Board of Education Meeting - August 19, 2025

001I would like to call this meeting to order at 7:01 p.m. Lauren, may we have a roll call, please? Laura Brstone, >> yes. >> Annne Hill, >> I'm here. >> Carrie Steinbach, >> here. >> Andrew Carlson, >> here. >> Lauren Hirs, here. Richard Driver, >> here. >> Tim Penich, >> here. >> All right, let's say the pledge of allegiance. I pledge algiance to the flag of the United States of America and it to the republic for which it stands. One nation under God and for all I kind of feel like it's the first day of school for us. Take a little while to settle in. Yeah. Um Okay. Yeah. Carrie, would you like to read our mission, vision, and motto? Sure. Um, sure. Our mission is to ensure academic achievement and personal growth for all

002students through innovative and engaging educational opportunities. Our vision is an inclusive community of motivated learners who are inspired to change the world through exploration and collaboration. And our motto is excellence in education, enthusiasm for life, every student, every day. Thank you. Uh, at this point we do welcome any public comment. Is there anyone here to make a public comment? All right, we'll check again at the end and we'll go right into tonight's reports. Um, I do not have a president's report other than to say welcome back everybody. Excited for the year. >> H Dr. Lei. >> Yeah, same here. We've been working really hard to get our schools in shape. We have had some of our introductory events. Today we had I think almost 40 guest teachers at our um training session for our substitute

003teachers. We're really excited about that. Um we have our new teachers coming for the next two days tomorrow and Thursday and our whole faculty joins us on Friday, Monday and Tuesday for institute days. We have a really um think we think a very thoughtful plan to welcome everyone back and of course the most exciting day will be Wednesday, the first day of school. So can't wait to see the kids. We also have some new changes that we'll walk through um in more detail, but I want to just preview that our back to school nights are going to look really a little bit different this year. We're going to be offering some sessions with central office um technology safety curriculum kind of before sessions and during if so if people want to come early they'll be

004able to get some information about kind of big picture district things on the same night as for or back to school night information night. So we think that'll be a nice consolidation of you know one time one-stop shop for parents to come and get some information and ask their questions. And like I said, we'll go through a little bit more specifically what's that what that's going to look like at our next meeting. Um, and finally, really quickly, um, Ann and Carrie and I, uh, this summer met to kind of draft out presentations for the board for the entire year. Um, I will send that out to the board. So, please take a look, give us your feedback. If there's anything that you think we're missing or you'd like on the calendar for the rest of

005the year, please let us know. We tried to look at strategic plan goals and kind of initiatives for the year and take feedback we've already gotten. So, like I said, I'll send that out this week. Please take a look. Let us know if you have any other thoughts other than that. >> Great. And we'll move into discussions and presentations for the night. Uh the first one being our CIC partnership with Dr. Oz. >> Okay. Um very excited to welcome Kay Osborne here to give us an overview of our CIC partnership. >> Sure. Uh, where's the best place? Over here, Ken. Um, great. So, hi everybody. My name is Kane Osborne. I'm the my my title is director of the consortium for interd district collaboration, but it feels a little bit much honestly what you guys

006do. So, I really see myself as a facilitator of the learners from all the district, the adult learners from all the districts that work together. Um, so we're going to start off with a brief video that was put together at with the nudge of Dr. Lei who this spring is like we should really put something out and she got me motivated and connected me to somebody and we uh got some people over the summer which was hard to sit down and do some interviewing and put together this little video. So we'll start with this to get a give you a sense of an overview. >> Once we took a deep breath and exhaled and really just focused on our essential questions and set up a process for people to come in. the rest is what

007it is. And that's an awesome experience to participate in because we're getting a reflection from experts in our field on what we're doing well and what are areas that we can continue to focus on. And it allowed us to see our district's mission through a whole new lens. Um, seeing it through other districts perspectives and the additional direction actually will help our good work continue. >> It's not a deficit model. It's really looking at what we're doing well and having those conversations, I left mentally exhausted and so energized. >> The reason I think this is such impactful professional learning is because it's holistic. It doesn't try to narrow down what's important in our schools to a test score or to one subject. So it looks ind depth at a district over two and a half

008days and produces a range of different perspectives that can be taken to look at this essential question. The consortium for interd district collaboration CIC is a peer-led structured process where districts ask essential questions and invite trusted colleagues to help them find answers. It's not a checklist. It's a thoughtful conversation, honest and entirely focused on helping each other find the next level of work that will promote authentic learning. >> We were a host district and our question centered around productive struggle, which is something that we were wanting to measure relative to our mission statement. And um it was interesting for us because we have a very supportive and engaged community. Um, our families are very invested in our system. But one of the pieces of feedback that we received was relative to uh this this idea

009of productive struggle and that one of our next steps needed to be like engaging our community more broadly in that specific narrative. >> Well, you see a tangible impact from it because a lot of the times, you know, the classic PD is you go off, it's like a vitamin shot. you have all these ideas and how am I going to implement this and you come back and then life takes over and you know it winds up in a binder on the bookshelf or you know what have you. In this case you've got a team. I say the theme from those participating was this is the best professional development I've ever had. >> Probably the the greatest surprise is how much people really did connect um during the event but then intentionally to follow up post.

010They were sharing contact information, continuing to network beyond the two and a half days that they tend to have visit. That continues to this day. This work makes us better together. If you're thinking about joining a visit or hosting one, say yes. We're just getting started and we can't wait to involve even more educators in this coming year. Join our conversation. Be part of the CIC. So the producers made me put on that voice which I I said it one way the first time. They're like, "Hey, can you just pump it up a little?" Like, so that's what that's how it comes out. Um, so but we're sending that out to member districts to share with their staff to get them to sign up for this year, but also to potential new partner districts to

011get them to bring people this year to learn about the process and join us officially next year. You can see the districts here listed. uh Deerfield and Gleno here at Lake Bluff. Uh Lake Forest 67, Libertyville 70, Highland Park 113, and True North are current members. Uh and we're working with other districts who are going to come kind of observed this year and then jump in the tool we think next year. So why don't we talk a little bit about it? Um the what I hope you walk away with is just understand what CIC is, its purpose, the process overview, which is just the heart of this experience that it's very rewarding. uh what the essential questions were last year and their importance and a timeline for the year. Now, CIC is actually modeled on

012the tri-state consortium that covers three states on the east coast, and it's been around for 30 years. And some member superintendent here were aware of it and started talking about, we think we might like to try this ourselves. And so, uh, I took this from their website as a starting point last year and worked with their just retired executive director, Marty Brooks, who basically taught me how to facilitate and he walked us through last year. Um, but you can see here, this is their purpose and we used it as our draft purpose for our opening year. And I've then shortened it down to this which I think is a lot more digestible and in language that a lot of our member district staff members and even community members will understand. But essentially uh I think

013everybody in our communities recognizes that the importance of collective efficacy and especially collective inquiry. Not getting the answer but engaging in the questioning together and then relying on our expertise. both ask good questions and propose good answers, but we do not give um strict guidance to districts to say you should go do this. We after visiting say you might want to consider the following options based on what we've observed and what you have said is important. And that's an big distinction because unlike a lot of audit processes or outside groups that you might bring in, um they often have the answer before you're done asking the question um or they have a process that works exactly the same every single time. Ours is contextual based on who's coming to the table and who is hosting.

014So the heart of this process is the visit and it's made up of the visit team and the host team. So, the visit team are CIC staff members from CIC districts that we've trained. We do a one-day training, which I'll talk about. Um, and then there's the host team. Now, the visit team is usually anywhere between 15 and 25 teachers and administrators from the districts that we've mentioned. And then the host team, their uh host team members, many or most of them have also been trained, but not all of them necessarily because the host team requirements are a little different. And the host team then identifies what they want as their focus, which we'll talk about the essential question. It could be something very academic and very kind of um uh tangible. Uh but it

015could also be something that's a little harder to get to and that's through the essential question that they ask. The one thing we do tell host districts is don't ask a question you know the answer to. Okay? Don't that's not what this process is about. dig into what you want to know about yourselves that you really aren't sure of and let us help you through this process get you some direction that will be helpful to you. So what happens after the training and after the question has been formed is the host team then collects data for the visit. Some of it is very standard data that you already have available. We think the most important part is the student work part and the teacher work part. So actual artifacts of student work and the on

016the groundwork that teachers do, assignments, syllabuses, meeting agendas, um assessments, uh all those things that are there all the time, but we don't see them and talk about them and so on a regular basis. So that's what the host team is collecting and then we conduct the actual visit. Uh the visit takes two and a half days. Although Miss Tividor, Miss Le Alli and I are looking this year seeing if we can do a two-day visit based on your size. We're we've made a promise that we won't, you know, commit to that until we're sure we can do it because we don't want to do something that then might mess up the process, but we think it's possible and asking people to be out two and a half days is a lot and asking the

017host team for two and a half days is a lot. So, we're going to see it how that goes. Over those two and a half or two days, the visit team looks at the identified topic via eight indicators and three lenses that I'll talk about. And that's the essential question. And over those two days, we focus on a data review. And then we conduct focus groups, interviews, and we visit classrooms. So we try to see everything that can be seen and heard, hear everything that can be heard over that two and a half days. and the host team coordinates that with our principles here who will help us with that. Um and then the last day of the visit, that last half day really, the visit team debriefs on all its observations, tries to come

018to a consensus about where is the host district on their question and on these indicators, where could they go next? And then we actually meet with the host team and do a real dialogic kind of fishbowl exercise where we ask the host team questions. We get into a dialogue and then we also have them listen to us talk about our visit and talk about how it all went and then we get further feedback on that. Um and then at the end I will actually take that entire experience and develop a report for Dr. Leali, Dr. Tividor that will go over all the indicators and feedback from the visit team and usually it's made up of at least three commendations and three recommendations per indicator and then recommendations and commendations on the essential question itself. So

019what they have at the end if last year was any indicators is about a 20page report and the truth of the matter is they will only use a very small portion of that because the idea behind this is you here already know what your most important work needs to be. We're just here to give you some insight into what it could be that you might not have otherwise gotten. And then you figure out how what we gave you and where you were going goes together in a way that you wouldn't otherwise have. So um and we I can talk about that a little bit more with the host district from this last year. Some visit details. We do interview board members. So we interview teachers, we interview parents, we interview students, which is the most

020fun. No offense. Um and then we interview board members only in groups of two. And I'll conduct those. Um, and we ask questions of everybody we interview related to the essential question, related to these indicators that we talk about and the lenses that we talk about um, to try to get at it. The interesting thing about these questions that we ask is they're not formulated until the middle of day one of our visit. They're not preformed. The visit team comes in and looks at all the evidence that's been documented and comes to an initial kind of place. and Miss Bay was uh at the training and and what we say is what do we know about the district face and what they've given us and what do we still want to know and that's how

021we generate the questions and that's important because we have to start with the context that's been given to us not a preset set of questions and ideas that we then insert into the process in the district. So the indicators that we focus on and at the end of this presentation which we won't go over each I have a slide for each indicator the descriptor of it so you can see it a little bit more but it's about a 25page document of rubric for these indicators. So it's quite indepth um but you can see how they're organized here and Danielle Arnold at Deerfield actually came up with this. I stole it but with but their help. >> And you can see how we basically use each of these areas to look at all the evidence that's

022presented >> and to say how is the district doing in these areas and what could their next level of work be in these areas if they wanted it to be? What would make sense? And that comes from looking at the evidence and conducting the interviews and then having a dialogue about it. And then on that rubric for each of those areas that I just mentioned, we have what we call the approach and the implementation and the results. So we don't just say how you're doing in one dimension, but really in three more dimensions. And approach is important because having been a teacher and a district level leader, um what's happening in the district office on any given idea or initiative and what's happening on the ground in the classroom are not always exactly the same

023thing. I know we'll find that stunning. Um but oftent times we are working on the approach which is we intend to do this here are our plans here's how we communicate it but in the classroom we're not there yet it's not quite happening yet and so implementation is kind of what that piece is however as we talked about in training sometimes it's actually the opposite our teachers are sometimes ahead of where we are in the district and so the rubric based on when we look at the evidence will sometimes reflect that so it's not just one thing and then results is the hardest part where we try to look at based on this set of evidence can we see a change in student performance that's tied to this evidence that's been presented and that's a

024pretty high standard. Um so we do a lot of talking around that and it's not just about test scores. So for instance, if we were to look at um student work in third grade on writing, I'm just going to take an example. And the question was around that, we might look at how was writing approached at the early in the year and did they submit evidence from later in the year that told us something about how writing itself had progressed um not just around test scoring. Okay. So I'm just going to give a little timeline from last year and then I'll talk about this year. So last year we uh trained over 70 staff members from seven districts. Uh and then I collaborated with staff from the host districts to help them develop the essential

025question that they wanted to ask the visit team. And that's key. That question has to be generated by folks here, not by us. These are the two questions that the host districts generated last year. And the one thing that really stood out that was very rewarding for these districts was both of these questions came directly from some aspect of their strategic plans. And those strategic plans had come directly from community engagement and feedback they got from the community. So in Deerfield uh their mission is challenge, collaborate, innovate. I should know that. So challenge was the big one and it kept coming up in their community engagement. are we challenging our kids and do we feel like they know what to do when they are challenged? And so we wanted to get at that and so

026they landed on productive struggle which is a more educational term. Uh but what do kids do, you know, when they struggle and do they experience it because the community felt it was important but they didn't know if it was happening. And so the district collected evidence that they thought spoke to that. And then we came in and looked at that evidence and talked to a lot of kids and a lot of parents and um a lot of teachers about it. And we were able to give them feedback in such a way that I then met with their team this summer and then their team met again and they have a whole plan this year on how to engage their community around this because their own parents were telling them we don't know what to do

027when our kids are struggling with work and sometimes we feel like we are not helping them in the wrong way. And so now that all came out through this process and in district 70 um they wanted to know are they providing active and authentic learning experiences and again that came right out of their strategic plan and their community engagement and is often the case in communities where test scores tend to be pretty good. We have communities that are also concerned about other things that aren't related to test scores and that's exactly what was happening in these two instances. Um, so again, we looked at evidence and we were able to give them extensive feedback on where we thought it was happening and where else it could be happening. Um, so then we went and conducted

028the visits. I won't go into this too much. I've kind of said it before. And then let's talk about this year real quick. So for this year, I've already done one training and principal bay and two staff members from here and a group from Lake Forest were at that first training. So far we have about 50 people signed up for training and we expect another probably 15 to 20 u because anybody who was trained last year can still do a visit this year. They get like a refresher video to remind them. Um so we'll have a pool of over a hundred staff members from all these districts who can participate but each team is usually made up between 18 to 25 people. Um, and then between now and the visit, and I believe Lake Bluff

029is looking at February, the end of February for the visit, between now and then, they'll develop the essential question. Um, and they'll start to collect evidence around that. And for me, I just work with Tividor and Dr. Leali on a regular basis basically to say, "Do you need anything? Can I help?" And I'm always available. It's probably more than you even want me to be available. Um, I sometimes bug her. I'm like, you know, hey, you need anything? Like, she doesn't have another job. Um, and and by the way, uh, I do want to do a little timeout because Miss Tividor and Miss Dr. Leali were kind of leaders last year and Jackie was at both the visits and at the visit was a leader on those teams. was an outspoken person in a good

030way in both the both right because sometimes you know no in a good way she really was a voice that other people listened to on the visit teams um and of course that of course perked my ears up because I'm like oh we got a host and then Dr. the alley was at the Libertyville visit for two and a half days. Um, and she again was uh leading the way. Um, so it's it's made it very exciting for me to be able to collaborate with both of them this year. Um, and to be available in any way that they need. And so I just like to end you know that and you heard it in the video really this is a holistic view that's grounded in a focus that the host district identifies and then

031we get diverse perspectives to engage that question. That's what makes this so different. Um I I tell the story my last year as a superintendent when I was in about Wlette part of our strategic plan was to look at a certain kind of program that we had that the community said we're not sure if this is working and I brought in a very prestigious university team that came in and lo and behold did exactly what we do in this process except they had all the answers kind of already done because they've been doing it so much and they only it was the same team only doing it one way. The thing about this is because we have different teachers and staff each time, it's never exactly the same and we're bringing diverse perspectives, but we're

032still using the same groundwork to approach it. So, I think that's why it's a very rich experience. I'm excited to meet more of the teachers and administrators here that we get to work with and I'm happy to answer any questions anybody has. Yeah, just really although thank you for saying all that and it you did, you know, prompt us to have a visit. It's actually the perfect time because we're in year three of our strategic plan. It's a good time for us to take stock of how it's been going and we're going to work with our district vision and guidance council which includes teachers and admin to formulate our question. Just to be also clear, Nate was also trained in the first year with me and Brooke McKeen and Anna Growth from the middle school.

033So, we have a pretty good team already here. We're looking forward to more people and really it's just a like a highly effective group of professionals and you couldn't ask for better people to come in and just give their opinion on how things are going. So, >> but yeah. >> Yeah. Any questions that anybody has about the process or the product or just how it goes that if it might sound like different than what you were expecting haven't seen the material. I think I understand it a lot better. I really appreciate that. I know we had an this sort of overarching idea of what you guys were doing, but that's really >> uh explains it in a way that makes it tangible and understandable. So, >> thank you. >> I do have a couple questions.

034So, it's only two days. So, do they get anything beforehand to look at to familiarize themselves with the school or is it just like sitting in a classroom, the same classroom teach like >> Oh, yeah. So, great question. So, they don't get materials ahead of time, although the host team typically does a brief presentation to begin with a little bit of an overview and also how they came to the essential question and what it means. So, there's context. So for instance, Deerfield picked productive struggle. We had to have a presentation from them so we understood what they meant by it. >> Um however, you've just said something that makes me think we could do some pre stuff. Um however, when the teachers go when the uh visit team goes to visit, they don't go sit

035in one classroom. They usually visit five or six classrooms in a half a day. then they'll might go and conduct a focus group with parents or students or teachers and then the next half day they'll go to a different school. So because of your size, that's why we might be able to cut down some of the time a little. So they're not just sitting in one classroom because um what we want is that dialogue about what different people were seeing in different places when we start to talk about what's happening and kind of think of it as a mosaic, right? We want to put together all those pieces and the deep expertise that all those people are bringing to it. Um I won't not this isn't poo pooing our our newer teachers but we tend

036to get veteran teachers and administrators who come into this process. Um, and so the conversations which you've both been a part of are really quite indepth and complex >> and and I would say the way it's structured and like the tri district we really took their model that they've refined over the last 30 years that document review is kind of a jigsaw. So you don't look at everything. Each team looks at a part of it and then you pull it together. So there's a lot that's reviewed and I was really grateful as a visit too cuz I'm like oh my god I cannot look at all the stuff right that they presented but I had a lens that I was looking at with the people at my table another table was looking at something else

037and we could look at it we didn't talk to and then everyone went to different places that were set up by the host district to just see and it felt like kind of it moved nicely so you weren't bored but you got to see a lot of different things take notes talk to people groups and then you came back and break so it's the way they're structure is set up and I think we're mirroring it pretty closely. >> Oh yeah. >> It's really it's tight. >> Yeah. And so just as a quick example, you know, Dr. Le Alli and her team are on indicator 7, they're looking at that in depth in terms of evidence, but when you go to visit a school, you're actually looking at everything. And so when we come back to

038talk about, well, Dr. Lai, what do you think? How should we rate them on this indicator? Other people can now chime in and say, well, wait a minute. I saw this thing over here that speaks to what you saw. I'm not sure. And that's where we get a lot of >> conversation and a holistic view. >> Well, I will see all of you again in February. Uh, any of you who can partake in the conversations and the interviews, but as Lisa and Jackie know, I'm available whenever I need to be to come talk to staff or anybody about the process. And it'll be a lot of fun. >> And Lake Forest visit is after ours like April. >> Lake Forest is in April. >> No, we'll go first and then 67 will go. >> Yeah.

039>> We look forward to it. Thank you. >> Thank you very much. I'm not going to stay for the rest of your >> It's hard to believe. >> I'll watch it on YouTube. >> But thanks again. Have a great night. >> Thank you. >> All right. Next up is debt service fund balance cleanout with Tammy Shelly. >> Tammy is one of our trusted partners as you know and also makes things incredibly understandable and uh digestible in the world of finance. So thank you for being here too. >> Thank you. Thank you for having me. But I know that the title is riveting very we'll try to make it a little interesting. But my goal tonight is to explain what a debt service cleanup is, how it might apply to you, and if it's something that

040you want to pursue, what that process looks like. So, we'll just get into the presentation. I think you all can print a copy as well as it being up on the screen here in a minute. So, if we go um into slide two, as you know from being on the board and looking at your monthly treasures reports, you have a debt service fund. And that debt service fund is used to receive revenue, primarily property taxes, to pay semianual principal and interest payments on your bonds. It's earmarked for that purpose. But over time, you accumulate a fund balance in that fund because obviously dollars go in and out to make sure you're meeting your obligations in that fund. And it comes from two sources. One is interest earnings that accumulates over time because you're carrying a

041fund balance. You earn interest over time. and the other are called loss and cost collections. So there's no school district that collects exactly 100% of its property tax revenue every year. You are fortunate that you have a very high property tax collection. It's over 99% every single year, but the county clerk gives you an extra 1% on your property tax extension for your debt service payments just to make sure you always have the money you need to make your bond payments every single year. So, for example, if you had a 99.2% collection rate, okay, and you're gettingund one or you're getting an extra 1%, you're always going to have a spread. You're going to have something on top extra that you don't need, okay? And the law says that funds accumulated in your debt service

042fund from loss and costs can only be used to pay debt service and general obligations. General obligation simply means bonds that you levy tax for which is what you do. Okay. So, and if we think about your fund balance and what might have accumulated, you can't just look at it as of June 30 because your June 30 fund balance in the debt service fund was about $2.83 million. That does not mean you have an extra $2.83 million because Jay's earmarking that money. It comes into the spring of 25, but he needs some of that money to start making debt service payments in December 1st of 25 based on how your property taxes come in. So Jay did an analysis to write try to understand what is truly truly accumulated as interest and loss in cost

043over time and we'll come back to that in a second. So we go to the next slide. How does a debt service fund cleanup work? You as a board have to take certain legal steps to be able to issue what are called nonreferendum working cash bonds. You've actually done this as a board before, but in the past you would issue working cash bonds and extend property taxes to pay the debt back. There's going to be a different approach this time because it's a cleanout. The bonds will purposely have a very short maturity schedule. When I say short, I mean about a month, okay? because all we're trying to do is enable you to get this money that's sitting in the debt service fund for another purpose. And this is the legal way that we can

044get to it when the bonds mature. So about a month later, the money that's accumulated in the debt service fund will be used to pay the principal and interest on those bonds that we've created with the bond issue. Okay? You will not extend property taxes to taxpayers to pay off this small short working cash bond issue. Want to be very clear about that. There's no additional property tax levy that's going to impact your taxpayers in your community. Once you get the working cash bond proceeds, what happens is you take those proceeds and by way of board resolution, you're able to move the dollars into the capital projects fund to use them for capital projects that I know Jay and the district you have identified. Okay. But that does have to be achieved via a board

045resolution. So go to the next slide just to show you some numbers. So Jay has gone through the math as I said and estimated that the amount of accumulated interest earnings and loss in cost is about a half a million dollars. So to kind of back into that and say okay if we have an approximately one month non-referendum working cash bond that we're going to use that amount to pay the debt back. What might that mean in terms of proceeds? So, if we factor in the estimated cost of issuance, which I've listed for you here, it's $6,500. It's pretty small. The estimated true interest cost, that rate of about 5 1.5%, hopefully that's a little bit conservative. It could be something a little bit less. After you factor all that in, and the interest cost

046for that roughly 30 days, we're trying to use as much as we can, as close to as we can to the $500,000. You can see it's about $40 short in this estimate. that would generate proceeds for the district of about $491,000. So, this is how that works, right? We're generating a bond proceed pocket, you know, for you. You're going to move that money where you need it and the money that's sitting in the debt service fund balance is going to be used to pay that off. Everybody follow that? >> Okay. This is a this is an allowable process commonly used by school districts that accumulate fund balance in the debt service over time. But unfortunately, you can't just transfer it with one resolution to use it for capital projects because of that restriction I talked

047about at the beginning. And if this is something you'd like to pursue, there are multiple steps on this timeline. And we've laid out here for you as you could start this process if you'd like at your September board meeting. And you'd adopt what's called a resolution of intent and a resolution called calling a bond issue notification act hearing or a binding hearing for short. The hearing functions much like the type of hearing you have annually for your budget or your check site. We'll have to put a notice in the newspaper and then you give the public the opportunity to come and speak at a board meeting about the bond sale. They can provide a written or oral testimony about that. I'm sure you will not have a line out the door about this at all,

048but you have to give them the opportunity to do that. Once we get through that and what's called a 30-day petition period. So, what will happen after that September 30th board meeting is we get a notice of intent in the newspaper and it starts a 30-day clock. And if at least 10% of the registered voters in the district sign a petition and bring it to you, the board, you either have to just stop the process altogether, can't sell the bonds, or you make a decision to go to the voters directly via referendum and ask for permission to sell the bonds. So, this is a very very rare occurrence that a district gets at least 10% of the registered voters signing a petition, but I just want to make sure you're aware of that that part

049of the law. So, we get through all that. Then the board can adopt a parameters resolution for the sale of the bonds, which we're suggesting could occur on November 18th. Then after that, we sell the bonds. And what we would do is do something called a placement. You historically when you've sold much larger bond issues, you've gone to the public market, right? and try to get as many investors interested and get that low rate. We're still trying to get the low rate, but because it's only going to be about a half million dollar bond issue and outstanding for 30 days, the public market's not going to be that interested. Don't take it personally. It's just because of the size and the short duration. So, what we will do is we'll put together a placement and

050send out a term sheet to potential purchasers, which likely could be a local bank. It might be a township school treasures office that manages money for a pool of school districts. Uh they're you might have heard about these. They're pretty common in parts of Cook County. Those would be the likely investors. So say I'll buy this for 30 days. That's great for for the portfolio. They give us rates. We get bids and we award your bonds to the the bidder that gives you the lowest interest rate. Then you would close on the transaction in mid December, get your proceeds, and then in the middle of January, about a month later, like I said, those bonds will mature. You'll pay off the principal and interest, and the process will be done other than you formally as

051a board adopting a resolution to move the money to the capital projects, funds, and projects. Right. So, that is about it. Um, happy to entertain any questions that you might have. Yeah, might not make sense like my brain, but so if we didn't, it's a way to use money. Not like necessarily make money, but use it in a different way. >> Right. Okay. >> Yes. Exactly. >> Right. Don't do we just can't spend that money in the capital. >> There's no way to use it for capital projects unless you go through this process we've talked about. >> What happens to it if you don't? It just sits there. >> It continues to sit there. Yes. How long has it been sitting so far? >> It's accumulated over the past decade. >> Oh, okay. And it's

052just like finally enough money at this room. >> It recently interest rates have gotten so high that it's grown more quickly recently because you get the 1% of the difference between what you collect and what you spend in there. Then you get year after year that you're earning interest on that money. So with interest rates where they are, we've accumulated a lot of interest in the last three or four years. So when we first started, it wasn't really a big issue and you just wanted a little bit of cushion in there. But the last couple years, it's been growing atund over $100,000 a year. So it's money that's we could use for purposes. >> Yeah. And I would say most school districts do a clean out like this every 10 to 15 years. So Jay

053describing that history you're about at that point and and like you said the higher interest rates have helped >> you a lot too. >> Is there Oh go ahead. >> Um thank you. Um I I'm assuming 5.56% as annual rate. >> Yes, that's correct. Yes, that's right. >> Yeah. >> Is there any reason why we would not want to do this? Like is there any benefit for it sitting there and growing? >> Only other thing you could do is let the money sit there and then you could pay taxes and use the money to pay down debt service and lower people's tax rate. >> But then the next time but if you wanted to do capitals in the future they're going to have to you don't have it. So >> right >> I think we

054have the reason I'm asking to do this is because we have name capital projects needs and have fund balance your operating money to do them. >> Sure. And so it's a great way to be able to get more money into our capital projects fund without taxing. And so otherwise it would just if we had to do capital projects it would just come reduce our fund balance or surplus from your >> education fund or your own fund to do that. >> Any other questions >> are there? So we'd leave about 65,000 in >> we I think we have about Yeah, we have about 165,000. So >> and then that would just continue to accumulate. >> Yeah. At the end of the year, we can transfer the interest and maybe start doing that like in June, we

055would the board would pass a resolution to transfer interest out of service fund to another fund. And you can do that within the fiscal year, but once it's once June 30th, it's stuck in so do that just to prevent from going increasing. Uh our debt service, our bonds will be issued for our debt service extension based for the metro. those funds. Um the the debt service payments are a little bit finer than what we're extending. So we need some question. >> Thank you. >> We really appreciate your support because it's not something we do often and so your help navigating kind of a complex process is really helpful to us too. >> Absolutely. Appreciate. Nice to see everybody. Thanks. >> Turn right. >> I don't want to say anything there. Amy's like >> All right.

056Are we just saying we're ahead of ourselves that we understood that? >> Uh, next up is our discussion on the BOE self-evaluation workshop that we did in June. Yeah. So, this is I think the fourth one that I've participated with boards uh in district 65. This is again um a close session workshop designed by the Illinois Association of School Boards to help uh boards of education um with their superintendent kind of evaluate your governance. You know, how things are working for you as a board and um as you recall, we kind of dug into some of our communication protocols, some of the ways that we make sure things get on the agenda, um how we function as a team um to support the leadership in the district. So, I just always think it's a good

057idea for us to revisit it now that we've it's been a month or two and just think of like kind of what stuck with you or um was there anything that you feel like could be reiterated now um in a public meeting that we want to reiterate for the committee >> or for each other if questions came up. >> I always just think it's helpful particularly when we have new board members who have not been through that, right, Andrew? But then, you know, Dick, the way that you came on the board as well, you didn't get to go through a a workshop >> through the back door. >> Um, so I think it's always helpful to get together as a group and talk about what our role really is and what our function really is

058and where we can be effective and where we should stay out of the way. And I think that's a big part of what we accomplished. I thought the chart helped a lot >> knowing kind of what our role at this board and forward. >> That's the visual helped me a lot. I agree. I agree >> to being new. It was very helpful just kind of get an idea of what was expected, what to do, what not to do. >> Very informative. Anybody have any other thoughts? >> Made a chart or Laura made a chart with some action items. >> And did she email that to all of us? >> Feel like she did. >> She usually does. So >> things that we wanted to circle back on. >> Yep. >> Uh so I will pull

059it up here. >> Tired to come to >> Yeah. Yeah. Uh >> we did this in June. So the next steps that you discussed were continuing to ask questions before the board meeting but also asking questions after board meeting. So one of the um discussions that we had was about how um I try to present you with enough information so that you feel prepared for the meeting but then after presenting that information a lot of times you will send me questions ahead of time to get clarification and then sometimes those come out during the board meeting sometimes they don't. And we did talk about how that's helpful for the community to hear the questions that happened before the meeting also. So, not to be shy about asking it even though it's already been answered. Um

060because we want to make sure the community knows kind of the discussions that or the questions you've had or concerns that you've had and what the answers to those are. >> We want to be transparent in the process, not just in the outcome. >> And we were saying like we can pretend like it's everybody's first meeting watching it. So to explain things where we already know for other people what like an acronym might mean or the process might be. >> Um we were going to discuss superintendent goals and what goals would be most meaningful. And um that will come a little bit later when I talk about um our wrap up from last year and what we think our uh realistic and measurable goals could be for the for the next year in terms of

061student achievement and all of our strategic plan goals. like looking at those metrics and kind of discussing openly what we think is u realistic for us to try to achieve in those areas. So that we will do. We said um we would want to remove the future agendas items um item from each agenda because it felt like a little bit on the spot and not everyone was prepared at that time. And when you do have a future agenda item, you just typically send it to me and ask and we put it on. Um Ann and I work to get it on a schedule. So, we did talk about that. Um, and then we reviewed our public comment pro procedures um and felt that we still like to have uh public comment before and public comment

062after. Um, and then Laura Martinez, who's our region rep, did uh attach the board protocols and then communication protocols. Um, and those we can review as well. Um, if you feel like you'd like to in the open session or we could schedule that for another time. Um, it's up to you. >> The paperwork that might be updated. >> So, the yeah, the communication protocols between the superintendent and board and then also the the um they called >> board protocols just having to do with the agenda and the meeting preparation and all those things. Um, we could also just attach those into the board packet for anyone who's interested in seeing them. >> Why don't we do that? Because it's a little >> They're long and it's, you know, >> yes, it's talking about how like

063we get an update at a certain point in the week and how the board book is ready at a certain point in the week. And >> there were some changes. >> It's necessary, but it's not riveting information. >> Not the changes. >> Yes. Senate isn't updated. Is it has it been was it five years or something? 9 to 10, I think. >> Yeah. I think the one big change we made was um internal just getting uh the packet materials ready for you by Thursday before the board meeting instead of Friday. So, that's um that's our goal. And um just appreciate the questions that you all continue to send, you know, um after you've had a chance to review and we can get those posted. >> Yeah, thanks for that reminder. I do continue to think

064it's very important that we ask the questions in open session in meeting as well so that we are transparent in how the process goes not you know we all know that we're asking questions and getting the answers that we need to get to the vote behind the scenes but it's important to do that in front of the scenes as well. >> Anything else? hope we do another one you know keep it tradition or whatever a year we can learn >> we can uh there are other options for workshops too so on off years like your first year we did the retreat with admin on inclusive practices so we might revisit something like that that was really wellreceived or we could do another starting right workshop what we can talk about that >> too workshop and

065yeah I do think they're helpful to do one a year >> maybe the next year we can invite the admin team have a working session again and maybe in every other year just with the board and every other year with the admin. >> We all liked it. We all liked that session. It was helpful. >> Tim, you can get us. Didn't you get us a discount on >> Are you going to try for a coupon? >> Yeah, let's do it. Let's do it. >> Big deal. Thanks, Jill. >> All right. Thanks, everybody. Um, next we're going to discuss staff and student recognition. Basically, how we want to go about recognizing staff and students this year because asking them to come to the board meeting all the time does feel great. >> I mean, so I

066just as background when I got here, we just kind of continued the way things we had had happened before I was here and then co happened. Things got a little disruptive. we went back to those some of those ways that we have invited staff to meetings. Um new staff at the beginning of the year, retirees at the end of the year and then you know teachers um when we could and it sounds great and it is a good it's an honor but also I know our teachers are super busy and nighttime is hard for them to get out and then when they get here and it's a really brief kind of presentation and then we just quickly adjourn into a meeting. I'm not sure that it achieves the goal of really meaningfully recognizing people in

067a way where the community can see it um or regularly sees it intentionally. So I think we all have just we've tried to do it different ways. This year we're trying a new situation with new teachers. We're going to have them record a little video um each person and then show that at the meeting u so that anyone can watch the video and see everyone and that will be hopefully a little bit more um informative without kind of infringing on their time when they're trying to get ready for the school year. So open to new ideas. We try to do a lot of student recognition through PA postcards or bluffer um cards at the middle school. Those phone calls go home. We're trying to, as you know, limit like student faces on social media, but

068we will be sending those personally to parents through Seesaw. So, we're kind of reorganizing a little bit. Now is a good time to think about how the board might want to be involved in recognizing staff and students. >> I do definitely still want this to be a a priority and something that we do. I think it's important to recognize people for their effort and their good work. I do think the students really value much more the phone calls home and the bluffer assemblies and Paul's postcards from you guys rather than from us, right? So, I think that part is covered well. Um, but how can we go about pushing something out to recognize staff or students as opposed to requiring them to come to us just so we can say great job, be on your

069way. You know, >> I had a small idea. Well, I thought originally when we talked about this like couple months ago that it would be a nice way to go into our new social media with, you know, a weekly or a monthly for the students almost like first and last initial or something just like a posting of all the people that got a bluffer fart or got the pause. I don't know, something that's tangible, parents can see it, you know, resend or share, whatever. And then for staff, I was thinking that we could take it on more for the board that we do something specific for them like I'll sign a card. And I don't know what the requirements would be for like what kind of recognition, but just like a thank you from us

070or a recognition from us or like a little something little gift, something tangible that we could hand them during the school day or you could as like a thank you from us that says we recognize you for somebody else recognizing you. You know what I mean? But at least it's from us and it maybe means more than showing up for five minutes. >> I like that too. I like that, you know, them receiving a thank you or an open of appreciation. Yeah. As opposed to, you know, having to come in. >> So, we do like one thing we did was when we got a note from a parent through the Thrillshare, like the website, that's what we would read. We are thinking of shifting that to more of a social media presence. So, if we

071get a note in from a parent asking them if they're willing to have that be on social media and then sort of like a thank you from a parent to a staff member on social media, that might be an opportunity for you to also sign a card. Like when we have that happen, we could bring cards to the board meeting and and you guys could sign that. >> Yeah, >> it's a great idea. >> And Nate, I don't mean to put you on the spot right now. and think about this, but if you have any ideas of a great way for us to acknowledge and show appreciation for the fact that >> I understand I mean I think um and I think you've correctly identified that that you know the way we've done it is

072um has been good but it also creates u some sometimes inconvenience I thought about this. I didn't come up with any good ideas, but then I said, well, um, the teachers might the teachers hopefully um, you know, just a handful informally would maybe have some really good suggestions as to as to how to do it. >> So, we do talk about recognition every year, right, through our culture and climate survey. um because that is one of the measures on the human survey is whether or not or to what extent teachers feel uh that they've been recognized in the last 10 days and I know that each of the working groups in the school which is comprised of teachers will go back to the faculty and kind of ask like how do you want to be

073recognized what is meaningful to you and I think unsurprisingly everyone kind of feels a little bit different some people like public recognition some people like uh you know just a private um you know tap on the shoulder. Some people like a note. Um, so it can be right a little bit. I don't mean to put you on the spot, but >> it it is kind of first personal. >> Yeah. So, but that could be a question. If our board were to recognize you, what do you think would be meaningful and appropriate? We could absolutely ask that at our sharing assignment. >> So, questions like the signing outside the doors. What do you want? High five, too. >> Yeah. What is your way that you'd like to be? Because I I like your thing. I don't

074want to take their time. I'd rather take our time. >> Agreed. Agreed. >> I also worry and it's I'm not a fan of everybody gets a participation award, but also I don't want to miss somebody that was recognized or or needs to be too. Like how do we make sure everybody's >> Yeah. Like >> how are we learning of the times when people should be appreciated and recognized? >> Yeah. >> It's a good question. >> Something So yeah, are you overrecognizing, underrecognizing? We don't want to create a competitive culture either. >> We also want it to be meaningful. >> Not just, oh, it was my turn. >> Yeah. Or like, you know, the parent in your classroom that's more outspoken and sends in the thanks where other people are just saying it in their house,

075too. So, >> just a thrill. >> Well, we can try it. And and one thing that we've talked about is kind of tracking also. Like in a classroom, a teacher would typically track, you know, who they've sent postcards. So, you know, like which students have received those. We do the same with our staff and kind of see what percentage of our um staff and faculty that we do wind up recognizing and then we can reevaluate the end of the year. We feel like that system didn't get us to enough votes. Um and then look for opportunities throughout the year. I mean, we could al maybe I'm making this too big. Um, but like we can also pick a grade or a group once a month that we are just recognizing because we're thankful for their

076work. You know, all the new teachers maybe like halfway through they get something that says thank you for staying strong for six months or whatever. I don't know. We can absolutely add that to or like anniversary. >> Yeah. Or presentation uh or board presentations if you I like Yeah. >> I like that one. >> Keep going. >> Anniversaries. >> Yeah. >> You know, or Yeah. If we're not getting recognition, at least we can recognize their like small achievements of like I don't know, you've worked for 3,000 days or something and saying, you know, like >> like 10 years or you know. >> Yeah. >> Cuz I know you do. >> We do at the end of the year. We do service awards. But we could, if you have ideas, how about this? If you have

077ideas of the groups that you think we could recognize throughout the year, send those to me and we can put we can plug them into each month and kind of plan out what makes sense. >> That way we're always recognizing somebody. We don't have to wait for >> Yeah. Love that. >> Forte of yours wheels. >> Yes. But I feel like your input will be valuable. >> It's like teacher appreciation part two. >> It's like 2.0. nail teacher leveling it up. >> You know, I know there there a lot of teachers watch the uh watch us online. Um and if a teacher's name is mentioned for generally, you know, positive recognition for some reason that gets around pretty quick. >> You should do that along, you know, make sure we say it out loud. >>

078Yeah. >> They don't have to be here though. >> They don't have to be here. >> I like that. >> They do watch you, right? >> Yeah. Okay. >> Or if they hear about it later, they'll watch later. >> Yeah. Yeah. No, exactly. So, a person may not be watching it, but you know, three teachers the next day will come up and say, "Yeah, you >> they were talking about you last minute at the >> time. It really does. It does. >> It's nice to be acknowledged when you work hard and make a difference." But if you're watching, hi. >> All right. So, what I'm hearing is uh we potential ideas. I'm just writing down what I what I wrote down. So, student and staff recognition potentially for students maybe first name, last initial or

079bluffer cards or pause postcards once a month. Yeah. On social media, we can work um with communications to help us organize that and get a nice monthly thing. um the thank you cards from the board for the thrillshare um submissions and then those also go to social media so we can get an ecosystem going for that. Um, we will ask at the Humanex debriefs this fall once we do our we'll ask for more input from staff like if you know what feels good. And then also we're going to try to plug in some grades or groups during throughout the year that we can actually plan on recognizing during a certain month. Call the people out, thank them for specific contributions. >> Oh, great. And some of that may present itself along the way this year

080too when certain things happen or whatever. >> Love it. >> Thank you. That sounds great. >> All right. Thanks, guys. Policy 118, second and final rehab. >> Uh there's a lot of policies in this one. We did review it in June, I think. Um it's a long one mainly legal references and the title nine regulations that are going back um burning back. So again not not I don't believe we have any um decisions we had to make with these policies. So we just reviewed them. They're coming as our legal recommendation um from press and we are as a board policy committee recommending that we accept all of the uh recommended policies and that is all for that. Any questions or further thoughts on that? Okay, next up is workers compensation. Jake, no one. >> Next

081up is workers compensation. Jake, >> they don't think so. >> Is that on the menu? But it's not >> on the menu. >> I don't know why it's on. So, next up is True North with Dr. Leo. >> All right. Sorry about that. Just that we didn't we were worried about >> it and was on Yeah. >> Okay. >> Sorry about that. >> No worries. >> Okay. Um, we have It's been a bit since we've talked about True North and a lot has happened since we last talked about it. So, I don't usually do this, but I'm actually going to read um because I want to make sure that I don't misrepresent what is going on and I want to make sure we're clear uh before we go into the leadership council meeting tomorrow. So,

082I think this would this should answer a lot of your questions, but if you have questions after this, I'm happy to answer. Is this in the packet? >> It's not in the packet. No, because I we're going to be presenting this at the leadership council meeting tomorrow. So, I don't want to put it out there yet, but this is your briefing. So, I will be uh in attendance at True North Leadership Council tomorrow along with a bunch of other superintendents that I'll talk about now. So, as you know, in June, the True North Leadership Council approved a resolution directing the True North administration and and council to work with the districts and their council uh and any other attorneys involved who represent the other six districts outside of the forensic 12. You know, we're a

083part of that forensic group to develop a dissolution plan. The resolution was spurred by the fact that at the end of by the end of June, all 18 districts in the cooperative were going to at least give preliminary notice of withdraw. That happened. All 18 districts put in their notice to withdraw. There are a number of reasons that True North has gotten to this point. Most notably, that many districts have built up their internal capacity to serve students with special education needs. And what they are paying for True North now greatly outpaces the services they use. Since that time, a subcommittee on dissolution made up of Katherryn Wang the superintendent of Gleno, Jason Pearson from Northbrook 28, myself, Matt Montgomery from Lake Forest Districts, and Monica Schrader from Northshore District 112, as well as Chris

084Johnson from New Trier High School have been meeting to put together a plan for dissolution. We also have met with True North True North's administration a couple of times and got really helpful feedback from them, which we've incorporated into our planning. and we have met with representatives since then from all 18 districts. Last week we met with the finance committee of the leadership council, the internal administrative team at True North and also the union leaders at True North to discuss planning around next steps for the organization and we do believe they've been very collaborative. Everyone has been um helpful in giving information and it's a very very difficult thing for true north employees to do and they have been professional and working with us collaboratively. Tomorrow night we will be presenting highlevel information regarding the

085dissolution plan which I will give to you in a moment. Additionally during the course of that work some member districts began reviewing whether a slimmed down reorganized true north might be possible. A second subcommittee was formed and we have been meeting. I will be sharing some of that um with the leadership council tomorrow and I'll share tonight. While our goal for tomorrow was to present a full dissolution plan, we are actually excited by the prospect of continuing to work on the matter to try and finalize a recommended path for the leadership council that might be a reorganization. So here's where we are with dissolution. Nothing that the council hears tomorrow uh represents a final decision or a formal recommendation. It's only a chance to share information and answer questions. The dissolusion plan has the following

086components. It's a three-year plan phased disillusion starting with this school year. Nothing will change from a staffing or financial perspective for this school year. The dissolution plan reflects the goal of minimizing student impact and transitioning to new programs and a phased approach that is developed in conjunction with unions and work groups so the process is fair and transparent for staff. The plan includes the reduction of programs after year 1, the transfer and assignment of staff who are currently assigned to an individual district after year 1, and the possible transfer of programs to member districts after year 1, the sunset of all programs by the end of year two and determinations for remaining staff by the end of year two and year three will be reserved for the disposition of assets and debts. So that is

087how the dissolution plan is going to be high level. That's how that would look. three years phase dissolution. You want me to stop for questions there? Keep going. >> All right, keep going. >> Reorganization. So, a we as we've gone through the process of developing a plan for dissolution, a number of districts have decided to see if it's possible to develop a plan for a slimmed down restructured true north cooperative. Our subcommittee has been myself, Monica Schrader, RJ R.J. Grall the new superintendent from Glenbrook District >> 225, John Deer from North Brook District 27. Both of them are represented by a different council than Franit. This is a different group. As well as Heather Meal, the director of student services from North Brook 27 and our assistant superintendent, Tracy War. A number of our 12

088districts as in forensic as well as some of the other six districts are interested in exploring this option. of particular interest is to see if maintaining a prek through 8th or 12th grade day school is possible. The plan currently does not include a high school component for transition or professional development for anything. Professional development is looking to not be a part of that reorganization. This approach will focus on essential programming that meets member district needs with an appropriate cost structure and elimination of programming that is not sustainable. The goal is to focus on the students in the programs and create even better outcomes for them in the future through maximizing their learning experience in a fiscally responsible economy of scale. The plan will still result in a reduction of staff, but there will be limited

089retention of staff within programs and an opportunity for current member districts to hire staff directly who are assigned to their districts now. So staff will have an opportunity if they're working in a in a district, they'll be able to go to that district hopefully. We still anticipate that five to eight districts will withdraw. So this plan will also reflect a fair potentially redesigned exit strategy for those districts. The plan will also actually both plans intend to make changes to the True North uh governance structure. So we will be proposing a change to how governance works in True North. Currently it's a a leadership council made up of 18 board members from each district. um and the superintendents aren't really directly involved. Neither are the directors of student services. And so we are looking for a

090different model that would retain the leadership council, but then also have a smaller, more compact working group that adheres to school code, but that could be a little bit tighter and more um close to the decision- making than the 18 folks. >> Uh good option. So, we will not expect the leadership council to take any action on either plan at the meeting tomorrow, but we will be requesting two special meetings to be held in September to review a final plan and for the leadership of True North to take action in September so that each of our member districts can have a conversation in October and decide what we want to do at that time. Because if we if any district still wants to leave, then they would leave in their petition for withdrawal. But if

091they want to stay, they would have to take back that petition by December because we would need to know who's in and who's out by December so that we can make staffing decisions and decide kind of where we're going. >> Questions? >> Yes. So if if it ends up going to this reorg option, >> have you guys discussed a built-in plan for if schools want to enter this new organization or leave? Is there >> not the entrance? Okay. >> But there is uh we have talked about the exit. >> Okay. >> And most of that as you can imagine is a financial asset distribution issue >> and um >> it's been really helpful to have our CSBOs involved in that process. Jay's in the finance committee. R.J.'s coming from that pool. Um, and we're really

092appreciative that they're helping us kind of take a look at like long-term if we want to redesign and slim down, what would be feasible for us in terms of maintaining that program while allowing districts to exit in a fair way. >> Okay. I just don't I I mean, I think the reorg is something districts will be interested in, but I want to make sure that there's So, I just don't want to be in this situation. >> Yeah. None of us. And I I have to tell you like everybody has been collaborative. Everybody wants the best for all 18 districts. I feel like the um climate has changed a little bit. We're less a little bit less um anxious and a little bit more focused on actually developing a sustainable plan. Either way, uh disillusion or

093reorganization, but that will be in the best interest of kids. Nobody wants to see this go down a bad path. And um that makes that makes me feel good. So I will keep you posted. That's a lot. >> But I I Oh, go ahead. >> No, you >> I was just going to say that I would really like to recognize Dr. Leawi and all of the work that she personally has done in this along with Christy Warick, right? Because they are well and Jay, you too. I mean, you guys have done so much to really, really, really talk through this, come up with good ideas, >> pull it back from the brink even, and make it productive. >> Thank you. >> Thank I appreciate that. And we don't know which way it's going to go.

094But either way, >> but even if there is a dissolution, it's not contentious and because it seemed like it maybe would. Yeah. >> No, we're in a good we're in a better To clarify, you said pre-K through 8th >> maybe. Okay. Right now, we're leaning toward a potential EC through 8th grade building as being the most sustainable option, but we're still we're still talking to the high school districts about what their needs are. Um >> feel like the high schools were the kind of to pull out. So, >> they were some of the high schools still, one of the high school districts in particular uses a lot of transition, which we don't think we can sustain, >> but we're not sure about the NSA component yet. >> Okay. Um, also some districts are still interested

095in partial staffing. So, in other words, like even bigger districts, it's very hard for them to staff like a 0 2 or point 4 uh vision and hearing itinerant or physical therapy um itinerate. You know, somebody who they don't have enough students, but they don't want to hire a full-time person. That's still a very beneficial service that the cooperative has offered, which we're trying to figure out a way to manage. The goal financially is, like I said, to get the evidence-based funding allocation that they get from the state to be the primary funding source for the overhead. So, whatever all of us need to pay into, we're trying to get it down to be under the umbrella of the EBF so that we're not paying a membership fee. Cutting out professional development takes away that

096professional development fee. We're looking at con, you know, creative ways to handle the facilities in the O andM. not really sure, but shifting as much operational cost to the tuition so that if a district places a student there, they're paying tuition that covers the operational costs. And we really do believe we will have enough students in the programs, especially EC um and NSAE and Arbor that will >> Can I one? >> Yes, please. Um so when we talk about the prek through eight kind of one building model um in actuality our early the early childhood programming is a community- based program. It's very popular amongst member districts. It's one of the only programs that is almost solely member district students. And so we kind of had the thought of like we don't touch that, right?

097we just let that community based program um keep going the way that it is and then a one building model for K through eight. If we need if we do add in the high school and there are high schools that want to participate in and continue on then it would be more of a campus model because not everybody would fit in the one building and so it would be a campus model across the two buildings that are currently being utilized. Yeah, I really want to recognize Katherine Blanco Johnson, Trier, Matt Montgomery, U and Mike Forest. Uh, who am I forgetting? Monica Shreder. Did I forget her? Monica is going to be the new superintendent of Northshore 112 after this year. She's the deputy student now, but she's been working on this. We've been meeting every

098week, multiple times a week all summer. and that group has really made up like the beating heart of the work keeping it moving forward. So, I'm really proud of what we're going to be presenting tomorrow. I think the leadership council is hopefully going to be receptive. Tomorrow, we will also be hiring hopefully and appointing two interim retired superintendent and to take Dr. Schneider's place who will help um and who I've heard have experience with uh collaboratives and um come with some real support for the effort no matter which way it goes. So we're looking forward to it. I ask one question. >> Yeah. As far as I was going to say next year, but this year goes, our students won't see much of a change. >> No, our students are right, Tracy. No change for

099our students. >> No. >> Yeah. Status book 2003. So I I really like the idea of of right sizing you know the the organization and looking at it you know from from the um almost zerobased >> yes >> type approach. >> Um so Dr. Osborne's presentation and that um you know inter collaboration CIC program is that are is is that under the umbrella of true norm? >> No. So that's a really good question because CIC that little acronym actually comes from the north group the north region group of districts that make up true north. So Highland Park, Deerfield, Lake Forest Districts, Banickburn and um us >> and Deerfield. Those are the districts that make up this northern region of true north and we from whenever I don't it was before my time they called themselves

100the consortium for interd district collaboration. I don't know why they called themselves that um but that's what I came into and those are the we called our meetings those meetings when we got together as a north group of true north aside from the north northfield region and aside from the new trier or north cook region we had those three regions. This was our group and actually as we were meeting about true north that is how the idea of the walkthrough um protocol came up. It was us talking about things and actually it was um Mike Simmit from Deerfield that had worked with Marty Brooks and brought that to our group and since it was mainly us anyway. Oh, and I forgot 113 is in that group too. The high school district 113 um we were

101like well we'll just call it that. So >> True North is perfect. And Trim North is part of it. Yes, >> they're going. Yeah. >> Oh, >> they're part of the walkthrough process. Thanks, Jackie. >> Is he employed by True North? >> No, he's employed by all of us together. So, last year we all have kicked in. Um >> Okay. Yeah. >> What? 5,000 I think that's 10,000 last year. And we aren't paying anything this year because we have enough now to sustain us for a few years. Um and we hired Dr. Osborne and again he's from Aoka. He kind of knows the area. Um, and then that paid also that helped us pay for Marty Brooks to come in and do the training. Um, so, >> so that program is not part of True

102Northwest. So, whatever happens to True North in fact, >> it will stay it will stay. Yeah. As long as we're invested as districts. Good question. >> Anything else on Yeah. Uh, real quickly, this is an annual approval. We're really excited to be presenting our intergovernmental agreement with the Lake Bluff Public Library. Um, no terms have changed. It is still $1,000 that we pay to the library so that all of our students you within the village and in unincorporated parts of our community can access the library. I just want to do a shout out to Natalie Sara at the library, the new director. very collaborative working with us trying to figure out streamlined ways to get our staff their actual cards, to get our students their actual cards, to get more people into the library. Uh

103we will be hosting I think one of their events soon. Um so we're really trying to partner a little bit more and make this more of a um interactive partnership, but we're really excited that the terms of this agreement haven't changed. Great partnership for us and our kids. Um, next up is the train three-year maintenance contract renewal. >> So, we our current three-year maintenance contract with train expires October 1st. Uh, this is a renewal. Uh, this is um we have most of our current HVAC systems are on train equipment. As we replace equipment, we are actually replacing it with non-train equipment. So the need for this agreement will continue to decrease in the future. Moving more open-source um equipment where we can have anybody work on it. Uh but we still have a lot of

104legacy systems and this agreement ensures that you know there we're always the users needed to keep it working. >> Any questions? >> Thank you. And then you want to talk about the purchase of the used cargo van. >> Yes. So we have a cargo van right now, white van that we use to transport items between buildings is about 15 years old and it's being held together by Russ. So we have to replace it. Uh Andy has looked and found actually quite a few options at the dealership. Um these are vans that were leased and they're being returned. There's one in particular I was looking at that is low mileage. Um they're all roughly the same cost, some notense. Being a used item, it does not need to go through the bidding process. So we can

105just with board approval go and purchase and this has been included as soon. >> Wonderful. >> Are you also talking about Apple finance services to me? >> Uh yes. So those uh Kevin put the details in your board packet. Nothing has really changed. The plan was to do this transaction in the spring and he got a call from his Apple dealer said, "Hey, with all the interesting things going on, >> so it's not quite >> a the interestfree uh agreement that we that we did the last time may be ending and that they willing to uh basically lock us in now. Um we would not be build until April. We would just sign the contracts early and take possession of the equipment and keep it. Um or probably not deploy it until next year in

106this situation where we needed it. But that doesn't really change the the plan for the future. So, it's just kind of moving up this contract so that we can take advantage of real >> and it's even moving up just the agreement more than it is moving up the payment. >> Yeah. You still would not cut Chuck and tell we normally wouldn't go anyway. That's when it would really start, but we would be signing the agreement. >> In the price quote, it says that the iPads are pink. Are we getting 53? >> I saw that, too. I was like, >> I don't know. Yeah, >> yeah, it was that one 10 pack was in pink and then another like the case was in blue. I mean, not that the colors matter. I'm just >> I I

107don't know. >> Okay, we will ask. >> Might want to check on >> I the problem. >> It's they have different models that are often >> cheaper priced and more available at certain quantities and we go with >> they'll all be in cases. I'm the black one. >> It's like red, fox, pink, and then >> blue. and they all work which is most >> but I know we had some questions about whether or not would change the plan or but no we would actually continue with the deployment plan as we've already laid out and just kind of hold those iPads back in storage and we're ready to >> and we not repurchase iPads the plan was not to re purchase them for another three years again that and at that point like one is only

108as good as what It's not at that point, but Apple tends to try to make these devices affordable for districts. So, and if it was 0%, it would be low interest or we purchase them or something. >> Great. >> Um Jay, can you just refresh our memories for what the roll out is because I I thought we'd already given iPads to like all the the elementary school. >> No, just two grades. >> Yeah, I didn't I didn't. So what how many grades now have them? >> Uh sixth grade, seventh grade and then second I think just second and then third three four five. >> Okay. So not quite less than half of our students currently have and so this is intended then to cover the the remaining students that that don't and that also considers

109like the reduction in the onetoone situation in kindergarten. So we're only putting five iPads in each kindergarten classroom instead of assigning to all the students. So it's but everyone will first through 8th will have iPads as of next year. >> As of next year. So, the eighth grade still has >> Chromebooks, >> the Chromebooks, and a few other grades still have the Chromebooks as well. >> Exactly. >> I'm sorry. >> They'll get the iPads except for eighth grade. >> Oh. Oh, okay. Wait, so all the other classes are getting the iPads at the start of this year? >> I want to look at the plan. Ellie, do you remember >> jump in? >> Three, four, five, and eight will have Chromebooks for this school year. >> After that, they will be phased out with the

110iPads. >> Okay. So, >> so as of next year, they'll all have iPads. >> Yes. >> Okay. So, second, sixth, and seventh >> are iPads. >> And based on what you said, >> A has some first grade has iPad as well. >> Okay. So, this purchase is for next year's >> lab. >> And just as a reminder, none of the devices are going home in K through five this year. >> Yeah, Kevin's little video is very great. >> Good. Very informative. Very helpful. >> Thank you. >> All right. Thanks everybody. Let's move on to our action items. First up is approval to merge fee waivers. >> Yeah. So, this was a discussion we had in the spring. Um, this is just a streamlining of our um application for free and reduced and fee waivers. So,

111we have parents typically filling out two different forms for this and we would like to merge the process so that we would uh wave fees for any parent that qualifies for free and reduced under that application process. is um then it just streamlines one less thing for parents to do and we would just take care of both um processes with one application >> seems to simplify it and get rid of redundancy. >> Yeah. And I don't think it will result in a lot more students having fee wavers. We kind of did an analysis of it and it'll be less work for parents and we thinkable strategy. Okay. May I have a motion to approve the merger of fee waiverss as presented at the last meeting? >> So moved. >> Second. >> Lauren, can we have

112a roll call vote or a call vote, please? >> Laura Brastone, >> yes. >> Ian Hill, >> yes. >> Andrew Carlson, >> yes. >> Steinbach, yes. >> Richard Driver, >> yes. >> Lauren Hirs, yes. Tim Bennett, >> yes. >> That motion passes. >> Next up is approval of the Lake Bluff Library intergovernmental agreement. May I have a motion to approve the Lake Bluff Library IGA as just presented? >> So moved. >> Second. >> Lauren, could you call vote, please? >> Tim Penn, >> yes. >> Lauren Hirs, yes. Andrew Carlson, >> yes. >> Ian Hill, >> yes. >> Gary Steinbach, >> yes. >> Richard Driver, >> yes. >> Laura Breaks, >> yes. >> That motion passes. Next up is approval of press policy 118. Do I have to read every >> All the policies are in

113the agenda. May I have a motion to approve the f can I have a motion just to approve the policies from press packet 118 that are in the agenda? >> Yeah. >> So moved. >> Second. >> Lauren, could you call please? >> Lauren Marsh. >> Yes. Uh Richard Driver, >> yes. >> Dan Hill, >> yes. Andrew Carlson, >> yes. >> Carrie Steinbach, >> yes. Tim Penich, >> yes. >> Laura Brastone, >> yes. >> That motion passes. Next up is approval of the personnel report. The big one this month. >> Okay, as you guys know, we have to read it in full, so hang tight. Non-licensed new hires. Jennifer Malloy, para profofessional at LBMS, effective 822 2025, replacing Marta Alvarez for $20 per hour. Todd Betaglia Parah Professional LBMS effective 82225 replacing Gretchen Winkler $20 per

114hour. Macy Claws paraprofessional LBES effective8225 replacing Skyler Ko for $20 an hour. Jeffrey Jacobs, paraprofessional, LBES, effective 82225 replacing Leah Pound, $20 an hour. Asha Brown, paraprofessional at LBES, effective 822 2022, replacing Brett Montobano at $20 per hour. Diana Cervatias is a guest teacher effective8425, $155 a day. Janice Ziggoria, also a guest teacher, effective 84205, $155 a day. Sandy Bowman, another guest teacher, effective8425 at $155 per day. Gretchen Winkler is a guest teacher, effective8425 at $155 per day. Gabriella Salgado Mata also a guest teacher effective8425 for $155 per day. We have two resignations. One was Gretchen Winkler resigning as a paraprofessional at LBMS effective July 21, 2025 and Leah Pound paraprofessional LBES 724 2020. We have three licensed new hires. Benia Coland, school psychologist at LBES, effective 820 2022, replacing Tim Burks at annual salary

115rate of $88,397 on a schedule of MA13. Barbara Fox as a part-time nurse at LBMS effective 818 2025 annual salary rate of $40 per hour salary schedule placement.5 and Kathy Sullivan part-time nurse LBMS effective 818 2025 at $52.56 per hour this is a change from full-time to a.5 to FMLA Amber Pringle, special education teacher at LBES. This will be effective January 20 of 26 through April 17 of 26. And Adrien Logan, kindergarten teacher at LBES, effective December 1 of 25 through February 13 of 26. And I just want to really quickly uh thank our principles and assistant principles for the amount of hiring and our uh director of teaching and learning who had and assistant superintendent who have onboarded a lot of our new staff and trained our new staff. Like it was a lot

116of work this year to be doing interviewing and screening and onboarding and hiring and um Captain Quinnland of payroll and benefits Amy and we just have all come together to kind of welcome our new class of 25. It's going to be a big class, but we're excited about all of them. >> Thank you everybody. >> May I have a motion to approve the personnel report for August 19, 2025? >> So move. >> Second. >> Lauren, could you call vote, please? Harry Steinbach, >> yes. >> Laura Brickstone, >> yes. Tim Penish, >> yes. Dan Hill, >> yes. Lauren Hersh, yes. Andrew Carlson, >> Richard Driver, >> yes. That motion passes. Next up is the consent agenda. The consent agenda consists of the following open session meeting minutes from June 24, 2025 of a regular meeting. June

11724, 2025 of the True North Cooperative withdrawal hearing meeting minutes, the treasur's report, the Impress report, the bills report, and the Pecard report. And just really quickly, the impress and the bills reports include July and August. And I'm wondering if you wouldn't mind just highlighting a couple of the new charts that you put in the treasure report. >> Uh yes. >> Thank you. >> So there should be two new charts just I'm just trying a few different things to see if you like them. Not one was um that was based on Dick's recommendation of the instruction showing the different columns >> instruction support services on&m and transportation. Yeah, the expenditures by >> and I added a couple of other categories just to round it out. And then there's a waterfall chart just to show kind

118of visually the difference between the forecast and the actual >> the budget the actual record valuation >> and that's of the change in fund balance or the ending fund balance. So it comes >> I love that chart I think is so helpful. Um, I mean, you can just kind of look at it. Um, and for kind of for the benefit of everybody at home, um, you know, it shows just at a glance, we were like a little underbudget for instruction spending versus budget, but we were up like 800,000 over last year. So, it was a a pretty big increase. um you know we were a little bit um overbudget for the support like 164,000 but um you know it was only like 80,000 more than last year so you know it I love this snapshot

119being able to see that so quickly and you know having to go through the detailed reports trying to look back and forth and I mean Um, I don't know how everybody else thinks, but I I would love to see something like that. Uh, maybe quarterly. >> I mean, they're in they're in my mall, so I can generate every month. >> Yeah, we don't need to see it every month. I don't think um >> it's probably easier just to do it every month, right? >> Yeah. So that you're >> Yeah, it just it'll calculate itself. So, you know, >> I just I really appreciated that. I thought that was great. And then for people who like to see numbers, they're they're still in there. If you want to look at the table, I rearrange it a

120little bit. And then quarterly, I do share the list of investments. So I one detail question. Um, so I'm looking at being a little bit um overbudget in um the support and under budget and the in the um instruction. Did that the the treatment for the computer leases play a role in that? I think you said it it ended up being a source of funds. >> Yeah, that was really just an accounting. >> Okay. So that that wouldn't change those numbers at all. No, those were budgeted in um those were budgeted in instruction. So, I mean, we actually were probably below that probably saved some money because we had budgeted for a purchase. So, we budgeted I I didn't know about the lease option. So, we 250,000 to buy them. >> Okay. >> And then

121we leased them zero interest for four years. So, we only had to pay a quarter. So, thanks for that 175. >> Okay. So that so that might have looked a little differently. Okay. Thank you. >> I have one question on the bill or in the treasures report. The Rogers nursery van parking >> or did they did they redo some of that landscaping so that the van can pull up? >> Yeah, the van has been they were parking it on the corner in the grass and we were concerned about getting stuck. So they put some bricks down. say non veteran park there anything kind of >> can I ask a bill question is well the on um the invoice listing there a bunch of refunds forcoin >> yes >> is that an automatic when your last

122child leaves eighth grade or do we as parents have to reach out and say can you refund my what's left >> any balances that are over $10 um will automatically be refunded um when there's no siblings and the the oldest child graduates. Okay. >> If it's less than $10 and the parent will need to cost >> is when the youngest child graduates, right? >> When the >> the last child in the family, does it automatically transfer from one child to the next? >> We will do that. >> We don't have to >> you have the ability to log in and do it yourself, but in the absence of that We actually after our graduation, we look at all the eighth graders who left, >> see what their balances are. Any anyone who has a sibling,

123we move it. So, I'm basing sering everybody out. >> That's right. >> Anything less than $10 either way is just a wash. We will forget. Anything negative less than $10. Anything agreed with nothing would be just fored unless they requested another Sunday. >> Okay. >> And anything over 10 maybe Sunday. >> Thank you. >> That is good. >> Anything else? May I have a motion to approve the consent agenda for August 19, 2025 as presented by administration? >> So move. >> Second. Any further discussion on this? Would anyone like to pull anything out for a separate vote? >> All right, Lauren, could you call a vote, please? >> Dan Hill, >> yes. >> Laura Brickstone, yes. Sim Penish, >> yes. >> Andrew Carlson, Richard Driver, >> yes. >> Steinbach, >> yes. >> Lauren Hirs, yes.

124>> That passes. Thank you. Um, we did have one foyer request this month. Details are in the board packet. The FOYA section of our agenda is simply a report item, does not require approval. Um, are there any questions though about whatever? Okay, not seeing any. We'll move on to public comment, but nobody else has joined us. So, does anyone here want to make public comment? >> Thank you. Some point on the food service like it's working again. Oh, good. >> Hi, Curtis. And long blank is something for us. That's awesome. Change. Awesome. May I have a motion? Um, may I have a motion to adjourn the August 19th, 2025 regular board of education meeting at 8:42 p.m.? >> So, moved. Second. >> Second. >> All in favor? >> I. Any opposed? Meetings adjourned. Thanks everybody.

125salsa food ordering and doing what they can do to