001of the United States of America, and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Let's move on to roll Katie Casey Here. Jill Johnson >> Here. Natalie Melchert >> Here. Joseph Quinn Here. Tom Schwartz Here. Mary Schufeldt, here. Ali Stansbury Here. Good. On to item three, consent agenda. We need a motion to approve the consent agenda as submitted. Motion. Second. Melchert Yes. Stansbury Yes. Casey Yes. Schufeldt Yes. Johnson Yes. Schwartz Yes. Quinn Yes. Okay, that moves us on to student recognition. All right. Good evening. Thank you. This year we had four wrestlers for NMS make it onto the podium at the state meet. So, we wanted to recognize that accomplishment these four young men. I'll have you guys stand up over here. Don't be nervous.
002Right over here where everybody can see you. This time I did last time I did a bad job. Make sure everybody can see you, okay? So, I'll introduce these guys. Um Unfortunately, they're all eighth graders, so they are moving on. We'd like to have them another year, but they did a great job this year. Like I said, each one made it on the podium. First one with a sixth place finish IS LANDON STEIN. AND THIS YOUNG MAN, HE WAS HERE FOR the silent film. So, he goes in front of the board all the time. This is nothing new for him. With a fourth place finish IS DYLAN MOORE. FANTASTIC HAIR. DOES A GREAT JOB, multiple sports for us, out for track now. All right, he a great job in that too. I'm sure we'll be
003hearing about it with a fourth place FINISH SAM RENDORF. AND FILLING IN FOR ME AS PRINCIPAL OF THE middle school when WE'RE DONE HERE. AND A RUNNER-UP FINISH this year KENNY GERSH. CONGRATULATIONS BOYS. CONGRATULATIONS. Job well done. I know you're working guys. The the wrestlers are the coaches here too. I contacted coach Lesniak coaching girls soccer. >> Oh that's right. I should know that my daughter is playing right now. Very good. Well again job well done. Congratulations for your Good luck in baseball. I see no public input. This moves us on to the reports. You are welcome to stay or you can you can leave too. It's completely up to you. Thank you all. Thanks so much. Thanks guys. Thank you very much. Thank you. We have no public input. Really wanted them to stay.
004And that moves us on to the reports. I'll go through each report. Please stop me. I'll pause for a little bit if you have any questions. So the first one is 6.1 revenue expenditure report. 6.2 fund balance comparison report. 6.3 special education revenue expenditure report. 6.4 impressed reports 6.5 transportation report 6.6 impact fees That moves us on to administration administrative reports 6.7.1 superintendent's report. Yeah, just a couple things real quick. Talking um uh with Chris, these are a few of the projects we'll be looking at this summer. A lot of it is basic maintenance. Uh we've got the basketball floors at all the all the schools fixed now, so we'll just go back to regular maintenance. Uh looking at some things like new windows. Uh Chris came up with a a 10-year plan last year.
005If you remember we talked about it where we could take a little bit of our money every year, replace x number of windows, you know, start doing those things that if we had to do it all at once, it'd be a lot of money. And uh I think it's a great way to go about it while we wait to see um where we end up with the ISBE uh approval. So, we've got windows at RGS. Uh the boiler's been shut down at Nippersink, which is always a a celebration day. Uh the the other day we always keep our fingers crossed for is the first cold day in October where we have to fire it back up. Uh so, there's a lot of cleaning, refurbishing, and those types of things will be taking place this summer.
006Uh we're looking into some seal coating prices. Uh we do have the uh roof as well and uh and it must be replaced. So, Do you have to go out for bid for seal coating? If it goes over 35,000. So, what we look to do is do small sections or we look to you know, rotate it every year. Might do this parking lot this year, next year do another one as opposed to going out and doing all three schools' parking lots in the same year. Yeah. Yeah. Uh Uh, the other thing I wanted to go over real quick is just an overview of where we are with our financials right now. We're 75% through the year. This is always a good month to kind of take a look at where we are where our funds
007are. If you notice in the fund comparison report, we are about $300,000 above where we were last year and last year we were about 300,000 above where we were the year before. Of course, this is our unaudited numbers that you have so it could go up a little or go down a little bit but overall what we're seeing is a more efficient, more streamlined budget. And not only are we staying to it but we're we're keeping a little bit of it to build up some more resources so we can replace more windows, more fire suppression systems and those types of things. If you take a look, Denise provided me the numbers with our funds fund 10 through 90. You'll see that we're 75% of the year through. The number in the left column is the
008percent that we've used in that fund to date. And on the other right hand column shows you where we're under the 75%. So we're we're doing well. You'll notice in transportation surprisingly we're 8% under where we our funds were. Our debt service is looking good. If you notice there is one that we're 24% over. That's our tort fund but that's expected. No other money will come out of that. We'll pay that again in July. So that's your liability insurance and those types of things. So that's at 99% but nothing else will come out of it. So when you get to the end of quarter four you'll be even. The only thing I'll add to our liability insurance is because we have had claims this year they've doubled. So we're going from our upper 50s to
009over 100,000 next year. And those are 20 cost. At cost. Those are claims due to workman's comp, injuries, things like that. So, we have focused on making sure that when people are lifting things, they've got their belts, that they're paying attention to the things that could cause, you know, people to trip, fall, and those types of things. Um and we'll monitor that as we go through next year. But overall, this kind of gives you a snapshot of where we are in all our funds and uh we will come back and and show you at the end of June where we ended up. This is Yeah. Is somebody No. Um Couple of questions. One, transportation. What's the rationale behind that cuz it's not gas? Uh well, we pay so much per mile and that's based on
010and and Denise, you can correct me, that's based on the cost of gas, it's based on uh the number of students. Am I correct? Yes. You would need to remember there were missing a month in or I'm sorry, a week in the month of March cuz it's spring break. Yeah. Okay. So, we might be a little bit under this month, but we more likely will make it up in April because of all the traveling for Sports and stuff. Got you. Yeah. Um that necessarily uh it won't impact D 2 as much as it would RB. Um but that that is what we attributed to this. We had that whole entire week off um uh from from school. Ideally, I would say on the on fund 40 with transportation, if we can get to 100%, that's
011a good year. Yeah. I'm I'm satisfied with that every time. Uh I think RB will probably bump over that cuz they've got all the athletics and all the sports. And again, the unpredictability >> teams that make it to regional sectionals and And the unpredictability of the cost of fuel now is is driving it. So, we I mentioned before, we did get our our lease taken care of and you know, the price has had gone up significantly, but I think having got it taken care of earlier saved us some money because if they're just going up now each month, the cost of these leases. So. Yeah, I think this report is very helpful. The only thing I would ask to add to it is at the bottom under fund 90 is to have a totality. So
012that we can see, you know, in total of these funds where we're at. >> Okay. Whether it's halfway through the year, three quarters, or 100%. >> Yep. We can certainly do that. All right. Any other questions? Okay. Thank you. Yep. That moves us on to 6.7.2, Assistant Superintendent of Curriculum Report. Good evening, everyone. A few updates for our academic pieces and we'll hear a little bit more later on during the curriculum committee report out. AIMSweb is the program we're onboarding for our secondary screener. So, you know, this is our first year we've gone with ixl. We've moved away from iReady. That's the universal screener that we do three times a year. We're moving away from Star Renaissance and onboarding AIMSweb Plus so we can do a secondary screener for students who would be at a
013tier two or tier three interventions. The year after this in the 2027-28 school year, the state has mandated that we have to use do universal mental health screeners as well. And AIMSweb has a AIMSweb Plus has a product that can that can achieve those goals for us. So, we're so we're pretty happy that those all align. Word of And so, we're going to have training for our staff on August 12th. That's a 3-hour virtual training. Word Origins is the second part of UFLI. So, UFLI is what's used for our phonics program grades K through two. We've seen some really, really great success with that. We're starting to see it also in moving into the grades three, four, and five with reading skills. But, we also know that there's some gaps with our students with phonetic
014awareness and morphology. So, they're going to onboard that as their tier one um uh phonics stand phonics program for grades three, four, and five next year. So, that's going to really envelope some nice things for our students, increase their reading abilities when they go into sixth grade to 12th grade. And that's an all-day training on August 11th. And with our standard-based report card, we've had uh two parent meetings so far on April 9th and April 14th. Really, really great discussions with our parents about the current report card that we have. They noticed a lot of things that we noticed as well that we know need to be fixed, but they also kind of indicated some other things like there's too many there's too many ways to see a grade, or there's too many keys on
015there, or there's not enough information, or the language is really teacher-y. So, we need to address all those things. So, we talked about a lot of those things. We have another meeting on April 30th and a final one on May 14th. But, uh we'll talk a little bit more about that uh later on, too, as well as what their thoughts are for moving from a quarter to a trimester. Dr. Any questions for Dr. All right. Thank you for your report. That moves us on to 673, RGS principal report. Good evening, everyone. Since our last meeting together, uh we had two concerts with our second grade and fourth grade all the same evening. So, it was exciting to see everybody together and see the differences and the changes that happen between those grade levels. Second grade
016um was celebrating March as a music in our school's upon thematic music. And our fourth graders, for those of you that have had children in fourth grade, uh brought out their recorders. Now, what I want you to appreciate about how we do music with recorders is it's not just hot cross buns, but there's some great background music with it, so it's very intentional. Um they did a great job. Um they always work really hard on the scripts and their presentation, and it was a wonderful, wonderful evening. So, kudos to them. They did also plug that tomorrow night is the RGS Zoo Fine out tonight. So everybody's invited to that. Our FPS group also had a competition last week Friday. They did really well. We're really excited for them. You'll see the list of students there
017who competed. Also kudos to Kelly Red, their sponsor. We did have two teams that placed as an update. We had a sixth place group and a first place group. So I'd like to bring them in and congratulate them next month. We also had our RV friends out again. This is Murphy brought out her honors chem kids and they brought STEAM to RGS doing a whole bunch of different experiments. Luckily no elephant toothpaste this year. It was intense. But they enjoyed their experience with the kids and learned a more about different types of sciences including physics or chemistry. And then we also had our Kids Heart Challenge celebration. I remember last board meeting I barely had a voice. So we had a couple of stand-ins take care of the obstacle course this year. Kids raised over
018$15,000. We celebrated with musical chairs. It was a great time. And then we had our rally for education. Just want to give a kudos to our PTO who put together a great celebration. I wasn't able to make it due to a death in the family. But it was a great time had by all. I appreciate all their support along with all of our families. All of them. Very lucky to work with them. And then our dates for upcoming events are on there as well. Thank you. Who's Who's wearing the costumes? So Mrs. Ward is in the shark costume. She is one of our front office assistants. She's amazing. She stepped in for me and Mrs. Johnson was not available. So in the minion costume is Mr. Rex. Really? He yucked it up and threw foam
019bananas at everybody as he competed and he lost. He makes that costume work so well. Yeah, it was great. Terrific. Any questions? All right, thank you for your report. That moves us on to 674 SGE report. Thank you. So, um kind of giving an update with um the high intensity summer school which will be held again at Spring Grove. Um it's going to be taking place from June 2nd and we had to move it because of snow day. Um so it'll be June 2nd through June 18th um from 9:00 a.m. to 12:00. Um this year between RGS and Spring Grove there were 75 students um that were uh invited to participate in uh summer school. Um last year that was 83 students. Um so it's gone down again and remember 3 years ago it was
020120-ish students. So, um less students being recommended for um the high intensity summer school which makes it a little more difficult because I've had the most teachers wanting to do summer school this year. So, um so I'm going to go through all the the numbers of who um will be officially uh attending. So, uh I have more staff than students. Um so I'll have to uh figure that out. Um and then just kind of some school celebrations, uh we have uh myself and the PTO we've been looking at um doing electronic sign out in front um of Spring Grove. We're the only one that has the little uh letters. You go up and put them in and um hope that it stay in place. Uh so, uh we have officially submitted the application to the
021Village of Spring Grove um for the sign. Um so I'll I'll be attending the May 4th meeting. Um they have questions about it. Um we partnered with Rainbow Signs um, of Spring Grove who um, worked with us amazingly um, for the price. Um, they're uh, been really great to work with, so um, we're hoping that uh, that everything goes the way it's supposed to, uh, we can do some type of install this summer um, so we can have it ready um, for the start of the school year. Um, again um, the PTO has helped um, to help pay for it and then long ways. I'm using some building funds that I would um, you know, kind of be frugal about as well, so that we could um, get this uh, sign to to become you
022know, a reality. That's great. Does Do you expect any pushback from the sign? Um, so I've met with the village ahead of time and kind of gave them an update on what you're looking at. Um, we are considered um, historical part of Spring Grove, which is why we could never do a electronic sign. Um, couple years ago um, I contacted them and they actually are kind of being a little more lenient on the ideas of electronic signs. They kind of want to make it a little uh, get more with the times, they said. Um, so there's some specific requirements we still have to to meet. Um, I had to do a variance because the sign is higher than what the normal requirements are, but it's shorter than the current sign there. Um, so it's like
0234 ft shorter than the current sign, so I made sure to write that in the you know, the description of that. >> It's better. Yeah, it is. It's better, yeah. So, they didn't seem to see any issues with it going forward, which is good because we had to put a deposit down on the sign, too, so but uh, Yeah. >> So, hopefully yeah, everything should work out. So, is that something now these days where you still have to have the wires hardwired into the office and you make the changes from there or is it like Bluetooth now? >> It's Bluetooth. Oh, it's got it. And we already have electric down there for the current sign, so that's that's easy, too. We already checked to make sure that we have enough power output we need. That's
024fantastic. Any questions? Thank you. On to 675 at MS Principal Report. Thank you. So, the Illinois Principals Association puts on a leadership breakfast every year and that took place on April 15th. Essentially, I asked the eighth grade team to give me two students that exhibit leadership. The two they nominated this year were Anna Lebec and Bronson Beschel. So, those two students got to go with their parents to the leadership breakfast at the Holiday Inn in Crystal Lake. Um there's a guest speaker. They get introduced to the It's a large crowd. Really large. And and then they get a book on leadership. Uh it's really nice breakfast. So, those two kids got to do that. Um also on April 9th, um which is is here at the end of the year information was sent out to
025parents uh regarding information for eighth graders and end of year dates. Dates are set for the rocket launch. Um a makeup date as well as is included there, the eighth grade dance. Uh and the eighth grade promotion ceremony. All the details on that have been sent to parents. It's also in the newsletter that I send out every Friday. So, hopefully, people are are aware of that. Um we have probably sent it out again individually on Skyward as well. Uh school celebrations, we had our spring dance on April 10th. It was a wild success. Um and honestly it was It was It was I enjoyed this dance and and we got out of there. Actually, someone called me the other day and said I heard there was a problem with the dance. I said, "No, there
026wasn't. Don't ruin it for me." And there wasn't a problem. They were wrong. So, uh it was great. The kids had a good time. Um spring sports began. We just got starting season 76 kids out for track Wow. this year. And on April 15th as well, the Fox Valley Honor Band Festival took place at NMS where this 125-member ensemble from the entire conference uh students are there from all the schools. They arrive at 1:00. They practice until 5:30 and then we'll have a concert that night at 7:00. So, it's a long day for a lot of people and everything went well. Perfect. Any questions? All right. Thank you. That moves us on to seven, any old business? I've got something I I want to note under old business. Okay. Um and maybe I should have
027brought it up during the transportation report, but just a couple of old things we talked about with uh transportation related to routes for next year. I know there's a lot of interest in in routes and what's going on there. And just kind of looking at the the calendar, here we're in April, May and June would be great um for a committee meeting to really review kind of resources and how routes are looking in topology for next year. Just cuz when you get into July, August, it's the final stretch and you know, you're you're putting kids on buses, finalizing things. I just the window's closing, so to speak. We could get together committee meeting, I think it'd be great. So, 157's been meeting cuz they're 157 runs the transportation um and we're going through some things
028now and uh two things we're going through right now is one, talking about routes and looking at how to to make those more efficient and cut times down. And then the other thing is we're working on on negotiating a new driver's agreement. And so, we're all And we're also in the process of trying to hire a new director. So, but I can get a like a joint committee together. Um Yeah, I'd love to hear updates, uh you know, on the like where where the progress is and and everything. I know we've talked about this throughout the year and just so I just Yeah, like I said, we're getting down to the Yeah, it's being taken care of. It's just through 157, but I would like D2 to come back in and be part of um
029the discussion. Yeah, so how much of the transportation cost does D2 pay for? Uh I'd have I'm not sure what it is. So, you are billed uh for the hours that people uh drivers drive and you are also billed per mile. Yeah. Okay. So, it's a kind of In essence, you contract out 157. Yeah. Yeah. It would be interesting to see, you know, the total cost of transportation what portion uh District 2 pays in. We do. Sorry. No, I I agree. Um I also think that since we are paying for it, we should probably have a D2 representative at those at those meetings. I second that. That would be great. Yeah. All right, I'll I'll definitely I'll bring it to 157. Maybe we should have a shared service. This may not be a bad idea.
030We haven't had one in a while. Have a shared service meeting together and then have on the agenda as as an agenda item between the shared service committee bringing transportation. Yeah. Because I think that would be better than unilaterally me telling 157, "Hey, we're going to do this." Okay. I think they'll be open I mean, completely open to it. Okay. So, I can uh set something up. I'll send some dates out um this week. Yeah. And That'd be great. Yeah. Yeah. And then uh then just the other note was uh some old business about the the bus lease. You know, that that's been approved uh through Midwest Transit for a 3-year lease on IC port buses. Just something I'd I'd like to look into if we're all in agreement is uh most other districts, neighboring
031districts that have that service, they have joint transportation. They list both district names on the sides of the buses. >> Mhm. And I just I just thought that that would be you know it'd be nice we could look into doing it with with our situation. I can certainly I don't see a problem with that. Yeah. Those are the only things I had. Okay. Points. I did see too Tom when I was registering my daughter for high school there was a button to click in if you want a transportation or not. So, that's why I think it was my assumption that something was already happening whether you were opting in or out of transportation or maybe that's always been there. >> And then they were out. Yeah, that's great doing that. >> Yeah, we There's a
032lot going on I think um the new contract agreement for drivers has taken a a lot of time. It's hard to get everybody for the contract negotiations on the same night at the same time. Uh and then again the my our priority right now is we have a new director because I think that's going to help us when we do meet. That director is going to be able to take care of things and I hope to have a new director at least named and not approved by next week. Yeah. Yeah, and I think that I'll I'll get I'll get all that out here this week to D2 as well. The information that you're talking about. Excellent. Thank you. Okay. That moves us on to eight new business, 8.1 resolution authorizing participation in the McHenry County
033Regional Safe School program. Yeah, this is an uh an annual resolution that we do so that we have an opportunity if we do have a student that has to be out placed for generally behavioral reasons, we have a place to send them that is within our budget and relatively close. So, we would just ask for approval for it again next year. Any questions on this? Okay, I need a motion to approve the resolution authorizing authorizing participation in the McHenry County Regional Safe School Program. I motion. Second. Johnson? Yes. Quinn? Yes. Casey? Yes. Schnelfelt? Yes. Schwartz? Yes. Schufeldt? >> Yes. Stansbury? Yes. Motion passes. Moves us on to 8.2, committee updates starting with curriculum committee. Uh updates are as follows. We have an update from the report card team. Um Dr. Henry already alluded to the
034fact that these parent focus groups have met. Um they took us through how they had the parents sit down and sort of look at how things are currently, asked for some feedback. Um and it was interesting hearing some of the feedback that was given on the report cards cuz I think it's everything that parents normally think about with the current state of the report cards. Uh K through 5 cuz sometimes they can be a little challenging to read. It's different per grade. Um numbers 1 through 4 sometimes are backwards, 4 through 1 later on the report card. Um and so it was it was great feedback and things that we'd already thought of as potential conflicts leading into them sort of showing them draft examples of what the new I Can uh statement standard based
035report carding uh report cards will look like and from what we gathered, um they were received very well. And so now they're going to continue to work on refining these report cards um and continuing to meet with the parent focus groups and and providing updates and for them and feedback from them. Uh we are moving to potentially moving to trimesters for K through 5. And so, people have been used to quarters. Uh the idea behind moving to trimesters is in in the way I sort of look at this, too. Uh everybody starts the year at a 1 and the end of the year at a 36, right? There's 36 weeks in the year. And if you're stopping every 9 weeks to try and provide updates, things can sometimes feel rushed. Feedbacks might sometimes be premature
036so early in the school year. So, provide more time to get to that 12, 24, and 36 so that things can really kind of sink in for the children. True progress can kind of be shown. Um and one of the questions that everybody will ask is is this in any way going to impact um spring break and Christmas break? Is it going to change compared to what the high school and the middle school does? And the answer to that is no. There will be no difference um when it comes to um breaks. And so, the idea is um we have a draft of what this looks like, potentially bringing this to the board in May for approval so that we can move to trimesters K through 5 next year. But, I'll pause to see if
037there's anything else that either of you would like to add to that. See none. Okay. I'm doing good. Um moving on. Uh we had some updates from the literacy team on AIMSweb Plus and Word Origins, which we've heard about. And then, soon uh as with the rest of the board, we're going to be going through and revising our uh 5-year plan, our board goals. Um it's been uh a couple of years. Uh a number of what we have on there from 2024, we have accomplished. Others, we made some some progress in. And so, over the next few months, we'll be going through and revising our board goals. And on that, I do have one question. Have we inquired with the IASB uh us having a board goals sort of workshop? We have, I don't know
038if they got back to us. The IASB She got a promotion, so Okay, we'll have to find the new person. Okay. If if we don't have So, the two things are So, the workshop training is great and we can certainly go through that. I think they do a good job. Um and that would We can go into closed session and do and have conversations about where we want to go. Um we'll get that on the books. We may want to in June, if we can't get her before then, have a a meeting that's open, but to start discussing that 5-year strategic plan that we we really need. Um cuz I think we've met a lot of our goals. Yeah. Others are kind of outdated, so either way, I think maybe June is a good time
039for us to meet on that. And then we can find out as soon as we can get someone to come in and do the training. Yeah, I think that's a good plan. And we talked about having somebody else facilitate the course that we had before. Um I think that's I think that's fine. You know, as much as we get out of organizing board goals, what I do like from those trainings is it also sort of helps educate the board in how to Yeah. work together, communicate together, and accomplish these things as a group. Yeah. Um so, I think we can certainly start on the board goals and then have that training after that. They do an excellent job. So, I'll I'll work on both of those and I'll add that in my Friday updates. We're
040working up with it. All right. Any questions for curriculum committee? I just had a quick question about uh the trimesters versus the quarters quarters that we're currently doing. Um did anybody in this focus group bring up having kids in the middle school or high school and saying it's going to be a little confusing, you know, having kids in one school that are on, you know, trimesters, others that are on quarters, you know, as far as grades and reports and all that. Like Was that brought up as a point of concern? I know the topic was brought up and the idea behind it is, you know, when you're in K through 5, the objective here is to get to a place where you're you're mastering the subject based on standards and get And and we feel
041that trimesters is the best way to do that. You're going to stick with quarters in the middle school because you're going to move to quarters when you're in high school. So, there could actually be kind of a progression there. You want to get the children through fifth grade understanding the subjects going in the middle school. So, you start trimesterly, you move to quarters in the middle school, and it's going to remain quarters in the high school is the thought process behind that, but happy to hear any other comments that might have been mentioned. Yeah, so the So, we're creating a we have a parent focus or frequently asked questions. So, that one's going to be on there for sure. But, the whole idea like Mr. White says uh foundational K through 5 students have their
042reading and arithmetic developed. That preparing them for middle school, middle school prepares them for high school, and beyond. So, we want them to look to that. Keep the quarterly grading period for the middle school instead of the annual thing. Other questions? Thank you. Should we go? The the pilot teams, the teams that will be piloting next year will be kindergarten and second grade, is that correct? For the unique standards-based >> Oh, for the standards-based report cards. That is correct. Yeah, so um as soon as we get these sort of finalized and we get all these standards-based report cards built, we will have kindergarten and second grade as the pilot groups. Then, if that all goes well, ideally that is 27-28 where we're going to go live K through 5 with the rest of standards-based report
043cards. Thank you for going through. Other questions? Um I had one. So we're talking about feedback from parents, right? What's the feedback from the teachers? Great question for them. Uh it's been positive. Um we surveyed the teachers in September asking them what their thoughts were on it. Um majority of the teachers felt as though it's time to move in this direction. Some have commented it's been 10 years we've been talking about it. So we're moving that direction. Um the open question that we asked them about what do you need and it all revolves around training and time to be able to better understand it. So we'll build that out. Um again, we have the 3-year plan to do it. So this is the year one to kind of get it set up. Next year is
044the pilot group where we can take a lot of feedback, give more time for folks to be able to start to wrap their brains around what moving away from the percentage grade that we're all used to moving into trend grading. So it's the last couple times a student does something, that's where they're really at on a standard versus a percent grade where I do lousy in the first couple weeks of school, that percent is with me when that quarter comes around or trimester or semester. So it's a little bit more equitable for the kids. Um for the most part that that the teachers were were in favor of it but they, you know, with anything a couple of folks are a little bit concerned about what's going to look like. Um they hear from other
045teachers who know other districts who do this kind of stuff too. Uh just want to watch out for all those things. So we have a full year to kind of make sure we're not missing anything. But I'm sure there's going to be stuff that we have to make up. Thank you. Other questions? Okay, that moves us on to buildings and grounds. Yes, so we really did what we did need this this month cuz we're kind of in a holding pattern. Um we probably should meet definitely for May just to kind of regroup where we're at, look at what our summer projects are going to be, review those, and and Mr. Lincoln can provide some updates with that. Um but right now we're just waiting, I think, to see where we go. Okay, sounds good. And
046uh this I think when we we uh reported last time, I don't know if Chris, did we have the life safety inspection at Nipper Sink Middle School? I know it was delayed. Uh they got moved to the 29th and 30th. Okay. And then so that hasn't occurred yet? Okay, so we'll we'll have updates on that uh next time. Okay, great. Thank you. That moves us on to uh ISBE life safety bond application updates. Yeah, so there's no update on the actual application. And I haven't received any and as well received anything. We are working through it. We did Pardon me. Pardon me, Becky. Uh we did receive some initial comments, so it has made it to the state. They've actually started looking at it, so we're working on just addressing those comments. Um it's a
047few things. I think we probably shared a little bit of this as the legislative change occurred, we kind of anticipated that this might lead to the state looking at things with a little bit of a uh more of a magnifying glass, looking through some more specific details that they haven't always looked at in the past, and we are finding that to be true. Um so one example is we've known that we always if we're submitting for roof work, we've always had to provide some type of roof diagram that shows the different areas and make sure there's a corresponding square footage that aligns with the list. Um we've done that. I had an approved one that it took place in 2025. I took the same format with what I submitted um for Nipper Sink, and we
048got a kickback that said, "Yeah, we need this to look a little bit different." So those are some updates I actually just finally got um was able to connect with uh Mr. Rungis down at the state uh earlier this week to confirm exactly what he is looking in for, so I can make sure we get done. Uh the two meet his expectations, so we're working through those updates. Um additionally, we're working with Mr. Link to um there was a few missing uh utility lines of just where they're coming in. Um so we're working with Julie locally to make sure we've got those all accurately located. So, um everything that's kind of a part of the process, working through those review comments, um and then we'll get everything Oops, reattached, resubmitted in the right format, and
049we'll continue on with that. It's It's a process. Yeah. You know, we certainly would like it to be really quick, but It's a process with the state. It's a process with the state, and it's a process with whatever state agent in the state has it. You know, it could be different. So, we're going to work through that. It'll, you know, and and we'll see where we end up with what they approve. I think we should be in pretty good shape for approvals. Um in the newsletter though, I did want to bring up I I If you get the newsletter, we did put information. That's the most we put out for the public, and I think that's important like starting to move forward. We start having those conversations, and then I'll continue to update uh superintendent
050letters, but this goes to even people without children. Um and then in there I mentioned that we would be doing three meetings in the fall. We could do more if the board would like, but at least one at each school, and we can do tours at that time. You know, we can take people on tours through the buildings and and those types of things. Although it's not a a referendum, I think it's definitely in the interest of everyone to just get as much feedback and and tell our story as to why we're doing it. So, I think we're definitely on the the right road. So. Since the newsletter has gone out, have you gotten any feedback on the >> say I thought I would get I thought I would get um a couple calls where
051people want to meet and talk about it, particularly from uh some individuals I thought maybe where I live in my neighborhood are retired, they're not going to children in the district and would like to get more information, but I haven't heard anything. So. Yeah. Any other time? No. I One last thing, I did talk to um District 157 and I asked them if if, you know, as we get to the fall if we couldn't maybe present I'll present to them what we're doing cuz I I said I think it's very important to have both districts on the same page for support and to kind of be able to tell that story too and they were they were very agreeable to that. So, that's something else we'll we'll be doing. Great. Anything else? Moves us on
052to 8.4 special education update. Yeah, so we are I think doing a really good job on this. I I've met with our directors, we've been meeting, going through it. They will be coming in June to present. Um I'm just updating kind of where we are in the process, so uh the second phase of it I'm working with the consultants right now to kind of narrow down some of the data they got to make sure that everything they have is accurate and that we get the results back that are are really telling us the true story of what our special ed program needs or where we're at with it. Um I told you one of the first things we needed to focus on was our leadership and how we break that down within the district. Uh
053so that each school feels that they're being taken care of and that there's a purpose as opposed to, you know, someone going school to school and and kind of putting out fires. So, we're doing that. We have the uh director, Dr. Jackie Miller. We have her duties assigned. Um the assistant director who was the LEA, uh one of the suggestions was to pull her out of the LA LEA position. The LEA is the person in an IEP who is designated by the district to make decisions Mhm. for services and those types of things. That she would be better used in her position of being in classrooms, working with programs, and oversight, and being in the schools. Um so, what we're looking to do, and this is something we'll be talking with the education association of
054the teachers about, is create um a special ed coordinator position at each school, like a stipend position, or part of the teaching duty. And so, you would have a teacher who's a coordinator Their job would really be managing the I the LEA position for the IEPs. And then, the assistant director would work with that individual oversight. And so, I think we're getting to a point where it'll be good for them to come in and present and and share, so you can meet them, and also they can answer questions that I'm not as familiar with about the little details of with this special ed. But, I think in the end what we're getting is a system that's going to be much more um parent-friendly, um more uh able to adjust. It may take We may need
055to have another additional special ed individual within the district to make sure that we're managing that, we're covering all the needs. All that might come out of this, but I In the end, it's going to be better for our students, the district, and and and parents. And so, like I said, in June, they'll be here to do the full presentation. Okay. Any other questions? Thank you. That moves us on to nine, closed session. Do we have anything for closed session? >> One small thing. Okay. Yeah. All right. Then, uh we need a motion to enter closed session to consider information pertaining to the appointment, employment, dismissal, performance, discipline, and compensation of the employees of the district. Motion. >> Motion. Second. Melford? Yes. Schwartz? Yes. Schufelt? Yes. Stansbury? Yes. Casey? Yes. Johnson? Yes. Quinn's? Yes. All
056right. So, we'll meet in the former Thank you. I just have two quick things. I just want to know how I can get them quickly. Thank you for bringing them in. I updated it. Okay.