001Seven. Are you ready? Okay. It is now 6:01 and I'm calling to order the regular Board of Education meeting for Indian Prairie School District 204 on Monday, May 18th, 2026. Michelle, will you please call the roll? Ms. Donahue. Here. Ms. Fostik. Here. Mr. Kurbis. Here. Ms. Grover. Present. Mr. Rising. >> Here. And Ms. Genz. Here. We have a quorum. Mr. Kurbis, as your last official meeting, will you please lead the pledge of allegiance? I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. The next board meeting will be on June 8th. Tonight we have nine board salutes. We'll start out with Ms. Genz. I do have three. 2026 Best Communities for Music Education. The
002board salutes the Indian Prairie music program and community for being named a 2026 Best Community for Music Education. Now in its 27th year, this award program recognizes school districts nationwide for their dedication to providing equitable access to music learning as part of a well-rounded education. The Indian Prairie Community was selected for this national honor through a comprehensive application and review process facilitated and verified by the independent education and arts firm Wolf Brown. This marks the 15th time Indian Prairie has received this national recognition. Congratulations to our music teachers and the community members who provide such outstanding support for music education here in District 204. 33rd annual Midwest Media Educators Association High School Video Festival. The board salutes the media production students at Neuqua Valley for their performance at the 33rd annual Midwest Media Educators Association
003Video Festival. Competing against 35 schools from across the region, the students earned 12 top honors and five finalist spots in categories ranging from news and sports to cinematography and comedy. We also celebrate the students who received student production awards from the TV Academy and those moving on to the national competition. This record-breaking year is a true testament to the hard work of our students and the dedicated teachers who support them. Congratulations to everyone involved on this outstanding achievement. And last but not least from me, corporate-sponsored National Merit Scholarship winners. The National Merit Scholarship Corporation released the names of the second group of winners in the 71st annual National Merit Scholarships program which includes approximately 700 distinguished high school seniors who earned corporate-sponsored awards financed by about 300 corporations, company foundations, and other business organizations. Seven
004District 204 high school seniors were named in this year's competition. Claire Nang and Rachel Chen from Metea Valley, Arav Goswami, Rhea Mascarenhas, and Aditi Keshav from Neuqua Valley, and Vaishnavi Reddy and Amogh Shobhana from Waubonsie Valley. Congratulations on this stellar achievement. Ms. Fasbender. National PTA Reflections Award winners. The board salutes Eugenia Perret-Gentile, a second grader at Patterson Elementary, for her musical composition Together with the Wind, which earned an Award of Excellence in the 2025-26 National PTA Reflections Arts program. Also recognized is Nithin Srinivasan, a sixth grader at Gregory Middle School, who received a Merit Award for his piece Together in Unison. For more than 55 years, the Reflections program has empowered students nationwide to express themselves through creative works, and these two District 204 students were among only 27 from Illinois selected for national review.
005Congratulations to Eugenia and Nithin on this remarkable accomplishment. Do you have a second one? Okay. Um Mr. Rising. I have two. Uh the first one is SAM Labs Annual Design Challenge. The board salutes the student teams and teachers from Fry and White Eagle Elementary Schools for achieving national and regional acclaim in the SAM Labs Annual Design Challenge. Get Wild with SAM Labs. In this national STEM competition, Owen, Jacob, Daniel, and Will from teacher D. Batchelder's class won the national prize in the fourth through eighth grade bracket for their innovative project Snake Serpent Attack. In the same bracket, Emma, Maddie, and Vivi, Ellen, and Abby from teach teacher Janine Gurtitsch Gurtitsch's class secured the regional prize for their creative project Mission Meerkat. By combining engineering, coding, and found materials to build these wildlife-inspired inventions, these students
006and their educators have a demonstrated the spirit of innovation and excellence within our district. Congratulations to both. The next one, Metea Valley journalists take home national awards. The board salutes Metea Valley High School student journalists Samra Duty Patel, William Donofrio, and Nitra Nulobolu for their success in the National Federation of Press Women's High School Communications Contest. Contest. Samra Duty earned first place nationally in in opinion writing for Revenge is not justice. William took first place nationally in feature reporting for car dependency threatens individuals, and Nitra received a national honorable mention in cartooning for breaking down walls. The contest is a rigorous competition that evaluates clarity, style, and impactful storytelling. Congratulations to Samra Duty, William, and Nitra on this stellar accomplishment. Ms. Grover. 2026 Middle School Educator of the Year by DuPage Regional Office of Education.
007The board salutes Hill Middle School math teacher David James for being named the DuPage Regional Office of Education Middle School Educator of the Year. This award reflects the talent and dedication found within our schools as honorees are selected from competitive nominations across the entire country. Congratulations, David, for your commitment to excellence in the classroom. Virtual Enterprises International Youth Business Summit. The board salutes the 34 Neuqua Valley business students who traveled to New York City and made history. They are the first team outside of New York or California in the 30-year history of Virtual Enterprise International to win the national business plan competition. Students competed in national business competitions, participated in leadership and networking experiences, and entered their work at the International Trade Exhibition. Thanks to the guidance of facilitators Beth Schmit-Schmitgol, Beth Knut, and Hoth
008Jahansson, sorry, John Hanson, these students have proven themselves to be among the best young entrepreneurs in the world. Congratulations on the stellar accomplishment. Mr. Kurbis. Naperville Crime Stopper calendar winner. The board salutes Brookdale Elementary third grader student Zoe Chen for winning the Naperville Police Department's Crime Stopper calendar contest, earning her entry into the calendar for the 2026-2027 school year. Congratulations, Zoe. Let's have a big round of applause for all of these great accomplishments. [applause] We will now have a presentation from Matt Shiple regarding the 2027-2031 budget forecast. >> [snorts] [snorts] >> Good evening, members of the Board of Education. Welcome to tonight's matinee performance of our budget presentation. Uh tonight's presentation is in line with board policy 4.10, although we will be making uh references to other board policies uh during the presentation as well.
009And it's primarily linked with strategic plan priority four. Although again, it does relate to um all of the other board uh strategic plan priorities as well. Uh this is the second of four budget presentations as part of the cycle to adopt our 2026-27 school year budget. And I'll say this is sort of the presentation where we start pivoting a little bit from looking at um high-level data and five-year data and some forecast data into into really starting to hone in to what some of our priorities are for the upcoming school year. Uh tonight's agenda, uh we'll just start with uh kind of re-listing our budget priorities and what our administrative team sort of starts as our uh foundation as we build a budget. Uh we'll summarize some of the key points talked about during our
010February presentation. Uh I will show our budget to actual summary and revenue updates through April of this year. So again, trying to get a good um anchoring and and uh data about where where we've been the the past years we we build next year's budget. Uh we'll then really do do it our first real look at our operating expenditures on a five-year time horizon. Uh summarize some of our priorities for for both the the upcoming year as well as uh the 2027-28 school year as well. Uh we'll look at the non-operating funds. That'll be a quick update. Uh we are planning next month to do a safer stronger 204 update where we'll go into those um pieces in a little bit more detail. And then we'll conclude with a summary and any next steps. So
011again, just starting with what our priorities are as we uh build our budget. We've we've shown these to the boards before, but always want to uh anchor with them. Uh our our priorities are a sustainable and transparent budget. Um that starts with structurally balanced operating forecasts. And I do want to say that when we talk about structurally balanced, really trying to look with a 3 to 5-year time horizon. We're not looking to to play games or to try and balance one year of a budget over another with with potentially moving revenues or expenditures one way or another. Really trying to build a sustainable budget over a a significant period of time. Looking at maintaining necessary operating reserves. And then also using the recognition status from ISBE as kind of kind of again a good benchmark
012for ensuring that our financial status is healthy and that we we again have the reserves. We have the capacity to to run the district. We do look closely at our strategic plan objectives to ensure operational alignment. And then again with the passage of the safer stronger 204 referendum, we've also added as a priority to maintain the commitment to the taxpayers we made during that referendum. The largest one being maintaining a 37 cent non-operating tax rate. We do this all through a transparent and accountable process. It includes four board meetings including this evening's. Compliance with all state and federal laws regarding budget posting and and compliance. Again, there's a significant compliance piece now that we are issuing bonds. Um and I'm proud to report we are current with all those filings. We do have a AA+
013and AAA bond rating and all the documents that build this budget are available at ipsd.org/businessoffice. Um This is kind of a a new new graphic and just kind of wanted to to again share it as we we talk anchor our discussion this evening. Um what are the foundations for a stable budget for a suburban school district in Illinois? And really I think we've identified five pillars of that. And I think over the past several years we've done a lot of good work to ensure all five of those pillars are as strong as possible. Um the first again in Illinois we are all uh dependent on property taxes to fund education. So, the first pillar is that strong property tax base. Uh and we've talked over over the past presentation in February and over the past
014several years, we continue to see our our strong property growth both in new property and existing property values uh continue to be available to support the district. Uh again, uh already the second or third time we've mentioned the importance of maintaining adequate reserves. Uh again, money that's available there for for emergency contingency to safeguard against sudden revenue shortfalls, and to be available just just to provide the working cash needs uh on a day-to-day basis for the district. Um the third pillar, we want to talk about just stable enrollment. And again, this is an area where we've done a lot of work as a as a board and as administration over the past several years starting with our boundary work back in 2022. Um really ensuring we know what what students were were projecting over the
015next several years, ensuring we have boundaries and and feeder patterns that support that. And again, our our always staying aware and and on top of what our enrollment is doing to ensure we're we're staffed and operating appropriately. Um the fourth pillar, probably the one we've we've added to the most over the past 18 months, and that's ensuring there's a a dedicated source of funding for capital. Uh so again, now with the the passage of the Safer, Stronger 204 referendum, we have that dedicated source for capital. We are not looking towards the operating budget to provide significant sources of of revenues to to support and maintain our buildings. And then again, the the final pillar maybe the um maybe the most important, and that's just ensuring strong governance and management practices. So again, um using data
016to to make decisions, um showing structurally balanced budgets, and and presenting data regularly, ensuring we have transparency and ensuring we're aligned with district policies. So again, I want to um mention this is something that that I think both our board and administration have taken very seriously and we we continue to uh to operate under all five of these pillars. Uh and again, that puts us in a good position as we talk about some of the budgetary challenges moving forward. So, I'm going to February's uh presentation. So, again, this this presentation was really focused on a 5-year horizon and specifically focused on on revenue or sources of funds for the district. So, we talked about how we expect our revenues to grow around the rate of inflation for the next 5 years and that increase is
017primarily coming from our local property tax base. Um we did show that our property values uh are continue to grow and continue to grow above CPI so that our tax rate is the lowest it's been since 2009. Uh we also talked a little bit about new property and where where we anticipate some new property coming online in the district. And we do see some some s- um some good commercial property as as well as residential growth coming online in the next several years. Uh we did talk about state and federal revenues. These generally are more challenging than the local revenues and we're projecting these to stay flat or only see minimal increases over the next couple years. And then again, finally, we we covered our capital needs and and where we were on the capital
018side, noting that we're funded through 2032 as a result of the safer stronger 204 referendum. Um Again, um we we've covered this uh as part of February, but as we transition to looking at the operating funds, we are talking about the six funds that maintain the day-to-day operations of the district. We're not talking about the the referendum funds, which are the non-operating funds. And so, with that, we'll we'll transition into kind of our our operating budget discussion. Again, this is the same budget that was presented in February and that the board adopted uh over the summer. Uh we adopted a budget that was effectively a break-even budget, just a small amount of surplus for the year. And we adopted a budget that had that left us with a fund balance percentage estimated at 34.4% which
019is again above the 25% target set by the board in board policy. So with that said, we've been tracking to that budget very closely. Our team updates this this regularly and and as an administration, we are regularly reviewing how are we projecting to that budget. And so I'm showing that how we're projecting that budget through April 30th here. Um so as you'll see both revenue and expenditures are largely in line with budget, although um we we are trending a little above both both numbers by about three three and a half million dollars. Um just to kind of uh anchor uh you know, provide context to that, that is less than 1% of both total revenues and expenditures. So um you know, we're we're close, but we are um slightly above on the expenditure side. Uh
020the revenue number is primarily uh due to final new property coming above what we uh budgeted for and even above what we expected when we uh levied in December. And I'll cover that in a little bit more shortly. Um on the expenditure side, you'll see several lines that are really close to budget, although there are um again some that are slightly over. Um on the salary side specifically, we we were showing a a positive variance, I believe, in February. We're now showing that we'll be slightly over budget. Uh the number one driver right now on sal- on salary expense is substitute expense. So we are significantly over budget on substitute expenses uh for the year. And again, we'll talk about that as a as a budget priority shortly. Um special education transportation and outplacement services
021also continue to trend above budget. Uh I believe we've been updating the board about that almost since the budget was adopted uh back in September. So continues to be an area that that we're focused on and uh have made we'll be looking to to prioritize uh how to improve that going forward. So despite those those few challenges, again, we are projecting a balanced budget uh when when the actuals come in as for fiscal year 2026. Um so again, what most of most of the night will now be uh talking about operating expenditures, but just a few quick updates on the revenue side. Uh since we talked in February, we did receive our final property tax extension from both DuPage and Will Counties. And a bit of good news to share, our new property came in
022$25 million above what we were projecting. That adds about a million dollars to to the annual uh budget. Um really this this really comes down to uh growth of residential property specifically in Will County uh where we do have a a significant new subdivision coming online. As we shared in February, there's a lot of uncertainty on on when different um uh different properties come you know, become available to to the taxing bodies. So, I think a lot of this is just a timing issue and maybe just finalizing a value of a significant development that we knew was occurring. Um we'll continue to work with Will County to try and uh you know, hone in those numbers and and get them a little tighter than than we have in the past. Um again, in this situation,
023it was it was good news, but that doesn't mean in the future that uh you know, we could have an estimate coming under. So, we'll continue to work with the counties on that process. Um again, just just to reiterate, lowest tax rate since 2009 and you can see the the annual chart there on the left of the slide. And then as we look at that safer stronger 204 tax rate, that is now coming in at 32 cents. So, that's below the 37 cent commitment I made as part of the referendum. And again, we'll share briefly during the non-operating funds uh discussion, a little opportunity that creates uh as we look to accelerate some of our capital work. Um No real updates to report on state of Illinois. Um continuing to wait for the the state's
024budget. We're now T minus 12 days until they're supposed to have that passed. Um but I think overall the the message uh continues to be that even if we see some increases uh this year, it'll continue to be below the level of CPI and we shared this same graph back in February showing how that gap continues to grow and is now at about $10 million from 2018 as the base year. Um federal funding is where we've probably had the most significant change since we spoke in February and that's unfortunately due to the reduction of title one funding. Um we now received our initial allocation from the state in late April. We're now budgeting a $1.2 million reduction in title one funding. That's over 50% of that total grant. Um federally the same amount was allocated
025to title one, but we've seen a decrease of what went to Illinois, a decrease of about $38 million. And then IPSD was the second largest decrease statewide in title one funding. Uh We talked during the SR funding period several years ago about some of the uh challenges and equities um kind of things that don't make a lot of sense when it comes to how federal funding is is allocated. And and really a lot of those same issues kind of kind of came up again with this title grant. Um so again, the title grant's calculated based on a poverty rate. That poverty rate's based on census data. It's not based on the students in our buildings. Uh it's one to two years in arrears. Uh and it's relies on a a poverty threshold which is different
026than the services we provide to title one eligible students. So the poverty rate is a different rate than when we talk about free reduced lunch rate for for how we identify um low-income students within our district. Um other federal revenues did come in consistent with February's presentation. So this title one uh issue is really the the primary driver of any changes to federal revenue in our forecast. Um so I wanted to to to show this this graphic here, which I think um kind of tries to explain why that five why why that decrease and and again what was really kind of a marginal decrease for us became so impactful. And really although we talk about Title I as being um one grant or or one source of funds, it it's almost three separate funding sources
027in one. And so and and some of those additional funding sources are tied to to hitting a specific being at or above a specific percentage of poverty. And so what we're showed here is that as we got as we went from just over 5% to just under 5%, we started um no longer qualifying for the targeted grant and the educational incentive grant. Both those require that number to be above 5%. So even though we had a a decrease of less than 200 students in this calculation, by losing out on those dollars, we lost over a million dollars of funding. Um just to tie this to uh the Vision 2030 plan, one of the priorities of Vision 2030 was predictable funding uh for Illinois school districts. Uh I would argue that when such a small change
028in students can create such a disparate impact from a dollar standpoint, that does not represent predictable funding. Um I'd also point out again we we received this allocation the last week of April. Um so when you start talking about the time to to implement changes and things, again I don't think that's that's what we mean by predictable funding. Um I don't want to um I I I do want to credit our team that is that has done a lot of hard work over the last two to three weeks to really um try and minimize the impact of this change, but as shown here I don't want to downplay the fact that this has the potential to have long-term impact on our district and specifically on the schools and students that were receiving Title 1 services.
029Uh showed a 5-year revenue update summary in February. Again, this is this is pretty similar to what was shown in February. Uh total revenues are still in line, but again, we've got a reduction in federal revenues that's being offset by an increase in local property taxes. Again, we talk about that that challenge uh of how dependent we are on the local tax base. This is a perfect example of how that that challenge continues uh to grow. So, with that, uh again, I transition into our operating expenses. Uh so, I'll start by showing what what the 5-year projection looks like for our district. Um again, a lot of a lot of numbers and don't want to uh don't want to be giving people a vision test necessarily, but uh try and hit the hit that um
030when you take that revenue growth that that was shown on the last slide, um and you align it with our operating expenses, um we are showing a structurally balanced budget. So, we're showing that um over the 5-year period, we are are um we are generally at a break-even position. However, we are projecting a one-time deficit for the 2026-2027 school year um of about $4.9 million. Um so, again, we've had many years uh of uh small surpluses and moderate surpluses in our budget. We are projecting uh going into the future that we will have uh similarly uh small surpluses, but we do have a 1-year deficit projected for the 2026-2027 school year. Um so, just starting to to talk about what what's uh potentially driving driving that that forecast, uh again, driving driving the structurally balanced
031nature of the 5 years, while also talking about what's causing the 1-year deficit. Um so, consistent with prior years, the majority of our budget remains salaries and benefits, over 3/4 some budget um relates to to staff directly employed by the district and another 15% or so of purchased services represents outsourced services such as custodial, transportation, and food service. So, even those those show up as purchased services, those are primarily representing individuals that are in our buildings serving our students every day. Um we are planning 2.7 million of reductions um from baseline uh for 26-27 and that does include the impact of that Title I reduction. Uh and we're projecting a reduction of about 20 FTE which uh comes to about 0.6% of our total FTE. So, I'll point out we also saw a small enrollment
032decline over the past year. Uh that enrollment decline largely uh matches with that that total FTE decline for next year. Uh since we talked in February, we we've been busy. Uh we have uh negotiated two uh union agreements. Uh we've also brought to the board two uh two years' worth of transportation contracts as well. All of those uh all the impacts of those new agreements has been built into this this operating uh forecast. Uh so, again, we're accounting for anything that is uh that is known as of today. So, again, looking at our budget priorities for 26-27, I think there's really really four areas I I want to point out. Um the first, again, uh is to minimize the impact of that Title I funding loss. So, recognizing that that's going to be a significant
033um challenge, but trying to minimize that impact to the fullest extent possible. Um So, we do anticipate that that that's going to result in the reduction of about 25 positions. Uh we are still finalizing some of the um the exact exact positions or or how some of that um that impact is felt. Um we are transitioning about $200,000 worth of Title I funding um in into local funding programs. So, um e- with the the even with a projected deficit, we felt that was necessary again to to ensure we were supporting these buildings as as as best as possible. So, we are taking on a portion of those those expenditures with local funds. Um this has also meant the consolidation of some preschool programming and again, we're still working through some of the details of that
034as well. Um we've really continued to prioritize our IMTSS work. So again, as part of our budget process, we really look to be aligned with our strategic plan and one of our strategic plan key priorities was that implementation of IMTSS systems. And so, that does mean that uh uh even in a challenging budget environment, we have made funds available for for a few select positions that we felt were critical to align with that work and to and to demonstrate that work within our schools. Finally, I I third, I did I did point out that our substitute expense continues to grow. We're projecting substitute expense to be over $6 million for the current year. Um that does represent one of the largest expense categories, um one of the fastest growing expense categories in our budget. Um
035and so, we are we are kind of taking an all hands approach to talk about how we can reduce those costs. Um that that did start with with some discussions during our uh collective bargaining agreements, but this this really has become become a challenge for us to to manage from an expense standpoint. Um I I'll say if this was an easy solution, we would have we would have had it to you already. Uh but but it is something that we're going to start looking at very and taking taking a close look at. I do want to emphasize that uh you know, we pay we we need substitutes and pay substitutes for a variety of reasons. There are staff generated absences when staff are sick or unable to report to work work that requires a that
036requires a substitute. But a lot of this is also things that we're doing at a district level. So, uh you know, this is you know, looking at how we do um professional development better, how we do uh curriculum development better. Um you know, are there scheduling components here to ensure teachers aren't needing a substitute so they can attend IEP meetings, for example. So, there are um again, really really a variety of things and encompassed in this. Um a lot of things from just a scheduling logistics and um standpoint that that really become part part of what we're trying to um address. Um the the fourth and final budget priority then was really at at investment in our student services. Uh so, our student services team presented in in March and they showed the chart here
037on the right, which just shows that that continued growth in some of our high incident disabilities. And really with a focus on on uh students um uh qualifying for services related to autism. Uh so, again, uh even in a challenging budget environment, we felt this was a priority was to to find the resources available to to support this growth and this need within our student services uh department. So, we are uh budgeting a a 15 uh FTE equivalent increase in special education positions. Again, primarily to support RISE program initiatives. Um again, as I mentioned earlier, we are we are seeing a a slight decline in enrollment over the the last year and projected for next year. So, these new positions will primarily be supported through a through a reduction in core classroom caused by that
038enrollment decrease. Um we're we're excited. I mean, this is a significant investment in our student services space. It it definitely the largest investment we've made in the past 10 years. Um but I do want to reiterate, this is this is likely a one-time opportunity. Um and we are going to continue to um, need to look at at how these services are delivered. And we also need to continue to advocate at a state level for additional state resources coming to support special education specifically. And the the tagline I'd like to potentially start tonight, but we are we are if we are a destination district for special education services, we need to be a destination district for special education funding. Um, because with such a when we are with such a large percentage of our funding coming
039from local resources, um, we're just not we're not able to to get the resources we need to to support this this population as it continues to grow. Uh, so those are the four priorities for 26-27. Uh, just as we look to 27-28, um, you know, that you know, this kind of becomes how we are showing a one-year uh, deficit, but also are are confident that this is that this really is a one-year deficit. Um, so the first thing uh, we've talked several times with the board about the operating savings we expect to to generate through our safer stronger 204 capital program. Um, so we do expect to really see those savings start to come in line on 27-28, uh, specifically with the transition uh, of the Neuqua Valley freshman to the main campus. Um, again,
040I think we've we've shared before, but we we budget that that represents about $2 million of operating savings coming from a variety of sources. Um, we do continue to prioritize uh, energy savings as part of that capital program, um, both through our LED lighting initiatives through through just some more efficient uh, work in our HVAC systems. And then I think uh, again, we've shared we're we're adding solar panels to five buildings this this summer as well. Um, initial reports on on buildings with the LED light conversion is we're using about 25% less electricity and saving about a similar amount from a dollar perspective as well. Um, Um, second priority uh, again, just just speaks to to some of the work we did, uh, as part of our, uh, collective bargaining agreements. Uh, we we really
041feel we have an opportunity to to really, uh, uh, refine and improve our health insurance plans to ensure those plans, uh, continue to meet the needs of our employees, but also, uh, ensure some cost stability for our district. And so, again, we had very collaborative discussions with with leadership of both our, uh, both our associations about how we can can meet that goal, and then ultimately, um, you know, use some of those savings to to help, uh, help meet the needs of the board, but also help help meet the the needs of their members as well. Um, finally, we, uh, as the board knows, we are starting our, uh, Prism initiative, uh, and again, we do, uh, expect to see some reductions and efficiencies come out of that work as well. So, again, just wanted
042to spend a few minutes this evening talking about our non-operating funds. Um, again, we continue to maintain two not continue to maintain two non-operating funds, um, both the the capital fund or the work we do for district facilities, and then our debt service fund or how we repay, uh, the obligations that come from that capital work. Um, again, very limited recurring revenue is available, but but again, this this really becomes one of those key pillars to the financial health of the district is ensuring we have the the the capital program in place and funded through the successful referendum. Um, so, again, just like in February, we are on time and at or below budget on these projects. Um, we are, uh, anticipating savings that that we just mentioned coming into the forecast in 2027-28. Uh,
043and I will point out, uh, but we are working on our next semi-annual report to the community on this work, and we should have that available, um, by the end of the month or, uh, at the time of our next board presentation at the latest. So, I just want to start and and look at sort of the updated forecast for our debt service uh fund and just just again put a new concept or or um a potential opportunity in front of the board. So, again, we um we had a commitment to the the community to keep that tax rate at or below 37 cents. Um with the amount of new property we've added in the continued strong property values of of current property, that tax rate's now sitting at 32 cents. Um so, there is
044an opportunity within the current debt schedule to maybe accelerate some debt issues and repayments. Um and so, that's kind of what's shown here just under that uh debt service proposed line um showing what would happen if we added an additional million dollars of debt service each year. Um so, you can kind of see how that flows through the um calculation. We'd still maintain a tax rate um again below 37 cents and and still have have a little bit of cushion there. Um but, this new payment schedule could allow us to um to issue an additional bond, issue a bond earlier, and potentially complete uh some of the work we we were planning maybe at the back end of the program uh even earlier. Um so, again, if we if we look at what that impact
045could be on the the capital projects fund, so originally we had not um anticipated issuing any new uh capital bonds until uh summer of 2027. There is now an opportunity to potentially do an issuance this fall uh and again use those those funds to to start some work um earlier than anticipated. Um and then just just to kind of finally uh close out the the capital piece, um again, we'll talk about this a little bit more next month, but we also talked a lot about how um the capital budget not just included the bonds, but also included the opportunities for rebates, incentives, and other sort of revenues that that could occur as part of the capital projects. We are starting to see those revenues come in. Um we're showing this in the locally funded capital
046um bucket here and you'll see again we're we're anticipating having about $4 million now available to also supplement some of that work. Um we are just tracking this part of local because um there's some less restrictions or some different restrictions on those funds. So uh those will be shown as part of the local capital um forecast going forward as opposed to as part of the bond funds. Again, just trying to to track the funds separately and maintain compliance with um with bond with bond requirements. But again, a you know, good news that we we're starting to see some of that additional revenue become available um and available to again supplement the the capital work as as we've previously discussed. So with that said, um we are starting to to outline the uh steps that will
047that are required to to approve a budget for the 26-27 school year. Um I'm tentatively planning on a July 13th budget presentation and then a budget public hearing and adoption on August 24th. We are required uh by state law to have a 30-day period between that initial presentation and the adoption. Um as mentioned earlier, uh next month on June 8th we'll be diving um much deeper into our Safer Stronger 204 program um including an update on a lot of the design work that's occurred for Hill Middle School. Uh I I'm I will say that's going to be a a pretty exciting night. I think we're really excited to to uh show the board board some of the the great ideas our team has come up with with how we can transform that facility. Um and
048as always we will continue to to update the board and be available for any questions um with those questions starting now. Okay, thank you. Mr. Krouse. Two points, uh slide 10. This kind It kind into state advocacy. Which you mentioned about special education and you mentioned that we have a growing deficiency here. But I think the the district and the school board need to look at expanding our advocacy to include a tier two district organization. Um, I think the other advocacy groups we have, IASB, Land of Lincoln, are kind of having their own focus. And I think we we need a you know, ad- advocating solely on our behalf is kind of level one. I think if we group together, um, you know, that'll that'll help us with the advocacy. Um, I'm not thinking we
049should hire our own lobbyist to do this. I think there's efficiency in numbers. Um, and I think part of the special education conundrum with the funding is you know, it's a variable in the evidence-based funding formula that might need tweaking. I think if we just our tagline is you know, we would like more money. That's not as impactful as hey, we should change the formula for everybody. So, I think uh if we seriously look at a tier two um lobbying organization, I think that will help with this discrepancy we're dealing with in slide 10 and the special education problem. Slide 14. So, you want to maintain healthy reserves. Um, if you have too much reserves, then you are wasting not reasonably using taxpayer resources. If you have too few reserves, then you are end up
050borrowing to make payroll. Um, that's where we get our 25% minimum from. If you look at the bottom left, we're at 35. And you can see how we used our reserves to deal with uh a federal discrepancy partially. You can see that our projection for next year was a 20% reduction overall. So, we used our reserves uh mindfully to level out the budget. And then you can see going forward that it is structurally balanced. Um something that is concerning though is the direction of our reserves going from 35 to 30 over 5 years. So, directionally, you can see it's smoothing out. But uh reserves take a long time to increase. And usually they jump down quickly. So, you see how we went from 35 to 33. Um we don't want to have uh not enough
051money in our savings account to make it a problem. So, I'd like to see that uh you know, to slow down the decrease or to start bringing it up. That's it. Ms. Gantz. I want to thank you um for the presentation again. You always explain things in a way that it makes a whole lot more sense than just looking at all of the numbers. And I do appreciate how challenging it is right now, especially as you're talking about, you know, a decrease in enrollment but increase in special ed needs. So, I can really appreciate when you're talking about everything, the funding that we've been able to increase for special education with 15 new positions. I think we can all agree that's that's absolutely wonderful. Um but what I did email you about um and you
052did answer me. Um I think I would just love for everyone else to kind of hear those answers too was really slide 16. Um and I also can appreciate how difficult of a job it is to actually minimize the impact of Title 1 funding loss. And I have no doubt that when you were all working together, you did that 100% with that in mind. Um my only question concern really is when we're talking about reducing 25 positions, you're talking about some of these Title 1 schools only having one maybe two interventionists trying to do the job of what currently four or five are. So, what I'm wondering is if we're not able to bring some of these positions back, are we at looking into ways that we can still academically help these students that they're
053still going to need the help whether or not we have a math interventionist in the school or not. So, yes, absolutely. That was more directed at you, honestly. >> [laughter] >> Thank you. Uh the the answer is yes. >> Okay. Um through our IMTSS process, that's one way by which we look at what are the services we're providing to students. Um are they making progress? And if not, then do we rethink about what what interventions we're doing and in place? Mhm. The schools still have interventionists in the building. Yeah. Um and but I I I will admit uh the fact that we have uh you know, teachers and administrators in the audience, um it will take a little bit more effort to make that happen. Some of the positions that were cut were teaching assistants.
054Some were um uh teacher level positions. >> Mhm. When you see the fact that we lost $1.2 million, it Right. it it it's impactful. There's no other word around it. And so, um uh >> [laughter] >> I know we have the right people in the schools, the right uh staff who are doing all that they can to ensure the success of our children. Um and so, we looked at this very carefully with a very close lens at what are the positions we're cutting and how will the impact be felt. Yeah. No, thank you. I really do appreciate that. And again, I know it's it's from a funding loss that we had no control over. So, um I I just know there's also a lot of parents and staff concerns moving forward into next year. So,
055I thank you very much, honestly. Um and I have no doubt discussions will be continuing into the summer. So, thank you both. Yeah. No, the only thing I would add is uh you know, we independent of the the Title I funding, but even as we look at allocating all other funding, we are um you know, we do that with to and always trying to improve, but we do that with an equity lens. Um we do that recognizing that um you know, that that those buildings and the and those students some sometimes have different needs or or um more needs in some of our other uh buildings and and schools. So, you know, I'll point out things like um small we we do offer smaller class sizes at at those Title I buildings. Um that's always
056been locally funded and that will continue. Uh so so again, that's an example where uh again, of sort of uh you know, recognizing that and and using local funds to to achieve that as well. So, those local funds and those sort of allocations that have always also um provided some additional resources buildings, buildings, those will remain um regardless of the the Title I issue. Okay. No, thank you so much. I think it it helps for all of us to hear that and I know we really do try to look at everything with an equity lens and right now that that is a very large hit frankly to take. So I I do appreciate you guys kind of walking me through all of it, the community through all of it. And I have no doubt you'll
057keep us updated of any changes. Ms. Grover. Thanks Matt for the presentation and I echo what Ms. Gantz stated. You know you explained the title one and what's going on. My question is to substitute teaching. You mentioned that um you know it's one of our our we we spend a lot on substitute teaching and you may not know the answer but have you spoken with um neighboring districts or other districts as to if they are having the same concern and how they are handling it. I I think when we look at the data we would see that it's a um it is a regional or or statewide potentially national trend. Um I think we are still um um again maybe maybe have some uh some unique factors going on or or again maybe maybe still
058just a little bit um above the trend line if you will on that. Uh again I think coming um I think coming out of COVID in 2020 and 2021 there was a lot of um you know there there were a lot of just just natural absences as part of that period. Uh I think then we got into a a period where we were so far behind maybe on some professional development and and curriculum adoptions and things that that then we started um as a district maybe generating more more substitutes and I think that's really where we've got to start looking and having having some some really um deep discussions and and deep conversations about philosophically. Um we know that you know again curriculum development, we know professional development is is important work, Um but we
059also know the most important work is having a having the students' teacher in front of them as many days as possible. So, again, a com- there's a combination of factors going on and we're committed to looking at all of it. Again, I don't think we're necessarily unique, but uh you know, it's it's definitely a challenge for us. Thank you. I'll just add attending national conferences, I have asked the question and across the nation we have seen that issue as well. Mr. Rising. We go to slide eight. Um I'm going to start a little bit I'm going to combine some of what Mr. Carubis and Ms. Gantz both both said. Uh as we look at next year's um deficit and what's really driving that. I mean, you kind of laid it out on the right hand
060side of what's really driving that. And and if we even get more granular and specific than that, it's it's it's the the biggest deficits there is that purchase services part. Um I agree with Mr. Carubis. For people that don't understand how schools are funded from a state level, it's by tiers. And your your tier one are your lowest locally funded district. Your tier fours are your highest locally funded district. We're tier two. Um evidence-based funding for tier two districts has not been beneficial. Since 2017, we have been facing this issue of stagnant state funding. Um which has hurt us. and and and there's somewhat of a miss conception or misnomer out there even from fellow school board members across the state. They feel that tier two districts are getting extra state money. The reality is
061that the majority of the extra money that's coming from state funding is going to tier one districts. And what tier two districts are receiving we can't keep up with inflation and it's you can see it's killing our purchase services. And so if I could ask a question there if you had a I know this is crazy ballpark for you to but as far as our purchase services those are contracts that we have to frequently renew. We always try to negotiate those purchase services contracts or vendor contracts but the reality is is sometimes we're just renewing from year to year. Do you know on average the cost increase of purchase services if not you can get back to me. I mean it's again I'm just totally asking for a ballpark. I know some could be 1%
062increase year to year or some could be 15% increase from year to year. Is there any way you would even want to remotely even guesstimate that? Yeah I think the the the majority of that that expense again 69.2 million dollar budget for the current year the majority falls to to three purchase service categories. So our outsourced custodial our outsourced food service and our outsourced transportation. I think in general the the food service and the custodial has tracked pretty closely to CPI potentially even even slightly below it. It's the transportation where we've been well above the consumer price index over the past several years. I think our team has worked Um, extremely hard to to minimize that that impact. Uh, that's whether that's through um, you know, really really adopting and staying on the cutting edge
063of uh routing technology to ensure we're routing as efficiently as possible. Uh, I think back to our our boundary work where we had an 18% reduction in miles driven. Uh, you know, I I look at the the uh safety hazards and and work we do there to ensure that we're um at, you know, uh hunt as compliant as possible with with this the state regulations on on who's eligible for transportation. Um, it just it feels like we've gotten to a point where maybe we're we're running out of things to pull out of that bag of tricks on the regular um transportation or the general transportation. I think uh specifically this year where where we are um overbudget and where we're over where we thought we would be is on the special education transportation side. Um,
064again, a lot of those efficiencies and and drivers kind of um are minimized in that space. That really comes down to students qualifying for those services. Yeah. And so that that that ties or correlates a lot more closely with some of the other challenges we're we're seeing um from a expenditure standpoint in the special education space. And so, I guess my point there is since 2017 with evidence-based funding, it really hasn't helped two-tier tier two districts. Tier three and tier four, they get so much local revenue, they're not really struggling when we see increases in these purchased services contracts. Tier one districts have received millions of extra funding. Those are the districts that rightfully so were underfunded in the past, but those are the ones that are now creating building new buildings and everything else.
065I've been on this board for 15 years. And even before evidence-based funding 2017, state funding was prorated. So, we always receive less than the state promised us. Um And the reality is, as a district, we have not spent and no fault of our own, we have not spent even the state average of what school districts have across the state. Because we don't have the resource to spend that. On a positive note, I will say we are the 36th best school district in the country. 36 out of 12,000 school districts. So, we are doing great things, but to your point, Matt, when those purchase service contracts are going up so much more than inflation, CPI has been 2.7, 2.9, 3.4, and these contracts are going up 5 to 10%, that's where we're seeing this big huge
066reduction of of what's coming out that we're we haven't been able to keep up with. And oh, by the way, state reimbursement for transportation is the lowest it's been in the past 15 years as well. So, I just wanted to make that point because a lot of this you have even seen with those tier tier three and tier four districts where they did not see this coming as well, some of these purchase service increases. So, that's the point I wanted to make on that. Um just one final point, slide 21. Um you had asked our our eventual um kind of direction on this or thoughts on this. Um and I'll kind of briefly give you mine, but I'm sure you'll want to hear from other board members eventually or reach out to them individually. Um
067Kind of where I land on this as far as I am very excited that the tax rate we told our residents through the referendum, we have been less than that 37 cents. So, extremely excited about that because lower tax rate means lower taxes. We can get into the whole discussion how the assessor really makes up that mind of how much people get taxed anyway, but but we've kept our promise at least um as far as the extra money um to me it's kind of a no-brainer of why wouldn't we accelerate a payment as long as we're staying under that 37 cents, why wouldn't we accelerate a payment to potentially take out another bond to do additional work or pay off it early? To me that's doing what's the smartest thing to do with your money
068to maximize the funds that you have while still aligning to the commitment we said we would align to. So, to me that's kind of a a no-brainer, but um you know, I'm sure other board members will weigh in as as well, but that's all I have. Thank you so much. Ms. Fosdick. All right, my fellow board members have covered most of what I have to say, but uh Mr. Krups's comment about advocacy for EBF changes um reminded me that I also wanted to share there is an opportunity here for us to advocate at the federal level as well. Um on slide 12 when you talk about the impact of dropping below the 5% poverty rate and the fact that for us that represents 200 students, that change 200 students um is exactly the kind of
069personal story to take to our legislators and have that discussion face-to-face. So, I would like to see us continue to do that personally to help make those changes going forward. Thank you for the presentation and for the comments um by the board members. I um I echo many of the uh comments that were brought up already. Tier 2, you know, I've also been advocating that we need to pursue advocacy in a different route than some of our traditional groups because they are focused in a different direction, it seems. I also though recall a discussion with Mr. Rising. We have to watch or or maybe it was Mr. Curvis some someone or maybe one of the other board but it was about that okay, yeah, Tier 1 schools have been helped right over the ex- last
070ex-years and some of them recently moved to Tier 2. So, they're like in happy happy land right now, right? They don't know what Tier 2 is like where you get nothing. And so, we have to watch that the districts that are participating have a similar viewpoint as we do and may you know, maybe we can educate them at what it means to be now that you're in Tier 2, you got helped while you were in Tier 1, but now you're going to get what $15 a student per year type of increase. So, it's like we I think we need to selectively either educate some of the other Tier 2 districts or make sure that they're ones that have been there for a while like us. Yeah. So. They do learn quick though, I will say.
071Yeah. They they There were some fast learners this year when some of those uh districts went from Tier 1 to Tier Well, and I know like Chicago Public Schools, I don't know, are they Tier 2 still or Yeah, Chicago Public Schools and and that's actually one of the big changes go impacting this year is that cuz they're sitting right on the cusp between Tier 1 and Tier 2 with sort of again, if the if it's if the largest district goes one way or the other, then a bunch of other districts have to to go. And so, with CPS moved back to a tier one district this year it moved a fairly significant number and some fairly large districts from tier one to tier two. And again I think there were some fast learners in that
072group. I think there were some districts that got used to that additional tier one money that are that are now having some challenges but again if if something happens with CPS that moves them back up to your point they'll fall right back into the the tier one um area and and again maybe not be the the right partners who tell the the story of of our district. It is a little unique to be kind of smack dab in tier two for the the length of EBF. We don't have a it's it's a small club unfortunately. The positive is I sit on that state committee for evidence-based funding but I've only been appointed since the fall and there's only been two meetings and and I couldn't really come guns blazing um but the positive is we
073have a meeting again next month and Matt and I have been talking um we've also talked to lend and they've given us some ideas to better tell our story about tier two and and how they're struggling. Um I think there's also some opportunities for some discrepancy that and Matt has seen in some calculations that they've done with previous things around evidence-based funding so we're working towards spreading the word but it's going to take a broader advocacy as Mr. Crobus and and President Donahue has said. I also did participate in a interview a couple maybe three weeks ago with a group that is doing advocacy for public school funding and it's based in Illinois and they did come back to me and asked if I would join their small circle that meets like every two weeks
074or so so I said I would And, the first meeting is either tomorrow or Thursday, so I'm you know, I read them the riot act about what tier two is like, and um they were pretty shocked, actually. Um so, it was a good good discussion. The um when you mentioned some of the things we're doing to try and look at transportation costs over the last few years with um changing our boundaries and some of the other things. Our recent change you didn't mention is that we're no longer going to bus for preschool. So, that was significant savings that we'll have there. Yes. >> I I don't I'm not happy that we're doing that, but I just wanted to add that to your list of of things that we have been doing to try and look
075at the transportation costs. The um substitute teaching expense is a major concern in in the new teacher contract, we did put some incentives in there to try and um help uh address teachers taking a lot of time off because we all agree that that not only is expensive, but it also is we want our teachers in front of our classrooms, and the more we can do to encourage that, the better. Um everybody has talked about the $1.2 million cut that we got from the Title 1 federal funding, which is very concerning. Is that That's a yearly assessment, so next year we could be back at 5.1%, and or whatever number was. And again, we uh you know, kind of had the just had the conversation about EBF as well. It It works the same way.
076So, if we go for if we go back up to 5.1 or you know, 5.01, it it Yeah. most of that funding could be restored. So, again, when we talk about uh you know, predictability of funding or or lack of it it does go both ways. Yeah, the concern was and um I'm sorry I didn't get to ask questions ahead of time. So, but um the you mentioned that it's based on the census. Census in some people's mind is like a 10-year thing. So, it's like are we you know, stuck with some number now for the next >> Yeah. Yeah, I um There is the the annual census that's that's done once every 10 years. Again, the last census was done in 2020 and so I think there's been some um concerns for 6 years
077now about the the accuracy of of that data. Um it is kind of rolled forward each year. Um Um so so this but it but we're a year or two in arrears. So, I think we're now working off of like the 2023-2024 census, but but yeah, that's that's not data that's a you know, 100% sampling like the every 10 years. That's really doing some statistical sampling and some um some work at the census to kind of roll it forward. Uh and again, I'll just reiterate, it's not based on students actually attending in our buildings. It's based on what the census data is for the the general area for the Indian Prairie boundaries, but that could look different and and I think um potentially does look different from what um uh from what's what's occurring in
078our buildings. Uh one one final point to point out of that because it is something uh you know, the city of Aurora specifically has is working to sort of protest um the the census data. I You know, to demand a recount, I guess. Um And so there is some information that they're starting to share specifically in Aurora. Um again, where Aurora at uh the their city council has said, "We know our census data was inaccurate. We know it's costing us money. What can we do to correct this?" And so again, some of that may also be playing into it to our our issues as well. And that could look at the funding um formula that they use for this year where we have this $1.2 million cut. Uh I do I I don't think it
079would be retroactive, but it but it would be something that could help us going forward. So, again, I I know that they're the city of Aurora is starting to put information out about that uh that campaign this summer. So, I did I'd encourage uh I'd encourage our community and encourage our our board and others to to encourage people to to take that effort seriously as well. Cuz I think as as you point out, these these do have real consequences. I It does strike me that we do use a lot of terminology and things. Maybe for the audience, explain what Title I means. Sure. Yeah. Uh So, so real quick for for those who who came in late. Uh Yeah. The uh the the you know, Title I is one of our primary federal funding sources.
080It is It is tied to a uh um it's designed to to assist our our buildings that have a a certain percentage of low-income students uh to provide some supplemental funding to support those those buildings and those students. And again, we're we're just talking about um one of the budget challenges where uh we're looking at an over a million dollar reduction in that funding for next year. Uh again, cuz of some changes uh some real minor changes to our to our overall census data, which really drove a significant budget impact. And how many of our schools are Title I? One? Uh I believe it's five. And of course, I'm looking at that too. Four and a half it should be one. >> Four and a half. We We We've added one more to it, but
081you also have to understand there are two schools that are um uh that are Title I without a waiver request. And that's because their free and reduced meals, their farms rates are over 40%. Um then you have um two other schools, three other schools that are we applied for them to be Title I based dependent waiver because their farms rates are under that amount. Uh a school can be completely Title 1 or you can have within a school certain students receiving Title 1 services. What we have applied for is the waiver so that all of the schools under the 40% can have total um Title 1 uh application as opposed to just some within the buildings. And the 1.2 Farms, f a r m >> That's the term free and reduced meals. >> term used
082I Well, I explained it ahead of time. I said farms, the free and reduced meals, farm rates. And it's a term used on the East Coast. >> Yeah, you you brought that one. That's not that's that's not even Illinois lingo. >> It It is It Farms rates, okay? I'm leaving. >> [laughter] >> The All right, I and I know I'm trying to move forward, but I have to ask a couple more things. The 1.2 million, which you know, I'm It's very bad to hear that we are getting that and that it was the second largest in the state and that our student population still is at 19% low income. That has not changed, but we will have 1.2 million less, which was going to four and a half schools to provide supplemental resources. So, um
083the 1.2 million dollar cut is it totally being absorbed by those four and a half schools or did we put some extra money in to try and Yeah, so we >> that a bit? We we did work to soften it a little bit. Uh and and again, we're still finalizing some of those those plans, but we are committing some local resources to help help offset that. Right. So again, uh um just given some of the other challenges with you know, with the state revenues and and some of our other budget challenges, I don't know if there's the ability to to absorb all of it or or even um you know, most of it, but but we are absorbing some of that that with local dollars. Okay, that was it. So, thank you very much for
084a um informative presentation. Thank you to the all the board members for all of their questions and comments. Now, we have our student representative report by Anushka Sandeep from Waubonsie Valley High School. Hello, everyone. It's a pleasure to be here. Thank you. My name is Anushka Sandeep, and I am here today to represent Waubonsie Valley High School. As a warrior, I am proud to report that our Waubonsie community continues to flourish and provide many outstanding experiences to our students. Lots has happened over the past month. The building is wrapping up a very busy year celebrating our 50th anniversary. Some unique celebrations from this year were the opening of our time capsule, a reunion of 50 years during homecoming, a successful kids' carnival in January, and our lip dub, which is now up on YouTube, and
085the reveal of our mascot, Ovie. Our spring musical was a fantastic performance of Shrek with over 100 students involved. On May 5th, we celebrated the green and gold awards for the senior class of 2026, recognizing over 60 seniors. And 640 students attended the Golden Hour prom later that week at Bolingbrook Golf Club, a huge success. This week takes us into the last few events for the class of 2026, including senior finals, senior brunch event on Wednesday, the senior farewell ceremony on Wednesday night, and the graduation practice on Thursday, and finally graduation itself on Sunday. Dance team, cheer, show choir, and many other teams are hosting tryouts for the 2016-2017 teams. And this last week, we celebrated five of our Special Olympic athletes going to state. We also had a badminton doubles pair place sixth at
086state this past weekend. And last weekend, Waubonsie Valley BPA also had 27 people place top 10 at Nashville, in Tennessee. Regarding renovations, our building is taking on the very real challenge of relocating several rooms and department offices in order for construction to take place. Our cafeteria has been completely relocated to our auxiliary gym, while the cafeteria, atrium, stadium, and other locations are under intense construction. We invite the board to come see the progress. It has been a pleasure to represent Waubonsie Valley High School this past school year, and thank you for all that the board does for us students. That is all for the Waubonsie Valley Board Report. Thank you all so much, and go Warriors. Thank you very much. [applause] Our school spotlight tonight is Gombert Elementary, which will be presented by Jeremy Ricken,
087Christina Moser Schmidt, Sheila Owens, and Lauren Rivera. Yeah, hey. Good evening. Uh President Donahue, Dr. Tally, members of the board, thank you very much for inviting us uh to come out this evening to spotlight uh one of our very favorite events annually at Gombert uh one of our most popular well-attended events, our family learning night. Uh this year our event was held in April and I have several people here from our very talented and dedicated staff to share some more about that event with you. We have Sheila Owens, uh reading specialist. We have Melissa Harry, our interventionist. And Lauren Rivera, our student services coordinator. So, for an evening on April 16th, um our school transformed uh its focus to one central purpose, increasing family engagement and strengthening the bonds between our school and the surrounding
088community. Uh we appreciate the Title 1 funds that allowed us to plan this event. It was a time to welcome everyone into our building to learn and to have some fun together. This event is a well-attended annual tradition at Gombert, and we feel that this is a testament to the community spirit that we foster. Our family learning night is designed around high engagement through hands-on interactive learning. This year's theme was learning is sweet, and every activity was directly connected to our core school theme. We ensured the night offered rich learning experiences across all areas um and including reading, writing, math, and art, while providing a fun and informal learning environment for all ages. Building on that theme, the night was packed with differentiated engaging activities. We had a great variety of things to do, including
089read-alouds, various literacy and math activities, and an interactive book walk. The math focus included several math games. Our art component involved making make-and-take crafts. Families had a lot of fun creating colorful fidgets and collectively coloring a mural for display. We also hosted the very popular bingo game. A major highlight of the evening was the Anderson's book fair where families could shop together. One of the most popular activities of the night was the black light escape room where families worked together to unlock puzzles. The impact of this event is best captured by our families. A parent of a kindergartner and first grader shared that it was such a beautiful sight to see the children so engaged and eager to participate in what was a success- successful and fun event. The creativity of activities was also praised,
090especially the black light escape room. One family attending for their second year appreciated the new ideas and stated, "I love the creativity that comes with planning this event, such as the sweet escape room. The teachers and staff were able to create an engaging for all elementary ages, which can be challenging. I also appreciate the variety of activities allowing all the kids to enjoy the night." Overall, our family learning night was a wonderful success fulfilling its mission as a great community event focused on learning. Thank you for your continued support of our efforts to connect with Gombert families. We look forward to future opportunities to bring our community together. As you can see, this event really was a highlight of our year. Uh we are grateful for both Sheila and Melissa's leadership as well as the
091entire Gombert staff for making this event such a success. Thank you again to the Board of Education for allowing us this opportunity to highlight Gombert Elementary and our family learning night. Thank you very much. >> [applause] >> It's wonderful to see making learning fun and also engaging the family. So, it's like uh thank you for your creativity and your engagement to to bring this together. So, thank you so much. Next, we have our outstanding service awards. So, each year, we want to spend just a few moments celebrating the three high school student representatives who report out to each of the board meetings the great things that are happening in their schools. As a token for each of these students, we have a plaque and a gift card. Miss Silha Panchal from M- Metea High School,
092she will be attending Loyola College in the fall. Silha, are you here? >> [applause] >> Congratulations. You can just walk up to the desk. Stay right up here. We're going to take a picture of you. Can't go anywhere. Sorry. Miss Kylie Tran, Neuqua Valley High School, she's going to Nova Southeastern University in the fall. She has been accepted into their BS/MD program. Kylie, are you here tonight? >> [applause] >> And Miss Anoushka Sandeep from Waubonsie who was up here tonight, she had a concert to go to, but it's okay. I will bring her her award, and she'll be back next year cuz that's where she's going. She's coming back to us at Waubonsie. We have enjoyed hearing from these three students this year. Their pride for their school always was heard in what they had
093to say. We wish Kylie and Soha the best next year. Congratulations to all of you, and we're going to take a picture. >> [applause] >> Now we [clears throat] will have our Inspire Awards. And um I have several people that are going to present. Did I miss something? You had a strange look. Okay. >> [laughter] >> No, Mark. That's just some. Sorry. >> [laughter] >> All right. We'll start with the Illuminate Award. Who has that? And okay. Is Rommel Bunn here? >> [cheering] [applause] >> All right. Inspire, the mission of the Indian Prairie School District is to inspire all students to achieve their greatest potential. Tonight we're presenting four district level four awards to recognize individuals and organizations who make a meaningful and lasting impact on the students of Indian Prairie. The Illuminator Award, our
094first award of the evening, is presented to a community member or organization dedicated to supporting District 204 students and the community. This year's Illuminator Award is presented to Ram Alban. While he is an IT professional for Indian Prairie, his impact on the Waubonsie Valley community extends far beyond his day-to-day role. He originally joined the Waubonsie family as a parent, but long after his own children graduated, Ram chose to stay. No, we won't. Actually, no. I agree. >> [laughter] >> For over 10 years, he's dedicated his free time to taking photos of all students, whether they are athletes, performers, or seniors, working to capture the diverse moments of high school life. Ram's photography does much more than fill yearbooks and social media pages. It creates a deep sense of belonging. Through his lens, students see themselves
095recognized and valued for their unique contributions to the school. Remarkably, Ram provides this service entirely free of charge. Which we are always very grateful for. From hours spent on the sidelines and in the auditorium to traveling to away games at his own expense, his dedication is fueled purely by his love for the students. In recognition of his dedication to enhancing lives and creating a caring, inclusive environment, the Indian Prairie School District 204 Board of Education is proud to present the 2026 Illuminator Award to Ram Alban. Congratulations, Ram. >> [applause] >> And I do have to say a personal thank you to you as a Waubonsie family uh parent. I have a daughter in show choir who talks about you constantly. So, when they say he has an impact on the students, you guys really have
096no idea the huge impact he really does. Like, he is a celebrity at Waubonsie Valley. Thank [applause] you so much, sir. And then you get I will box for you. This is all for you. If you Do you want Can he See, you can if you would like to say something, you can. I don't want to put you on the spot, but I guess I can. >> [laughter] >> Uh yeah. >> Take a picture of you, Ron. >> [laughter] >> Uh this is the 2016 is the conclusion of my 14th year doing this. When I started this, I thought it was just going to be 4 years after my And when my son graduated, I'm done. But, uh some families came up to me and asked me, you know, if I can keep doing it.
097And it's grown. Um I only started doing Like, I I do all the banners for the school, and that only started after the year after my son graduated. My son didn't He was a little squirrely about having me around all the time. So, I had to wait. And it just First, it started with the football team, but now it's every team. All the dancers, all the cheerleaders. Uh I have a hard time saying no to the kids. That's basically the problem. Um when they ask me why I do this, I'm just trying to pay back I Like she said, I had two children that went through 204. And I'm just trying to pay back because they had such a great experience all the way from kindergarten through high school. Uh I love the parents and
098the students uh that that go to Olentangy. Mr. Stipp and I started together. He's his first year was my son's freshman year. So, uh and recently I posted the most common question I get asked is "How long are you going to keep doing this? Because I've got a freshman, you know, that's coming up in a year." Every time before this year, my answer would always be, "This is my last year." But, I've kind of thought about it and I'm just try I'm going to try to make it to 2030 and >> [laughter] >> No, there's somebody said I know who's saying 35 back there because she's got a a daughter that I think in fourth grade or third grade. >> [laughter] >> I don't know if I can make it that far. Uh but, I
099just figure, you know, I'm looking to retire from the district in 2030. So, we'll just take it from there and see. Maybe I'll still do it not as much as I do it now. But, I just want to thank everybody for the recognition. I I was really surprised when they told me. Actually, when I got the letter from Dr. Telle, I go, "Am I getting fired?" or >> [laughter] >> and you know, and the superintendent's taking a personal interest in it, but so I was extremely surprised. So, thank you very much for this [applause] award. Do I take a picture? I have to take a picture. Yeah, I know. This is all about you. Yeah, yeah. Mark, okay. >> [applause] [applause] >> All right, next we have the Impact Award. Is Ms. Jennifer Campin here?
100>> [applause] >> Our second award is the Impact Award, which is given to a staff member who has made a significant difference in the lives of our students. The recipient of the Impact Award is Jennifer Campin, the student services coordinator at Longwood Elementary. Jennifer is an exceptional leader who positively is matched by her ability to turn vision into meaningful transformational or transformata transformative, I will get that word right, action. Over the past 2 years, she has designed and implemented strategic initiatives that have strengthened the school community and created a lasting positive ripple effect for Longwood families. One outstanding example is the Longwood Walking Bus, bus, which Jennifer launched to help students walk safely to their neighborhood school. Staff members now meet students at three neighborhood pickup points to walk them to and from school each
101day. This simple, powerful program has slashed student absences by an average of 50% and reduced late arrivals by a staggering 75%. Beyond the incredible numbers, it fosters deep connection, physical activity, and a joyful, welcoming start to the school day. Jennifer also launched, uh, I'm sure you've launched a lot of things. Jennifer also launched Stay and Play Fridays, inviting families into classrooms once a month to read, participate in activities, and engage directly in their child's learning. Over 100 parents attended the very first event, and that enthusiasm has only grown, beautifully strengthening the partnership between school and home. Jennifer does not just support students, she builds systems that uplift an entire community. Thank you, Jennifer, for your incredible dedication and for being such an essential part of our community. On behalf of the Indian Prairie School District
102Board of Education, I'm pleased to present you with the 2026 Impact Award. Congratulations. >> [applause] >> Thank you. >> [applause] >> Um as a District 204 graduate, I've also been fortunate to serve the entire um my entire career as an educator, which I'm so proud of. Um and this award means so much, and it's because of our community at Longwood. We have incredible teachers and staff, incredibly dedicated families that make all of that possible because of their support and willingness to try new ideas and inspire new ideas, um and support with their time and heart for our students each and every day. So, this is because of them, and I'm so grateful to be a part of our community at Longwood. Thank you. Thank you. >> [applause] [laughter] [applause] >> Now we have our ignite
103award. >> [applause] >> Our third award is the ignite award, which is given to students who are emerging leaders and demonstrate exemplary qualities within a district 204 student organization. The ignite award is presented to Neuqua Valley senior, Kylie Tran. A young leader who has made a profound difference in our community. Her leadership is rooted in thoughtfulness, consistency, and integrity. Kylie leads deliberately, inclusively, and steadily becoming one becoming someone her peers naturally turn turn to for guidance, support, and strength. Kylie's commitment to service and growth extends across our entire school community. Beyond her work organizing meetings and coordinating with local organizations for Interact, her services as an officer on the student council, where she represents her peers with professionalism. Her incredible time management and discipline are further reflected in her four years on the varsity tennis
104team, her work as a tennis instructor, and her active involvement in the Red Cross Club and PE leaders. What truly distinguishes Kylie, however, is her resilience. After moving from Mississippi to Naperville in the eighth grade, she seamlessly adapted to a rigorous academic environment, developing an exceptional work ethic and a perseverance that inspires everyone around her. Ultimately, it is Kylie's thoughtful compassion and unwavering integrity that truly sets her apart. On behalf of the Indian Prairie School District Board of Education, I am pleased to present you with the 2026 Ignited Award. Congratulations. >> [applause] [laughter] [applause] >> So, would the P3A Pillar Group come up and join me. >> [applause] >> You need to stand way back. >> [laughter] >> I now have the honor of presenting the most prestigious award of the evening, the Inspire Award.
105This award is given to an individual or an entity that has demonstrated exemplary service to District 204 over a sustained period of time. This year's recipient of the Inspire Award is the P3 Pillar Coalition, an invaluable partnership of the African American and black parent groups at Indian Prairie School District 204. This incredible coalition includes PASS, established in 2010, PAGES, established in 2013, and PACES, established in 2016. Together, these organizations serve as pillars of our district dedicated to championing the needs of African American students, striving for equity in education, and empowering our community by sharing vital academic resources and knowledge. Since their founding, P3 and Pillar have been supporters of District 204 students, families, and the wider community. A powerful example of this impact can be seen through the standout programs led by PAGES at Waubonsie
106Valley. These initiatives include the Limitless Learning Lounge, a bi-monthly tutoring environment offering academic support and free meals, as well as monthly workshops covering essential topics from resume writing to college prep. Furthermore, their annual Martin Luther King Jr. Day of Service brought together over 150 attendees this year to pack care packages for shelters and support children in hospitals. While their annual scholarship program continues to provide a vital financial support to college-bound seniors. Their collective impact is measurable, meaningful, and serves at as an inspiration to all of us. On behalf of the Indian Prairie School District Board of Education, I'm pleased to present you with the 2026 Inspire Award. Congratulations. >> [applause] >> Good evening. Thank you so much for this award. On behalf of all of our leaders here, we are just eternally grateful for this
107recognition. And we are happy to partner with the district and you know, with with leaders in the community and also with parents and students. We could not do this if we did not have your support and we really really appreciate that. And if any of our other leaders have anything to say, if they [laughter] You're good. All right. All right. Thank you again. We really appreciate it. All right. >> [applause] >> The work never stops. >> Okay. Okay. >> [laughter] >> Just a little Natasha. Just Yep, there you go. Great, thank you. >> [applause] >> It's a night of recognitions tonight, so we will continue and we have a recognition of our retirees. As is a custom of our board, we would like to take this opportunity to recognize our administrative retirees, Dave Worst. >>
108[applause] [laughter] >> Come on up. Come on up while I read. You're going to keep this bag. I'm going to read all of it. It's a proclamation. Yeah. >> [laughter] >> Yes. He just wants to leave quietly. That's right. That's right. All right, the Indian Prairie School District 204 Proclamation. Whereas, David Worst has devoted the past 33 years of his career to serving the students and families of Indian Prairie School District 204. Having served as a teacher at Spring Brook Elementary and Crone Middle School, as assistant principal at Hill Middle School, and as principal at both Gombert Elementary and Spring Brook Elementary Schools. And whereas, in addition to his leadership within the district, he has also served the community as a sophomore assistant basketball coach at Aurora Christian High School. And whereas Mr. Worst earned
109a bachelor's degree from Trinity International University in Deerfield, Illinois, and a master's degree from Aurora University. And whereas he remains a devoted family man and grandfather who finds joy in his personal time through reading and playing pickleball. And whereas he shares a daily reminder with his students and staff to always, quote, have fun, work hard, and be kind. Now, therefore, be it proclaimed that the Indian Prairie School District 204 Board of Education, administration, and community honor Mr. Dave Worst for his outstanding career in education, which has enriched the lives of so many students. Although we will miss his passion for always inspiring our students to achieve their greatest potential and his unwavering commitment to District 204, we wish him all the best in his future endeavors. >> [applause] [applause] >> Well, the key is to
110getting for me to for me to get hired was they were opening a school a year when I started. So, they were hiring about 200 people. So, the bar was really low. So, I snuck in under the radar and I've been here 33 years. I'm incredibly grateful. I'm thankful the Board of Education has always put kids and the faculty um at the forefront of what we did. Thank you for leadership like Dr. Talley and everyone else who's been here. So grateful and so humble humbled by this. Thanks. >> [applause] [applause] >> Yes. Come on down. I'll be straight up. >> [applause] >> All right, is Sally Osborn here? >> [applause] [laughter] >> You Yeah, yeah, you're perfect right there. Thank you, Michelle, for taking the bag. If you want it, you can bring it home,
111though. Indian Prairie School District 204 Proclamation. Whereas Sally Osborn has devoted the past 15 years of her career to the students of Indian Prairie School District 204, serving as the principal of Prairie Children Preschool since July 2011. And whereas before joining our district, Ms. Osborn served for 14 years with the La Grange Area Department of Special Education. During that time, she worked as a school psychologist for eight years and six years as the Early Childhood Program Coordinator. And whereas Ms. Osborn earned her bachelor's degree from State University of New York, College at Cortland, and her master's degree from Roosevelt University. And whereas Ms. Osborn is beloved by the students, staff, and families of the Prairie Children Preschool community, where she created a supportive learning environment where everyone felt valued. And whereas her leadership at Prairie
112Children Preschool has made a lasting difference ensuring that our youngest learners feel happy, safe, and ready for their educational journey. Now, therefore, be it proclaimed that the Indian Prairie School District 204 Board of Education, administration, and community honor Ms. Sally Osborne's dedication and devotion to the students, teachers, and parents of our community. We are grateful for all that she has done for our students, and we wish her the best as she moves into the next chapter of her life's journey. Thank you so much. >> [applause] >> I just want to thank everybody. I want to thank the board. Um, I'm so grateful for the time that I've had here at Indian Prairie School District. Early childhood has always been my passion, and moving into this position just, um, has filled my heart, um, with what
113I've always wanted to do and make a difference in a child's life. So, thank you for giving me that opportunity 15 years ago here in the district. >> [applause] >> All right. Just to figure out where you're going to put that. >> Okay. >> [laughter] >> All right. >> Okay. All of you in the audience are probably anxiously waiting. It's time for a public comment. And we have 60 minutes allowed for public comment. Each person is limited to 3 minutes. When addressing the board, we ask that you respect the confidentiality and safety of our students and school district personnel. We also ask that those addressing the board be cognizant that this is an open meeting and is available to all age groups and as such ask that you consider who the audience members are this
114evening and keep comments age-appropriate. Public comment represents the voice and opinion of the speaker. There will be no feedback from the board members during the meeting, but follow-up will be provided by an administrator as appropriate. Although this is not required, it is helpful for the board to know whether the comments and concerns we hear are being raised by residents. So, we ask that you state if you live in the district and if you currently have children in our schools. The first speaker is Mike Rezak. Thank you. Given the importance of today's meeting and giving a very capable timekeeper, I will keep my comments short. >> [laughter] >> So, with the school year ending, I thought it appropriate that I extend some thank yous. First to the board. I don't want to jinx anything, but you
115almost made it through another school year. During the course of a school year, you are faced with 100 decisions. Some of them easy, some of them difficult, some of them contentious. I just want to thank you for making those decisions in a professional manner based on governance principles. You made our community You make our community proud, and I thank you for that. Dr. Tally, last week, I was cleaning out my computer and I found my speech in which I introduced you to the community 6 years ago. Sir, we had a few stretch goals for you. You had to change our boundaries. You had to pass a referendum. You had to increase achievement. We didn't tell you about the pandemic. >> [laughter] >> Not only did we want you to exceed expectations, we wanted you to
116come out smelling like rose. And the expectation on the board was that we as a board smell good, too. Somehow you did it. Thank you. And I thank you I I I think you did it because you have professional cool. In additional to the professional cool, I think you treat each person you meet with dignity, and that goes a long way. Good luck to you. Finally, Mr. Corrubus, you were my colleague, my friend, sometimes my friend and me. I have three things to say. I remember as we worked with our time together. What I remember first was the first coffee we had before we went on the board. You looked at me and said, "We have to get to 2025 and pass a referendum. In 2013, we're never going to pass a referendum. We have
117too much to do and too much to take care of and the community is not able to do it. So, somehow we had a 12-year goal. You stuck it out. I appreciate everything you do. You were right. Based on the financials that we hear today, long-term sustainability was important based on the passing that referendum. Two, you were an advocate for our community buildings. Look at them now. Thank you. Finally, thanks for being the board curriculum cop. Dude, district policy and governance is boring, but it's foundational and so necessary. It is key to board excellence. Thank you. I know your next steps will be fruitful and happy. Thank you for everything. Everybody enjoy graduation. Thank you. >> [applause] >> Okay. Next speaker is Rhonda Jenkins. Good evening, members of the board and Dr. Tally. My name
118is Rhonda Jenkins and I've had the privilege of serving students in district in our district for 27 years. For 13 of those years, I've been a library media center director at Kendall. Tonight, I want to reflect on the impact of those 13 years. Not because recognition is what matters most, but because legacy does. When many people picture a school library, they imagine shelves of books in a quiet space. What I created at Kendall was so much more. I built a dynamic learning hub where literacy, creativity, innovation, technology, collaboration, and belonging came to life. I intentionally developed a diverse, engaging collection where every student can find books that reflect their interests, experiences, and curiosities. Students discovered books that changed them. They met award-winning authors. They explored emerging technologies. They created in our makerspace. They relaxed and
119read quietly alone or with a buddy in thoughtfully designed spaces. I created meaningful afterschool opportunities where students could innovate, create, connect, and grow. Not just academically, but socially and emotionally. I told you about our book blast event. What I didn't tell you is that on book delivery day, students went home with heavy backpacks and heavy and very happy faces thanking me as they passed me by. I have volunteers who have been with me for years, one of whom has been with me for 11 years. I have another volunteer who hasn't yet mastered English. She feels uncomfortable because I speak her language, Mandarin. We help each other learn words. I have shared this work far beyond our district. I have presented at multiple library associations and professional conferences in seven states, sharing innovative ideas, my successful
120projects, and the resources I personally created so other librarians could bring those same opportunities to their students. In doing so, I proudly represented District 204 as a place of educational excellence and innovation. In 2022, I was honored to be named Illinois Librarian of the Year, an award typically given to public library directors, administrators, and leaders in higher education. As an elementary school librarian, I was one of the rare exceptions. In October of 2016, I was the recipient of the A+ A Award. Again, an honor to be the first librarian to receive that award. And one of the most meaningful affirmations of the work I do, two authors dedicated books to me, an extraordinary honor that still brings smiles to my heart. But titles, awards, and recognitions are not the true measure of success. The true
121measures are the reluctant readers who became readers for life. The students who found confidence through creating. The students who felt safe, inspired, challenged, and valued. For 13 years, Kendall has not simply been where I worked, it has been where I belonged. And in keeping with the district's theme of believe and belong, I believe I belong at Kendall. However, that sense of belonging has been taken from me. Through the decision of one, I've been reassigned to a fifth-grade class at a different building for next year. I want to be clear, that is not my choice. After building something extraordinary for 13 years with a plan to serve just two more years before retirement, I was >> Ms. Donahue, the speaker's time has ended. Thank you. >> [applause] >> Next speaker is Dawn Forkner. Good evening, board
122members, Dr. Tally, 204 colleagues, students, and families. My name is Dawn Forkner, and I have worked in Indian Prairie for 10 years. I do not live in the district and do not have children rolled in 204. I currently work as our SEL and wellness coordinator for Indian Prairie. I've never registered for 204 public comments before, but I'm here tonight because I am proud to kick off the next round of tributes to Dr. Tally. I am joined by my colleagues to shine a light on the nearly $8 million in competitive grant projects over the next 15 minutes that further demonstrate Dr. Tally's impact and service to others. Early in my work with Dr. Tally, he said to me, "If I become known as the mental health superintendent, I'm okay with that." Through his leadership and innovative
123projects, Dr. Tally's undeniably the mental health superintendent. Two of those projects, Peace of Mind and the Mental Health Symposium, I had the pleasure of leading alongside Dr. Tally and my colleagues Candy Michelly, Lisa Berry, Genie Dyna, and Dr. Trudy Ranson. Peace of Mind stands for parent education and community engagement. This project addressed gaps and opportunity and unmet needs from the pandemic by developing and expanding relationships between schools, community-based organizations, and mental health providers. The board and community should be proud that this project was made possible by a competitive grant awarded Indian Prairie called the Community Partnerships totaling $635,000. Without a single local dollar, every school and the majority of our preschool through 12th grade students benefited from Peace of Mind over the 3 years that we had it. This project included funding SEL ambassadors in
124every school, solidified more than 30 community partnerships, including therapy dogs, motivational speakers, and parent engagement events. Featured a superintendent-led Peace of Mind breakfast that has that was attended by 50 community members to date. It created summer art camp to promote mindfulness and creativity in our title one buildings, and ultimately helped to lead to the creation of the Mental Health and Wellness Symposium. The Mental Health and Wellness Symposium was the hallmark of the Peace of Mind and has since become an annual event that was attended by 843 individuals in 2026, 674 people in 2025, and 375 people in 2024. The symposium is unlike any other district-sponsored mental health event in Illinois in both scale and substance. It provides students and family education on mental health and wellness topics, includes high-profile guest speakers, and connects families with
125community resources in real time. The mental health and student wellness landscape in Indian Prairie has been permanently impacted by Dr. Tally. Return to instruction and the pandemic recovery process simply would not have been the same without him. Dr. Tally was our difference maker. Leadership matters, so please join me as I express gratitude to Dr. Tally for his. Thank you, Dr. Tally. Next is Arlene Sanders. Good evening, members of the board, Dr. Tally, 204 colleagues, students, and families. My name is Arlene Sanders. I was an Indian Prairie educator at Brookdale Elementary for 20 years until I retired 6 years ago. I do not live in the district, but my daughter is a English teacher at Neuqua Valley High School. Very proud of that. In my retirement, I've been visiting schools with my therapy dog, Scout, and
126I'm also contracting with Indian Prairie to support family engagement. I have never registered for public comment before, but I wanted to um [snorts] shine a light on Dr. Tally's service to others in a project that I led called Club Hub. The board and community should be proud that Club Hub was made possible by a competitive grant awarded to Indian Prairie School District, and it's called the 21st Century Grant. It totaled $1.5 million without a single local dollar. We had 809 students in first through fifth grade from Georgetown and Longwood, and they benefited benefited from this grant over 5 years. Club Hub featured a diverse portfolio of before-school, after-school, evening, weekend, summer activities totaling 12 hours per week for 33 weeks, all offered at no cost to families. The project was strengthened by Dr. Tally's Deck
1277's long expertise in after-school learning, community schools, and whole childhood development. By combining after school academic programming like Scholastic Lit League with hands-on enrichment through Camp Invention, and innovative family engagement that I led, Grow Club, Lego Club, and Family Art Club, we, by the way, have beautiful artwork in the hallway from our art club. >> [snorts] >> And Club Hub has resulted in significant gains for students. Analysis of state testing and internal benchmarking data conducted by Dr. Mom and Jason Gusman proved that Club Hub participants consistently outperform their peers, helping to close the achievement gap. Georgetown was also recognized in this exemplary 21st Century site as an ISBE-funded study conducted by the American Institute for Research. Club Hub families recognized actor Talley's visible involvement as a hallmark of Indian Prairie's 21st Century program. He visited
128students before school, after school, in the summer, and even participated in my Monday evening Family Lego Club on Zoom, and he became one of our beloved guest builders. >> [snorts] >> Dr. Talley told the students that Lego Club encourages problem-solving, creativity, and most of all, fun. In November, Dr. Talley helped us conduct a needs assessment with at Georgetown and the Longwood families, "How important is it to have no-cost after-school programs?" Of the 98 respondents, 91% stated that it was very important. 62% requested three or four days per week. Families were asked, "Why should we apply for another 21st Century grant?" I'm so sorry. That sounds amazing, but your time is up. >> I want to tell you leadership matters, and we really, really enjoyed having you, and good luck with what you do in the
129future. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Okay, next we have Natalie Johnson. Good evening, members of the board, Dr. Tally, 204 colleagues, students and families. I'm Dr. Natalie C. Johnson, a former 204 math teacher for over 19 years, resident of the district for over 35 years, and a proud parent with my husband of two adult children who attended kindergarten through 12th grade in 204 schools and who have successful careers working in higher ed and medicine. I'm spending my retirement working as a senior director of education and public engagement at Fermilab, one of the 17 national research labs in the world. I've never registered for a 204 public comment before, but felt compelled to do so tonight because I wanted to shine a light on Dr. Tally's impeccable service and share my perspective of his impact
130on students and families via project that I led after retirement called RISE. Named by Dr. Tally, RISE stands for a reimagining student engagement. RISE's afterschool and weekend programming included a K-5 book club called The Joy of Reading, hosted by myself and famed English literature writer and higher ed English department chair Dr. Ebony Wilkins. Provided 87 students with books written by and about black people, including topics on positive affirmations, leadership, and student STEM leaders of the past and current today. A summer camp and a weekend STEM lab camp, led and facilitated by Liz Coletta, introduced students to coding without code and serviced 77 and 92 K-5 students for 2 years, respectively. African American Men of Unity worked as the mentoring leg for the youth and benefited 58 middle school students. Our popular weekend brush and paint
131events were attended by 192 plus participants. At the high school level, pages provided a Sunday tutoring program that benefited 49 students from Waubonsie Valley High School. Adam Dice contributed to the building the framework for a community outreach event called the Civics Engagement Summit, which was attended by 53 students and 62 parents and was facilitated by myself, Bev Matthews, and Liz Callado. However, one of my favorite components of RISE included weekend family trips that Dr. Tally helped us plan. Beverly Matthews and I took more than 200 participants to railway and field museums, Brookfield Zoo, Navy Pier, and even had a magical bus ride with Mahogany Tours to learn about lesser-known facts about Chicago's amazing and dope history. And that excursion was facilitated by Chicago's renowned historian, Sherman Dilla Thomas. These engagements focused on building community, family
132bonding, and cultivating school connections and the survey data reflected that families who participated felt valued, including families with special needs, and the RISE program met its goal of building community and connections within the larger 204 family. A project designed to build community across the district by providing understanding of the tenets of the Civil Rights Movement. The board and community should be proud that it was made possible by a competitive grant awarded to Indian Prairie called Freedom Schools in total $366,800 without a single local dollar. 609 K8 students and 217 parents benefited from RISE over two academic years. For the record, that's 826 lives positively impacted. Although the African proverb held true, many hands make light work, in this instance, Dr. Tally's involvement and leadership example, his single hand in the Freedom Schools grant, provided authenticity
133and he was clearly the difference maker. Leadership matters. Thank you, Dr. Tally. Thank you. >> [applause and cheering] >> The next speaker is Amit Thacker. >> Good evening, board members, Dr. Tally, 204 colleagues, students and families. My name is Amit Thacker. I am the founder of a company called Referral GPS and we are Chicagoland's largest mental health care care navigation provider. I don't currently live in the district or have enrolled children, but I am a product of District 204. I'm a proud graduate of Waubonsie. I actually went to 204 from K through 12. I've never registered for 204 public comment before, but I'm here tonight because if you're keeping track of all the tributes, you might be thinking we're about $6.8 million short of Dr. Tally's $10.7 $10.7 million PMO. I'm here to fill that
134gap with a project near and dear to Dr. Tally and so many of us here tonight. The CARES program. CARES, which was named by Dr. Tally, stands for community advocacy, resilience, engagement, and supports. It's a homegrown early intervention program that combines prevention and it was envisioned by Dr. Tally in response to unmet needs raised by students themselves. CARES was designed in-house and aligned with evidence-based practices in both public health and systems design. It delivers no-cost after-school mental health treatment sessions to students and families focused on early identification, skill building, and stigma reduction. Through a discreet online referral portal, rapid care navigation provided by our team and the establishment of school-based CARES community clinics, any student in need of support may receive up to six no-cost 50-minute treatment sessions funded exclusively by grant grant funding. Our
135team's triage referrals rapidly, bypassing traditional wait lists, and place students and families into care, ensuring they receive support just in time regardless of their insurance. CARES has revolutionized access to care by eliminating barriers to funding, transportation, and wait times for families. Surveys that we've done in families have come back that 96% of them have received care they said they otherwise wouldn't have. 98% of them have recommended continuing the program and the overall care provided was rated 4.9 out of five. Additional outcomes include reported increases in in student engagement and a reduction in stigma in schools. CARES has not just benefited District 204, even though that's where it was born. It was piloted through multiple iterations here and through 10 competitive grants from funders including Endeavor Health, IDPH, the City of Aurora, the Naperville Township 708
136Board, totaling more than $2.2 million specifically for District 204. To date, CARES has delivered more than 5,000 sessions in Indian Prairie and more than 13,500 additional sessions across Illinois through 19 grants totaling $4.6 million to fund CARES programs almost like franchises in 20 additional school districts in the area. As we've been hearing from our colleagues before us, leadership matters. And I want to take that a step further and say legacy matters. Dr. Tally speaks of CARES and he often says we built it and they came. With close to 20,000 no cost treatment sessions, I really want to say Dr. Tally, your legacy will live on through CARES. Thank you. Thank you. Next we have Beverly Matthews. >> [laughter] >> She's feeling bad. Good evening, members of the board, Dr. Tally, 204 colleagues, students, and families.
137My name is Beverly Matthews, and I worked in Indian Prairie for 23 years. I no longer live in the district, but I did for 18 years, and I don't have any enrolled children. As an Indian Prairie educator, I worked at seven elementary schools until I retired two years ago. Since then, I've been supporting family engagement through two ISBE after-school program grants awarded to IPEF and AAMOU totaling 558,033 I have never registered for 204 public comment before, and I'm here to summarize the collective impact Dr. Tally's leadership has had on so many people. Dr. Tally's drive to eliminate barriers and address unmet needs, particularly among students most at risk, inspires my colleagues and I to view what ISBE calls out-of-school time as a call to action. As a champion of community schools, experienced Title administrator, and
138advocate for mental health, Dr. Tally knows that school does not start and end with the bell. My colleagues and I spent months considering an appropriate send-off for Dr. Tally. Faced with the age-old question, what do you give someone who has everything, we landed on a simple answer. Shine a light on their service to others. The 11 grant-funded projects we have shared through public comment add up to 10,734,405. In Indian Prairie alone, the number of students benefited is tens of thousands. Please join me in a resounding wow. If you've been to Dr. Tally's office, you know overcoming challenges is a strength, as evidenced by the number of challenge coins on display. While Dr. Tally has a lot of challenge coins, he doesn't have any quite like these. >> [snorts] >> It is my pleasure to present
139Dr. Tally with these two coins to memorial to memorialize his impact. Thank you, Rhonda Jenkins, for fabricating these coins and doctors Rafael Segarra and Jeremy Rickert for the idea. One final time, leadership matters. Thank you. And Dr. Tally, for all you've done and all you have inspired, let me know when I can pick up my ZZ plant. >> [laughter] >> Okay. Our last speaker is Alicia Smith. Hello, my name is Alicia Smith. I live in the Gombert neighborhoods. I have a niece and nephew that attend Gombert. My other nephew attends Fischer Middle School. I worked in Indian Prairie 204 for 13 years. I also graduated from Waubonsie Valley High School. For almost 4 years now, those of us who live alongside Eola Road have been telling Indian Prairie School District 204 administration and the school
140board that Eola Road is too dangerous of a hazard for our children to walk to school. You have responded by sticking to an interpretation of the I dot guidebook. Please use your eyes and ears to assess the situation. Here is what we know about Eola Road. It is one of the most dangerous roads in Aurora. There have been several fatalities in the last 4 years. The city of Aurora classifies the section between Montgomery and Keating as a five-lane roadway. Most of the District 204 students who have to walk alongside Eola have to walk along this section. The section has a traffic volume hovering around 23,000 to 25,000 vehicles. Students are walking to school during the morning peak. When the city of Aurora approved the Eola Road expansion in 2016, they approved a noise abatement fence.
141The noise from the increased traffic being close to homes required the fence. The district has conducted numerous I dot serious safety hazard studies. There is not a single I dot serious safety hazard study rating Eola Road anywhere between Ogden and Keating. The neighborhoods to the east of Eola were never granted bussing to Fischer Middle School when the boundaries change in 2022. There is no I dot study rating for Eola for their walk to school. Yet, they were still denied bussing for their walk alongside Eola Road. The Gambert neighborhoods have been asking for four long years why our children had to walk alongside Eola Road. We said that the readings do not make sense. We were belittled, and then we were ignored over and over again. We want the I dot serious safety hazard study to
142be done correctly. We want the hazards of walking alongside Eola Road to be calculated and not dismissed due to the existence of sidewalks. We want to be bussed to Fischer Middle School. Thank you. Okay, we now move to our consent agenda and superintendent report. >> Yes, and I'm going to We have a student who's come back. Oh, after her concert. Uh-huh. Did you sing well tonight? What did you sing? Um we sang um a lot of pop songs. Wonderful. Good. Well, on behalf of all the work that you have done being one of our student speakers, we want to give you this plaque and this gift card. And you will be back with us again next year, right? Yeah. >> [laughter] >> It's all good. All right, congratulations to you. We're going to get a
143picture of you all together. And we're going to take a picture up front. All right. We're going to do one more picture up here. >> [clears throat] >> Okay. Now we move to our consent agenda and superintendent report. We will start with the superintendent report. Ms. Donahue, members of the Board of Education, Indian Prairie community. I have to start my comments with sad news. Last week, Shlok Kandey passed away. He was a 10th grader at Waubonsie Valley who was actively involved in the school as a band member and other activities. May his family know how much he will be missed and that he will be part of the the Waubonsie family. I ask that we take a moment of silence in memory of Sloc Thank you. Last week Mr. Matthew White, orchestra teacher at Scullen
144Middle School, was awarded the Golden Apple Award for teaching excellence in a surprise announcement. He is the first award winner from Indian Prairie School District in more than 20 years. He is one of only 10 winners across the state from more than 600 nominations. This Saturday I was able to attend our annual Fine Arts Festival. It was a delight to see all the artwork that students have created and to listen to the wonderful music that our students performed. I want to thank all the teachers for their efforts in creating the event. I want to thank the students for their performances and showing their art. Pulling all the art and together and and gathering all the students is not an easy task. It is a testament to the staff for their commitment to this event each
145year. And finally I want to thank Indian Prairie Education Foundation for sponsoring the event. We are proud to announce that Metea Valley, Neuqua Valley, and Waubonsie Valley have all been recognized as 2025-2026 Project Lead the Way Distinguished Schools. This recognition means we are empowering students to thrive in an evolving world and achieving exemplary results with our Project Lead the Way high school programs. Metea Valley, Neuqua Valley, and Waubonsie Valley are three of only 20 Illinois high schools recognized. This is the fifth year in a row that all three of our high schools have received this distinction. Since 2017 at least one of our high schools and in many cases all three of our high schools have won the award. We celebrate all Project Lead the Way staff for their hard work over the years and
146we must also add Mr. Brian Gialanella, director of innovation and instructional leadership, for his actions leading this work for the district. At the last Board of Ed meeting, I mentioned we were celebrating all of our volunteers. I said I would provide some additional information at today's meeting. Uh Nikoko White, who volunteers at Brook Dale Elementary School and Hill Middle School, for having the most volunteer hours, 421. Springbrook, for having the most volunteer hours this year at 8,341 hours. This Sunday coming up, we will celebrate we were able we were we will be able to celebrate our seniors as we hold our graduations for all three of our comprehensive high schools. We will start, however, as we always do, this Thursday with Gail McKenney's celebration. We look forward to attending all of these events and celebrate
147the hard work of our students. As this is the last Board of Ed meeting before the end of the school year, I will end my comments by thanking our staff for an amazing school year. Their dedication and commitment have helped to achieve the success we have as a district. To our students, thank you for all you all the hard work you've had, even sending me the snow request letters for no school. What you thought would be a very long year is almost over. Your hard work has paid off. To our community, thank you for your engagement in our schools. We are only as good as our community. We have a great partnership, and that partnership enables us to do all that we have been able to do this year for the benefit of our children.
148I hope for all of you, you have a wonderful summer. Ms. Donahue, I'll return it back to you. I need a motion for the approval of consent agenda items D through N. Make a motion for a consent agenda items D through N as presented. Second. Any discussion? Michelle, will you please call the roll? Mr. Rising. >> Yes. Ms. Gantz. Yes. Ms. Donahue. Yes. Uh Ms. Grover. Yes. Mr. Carubis. Yes. And Ms. Fosdyck. Yes. The motion passes. I now need a motion and a second to approve our four-year negotiated agreement between the Indian Prairie Classified Association and Indian Prairie School District Board of Education. >> Make a motion that the Board of Education approve the four-year negotiated agreement between the Indian Prairie Classified Association and the Indian Prairie School District Board of Education as presented. Second.
149Any discussion? Thank you for everyone for their hard work in pulling that agreement together and for our union for um approving it. So, thank you. Michelle, will you please call the roll? Mr. Rising. Yes. Ms. Grover. Yes. Ms. Fosdyck. Yes. Mr. Carubis. Yes. And Ms. Donahue. Yes. The motion passes. >> Yes. If anyone was wondering, yes, it's a yes for me, too. Oh, I'm sorry. It's okay. [laughter] We needed that. Yeah. Okay, we now have a presentation from >> Hold on. We need to sign off on the Ms. Lanning. If you can come forward from IPCA and we need to sign off on the contract. Ah. Ms. Donahue, if you'll join me at the table. Claire, we'll put you in the middle. Oh, I get to be in And I'll Ms. Donahue and then I'll
150be on this side. All right. I didn't bring my own pen. Nancy come. That's a shame. Next. >> [laughter] >> And I'm being different. I'm signing in blue. Oh, jeez. There we are. Thank you, miss. Thank you. Wonderful. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Yes, I know. All right. Now, we will have a presentation from Dr. Barbie Chisholm, Angela Borin, Christine O'Toole, Chrissy Webber, and Jessica Walch regarding the MS ELA courses for PA and seventh grade ELA curriculum revision. Thank you, members of the board. Can you hear me okay now? Okay, great. Thank you, members of the board and Dr. Tally. I'm excited this evening to present the work of our PA ELA and seventh grade ELA curriculum and I've brought with me some of the hardest workers on the team, and they are here
151with us tonight to share some updates. So, the purpose tonight is to provide the information for middle school Project Arrow English Language Arts courses, all three grade levels. We've been working on a full revision, and we'll provide an update on that. And then, the The part of my presentation will be just an update on resources for our seventh grade standard ELA. So, it's in alignment with our board policies with curriculum development and resource adoption. And of course, our strategic plan alignment ensuring we are providing all students with high-quality curriculum and instruction. So, there's two parts to the presentation. The first part is the full course revision for our Project Arrow ELA courses. And then the second part will move into the the standard ELA resource updates. So, first we're going to talk about middle school
152Project Arrow English language arts. We have been working on a full course revision for sixth, seventh, and eighth grade courses. And so, in general, thinking about our general process for course updates, we we like to review this process. We prioritize different courses. We work with building leadership team, our teacher leaders, and our curriculum teams. We our prioritize alignment to state standards and mandates, alignments with evidence-based practices, including those outlined in the Illinois Comprehensive Literacy Plan. We prioritize alignment across school and between levels, a student achievement outcomes, and of course, alignment to the Board of Education goals, strategic plan, culturally responsive instruction, and the portrait of graduate framework. So, our visual, just thinking about this nice, neat um graphic, it usually doesn't go this way. You know, there's always starts and stops as we work through
153the process, and we'll talk a little bit about what that looked like for Project Arrow. Um So, this work really got underway beginning in 2023-2024. We were working through the standard ELA revision. Um during that same school year, we had the elementary Project Arrow audit. And the Illinois Comprehensive Literacy Plan was also released by the state of Illinois. So, all of these pieces have helped inform our work in and how we move forward. Uh in 24-25, we um really started to work more on the Project Arrow ELA curriculum revision. We identified priorities in our framework and began our evaluation of some potential core resources. We did initially pilot a resource. Um however, we found that um our consideration in doing a completely separate resource, which is how our curriculum was previously structured, wasn't really meeting
154the needs of our courses, of our teachers, and our students. And so, we decided to shift course a little bit. So, that's where that uh that cycle starts to not look so so nice and neat. So, then this year we began um I call it our our pilot 2.0, building on the work of our standard ELA course revision uh with CommonLit 360, and um working with the resource to develop something specific to meet the needs of our Project Arrow courses. Uh we also piloted some supplemental resources and uh final work to finalize our scope and sequence. And with pending board approval, next year we look to implement our new scope and sequence, our core resource, um supplemental vocabulary resource, and continue our development uh with grammar resources and identification of additional texts. So again, not
155quite that that easy circle. Usually it gets it gets a little messy. Um but I'm really proud of the work that the team has done. So, two of our um main priorities that came out of our needs assessment, um number one was just to update resources. Some of it was just logistics. A lot of our resources are out of print um from our previous adoption. We are also looking to provide um a balance of both the classic resources that our students really need that strong foundational background in and modern resources so that it it reflects who our students are and provide that authentic and empowering um lens. The other piece and this a lot of this was highlighted in the um the project arrow audit that was focused on elementary, but it's something that we
156also saw as part of a need for middle school project arrow is that alignment and being able to clearly articulate what is project arrow, what is this what does it mean, what is its relationship to our standard level courses in the middle school, and then how does it vertically align to our elementary um project arrow and coursework, and then our high school advanced coursework. So, really try making sure that we have a clear definition of that across all of our our buildings. So, today um I'm asking the team to share with us our proposed curriculum overview, our revised units for all three grade levels for sixth grade. They do include um shorter and extended text from the CommonLit 360 resource, which was board approved for standard English language arts last year, and also it also
157incorporated some previously incorporated text, and the team really did a great job of of making it meet the needs of of our project arrow courses. Uh so, our sixth grade PAELA, uh those units um you will see that there is a combination of both sixth and seventh grade Common Lit 360 units in the process. Um because our our team really wanted to make sure that we were providing a really strong transition from students, those that are that were in elementary Project Arrow, but also those that were not that are now moving into Project Arrow ELA at the middle school level and how do we create that that transition? So, um it we also wanted to incorporate some common sixth grade experiences. So, the um revised sixth grade units for Project Arrow incorporate three of the
158Common Lit 360 units as a foundation. We're also continuing to use The Outsiders, um which was in a previous text within sixth grade PA ELA. Uh we are adding would like to add in The Giver by Lois Lowry, uh which is also a current novel in our sixth grade standard ELA. So, that's going to be one of our um uh common experiences for all of our sixth graders to read the same unit and to be able [clears throat] to to um have that that experience. Um and then we're also going to be continuing with some existing uh book clubs. Yep. So, Angela and I I'm Christine Weber I'm at Still Middle School. Um and Angela Born is at Gregory Middle School. Um we both piloted with the seventh grade Project Arrow. Um we have cut
159down the Common Lit 360 to four different units um from the 360 curriculum. We're still looking at with unit one, um we want to extend uh or have a whole class novel study, but we're still looking at some titles for that. So, that's a possible thing for some piloting next year and to review for the 2027-2028 school year. Um we are keeping in our of second quarter our thematic units and we're looking at continuing to use the existing existing text of A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens. And then one of the things we added this year with our pilot is 12 Angry Men by Reginald Rose, which the students actually loved. So they absolutely loved that. So our last unit is a lot of research and debate and we're still also hoping to use our
160existing book club titles that we've used for the past few years. So At 12 Angry Men that is the it is currently in our eighth grade standard ELA. Um Um, Kristen Otswald I'm at Still Middle School as well, eighth grade PA. I'm Mrs. Gans. >> [laughter] >> Um, for eighth grade we really had a a little bit easier than sixth and seventh grade because for us it's not so much a revision as it is a refresh. None of our core texts are changing with the CommonLit 360 curriculum. Um we start with the ninth grade unit one which is all short stories, non-fiction and poetry which is what we were already doing. The central text to that unit is one of the central text that we were already reading, The Lottery by Shirley Jackson. So it
161it just kind of freshens it up a little bit and brings in some non-fiction articles that are more relevant to students' lives but a lot of what we read are still dealing with those big questions that our middle schoolers are wrestling with that have been the big questions middle schoolers wrestle with since ever. Um So by keeping that that in there it it really gives the kids a good outlet to explore some of these universal truths and the archetypes that we see across literature. Um the big change for us was flipping Animal Farm and Hamlet. They we they just basically flipped quarters. Um so Animal Farm is part of the CommonLit 360 uh curriculum. So we're still reading that. That was an existing text. It also brings in some more more recent nonfiction articles that
162tie into Animal Farm to show that these these struggles are are still going on today. Um the next unit is Hamlet and Antigone. And the Antigone unit comes from CommonLit 360. The Hamlet is the existing unit that we were already doing, but by tying in Antigone, it really helps students see the development of archetypes through classical literature. Um they're they were already making the connections between Hamlet and modern-day literature, and now they're able to go back and look at where Shake- speare's references came from as well, and what his inspiration was. And we're a little not sure how the kids were going to do with the ancient Greeks. Um and they they loved it. They absolutely loved it. It was great. Um they were all like firmly team Antigone, and they thought it was so
163unfair. And then um our last unit is what we're wrapping up right now, our study of To Kill a Mockingbird. Um we pivoted a few years ago and switched the lens through which we look at that book. Um there's a re- a fabulous resource from Facing History and Ourselves called Teaching Mockingbird. Um I actually went downtown Chicago for a couple of days and did their seminar to really dig into the resource so that we know that we are implementing it with um the fidelity that it requires, and really dedicating the the time and the emotional energy to understanding um all of the the struggles and all of the different themes that Mockingbird brings up, and giving our students a a safe space to explore these challenges before they get into high school and they're confronted
164with all of these situations kind of in real life. Um it gives them a good vicarious learning example with that. Um the last component that we looked at for this upcoming year is the supplemental vocabulary program. Um our existing resource is out of print. So as numbers have been going [clears throat] up and increasing, we do not have enough textbooks in our classrooms for the students that we are trying to service, kind of a problem. So we took a look at vocabulary from Classical Roots. It's a series. Um it'll be used at 6 PA, 7 PA, and 8 PA. Um we sat down as pilot teachers looking at what would be the best place to start at each of our grade levels. So 6th grade's going to be starting with the 6th grade book and
165then book A. 7 PA will do book B and C, and 8 PA will do E and F. Is that D and E. D and E. Okay, that was it. D and E. I have the list on the next slide. Yep. And they all follow parallel to each other. What's really nice about the program itself is that as a 6 PA at the start of the year, it is getting you introduced to all the word work that is involved with vocabulary, the morphology, and getting it more complex as you keep going. Um and so that's why we picked the 6th grade book at 6th grade to start with just to ease them into um the program. And we have the two titles per grade level and we're just kind of working through and figuring out
166that will how we we kind of tried a bunch of different things. We've been on texting and hey, do this, try this um to figure out what would be the best for the students in our classrooms. Um and we've been very successful with this program um so far. And the kids are doing really well with it. I feel like in our classes. Yeah, and um the morphology work has been a big part of project arrow. Our our previous resources um were stand-alone and not necessarily connected to one another. We also sometimes found some some dated language in them that wasn't is no longer um in in usage and so we really wanted to make sure that we're bringing something forward uh that better align to to uh where we are now. So um So our
167recommended resources um are CommonLit 360 which as I mentioned is our existing English language arts resource for our standing for our standard class. Um also three new whole class texts uh The Giver, 12 Angry Men, and Antigone for the the three respective grade levels. And then the Vocabulary from Classical Roots series as Angela mentioned, two books per grade level. Um and then the cost of this uh the total cost would be 115,000 which covers the cost of purchasing the new whole whole class texts and the bound copies of student vocabulary books. We are building on the existing license of CommonLit 360. When we approved it for our standard ELA courses, it was a site license and so we are able to to leverage that and really make this a um fiscally responsible proposal for the
168board. Um in addition, we are sorry, we're continuing with um several of the texts were mentioned through here. Sixth grade PA is continuing with The Outsiders. Seventh grade PA is going to be continuing with A Christmas Carol. And eighth grade PA is going to be continuing with Animal Farm, Hamlet, To Kill a Mockingbird. So before I move into the second part of the presentation, I wanted to pause and give the board an opportunity to ask uh the teachers that have done so much of the legwork on the ground. Any questions? >> just going to open it up to anyone if they have any questions or I do have a quick question, um, that I didn't have I didn't have the wherewithal to ask in advance, but um, I'll ask you to think about it if
169you don't have the answer to it now. Um, uh, a few of my kids have gone through this previous iteration of of PAELA in middle school. Um, and there is differentiation among teachers about how things like classical literature is taught and whether students are allowed to use the translated version on the left side of the page or the actual old school language on the right side of the page. And is that something that is going to be more standard across the board since it looks like we're trying to make sure that we're all having the same approach or is that still going to be a teacher specific We're working on it. >> decision? Okay. Um, yeah, that's great. It's a lot of books to replace to be honest. >> and um, I I can tell
170you even just at my school we have three different versions of Hamlet. Yeah. So, that makes it super fun when I'm like, "Okay, I've got this one and then you have this book you're on this page and if you have this book you're on this page." And like I got another one under my arm and if you're on this right >> Right. So, just to get all of those resources and have that be standardized across the district will take a little bit of time >> of the older texts as they're needing to get replaced because they're just falling apart. Um, we're replacing them to make sure that they are standardized across the district and by, um, focusing on the CommonLit 360 in general across the district, we are looking to standardize a lot of the
171instruction that the students are getting as well. I can tell you too, I have a sixth grader and an eighth grader right now at a different middle school And they come home and they ask me questions and I'm like No comments. >> [laughter] >> Uh Like, tell me what you're reading cuz it's not what I'm reading. Um so it's it's one of the things that we know is kind of an existing hurdle that we have to overcome. And we've also done a lot of work on the curriculum committee as well to standardize assessments. Even the assessments, the ones that are already in CommonLit 360 are we're good. Like they're already standardized. Um but now we're working on putting together standardized assessments across the district for both writing and reading. And then tying all of those
172assessments in pair assessment to specific standards so that we can track how kids are doing across the district, across schools, and make sure that they're getting maybe not the same exact experience, but at least a similar and equitable experience. And the idea is that, you know, we want to have that that common definition and that common foundation. We don't you know, you're going to have different needs in different groups of students. And so also having that space and that flexibility, so we're all we're all starting in the same place. We all have a common goal, but then there's room for teachers to adapt to meet their their students' needs to get them there. So And I feel like we've been real good, too, as piloting the curriculum. Um coming up with note slides and divvying
173up the work and sharing that out so that what I'm using for this unit or where I'm at, I can share over with Chrissy. And so we are trying to make sure we're all using even our same note slides. We've really been real adamant about sharing all of that with each other in case someone new comes in and they look at the curriculum and say, "Okay, it's written here, but now what am I using?" We are creating those resources as well, which allows us to put our own spin on things in our classrooms. Thank you so much. That sounds like an incredible amount of work. It's appreciated. I I think you kind of answered my question, but I'm going to ask it again. Um and just know I'm going to ask it at the end
174of the second part, too. But uh >> [laughter] >> Just one second now. But on on slide eight, when you talked about updating resources um cuz they weren't meeting the standards. Uh the great thing is we only have seven middle schools, right? So, I see most of the teachers here that represent seven middle schools. Uh When the curriculum resources are not meeting the standards, I would assume because our teachers are so incredible that they do their best to either supplement it themselves or create their own instructional practices. In my mind and the research I have done on literacy and math over the past year and a half, really it doesn't matter the curriculum that you have because really that's just a resource, a tool. What it really comes down to is your instructional practices. And
175so, I guess my question there is and I hear you're all texting each other and sharing stuff, but I want to make sure as a district that we're aligning our instructional practices and strengthening that equally and all together and we're all on the same page because that's what we have we don't have fidelity across the district. Um so, that's the most important thing to me. Yes, the curriculum is nice, but I want to make sure that our teachers are all aligning on instructional practices and strengthening that as best as we can. And our teachers I think you you made a a really great point when our resources are not in alignment with our curriculum. Our teachers do amazing things and they make they create great learning experiences for for our students. I think what happens
176sometimes with that is then we start to get a little bit of a drift where I'm doing amazing things over here in this building, but then over here somebody else is doing something also amazing, but it's very different. And then that's where our experiences start to become out of alignment. So, the purpose of the curriculum is to create that common foundation so that we do have equitable experiences across the district, but then now we have that foundation, we can really focus on those instructional practices and that we're all speaking the same language. It's not, "Oh, you're doing this book and you're you're doing this unit. We don't do that unit over here." And so, trying to eliminate that piece so that we're all moving in the same >> Okay, I will ask you that at
177the end again. That makes Justin happy. >> [laughter] >> I got a question. So, the books for the new whole class text, do the students get to keep those books? Cuz sometimes they annotate, so are those for them to keep or So, um most of the texts are we're purchasing as as a book. It is very costly to buy a text that you can send students home. When we are using the CommonLit, they're not whole class texts, but when we're using those, uh students can annotate those. We Many of the teachers use print workbooks so students can mark those up. Additionally, um a the texts that are in the public domain, uh A Christmas Carol um and Antigone, we are actually not going to be purchasing any copies of Antigone. We're going to be printing
178that allowing that as a consumable to to include that annotation. We're looking for ways to kind of build that in um without having to buy a complete refresh of text for every student. We go through a lot of post-its. Yes, >> [laughter] >> a lot of post-its. Yes, and At the end of every unit we have what we call in my class a post-it party. Where we put music on and everybody just sits and rips post-its out of their books. >> [laughter] >> Um some of my students this year have opted to purchase their own copies of the book so that then they can write directly in it. And then I see some of them [clears throat] but that buy their own copy and then they're still using post-its and I'm just You know you
179know you can write in that. You're [laughter] allowed. Um so it it just kind of depends on on their choice but we also I know we use building money to buy post-its for for kids to make sure that everyone is is supplied and and then the post-its helps you because we can use different colors to mean different things. Um so and then it becomes a ex- you know opportunity for an executive functioning lesson so um but but yeah. Um one more question. Um the PA program in general, if you are not in in sixth grade, you can still partake in it seventh grade and eighth grade? Yes. And how is it determined in fifth grade is it determined if you get into the sixth grade PA program? Yes, so yeah the students qualify at the
180end of um their fifth grade year for plate well mid mid fifth grade so we can get get schedules. But yes, it is rolling like a student can continue to qualify again once we're in middle school, it's really about uh readiness for above grade level work and that rigor that's going to be in the preparing students for that rigor of advanced high school course work and that's um and so students can can rise to that at any point. Thank you. Any other questions? Okay. Uh go ahead. Great, thank you. Thank you. All right. So, I've been I'll let you introduce yourself. Hello, Jessica Walsh, seventh grade ELA at Granger Middle School. So, I invited Jessica in to talk um to speak and help present about our um just some resource updates. This is something that
181we don't um always do. This is kind of like the behind-the-scenes work of the curriculum teams, but it seemed like a really good opportunity to show about the ongoing work. It's not just the every few years and look what we did, and then everything is fine for another 5 years. Um it is ongoing, and we're always looking to continually refine and improve. So, this is an example of of this. Yes. So, um this past year, some members of the seventh grade curriculum team highlighted book clubs. Uh we have been doing book clubs for years. Um I've been teaching seventh grade for 20 years, and shared reading is one of the foundational elements of a strong literacy block, whether that's a read-aloud, book clubs, whole class novels. The shared reading experience in reading in community is
182one of the most valuable tools that we have, um especially with the block, the time that we are allowed. Um and so, we realized with the refresh of Common Lit that we needed to look at our book club selections. Um we know that our students are changing very rapidly, their attention spans are changing rapidly, their interests. And so, um we know that book clubs is one of those places where we can really build a lifelong uh love of reading. So, I think it's probably one of the most authentic experiences we can provide for our students as well. I'm sure many of you are in book clubs as well, or partake in, you know, reading a book club a celebrity has endorsed, but uh it really is one of those authentic most authentic experiences. So, um,
183our curriculum team piloted uh, some new titles. Um, some we pulled um, from our past curriculum because they still fit in with some of the Common Lit thematic units. So, um, we had to give ourselves a pat on the back that we did make some smart choices in the past because Common Lit um, was still including them in their uh, recommended independent reading choices. And so, um, this past year the curriculum team um, for one of the units, uh, influential voices unit, we piloted book clubs which would be our second book club experience for seventh grade with 11 new titles. Um, the influential voices unit is a unit where students analyze um, speakers, real speakers. We we watch speeches, we read speeches, we look at the um, the tools that speakers use to convince their
184audience. And so, um, nonfiction texts are really the majority of some of our book club books and students were able to connect what we studied uh, in the Common Lit texts to their book club um, texts. And so, it really just deepens the experience of that unit. So, um, some of them are Common Lit recommended texts, some of them are previous book club titles, and other additional high-interest texts that we either had in our uh, school libraries or we had researched to pull into this pilot. Okay. Yeah. Okay. >> [laughter] >> And so, uh, the updates would include these new titles for this unit. Um, we went from 11 titles down to nine. There were just a couple titles that were uh, didn't quite have the impact we expected with um, with our seventh graders.
185And so, we let them know that this was a pilot, please give us your honest feedback. And you know, seventh graders love to do that. So, um, but they were really they really took on the challenge of giving us their feedback. And so, um, moving forward we're recommending nine titles for students to choose from that align with this uh unit. And this would then build out a full year experience for students with one whole class novel and two book club experiences. So, the first opportunity for students to have a book club experience is at the beginning of the year. And then we have a whole class novel with Brown Girl Dreaming, which is part of the common lit curriculum. And then this final book club experience would be towards the end of the year um
186around spring break time. So, what we're looking for Do you want to talk about the financial part? Yeah. Yeah. And so, because we know, you know, book clubs are are really our opportunity to stay current. Uh the strategy for purchasing these is to try to actually purchase the cheapest version of them as we can. So, we typically just buy a paperback um and five copies per section just to keep the cost low and that ability to to turn over those titles, you know, as opposed to, you know, like our whole class novels, we buy those hardback to last last us a really long time. So, this whole refresh um just costs uh the anticipated cost is around 18,000. So, this is the full uh list uh the new book clubs. Um and you could see
187there are some familiar names uh famous names on them. Uh you know, many of them most of these are nonfiction titles. Um I think there were a couple fiction ones that we we incorporated in there for some variety, but Yeah, we wanted the full range to just reflect uh students' interests, to reflect uh the students in our classroom. Uh some of hopefully some of these people, you know, are recognized names for students. And if they're not, then they get to kind of learn about people um who are currently living or from history that have used their voice to make a change. And that really leverages that influential voices unit. So, um you can see titles there from Katherine Johnson. And then that uh many of these are young readers editions. So, there's an adult version,
188but the the book club version for our seventh graders is the young readers edition. Mhm. So, um if you have questions um specific about the book clubs, but our next steps are just that our course curriculum changes for PA ELA are open for comment until the next board meeting um where we anticipate requesting approval of the curriculum changes on June 8th. Um all of the resources including the book club titles, although they're supplemental, they will they are uh available for review here at the CEC and that um at the next meeting we'll be requesting approval of the Project Arrow ELA proposed resources. Um and we will continue our ongoing uh the ongoing work of of the teams. Um It's it's a one of the things I really enjoy doing is getting to to to work
189alongside them. So, questions um I'm going to open it up again for anyone if they have questions. I don't know. Justin, I know you must have questions. Uh >> [laughter] >> This is your last topic to ask questions. You're going to come back and do public comment all night. >> It's 9:00. >> [laughter] [clears throat] >> Well, I'd like to focus on the policy part of it. >> [laughter] >> You started with the policy and sometimes we skip over these things. >> Yeah. But it is important. And I've got a t-shirt that talks about my love of policy. Thank you, Natasha. Um but I do think it's important that we don't just flow over it. And so, you know, you look at I'm not a teacher. I don't pretend to be one. I'm not an
190administrator. I'm a school board member. Um and I used to be a caveman attorney. So, this is I focus on the policy aspect of it. And curriculum development, you know, the the school board will adopt upon the superintendent's recommendation the curriculum. Um, if it meets the seven standards that are in there, and the presentation just walked down pretty much them exactly how they should be. Um, so I think when we all focus on the policy, it makes all of our jobs easier. You guys have the the end goal um on what boxes need to get checked. Um, and it makes our job easier. Um, so we don't have to go back in circles and saying, "Oh, you did it all wrong. Go back and start over." Um, and then the the instructional material, um, you
191know, the superintendent shall make recommend for us to adopt. And it it deals with um, textbooks and primary instructional material. That's our world. Um, and that's what we're doing here today, and there's a list of things that we're approving. And the policy has what we need to approve it, and it makes it really easy for us to say, "Hey, we followed policy. You guys did a good job. Thanks for the presentation." And uh let's do it. So, thanks for making me end like that, Lori. I But, I had nothing else to say. Well, thank you so much for your work. And when you look at um a presentation like this, you realize and I'm not a teacher at all, um how complex and how thoughtful um the work it takes to um have a curriculum
192that engages and challenges and really helps our students um engage in the whole process of learning. So, thank you for all the work and energy behind all of this. And I've read several of those books in the book club and love it. So, thank you for that. So, thank you. All right, last um up any legislative advocacy or Board of Education update? >> have a couple things. >> Okay, yeah. Um so just wanted to update the board recently IASB asked me to speak with um Representative Janet Yang Rohr with three other DuPage County superintendents. Dr. Tally was there about the um um oh, which escapes me now, Adrian. Uh notice to remedy notice to remedy bill that's currently in at at in legislation at state of Illinois. Um so they asked me to represent DuPage
193board members. IASB did, so uh tended that. June 2nd, I just looked it up, will be that evidence-based funding meeting that I'll be attending half a day um during my work day, so I'll be taking off for work for that. And then also June 5th and June 6th I'll be taking off work and going to that as part of the DuPage representative. I'll be down in Springfield for IASB, so um my goal after that meeting is to send updates to all the school board members in DuPage County of what takes place at those meetings, so they're more informed of what actually happens at those directors meetings. So, look for that. You guys will receive it first, but I'll be sending it to all the DuPage County board members as well, so that's it. Well, thank
194you. And um I'm going to say thank you ahead of time to the board members cuz I know we are going to have a busy couple weeks coming up here, so thank you in advance and um I appreciate all of you and all of your hard work here. And um with that, I need a motion to adjourn. Motion to adjourn. Second. All in favor? Yes. Aye. Okay, thank you. >> Hey.