Board Of Education - February 24, 2026

001here. >> All right, let's stand for the pledge of allegiance, please. I >> pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands under. >> Thank you. And no, it's NY. >> Or is it N? >> Who wants to read? Okay. Um, ensure academic achievement and personal growth for all students through innovative and and engaging educational opportunities. An inclusive community of motivated learners who are inspired to change the world through exploration and collaboration. Excellence in education, enthusiasm for life, every student every day. Thank you so much. Um, all right. We will welcome comments from our staff, parents, and constituents for public comment. We'll also have another opportunity at the end of the meeting. So, do we I know we also have some >> We have some

002that have incentives. >> Do you want to go with people here? >> Yeah. Anybody here want me? >> Okay. Uh, so I'm reading them tonight. Amy usually reads them, but she's losing her voice, so I'm going to go ahead and read them. Uh, we have four public comments. So the first one, I appreciate the school improvement plan update included in today's agenda, particularly the reference to 84% performance growth in math for the board board. Please clarify how this figure aligns with the Illinois report card data, which shows I math growth at 58% and proficiency at 60% for LBES. Additional context explaining how these measures relate to one another would help the community better understand where math proficiency currently stands. It would also be helpful to hear the board's perspective on how our school's math proficiency

003compares with neighboring schools. For example, Spencer Lumis Elementary School 78% Everett Elementary School 87% and Sheridan Elementary School 90%. How should we as a community think about preparing our students as they transition to high school alongside peers who may be entering at much higher math proficiency levels? Lastly, when reviewing the ECRA longitudinal math proficiency analysis based on the new Illinois 2025 benchmarks attached, there is a multi-year declining trend for Lake Bluff with some grade levels showing math proficiency rates in the 30%, 40%, and 50% ranges in 2023, 2024, and 2025. Could the board share its thoughts on this data, how the community should interpret it, and the path forward? Thank you for your time, consideration, and continued leadership, Jacob Armstrong. The second comment, uh, I am writing as a LakeB block parent to ask for

004a clear parentfriendly explanation of the recent report card data, especially the multi-year decline in math proficiency. It would be helpful to better understand what may be driving the trend in the district's plan and timeline to strengthen overall proficiency. Thank you for your time and consideration, Karen Neiego. Third comment, I'm writing to express my concern over recent district testing scores as well as what appears to be continued decline. As the parent of a first grader with an incoming kindergartener, I'd like to request a forum to understand this troubling data better. Along with transparency and data surrounding LBES testing scores, I'd also like to understand the administration's plan for increased benchmarks moving forward. Thank you for your time and the center asked to remain anonymous. And the last comment and good evening. Thank you for your service

005to Lake Bluff students, parents, and the greater community. I'm ready to express concern about the decision to eliminate French at Lake Bluff Middle School. This change would make LVMS an outlier among Northshore districts in terms of world language offerings and would place our students at a disadvantage compared with their peers. For example, in Wultt, students in district 39 have access to Latin, Mandarin, French, German, and Spanish in grades 5th through 8th. Early access to multiple languages strengthens cognitive flexibility, supports literacy development, and enhances preparation for high school coursework and college entrance expectations, including standardized assessments. I respectfully urge the board not to give up on language diversity, but instead to think creatively through shared staffing, virtual instruction, partnerships, or phased programming to preserve meaningful choice for our middle school students and keep Lake Bluff competitive

006with neighboring districts. Sincerely, Stephanie Dinger. We had some people come in. So, it's time for public comment if you'd like to come up to the podium. We do limit it to three minutes, but we're just Okay. I'm just the opening act. Um, we wanted to come here and talk about the French program in the middle school. Um, actually, as that email said, a lot of the same things. It just keeping the competitive competitiveness across the Northshore. those are the people who are going to compete events going into colleges. Um, so for us to get rid of those choices that the kids have, I feel like really limits their opportunities. Um, and I think one of the biggest things is it takes away a chance for kids to find something that they're passionate about because not

007all kids love the same subjects and it's the first time that they get a chance to really make a choice. And the real reason we're here is when I brought it up to my kids, they both felt really passionate about it and talk. They wanted to come. they wanted to speak at this meeting and talk about what it meant to them. So, I'm going to let Margarite talk about why it matters to her. And then Mave, who is a third grader, also wanted to speak on it. >> I'm in third grade and I wanted I'm here because I want because friendship has meant so much to me and I want other like bus students to have the same opportunity. I chose French because I want something different and fun. I had taken Spanish in elementary

008school and I was starting to feel bored. I wanted a bigger challenge and I wanted to try something a little push myself. I wanted what makes French special is that it was my choice. When students get to choose something, they take ownership of it. They care more and try harder. The they feel responsible for success. Choosing French made me feel more invested in my learning because it was something I decided to do. It hasn't it hasn't been easy, but challenges help me grow and be and learn as a student. I became part of a class community where we support each other and celebrate progress together. If the program is removed, students like my sister won't even get the chance to make the choice. We won't get the opportunity to take ownership of their learning in

009the same way. Princess has helped me grow academically and personally. I hope you will keep this program so future LBMS students, including my sister, can choose it, love it, and grow from it. Thank you. Hi, my name is Mave and I'm a third grader. I heard that the French program for the middle schoolers might be taken away. Even though I'm only in third grade, I already think about what I'll get to learn when I want. I like having choices. Some kids might want Spanish. Some kids might want something different. Learning another language isn't just about words. It helps your brain grow. It teaches you about other countries and cultures. It helps you understand that the world is bigger than just our town. I've seen how French helps older students feel proud of themselves. And when

010I learn something challenging, I want to have the same chance when I learn. Thank you both. >> Nice job. Thank you guys. And my biggest thing is the mom. If we get rid of the French program, yes, they can take it in high school, but they can't ever take that French tribe. They can't take that AP class. And that actually like really affects them in college and it affects their college applications which like I said we're competing against the whole Northshore. So that's a big piece in our puzzle and a lot of it starts in middle school. Math starts in middle school. I mean in this room so thank you guys. >> Okay we can move on from public comment. Um we'll start with our reports. Do we have PTO or alliance? I do not

011have a residence report and so Lisa. >> Yeah, two really quick things. Um, so just as uh I think our board has now been made aware of it for the community, uh, Lake Forest District 6715 and our district are getting the portrait of a learner group back together to do kind of a little refresh and a discussion as a community about the portrait and how we feel about the competencies in the portrait at this point. Now, I think we're four years uh into having that as a tri- district northstar. So, that reboot takes place on March 2nd. We are inviting all of the community members that participated the first time. We hope people come back. We'll be reporting a little bit on the progress that we've made each of the three districts. Dr. Montgomery and

012I will start the session and then we will have a member of Battel for Kids, not the same facilitator but a different facilitator that um from the same organization that helped us last time. So I just want to say that's a really great opportunity for us to continue to evaluate where we are in terms of our portrait and strategic plan. It's a it's a critical part of kind of evaluating our midcourse um three years into our strategic plan. So that's one. The other piece is uh True North. Uh as you know, Laura Braggstone is our official True North board uh leadership council governing board member, sorry. Um and our interim executive directors are asking that we have an official alternate board member on the books uh for True North so that if our appointed board

013member cannot make it to a governing board meeting that we already have an alternate board member loaded into the system with access to board book. I can tell you we have changed over from board docs when now we're on board book. It's a very seamless transition from your board packet here to the board packet at true north. We are only meeting hopefully three to four times a year and I know Laura's already committed to a lot of those. So if you're interested, I'm there every time. I can help you u transition into that role, but it's really important especially as we're going through our reorganization to have steady leadership. And I would appreciate appreciate anyone letting me know if that would be something you'd be interested in. >> Sign me up. >> Yay. Thank you,

014Lauren. >> I promise that's not I can guarantee it. That's all I have. Thank you. >> Thank you. >> All right, we'll move on to our discussion and presentations. Um, school improvement plans. Yeah, >> principles. So, I'm going to start us and then our principles are going to join me um talking about school improvement planning and the process that we've been going through this year. And before we even start, I just want to thank our building administrators, but I also want to thank our building leadership teams that are made up of teachers. Um, in each of our teams in LBEES, we have Kate Whitehead, Erin Griffith, Eileen Sherhart, Megan Kelly, Andrea Solsberg, Sam Marshall, Bethany Plap, Brandy Mcdana, Amanda Haden, and Ryan Rean are all part of our building leadership teams that developed a plan

015you're going to see tonight. And at LBMS, Mallerie Jorgensson, Brian D. Young, Brooke McKeen, Ashley, sorry, Annie Shance, and Sarah Coleman. All parts of the all people who are really integral in making these plans. and we're really grateful to them and uh since they they all can't be here tonight, but we want to make sure we recognize that they have put a lot of work and time into these plans as well. So, I'm going to go ahead and get us started. Um and >> did that work? Yeah. >> All right. Yay. Okay. Excellent. So, school impromp improvement planning process is a bit new for us um as a district. This is not a process that we engaged in uh too much prior to my arrival and then at COVID we sort of revamped and kind

016of retoled after the pandemic and thought we need to get a little bit more serious about making specific plans in each of our buildings. We've been doing it for about three years. Um, but this is the first time we're making our practices public, which I think is really important for the work that we're doing. Um, I'm going to switch to this because I think it's going to be I mean it's going to be easier to share and see. Uh, I was going from a different thing. So, as you know, our foundation is always our mission and vision and motto, which uh, thank you for reading that again today, Nancy. Um, but I want to actually start us back to three years ago when we started on the road down to professional learning communities. So, we

017have been on a really thoughtful and intentional journey to make sure that our schools and our teams are working as professional learning communities and a culture of continuous improvement. So, as you know, as we've been talking about, we our first step was to build our guaranteed viable and transparent curriculum. And we are this year looking at our assessments in terms of formative and summitative assessments in both ELA and math. And the goal is to be continuously looking at those data points, continuing to build more formative uh data points that can help us along the way so that we can adjust our instruction as we move through the school year. For context, when we began our strategic plan metrics, um this is where we had our baseline. Now, to be clear, these are again, as we've

018talked about, not just the Illinois assessment of readiness. Our state standardized assessment is the is the assessment we want all kids to get to proficiency on. That's sort of like the opening door. But we also understand that we have some students who might not make that goal, but will make significant growth towards that goal. And since we give not just the Illinois Assessment of Readiness every year, we also give math as a benchmark in ELA and math. We look at those scores for students that haven't met proficiency in AR to see whether or not maybe they haven't met proficiency yet, but are they making growth or are they demonstrating proficiency on the MAP assessment, which is another measure of that. We give those assessments because they're both good pictures, snapshots of where students are in

019the year. Anybody who has been with a student preparing for an assessment that takes place on one day knows that there's lots of variables that can affect your performance on that one day. And so we really feel strongly that we want more than one measure to capture how students are progressing. So in that first year we had about 80% of our students either making AR proficiency on AR or for the ones that didn't making their MAP growth and or proficiency in that assessment. As you also know, we've spent the last two years going through an evolution in our literacy curriculum and instruction. We've made a shift from the units of study to a research-driven science of reading literacy plan, which is focused on phonics fluency and comprehension through explicit instructional practices. In order to make

020that shift, we've spent a lot of time, and Jackie will talk about it as we look at our resource recommendation. We've actually spent a lot of time with our teachers helping them to understand what the shift means between units of study to science of reading providing targeted professional development and making sure that they have time together to unpack and look at their standards and look at how do we actually teach reading and and in a way that makes sense that's structured for all students and how do we intervene when they're not making it when they're not learning. As you know, later in tonight, we'll be recommending a new literacy resource for district-wide implementation next year. Because we've spent two years focused really heavily on language arts and reading, um I wanted to go over some

021of the action steps that we've taken so far in math, but our shift is going to be moving into next year towards math instruction. When I arrived in 2020, we added a math interventionist at LBEES to provide tier 2 and three intervention, which we hadn't had before that. Alongside our language arts work, we've spent a lot of time looking at the exact same process for unpacking and understanding the standards in the math curriculum. In addition, because of our Northwestern audit, we've added accelerating learn accelerated learning services in math and ELA, as well as a new accelerated math course in fourth grade and a new math course in seventh grade. And that's all coming directly from that audit uh that we did with Northwestern as well as our portrait of a learner and what we're expecting

022for our students in terms of above and beyond curriculum. Moving into the spring before we get into our next steps this part of the year, we've asked the regional office to work with us as well to do a little bit more of a detailed audit on math instruction and looking at the resources that we have in math to prepare us for next year. We have uh through a grant been able to get Jenny Winters who's been working as the regional office um consultant for math and science for over I think 15 to 20 years. She knows the standards inside and out and she is going to be coming to provide some targeted professional development to our teachers this spring as well as supporting with some um instructional analysis and just kind of meeting with teams

023and hearing what they need or what they feel like they need at this point in their planning and instruction. So we went to our baseline in year two. Uh when we look at that aggregate score in English language arts, we made a benchmark of 85% and then this last year 92%. So again, that's the percentage of students that met or their proficiency benchmark on AR and then also those students who maybe not met that first benchmark but did meet in math and in math 79% that first year. So that first year we didn't see a lot of change, but by the end of last year we improved to 84%. I also want to put out there that Illinois has been involved in making two really critical frameworks for the state. One is a literacy plan

024which is aligned with the science of reading which we've been working with as we work with our teachers. The other is a numeracy plan. uh and it's in its second draft now, so it's actually not finalized yet, but they're asking for a lot of feedback and public comment from educators across the state, but we really want to keep our eye on what Illinois is going to be asking us to do in terms of updating our instruction and resources, and we want to stay aligned with that plan as it develops and uh becomes finalized. So, that all being said, I want our principles to join uh to talk about how all of those shifts districtwide have translated into specific improvement plans for each of our schools. Um, the process has been super collaborative. I mentioned all

025the teachers who have been involved, but they've also used a lot of data to inform their goals and to inform their uh discussions with their teachers. So, who's going to start? So Joe and I >> All right. >> Be all right if I stole the uh projector. >> Do you want to do it or do you want me to drive for? >> Oh, look at that. You can drive for me. That'd be even better. Um good evening. Thank you for uh having us here today. Uh Mr. Jackson and I are pleased to spend some time talking a little bit about the Lake Middle School uh school improvement plan. Um, one of the things that I wanted to make sure to mention before getting into the tool that we'll show you here, uh, is that fundamentally

026the Lake Middle School SIP, school improvement plan, uh, was designed to be a, uh, buildingwide effort. We wanted all staff, regardless of the subject area they specialize in, uh, to be part of the process and be working toward accomplishing these school improvement goals. So, I wanted to be clear about that. Now, also, these goals are written in the format of a of a smart goal. And for those that don't necessarily or maybe aren't familiar with the concept of a smart goal, u it's an acronym. We love acronyms in the world of education. Uh smart meaning specific, measurable, achievable, uh relevant, and time bound. So as you see how these goals are formatted, uh that is the smart goal format that we were going for. So, um, first of all, what, uh, is on display here

027is the very website that we link into our documents that teachers use as a reference when they go back to review the, uh, school improvement plan. It's right there. It's linked into, uh, our notes. And this first kind of landing page highlights goals uh, one, two, and three. But I'm getting ahead of myself because I was going to turn things over to Joe, and he's going to talk a little bit about what it looked like last year. So Joe, go ahead and then I'll jump back in. Sure. So, as as Nate mentioned, our our big focus was to get a goal or two into our staff's hands that everyone could contribute to. And so, last year in the first edition of our our school improvement plan, we really looked at at writing as our focus.

028Um, and you'll see that in in embedded in these goals as well. Last year, we looked in in two areas for writing specifically for all students. And we wanted to see well, how are we going to measure that? And that's in our AR proficiency uh data. And so last year we set a goal that by the end of the school year last year 85% of our students would demonstrate proficiency or above on the ELA I AR assessment. And so pre prior to that we were at 76%. We didn't quite hit that goal. We made it to 82% were proficient in that area. Um and so it the we we gained momentum and as Nate talks about this year's goal that momentum is continuing through what we're doing. But we also looked at a second layer

029of that. We wanted to keep our efforts linked together, not only supporting the writing and literacy needs of all students, but also students that we identified are still growing in that area, our multilingual students. So, we looked specifically at the data for our multilingual students, and we were not satisfied with their proficiency rate on IR. Um, prior to this plan, that most recent data point was 18.2%. and we said we need to really focus our efforts across the building and in just a year our results uh grew to 29.6% 6% at proficiency and at the middle school level um as as you may know for students that uh are multilingual learners and receive support they take the access uh for MLS or ELS is the way the state describes it and we had 10 students

030that either approached graduation from uh ML services or or graduated from services and that's almost unheard of at the middle school level typically exit rates are stronger when kids uh are a little bit younger but at the middle school level that's the high level of growth that we've had in a long time. So clearly this gained momentum in focusing on writing and literacy. And so Nate will explain a little bit more about our current goals which build off of those and unpack those goals a little bit. So back to that landing page that I was talking about earlier. Uh this is where the three goals are outlined, but we wanted to get a little bit deeper. And so thank you Lisa. If you go ahead and click on the goal one page, uh you'll see

031that we've gone ahead for goal one specifically and rolled that forward to this year. We wanted to continue with that um that ELA reading goal. Um and one of the things that you will notice, sorry I'm going to do the same thing on my computer site to follow along. Uh this is as a resource for teachers a place where they can actually go. Um one of the things that I wanted to point out was the critical attributes. Um, we wanted to focus on some of the fundamentals of writing, not just in and and I will tell you that sometimes, uh, Lake Bluff Middle School students get kind of honed in on what the subject is that they're currently working on and what they think that teacher might be looking for. And if you're the ELA

032teacher or you're the writing teacher, then that's where I'm going to make sure that my punctuation, capitalization, and all those things have been done. But if I'm in SC, so our point was we were trying to break down that idea that uh, reading fundamentals are siloed into specific subject areas. And so if Lisa, you don't mind clicking on that LBMS uh editing checklist. This is one of the things that you're going to now see in all of our classrooms. It's large and poster format. Um and students get copies of this to keep inside of their uh assignment notebook. But whenever writing is turned in, regardless of the subject area or grade level, students are prompted to review their writing checklist and double check, are we doing those things that we all know is supposed to

033be, uh, reflected in good writing before we turn it in. Also, it's not just the ELA teachers that are going to be evaluating students on those things. So, um, we've got that as one of the tools that I wanted to just highlight and something that's happening universally across the the building. um if you don't mind going back. Thank you. Uh you'll see that we have um a variety of other key activities that uh are feeding into this goal. Um one of the things that we did this year was to revise that checklist a little further. Initially it was the same at all grade levels and we worked this year to differentiate it a little bit to build upon it to extend upon it by grade level. So, sixth grade is going to look a little

034bit different than seventh uh and a little bit different than eth with those expectations uh growing each year. Um so, I kind of summarized um the things that are happening and and you can see teachers uh share expectations with student teachers will collect uh formative data on written assignments uh for discussion at team meetings. We're spending time uh looking at student data and I should back up again. I got ahead of myself. Uh initially it was our building leadership team uh that began working through these goals that we're identifying and sharing with you tonight. Uh ultimately that fed into the team level discussions and so uh we have a sixth grade team, seventh grade team, eighth grade team and fine arts team as well as our student services team. So they're spending time working on

035these goals and discussing them at their team levels as well. Um the monitoring is also uh put up here on the uh on the presentation for you. All teachers um had the editing checklist had that done by November of 2025. All students had the editing checklist as their in their planners. As I mentioned, those are in there. We did that by the end of November. Uh teachers identify upcoming assignments, assessments to launch the editing checklist. So, these are all kind of first steps that were taken throughout the year to make sure that students were aware of school improvement goal number one. Um if we go into our second goal, This is as I mentioned before very similar to the goal that we launched last year. The difference with this one though is we up the

036benchmark. Initially we were looking at um trying to get all students by the end of the year to 40%. For this coming year we went to 50% uh for multilingual learners uh will demonstrate proficiency uh or above an ELA assessment. So with the success that we had and it was a larger amount of success than we initially anticipated uh last year, we felt it was uh prudent to go ahead and up the uh percentage of it for this one. Uh similar to goal number one, we've linked in some of the strategies here and a lot of the multilingual strategies that are specified there are not just multilingual strategies. They're really good for all kids. Uh and so those things that are uh highlighted on that list are things that our teachers are working to implement

037uh in all of the classes with the ML students in mind but also understanding that they benefit all students. Um and so similar to goal number one, we've listed some of the key activities and the monitoring um very much reflecting what goal number one looked like as well. Um so with that, I'm going to turn things over to Mr. Jackson. He's going to talk about our third goal that we added as a new one for this year. Our last goal really uh continues to focus similarly on on these topics of literacy but also math and embeds this um move screen over to goal three. So I'm looking at that too. Um and what we wanted to do is make sure that every student was both growing so demonstrating growth and also demonstrating high levels of

038achievement. Sometimes we've noticed that students are achieving at high levels but maybe their growth has tapered off some. Other times we've noticed that students haven't been growing for a season in their school experience and we want to figure out why that is. And so in this goal, what we've really uh identified is for teams to look deeply at student data and then identify students that either are in uh a couple different categories, perhaps demonstrating low growth on their most recent standardized assessments and low achievement or low growth and high achievement. and then work together as a team to identify needs, classroom supports, school-based supports, and interventions to help all students grow and achieve. And so what it's really doing is a call to looking at every single student across our grade levels. We don't want

039to leave any stone unturned and we don't want to miss anything along the way. And so through this um we're we're using our NWA resources through our MAP assessments. We're looking at um some key activities where we're looking at we're reviewing student data together. We've identified different problem solving approaches to help figure out what's the best way to deliver that support to students and then from there uh work as teams to best identify when and where and how that happens. Does that happen in the classroom? Does that happen during our flex block time? Does that happen during an intervention that a student may be recommended for? And so it's looking critically at every student so that we don't uh lose sight of any growth or achievement opportunities that kids have. I'm thrilled of the progress

040that we've made. I'm excited for the progress that's ahead and for the next round of um school improvement planning at the middle school level. >> Do we want to ask any questions before we move on to the Do you guys recognize the chart? I I've got some questions really for both of them kind of at the same time, but if you'd rather me ask each group individually versus kind of the same questions. >> Can we if you're comfortable with that? >> Okay, >> we will move on. >> I don't want to miss the one question. Students, do you recognize chat lessons? >> Make sure you weren't going to hang me out drive. Good answer, Moose. Good answer. >> She's like, "Do we need to see it again?" >> Kathy and I are excited to have

041the opportunity to present our to um we there's been a lot of effort put into creation of this plan and not just the two of us sitting around the table um which is sort of what had been happening in the past. So, be able to make this public to spend time on it with a variety of stakeholders, I think really prioritizes the work that we see as important. It gives us a focus. Um, and we know that working towards a common goal helps to benefit students. So, um, this is going to look familiar. Um, we sort of followed in the lead of the middle school and created our own web page and landing page that is accessible for staff and on our sort of shared communication document. So, um, our hope tonight is that you

042leave with some understanding of our plan, our action steps related to the plan, some data and progress that we've made. so far and how we navigate and facilitate conversations around our plan so that we're constantly sort of keeping our eye on it and measuring sort of how we're doing so it's not just at the end sort of how did we do or a private conversation around a table for two people's going to talk a little bit about how and why we got to these goals I would say I would share with you in the past um I approached a school improvement plan with the idea of like if you're a bear be a grizzly and made it very robust and had multiple goals um more than multiple like four or five and the reality is

043that wasn't paying for us because our attention was really split. So this year when we approached the school improvement plan um the BLT our building leadership team and Kelly and I really approached it with the idea of what are the things that matter to us and what are the areas that need our attention the most and that's how we came to these two goals. Um, it spent a lot of time looking through data, digging through numbers, working with ECRA, looking at our own practices within the classroom and getting surveys and parent feedback for us really to identify what are these key areas. We looked at the HumanX data as well. That was one of our big resources to really determine what do we need to focus on, what do we need to improve the most.

044And that is how we got to the areas of math and communication. So, I'm going to talk about our first goal, goal one. So, our first goal, as you can read, is really about um having our students in grades three, four, and five uh demonstrate proficiency um or above on the math IR assessment. Now, I know what you're thinking. This is a school improvement, Kathleen, a school improvement plan, not just a grades three, four, and five. However, we realize that in order for grades three, four, and five to prove proficiency, they have to be proficient in the earlier grades. They have to be working on those fundamental math skills. So, as a BLT, we really discussed that this was an appropriate goal because it also relied on the foundation work that they were doing in

045the younger grades. So, we thought this would be a great thing. We also note that our IIA scores have not been super great recently and so we needed to boost it up. I'm going to acknowledge that this is a very lofty goal for us. It is. We may not meet it this year, but we are going to approach it and we are going to continue to track it. Now things that we're doing to to achieve that is at each grade level we've identified what are our goals for number sense and fact fluency. Each grade is tracking that and they are doing a concerted effort to push and collect data. They're collecting the data in forefront. Those conversations about what do our students know, what do they need to know and how are we going to

046fix it because they don't know it is occurring at not only their grade level team meetings at our BLT conversations. We're even talking about it at faculty meetings. We're really diving in deep. Our math specialist is coming to our release times to talk to teachers about different interventions they can put in place within the classrooms. And then we're looking at other interventions that may be needed um in addition to our tier one and tier 2, but more of an intense tier three. How are we supporting all learners at all levels? We're continuing to build our GBTC to make sure that it's accessible. We're really looking at planning for all of our students, not just for the middle, but how are we reaching the people that are on at one end and the other so that

047everyone is successful. We're asking those PLC. I'm sorry, I'm really excited, so I feel like it's great. In addition, our teachers are coming together with their common assessments, looking at it to say, what did our students get, what didn't they get, and how are we going to retach it for our students so that they are successful? And again, they're really looking at that fact fluency. Um, a great example would be our fourth grade team recognized that our students were not solid on their math facts and they decided that the best way to approach that was to go back to the earliest um what am I looking for? the numbers like the early numbers like you know starting with your ones and twos and making sure that each child was solid and then pushing on and

048progressing and they found that the students were really invested in fifth grade they found a way to motivate students with their 30 to 30 and really just helping the students embrace the challenge. So it has been a really successful push and at the elementary the earlier grades they're really looking at their forefront at it to see how are they being successful what do they need to change and what practices do they need to incorporate. It really has been a schoolwide effort and I'm excited for I AR. It is a lot of work, but I'm excited for AR um and the results to come to see how it's paying off for our students. I'm also excited for the MAT test because that will also be a great indicator. Like I said, we know that this is

049going to be a multi-year like going over the trends and seeing what we need to do. So, just like our teachers are asking those four PLC questions as a a school building, we are going to ask the four PLC questions. What do we need to do? What do the students need to know and how are we going to fix it when they're not learning it? >> And as a reminder, only third through fifth graders in your building take the IR. >> That is correct. >> However, I want to reiterate that we are looking at other measures to make sure that math is growing um at all grade levels. >> Um I'll talk a little bit about board goal two. So board goal two is um focused on communication specifically with our families. Um so by

050the end of this school year teachers will increase their communication with parents to achieve the following benchmarks and we've identified two because we have some different measures now that are giving us data and informing us on kind of how the parent sort of satisfaction around communication. So the first benchmark is related to our human x parent survey specifically question 26 which is my child's teacher reaches out to me regularly with feedback about how my child is doing in school. Last year um we were at a 3.52 on this one and we're looking for a mean of 3.6 and I will just share since I started and um took over as principal communication has been an area of meat and a topic that we had feedback on when COVID hit that sort of needed to take

051a backseat and now it's back in the front again. And the helpful piece is that we have parent surveys that are giving us timely information. So we know where to target our work when it comes to communication. That's a really big bucket. And so we think by defining these two benchmarks um it will help us to focus these efforts so that we can try to see some change and improve the family satisfaction. The second benchmark is that 80% of parents completing our district family sur feedback survey will select very well informed or mostly informed when asked how informed they feel about their child's academic progress. So when we brought these um suggested goals forward to our building leadership team, we really worked together on key activities um and monitoring so that we were in agreement

052on how we were going to try to achieve these goals. Um so we prioritized prioritized Seesaw as a universal communication tool and our um at the beginning we're striving for teachers sharing one post per week with families. Um, and then at least one time per month, we were asking that staff send home something, homework, an assessment, an a seesome post, um, objects, things that will help parents get a glimpse into their child's school life. Um, and then the last key activity is that teachers will make every effort to send home positive communication. So, that was another area that we, you know, there's lots of times we're touching base or communicating home about challenges or problems that we're having. Um, and we all know that we start a strong trusting relationship and we can start off

053on the right foot with communication with positive. And so we really wanted to highlight that that is something that spotlights all of us to work on. Um, we've got some tools to monitor so that we kind of have a shared understanding about how we're going to keep track of our success. Um, so I want to talk a little bit about kind of where we're at with um, the communication piece. One thing to highlight, we had several um at least six staff members at LBES make this part of their personal learning goal as part of teacher evaluation. And so really going further to do some tracking, monitoring, and creating plans and systems for themselves because they know that positive communication and communication with families is so crucial and important and an area that they have been

054wanting to work on. Um we also have some survey data that um is good to update you on. So first in relation to human X we'll start with our celebration. When we gave the November survey we actually met our goal. So from the last time when we took the survey we were at 3.52. Our goal was 3.6. Um we actually went up 0.17 from the last time and we're 3.69. So celebrating the fact that through that November December survey from families, we've increased the satisfaction. Um our LB65 family feedback survey has been given twice. So we've got sort of a first semester and second semester. Um unfortunately that one's telling a little bit of a different story, but I think that's even more reason for us to have multiple data points to be able to

055measure. we're going for 80% um kind of selecting those top two. Uh in the first semester we started off stronger. We were at 66%. Um the second time we gave it we went down to 61. So we're really digging in to have more conversation with building leadership team grade level teams to try to understand. We feel like we've made some really big strides. for getting feedback from human X that's telling us one thing and then our family survey that's telling another. So we want to just take all those pieces into consideration really understand where to go next. Communication can be challenging because with all of our families they may want a variety of things. So bringing some consistency and making sure that we're talking about it um and understanding is clear um is going to

056be a big part of the conversation. So, we're proud of these kind of narrow focus goals that we're working on and I think it's a celebration that it is a schoolwide practice at this time. So, we're ready for questions that you may have for for real school. >> Um, first I just want to say thank you. Looked like a lot of hard work went into it and honestly your enthusiasm was awesome and it makes me happy that you guys care so much in both um schools. Um my one question is that how will we once these goals are met how will we hold on to these goals so that we don't slip again and then how are we introducing new goals so that it's not overwhelming and you have too many on the dock there

057>> in at least for middle school what I really like that we're doing is creating long-term practices for our staff so the writing checklist is one of those right that is going to live on regardless whether that holds is what is posted or whether it's something that we've set as a different goal that will be a good practice that people will have. In terms of supporting our ML students, we worked with our ML team to develop a list of best practices to support multilingual learners. And those have been things that we talk about at team meetings, talk about when we're talking about student growth and achievement. And so we're building that capacity in our in our staff. Um, and our last goal looking at the data analysis. If we can help everyone understand what does

058it mean for a student to be growing and achieving regardless of what goals we set in the future, we can hang on to those really high leverage practices. It's a great question because there's always other areas to to grow in, but we don't want to neglect the things that we we've just spent a lot of time working on. >> Yeah. >> Fundamentally, we'll keep what works >> and if there are things that are proven not to be worth it, we're going to put those aside. uh but ultimately building into our processes and procedures the things that are working and in some cases we'll identify new goals that will be part of the process that we'll go through with our building leadership team at the beginning of the year each year. It could be building upon

059current goals that we have or it could be developing brand new ones but uh really not losing sight of what's working and continuing to identify new areas for us to uh work from improvement. >> I'd like to jump on that if I can really quickly. I think also we are in our PLC journey and continuing those practices of asking the four questions will help us maintain our focus on um what do students need and how are we going to address that. Um there's always more data to look at and then there's always root cause analysises to complete and so I think as we continue to do those with our DLC they will help us add new goals in um or continue to work on current goals. >> Thanks guys. Anybody else? Um, yeah. Just were

060these what were these action items that you've that you've done? And I apologize, Nate. I didn't realize I didn't realize I could drill down. I didn't see the links, so I just saw your your three >> planning page. Yeah, >> I did. I didn't see all the details. I appreciate those. They're they're good. But, um, when were those uh action items like initiated? Was it at the beginning of the year or were we doing were this sometime >> so beginning >> October November or something? >> Yeah octo uh September October with an target date of end of November for things being implemented and up and ready to go. Um, so >> yeah, how about >> missing for our building? Our leadership team starts beginning meetings in August, September. And so we have a a few

061build building business things to take care of, but the school improvement plan was really brought to them at the very beginning so that we could start the work at the beginning of the school year. And I appreciate the ultimate goals that you've got, but kind of to reach those goals, you got to make sure that the action items are being followed. So, how the elementary level, how would you how are we doing so far on these action items? >> Well, I think that our entry point to talk through the the action items is happening on a lot of different levels. So, as Kathleen referenced, during the curriculum release time, when our grade level teams are meeting for 90 minutes, there's conversation around specifically the math goal. A lot of weeks um are spent on on

062talking about math achievement, math instruction, math unit planning. Um a lot of the FA fluency work. So, grade level teams are talking during those blocks of time. They're working during team meeting times. And we've also built time into faculty meetings. And so Jackie's present for much of the curriculum release time work. Um Kathleen and I attend the building level team meetings to be able to reference sort of the work that teams are doing and the action items. Sometimes we'll reach out in advance like we spent um some weeks talking about Seesaw and just getting in alignment on like what are we posting, how are we posting um so that teams were working together to create some plans and action items. Is that answering the question that you're >> Well, I think so. And I think

063you may have answered some of my next one, but but so you may have to repeat, but so exactly how do you monitor then the the um how we're doing on these action items? You get do you get the um they still make minutes from the team meetings? >> They do. I think our Yeah, but we do strive to be attending those meetings so that we're there in person and we can ask follow-up questions or get more information. But we do also re receive their agendas and minutes following the meeting. >> Okay. And and really the same two questions for you guys. How how are we doing so far against these action items? And how are you able to to monitor that? >> Right. The measurable piece really is going to be the I scores.

064That's what we're looking at and we get those once a year. So we we monitor it by building in the time. As Kelly mentioned, it's critical that this doesn't just sh sit on sit on a shelf. Excuse me. Um to do that >> without a shelf we need to make make sure that we're it's happening in team meeting time it's happening in faculty meeting times. Uh we're dedicating effort to uh these these goals and we're going to hope hopefully see improvement on those scores. Obviously, we're looking at the standardized assessments map and I are being the two >> and just to add on if I can some of the action items that that we stro for I don't want to say that they're big ticket items and so like one of the best ML practices

065is creating more opportunities for vocabulary and clear vocabulary for uh all students. And so seeing that and seeing teachers uh develop different ways to embed their their vocabulary acquisition practices in their classes, have vocabulary words and word banks posted and available to students really enhances that. So we wanted um to make things that that were attainable as they talked about with the smart goal uh feature and we go through and we make sure that we're hitting each of these benchmarks and so that's why we have the dates and and the the check marks to do that. So you're able to monitor that somehow. >> Absolutely. >> Through >> So for example, one of the easiest ones was making sure that every teacher had a copy of the writing checklist posted in their room. So beginning

066of the year when we were at that, we sent out a survey that said, you know, please verify that you have a copy and you don't have to go through it all the details. >> Yes, absolutely. >> We want to make sure that we're adhering to the plan that we set forth. >> Okay. And so I I mean I think you know I wouldn't worry too much about the IRS because if you do all of these things well they'll take care of themselves. >> They should hope >> you know I mean >> you know that's just the end result of doing of following your plan. Um but I was a little concerned there was nothing to there was no mention of math in in middle school >> in Google number three. That's part of goal

067number three is looking at students that are not uh well we talked about either m meeting mating low growth and low achievement or high growth and high achievement or sorry we're looking at both math and reading in goal number three >> but there's nothing specific for math I mean that was >> well remember this the design of the smart goals is to be building wide we that doesn't mean we don't set goals and we don't work with our departments math specifically But when we designed and developed these goals, they were intended to be worked on by the entire staff regardless of content area and subject area specialist. So in the in the school improvement plan that wasn't a specific math goal wasn't identified yet, but that was that was not how we designed. >> So

068the goal three identifies students that are either, you know, not not progressing or even decreasing or not progressing as they should against, you know, what's projected for them. Correct. Yeah. >> Um but beyond the identification of them, I I wasn't sure what the what the action item was once you identified a student, >> but it depend on what the student needs. >> And so that's really where teams are working together to figure out what is that level of support. For some students, it's just building an awareness that this student is in need of uh a little additional individual support in their classroom setting. For some students, it might be additional math support. In our a couple of our grade level sixth and seventh grade, there's math uh support that's available during students lunch periods and

069they can meet with one of our math teachers to get additional support. For some students, it might be looking closely whether they need uh a more formalized intervention period in their day. And so it really depends on uh beginning with the data, following the data, and then identifying what the best way to support. >> Can I specific? I do want to the redesign of the schedule at the middle school was to include a block of time where kids could receive specific interventions that includes math and reading. So every day during that flex time, students are identified for extra support if they need it. And because that goal encompasses both math and reading, those students get the extra support. So they'll get a double dose of math or in seventh grade even a triple dose of

070math if that's what they need. So the the idea of looking and what I want to make sure I highlight in both of these plans is the fact that in our mission statement we want to look at every student every day. Both of these plans incorporate a way to look at individualized student data and make those plans for individual students. So I just want to highlight there were there was a big structural change to accommodate additional support in the middle school this year for this specific reason. >> Yeah. And is that and is that extra session seeming to is that implemented pretty well? Yeah, >> I would say that it is. Yeah, we've got students that are taking advantage of it. We've got parent or teachers that are crawling kids in for their flex block.

071The ability to adjust and do that twice a week is something that's been beneficial. Um, you know, and and to speak a little bit more to the math piece, we have our math teachers that are looking very closely at the different uh strands on their assessments and and looking specifically at a class. For example, if they happen to have a group of kids, three or four, who are struggling with algebra and thinking and they can spend time looking at that data on the map uh results, then they can structure some support around how to help that group of kids knowing that they've got a cluster open in a classroom. So those are the sort of conversations that are occurring uh not only at the team level but at the department level. So >> um I

072had a went to a seminar on the ECRO presented at triple triple I and um so I was pleased to hear Kathleen that you're using ECRA data ec packager reports. Are you using that as well? >> Yep. You get the same information that elementary did. They uh they send us that information. >> Yeah. looked like you could drill down as far as you wanted to go with with using that data. Um um and I did I did appreciate you guys had a big strong emphasis on math but um I think frankly you know that as you pointed out pay to first and second I mean it if they're having to play catch-up by the time they get to the third it's just going to be that much harder you know and so I I mean

073I think I'm not sure what resources you've got at at that level but but I I think that deserves, you know, a lot of focus and it is clearly aware of it. Um um but I mean I think that's certainly a key that that don't let these kids fall behind to begin with. >> Yeah, it all starts early. >> I do want to just make one comment too about the percentages. So when we're talking about 80% um just to remember that our class sizes are pretty small. So each grade level consists of only 90 to 100 kids. And so when we're talking about 80% of students, we're talking about less than 20 students in a grade not meeting that benchmark. And we know that we have students in each grade that do have specific learning

074challenges that do need additional support that are coming in with multiple languages that they're learning and they're trying to become English proficient. And so I just want to make sure that when we're thinking about that percentage of 80% in a grade, we're really talking about a very small group when we get to that 80% that need that additional support. And also that we know that when students move in and out um that can really impact those scores. And so again, I really appreciate these plans focusing on individual students and their actual needs and making sure that like we utilize all of our resources to give each student what they need based on their profile. >> But I think the disconnect especially with parents because they don't see everything is, you know, the IR is showing

075like it's a 40% number, not a not a 20% number in math. Um, and it and it's not improving. I mean if it was you know if if we were showing improvement in it as we are in in um language arts I mean that AR is improving the you know our overall scores are improving it's just you know that's such a visible number out there that um I think there have to be pay attention to it as well. >> Absolutely. >> Thanks very much. I'm sorry to >> do you have somebody else >> make everybody stay alone >> just a kind of c how many multi- language learners do we have at the middle school >> so I think based on last year's data I think we had 27 students take the access for ELS

076and so of those 27 we had three three graduate and seven really approach that graduation benchmark so I'd have to double check the exact number >> I was Kia, that's your from last year's access course. Thank you. >> Thank you guys so very much. >> Thank you. >> I just want to look ahead from a district level, we do recognize um the need for math support and additional math work. And so above and beyond the school improvement plans. I want to just introduce a couple of recommendations. Uh we will talk about staffing in a moment, but I am going to be recommending two uh specialists to help teachers design more effective instruction in both ELA and math. Um to focus their efforts uh with teams of teachers, not necessarily student support at all, but supporting

077our teachers. I want to emphasize which I don't think that we've totally put this out there. Our staff are working really hard uh to make these changes and to make sure that they make the shifts that we're asking them to make. The literacy piece that's been happening for the last two years has been a big shift and I want to recognize our staff and Jackie and our administrators for all the hard work that they've put into that. But you'll see in a moment that we're going to be recognizing another big change in terms of a resource at uh elementary in terms of English language arts. And I want to make sure we have enough support to continue with that. And to Carrie's point, not lose the momentum we're making in English language arts as we

078shift our focus to math. We have to be able to do both. And uh we are pretty lean team here in Lake Bluff. We don't have much administrative support or support that's focused totally on teachers. And as we know, we we aren't just working with teachers. We're working with students, we're working with parents. We want to make sure we're we're keeping everyone connected. And so this additional two uh staff members we believe are going to be very helpful and supportive as our teachers make these shifts. Um we will continue to evaluate our math resources. We use bridges as a resource right now. Most districts around us use the bridges uh program. It doesn't mean that's where we'll land, but we'll continue to evaluate and make sure that we're using the best resource to align with

079the state numeracy program and what we need to achieve our outcomes. And it might not be just our primary resource, but also supplemental resources and making sure that we have what our students need. Continuing our PLC culture, we want to make sure we're getting to that 80% and then offering additional support. So, we're trying to work to structure an option for afterchool support for students who could benefit from supplemental instruction. This isn't um as simple as it sounds to organize and structure after school support. We want to get uh criteria down for the most um impactful grades that we could work with. Right now, we're considering the early grades um for second and third grade. We know that as kids get older, they have a lot more to do after school. might not want to

080be staying for afterchool support. They might also not be able to because they're doing more stuff. But then when we're targeting our efforts towards younger students, part of the equation is making sure we have transportation for them home, making sure we have a commitment from parents, and then making sure we have a commitment from teachers as well to provide that structured support. So, these are a glimpse into kind of our big um changes that we'd like to make for our system to continue to see that growth and progress. But, uh as you can see, we're very focused on making sure that we're seeing improvement in both of those areas and not losing sight of writing and science and social studies and the arts and physical education and like creating an atmosphere where kids love learning,

081which I think we should be really proud of. We have two really great buildings with great cultures for kids and families and we want to sustain that while we're upping the rigor um and expectations in terms of the academics. >> Happy to take >> one quick thing. You mentioned uh the math resources. Is that something that the audit would be looking at this? Um, I mean, I've already kind of talked to her about it and right now there isn't much out there that's going to be better than what we have. It's really more about are we using it effectively? Are we supporting our teachers, making sure that they have the support they need to use the resource more as effectively as possible. >> Thank. >> But that will be part of the work though, for

082sure. >> Okay. Any other questions? Okay, let's move on to our third grade pilot and they'll make a recommendation. Jackie or Jackie, do you want to show it or do you want me to? You got it. Okay. I do want to introduce really quickly and just thank Jackie for all the work. I know we have set we're going to make this recommendation a couple months ago and I want to highlight the fact that Jackie has worked really hard with the teams and the building administrators to make sure that all teachers are on board with the recommendation you're about to hear. and um I'm really proud of all that work and I just want to thank you for that. >> All right, so uh third grade pilot and LA resource recommendation. Just going to go over

083a little bit of information about how the pilot has gone in third grade this year and then provide a recommendation for moving forward. Uh so we've been doing a lot of work over the last several years aligning our literacy instruction in um this includes both our strategic plan goal one and also aligning it with the alumni literacy plan that was released two years ago. Um so these things are very you know in line with each other and really just uh kind of going back to the idea that every child deserves high quality literacy instruction that is evidence-based. So uh beginning in 2015 and kind of moving through the present we've used a variety of curricular resources and been designing a lot of our own curriculum. The big challenge of this is that it has required

084a significant amount of supplementation. So well um in 2015 it felt like we had kind of a solid resource. Then we recognized that there was a need to incorporate phonics. So we added an additional phonics resource in 2019. Um and even within that there was still a lot of supplementation happening across grade levels and even across classrooms within the same grade level. Um there also has been a lot of research since um 2015 just uh acknowledging something called knowledge building and that's still been a gap in the program and the um resources that we have available to us which I'll get into in a little bit um because of all the varied resources implement implementation can be very inconsistent again not just across classroom with integrate but the vertical alignment can be really tricky too

085and then so again that kind of vertical coherence of the resources that we're utilizing has been um inconsistent been a little bit challenging. So over the past couple of years specifically, we've been really trying to think about how we can provide a very coherent experience for students within our schools and also just thinking about the sustainability of kind of piecing together all of these varied resources that are um well researched and uh well-intentioned and really quality materials. But again, just the sustainability of continuing to pull from um it can oftenimes lead to things being feeling a little bit watered down or kind of losing sight of the intention. So we feel like there's a need for a more unified system just integrating those foundational reading um foundational reading skills at the K3 level reading and

086writing standards um kind of paralleled to that and then also recognizing the need for more of that knowledge building foundation that's become a big part of the scientific. So we've had a multi-year process. We've really been working hard the last several years during our curricular release time with teachers to build expertise. Again, the release of the Illinois literacy plan, uh, which was released in January of 2024, provided some guid guidelines for what literacy instruction should look like in the state of Illinois. We've been doing a lot of work with our guaranteed viable transparent curriculum. um really unpacking standards, allowing staff to gain a deeper understanding of what the standards are, what they look like, articulating what it is that we expect students to be able to do, looking at student data and identifying where those

087gaps are and where we could really use additional supports. Um and again, professional learning with our staff on understanding the science of reading. One of the big investments we've made over the last year and a half is having all of our uh kindergarten and first grade staff members be letters trained, which is aligned with the science of reading. Um, this going back to again making sure that we're really well verssed in what the literacy instruction looks like so that we would be in a position to make a really good uh decision on what instructional resources we might want to move forward with. So, um, beginning around this time last year, we started looking at what programs might be potential for a pilot. We evaluated programs against criteria um, related to the science of reading, which

088really embeds more systematic phonics, uh, knowledge building and standard alignment. Um, and then the need for a more coherent system that would stand levels. It's really, um, one of the things that's really tricky about teaching reading and writing, um, is that when kids are younger, you have a lot of those foundational skills being developed. So, a lot of programs and resources have a very distinct program, K2, and then it shifts completely 35 and then might be a whole different program in 68. We were looking for something especially um knowing that we have kind of a elementary building that has a K5 feeling something that would have a very coherent uh feel for students in their um experiences as they kind of metriculate upwards. So the resources that we reviewed are HMH into reading uh great

089minds has two programs called wit and wisdom and arts and letters a program called really great reading a program called collaborative classroom and then a program called phonics to reading. in looking at these programs, a lot of them felt that um or it felt that a lot of them weren't just cohesive is what we were looking for and we would still need to supplement quite a bit. Um there's no resource that's going to be perfect and answer like every question and do everything perfectly, but we wanted something that had enough kind of material that we could work with and make the adjustments that they needed to. So after reviewing these resources and thinking about um what it is that we were looking for in a program and also what our staff strengths are, we went

090with uh amplified CPLA as a resource to pilot for this year. So this year our uh third grade team has been piloting this resource. They've done it for the whole year or at this point it's only February but it's you know they've been working on it for most of the year. Um we felt like this was a nice place to start because it's a very pivotal transition year. So again, it was a um grade level that we could pilot at and see what the foundational reading skills program looks like, but also what it looks like as they metriculate upwards and really get into more advanced skilled um what people say like reading to learn as opposed to learning to read. Um so we've used the third edition of CKLA. This is only it's only been

091out for two years. A lot of our um neighboring districts are using the second edition. So, this third edition does have a more streamlined pacing and an improved writing component, which was one of our hesitencies in this program to begin with was that the writing is some people say not as robust as you'd like it to be. In the third edition, um it's been kind of finessed a little bit to be a little bit more robust and align with our expectations for students and their writing abilities. Our implementation philosophy, and again, I just want to reiterate, you know, no resource is going to be perfect and answer all the questions. So really thinking about our instructional integrity over strict fidelity. So if we're reading through a lesson and we recognize that maybe it's not exactly

092what our students need, giving uh the flexibility to make the adjustments that we know that match the needs of our students by using database decisions and again what we know about our students and their abilities. Um, so I just want to make that very clear that we do still launch and make some adaptations and some of the things that the third grade team has done this year have really really truly enhanced the program and I would say some of the highlights of third grade are actually things that are not even written in the program. For example, there was a debate that happened in third grade um that was a performance-based assessment that was really important to the third grade team. It's not part of the program. That was something that they felt was a better

093way to assess student learning. Um, so they've done an excellent job really being thoughtful about what the things are that we value here in Lake Bluff and making sure that we don't lose sight of that by adopting a resource that some feel might be a little dry. Um, so what is core knowledge language arts? Kind of going back to what the concept is in the science of reading. There's been a lot of research around not only needing that kind of like um really explicit phonics instruction and really explicit reading instruction, but also this idea of knowledge building and how important it is for students from a young age to be exposed to different types of um content knowledge to become better readers. So, some of the examples might include learning more about Greek mythology because

094when you're continuing to read um throughout your life, there might be references that are made, metaphors, names that are used that will correlate back to some of those content strands. So, this program has um there's been a lot of research done to identify what are some of those kind of core knowledge pieces that are really important to build literacy skills in people. Um but then there's also the very systematic instruction with phonic decoding and writing mechanics. So kind of those grammar pieces, a lot of kind of work worksheet based material that we've shifted away from in the last decade or so. It's bringing some of those things back, recognizing the need for kind of the pen to paper. Um and having some of those experiences too. Uh the program is nice because it really does

095have pretty much everything that we would want. Um it connects the reading and writing and again that deep background knowledge. So just to give a little bit of background, um this is what knowledge building looks like. So this is the kindergarten, first, second, third, and fourth grade strands. There's literature topics, science topics, and social studies topics. Something very important to note though is that these are topics. They are not teaching Science and social studies standards are very different from memorizing content. Um, and the purpose of this program is not for students to start memorizing facts. It's kind of a cool fun additional component of it, but they're not going to be quizzed on do you remember the date that this event happened or can you tell me when this person was born. Um it's again

096more to just build knowledge so that kids are able to just be citizens in our world. Um there's still a very significant need for science and social studies, but having a program like this will allow our science and social studies programming with the enrichment team to focus a lot more time and energy on those hands-on experiences um and really enhance what it is that students are learning with only 90 minutes a week. It's very it can be limiting sometimes to try to build all of the background knowledge and do the inquiry based exper experience for the science experiment that they want to do. Um, so it really provides a nice foundation of students for their understanding and then allows us to make those science and social studies experiences even deeper and more complex. Um, so

097you can see there's some really nice topics that are kind of um within each grade level and there's also some choice areas uh that we would look at with teams and align vertically to make sure that kids are getting really nice exposure to a variety of content areas. So my recommendation for adoption is that next year we would um adopt amplified CKLA for grades kindergarten through fourth grade. For fifth grade we would continue to evaluate this throughout the course of next year. The current cohort of students in third grade then this program would roll up with them. Um it doesn't feel like the best decision for our current for fourth grade cohort to be given a new resource when they're then going to make an additional transition to middle school the following year. Um, again

098because of the scope and sequence, there's a lot of knowledge building that happens over time and to be able to cover that ground to make good grade make sense would be very challenging. Um, we've come to this conclusion after many conversations I've had with both the program and also with some neighboring districts, some of which even recommended maybe just start at kindergarten and roll up if they could do it their own way. Um, but we felt like this would be kind of the best way to address a variety a broader base of our students at once and also to have our teachers being able to work collaboratively to understand the program. Um, so the timeline would be that we'd be doing implementation in the uh in the fall. We already have teens in um pretty

099much every I think first, second, and fourth grade have already decided that they would like to test out some of the um material this spring just so that they can familiarize themselves with it. Um, so we're working to get time with the uh company now to see if we can pilot some of those units just so that we can get a feel for the flow, start to expose students to the concepts and ideas and what this um instruction look like. Um, and then the financial impact is about $15,000 per grade level. That's a one-time cost. Uh, we already covered the third grade costs in the pilot when we purchased it for this school year. Um, that would include print materials, which are physical teacher guides. their student readers, which are really nice, um that every

100student has access to throughout a unit, workbooks that every student has. Uh that would be an ongoing consumable that we would need to look at, but that's really the only um kind of ongoing cost that we would see. The cost also includes professional development, digital licenses, and the platforms. So again, just kind of coming back to the idea that um we recognize the need for this building a unified literacy system. We feel like this is the right program for the needs of our students and the needs of our staff. We have a lot of strengths that we've developed over the course of time where we were using units of study that we know that we can pull into using a program like this, but it will also um provide some of those foundational resources that

101we really want to have for that cohesive system. >> Thank you. this room get involved. >> I think >> will we be able to like with the cost of this are there some other programs that we use to supplement that we can then remove >> like saving costing? >> Yes. Yes. >> Yes. >> We'll be digging into a little bit of what some of those resources are. Um, my recommendation in working with team is that we would really scale back a lot of what it is because we won't really know what we need it is to supplement until we kind of live it a little bit. Um, but I I can think of a few um digital resources already that we won't have as much of a need for uh a variety of other material

102that we purchase annually that we won't need to be purchasing because it's kind of embedded within. >> Great. I I've heard that the um um core knowledge language arts was a little weak or one of it's got a lot of strengths but one weak area was in the writing. Um and I know uh losing Tomkins is really pretty strong in writing. So are we able to >> meld those two somehow or how that >> Yeah. So that was a little bit what I was alluding to. So kind of two layers to that. The edition that we're adopting is the third edition. This is only the second year that that um program has been available to people to use and the part of that roll out of the third edition for this company was to enhance

103the writing a little bit more. They're utilizing a resource called the writing revolution which actually some of our staff members have gotten trained in already and are some of um it provides some uh kind of more explicit writing instruction that we've already started to leverage. Um, but to your point also, we the loose units of study programming is very strong in the area of writing and because we've been using that program for so long, a lot of our staff members are well placed in what some of those best practices are. And so I can speak to third grade specifically, they're already kind of pulling in some of those things and folding those higher expectations for what student writing should look like. Um, and I think that is actually I don't want to say concern, but

104one of the questions that has been raised by some of our primary teachers as well is our students are really strong writers. when we go to other schools, we can tell the difference in our students writing versus some of our neighboring districts. And so, we don't want to lose sight of that and continuing to reference back some of those best practices that we've learned over time with our writing program and making sure that we're continuing to abet those. >> Um, speaking of that, I I just add to what Lisa said. you've done a fantastic job of first off, you know, getting into the other schools and getting input from all the other schools that are using this and getting our teachers involved and bringing everybody along in the in the process. I know it's a

105whole lot of work, but but um that's the way to do it. >> Buying is super important when it >> get program. You want to make sure that the teachers feel supported and that they understand. Um, I keep joking around with them, but I want everyone to be very clear what they're getting themselves into. This is a lot of work. It's going to be a lot of work and um, we're going to be supporting them along the way, but adopting a new resource is a a big deal. So, >> which leads right to my next question. Thank you very much. >> So, with my business hat on, um, you know, we're doing a good job now. We're looking at doing something new where we expect better results. So I would call that a return on

106investment and part of it is the $60,000 but a big part is all the cost and labor and everything else. What are what did the other schools showed? Did they felt that they had seen an improvement in their final results and by what kind of a degree and what's our expectations? >> Sure. I generally speaking typically when you adopt a new resource there is an implementation. you can expect an implementation dip just because of things like um students are not familiar with the resource, right? So, it's going to be a big shift in the type of instruction they're used to receiving. It's uh just going to be a big shift for students. It's going to be a shift for teachers. So, oftentimes there is an implementation of it, but I will say that also some

107of our neighbors have found success within the first year in utilizing these program implementing it. So, it's hard to predict what could happen for us. Um I I won't be surprised in getting either result, but obviously the long-term goal is that we would see uh increased you assessment scores just based on the fact that we're using a program that aligns better with standards and has a little bit more rigor. >> So you're not putting No, you're not going to >> put my money down. >> I mean I have because I wouldn't, you know, I would end up there would be a lot of variables to determine that. But I also think it's important to Jackie's point. We may put it in all grades next year, but not all of the students are going to have

108it have had it for all those grades. So, you're really not seeing the full impact for about four years and when until all the grades have had it as planned from kindergarten through. So, unfortunately, we might see some gains. Um, but we're also going to have to feel it out and also differentiate based on the needs of students in the class. And I'm not I'm not sure we'll see measurable right >> gains for a while until we've really had it. No, but long term we're expecting to see measurable gains. Yes, I would think other otherwise why do we >> exactly >> right? >> And just to fully acknowledge the math conversation too, we can't lose sight of either subject area, but also I think that we want to make sure that we don't end up

109in a position where we feel like our ELA is flipping. And so I think that that's a big reason why this recommendation is being made now because we do have, you know, we're doing pretty well in the area of ELA and we could continue to do better. So we have an opportunity to to leverage a lot of the work we've been doing and make this shift now. >> So you'll be able to use a lot of the work that the teachers are putting in this past year curriculum revisions. I cannot say enough things about our third grade team, the how savvy they are with the standards and their ability to go through these units because they're so savvy with the standards and really determine what it is that the what the goals are of a

110unit and how to really direct the instruction to make sure that it's getting at the point of what the resource is getting at is just incredible. And I have full faith that that's true of all of our teams that their knowledge of the standards and of good literacy instruction that they will take this resource and that this will be on our list of like getting an update on our >> our board our board presentation calendar like we'll get for next year. >> Yeah, we we're aiming for after the first of the year. So like giving them at least four months to kind of start before we talk about how it's going. Yes, it's planned in our presentation. >> Yeah, to echo what Dick said, thank you for all your work on this and just the

111deliberate approach that you've taken to identifying and selecting a new resource. I appreciate that. Um, looking at the program and sorry if this is getting in to the weeds too much, but uh the resources themselves like are kids reading on their laptop? Are these paper books? What are we looking at? >> It's much more offscreen. Okay. >> Much I would say really there's no component that is truly digital that the the um students need to be on. There is an assessment component that we haven't really made a determination of whether or not we will utilize it. Um it's offered with the program. Um student teachers are this they're driven by slides. So I guess that's a digital component. But as far as students on an individual onetoone device, very minimal in the program. Um, and

112that was part of what we were looking for. We've made a deliberate shift away from screens. Um, and so the pro unfortunately a lot of programs rely heavily on digital resources and and digital interfaces for students and this is a plus for this one for us. It's a huge plus. Um, students are actually too just something that you said kind of sparked another thought in my mind. Um, so every student has been a reader which for me personally a year or two ago I would have been like what? We're giving every kid the same book. this isn't differentiating appropriately and I just sort of had a lot of different feelings about it. Um, but what's wonderful about it is that they are uh they're grade level tech. So, we're expecting that students can have the

113grade level text in hand. We're not lowering the bar for the text, but there's different ways for students to access that grade level text whether they're being it's being read to them. They're breaking it down in smaller parts. And I think that just that exposure and that expectation that all kids can do it um just really helps move everyone forward as a whole. Thank you. >> Any other questions? >> Thank you, Jackie. Appreciate your time. >> My staffing update is going to be brief. We don't have a full staffing plan to bring to you tonight, but we usually start these conversations at this time. So, I just want to give you an update as to where we are. Again, we'll we're looking at our process for shifting classes forward. We still are looking at a

114class size of 25 as our cap monitoring until August 1st and then we will add sections if all of the classes in a greater at 25. Preliminarily, just uh putting it out there, we're looking at a net um decrease with some shifting at LBES. Uh we have right now we're we're looking at a shift down in 1.0 no classroom teacher, but we are adding some speech and language support as well as some occupational therapy support. We don't see any changes at the middle school right now, although pending the French decision that may change. We still that's why we still have some things up in the air. Um we are reducing a bit at the district office.5 in human resources.5 administrative assistance um so that we can make up some of that instructional coordinator support for

115the 2.0 know that we're requesting to support teacher um plan development. So, we've got the charts, but we're not totally finalized yet. Some of the other shifting has to do with um True North supports that are no longer being offered through True North that we are going ahead and bringing in house either ourselves or through partnerships with other districts. So, I don't know if you want to talk about that. um just all of the staffing that is on our staff is up above and then below is kind of the the third party stuff. And so last year we were behavior coaching and physical therapy through True North. Now we're working Grace has been working with other districts to hire people and share them. So it's still sort of third party because we'll be paying the

116other district like fourth will be hiring some of these people and then we'll be sharing them and it's kind of like Austin's arrangement where we're paying the other district. So technically it's they're not on our staff but they'll be more of an employee than as they were at. >> So we'd like to bring you the full staffing plan. Um what we're asking for is consensus to move forward to really um do a job description for these instructional support um personnel and bring forward a little bit more detail on what we expect out of those two positions have a French uh decision about that and then be able to project a little a little bit out about staffing so that we can bring you more firm numbers. >> So this is this is this document I

117think in the packet >> it's not in the packet it's not finalized yet. So this is what we're working off of but >> preliminary we're looking at almost lines two FTE here and the back FTE are >> so financially we're budgeted and things >> yeah there may be some I think we can cover the cost of those FTE we'll probably have an increase of the cost of one but there's not All right. Okay. All right. Any questions? So, we'll see this. >> We'll see it again next month after some of the conversations we >> Great. Good. Okay. We're going to move. >> So, the next item is uh just a continued declareration. I'm just put this on an agenda item for to address any questions you might have. The presentation in the packet is the

118exact same presentation we gave last month, but wanted to offer the opportunity in case you have any questions uh to be able to answer those if they've come up. >> I think a good reminder is >> Yep. So, this is that's okay. Um, so this is the Lake County. >> No, I meant >> Oh, sorry. >> Oh, I thought we were like finishing each other's sentences. Um, not yet. >> Good reminder as to our role and what is being asked of us. >> Yes. So, um, for the >> county swell facilities tax, um, the question for our board is whether or not to pass a resolution in support of putting a question on the ballot in 2026. It is not voting for approval. It is simply voting to support putting a question on the ballot

119for the voters to decide whether or not they would want a county school facilities tax that we presented on last uh last meeting. Um, I would say the majority of districts in Lake County are presenting this to their boards for open discussion um, in order to make that decision. And again, in order for the question to go on the ballot, districts representing more than 50% of students in Lake County need to pass the resolution. So we, if we passed the resolution, would add about 870 kids towards that 50% of students in Lake County. Um, and that would be it. It would be, if it passed, it would be on the ballot for people to exercise their right as citizens, >> but we're not making the decision on >> only if you go out. >> Yeah,

120we're just >> just you would be voting in support because it would take a lot more districts and students to get it on there, too. So, >> and when would we have to pass? When would we be looking at >> I don't know the timeline. Uh, but I but I think I think it needs to be by August. It needs to be filed with the county. So, we'd be looking this spring. >> Okay. Thank you. I don't know exactly which meeting we would be to probably April or May we'd be looking to >> so wait April or May we'll vote on this >> I would say sorry sometime before June because we don't have a July meeting and the ROE needs to get it certified by August so we'd be looking this spring >> I'll

121hold my speech >> I'll keep you sure no questions. >> Okay. All right. We will move on to our facility use fees. >> So, every year we um the board passes a facility used fee. Um we currently categorize groups who want to use our facilities into four categories. Um school district affiliated groups, student organizations, PTO's alliance, etc. community groups who are Lake Block communities like Stouts and Little League, nonprofit organizations including churches and government entities and non and other nonprofits that serve Lake Bluff. And then the last group would be for-profit groups that do not meet the above criteria. Um we as a public resource want the community to be able to use our buildings. They support us with tax dollars and we do not charge those groups a fee for rental but we do

122pass on the costs are incremental costs. So if we have to hire a custodian and provide security or clean up then we would pass along that that cost to those roots. And then uh the last group that for profits would be charging $75 an hour. I'm recommending that we continue our current practice um and hold everything the same, but to adjust the cost of use up from $47 an hour to $48 an hour just to account for increases in salaries and benefits. >> And you'll still bring it to us if there's something. >> Yes. >> Like I feel like you still, even though we approved this last year, you still brought stuff up >> if there's a question um >> or like an event. Yeah. >> Or a special event. Something policy requires us to

123bring some of it. Anything that's questionable, we bring to the board for sure. >> Yeah. That's >> Yeah. >> Yes. >> And again, we're looking tonight. We don't have to approve them tonight, but we want we always include um the student fees in our student fair handbook. So, we're hoping that we can >> get these ready for registration, too. And so student fees, the recommendation is to hold all student fees um flat to last year, the current year with the exception of the preschool tuition. Um the recommendation is to increase from 5,000 to 5250 and that is to basically keep pace with our um comparable programs in the community. Preschool is an elective program. It's not taxpayer funded. It's very costly to run. Um, and compared to daycare, even this tuition is is pretty uh

124inexpensive comparatively. And if we do not keep pace with our comparable programs, then we need to make larger adjustments when we do want to make an adjustment. We prefer to make smaller adjustments every year. So, um, the biggest or most comparable program is the Lake Park District, which has pre-k right next door. They're going up to 5535 next year. And I believe the recommendation at Lake Forest School District for next year is 5,200 and so modest increase in between those two. >> Thank you. Any questions? All right, moving on to our board of education meeting calendar that we looked at last month and then we made a slight modification. >> Yeah, we talked about Yeah. just um mapping out our presentations which Carrie and Tim and I were able to get a draft together. Um

125and when we kind of looked at the whole calendar, just as we had thought together, um we might need an additional meeting. So, we everything is the same except for September. We've added a September 29th regular board of or we've added a committee of the whole. So the September 15th meeting we turned into a committee of the whole and added a September 29th regular meeting to accommodate some of the agenda items. I just want to highlight that we have tried to incorporate more presentations around um budgeting and finance to make sure that we have um more information around that as well as to follow up with some uh initiatives that have started this year and continue with some annual presentations that we typically do. As always, we add things when they come up. So, um

126this won't be a full accounting of everything that happens in place. And if anybody has anything that they want to add aside from the dates that we'll be voting on today, the discussions. >> First of all, I appreciate you seeing the you know adding budget discussions in April this year next year. I appreciate that. Um I I didn't see or maybe it was there, maybe I didn't see it, but I would like to have one agenda item where we um end up with a like a three-year list of what we see as our capital expenditures, which would be, you know, and I don't know the number to set whether it's over 30,000 or 40,000 or some number we agree on. Um, >> so it's planned for November right now. Um, in terms of long range

127planning for facilities, so that would be the capital projects for November, but >> but I would like to see it have like a two or three years so we know kind of what's coming down the pike. >> Um, just with a and enough time so we had a kind of an understanding of what the project is, what the cost is estimated at. It's not an approval. It's just a it's just yes, we think that's go ahead and pursue that or maybe it generates some extra questions, but also would include things like if you know we wanted to get a consultant, you know, a one-time expense. Not necessarily a consult. >> Yeah. Not necessarily a >> we have a capital item, but uh you know, just a onetime expense that's not normally part of a budget.

128Um, so if we do that in November, I don't I mean I I'd like to see it a little sooner just so we go into the school year knowing what's what's what's all in there >> if possible. >> We can move it up if we >> could. But remind me, did we not have a facilities audit that we paid for with consultants? >> We did. >> And we don't have that printed. I mean, we've seen there was the am I mean that lists kind of all of our projects that that and it really lists the condition of all of our equipment and >> and approximate cost to >> and when we think we would have and which I think what I would be providing based on Dick's feedback is these are the highest priority projects

129that I'm planning to to you to to go after in the next three to five years. And so I I'm tentatively budgeting pointing for this summer and maybe teleporting for next summer and I'll be parking lot for this summer and there are costs just so you can see. >> Yeah. >> And exactly. Yeah. I mean the white documents a thing to start with but we've never discussed it. You're saying take that document and then kind of pinpoint exactly the >> order. I understand what those things are >> that I've done. I mean, what we did in 2018, I had had a capital >> Yeah. >> plan. I just haven't shared it. >> Well, and we put in the grant updates too to kind of go over like all the all the grants that you applied

130for that for our facilities. So, if we need to move it, I'm >> um the other thing is >> well, wait, let's let's talk about >> when would we want? >> Yeah. When would you want to see it? >> Uh well, that's not urgent, >> but so would No. >> I'd rather see it early in the school year than earlier a little earlier in the school year if possible. >> What works on your like timeline for these things though? Yeah, I can I can include it with the budget presentation if that is not too much at once. >> That's the other thing we were looking at is like the length of the meetings if >> because really the work for this summer is already planned doing five of them and the work for next summer

131is sort of will be incorporated into the budget. So I sort of already have that. So this if we did in November it would be kind of capt well future things for the for the budget for the following year and I mean next five years I don't care that much you know I fit it in whenever it makes no sense. >> Is there any use putting it this or like before the end of this year? Is that too much of a >> I believe we have something >> maybe look for a good break because we'll be doing the budget probably April and May >> June we don't have anything >> we can maybe July like >> August budget >> we had said April 28th we were going to do a capital projects overview So for

132this year, so we can do that and then decide where you would like to see it again next year if you want to do that. >> Yeah. We don't Yeah. If we do it once and we come up with like a three-year plan, then really every year we just have to tweak it a little bit, >> you know, to say, "Well, let's we're going to drop this one. Let's we're but we're going to add these or something, you know." So, I mean, it's kind of a living document, but it we've got something to say. Here's what our here's what our scheduled and their surprises things come along that aren't scheduled or aren't on there, but >> we can start on April 28th of this year. Oh, that's not fast. Um, the other thing, um, and

133this is hardly I think this is a reaction to, um, um, you know, the the some of the math comments we got via from parents and emails and information, um, and just, you know, the concerns that are out there, especially, and I know they're based on the I, but that's what people see. Um I mean I'm I think we need a forum um to try to get our get you know the message across as to what we're doing and give also people a chance for input you know and it was so I thought so so wonderful and great that town >> the town hall meeting we had last year which was really focused on language arts I mostly >> language arts, technology. Um, we did like three items, class sizes, uh, communication. >> We had

134a bunch of items on that one, >> but, you know, I don't know having a because we've heard a lot about, and I don't want to just have people get up and repeat everything we just heard in a board meeting format. Um, so we could do that, but I'm just thinking we need to we need somehow to give the community, you know, a really good understanding of where things are going with with math. And for me personally, especially in the, you know, kindergarten, first, second, you know, kind of third grade at the early levels. Um, and I I you know, I've heard there's a lot of parents out there um second, third, fourth grades with tutors with um what is it? Mathnasium. They're get they're getting support because they they feel like, you know, somehow

135their kids are not um they're getting they're getting introduced to the topics, but they're not mastering them. So, they're going out to get extra help. Um, so that's a concern. Um, I mean, they shouldn't have to be doing that. Um, some are always going to do it. That's fine. But, um, I don't know how widespread it is, but I >> We did do a tutoring. We did a survey as part of our curriculum um, outreach last year. Um, so I can bring those numbers back. We could certainly repeat it too to get some updated numbers if we wanted to this spring. Um, and we did have parents talk about that. Yes. >> Yeah. So, that would be my other topic. And I don't know if that is >> is that a topic or you're you're

136proposing a town hall as a separate meeting? >> Uh, whichever we think would be the most effective. I mean, I think it's I think there's a perception problem and that might be better with the town hall to just to give everybody a chance to have their sing. And I appreciate it. It's a lot of work, but you did a great job on the other one. >> That's us. >> I mean, I'm I'm in the camp sometimes. I mean, that's what we we volunteer our time to do here and everybody has the opportunity to come and give their art and we explain it. I don't know. I don't know. It's more work for you. I mean, we can it would be less topics. It would just I think be focused on map. Um, so be a

137little bit different. >> But if the board wants us to do that, we can look at planning something like that. >> I hearing some of the comments made in public comment, I the about how we're measuring growth and stuff. I thought that's something that has been pretty consistent and that the administration, the board's been clear about that we're looking at multiple tests. Um, but maybe that's not being absorbed by the community. Um, and based on the comments, it it doesn't seem like it. So if if it's an opportunity to better to clarify why we're doing that. Um I I mean I understand but I we're exposed to it uh >> Sure. >> more. So, um, >> it's not something I I don't want to add more work, but it's not something I would be opposed

138to because I think it's always good to engage and make people feel comfortable with what's going on in the schools. And we, you know, we did the one last year and it kind of, you know, really gave us the, I thought, the momentum to thing to go out and look at um, you know, the new curriculum. I mean, it was one of the I think factors that that kind of pushed us over the edge to look at that. Um, and now and here we are. It's great. >> Well, I do think that we're already looking at the curriculum before that. Um, but yeah, I mean, if we're if they're not comfortable coming to a board meeting or emailing >> for the town hall that we did, did we allow parents to submit ahead of time?

139Right. >> We did. I just my worry about the town hall is after being there I feel like there's never enough time to answer every single >> I mean I don't know I don't know that the questions we would get. I can certainly present what we've presented tonight. We can put out a um a call uh for questions and have people come and do that. I think the the the part about that was a little different was that the board was there listening. So, I would want to make sure that we have it where everyone's available. So, um that it's not just >> me doing it, but I think the part of the power of it was that the board was there also listening >> um and and uh dialoguing if necessary. So, I'm happy

140to put it together. Do you have a timeline? Um >> I know May is hard. We do have a parent focus group that's happening like this week. So I know that some of our parents will be we put out the all call for the CIC parent focus group. We had about 10 or 15 respond to that. So we'll have some parents coming in. Hopefully they'll express their thoughts as well there. Um so we could look at March or April as a >> March is pretty ambitious. >> Yeah. Well, there's always so much >> I I think it's just >> you want this >> when when things when it makes the most sense to do it, you know, when we when we can do it and make the most sense and if we can do it

141as as early as April, that that'd be great. >> But I'm just I I mean >> we can have we'll start we can start sending out kind of a kind of >> I don't want a railroad this thing. So I mean everybody ought to be >> well everybody has to yeah give consensus and we have a quorum. So any against you don't mind? >> Yep. cabinet here. Um will it be just math focus and if there are other issues how many >> we did was >> we did it to address like four big issues that >> and make sure that it wasn't so that it just like >> so if there are other issues that the board wants us to address can we talk about it at the next I mean I guess time's running

142I'm not really sure. >> I don't know if comments on >> Matt. >> Guys, can I interject here for a second? >> Hi Ann. >> Hi. Um, you know, last time we did this town meeting, like you're saying, we did it in response to we had lots of parents showing up at board meetings and multiple topics that were um of great concern to parents, right? And so we did it as a way to get a bunch of information out because we had a lot of people coming in with feedback and coming to the meetings. Now, granted, I've been checked out for a little bit, so I don't know exactly if you're having that now or not, but um I think that there's maybe a we want to make sure that we're doing them when there's

143great demand for them as opposed to just doing them. And I don't know, I'm not the person to answer if there's great demand now or not, but if there's only one topic, I'm not sure that there is. >> Yeah. I mean, it's a hot topic that we're addressing or just address with more detail tonight. I wonder if we get more feedback after the explanation in the presentation tonight of, you know, school improvement and things like that because I'm I'm on Ann's train of thought that I don't feel like one topic would drive Lake. Could we revisit it at the next board meeting and just not plan to have it in April but >> at a later date? >> I see what she's saying. >> You know what I mean? >> It was a lot of

144mis not misunderstanding or misinformation but like the little bits that were coming in from we felt the need that it we needed to be more inclined. >> I I love the town hall and I know that parents responded really well to it and I got a lot of emails about it and I think it's a great idea. I think just instead of you know we have like one agenda item right now to do it in April and I think let's maybe let's def plan on doing it but give it a little more time until we have more issues that we can cover so instead of April we do June or you know August or something or when they're back in school >> well and alternately if there is you know if math is a big

145topic right now that needs to be addressed or something if there's only one topic perhaps it could be done you know like Lisa haven't you previously before done like a video and pushed that out to explain things to people. >> Um, >> yes, I've done that. >> There's other ways to do it is just my point if there's only this one topic. >> Yeah, thank I I I do appreciate that. And I think the format was uh we asked for questions. We made a presentation. Um then all a lot of information was presented. There was a question and answer kind of dialoguing part and then the presentation was sent out to the whole community after that. Um and I would say we had those of you who were there probably 40 50. Yeah, it was

146full of the presentations. There were a lot of people. Yeah. >> Yeah. >> So, what month was that? >> Um, March. >> Um, so there's like a there's pros to doing one topic. It could be shorter and more focused. Um, but at the same time, we're at the beginning of a process. We don't have as many answers for math as we had for language arts at that time because we were already two years into our work of shifting. Um, so we had more language arts like planning and information to share. Um, as well as the technology, there was more for us to present. Um, I would see this one since we're more at the beginning stages of like really doing an audit and looking at our resources that this would be more like information gathering.

147>> I could present what our plan is, but then I think it I don't know that I'd have as many answers right at that point. You're saying gather information from the parents. >> Yeah. >> You don't know. >> I think I'd want to hear more too. >> You don't know what ideas may come out of it. That could be very good. >> By the way, I that article you attached to your um uh weekly update. I mean, you talked about how math is such a hot topic and all these >> the nation, >> you know, states, I mean, there's state legislations involved. Well, not just school board. >> Yeah. There isn't really like consensus right now on the best path forward right now. >> Yeah, but everybody's dealing with the issue. The the issue is

148the same >> that results are are not improving. They're kind of flat, you know, how do you break that moment? >> We have some good stuff in the time. >> Do we want to try to schedule something for April or do we want to wait? I don't, but that's just my something. >> I agree. >> I think I'm not sure May is going to get us any um attendance and I think June >> June July will be I just don't I don't think we're going to get like I don't think people will show up. Um, >> I think I'd like to see some of the implementations of what was presented tonight and that way there's more information and then because yeah, it all came I mean all the public came tonight that I've seen. I

149haven't gotten emails otherwise I would have sent it out. So, >> and I just want to like um offer too like I'm very happy to meet with any parents that do have questions >> um to have conversations about what it is specifically that they're seeing or feeling like their student needs more of. Sometimes those meetings can be more informational and helpful for us in terms of direction of what parents are looking for um or where they see us needing to take some steps forward. So, I know sometimes it that was a great forum for me to answer questions or for us to answer questions, but I I feel like sometimes it's hard for people to say in a big group what it is that they want to say or have happen. Um, so I just

150want to throw that out there and I'm making personal invitations to folks to reach out as well uh for specific conversations. >> Well, I think that goes to all of us, >> all of us too. Like we welcome the emails or coffees or I think sorry to take so much time. >> So tableabling with the potential of doing it once we have a little bit more >> we could yeah or let's see how maybe it sounds like let's see how the feedback goes from tonight. >> Yeah. >> But we will definitely have long range planning ready for April 28th. >> Okay. U moving on to our press packet. It's another read. Yep. There's nothing new on this. This is just our second read we're hoping to be able to approve tonight. All right. Any questions

151on that? Cool. Well, we will move on with our action items. We'll have a moment to discuss each of them if need be. So, I would like to have a motion to approve packet 120 as just presented. >> So moved. >> Second. >> Thank you. Is there any discussion? >> Um, just to confirm, we're not adding the Irish >> to the Irish potato famine. >> We're going to wait until it's not adding. We're just >> We're just not not We're not We're going to wait until it's >> Thank you. >> All right. So, Lauren, can you call, please? >> Laura Bridgestone, >> yes. >> Annne Hill, >> yes. >> Perry Steinbach, >> yes. >> Richard Driver, >> yes. >> Lauren Hirs, yes. Tim Penage, >> yes. >> Great. The motion is passed. Moving to the

152next one, we need a motion to approve the administrative recommendation to sunset the LBMS French courses fall 2026 as previously presented. This one's current. Yeah, I >> I don't know. I'm I'm very conflicted because it's like >> I don't want to take the programs away, >> but then wearing the, you know, hat of a board member and being fiscally responsible, it's like >> I say, >> so I >> I would like to table this. >> I would too. >> Okay. Can we look at I don't I guess I know we've talked about other options. >> I think there's more option if there's options. I mean it used to a long time ago we just had a part-time French teacher. >> Yeah, I think those are hard to find. >> We didn't have a full-time French

153teacher. >> Well, let us remind ourselves. It's not our job to figure out what to do, but we can ask. Let's we can bring it back to Lisa and Nate and the team and just ask to investigate some more like cost effective ways, some more options to hopefully keep the program with less impacts to the schedule. Um, you know, what is our latest that like for you to Yeah. I mean, >> I mean, we really throw you into hardship by usabling it right now. >> We wouldn't want to wait too long because we do want to be able to know if we're offering it sixth graders next year. So, it's really about if we're beginning another cohort of students beyond the current teachers planner. >> Oh, I think consensus is that we'd like option. >>

154We will investigate a different option. Okay. Um, so we don't have to vote to table. We just just table it. Thank you. All right. So, we'll move on and talk about it in March. Okay. So, moving on to the approval of facility use fees. May I have a motion to approve the facility use fees? So, moved. >> Second. >> All right. Any discussion? Great. Uh, Lauren, follow please. >> Lauren Hirs, yes. Richard Driver, >> yes. >> Annne Hill, >> yes. >> Harry Sinbach, >> yes. >> Tim Penich, >> yes. >> Laura Brstone, >> yes. Okay, moving to approval of our student fees that were just presented by Jay tonight. May I have a motion to approve? >> So move. >> Second. >> Great. Any questions on the student fees? >> All right. Lauren, can you

155call vote, please? >> Terry Steinbach, >> yes. >> Laura Brstone, >> yes. >> Tim Penich, >> yes. >> Anne Hill, >> yes. >> Lauren Hirs, yes. Richard Driver, >> yes. >> Right, that has passed. Um, all right. Moving forward to the approval of the 2026 2027 board of education meeting calendar as just discussed. We have a motion. So move second. >> Thank you. Lauren or any discussion further? >> Okay. >> Dan Hill, >> yes. >> Laura Brickstone, >> yes. Tim Fenich, >> yes. >> Richard Driver, >> yes. >> Harry Sinwat, >> yes. >> Lauren B, yes. >> Okay. Moving to the personnel report for February 24th, 2026. We have four new non-licensed new hires. We have Tyler Demon who is a guest teacher, effective date 2024 2026 for $155 a day. Lillian Gasper is a

156guest teacher. Effective date 2024 20 26 224. No one wanted to savvy 222. Okay. 324. Um for $155 a day. Um, Erica P, who is also a guest teacher at effective date 224 2026 for $155 a day. Uh, >> GA Rajan. >> Thank you. Not Tar Rajan. Um, effective date 224 2026 for $155 a day. We have a resignation of Hiwa Brown who is a third grade teacher at the LBES building. Effective date 682026 and an FMLA request by Hillary Moore as a position of the sixth grade social studies and communication at LBMS. Effective date would be extension of the 2026 2027 school year. >> That's for the full >> just to clarify that's a an unpaid leave for the schools. It's just such >> understood. Thank you for the clarification. Um any or may

157I have a motion to approve the personnel report as just presented? >> Some moved. Second. >> Any discussion? All right, Lauren, please call vote. Laura Brstone, >> yes. >> Richard Driver, >> yes. >> Annne Hill, >> yes. >> Barry Steinbach, >> yes. >> Lauren Hirs, yes. Tim Penich, >> yes. >> All right. I'm just get on my computer. Sorry. Next one. Yeah, I just have to read all those. >> All three. >> All right. May Oh, here we are. May I have a motion to approve the consent agenda for February 24th, 2026, which includes open session meeting minutes um of February 10th, 2026 committee of the whole and February 4th, 2026 policy committee meeting minutes. So moved. >> Second. >> There's treasures and press. >> Thank you guys. Treasures report, the impress report, bills report,

158and the pecard report. >> So moved. >> Second. All right. Um, anybody want to pull anything out? >> I just one one discussion, two points. >> Sure. >> First off, Jay, you've done a great job on the budget this year. Um, and then keeping us on budget. I mean, we got five months left and we're like, you know, 99% or something right there, right on budget. So your predictions, your your budgets are so um useful and accurate. Well done. >> Um and just one thing to remind me, there's 534,000 a year to date, I think, for payments to other schools. Is that true? North. >> Yes. >> Okay. I've forgotten what that is. Thank you. >> Any other questions? Great. Tim Pennich. >> Yes. Laura Brstone, >> yes. Annne Hill, >> yes. >> Steinbach, >>

159yes. >> Richard Driver, >> yes. >> Lauren Hirs, yes. >> Okay, we've had um four FOYA requests since our last regular board meeting. Uh the FOYA section of our agenda is simply a report item. We do not need to require approval, but are there any questions for the administration on those four? >> Wonderful. We will move on. Um final opportunity for our public comments. I know. >> Do we have we have >> we have some new um leads. >> Just one more. Uh and I apologize for not seeing this before the meeting. >> Uh dear members of the board of education, we wanted to share share how positive our experience has been with the amplified curriculum this year. It has been such a wonderful program for our daughter Franny who is in third grade and

160our family has been very impressed. We really appreciate the variety of topic topics woven into the reading curriculum from ancient Rome to animals, pilgrims, and native Americans. content is engaging and meaningful, and it's clear that students are building knowledge while also strengthening their reading and writing skills. The third grade team has done an amazing job bringing the curriculum to life in the classroom. The work Franny brings home, her writing samples, projects, and other classwork shows real understanding of what they're learning. It's been exciting to see her confidence and enthusiasm grow along with her skills. We hope the board will consider expanding Amplify throughout the school year, throughout the school. From our experience, it's a program that truly benefits students, sets them up for success in reading and writing. Thank you for your time and all

161you do for our schools. Sincerely, Jenny and JP Ratziano. >> That's great. >> Right. Thank you. So, um, if there's no more, we can adjourn. May I have a motion to adjourn the February 24th board of education meeting at 9:04 p.m.? >> So, move. >> Second. >> All in favor? >> I. Any opposed? >> Thank you. Great. See you next time. Is there anything on the date? >> Oh, I know. They can just go