001All right, we'll go ahead and call the meeting to order. And tonight we have two meetings. We uh for everybody's enjoyment, pleasure, make sure I'm looking at the right agenda. Um so go ahead and we've got quorum. I'll take a motion to approve the agenda. So moved. >> Second. >> All right. Moved by Beerbomb, seconded by Deward. All in favor say I. >> I. I. >> Oppose. Nay. It passes. 6. I had to do a quick count. And next we have our public hearing on the resolution to expend funds the district's flexibility account. And is I don't we talked about this last night, right? Go ahead and open the public hearing. Is anybody here to speak on that matter? Wonderful. Then we will move to our general public forum if we have anybody signed up
002or not, but I'll go ahead and read our statement. uh residents of the district, students attending the district, parents or guardians uh of students attending the district and district staff members may address the board about any topic relevant to the district, whether on the current agenda or not. Those who wish to speak must sign up at the beginning of the meeting. Speaker participation is limited to three minutes, one per item. Views and opinions of citizens addressing the board do not necessarily reflect those of the board, district administration, or staff. Speakers are to remember that Iowa law prohibits the board from discussing specific employees, students for their performance. Student speakers will state their name and school. Others will state their name and address. And we have no one signed up. >> Then I will close our
003public forum and we will move to our consent agenda. >> Motion. >> I move the board approve the consent agenda as presented. >> Second. >> All right. Moved by Beerbomb and second that by Smith. >> All in favor say I. >> I. I. Oppose. Nay. Passes 6. And then next we'll move to some old business. First up we have our policies for action. I move the board approve the policies as presented. >> Second. >> There any discussion. All right. It was moved by Shields Cook, seconded by Beerbomb. All in favor say I. >> I. >> Oppose. Nay. Passes 6. We need a roll call vote for the resolution. >> Oh, [clears throat] okay. It's the next item. >> Next item. >> Next, the resolution to expend funds. >> I move the board to adopt the
004resolution to expend funds from the district's flexibility account as presented. >> By beer bomb, second ward, and I will let director do the roll call. >> Bomb. >> Hi. >> Ward. >> Hi. >> Rodriguez. Hi >> I Winfrey. >> Hi. >> Our next item is our appreciation for our retiring board members. Scott, you are listed as the contact here. Do you want to go first with that? >> I would like to go first. Um first for been through a lot of school boards um in my career as a superintendent and the work that is done is very um excellent work with what's you know for what we do and the board position is one that uh is non-paid lot of time and is a very serviceoriented role and I've appreciated every board member I've ever
005worked with. The two going out is Amy Erica Smith and Brett Barker Baker. And on behalf of that, also we will be giving you, it's not printed yet, but we have a lifetime activity attendance for all Ames activities for yourself and a guest. >> Wow. Well, thank you. >> This is what's been done in every district before. So, we're going to continue it on. That does not go for anybody who was off the board prior to this. So, we might get some phone calls. >> Apparently, nobody currently on the board. [clears throat] >> Currently on the board, you should be getting these already, but I guess that >> No, we have not. >> So, that is typically what I've done or the board has done is they've had access to school events as well as
006a guest home only, not away. >> But you'll get a lifetime pass that's being printed. we'll get to a set for you. And >> it's a little gift we can give. >> And I'll just say, Amy Erica, thank you so much for the four years you've served on the board. It's been fantastic getting to work with you. I've always appreciated um your perspective and the way you think about things and how much you care about Ames kids. Uh, and I hope that you will still stay in touch with the board, but also I think um I'm glad to count you as a friend after uh we've had all this this wonderful time together. You'll be missed. >> Anybody else has anything? >> We could, but you know, I'll miss you and I'm going to text
007you and bother you. >> Do I get to talk now or do I talk later? >> I can. Yes. >> Okay, I get to talk now. Yay. Um, I'm going to try to be brief. I thought about writing a speech and then I decided that you guys actually didn't want my speech. Um [laughter] but okay, so um thank you guys. Uh thanks to everybody who has taught me about the school district and about what our needs are. Uh you guys have been fantastic. I really believe in this district. I have believed in it from the beginning and month by month, year by year, I have my belief in the district only increased. Uh I am very proud of the people that we have hired during my time here. Personnel is policy as they say in
008Wanki policy circles which means that like the people that you hire create for policy and I am proud of the policy that we are now representing. Um, keep going. Uh, we can keep getting better. This is a rocket ship that's about to take off and the new board gets the excitement of being along for the ride. So, um, thank you guys. This has been wonderful. It's been a tre tremendous pleasure and privilege. >> Thank you. [applause] And next we have the abstract of votes. And so I will turn it over to So um I will start out with this one that currently on here was just delivered to us within the last hour. There was an error on our first abstract of votes that we received and the error actually said that Aaron was going
009to serve four years where he just is serving the remainder of the term that he um was voted for. So for two years and so this was a little bit different than what was We had three three positions to be filled for directors and then one position that um Aaron ran for which was just the remainder of the district that we appointed the time that we appointed him to. So he'll have years remaining and the other three people were appointed for four years. We have Arthur Bombgradner, Edford, and Kelly Winfrey for a fouryear term and then Aaron Rodriguez for the remaining two years. All right, I think then uh our next item is the oath of office for our newly elected directors. So if Jennifer typically come up, we'll do the oath of office. Jerry
010will administer that. Oh, and need to do it, too. >> Okay. >> [applause] >> I move we adjourn. >> Second. Second. >> Second. >> Okay. For everybody, this has been Ellen. Ellen had the corner on moving that we adjourn for years and I have been trying to encroach in his territory and I think he may have let me do it this last time. I think he may have been being nice. Well, or well, at least he's going to claim that. Um, so moved by Smith, seconded by Beerbomb. Is it right? Okay. All in favor of adjourning the meeting of our retiring board say I. >> I. >> Opposed. That passes 6. And we will transition to a new board meeting with our new board members. >> So, we'll switch over real quick. Okay. So, we'll
011go ahead and call. Um, this is would be considered our new board and our regular board meeting to order. Um, I'll go ahead and acknowledge that there's a quorum here. Um, we have a motion to approve the agenda. >> So, moved. >> Second. So moved by Alan, seconded by Angie. Is that Angie? All in favor say I. >> I. Carry. Okay. So we'll have a public forum again. Um all of the same guidelines apply here to the prior and not have any online. So the next item of business that I have is I will be taking um nominations for the board [clears throat] president seat at the table. >> I move nomination of Ellie Win. >> Second. Any other nomination? We'll say that nominations are closed for the um board president. I will take nominations
012for the um vice president of the board. I nominate Director Shields Cook for the the vice president. >> Any other nominations? Those those are closed end. We will go back and vote for the president then. Um, director beer bomb um nominated Kelly Winfrey for president. Angie Deward second. All in favor say I. >> I. >> Motion carried for the election of the vice president. Um, Angie Deardward nominated Sabrina Shields Cook. Second by Alan Berbong. All in favor say I. Motion carried. support. Yep. >> Thank you. >> [applause] >> Yeah, we believe that that is a mistake. We have public forum listed again. We don't we still do not have anyone that signed up before the meeting for the public forum. >> So [clears throat] I'm going to go ahead and move forward to the consent
013agenda. >> I move the board approve the consent agenda as presented. >> Second. >> All right. Moved by D'vor, seconded by Shields Cook. All in favor say I. >> I oppose. Nay. Passes 70. Uh next we will move to our reports and start with the student services item. >> All right. Thank you. Uh I just want to congratulate the new school board members that were recently elected and thanks to those who continue to serve on the board. Your education or your dedication and commitment to the students and families of the Ames Community Schools helped set the tone for the entire district. I appreciate the opportunity to be here tonight and present to you on the newly assembled team. It's been great this last one and a half years for me uh to be back in
014the K12 saddle administratively and providing some perspective for my years outside of the K12 system. Other than middle school teaching, my professional experiences has always been at a district or a system level with years as a director of curriculum instruction and assessment um or teaching and learning as it's called here, a superintendent for a few brief years and the chief HR officer for a similar size school district in Atama. So tonight I'm going to share with you a broad snapshot of student services as it exists in Ames. uh spend some time providing an overview of the DECAP which is the district career academic plan and provide an update on the transportation since we transitioned from our new provider for student in June. If there are questions I'm not able to answer tonight, I'd ask for
015your understanding and I'll be sure to get those back to you and follow up in a future board update. So I started with uh what is student services here in AS and I created this little graphic here to give you the umbrella of student services. It falls under three categories within our um strategic plan. So the first one is well-being. Um that one is listed as physical, emotional, mental health and safety. The second one is diverse learners which is objective number three and that's considered meeting diverse needs. And then the other supports kind of the uh miscellaneous category and that would be numbers four and five organizational responsiveness and communication and stakeholder engagement and support. Under those you can see the various programs or topics that um fall under my responsibilities and I thought I
016would just highlight a few successes that we've experienced over the last um 15 months. So in the first one there under well-being um probably the the the few ones that I want to highlight for you is the tried to have as less acronyms as possible but FRSA is FARA that used to be called student family advocate. We worked together last year as a team and refocus that to be about family resources and support. Um they are very much responsible for the whole pantry which is at the AIM center. Uh we do have a really neat progression from having no shelves in that building to now having um you know bountiful uh supplies and food for our families. So that's been really exciting to see. It was also highlighted recently on a who article. We um
017also in terms of the health staff we have nurses and health associates and we've worked to have some integration with our state iris system for immunization. Before there was a lot of extra work that we had to do in terms of infinite campus. Now we have that synced up with our immunization reports and that's really streamlined the process for our nurses. Um 504 training is something we've been doing this year with Dr. Deanie Thomas for our counselors. Um and also the board has reviewed some provider agreements for mental health with both the Hazel Health and Classroom Clinic teleaalth as well as several on-site providers in the district. Um under the diverse learners looking at some topics related to at risk or ALP that's another one of those acronyms alternative learning program. Um early warning system
018is something we're looking at and trying to identify the kids before they become at risk. So, we're looking at some criteria for that. We've also really focused with Sarah Davidson's help as a teaching learning coordinator on being more alike than different when it comes to title one success. That's for our literacy program at the elementary. Um, this year we have some title three dollars that have been allocated to our district, which is about three times what was allocated to us from Hartland Aea. And so, that's been a real um benefit for us. We'll use some of that for some transportation vouchers which will follow up a theme later tonight. Um also looked at emerging and progressing statistics for our staffing. So before um last year when I came in there was just a a number
019of students that are in a building and that's how many FTE were allocated. We looked at that from a differentiated staffing standpoint. Those students who are emerging EL learners need more support than those that are progressing. And so we've adjusted our staffing based on that. Um and then also we had KAT testing, cognitive abilities test that we did uh in two grades this year and last year as a part of the strategic plan. Um finally under homeschool assistance uh Kathy G is our coordinator for that. I work directly with her and two many of her successes relate to the fact that we have a specific location for the homeschool assistance program now at the AIM center. So, they've been able to add some additional supports for families and for students. One of those this year
020is the homeschool hangout where they have parents that just show up and work with other parents that are part of the homeschool assistance program as well as we have a dedicated resource center for students and families to be able to check out resources. And the last one is under other supports. Um, the ones I want to highlight for tonight, other than our two that we're going to mention, transportation and decap would be the dashboard for chronic absenteeism. Our data strategist, Gabe Jensen, worked really hard last year to create a um internal system that allows us to keep track of those students who are not attending school on a regular basis. And then we also have the accountability that goes with that. Um, I think Jeff will talk later about the SCAK report and one of
021the successes last year was [snorts] attendance and some of that can be directly attributed to having that monitored dashboard for us. Um, also included there under extra learning, I included summer school as well as our work with the United Way of Story County and the Americanore program which this year expanded to all five elementaryaries. Um, in the past we've had two or three. This year we have all five. And uh so that's kind of the the umbrella there. Next month we'll have two other plans that are going to fall under the diverse learners which will be the at risk plan and the low plan. Um but tonight I'm going to focus on the other supports DECAP and transportation. So DECAP stands for district career and academic plan. Uh some of you might hear referred to
022as the five-year plan where you have grades 8 through 12 that need to have a um plan in place as part of our individual career and academic plan. The the focus there is looking at finding supports to help students find their passion and their purpose as well as promoting equity and access. Um there's a lot of um activities that might be career-based or college um college readiness activities, but we want to be sure those are provided to every student. That's what makes the actual decap plan. And then also um it will strengthen connections between district goals, community needs, and workforce expectations. That bullet came directly from the state of Iowa, but it fits very well with the PK and beyond vision that we've been talking about for about the last uh 15 16 months. I
023wanted to review the structure of the decap because later in the year I'll come back and we'll present the actual decap to the school board. Um I just wanted to give you an idea of what the structure looks like for that. So the first one is that there are um some initial sections. The ones that are underlined for you on the screen are those that are th this year required for state review. So one of those is the annual school board review. Also in that section would be where we would list the district team members, a statement summary, the course planning, and then the fourth one which is also required this year, uh career connected or work-based learning. We kind of use those words sim uh synonymously, but that's the first section of the decap.
024Uh the second one, probably the the the meat and potatoes, if you will, is the essential components. And so those are five categories that are a part of the plan. and it really provides a real strong progression for how you think about career exploration and career um exposure. So the first one is just knowing yourself as a student and what are you what are you strong at? What do you like? What do you think you might want to do? After we figure out what that might be, then we look at some career information. So you find out you might be interested in this specific um field or this pathway. Then what are some careers associated with that? And then do some research on what do those careers look like. After that then it's career exploration
025that looks more probably at the middle school and high school level where they actually get some hands-on experience, job shadowing, internships, those kind of things. Uh the fourth essential component is postsecary exploration. So there's college and career ready or career and college ready and you can see the progression there. So no matter what we're learning about ourselves then we're going into what does a career look like then does that career involve post-secary exploration and then finally what does the career and post-secary decision. So those are the five components that are part of the decap. Um as I'll talk about later here we'll get to decide this year which of those we're going to focus on. We don't need to do the entire plan and put all of our energies in into all of it. We
026can do one part really well or two parts really well and then leave those other ones and phase them in as we see fit. And then the final sections um in the DECAP are the FAFSA, the free application for federal student aid advisement integration within the district. And this year new to the DECAP is the middle school because there was a law passed last legislative session. And so this year they're requiring that piece, but they're looking for comments only. So they are expecting us to have some kind of implementation, but they know it's going to be a work in progress. So we'll have a little bit of time to to get up to speed with that. As you [clears throat] look at the decap, they talk about at the state level and we need to
027incorporate throughout our four kind of foundations or lenses that are part of the decap process. Those are as you can see there inclusive, scaffolded, reflective, and integrated. So inclusive means for all students. Again, there could be an opportunity that happens in one classroom or at one building, but those would not be part of the decap because those are not accessible to all students. We want to be sure that we're inclusive there. Um, scaffolded means just what it says. It's building on each other. And so the whole PK and beyond vision is that idea. It can start as early as preschool. And then what does it look like throughout the the various levels? Um reflective. I think that's probably a thing that we could focus on pretty quickly and easily and get some wins out of
028that is whenever there is some career-based or work-based learning experiences or opportunities to students, have them do some reflection on that. It could be, you know, how do I fit in with this? Is this a career opportunity I could see myself in? Anything we can do to make it instructional then turns it into a career work-based learning experience. And then finally, integrated. It's certainly not separate. It's just kind of the way we do things. And so, as we think about the um the the framework for it, it's really looking at how can we include it in strategic planning, how can it be districtwide and planned as well as connect it to the various initiatives we already have going on. The next uh slide talks about the uh what the decap has looked like in the
029past and what it's going to look like going forward. I think these are exciting developments after having been in it for couple of years previously and then this last year as an interim. Um up until this year it was scored the entire district career academic plan was scored in its entirety and each section was given points. It was also scored externally by reviewers that rotated depending on who was available within H Heartland Aea. For example, last year we had Walke School District look at our plan and we looked at theirs. the next time it might be some other school district. Um, again, every section was reviewed annually and it was very much compliance driven, right? There was nothing there was no funding attached with it. There was no uh real specific feedback. It was just
030really a numerical score. We got the score, we turned it in, and we moved on. What they're looking at for this year is a portion of the decap is reviewed. I gave you those underlined ones. Those are the required sections this year. Um, and then we also have district choice. They really want to focus on it being growthbased and improvement driven. So again, um, we're not looking at the entire decap. Our team can get together and decide which of the five essential components we want to work on. Is it the one we're strongest in already? Is it one of our weaker areas that we think we can make the most progress? But we get to decide that locally as a as a district. The last one there, this came from the Department of Education as
031well as H Heartland AA. Um they talked about it in terms of positive shifts. They've gotten a lot of feedback from school districts and from stakeholders saying that it was compliance driven and it was just basically a checkbox. We wanted to be more than that. And so uh this year they have made it growth oriented. They wanted to focus and build on ownership, time and relevance. So again, if we're not looking at the entire decap, we can focus our time and really be effective with what we put into it. Uh they also have increased flexibility so every district gets to decide what they want to focus on and not focus on every element. And then also it should be a streamlined workload for the districts as well as for those that are reviewing. aimed specifically,
032I think, as far as the positive shifts. I wanted to mention the PK and beyond vision um that Superintendent Grimes mentioned uh frequently and is basically on a speaking tour around the the community and the counties uh talking about really an organizer for career and college readiness starting from preschool and going all the way up and thinking about next steps for students early on and often, right? So, it's not just that you um graduate and then you figure out what you're going to do. We have some builtin uh checks and places for opportunities for reflection for students so they know when they walk across that stage, they have a real clear picture of what that beyond looks like for them. So, I think those will be positive shifts. The other one is the future ready
033leadership team. When we were talking last spring about what does our leadership teams look like at the district, um we moved to the future ready leadership team. So it was kind of a landing place for the BKA and Beyond Vision and um that's really come to fruition. We had our last first meeting I think it was two weeks ago and we've got a really broad representation. We actually have a preschool uh teacher on that uh leadership team. We have instructional coaches, we have interventionists, uh we have related arts teachers, we have classroom teachers, and we we span the entire PK through 12. I don't think we would have had that had we just had a decap team, right? Because it's really focused on secondary and probably even more so at the high school level with
034a little bit of help from the middle school. Now we've really got this PK and beyond approach to it and I think that'll really pay dividends for us as you see what the decap looks like as well as what we can implement with the vision for PK and beyond. I'll pause there. Are there any questions or comments about the district career academic plan? Kind of the structure of it and know that it's going to come back to you as an actual um report later in the spring. question. The plan does also like end of it like you have to fill out a review of >> no there's not >> have a plan right have a plan >> not at this time. How about that? [laughter] >> Take care though. There we go. Any other questions
035about the structure and kind of the the shifts and how that decap is going to look this year versus previous years. >> All right. >> I think it's nice it fits in the the language that you're using describe it to assist nicely with the and beyond and our larger strategic plan and mission. It all things together nicely. I think that helps us explain what we're doing. >> All right. The other part that I wanted to mention was the transportation report. Um it was about a year ago that the the um suggestion came, hey, we should have an RFP process for our transportation provider. And so now a year later, uh here we are with a new transportation provider, first student. Um there's [snorts] been a lot of work that's gone into it. And if you
036think about half of our customers, students [snorts] are writers, um it's a pretty significant change. And I think overall it's been a pretty successful transition. At the beginning of the school year, we had a little bit of a hiccup before. Um we used the same routing software and that routing software was uploaded into Infinite Campus, which uh was great and that worked the way it was supposed to. However, it synced with some of the old addresses and so all the mobility that happens um with families in the summer, especially in Ames. There were parents that were bus riders the previous year and had a different bus stop and we didn't see that that was an error until uh we got the phone calls. So, that took about, you know, four to five days to kind
037of get ironed out. And since then, I think it's been, like I said, a really uh smooth transition for the wholesale change that it was after 15 plus years with a different provider. So, just a few stats for you here to look at. Um, again, 2338 uh riders that we have [clears throat] and 42 buses. Uh, last year we were at 53 buses and so we did streamline our fleet considerably. The other thing that we did when we got the new contract was we got all new vehicles and so [snorts] all of those vehicles um are air conditioned. we learned that um when when they were received as well as they all had seat belts because they were manufactured after 2018. So again, there were some learning curves that happened there that that caused some
038additional work for our team. Um but as you'll see on the next slide, I think we've done a really good job of collaborating and working together to figure that out. The other thing is that there are six buses this year that are specifically devoted to activities. Um, we asked for those to have undercarriage storage and we're still waiting for our specific new six buses to come in just because of the manufacturing for them, but we do have um those on loan for us right now and we've been able to [clears throat] save some money already this year because of the charters that we were receiving last year. um we made that a part of the RFP and so first student if they need to uh request a charter they're doing it at their own cost.
039We're only paying the district cost. So they've been a great partner with that and made it work for for the for the district. The other thing I think that we've noticed is that we uh revamped the routing for preschool and St. Celia. In the past, they were combined and so our preschool students were with St. Cecilia students and we had seven routes. Um, we split those out into five devoted specifically to our preschool and then we have two specifically for St. Cecilia. Um, by separating those and not having those together, we're really able to tell the difference in cost and what that does cost for the school district. Um, and so we'll be talking about that as we get into this spring and looking at possible policy changes. Um, based on the the cost to
040the non-public. At this point, we have 116,163 miles that have been driven on those new buses. And the OTP is what they call on-time percentage. And so they do a rolling 28 day average. and we've had 99.1% on time percentage for school arrival um in the last 28 days. Obviously, that's increased um quite a bit since the beginning of the school year. The other thing I want to mention as far as the school board's um role in this is looking at the again the transportation eligibility. Um that's board policy 7-Eleven. And we worked really hard when we made the transition to a new provider to implement the policy as it was written. And so there was a lot of um uh maybe prior understandings or unwritten agreements that were out there and we've worked really
041hard to formalize those, put those in writing, put those on the website for um parents and the community understand that we really are trying to adhere to the policies as it's written. And so that includes a onem walk radius that we don't have any busing ideally. We still have a couple that are carryovers from last year and we're working to resolve those as we think about next year. Um after two miles then there is no charge for anyone that lives outside of the two-m radius. And then that's at the K8 level and then for 912 it it turns into a three mile radius. So, we have allowed for the pay to ride or discretionary um for those uh families that are living between one and two miles away or for the high school one and
042three miles away. We just made it consistent and we went from one to three instead of just two to three like it had said. All right. [clears throat] So, that first picture there, New Dawn, that was actually taken on the first day of school at a very early time because I wanted to get there early and watch the buses roll out. And so that really was the new dawn of our um our service with First Student. And again, like I said, it's been a really strong partnership that we've had with them since. I'm going to emphasize the technology tools first. Um I just want to talk about the fact that there's a lot of technology that we have added into the system. Uh some of it we were supposed to have previously and we didn't
043have access to. We do have access to it now. That's been really strong. um part of those seat belts and technology tools. I included seat belts and cameras because that really is a tool for safety um and and supervision when it comes to that. We also have what's called Versatrans and First View. Versatrans is the routing software. Um again, that was used by our previous provider, but the school district personnel didn't have access to it. And so now it was just more of a, hey, go ahead and transport our kids and we'll let you know if there's troubles. Now we have a very transparent, accountable process for that. And we can see every bus that's GPS tracked, what stops they make, when they make the stops. I can talk from experience. Last year, if a
044parent was concerned that a stop wasn't made, we would have to contact the provider, get that information, get a screenshot. that could take a day to two days for it to get back to us. Now we have access to it in real time information and we know that those stops are made when the schools um when the students were dropped off at school when they were dropped off at home. So it's been really really a strong tool for us. Um the other [clears throat] one is first you dashboard. So, in addition to what we can see as school personnel, we've added in the app and we have about uh 650 users now on that app. Um, we're hoping for a thousand by the time we get into the the winter weather season and we've had
045about a hundred that have happened since November 5th when Amy and and her team put together another um kind of announcement reminding people that hey, as it's getting cold, you might be interested in knowing about this so you don't have to sit away at the bus stop as long. Um, and then we've also had the cameras include a stop arm violation and we've had about 20 of those already this year. Those are reported to local law enforcement and that's just a really important reminder of the safety and when those red lights are flashing you you don't get to to cross that and if you do they will be captured by one of our cameras that we have on. Um the second one is teamwork. The picture is kind of small but it's a really fun
046picture. Um, we met in July with the new uh, first student team and all of our principles or at least a principal from each building was able to be represented by that. Interestingly enough, none of the principles had ever been out to the transportation side of the the building. And so we did a tour of that. We went on and checked out the the new buses and they were on there a little bit too long for my lesson plan because I was thinking three minutes and it was the middle of July. What is going on? Why are people still on the bus? I walk uph all of the air conditioning and so it was the most comfortable environment ever. No wonder they wanted to stay on there. Uh but we did work together and we
047figured out some expectations that are consistent in all buses focused on what we use at the schools uh safe, thoughtful, and responsible. We sent out a letter to parents and let them know about that as well. And um we've also shared with administrative assistants about how to access their dashboard. So if they get a call at the building and it doesn't go to first student, then they might be able to answer the question for the families right then and there. And then um the other one as far as teamwork I just want to mention is every member of our uh district administration has been involved in some capacity in making this work when it comes to our partnership with first student. We have um Rob and his team with maintenance. They uh re refreshed the
048entire space, repainted it, put on chair rails, all these beautiful things to come in for our new tenants. Um Dan and the IT team moved around and did some uh routers and wireless access for them to be sure that they're ready to go there. Amy and her team with communications, Sherry with all of the the billing, and uh Deanie with the specialized transportation. So, it's been a a great experience with the teamwork there. And then the final one I'll mention is the staff and the attitude. Um just yesterday or yeah it was just this morning our first student report that comes out weekly reported that we are now fully staffed. I know at the time um in March when we first uh asked about updating this and making it go to a new provider there
049were some concerns about staffing and we're actually more staffed now than we were then. They're also looking at trying to find ways to get Iowa State University and some more students involved and as they think about getting their CDL and providing some additional part-time dollars to them. So, that's something they're working on right now. Also want to um express appreciation to Ankeny. They also have first student and so in this um interim they brought down some of their drivers as well as trainers and had them be available to us and are there for at at any moment's notice for us to provide support. And we also have a location manager who has been doing double duty. Um she came from Alaska has 15 years of experience in the first student um world but we are
050missing a safety manager right now. So, we have um been down one real strong management position and so she's been doing a lot of extra work. Um and her name is Dion Bliss and she'll probably be at a a future board meeting for you. The other ones that um I wanted to mention, we did keep our both of our dispatchers. Um and so we were able to keep both of those for continuity. We added two routers. Those routers are actually outside of the district. And so we have one out of Chicago and one out of Montana. They work together on the routing team first and then they send it on to our AS location to figure out if there's any local nuances we need to be aware of. So um they've just been a really
051strong team and the attitude that we have. And then I'll end with our our transportation coordinator Aubrey Fleming. She came in just under a year ago into the position that she's in and she's just done a great job of providing a lot of additional support to first student as well as to families and try to make the transportation process as understandable and accessible to um families as possible. Any questions for me about the transportation? It's been a whirlwind year, but we're we're in a good place. Yeah, I just wanted to say I'm not sure that folks realize what a huge undertaking it was to switch transportation providers, especially after such a long period of time um where we had not done so just because it was so much work um to potentially do it. And
052so I really want to give kudos to all of you um the whole staff for making this happen and it was almost seamless. I mean we've had we've heard very few issues or complaints or anything like that. Um, and I'm really really grateful and just amazed by how well you all pulled this off. >> Totally. As ride the bus, it's been fantastic. I mean, they're not sweaty and you when they get home. >> Apparently, I need to see my kid on the bus. [laughter] >> Much better. >> Yeah. Yeah, I do live too close. And I want to thank you too, Eric, and for all of the folks who have been a part of this because as said, it has not been easy. And I know um that in implementing the board policy as written,
053there was questions, confusion um and I appreciate how well you and and all that have been working on it have have handled that and worked with our families to make sure that they get where they need to be. And and I'll thank Sher again for initiating this as a not just I think an improvement in service but also the amount of money that it has saved that did not have to come away from other um student facing programs. So thank you. This has been huge and appreciated and thank you for answering all the emails that maybe I forwarded to you or that I forwarded to Scott that he forwarded to you early in this in August. >> Thank you. >> All right. Next up, uh we have our associate superintendent, Dr. Hawkins talk about our
054school improvement advisory committee and new court's proposal. >> Well, good evening board. Uh, thank you for the opportunity to give you these updates. Welcome to our new directors. Congratulations to those who've been elected and reelected. Appreciate having you here. I'd like to spend just a few minutes tonight just reviewing really quickly. Uh, we had our first SCAK, which stands for school improvement advisory committee meeting, uh, this past Monday, the 10th. Talk to you a little bit about the content of that meeting and some of the feedback that we got from As you may know, but as a quick uh reminder, um SCIAK is actually a committee that's called for in state code 280.12. Uh so this is the committee that's mandated by state code. Uh we reviewed um that state code with the committee to
055make sure that the committee understood the topics uh that we would need to talk about as a group this year per that state code. Every year we schedule uh more meeting time with SCAK than what we actually need in order to cover what's required in code. So we typically ask uh the SCAK that's that's sitting uh what should we talk about in in that additional time for the future year. Um last year's SIAK suggested that this year's SIAK should uh address two additional topics uh other than what's required in code. How are changes at the AEA uh in our state impacting support or the use of funds in our district? So, what's happening with the the changing landscape with the AEA? As well as uh an update on the implementation of our instructional framework, the
056Danielson framework for teaching. Uh how is that going and what are some next steps that we take that? Um so our uh on Monday uh the 10th uh we um spent our evening uh covering one of the primary topics that's called for in code and that is a review of our district goals and our academic achievement gathering feedback around the the uh status of that achievement. I'll provide you some some bullet points of that. Uh thank you. Just doesn't matter the mic. I just can't [laughter] All right. All right. We'll get it here. All right. Sorry about that. >> Hold it here. >> Yeah. Okay. I I Okay. All right. >> That actually helped a lot. So, >> did it? Okay. Good. All right. I just need to project my teacher voice. Well, okay. So,
057on Monday the 10th, we spent our time talking about um our our review of our district goals as well as our Iowa school performance profile. You may recall as a board that both of those pieces of information have already been board previously. We shared that with Sia and then um got some feedback from them and I'm going to share with you some notes of their feedback. We also discussed um with SCAK kind of an upcoming agenda. So we'll meet again in February. Um you may recall from previous updates around SCAK. We've we've actually written into one of our board policies on family engagement that our family engagement plan will be reviewed and offered feedback by SCAK. So that's kind of an annual expectation of that group. And we'll also spend time in February um uh
058with a little bit of an update about the PK and beyond initiative and that's where we will also weave into the conversation and update on our Danielson instructional framework as asked by last year's SIAK. And then finally when we meet for our third and final meeting of the year we will do uh the bullying uh re data review which is called foreign state code as well as talk about the implementation or the impact of changes at the AEA and what that has meant for us. Okay. So in addition to kind of outlining the responsibilities and the future topics of that team, we spent a few minutes to just review our agenda and our team norms and make sure that that still was working for our team. And then we really dug into the content of
059the evening, which was again that review of district goals and of the Iowa school performance profile. Uh we did ask um that team to uh give us some feedback on based on the information that's presented to you what resonates. Um and this was some of the uh notes that that the team had. They uh they noted and celebrated the significant district-wide improvements in attendance and the reduction of chronic absenteeism across all demographic groups. As you may recall, those were both goals that were met earlier this uh year when we reviewed them. Uh there was some mixed feedback about academics. There was some excitement about where things were going with math. If you remember, we didn't meet that goal, but six out of eight groups did um see growth and overall we saw growth in the
060district. But there was still uh again some mixed or maybe a little bit of concern uh around our reading uh scores. If you recall from our district goals, our readings decreased slightly and we only saw uh us meet our growth goal in three out of eight demog uh demographical program groups. Um and so SCAK noted that and expressed again some mixed reviews there. And then um SCAK participants noted an increase in suspensions and restraints uh questioning uh school climate and its connection to academics. So if you remember, we had district goals around reducing the number of suspensions and school ret restraints and both of those data points were actually pretty significant increases. And of of course SCAK noted that and you know maybe I would put it this way agreed with um the team that
061decided those should continue to be district goals. We asked also what questions do you have? There were multiple questions from SCAKS regarding uh data being disagregated by building, grade level, demographic group. Uh there were there were two different asks that SAK had. Hey, could we see some of the um data that you presented uh [clears throat] tonight? Because most of the data that I presented was how did um how did the data from this year compare compared to the data from last year because that's how the goal was written. But uh SCIK had said could we see more longitudinal? Can we see some of that data spread out maybe over three or four or five years so we could see the trend in that data as well as specifically when it came to suspensions there
062was an ask for can we see that breaken broken down any further do if we see increased suspension is that at a particular age level or with a particular program or demographic group and so we're working on getting that that data so we can update that for uh they uh sought to understand the root causes behind that increase in suspension. That was a an ask of that team as well as they're questioning what strategies uh we might use to improve uh attendance although it's improving and school climate. And then participants suggested um they wondered if whether maybe shifting away from discipline punitive disciplinary practices to alternative behavior such supports such as mentorships or alternate spaces would have a positive impact on um suspensions and restraints as well as they suggested uh that resources be allocated
063to address uh identified demographic groups in the achievement gaps. Uh, regarding that last one, this was not discussed by SCIAK, but I would note that that matched really well with the resource allocation review that we just completed as part of our ESSA process. Um, and so that that bullet point matched very nicely with that internal conversation. So that that is a review of SIK. Any questions regarding that? No. Okay, I will uh move on then uh with the microphone close to [clears throat] uh talk about our new course proposals. Can't win. All right. So, taken right from policy 601.2 on new curriculum development. Um uh that policy in part reads the design of curriculum deeply affects how a student experiences school is the intent of our district to provide highquality culturally responsive curriculum that empowers
064our students. Right. And so uh by adding courses particularly when those courses are based on student interest um and with the intent of expanding opportunities to be better prepared for post-secary work which you'll see that theme in these course suggestions. The district can best meet the needs of our students. that's that's what this work is intended to improve and I'm hoping that you'll see here a strong connection to our strategic plan. So um the there within our strategic plan we had belief statements identified um and these are are uh five of those belief statements. Uh things like all students are capable of learning and growing. All students can thrive academically when high expectations are set. Um, every member of the Ames School's school community is provided with intentional access to high quality experiences and opportunities
065in our school, right? And so really strong connection between offering coursework that prepares students for the world beyond school and our strategic plan. Um, as well as you can see it it's connecting directly here to objective two, which is uh instructional framework and programs. every student benefiting from a consistent and viable curriculum, engaging instruction, and connected programming. So, super strong connection between uh new course proposals and our strategic plan. So, I'll get into the proposals themselves. Um, at the middle school, we see two courses proposed. One is entitled Strive. It's intended to be a quarter-long flex program for students in any grade uh designed to help them build habits, skills, and mindsets needed for success in school and beyond. Um it it's really focused on developing executive functioning skills uh such as organization, time management,
066and goal setting. Right now, this course is offered to a select group of students based on data and the school would really like to expand it and be able to offer it to more students is the key. Um, and then the other course that was proposed at the middle school is called uh research through inquiry. Uh, the proposal is that this would be a required course for sixth grade students uh taught by the teacher librarian. It's a course that encourages uh engages students in foundational research skills through an inquiry model emphasizing critical thinking, research, communication skills. Again, this would be uh something that all sixth grade students would be expected to run through in order to build again um knowledge of what's available to them through our school library as well as the skills uh
067to utilize what's there uh in their academic work. Our high school has several uh course proposals. Um and I I think you'll see in general a theme like we talked about um about offering students opportunities to be prepared for some postsecary uh career type opportunities. So the the first one of those is foods one and foods two. Um, I will tell you there's a foods three that's in discussion, but uh we want to get foods one and two off the ground right now. Um, this is largely in part by a uh proposed based on continued student feedback that they would desire these courses. uh this would add a strand uh for our CTE programming and through the completion of foods one it would result in an industry recognized credential and IRC in the safe serve
068uh area. So again lot lots of benefit to our kids as well as the fact that our kids are are kind of clamoring for for these courses. Another uh proposed course at the high school is applied math. Um it's designed for students who want to strengthen their math skills through real world applications, emphasis on problem solving, critical thinking, math reasoning, um applicable to personal finance, construction, health sciences, manufacturing, business. Uh this would the idea would be this would be a postalgebra 2 math class that would take lots of the um foundational thinking that students would get in algebra, geometry, and algebra 2 and have them be able to apply it to a variety of contexts. To be [snorts] uh uh very transparent with the board, this was a course that uh uh not only were
069they interested in, but we as a district office asked them to consider. Um right now um one of the things that we do in order to meet our chapter 12 um offer and teach requirements is that we tap into some of the courses that students take out at DMAC in order to meet those requirements. So not only is this a great next step for our students, it also helps us not utilize our coursework that we have out at DMAC in order to meet our chapter 12 requirements. Uh Heritage Spanish 2 is being suggested. This would uh offer students in heritage Spanish one a next level of course. Um the teachers of that course are seeing a need uh for those students to have a next level course to go to. And it would also provide
070students who are going through that series of courses the ability to get a 2-year uh language um pathway uh for any kind of college entrance or NCAA type of work uh that that would allow them to do that in uh a native language speaking that's more relevant uh to their coursework. There were a number of um suggested courses from uh what I would call our CTE department including finished carpentry, cabinet making, residential wiring and a number of business courses. in several of those courses um particularly carpentry and cabinet making uh they uh may result in students um getting an IRC for that work as well as potentially setting up opportunities for internships but it's really delving students uh deeper into so these would be post um you know our current woods classes or or after
071our current carpentry classes and getting them into very much more specific specific um industry related type of coursework. The the wiring class right now does not uh lead necessarily to an IRC, but again based on student feedback and a way to to get students prepared for an opportunity for postsecary success, delving them a little bit deeper into the principles and practices of wiring in residential settings. Um I'm going to skip down to the business classes as well because a similar theme um similar theme both both in the idea that these are driven based on um student desire right so ethics in uh business ethics in sports and ethical standards of referees and certification. Both of those courses the teacher indicated that uh students have expressed a strong interest in taking sports related business classes. uh
072in particular the um uh ethical standards of referees does res will result assuming the students choose to to take the assessment that they need in them uh being finishing that class as a certified official. So they'll be able to referee games. Um and um and then the business law class is an extension. We offer business law one now. this is an opportunity to extend that class to go deeper into that particular content. Finally, the uh other the the last course suggested uh by the high school was a ninth grade ELP seminar. Uh this is an opportunity to really help our ninth grade students in our extended learning program focus on transitioning uh to our high school successfully and thinking about the the raised expectations uh of being in high school. It's a place where they
073can explore strengths, set goals, develop strategies for time management, organization, self- advocacy. Um I will say um slide none of the courses uh that are proposed have any staffing implications. So all of the courses both middle school and high school we have uh adequate staff to teach the course. Uh in some of the um in some of those courses we'll have to determine how broadly do we apply the class based upon the staffing that we currently have but there is no uh staffing requested in order to teach those courses. Um, I'm currently working uh with high school administration to determine based upon the number of students that sign up. What does that look like for a budget in order to get any kind of needed equipment or supplies to get that class off the ground?
074As well as a consideration will of course be the budget that's needed in order to sustain a course year after year after year. Particularly, um, Dr. Dr. Numal and I have talked about the consumables that would be associated with things like cabinet making or foods classes, right? Those have fairly significant uh consumable budgets. And so we're talking about that as far as u figuring out plans how to make that work. And then of course with any course a consideration will just be student interest, right? Uh so if by chance students don't sign up for one of these courses just because it's board approved um we wouldn't be able to offer it without adequate student registry. Any questions about course proposals? >> I don't have a question [clears throat] but just a comment. I was thrilled
075to see um the number of courses under CTE for the trades uh coming from a construction firm. uh uh there are reports that the architecture, engineering and construction are going to retire uh approximately 40% of the workforce over the next 10 to 15 years. So uh we're all staring down a big talent gap and so anything that we can do in at the high school level years after is very much. So >> yeah, I think I was I was pleased um uh Superintendent Grimes and I met with our CTE teachers a couple of times last year uh uh based on the internal work, if you will, on the PK and beyond conversation and started talking about potential course expansions and ways that our courses could lead to DMAC programming. And so I was I was
076extremely pleased with the uh suggestions of that team as far as ways to expand student opportunities. So thank you for noting that. I appreciate it. comments. All right. Thank you very much. >> Next reports from our superintendent. >> I have couple of reports. Um gifts to the district. We have quite a few gifts to the district. Um some very large monetary values and all are appreciative no matter the size. Our first uh gift, we have a $10,000 cash um donation from Anonymous to a lunch hero program. $2,500 cash from Paul and Judy Eland uh lunch hero program. $2,000 cash from Raymond England lunch hero program. $1,31 cash from the Collegiate Presbyterian Church lunch hero program. $1,000 uh cash from Don Tupe in memory of Tammy Tupe. uh who was a previous fellow's elementary custodian. $9
077$99 cash fellow staff in memory of Tim Tuberty who was an associate at the Fellows Elementary. $500 cash Dorothy Anderson lunch hero program $47 cash from the North North Minister Presbyterian Church for the lunch hero program. $370 cash from Collegiate United Methodist Church in Wesley and Wesley Foundation for the lunch hero program. Miscellaneous art supplies value around $200 from John Mary Joe Matilda for the Ames CSD art departments. $100 cash from Danielle and Jordan Turk from the Hope Pantry books value about $52 from Christy Minion. uh Mitchell Elementary Media Center, $50 cash from Patricia Newman for the Ames High Acquires, and $20 cash from Nita Grass from the Lunch Hero program. Once again, it's an honor to read these each month, and we do have some updated opportunities on our uh website that is actually
078has a QR code or an option to actually donate directly within the website to specific programs. We'd probably be looking at that. um a way to increase that with the Ames bringing up the Ames education foundation and then also looking at um potential support for the PK and beyond that may go beyond our uh dollars received from the state. So, it's just another way to I think we have a very supportive community when it comes down to projects. I think it's just a matter of making sure we're asking and giving the right direction for our community and our businesses to move forward with donation. uh the enrollment aspect of it. This is a uh similar document. Um I'm not going to go through it in much detail. Uh it's very similar to what is looked
079at each month. Uh the elementary just kind of looks at our consistent numbers as it was from um last week. This is an updated document uh that is maintained at every board meeting. uh we will then um starting looking at our projection numbers for next year uh and then also looking how uh this document changes. So updating um we will start having some resignations or retirements coming in December. So when we move from December to January, that's when um I will be more diligent on communicating about the enrollment documents, the staffing documents that connects to budget and class sizes and um possible projections with an enrollment decrease of six students. So it's just kind of a beginning onboarding for the new uh board members is this is just a snapshot and uh I will communicate
080much more greatly in future board meetings. So to help with the time this is what our current name board members don't have the ability to zoom in their computer. >> Oh that's you're saving them by not making them try to read that. >> Need some binoculars. >> I'm squinting. kind of shows our elementary numbers and then our secondary from last month to this month and then last year's numbers at the end of the year to this year's I attached the uh board agendas at your convenience. All right. Uh, thank you, Superintendent Grimes. And next, our chief financial officer has an item. >> Yes. Um, so typically by this time, this um school budget review committee has opened an application on the portal so that we can receive our on-time funding, which is an increase in
081spending authority for we had an increase of enrollment. Um if we have this one increase of enrollment, if we have um new students that are open or rolled out of our district that were not open and rolled out the prior year or ELP or English language learner students that are beyond five years, um that application is due December 1st and as of the time that this board meeting started, it still is not open. So it only gives us seven days. So hopefully um that will be open though we will not have that to approve tonight since that application is not open for us. Last year it was approved at our November um 18 meeting that one we're we'll just get we'll remove that from the Okay. >> All right. Anything from our student representatives? >>
082No items today. Thank you. >> Thank you for joining us. Um and any items for our board members? >> Wonderful. New business. We have our uh appointment of secretary and treasurer. The board to appoint Sher Rous treasure. >> Any discussion? Moved by the ward, seconded by Beer. All in favor say I. >> I >> oppose. Nay. Passes 70. Our appointment of legal counsel. >> Move the board appoint allers and puny as legal. >> Second move by beer bomb. Seconded by the ward. All in favor. Oh well discussion. All in favor say I. >> I. Oppose. Nay. Passes 70. Appointment of the newspaper of record. I move the board appoint. >> I know my Yeah, I I had just read it though, so I figured that was pretty close. [laughter] >> Second. >> Somebody can second,
083right? >> Yeah. >> Um, any discussion? All in uh Shields Cook moved, seconded by Beerbomb. All in favor say I. I >> I oppose. Nay. That passes 70. Next is gifts to the districts. >> Move the board approve the gifts as presented. >> Right. Move by beer bomb. Seconded by Deward. All in favor say I. >> I. >> Opposed. Nay. >> Passes 70. Next is our new course proposals. >> Move the board approve the course proposals as presented. >> Any discussion? Uh moved by beer bomb, seconded by the ward. All in favor say I. >> I. >> Oppos? Nay. Passes 70. And then we will hold the next item, the request uh for a future meeting when that those open. I haven't noted any request for the superintendent. Do we not? Oh, so I move
084we table or hold table the >> well no according to our training it's not table it's not table >> [clears throat] >> um but anyway >> hold to a set date of our next meeting item F on the agenda >> second >> all right move by Shields Cook seconded by Berbomb to hold until our next meeting all in favor say I >> I oppose nay passes 70 our board planning calendar Our next regular meeting is December 8th. >> Uh and at that meeting is a work session. Correct. >> Yes. Uh and we will talk about board committees, uh board handbook and all of those fun things. And I'm going to try to make this take as long as possible because I know Angie and Allan want to go to a basketball game. I'll hand it
085on over for Ames accolades. I'm just kidding. Ames accolades from Superintendent Grimes. >> You're You have it on there. >> I do. Uh once again uh Ames accolades is really to promote the good things happening on within our staff. Those are board table and then those are also shared within the district. >> I move we adjourn. >> Second. >> Any discussion? No. Move by Bob seconded by Dart. All in favor say I. I. Oppose. Nay. Passes 70. We are adjourned. Thank you all.