments with the policies, I was thinking as we have these SROs in our schools, maybe there's a way we can address cyber bullying. like they could be in the classrooms um talking about making responsible choices online that they have familiarity of the repercussions and consequences of online threats or bullying. Um I think that could come uh that could land with some kids when it's coming from an officer and their experience with that and real uh real life scenario. So just something to consider that maybe there's some sort of a general curriculum that we could pull together with some of the roles. >> Yes. And I

154know right now we do have that happening um through our police pals at the elementary level. And then um these past couple years it's typically been me doing some of that um social media training. But absolutely I do agree that um and each school that has an SRO has the opportunity to request them for those type of things. That's a part of their contract. And so you know at the middle and high school level if they have advisory and they they're choosing that we want to address bullying that admin has the ability to pull in the SRO and say we'd like you to talk about this. So that is that's like an ongoing resource that should be happening already. >> Okay. The last thought I have because it just came to me as we talk

155about these diversion rates and the charges, you know, that that's amazing that we see these decreases and increases in all the right places. Um but there's also this something to be said about just feeling safer in a space, right? That goes a long way. So do we have a sense of if our staff and students are feeling safer with these SRO and how do we, you know, capture that information? So, I think it would probably be best to answer that if I had the conditions for learning survey right in front of me. And so, I think I could definitely answer that at another time. But I would say that um without a doubt, we have evidence to show we have increased being very intentional about teaching safety to kids and helping um the district understand

156what safe and secure learning is. So, like as we're trying to make sure that people do feel safe, we're um working on that common language. And I think we did a lot of work this past school year um in getting into every single building, making sure they knew protocols and all of that and we'll continue the work this school year as well. >> Amazing. Thanks for all that your team is doing. Appreciate it. >> Yes, you got it's been it's a big difference. >> So, thank you. >> Yeah. Thank you, Tanessa. >> Appreciate it. >> Moving on to board governance, we have three items. The first item is approval of two policies for our policy manual. We are going to hear from a presentation from Jen Vanfleet, executive director of student services on proposed policy

1570611, which is the student use of personal electronic devices. Chen, >> welcome. >> Board of Directors, thank you for this opportunity to come forward. First and foremost, I'm really excited to be part of the Cedar Rapids team. So, thank you for the welcome that each of you has given me. Also, shout out to the kids who came up and spoke earlier. you guys did amazing and um it's not easy to get up here so good job. Uh so this presentation will give an overview of where we've been with the cell phone policy and also some updates as we move towards hopefully approving this tonight and what would next steps look like. So, first and foremost, we want to reiterate that our work around any of the policies, especially when we're looking at a safety measure,

158is re uh reminding of us our commitment to safe and focused learning environments for all of our students. In addition, this policy update is directly in alignment with the recent Iowa law update. So, we are serving that Iowa law through this policy update and also the growing national trend towards limiting distractions from personal devices. and our governor saw that and applied that to our Iowa context. We engaged in quite a bit of feedback over the summer months uh both from families, teachers, and principles and the majority favored that all day putaway cell phone stance. Um, I know from the first time that we presented on this policy, um, there was some, uh, questioning about what was that look like for staff responses if we were to break that down by level. And so we had,

159um, for the beginning to end stance, our elementary staff were 58% in favor. Our middle school were 81% in favor, and our high school were 60% in favor. So, a majority of our staff are on board with this uh full day phones away approach. Um we wanted to look at what would full day phones away look like as far as benefits for our students. And so you'll see a couple of those highlighted on this slide. Um we want our kids to be engaging, looking up, looking at each other, having discourse with each other, being excited about what's happening in our classroom. And we see that um having that phone put away lets them do that. They're young learners. They're still learning their limitations on how do I navigate between my phone and interacting with people.

160And so um putting this policy in place helps us support our learners as they're growing into navigating that for themselves. Um we also see um that promotion of self uh healthy social interacting action and then also that reduction of the online drama coming into our schools because there's just a break from that during the day. So it gives our ch our kids and our staff a chance to take a break from that. And then also again thinking about like when do I need to take a break from my phone. We're building that thought process in with our kids as we explicitly teach how to do this in our school setting. For our families, it gives them a chance to know my kid is going to get a break from their phone and be able to

161engage in school. We have our famil family's children with us for a large part of their day and so we're giving them that opportunity even when they're not at home um together as a family unit. Um, so it's going to minimize the families will know that their kids are getting minimized distraction, really being able to maximize their educational benefits. Um, and we also wanted to reiterate that families can and do still contact their students through just contacting their school offices and getting a message relayed. Um, so that would be a practice that we would want to make sure our families know. they can still access their students if something comes up and they're worried about something or if a student needs to get a message out to their family. And then again, it's going to

162reinforce those balanced media habits at home and at school. So some things that the kids will see at school will stick. Maybe there'll be a little bit more balance at home or families will be able to engage in conversations about what does that balance look like since kids will be actively practicing that each day they're at school. So just a couple policy highlights. So it would be um no use of personal electronic devices during the school day. And so we've got our school day times up there. So it again it is the complete day. It's not like a break during passing time. It is completely away for the whole day. Um and then emergency communication when we come uh through the main office. Um we do have what progressive consequences would look like for violations

163outlined in our behavior matrices. But what's missing from this slide that should be there is also there will be explicit teaching for kids about how to engage with this new practice. So we will work with our kids in making that transition because that'll be something new for them in many cases. Um and so we will be assisting staff and students on what that looks like. Um we know that there will be some needs for exceptions especially around health related um situations and so uh Liz Jacobe and I are working on a an application form and that process to consider applications and what that looks like. We actually should have that here within a day or so. Uh we're kind of just uh fine-tuning that. So we should be able to share that here really shortly.

164Um and there will also be a consideration and appeal process included with that. So then as far as supporting this uh after today um I want to give our communications department a shout out. They are ready in the wings with a really comprehensive communication plan to go out to staff, to students, to families, to community about what this looks like. Um and so they've been really great and collaborative with Liz and I as we've worked through this. Um and so we definitely want to make sure good communication goes out. We also want to work with our buildings as they implement. We have a plan on paper. what does that look like as they actually put that into play? We want to be partners in that roll out with them. Um, and then we want to

165be able to provide accommodations as needed for those students who do need them. Um, and then as we go underway, we want to be open ears and we want to be actively listening for feedback and fine-tuning that process as needed. So again, next steps, we will be jumping on messaging for family and staff. We'll be working on resources, um, FAQs, whatever will help with that implementation, and then we'll be monitoring and evaluating that for effectiveness. And then again, reiterating through this policy change, we want to strengthen that commitment to safe and healthy learning for our students. Um, so thank you so much for living letting me have a few minutes this evening to uh go through the nuances of this and I would love any questions you have. questions, anyone comments? >> Yes. Um I

166I you covered a lot probably just about everything, but I know that this is going to make parents very nervous that we're not a part of the putting this together. Um because I'm going to say we, but I don't have any school age kids right now, but been able to access have access to our kids uh during the day. And so this is going to raise a level of anxiety and I want to make sure that even though this these things have been put in place that we really are taking care of our parents and staff who are going to be very nervous going through this that we're not just pushing um the things that have been put in place, you know, the the framework and the restrictions and all of that, but that we

167are taking care of those needs and concerns. >> Absolutely. there. I know that that will be limited because we have things that are in place that are strong uh with this policy, but I want to make sure that that is taken care of with that with parents and staff because there will be some major concerns because oh my god, all of a sudden I can't reach my kid. I can't text them. That's that's Yeah. So, please make sure that that's addressed. >> Absolutely. And again through that starting with that comprehensive communication plan but then working with our staff, working with our families, what does this look like? Um relationships first and foremost. So knowing our families who may need to contact their students for various reasons will be very proactive about the implementation. >> Yeah.

168Okay. >> We just to speak to this from the policy committee. We did have a very long and detailed conversation about this policy and like for me like we were debating is it from the beginning of the day to the end of the day? Could some of the older kids have their phones during lunch? You know, there were all sorts of variations that we looked at. In the end, for me, the thing that was the deciding factor was that we asked the staff, "What do you want?" They're on the front lines. they have to deal with the distractions and the cell phones and the other electronic devices. And as Jen indicated, the staff was overwhelmingly in favor of from the beginning to the end. Um, so I think for most of our students, when the

169expectations are clear to them, they rise to the occasion. And there will be some acclimating to this no doubt. Um and yes parents will have to understand that if they want to communicate with their par with their student they can. It's just a different way but there will still be that availability of communication to their students. >> How many teachers were a part of the committee? >> Uh I'd have to double check but it was 300 and some odd. >> Okay. Okay. That's that's good to know. However, I still stand with what I said. I know that there's going to be a level of anxiety. So, let's make sure we're taking care of our parents and our >> There's a there's a significant behavior shift that's happening. So, the communication is going to be really

170essential. Um I you know, over the last several months where we've been talking about it in committee, but you know, several of us, I'm sure, attended ISB sessions on this very subject, so we knew the legislation was coming to make sure that we had a policy. But you know I would say that you did seem pretty consistent right it's not 100% right but it's not just the distraction it's the bullying so I mean a few have made comments just about like you know cyber bullying I mean that's very significant um that's happening throughout the course of the day so um absolutely want to see us have a pretty comprehensive communication plan so we address those concerns cuz folks that have been used to being able to get in touch with their kids whenever they want

171how do we do that and it's being addressed, but to make sure that it's, you know, that everybody does in fact feel safe because that I think is the goal of this is to make sure that we've we're increasing safety with policies like this. >> I got just one more question. At at some point, are you going to check in and just see how that process is working, how it's going? So, is that >> I mean, do you know like halfway through the school year or what what is your plan for that? would say a lot more often than that. Um this, you know, this is a plan on paper, but we are all infused in the buildings and conversations with staff and students and administrators and families and we'll be taking the pulse throughout

172the year. >> Okay. >> Yeah. And I think you make a good point of, you know, how we're going to deal with that tension, how we can learn from other communities that have implemented this and dealt with um those situations because we live in a world that's relying upon technology. So we can, you know, go back to the world we used to live in, how we walk to the office and use the phone, but that's not the world we're in, right? So we got to understand that learning curve and the tension that might come to be. And um I'm not there yet. I've got kids under six, but I know I see other friends and and you know, they're they're into contact with their kids all day long, even in school. So I do think

173there will be that adjustment period. So it's a fair fair thought and just how are we going to um be thoughtful of that and continue to communicate around that. Um, and unintentionally, I have like a theme of the night, but I'm just going back to teaching responsibility online. Uh, so, uh, some of the worst offenders, I think, are probably like millennials, Gen Z's, boomers of f phone use, right? Um, so I think we could all use a little bit of like self discipline in the digital world. Um, so, you know, there's been all that do you just ban, you know, that's not going to curb the behavior when they're outside the school walls. and how do you actually kind of teach that responsibility of use of phones so that we have the self discipline um

174in the rest of our lives? Um and maybe they could teach us all a little something but I'm just some you know it' be something to consider is just how are we also bringing that into the conversation instead of just saying put them away we're banning them you know what's the reason that we're doing that and here's the why. So, um it'd be nice for to communicate that language and use that same language across our school. So, our teachers are also talking about the why. Um it's not because we just decided to ban it. Parents and teachers said so. Um there is a why, right? So, um making sure that we're communing that communicating that to our students um would be uh helpful. >> And I did ask um I'm glad you brought that up.

175I did ask what kind of digital citizenship curriculum do we use in the district being new I wasn't sure and Nicole Brown's team was able to walk me through what we use um and there are some really explicit lessons on media balance and and bullying and all of that so I know they're taking a close look at that with >> Yeah. Okay. Wonderful. Thank you. >> Excellent. Other comments, questions? Okay. Do we have a motion to approve the proposed policy 0611, student use of personal electronic devices? >> So moved. >> Do we have a second? >> Second. >> All those in favor say I. >> I. Those opposed, same sign. >> Uh the next item under board governance is to talk about our legislative priorities uh for the urban education network. um directors, at your

176table or at your chair, you have a piece of paper that summarizes the results from the board on UEEN legislative priorities and ISB legislative priorities. I'm going to speak to the UEEN priorities and then Director Taminsky will speak to ISB. um for the UEEN legislative priorities. The topics that they presented to us are in that list. If you recall, we were asked to score them on a sliding scale from one to seven. So, we weren't actually being asked to like rank give our top four or our top three. We were excuse me scoring each of these on a scale of one to seven. So you can see the results there. Um for the public preschool remains at the top of our list of UEEN priorities. Um that was one of our priorities last year and

177that continues to be a priority that we fully fund four-year-old preschool that the state fully funds. The second one is district authority, meaning local control, letting us make the decisions, followed by school funding, special ed funding, and so on down the list. Those results will be reported to the UEEN as you see them on that sheet. I will report the average scores um from the board. So if you have any questions or comments about the UEEN priorities, I would be happy to hear them or respond. >> And so just to clarify, the full list and our ranking is going to be provided to UEN, >> correct? >> Yeah. >> Yep. >> Perfect. Uh so do we have a motion to approve those? UEEN legislative priorities. >> So moved. >> Do we have a second? >>

178Second. >> All those in favor, please respond by saying I. >> I. Those opposed, same sign. >> And our last item is to talk about the IASB legislative priorities. And Director Taminsky, I hand it off to you. >> Wouldn't it be nice if everybody had the same criteria? So ISB is asking us just to submit our top four. Um, so board members were given the opportunity to just kind of rank their top four. Um, our top three were clear, uh, preschool, early learning, and student achievement. Um, and this is to say there's seven on this list, and I think they're all important, and I think from being a part of IASB for the entire time I've been on the board, all of these will, I confident, will get addressed in some way. So, it's not

179to say that anything will be completely excluded. It's just a matter of us fulfilling our obligation of submitting our top four. Um so as you'll see the the other four um that are relatively close from my understanding in our rankings are local accountability, mental health, um SSA and then school safety. Um I would suggest to this board that the recommendation because of the way we ranked UEEN uh with district authority um local accountability and district authority I understand to be very very similar just different wordings. >> Um so I think my recommendation would be that we would list local accountability um as our fourth and make that recommendation. So including preschool, early learning, student achievement and then local accountability and make that recommendation. ISB as our legislative priorities. >> I agree. I think that keeps

180the UEEN priorities and the ISB priorities aligned. >> Makes sense. >> Okay. >> I'm in agreement with that. >> Do we have any further discussion about the IASB priorities? Okay. Do we have a motion to approve the IASB legislative priorities? >> So move. >> Is there a second? >> Second. >> All those in favor, please respond by saying I. >> I. >> Those opposed, same sign. >> Before we adjourn, I want to provide a reminder that next Monday, August 18th, there will be a board meeting for our open enrollment applications. That is a close session. And our next regular board meeting is scheduled for Monday, August 25th, 2025. Do we have a motion to adjourn this meeting? >> So moved. >> Do we have a second? >> Second. >> All those in favor say I.

181>> I. All those opposed, same sign. >> No further business. We are adjourned at 7:58.