June Monthly Board Meeting

001Mhm. >> It's Monday, June 22nd at 6:30 p.m. I call this meeting to order. The regular board meeting The regular monthly meeting of the Board of Directors of the Fairfield Community School District is to be held at 6:30 p.m. on the third Monday of each month. The meeting is open to the public and the public is encouraged to attend. Time is provided in the meeting for public input. The mission of the Fairfield Community School Board of Directors is, "We empower all students to achieve their highest potential through strong relationships, collaboration, and accountability." The vision of the Fairfield Community School Board of Directors is, "A destination [clears throat] district where we all belong, learn, and grow." Roll call, please. >> Yep. Christie Castle. >> Here. >> Dave Spurgeon. >> Here. >> Mark Porter. >> Here. >>

002Mark Florian. >> Here. >> McDowell Robbins. >> Here. >> Terry Wells. >> Here. >> Cody Freeman. >> Absent. >> All right. Do we have any perfections to the agenda? >> I have none. >> I I do not, either. >> Okay. Is there a motion to approve the agenda as presented? >> So moved. >> Second. >> Moved by Dave, seconded by Terry. All in favor? >> Aye. >> Opposed? >> [cough] >> All right. Agenda is approved. Um we're going to move into um some information on retention data. Can you share on this? >> Uh yeah, I'll start and then turn over to Evan. Um obviously one of our strategic plan priorities is belonging and one of the ways that we're measuring that is based on retention data um amongst some other things. And so, I just

003asked Evan to compile uh where we were at at the end of this current uh school year. So, turn it over to you, Evan, and you can kind of walk through that. >> Yeah, so we were working with the HR Committee um off and on on how the best way to look at the data would be because, as you guys remember, the Iowa School Performance Profile that will show the retention and that's based off all head staff. But, what we decided is what that doesn't capture are people who left mid-year, might have got asked to leave or didn't get a contract renewed or other features like that. So, what we decided to do is measure it based on issued contracts. So, people that we were expecting to return but chose to >> [snorts] >> move

004on either for um a different job opportunity or just a different career path. Um and then also excludes like the retirees cuz we were aware of those, so that would negatively impact on school performance profile. But, this is the data that we saw based off issued contracts. 94% of all staff um are coming back next year. So, that's 15 individuals across all categories that left district wide. So, to put [snorts] it in perspective, we have about 300-ish employees. Um teacher retention was at 95%. We had six teachers leave. Um associate retention was 89%. We had six leave. Um admin 89%. Um we had one leave. And as we dwindle this down, there's less people in each one of these categories. And then our support staff, so that would be all other categories, maintenance, secretaries, um

005food service. We had two leave at 98% retention on those numbers. So, year over year, um that's kind of starting our baseline as we measure this out. Uh I was thinking about putting this in our financial health report as we go to um for like 94% all staff and then to see what we're doing year over year. That's kind of a lagging indicator plus leading indicator as we measure this out. >> Yeah, I think it's important just to to reiterate what you said. When we get our school performance profile that comes out, you know, every year, there's retention data that's embedded in that and it won't be the same because it's not calculated in the same way. Does that make sense? So, just make sure Yeah. >> Do they include retirees? >> They do. >>

006Wow. >> Does that make sense? >> Okay. >> One thing about our para population is changes all the time based on kids' needs. So, this year we need 81 and next year we need 85. We have more staff but then next year we need 79. Well, we have to balance. >> be fun. >> it, too. >> The books and they show that they're making an impact on retention. That's all we had for that. Any questions? >> So, like let's say like a counselor or something like that, that would just go under like a teacher? >> Yeah, so they fall under the 279 contract or they can be part of the union master contract. >> Teacher. >> I mean, are overall are we expecting the number of employees to be the same? Are we having fewer

007paras next year? >> We're We're We budgeted for 88. And we're going to be right at that if we fulfill every need para-wise. Um we added, remember, a couple teachers special ed-wise. >> Right. >> Instructional coach. >> Okay. So, a little higher. Okay. >> We had those. >> Yeah. >> Not cuz we brought 88 dollars back in so that offset that from a cost standpoint. >> Any other questions? >> Do we have a gut feeling for what we're shooting for? I mean, this is just the first year, right? So, it's not like >> This is the first year we've really done this specific >> Yeah. >> Okay. >> I'm sure there's um some numbers out there that we could look at as for kind of what what a healthy what a healthy culture would would

008kind of mean. Um I think at the end of the day when you get everyone going the direction we need to go, I mean, we'd like that to be 100%. I mean, that would be ideal. But there's always going to be the nuances with a move, a spouse move, or just unique circumstances, right? >> Has there been any consideration about benchmarking this? >> Yeah, we could. >> To either conference schools or statewide. This would This would certainly lend to some form of benchmarking. >> Yeah, I think again, if [clears throat] we're going to do that, they would have to be calculating in the exact same way in house. So, um but I could definitely bring that up with some superintendents to see if they'd be willing or able to do that in a It's not

009hard. So. >> Well, we can start with like the school performance profile. We can pull that data pretty easily. So, we have two different indicators, you know, school performance plus how we're tracking it with >> That one's much easily easier to compare, right? >> Yeah. >> And the common question we get asked is, do we know why these people are leaving? I'd say out of all 15 that left, um between the administrative team, we know every single reason which one of those individuals left, and the majority of them were um family opportunities, moving closer to kids, stuff like that. >> Cool. Let's It's good. Maybe, yeah, mark this to do every year and kind of stuff as well as like the how we would code maybe the 15 that aren't returning so that there's some

010metric of, yeah, why. All right. Good on that? We'll move on to our focus on learning. I everyone did their homework 15 minutes before the meeting, maybe? Hopefully not. >> I crammed last night. last >> Why do I feel like you were looking at the board? >> [laughter] >> I just give me the stink smile. I don't know why you're looking at >> I think it's an audio book. >> Yeah. >> Okay. >> Yeah, we kind of thought um this first go around it'd be pretty organic, just um kind going around and sharing some key takeaways maybe that you highlighted. I think the At the end of each chapter, they've got the guiding principles or um guide posts I think they call them for the board specific to to each kind of component. So, we

011could look at those two and see maybe, you know, where where you think we're we're in a good spot or where there's still some room for growth. Um So, yeah. Um and then as we go, um you know, maybe we will ask somebody else to facilitate each each time we we do this. Um And it can be similar to what we do tonight or if you have a much more entertaining way to to do a book study, we can do that too. But, um yeah. I don't know if you want to start with the first the first chapter. Um things that really kind of hit home or reinforced um maybe what we're doing or is there something that you thought, "Hey, this is maybe an area that we need to to recalibrate on a little

012bit." >> [snorts] >> I mean, I really appreciated the you know, confirmation that setting that high bar. I think in our strategic planning committee, we were talking about you know, these goals of 100% and you know, I think this really kind of hammers that home like, "Well, of course we want to set the bar at 100% growth or, you know, 100% graduation rate." Because who do we want to like excuse from that growth goal if we were to bring them all into the classroom. So, I think it's just a really good, you know, reminder and it's reiterated again and again in here that yes, setting these goals for you know, setting these high expectations are is, you know, and internalizing that at every level of our organization. It's really important so that we um you

013know, we don't allow you know, anyone to fall through the cracks and we and we can become that destination district. Um So, yeah. Um Let me think. On that guidepost page, um I think one thing that we've been doing well um is having, you know, this component in our meeting um where we have someone come in from the district and share um during, you know, focus on learning. I don't think we had been doing that, you know, maybe a few years ago, but I think that that's been, you know, where they kind of anchors our our meetings in the most important aspect of why we're here, which is that student growth and student learning. Um So, I think we're doing that really well. Um I I guess in terms of um some thoughts on I

014had on what are we not doing, um I feel a little like gap in understanding curriculum and knowing kind of what we're doing curriculum wise. Um And also how we can discuss and digest the data that we're getting. Are are we getting the data in in a way that we can understand? And we And maybe that, you know, comes down to also having more student goals and really getting clear on what the goal is telling us about growth. I know that student growth goal is really important, but I kind of want to break it down a little bit more so that it's like students that are growing that are efficient uh uh or proficient rather. Proficient and growth. Not proficient and growth. And then, you know, anyone that's proficient, but not growing, I guess, might

015be the categories I feel like would be helpful to understand. Um and it's also just hard, I guess, I feel like as [snorts] a board member, it's been hard to know how do we know if standards are met and and if all the standards are being taught within the curriculum. >> One thing I was going to say is in the lighthouse study number one, the whole thing that I appreciated is the difference between uh school board members in high-achieving districts and school board members in low-achieving districts. I think the the big thing there is is that school board members that focus on just giving the the staff and the students everything that they need, and encouragement, and not making excuses are the ones in the high-achieving districts. The ones in the low-achieving districts basically point

016blame and blame student situations and teacher situations and all those things on that. And I think that's just very indicative that, you know, well, we have very little to do with the day-to-day activity of the district. Just making sure that we our teachers and the students and staff and everyone have what they need to do their jobs and encouraging them uh I think makes all the difference in the world. And that's been one of the things I've really appreciated about this board. I feel like that we do that. So. >> Yeah, I would jump on on that, too, Mark, and just >> [clears throat] >> echo what we heard as a team of, you know, 20-plus last week at our um conference. It aligns so directly with this. Um when you think about high levels

017of learning for every single kid, it doesn't matter. Um and I'll dive into this a little bit more in my update, just kind of um going over the the ins and outs of some of our learning last week. But at the end of the day, the question that pops up for me is what drives your school and district improvement efforts? Is it evidence of best practice or pursuit of universal buy-in? When you think about what education um has been researched, I think second it's the second most researched field in the entire world behind medicine, right? And so there's evidence of what works and becoming a professional learning community where we strive to continue to grow and get better every single year as adults and that trickles down into all facets of it. Um that's how

018you you're going to see this growth and one of the quotes in this first chapter is from Rick Rick DuFour. So it's I mean it's built into this mindset. It's our job to help all kids learn. Most operate under the premise that it is our job to see that kids are taught. That is not not semantic. It's a seismic shift. We have to focus on learning. So yeah. >> I guess just kind of add to that, too. Um it still got to me. I mean, it it took a lot of time to really like go into the evidence-based of why these things learn. I felt like the first couple chapters were really explaining why we do things the way that we we do and I I felt like what I was reading were was the

019things that we do in the district. Um you know, and making sure that we're not making excuses for the reasons the kids aren't living up to expectations and trying to like I guess let ourselves as a district out of our responsibility. Um stuck out the the writing mission statement and living mission statement are not necessarily the same thing. You have to have follow through. Um the building the collective will kind of like you were just saying with those two things of we do have to have the science-based on why we're doing the things, but we've got to have the buy-in as well from both the community and the the district staff. You know, everybody's got to be willing to get on the bus with while why we're doing the things. Um and then kind of

020to what Megan was saying too, um you know, making sure that we're not putting all of our focus on the students that are maybe the lower performers, making sure that the higher performers are getting the the increased challenges that they need. Um board education, I think we do good with that, but yet I agree curriculum we could spend some more time on being able to better explain to the community why we do things the way that we do. Um and then towards the end of the second chapter, you know, it reinforced the the getting on the bus and making sure that the teachers understand we're not telling them that they don't know how to do their job. It's just everyone has room for improvement. And then the develop the culture of the district that stuck

021out is making sure that once we get everybody on the bus, they stay on the bus, you know. >> [snorts] >> So, Megan, for me also on first [clears throat] chapter, page 16, this stuck out in the sense that I'm I'm a firm believer that the expectation you set for someone is you communicate what you think of them. But then it says the importance of setting high expectations for students and ensuring they internalize high expectations into their own aspirations and beliefs about themselves. Coleman study found that the students' sense of fate control, that is the belief that through effort they can improve their out their outcomes in the classroom, in school, in life, and be more be a more positive effect on their performance than all other school factors combined. And it goes on to

022say high standards can even demotivate students if students don't believe that they can meet the bar set for them or see the purpose of achieving higher expectations. Sometimes we set high expectations but it doesn't it it doesn't get to the student. That's a tough one. But I think we've all been in situations where maybe high expectations are set for us but it's communicated you can't meet these anyway. And that's not only consistency in what we say and consistency in what we do and living this vision statement but trying to get our students a sense of fake control. And that goes all the way through the classroom to extracurricular activities to everything. >> Yeah, it's really Yeah, I highlighted that as well. It's like I think maybe the strongest >> [laughter] >> bullet there. >> And

023I'm not sure I mean we can set high expectations and that's a tough one. Uh we need to make sure that we are closing that funnel if we can as best >> Yeah, there's one line there that I had underlined and starred like six times that says you need to set the bar high and it [snorts] says because we believe that you can meet it and then there's a follow to that and we will help you get there. And so I think that's where we need to get to the point where we want to set the bar high and we know that every student can meet it and then we have to figure out how do we get the staff on board to be like we're going to go do this. And so to your

024point of how do you communicate to that to the staff and the students that we're going to set the bar high, we know that you can meet it but then we're also going to help you get there whatever that means. So every as you mentioned every level of students, whether you know, they're low, medium, or high, we're going to let them We're going to get them to that finish line, whatever that is. So, how do we going back to your data, how do we find that right data points that we can understand as a board to then push that bar just a little bit higher to set to kind of get a trajectory of what we're looking for if we want to be the best. So, how do we get there? >> That thought makes

025me think of like the smart goal system, and it needs to be achievable, but you have to make the person whose goal it is understand the why it's achievable and how it's achievable. >> Well, and also the perfect talks about letting them know that it's not supposed to be easy, that you know, it does take hard work, and um you know, that that is part of being successful is putting the time and energy, [snorts] and I think so many kids get frustrated with so quickly because they think it's just supposed to come easily because it does to some kids, right? But, the kids that have to work hard, um you know, I think it's important to let them know that that's a part of the process, too. >> There's a point still on page 17

026that says in the gather simple data that tell them whether they are getting closer to that goal. Again, just that very quick stats of quick feedback to the student to know, you know, hey, you are on the right track. We're going to keep moving there, or hey, we're falling behind again, so we got to do something at that point to get you back on track. Otherwise, if you miss too many of them, it's a big gap again to get you back to where we think you that you need to be. So, that data is very big. I think it's just when we need to work together as a group to figure out what specific data points they are, and then know that the admin teams and everybody else down the chain know those as well,

027and way further grainier level, you know? What are they doing every day? What are they doing every week, you know, in those meetings to figure out how do we know who's meeting and who's not and then how do we get them back on track? >> So, then on page 26 in chapter two, things stuck out here is it says, "Our core business is teaching and our product is student learning." That's our product. >> Yep. >> And our return on our investment is meeting those high expectations. But it also says that part of our job at at the board level, too, is providing the resources to develop expert knowledge and skills among employees so they can respond to unexpected circumstances and changing conditions. >> [clears throat] >> And they use this development of protect professional expertise

028so the teachers, like pilots or firefighters, can respond to nuanced or unexpected circumstances, such as students who need additional support to read at grade level. So, we we have to make that investment. And the return on that investment is meeting those expectations at proficiency. >> Um jumping back to the first chapter again, I just wanted to talk about I thought the guideposts and roles of the board were really interesting. I think it's one of the hardest things to figure out, especially as a new board member coming in, >> [clears throat] >> is kind of what our role is. And the one that really stood out to me is, um holding the system accountable to expectations, because I feel like it's it's really hard to know and, you know, quantify like what exact [clears throat] um

029data we're supposed to be looking at and >> [snorts] >> you know, deciphering that down to a level that really I guess you know, speaks to us and really gives us the information that we need to know if we're being successful or not. So. >> The one thing I kind of want on the same lines is when I was reading this, not that we're doing this, but it's also like we need to be up front with if we do see declines in data, like we don't want to fluff that to make it look like it's being better. We want to be honest about that so we can pinpoint that at again at that point so we can try and correct it then versus us getting down the road and having a bigger gap to try

030and narrow it. So as we're having these conversations no judgement, let's get the facts so we can make changes as we go forward. >> When I was reading through this, I really thought the high expectations area could tie to all facets of education. Like I even went outside the classroom a little bit to include high expectations on your band program and your sports program and just everything that encompasses the world of PK-12 education. I think the expectations can start there and I think it starts with the culture of the expectation for the adults too and that should trickle down into I mean it starts with the board having high expectations for Zach, will trickle down and does leadership team and then move that all the way down to the classroom as well. >> Yeah, I

031think the uniqueness around setting high expectations and holding people accountable to those, but also creating an innovative fear-free environment or workplace is really important. So, doing that in tandem is that's it's that's a hard task to do because we you want people to step out of their comfort zone and try new things and that are evidence-backed or you know, research-based, but maybe they haven't done them before. So, it's going to be hard initially, right? Um and that's why it's so important to work collectively in these interdependent teams so that we can bounce ideas off each other, look at what is working and what isn't in our formative assessment cycle to know what needs to change so this kid gets it. Um yeah. >> And I think just one last thing is so to Christie's point,

032one of the one of the reasons why this retention data is so important is that we get we get quality teachers that are successful in the classroom, that are doing this and we invest in their professional development, we have to retain them. And so, that's a key measure of success and that that satisfaction survey that they are one of those satisfaction surveys that is exactly what you were saying. Do I feel that I can have input or I forget how it's worded, but do I feel comfortable enough to bring this to leadership and to work collaboratively. So, those are the things that why those two things are important as part of our vision. >> Yeah, and you think about autonomy. There's individual autonomy as a as a teacher, as a practitioner, but then there's team

033autonomy and we really want these teacher teams to be as autonomous as possible because they're the ones that are serving kids whether it's in a fourth grade collectively or a you know, ninth grade, whatever it is. There's got to be a lot of autonomy there, but individually there's not going to be nearly as much because we're doing this collectively. Cuz it comes right back to belief. Um which is one of our foundations. Believe in ourselves and in our colleagues and in our kids because it translate to kids believing in themselves to meet those high expectations as long as we put in all the pieces that need to be there for them to get get to it. >> And culturally like you were just saying like looking for solutions rather than blame and giving people the

034safety to to screw up and learn from it. You know, it's not failure is the best teacher in many ways. >> Yeah, I think just as important as identifying those students that aren't you know, getting it is also identifying those teachers that aren't they don't maybe teaching in the way that you know, they need to be teaching. One of the things that stood out to me is a highly effective teacher can deliver 18 months of learning over the course of a school year whereas a highly ineffective one only provides 6 months of learning. I mean that's a huge huge difference. >> This one yeah, I was just going to bring that point up as well of that and then it's a matter of how do we encourage our teachers and staff to use. I mean

035we did this I remember a couple of us on the calendar committee a couple years ago like we're trying to get every ounce of time we can have these kids in the school to be learning to be as much as we can. Um so we need to make sure that we're using the day fully, you know, even on those early outs. You know, it's easy to get into a habit of well, it's half a day. We'll figure something out where it's like we need to use every one of those to this point here that how effective are we over the course of the year? We need to take that over even a trimester. It's a lot of time, you know. A lot of it. I don't want to wasted time, but a lot of time

036that we can keep improving and being use every minute of that day to make every student that that much better. If you can just raise them that far. I guess like tying into like the PLC stuff that we run too. We have like 100% growth goals for our students. Do we also look for like 100% growth goals for our educators as well because I mean if we're going to close that gap, there's got to be growth there. >> Mhm. The answer is no. But yeah, that's a good point. >> I think that serves to like the the freedom to make mistakes too. You're not looking for perfection, you're looking for growth. >> [snorts] >> One thing that caught my attention there at the end of I think it's chapter two on page 28, why improving

037instruction matters. Unfortunately, high-quality instruction appears to be the exception, not the norm in classrooms. In an in-depth examination of student experiences 2,500 classrooms, 1,000 schools, and 400 districts across the US, for example, found only 17% of students experience consistently high emotionally supportive learning environments, and just 14% of students experience classrooms with consistency with consistently high instructional quality. Um and basically what I imply with that is rarely in school board meeting all [clears throat] right, rarely in school board meetings are these issues even discussed or addressed and it talked about how school boards can lead by example and drastically improve those situations for millions of students across the country. And I think that just goes back to while we have nothing to do with what goes on in the classroom, us just simply setting the example

038and giving our teachers everything that they need, you know, and encouraging them and encouraging our students. I think sets the example and that's one of the reasons I'm happy the job that Fairfield schools is doing cuz I feel like we are doing a very good job of giving those students what they need and I feel like there's a lot of encouragement in this district and hopefully give a lot of bright futures to play young kids. >> Kind of bouncing off of that on page 30, as it one of the guide posts is in setting clear expectations and and Dave you've kind of brought this up earlier today, uh say it in policy. So, review board policy to ensure it provides guidance for development of a rigorous rigorous curriculum based on high expectations and instructional model

039to guide and you know, aligned assessments. So, I guess one one action step might be to just review what do we have in policy around >> professional development and can can we >> The 600 series that we just were in, a lot of that was curriculum instruction, right? I don't remember >> [clears throat] >> I couldn't find a professional >> E standpoint, was there one? Professional development? There might have been, but I don't know how Yeah, but it's just kind of broad. He said a lot of discretion >> for the curriculum director >> superintendent to you know, have a working knowledge. >> Yeah, we just had one on the curriculum and how often we review it and then Lars and Heather gave a good explanation of how you guys have created kind of a matrix

040>> Yep. >> of when we review what and things like that. So, that was Yeah, that was reviewed and stuff. >> I guess I just don't feel like it's tied we're tied into it in any way yet. Um like this learn to be good consumers of research. Research-based improvement should be more than a buzzword for your board. Um your board must have a practical understanding of what research says about initiatives your staff selects. So, I guess one question is how do we achieve that? Yeah, how do we get there? Um but you know, I mean we can ask if we implement this, what do we gain to expect and what gains do can we expect? Um >> Yeah. was something one of the superintendents that I said she's been a superintendent for 16 years. Um

041her first 6 years she didn't ever really have board members a part of any of the kind of holistic big picture professional learning um that teachers were a part of, but she changed that. Um and so the last 10 years she's brought two board members. They have five, so she only brings two, but um to these different professional learnings in the summer that she invites them and they usually come and they're a part of the learning right alongside the teachers just so they have a sense of really what the work looks like. Um so that I think that's something that we could probably if we're going to continue to move the direction that we're moving um since I've been here um because I again believe it's the right work backed by evidence and research around

042what a professional learning community provides for kids. Um that that would be something we could definitely add, you know, is to bring a couple each each summer when we go to these cuz the goal would be to get everybody through at least one of the institutes um and then continuing to build the capacity throughout the year. It's just hard when we don't have It'd be nice to have 10 days of professional development that we could build in and we just we don't get that. So yeah. Anything else? >> I think one um page 27 I think we've gained a lot. Maybe you can speak to this a little bit, Zach, about what we've done so far. >> Yeah. >> building collaborative networks of teachers who work together to apply professional expertise engaging collective uh experimentation,

043action research, and co-creation of new and innovative approaches to teach learning. So I think like I think we've done a little bit of shift on that of getting the right, you know, giving time for all grade level teachers and PIV and staff to kind of collaborate together on and I think that was probably missing a little. I mean, they tried to do it, but I think we were being harder on that. Is that true? >> Yeah, and it's still I would say I mean really we've been we're 2 years into this from a systems operations time standpoint, we're sitting pretty good, but actually implementing it to the way it's supposed to be with fidelity, that's where we still have a lot of room for growth. But again, our teams the the guiding coalition that that

044that came back we're meeting tomorrow afternoon. We're going to have all of our CLT leads for the most part there. We're going to share the learning and then we're planning we're going to spend a couple hours planning what that looks like actually tangibly when we come back in August for those teams. But the structure is there for sure when you look at you know, what a collaborative learning team can do focus on one of those four questions every single week throughout the course of of of time. So yeah, we're heading the right direction and there's just a lot more work to do. >> Yeah, the only other point is just also it says, you know, learn more about the core how other districts and how other districts have successfully improved instructional processes. So I guess

045be nice to figure out who to who to connect with outside of our district as other boards and and how they've done it. I guess could just email some, >> [laughter] >> you know, just finding finding those sort of peer mentors in our positions. And doing some additional learning that way would be beneficial. >> Yeah, I think it would be interesting to plug a couple of board members into some of those other meetings just to be fly on the wall so we can understand again, how do we start learning and peeling back to onion of how do we How do we learn ourselves about the different systems and what the evidence says and how we would even go find that evidence. So, we just need to kind of peel that onion apart little by little.

046And I think the last several years have been making change and now that we're I think in the right direction, now we should dig deeper, I think, into that. And still have that separation of steering the ship versus, you know, um separation, but just the understanding of what decisions we're making and how they're impacting those conversations would would help. How that actually executes, I'm not quite for sure. >> Mhm. >> [clears throat] >> Yeah, I thought the um the stuff that that the beginning of chapter two specifically around the high-performing systems systematically review curricula and instruction. Um obviously that's an area where we um I think have fallen short because we chose to, you know, not have a curriculum director for a year, but I I really do feel like that was the right decision

047because there were so many changes that needed to be made, you know, prior to focusing on that issue that now we are in a position where, you know, we can focus on that and I think, you know, dialing it down to specific, you know, to individual subjects like, you know, English learning arts, you know, maybe we take, you know, one subject each year or whatever that we're focused on. Um you know, Zach is working with his, you know, workforce and development group um around developing, you know, standards across these different grades and things like what we've discussed in the past. I know that's been something that's kind of been on our our to-do list. Um but yeah, I think there's a lot that we could do as a board, you know, even when we first

048started, I know Megan one of your like passion projects was the whole like Spencer Reed thing, which I always thought was a really cool idea and something that uh could definitely generate some positive momentum around our school and our community and just embracing the whole idea of, you know, getting our kids where they need to be as far as reading goes, so. Yeah. >> Good. >> What do you think three and four for July? Is that Let's see what's reasonable here. >> We also um we're going to have our board evaluation >> Oh, yeah. >> conversation, too. Um but I think that's good because the next few chapters are on goals, right? >> Yep. >> Setting clear and focused goals, so maybe that'll >> And then making professional development relevant and useful. >> Yeah. So,

049we'll have a little extra homework. >> [laughter] >> Um yeah, three and [snorts] four sounds good. >> Thank you. >> All right. Uh another informational bullet here on handbooks. >> Yeah, I just wanted to make sure these were before you at at some point you had time to look through them. Um really not anything that needs to be formally approved, but um couple of changes you can see there on the middle school. Elementary really hardly had anything. They just changed uh the time for tardies, I think. That was all they had in there, but we we combined those last year just to an elementary handbook, so um Heather and Ange Angela have worked on that collectively. Um I had a question too about um you know, who actually is the one that that makes these

050revisions, and it usually varies um between kind of this model. So, usually it's just administrators. It could be administrators and office staff, or it could be administrators and like a building leadership team of some sort. Um for us at the district level with the employee handbook, that's our employee um handbook committee. So, um which depending on the year what we're looking at to change or tweak, could be just certified staff or um representation from from all employee groups. So, um yeah, if anybody has any questions on what you read, I'm happy to answer those as best as I can, but we just wanted to get those in front of you um prior to August rolling around. >> Is Is [clears throat] the goal to have have it to review these though? >> Really every year.

051>> Every year. But we hadn't in the last or about years. >> Um you know, we reviewed them. >> We did. Okay. >> a big update last year. >> Yeah. Okay. >> Yeah, this year we subtracted like 20-some pages. >> Okay. Thanks. >> Yep. >> Okay. Committee reports. Um each committee chair will share a 2-to-3-minute update connected to the work to their work. Um Mark Thornton, would you like to start on policy? >> Policy committee met Friday, June 12th, and finished off the 600 series. Again, we had Heather there for that one for her input um as curriculum director modified role. Um had lots of great discussion again on all the rest of the 600 series. So, you'll see all of those. We'll have the second reading for the first part that we did the

052first last month, and then you'll have the first reading for the ones that we did this month. And had a fun discussion about AI. That one That one was in this uh this section. And I think as a group we kind of agreed upon um the policy about AI and where it sits now, and we agreed we'll probably review that one more more frequently just cuz AI is changing so differently of how we let students use it, how we let teachers use [clears throat] it, and the enforcements around there. So. That's it. >> Great. Thanks. Strategic planning. Um you know, Christie, you were absent, so let me just pull up my notes. Uh we discussed the strategic plan, a 5-year strategic plan, um and any edits we wanted to kind of bring up regarding our

053district goals. Um one thing that came up was uh around the 85% of all students in grades 3 through 12 will be proficient by 2030 in ELA, math, and science, and we talked about maybe putting a stair-step goal in there between now and then. We also talked about the belonging goal, you know, if there's something else we might add. Um we felt good with our financial health goals. And then in terms of the facilities, we were going to bring um one of the action steps in as the goal, um that action step number one, ensure all district facilities are safe, modern, and adaptable learning environments that support student success and community use. So, um I guess we can talk about this a little bit more next week, too, but >> Yeah, and then I brought

054brought that to the admin table. I think it was the very next day to get some feedback from them, so there was a couple of other little things, too. Um and then we talked maybe about a work session next in the next 2 months around the strategic plan, so we can get whatever revisions kind of finalized and then approved hopefully by September at the latest, maybe October if there are, you know, changes. So. >> Yeah, so that was the plan. Uh we also spoke about um next steps with an academy. Um results seem to indicate more interest in a business academy from the students. Um so we were going to take some steps in that direction. Um We talked about Pathfinders. Um there's a road map that we've established with um the grant writer at

055Pathfinders. Uh so there's I think you know a chart of possible grants to apply for and she's You guys are meeting again and she's going to work towards those goals. Uh we also spoke about um phase two of the geo bond um and capital campaign. I know I believe there's a the committee met on that. I don't know if you guys want to share anything briefly on the capital campaign. >> Sure. >> Okay. >> Uh so Dave and I met last week. Um we are working on forming a steering committee that will help us um target and fundraise. Um so we've got a to-do list each of us to get that up and going. Um hoping to start meeting I would say next month. Hopefully. Um Yeah. So what do we need to share? >>

056Yeah, I think we we just met to to kind of put put an organizational structure together and identify people that would fit into this. So we made that at those identifications and divvied up people to ask. I think two of our critical um critical things that need to be done at the beginning as part of the organization that we identified was um >> [snorts] >> meeting with a uh Fairfield Fight Education Foundation to make sure that they're briefed and agree with the with the structure that we're going to provide as a pass-through or possible borrowing against pledges, those kind of things that they're briefed in. Also [clears throat] with local financial institutions as to be a part of that, see what their appetite is against loaning against pledges cuz I we feel that what we'll

057get is pledges more likely than not over a period of time. Also meeting with with a prime donor or a lead donor that can provide a commitment but also a matching quality to this. So that when we go in and ask for donations or pledges basically can say we have a donor that is willing to match your pledge. Of course up to a certain level, but can match your pledge. Gives them an incentive to say okay, there is interest. I can double my in effect double my donation if I do this. So that's kind of where we are right now. I think we came up with a target of $4 million to target to raise and depending upon the other $2 million or so dollars in that grant slice. So that's kind of what we're

058working targets are right now. So that's kind of what we did and >> [clears throat] >> that's how we're going to proceed as far as in integrating this as a phase two, phase three for that second competition gym that we all think is is required in this building. >> So, I think the other two key components are, you know, just getting kind of a breakdown from Chris of what this project looks like cuz obviously I think people are going to want more details as far as like what what does this consist of and you know, how much does each thing, you know, costing and that kind of a breakdown. And then, you know, if we could work with Pathfinders to even target a couple of key grants just to kind of say like well, we

059have this momentum going and we really think, you know, there's a high probability that we may get, you know, these [clears throat] specific grants. You know, I think that's going to be more effective than just starting from hey, $0. We need to raise $4 million. What do you have? >> [laughter] >> So, I think it'll just show that we have a more well-thought-out and strategic plan on how we're going to get there if we could target a few of those [clears throat] with them and really kind of focus in so that we have something to say this is, you know, we're already on our way. >> Okay. All right. And then, one last thing from our strategic planning meeting, our social media marketing person has started or is starting soon. >> January 6th is the

060official first day. >> And so, we just discussed some social media pillars. And basically, they reflect the strategic plan. So, yeah, we're just looking forward to to that developing as well. And that was about it for that meeting. Um All right. [clears throat] Anything else in that panel? >> No, sounds good. >> Okay. Finance, Dave? >> Yes, so we met this morning. Our committee met this morning. We reviewed the insurance year-over-year renewal comparison that's in the agenda. Um year-over-year savings was projected to be $138 with major savings component being workman's compensation. The factors identified contributing to the decrease in workman's compensation insurance are number one, better identification of hazards and mitigation of potential accident areas, clarity and establishment of procedures for injury reporting and assessment, and automatic [snorts] adjustment from falling off of of past

061large claims in the look-back period. Uh additionally, the committee discussed the continued coverage for equipment breakage in that in that insurance renewal comparison. Uh the major risk areas uh have were identified as HVAC and mechanical equipment with potential savings of $183,000 to discontinue the coverage. The committee decided to keep this coverage in place for this year or recommend to keep it in place for this year while the district assess its confidence in its preventive maintenance programs and the overall useful life status of the equipment. Uh the committee by unanimous consent recommends to the board to approve the insurance coverages for the year that we will see. Uh the committee additionally reviewed the proposal for school business software and support from Vista Iowa. The committee discussed previous questions submitted to Vista and their responses as part

062of the due diligence process. The committee will participate in a demonstration at its meeting in July while the district will attempt to better quantify startup costs and balance those against the efficiency savings plus budget savings to assess whether the payback period is reasonable. Lastly, the committee reviewed the current budget impact of the behavioral health program that is on the agenda for review. And we're going to recommend um uh approving that as we come up to Okay. That's all we need. >> That's great. >> Thanks. >> Operations? >> Yep. >> Uh we met on Thursday. I think it was June 4th at about 4:00 in the afternoon. And it was a pretty simple meeting. Pretty much what we went over was uh I'm just the [clears throat] schedule for all the summer projects that we already

063approved and then went over a few changes that had come down the pipe. Uh one of those was the walking path at Pence. Originally, that was uh projected to be an asphalt walking path. They decided to switch that to concrete. I think it was estimated it was going to cost around $1,000 extra to do the concrete, but they're also estimating that that'll last 10 to 20 years longer. Was that only 1,000 bucks? Was that right, Evan, or >> Yeah, was that all that it was? Okay. Um that was one of the things that I think there was also in the parking lot on the north side of Pence as well that they're switching to concrete as well. >> Correct. >> Yeah. Okay. Um basically went over just that and a variety of other things that

064uh schedule-wise is going to be coming up. Um We also went over the envelope study at the middle school, kind of talked about that and how that relates to the GO bond and uh how we're going to project uh tackle the middle school project. Um Also discussed the GO bond and how that'll differ from the previous GO bonds depending on um how, you know, everything else kind of works out here. We also talked about um the track at the high school starting to get into be pretty rough shape. We had I don't think that was originally part of our capital improvement plan but I I for this year, but I think we're going to try to get that squeezed in. Um it is going to cost around $83,000 to redo the track at the high

065school, but um I think from a safety standpoint, I think they determined that that needs to get done. I think it's going to be the first time uh that we have replaced that in 13 years. Um so, I think they're looking to tackle that this fall and they're going to try to target a 2-week time period um when the high uh when the football team's not going to be there. So, hopefully it doesn't get in the way of any current activities. Um we also discussed the current vehicle situation in the district. Um they recently purchased one new van, and they're looking at another van. Um I think that's kind of the uh big ticket purchase items. Also talked about the bus lease. That's going to be coming up in 2027. So, we're going to have

066to um really do our research a little bit and allow them [clears throat] to kind of give us some information on how to move forward from there. So, um there's several things that's in discussion right now. But, they're talking about maybe keeping half the buses and renewing the other half of the buses. Also going to have to decide uh do we want to continue uh right now you're most of them are currently gas, correct? Except for a couple diesel buses, correct? Going to have to decide if we're going to want to stick with gas buses or switch to diesel or vice versa. So, anyways, we'll have to do a little bit of research on that and uh come to a conclusion on that here in the next couple years. Um also discussed uh kind of

067how the transportation department went this year. Of course, remember this is the first year they got rid of the hub that they've had for some multiple decades in the district and discussed how that went and uh I don't know. I don't think I said I think for the most part I received positive feedback on it. And um like I said, if if anyone else didn't receive positive feedback on that, I'd love to hear what you had to say and please, you know, give give that to those guys so that they can take that into consideration moving forward. But, overall, I think uh logistically, it makes things a lot easier for you guys. It just takes a little extra time for a few kids to have to be on the bus for a while. So, but

068um yeah, that would basically was the extent of it. Any questions? >> Uh the biggest note on that is the track came in about $200,000 under budget. So, that's why we're proceeding with it this fall. >> The >> Excuse it. >> The track resurfacing. We had two $280,000 budgeted for it, and it came in at like 87. >> Why did you have it budgeted so high? >> Because we thought we might have to go all the way down. >> Okay. >> Yeah, like start fresh. >> Yeah, yeah, >> We don't. >> Yeah. >> So, that's why we move that forward for the next track season. We'll go. And then on the transportation side, we have three out of four people that went through the bus certification passed bus certification. So, we have three new eligible

069drivers. Um two of them are looking at doing some full-time driving. One is kind of waiting till retirement, so might be some sub work for us. So, >> And then we're going to be able to um consolidate routes, too. So, at least one, maybe two. >> You guys have to let me know what the meeting is now. >> Yeah, I I would think that on that on that subject, too, I think that um it might behoove us just to contact the county in January, February to make sure we know what their road repair schedule is and whether it would how it would impact our transportation plan to try to get out ahead of some of this. Because I think we kind of got ambushed. I got the feeling we kind of got ambushed by that

070by the Liberty Bell Road. >> I'm sure they communicated it, but we didn't go over >> I'm not sure. I'm not sure that that's true. >> I'll get I'll get the benefit of the >> Yeah, yeah. >> But I think we need to be proactive. >> Actively, yeah. Yep, makes sense. >> And see how that would impact [snorts] our transportation plan and what their what their road repair program for that spring is is going to be. >> All right. Um HR did not meet. Um so, we'll move on. Do I hear a motion to approve the consent agenda as presented? >> So moved. >> Second. >> Moved by Terry, seconded by Mark. Any discussion? All in favor? >> I. >> Opposed? Consent agenda carries. Um Public >> I'll just be since Evan was out last

071week, I was doing a lot of the board secretary stuff. So, there's things that were under new business that probably should have been under the consent agenda. So, I'm sorry for the extra votes, but it's fine. >> Uh public participation. Do we have any public participation? >> I didn't receive any. >> This evening? >> No. >> Okay, so we'll we'll skip that paragraph. Moving on to new business. Uh 9.1, do I hear a motion to approve the special education service delivery plan as presented? >> So moved. >> Second. >> Who seconded? Mark seconded by Christie. Any discussion here? This happens every >> Should be every 5 years. >> Okay. >> I think 2031 is when the next revision and review should be completed by, so. Yeah, Angela did a great job leading this process over

072the last 6 months. Um really created a new um caseload rubric that we're going to be using that will help justify how many um students and supports that one teacher would kind of oversee um in addition to a couple other little things too, so. >> Right. Anything else? All in favor? >> I. >> Opposed? Motion carries. And 9.2, do I hear a motion to approve the 2026-2027 school year insurance renewal as presented? >> So moved. >> Second. >> Dave [clears throat] seconded by Terry. Any questions, discussion here? All in favor? >> I. >> Opposed? Motion carries. 9.3 board policies. Do I hear a motion to approve board policies at the first reading? >> So moved. >> Second. >> Moved by Christie, seconded by Mark Porter. Any discussion here? Did you make a lot of changes

073or it was just >> We got rid of a few that are not required. Um just for cleanup for ones that are just extra. And >> [snorts] >> we went a lot of the other ones to IASB verbage. >> Mhm. >> But there were a couple that we tweaked it to our own. >> Okay. >> Um honestly, nothing crazy. >> A lot of it was putting in dusty knees. >> Yes. >> Superintendents and knees. Lots of desert knees. >> All right. Anything else? All in favor? >> I. >> Opposed? Motion carries. Do I hear a motion to approve board policies at the second reading? >> [clears throat] >> So moved. >> Second. >> Moved by Dave, seconded by Terry. Any discussion on these? All in favor? >> I. >> Opposed? Motion carries. Do I hear

074a motion to approve board policies for deletion? To delete policy 605.1R1. >> So moved. >> Second. >> Moved by Mark Porter, seconded by Christie. Any discussion? All in favor? >> I. >> Opposed? Motion carries. Do I hear a motion to set a public hearing for July 20th, 2026 at 6:30 p.m. in the ACT board room for proposed plans, specifications, form of contract, and opinion of probable cost of the proposed improvements described thereby for the middle school expansion bid issuance number one bus loop project. >> So moved. >> Second. >> Moved by Christie, seconded by Mark. Discussion. >> I have a question. Did we move our meeting to July 22nd? Did well, this interfere or is that misread? >> So we moved the June meeting to the 22nd and we moved the July meeting to the

075>> It's always been the 20th. >> The 20th. >> Has it? >> Yes, it has. >> Third Monday. >> Okay. >> I could be I'm hallucinating. This had to be I'm hallucinating. >> Yeah, July 6th is the first Monday, 13th, and 20th. So this will just be the precursor to our July board meeting. >> But that's closed on July 22nd. >> That's right. >> Yeah. >> As long as we have >> September 1st. >> Yeah. >> Or whatever. It was June >> You're further in the year. >> Yeah, you have a Sorry. >> No, that's all right. >> Uh okay. Any other comments on the public hearing? All right. All in favor? >> Aye. >> Opposed? Motion carries. Do we hear a motion to approve the quotes as presented for the additional outdoor speakers through

076Quick Alert. Do I have to go through each quote? >> No. >> Okay. So four quotes as presented. >> So moved. >> Second. >> Moved by Terry, seconded by Mark. Any questions, discussion here? >> This is yeah, just additional um safety procedures or protocols that we didn't currently have. People outside have a really hard time hearing things and so this would definitely help with that. Um, it was already it it falls under I think John has like $206,000 that he oversees from the reoccurring cost standpoint. So this falls he saw that money left so this falls underneath that so it's not anything outside of what we budgeted. Um, and we would make sure at the middle school um, where [snorts] we put it it's not going to be something that's going to have to be

077moved you know 2 years from now so. >> Great. Any other questions, comments? All in favor? >> Aye. >> Opposed? Motion carries. 9.6 Do I hear a motion to accept the renewal as presented for behavioral health allies? >> So moved. >> [clears throat] >> Second. >> Moved by Dave, seconded by Terry. >> Yeah, I would just make sure you guys hear this and we say publicly we we received roughly 400 30,000? 480,000? What was it? >> 430. >> Roughly $430,000 of um, money back from the state for the high cost claims connected to last year. So that offset the cost significantly which was way higher than we had in the past so um, again this is yeah something that a large team of people are a part of making decisions around so um, we'll continue

078to to do our best to um, yeah to serve every single student and we're we're working on trying to to find a way to to bring it back to Iowa to a place in Dubuque but we're having some hurdles so but we're we're still working on it. >> [snorts] >> So how does that work from a budget standpoint? Does that go towards our special ed deficit? >> Correct. >> All in favor? >> Aye. >> Opposed? [clears throat] Motion carries. >> Who's the motion and second on that one? >> I moved. >> Okay. >> Terry and Dave for yeah. >> Okay. >> 9.7, do I hear a motion to approve concrete work as presented? >> So moved. >> Second. >> Moved by Christy, seconded by Mark Thornton. Uh any discussion here? >> [snorts] >> We were

079speaking to this, Mark. >> This is the parking lot north of the school, correct? >> And the walking trail. >> Both of them? >> Uh both of them combined. >> Okay. >> Now, of course, a good chunk of this is being covered by the fundraising at Penn's >> Correct. So, how's that Penn's going to do this then, exactly? >> It's a split. So, um we agreed to a number. She's covering 50,000 of it, and then we're covering the remainder of the quote. >> Okay. >> And we'll meet again when the bill comes. >> The completion of the work we want. >> All right. All in favor? >> Aye. >> Opposed? Motion carries. 9.8 I just lost my spot. Okay. Do I hear a motion to approve the striping quote as presented for the parking lots?

080>> So moved. >> Second. >> Moved by Mark Porter, seconded by Christy. Any questions, discussion? >> Yeah, so the main reason this ended up back on the board agenda is if you look at our capital improvement plan every year, we have $15,000 allotted for striping. Um but when we were walking through some of our asphalt parking lots, we saw a need for some sealing. So, since it wasn't originally approved for the additional services on the capital improvement plan, we're bringing it back before the board for the striping and sealing. >> All right. All in favor? >> Aye. >> Opposed? Motion carries. That's it for new business. We'll move into superintendent updates. >> Yeah, first I just ISASP data we still don't have yet. So, we were told mid-June. Still nothing that I've seen. So, as

081soon as I get that I'll start working on a report with Heather and we'll share all of our data. I've got a couple things I'll hit in a little bit connected to growth and proficiency K8 with the information that we do use that we have access to, you know, immediately. So, I'll get that to in a second. But, I wanted to highlight from our work last week. All of our attendees took notes all the different sessions and then we used AI a couple different ways to gather that information to share out with more people tomorrow. Um and then we're going to provide time for teams to really look at planning connected to their plan on a page and how it all connects. So, for you guys from a, you know, professional learning community it it

082isn't a destination that we check off. It's not this meeting time. Um it's not an isolated program or or an initiative, right? That's not what a professional learning community is. It truly is a never-ending permanent process of how we do business. Um it's the entire school. It's the district. It's all of us. And the the true driving force behind this is the teacher teams. They're the ones that are the experts. They're the ones that are closest to kids doing the work every single day. And so, um there's some shifts though that are really hard for for people that haven't worked in a system like that um because it it's going away from how we were trained, how we learned even maybe as students. But, there's some some big kind of what we do's that come

083from this and I wanted to hit those as well. So, you can kind of see um this is not an op it's not optional. Like it isn't something that they opt into, that we opt into as adults. And it's same thing with kids. When we're intervening, when we're enriching, and trying to make things better. Um it's the expectation. So, that's a huge component to this. Uh the mirror versus the window, I think this is a really uh unique way to to look at this, but when adults continuously look out the window at factors they cannot alter, all those different things, um that's something that we don't want. We really have to have the mirror. Why is this kid not getting it? What am I doing wrong? What do I need to do different? I need

084to ask people. I need to go figure this out. I need to, you know, whatever it might be. Um and a couple other things you can see there. So, I wanted to provide this for you. I'm not going to read through it all, um but there's some really just some really good things that you may you may find interesting that that we took away from our time together there. Uh each day that we were down there, we met after. So, we would spend about 8:00 to 3:00-ish, 3:15, um in different sessions or keynotes, and then we'd have team time. We actually had one of um one of the guys named Mike Mattos, he he spent a good half an hour with us just answering more questions, helping us kind of figure out how we can

085best move forward. Um but if you go to the last page, number four, um kind of we think about the commit- commitments moving forward, and we've hit on this really hard this last year. This guaranteed and viable curriculum, what do we want to ensure every single student in second, third, fourth, whatever grade, they're going to walk away with, no matter who their teacher is, right? These are the the have-tos, the must-knows to get to the next grade level and beyond pace to move forward. So, that's that's really the first step, what we want students to know, right? And so, teams are in different spots there. Um we've talked to our already about, you know, moving forward with this grading coalition to to to change some things that we're doing there. So, we're on the right

086path. Um there's going to continue to be uh more, you know, um hard conversations, celebrations, all of it. Um but yeah, we're excited about the direction that we're heading in. Um this brought a lot more clarity for our teachers. You know, we spent five days with our admin team last year in the coaching academy. So, our principals felt pretty good for the most part, but now we have another 20 people that really feel excited about the process and how we're going to continue to move forward. So, wanted to give you an update there. Again, this is not the Fairfield PLC master. I don't even know what that word is. Compendium. That was AI. So, just so you know. Any questions on that part? >> So, how many people from each building went? >> Yeah, so

087we had three from Washington. We had 1 2 3 4 5 6 from Penn's. Middle school probably had five. High school probably had five with both administrators. And then Yeah, we had all of our administrators except for Andy and Carly. Um >> Right. >> Yeah. Quick student data. I'm going to give this to you. I'll show I can share this with you later too if you want, but Um so, this is again specifically I'm going to go proficiency from fall to spring. Um building building I'm just going to go building total. So, Washington 47% proficient proficient in the fall in literacy. And again, that takes into consideration a couple different things, but 47% proficient to 55% proficient. From a growth and proficient [snorts] standpoint, either showed growth or they were proficient, it was 95% at

088that building specific to literacy. In math, we were at 62% in the fall and we were at 59% in the spring. Um from a either growth standpoint of proficiency, we were at 97%. And remember there's things that are >> [music] >> in the the win the fall that obviously haven't been taught or assessed yet. So, that happens in the spring. So, it's it's kind of um It's kind of hard to compare those two uh because there's new concepts throughout, but um yeah, it's still not that's not great. Uh what percentage went from 50 literacy 53% to 60%? All grade levels. .6% either proficient or show adequate growth. That was fluency. Comprehension went from 56 to 58%. Proficiency-wise, and then 99% grew. Math to spring. The Panorama plans were closed on the intervention, which caused the

089testing window to close for students who hadn't taken the test, specifically for those kids, so we didn't get that for math. And that was specifically automaticity. Middle school 43% No, sorry, literacy 54% in the fall, 63% in the spring. And again, this is all grade levels combined. I've got it broken down, but I'll share it with you so you can look at it. 86% was the total number that either grew or were proficient. Math was 43% to 58%. 93% of students grew or were proficient. Science, and again, this is math testing, 62% to 65%, and 87% of all students at the middle school either grew or were proficient. That's not the ISASP numbers. I do have those. They're not um published yet, so I'm not going to say them here, but um I think I

090should or maybe an update will be out. If not, I'll share share them with this when I do. Um yeah, we're having open interviews on June 29th for associates for next year, so that's been communicated, scheduled. Our year-end financials, we should have a good picture where we ended probably mid to late July, so we'll make sure we get that shared. House File 2591, I'm sure you've seen this in social social media or other places, news related to eighth graders being able to compete at the varsity level moving forward. The we were waiting on the Department of Ed cuz they were having an emergency where they're having a meeting they were going to make some emergency rules. Well, the rules were really just let them compete. So now, I mean, we're we have a a Zoom

091with both unions. Jeff and I are going to hop on. I think it's Wednesday morning. And then our conference cities are getting together after that because we want to have kind of a uniformed plan with all the conference conference schools moving forward at least for this next year, so there isn't willy-nilly just whatever. But locally, we as a board can decide essentially what we what we end up putting in place for for for eighth graders. >> Is that just for baseball or is that for all? >> No, this would be any any any sport in the entire state of Iowa. Eighth graders are now by law able to compete. We locally can decide whether or not we're going to allow that, but >> So what's the push behind that? Just lack of >> I think

092it's rural schools having a hard time fielding any type of varsity team, so and I can see this in cross country, maybe tennis, you know, um some other sports that you know, may not be quite as physical, but you're going to have some teams that like, you know, they're they need an eighth grade girl to play basketball so they can have a varsity season. Like that could that could potentially happen for some smaller schools, so. >> Could there be a breakouts where there are maybe like I guess like physical requirements that an eighth grader would have to meet so that it's safe? >> There could be, yeah. There could be a lot of things that we put in place. I think for this first year, we're going to try to make it as kind of

093status quo as possible with giving more time to really think through what this could look like because we could have parents too that would, you know, potentially push like this is my kids are good enough. Why can't they aren't they, you know, playing varsity as an eighth grader, right? And we've done it with kind of the baseball softball for however long it's been. Forever pretty much, right? Um So, Centralia, I shared that they've officially requested to join our conference. Again, that would be the start of the 28 year from a high school standpoint. This would bring us to eight, which is a really good number. We'll get feedback from coaches on this as well. Uh ISB conference, I've got Cody, Dave, and Terry for sure that are going to be in. The reason I'm asking

094we just want to get those um hotel rooms right, you know, reserved so we've got them. So, take a look at your calendar. If you could let me know by the end of the month if you think you're going to be able to attend or not, that would be great. Um talked about this a little bit earlier, but we're going to potentially bring in a work session to to find ways to finalize any tweaks with the strategic plan. Middle school project, we continue to meet. We're meeting again tomorrow morning. Things are moving moving right along. Yeah, we started we had our first kind of interior design meeting kind of from a theme standpoint. What do we want to have that look like or kind of be? So, we had teachers um teachers were there, administrators,

095um some others as well, but once we have a little bit better handle on what that theme is, I'll make sure to share it with you guys too so you can kind of see what it looks like and if anybody's super like, "Mm." then we'll have to revisit it, but thankfully the team came to consensus on what a theme kind of looked like, so um that was good. Yeah, just to want to make sure publicly, you know, we had someone the last board meeting. Um she's here again tonight. And yeah, I just want to make sure you guys understand and know that we are going to be meeting with our secretary starting in the fall, probably mid to late October to start the process of looking at wages, same way we did with our our

096paraprofessionals. So, making sure that that you guys know that cuz I know it's hard when you can't interact or kind of share what we've talked about already. Yeah, then finally July 8th, we've got all of our new teachers and administrator will be on site in the morning. Um doing all the just not fun stuff about getting a new job. So, get that out of the way before they come back in August. So. Okay. That's all I got. >> That's a lot. Uh highlights. Who would like to start? Mark? >> Um let's see. You caught me off guard there. Um Um [clears throat] I think my highlight overall, I'd have to think tonight, what would it be? That would be I think it'd have to be um I think the walking trail at the Pence. You

097know, I think it's pretty neat that they were able to pay for the bulk of that through all the cookie dough sales, I believe it was. I think that, you know, we have a lot of thinking, yeah. We we have a lot of thank yous to do to a lot of parents and a lot of kids that put a lot of hard work into doing that. Um you know, it helps us out of our budget a lot and it was pretty great that all those people took the initiative to put all the work into getting that paid for. So, I think that'll be my highlight. >> Great. Thanks. Terry? >> Um I kind of enjoyed the focus on learning today and like having time as a board to sit down and like learn how we

098could grow and do our positions better and support the district. >> Yeah. Awesome. Dave? >> Um >> [clears throat] >> My highlight was we did make our first presentation June 18th with the Jefferson County Democrats. Uh we had a nice crowd, I thought. >> Mhm. >> Uh 18 15 >> Nice number in May >> Nice number, nice number. Uh Zach made the presentation and I jumped in a couple of times. It was very well received. We had some great questions. A very supportive crowd. We were able to get 20 signatures out of the out of it and handed out our signature page for them to to start their work. So, um very encouraged. We have July 16th uh 6:30 p.m. at the Fairfield Community Center, the old senior center, the lower level. We're meeting with

099the Jefferson's County Republicans to make the same dog and pony show on uh the status of the district and uh the phase two project and general obligation bond. >> I just want to say thank you and so >> Thank you. >> Uh we started that uh that project. So, if anybody else has any other groups or any other things that you you'd like to do, I think we can contact Zach and get it on the calendar and uh we can go meet. So, time short and we got to get out ahead of this. So, we had I had a really good time. I think Zach made a great presentation. It was very well received. >> Yeah. >> So, I think we're off on a good start. >> Is the website up for the bond? >>

100Not yet. >> We have the Yeah, there's I just I didn't tell you. >> It's okay. >> Mark. >> Um I would have to say kind of like book study. Um I think it's good for us to just dive in and talk through some principles for us to live by. I think that also pushes us hard to raise our own bar to learn how we're going to help teach ourselves what we need to learn to get the keep the the district raising their bar. So, it's good to finally be in a building phase of rebuilding things up and raising the bar. >> Okay. >> Christy. I will second what Mark just said. I think this is going to be a great resource, like I said, especially for newer board members that have come in to

101just have, you know, some sort of guidance as far as where your energy should be focused. I would also say it's really exciting to hear about the learning going on from our admin and their staff and just, you know, the positive momentum of coming back from St. Louis and what they learned and being able to take that back to the rest of our staff. So, >> It was kind of fun, too, cuz the Tuesday night was teacher appreciation night at the Cardinals game. So, they had these deals for teachers. They got sweatshirts, drinks, tickets, and for all pretty good price. So, and everybody won. So, that was kind of fun, too. That's fun. >> Fun time. >> Yeah. Definitely echo the [clears throat] book study. I think, you know, I feel like it's just really

102exciting that we're thinking and this this way of thinking about development is just so motivation-oriented and and it's just something that everyone should want to happen. So, it's like an easy easy buy-in, right? We want to help everybody. And it's just really nice to think about it in that way, you know, it's just 100% positive. And we're all going to do it together. You know, in that regard, too, I think that the athletic performance has been going well. I mean, a lot of kids have been attending this summer. My kids have been going. I just think that that is something that we've added in the last year that seems to be really building some good momentum. And again, that same sort of you know, bringing you know, the whole who says whole child forward, you

103know, developing the whole child all the pillars, so I thought again mental components to that. Um So, yeah, it's great to see that happening this summer when we're not in session. And the commitment from teachers to do that then as well, so. All right. Where were we after we before I lost my agenda? >> Motion to adjourn. >> So moved. >> Moved by Terry, seconded by Mark. All in favor? >> Aye. >> Opposed? We are adjourned at 7:55 p.m.