001says it is, but I'm not. Okay, I'll wait for you. You ready? Sure. All right. I call to order the Nipper City School District 2 board meeting uh June 25th, 2025 at 7:00. Let's stand for the pledge of allegiance. I pledge algiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for it stands. One nation under God, indivisible with liberty and justice for all. All right, roll call. Katie Casey. Joel Johnson here. Natalie Mailfell here. Joseph Quinn here. Tom Schwarz here. Mary Shufeld here. Ali Stanberry here. All right, terrific. That moves us on to item three, consent agenda. Need a recommendation to approve the consent agenda as submitted. Does we have any questions? Motion. Second. Johnson, yes. Belf, yes. Schwarz, yes. Shoefeld, yes. Stansbury, yes. Quinn, yes. All right, that leads
002us into item four, public input, for which I believe we have three individuals addressing the board today. Uh we ask that you try to keep your uh address to the board to 3 minutes or less. And uh the first person that we will call up is Paul Augustine. Uh thank you. First of all, good evening. I'd like to start by apologizing to you, Mr. Quinn, for uh ambushing you from behind at the promotion ceremony. So Oh, no. It's okay. I apologize, but I appreciate you taking that stride and handling that like a pro. Um, I'd also like to take a moment and thank the board and administration for the opportunity to uh present my daughter's diploma to her, although uh she was thoroughly embarrassed. Uh, it is sort of a memory that I will uh
003cherish for a while. I may have pictures of that, too. Come and see me afterwards. Excellent. Thank you. Uh, I'm here tonight both as a neverinc middle school teacher, but also as a neverinc um parent. All right. Uh during the last board meeting, there was discussion as to whether or not uh there should be adjustment to the middle school's uh grading percentages. Uh as a history teacher, I would like to provide a little uh historical context. I know, shocking, right? Um I was here a little bit over 15 years ago when the change was first brought to our staff and school. The district had paid for multiple staff members to go out and receive training on updated assessment and uh grading practices. Those staff members came back and and talked to the rest of the
004staff and after those discussions took place uh with the support of the administration at the time uh there was enthusiastic changes made to both uh the assessment uh components and then the grading structure and it was adjusted to where we are currently. Um I feel that uh well first now as time has passed probably more uh importantly administrators have changed. We have not done a great job of educating new teachers or leaders as to why those original changes were made. But I believe the current percentages continue to be the best way to serve the overall interest of educating our students. Obviously, I have a child myself go through the middle school with these percentages, but maybe even more importantly, she also has severe assessment anxiety. So much so that she has needed to seek the
005assistance of her teachers, other staff, and administration to help her with these concerns. Her test anxiety has led her to be less than successful on several assessments. But through utilizing the retake process and putting in place some additional support such as taking the assessment in a different environment where she could read it out loud to herself, she has managed to be uh continue to achieve success. I have no doubt that changing the grading percentages would make it easier for her to be successful in terms of school grades, but I don't believe that would be in her best interest in both academic achievements nor her o overall educational grit of overcoming challenges. There is more specific information I and others would love to share at some point. So all I request is before you make any
006changes that you have staff members such as Brad Ziggler, Chris Wagner, and Erica Sarna, and myself potentially speak with either the curriculum committee or the board as a whole to further explain why we think the current structure is the best structure. Thank you for your time. Thank you. Uh next up is Amanda Kasich. Okay. Um, I don't really have a nice presentation for anybody. Um, kind of feel like I got thrown under the bus with this one. Um, I'm just kind of here um in question about the eighth grade graduation ceremony and kind of rumor that it's going away and we will no longer have that. Um, so that was really more of what I wanted to put to the board as a question as to if that's going away and um to get more
007information as to why all I really got. Thank you. I appreciate that. Uh, next up, Molly Short. Hi there. Um, good evening. My name is Molly Short and I'm a parent of two children at Springrove Elementary. I'm a reading interventionist who has served K8 students. I'm a community business owner. I'm a proud alum of Richmond Grey School and Nippers Middle School. You were there when I was there. Um Chris Wagner was my soccer coach. Um so you mentioned those names. Um I chose to return to this district to raise my children because of the incredibly positive impact it has had on me and I want my own children to same have that same experience and that same foundation. I'm here tonight because I learned through social media and then watching the board meeting um that
008thank you for sending that um I learned um that the district has decided to eliminate the Spanish programming at the K5 level. The letter that was emailed from the administration and the board explained that this change was intended to increase instructional time for students below grade level, enhance support for students with IEPs and 504s, to maintain accelerated opportunities, and to expand library access. That was from the letter. Okay. As a taxpayer, as a parent, as an educator, and even more specifically as an interventionist who lives in that world, um, who frequently works on building level scheduling at in multiple buildings in my district, I have serious questions. I reached out to Dr. Lynn and requested a meeting to better understand the reasoning behind the decision. I appreciate um the time that Dr. Lynn, Mr. Pitman,
009Mrs. Tored, and Mrs. Johnson took to meet with me on Wednesday, June 18th. We had a very productive and honest conversation that lasted well over an hour. First, I was genuinely very encouraged to learn about next year's implementation of a consistent building schedule that includes a 25minute daily intervention block, wind time, also known as what I need time. This is a step forward. It is a model that allows for both intervention and acceleration without pulling students from their specials. In fact, I'd love to see one time out two blocks, but we'll start. Oh, you have two now. Great. Okay. We had that great conversation um to see for those students who need support in both math and like I'm going to skip that experiment. Great. Thank you. You're welcome. Um I was encouraged in the
010meeting also um that the elementary MTSS framework is going to be revisited um especially because some of the resources listed on the district website are outdated and no longer aligned with current evidence-based best practices. That said, I still left the meeting feeling frustrated, and I think they know that. Um, primarily due to how this change was communicated. The message that cutting Spanish would result in more time for student support was, in my view, a bit misleading. As an interventionist, I know that removing one program doesn't create necessarily more time for others. Unless more interventionists or service providers are hired, which I was confirmed that has not happened. We didn't hire any more interventionists. um those those available instructional minutes within intervention teams schedules still remain the same no matter how work how you organize the
011day. To be clear, cutting Spanish may offer more flexibility. I acknowledge that. And creating a building schedule, it does not result in more time. Sorry, I'm trying to keep it three minutes. By the end of our meeting, the district leadership acknowledged that nuance and it became obvious that while the scheduling change may make it easier for scheduling services, it does not mean students will receive more services. From what I understand, the decision largely stemmed from scheduling challenges um possibly at RGS, but maybe elsewhere too. Um where the Spanish teacher was splitting time between buildings, making it difficult to imple implement that consistent wood block. While I recognize how complicated building schedules can be, I respectfully disagree that this was the only path forward. With thoughtful planning and collaboration, other solutions could have been explored. What
012was also concerning to me was the timing. Making this decision in May, just weeks be before the end of the school year, meant our teachers had no opportunity to plan or prepare for the shift during the school year. Changes such as this are typically known by at least January or February prior to the upcoming year. Because of this, the affected educators are spending their time in the summer adjusting curriculum to account for the removal of the course special, an avoidable burden that could have been mitigated with earlier, more inclusive planning. Additionally, there had been had there been a more strategic and inclusive planning process in place, perhaps other options could have been considered like finally moving toward compliance with the state required 3 days a week of PE. That conversation hasn't happened, but it could
013have if the decision had been made with foresight, transparency, and stakeholder input. In most districts, major programming changes involve a committee of key stakeholders, teachers, administrators, schoolboard members, and parents who come together to weigh all the options well in advance. That didn't happen here. Instead, we're seeing a reactive decision that creates an inequity, uncertainty, and a loss of opportunity for students and staff alike. I also want to speak to the idea that the Spanish program wasn't effective. Um, as an educator, I feel strongly that we must remember how new language acquisition works. Listening and reading comprehension in in a new language always develop a four language output such as speaking or writing. Always. Um, this is a natural and research supported progression. In early grades, the goal of foreign language is not fluency. It's not
014conversational. It's exposure, cultural awareness, and sparking curiosity. We should not be evaluating K5 language instruction using the same metrics we apply to middle or high school foreign language classes. I was asked in the meeting why I was upset that Spanish was cut and has been on the table for the past three years, which had passed. And I know that I was sat I've sat in the board meetings where it's been talked about, but my response was still simple. In the past, there was talk of potentially cutting K5 Spanish to bolster the middle school Spanish curricul. But with this cut, that hasn't happened. Lastly, I'm deeply troubled by the inequity this change has created between our schools. Prior to my meeting with administration, I was unaware that students at Richmond School only had 25 minute specials
015where students at Spring Grove had hit 30. I know five minutes doesn't seem like a lot, but it does as it builds. Okay. Um, this disparity became even more apparent when I learned that as a result of cutting Spanish, RGS students will now receive nearly an hour of library time a week where spring grow students will just lose the 30 minutes of Spanish and be back in their classrooms. Um, I'm not sure how parents at either school will feel about that shift. I could see it a toss up either way. Um, whether a hour of library time is preferred or losing 30 minutes of specials is acceptable, but neither option feels ideal. Our buildings may be different, but our students deserve equitable educational experiences. I understand that the decision has been made back, but I
016urge this board to reflect on how it was made and how future decisions should be made through a strategic plan developed with time, transparency, and collaboration. When we leave out the voices of our teachers, our administrators, our schoolboard members, and our parents, we miss opportunities to not only make better, smarter, and more equitable choices for our students, but also to build stronger, more sustainable programming that truly meets the needs of our community. Thank you for your time and your continued service to our schools and community. Thank you. I don't think there's anybody else on here. Uh, thank you all for standing up and giving your presentations. This moves on moves us on to item number five which is reports and I'll read through these reports. Stop me if you have any questions. First 5.1 revenue
017and expenditure report. 5.2 fund balance comparison report. 5.3 special education revenue expenditure report. 5.4 impressed reporting. 5.5 administrative reports. Uh that leads us on to 5.51 superintendent report. Yeah. Good evening everybody. Um to our last meeting of the 2425 school year. uh a lot of really positive things going on in our district this year and I want to highlight some of the things that really have happened in our classroom that our teachers have accomplished and our students. Um so I I usually do an end of the year report and that's what I'll do. A lot of the data I get to make sure it it matches is I use the Illinois school report card understand the Illinois school report card is behind where we are now. For instance, the results the of of what our
018kids did right this spring will come out here in October. But the the demographics and the information I give you uh it it'll stay pretty much the same. And this way if people in the public see it, want to know where those numbers came from, it's easy for them to go back. We were playing around. We're doing a lot of stuff with AI as everybody is now. And we said, uh, create a district logo for New Sync School District 2. And this is what it came out as. We're just playing around with it, so I thought I'd show you what AI can do. Other than asking to create it, did you give it any other input, Kim? Did you tell our AI artist? Oh, is that right? I I just I had the the you
019know, I just said uh navy and yellow. And Dr. Lynn was looking for a creek. I said, "Let's have a creek in our the district color." Next thing you know, this is what popped up. So, we thought we'd leave it in there for tonight. There goes your jack. Yeah, I can be replaced. I was just going to replace everybody. Yeah. No, it's it's uh quite interesting uh how much is is changing with with artificial intelligence and and how quick it's happening and I think we'll see that in the classroom in the coming year, two, three, forever maybe. Uh it's going to change how we do things. Um so what I'd like to start off with, I always try to show up the the latest enrollments and demographics that we have. Um in orange is Richmond
020Burton. I apologize in blue I don't have the total enrollment on this slide but I will get to it. It's around 1160 students for district two. What's interesting is you see uh the high school district has the advantage of seeing what's coming, right? So they can really plan. We in district 2 don't have that advantage. We don't know necessarily what is kindergarten going to bring. Is it going to bring 100 students or 140 students? But we have over the last 10 years uh that we've been keeping this kind of uh chart seen some trends and what we see is a a year or two that bumps up and then we see a decrease and then a little bit of a bump up and a decrease. So you could see there uh eighth grade this year
021we exited 134 students uh we have 137 but then you seventh grade but you see sixth grade and fifth grade dropped quite a bit and then you see that uh bump up in fourth grade and then it starts to decline we have 98 kindergarteners but I do want to state that kindergarten often has late registrations um it's first time many parents have had a student and um they don't always know that it's an early registration. So, we'll have people trickling in. I would expect that if you're looking at these numbers, uh, district 2 is going to settle in eventually between 100 and 115 students per class. Um, we're getting more consistent with that unless something changes again and and it could something in the economy or housing. So, let's talk about the academics real quick.
022So, on 2024, our AR math results and I'm going to have uh Dr. Dr. Enright addressed a little bit about our local assessments which is I think I I prefer those because it's not just one shot in time. So the IR is hey today you're doing math you know or or reading and you get a result. The nice thing about an I ready or other types of test is it's over time and we look at growth and we just don't have a one time what's your grade. Um you'll see district 2 was uh proficient at 57% uh in math and the state was 31% proficient. Uh we're 26 points over the state average. The other thing I always caution is when you look at proficient sometimes you'll see gosh that's really low. You know say
023someone's in the 30s and that's not bad. The state of Illinois they set the bar where they want to set proficient. So if they set the bar um and it it goes up and down um they could set the bar higher this coming year meaning that um proficient would be harder to get to and so you have less it it's a fluctuating number. So it's important that you see that as well. So in uh 2024 the A and LEA uh proficient was 37% again 9% over the state average. um when we look at our science assessment uh 65% which is uh 12 over the state average. Um I want to talk about the subgroups a little bit because this has become a bigger part of what we do. So we are doing above what the
024state does but the state also takes into account um when they're they're giving you a score what are certain subgroups doing within your school. And um not every school, but in the three schools, these are the four subgroups we have. Every school does have an IEP and 504 subgroup. They do consider 504s with students uh with disabilities. Um a Hispanic subgroup, and we know that we have a subgroup of ident students that identify as two or more races, and we have um an EL subgroup. So, what does that mean? That means that each one of those groups is going to be pulled out and their test scores are going to be measured in a in a bar for proficiency. And if you don't meet for one subgroup proficient, your whole school then is taken down
025from uh Pat help me with the terminology. Comm commendable. Commendable. So from commendable down to like early warning or or below. Um last year as you know in uh RGS we had a subgroup of students with disabilities the way they drew the proficiency we were 0.5% or I'm I'm sorry a half of 1% okay below where the bar was which forces the school into a four-year cycle um of school improvement. So, it's important to know that that although we're we're doing well, we also have to keep our eye on all students. And I don't look at that as as having subgroups that could impact your score is bad. I think that's a positive thing because it lets us know, do we have a subgroup that might be struggling and what can we do to help
026them? What do we need to do for our teachers so that they can better help those students? And like I said, I will have Pat do the local assessments. He'll talk a little bit about that. If you take a look at our demographics, um they've stayed fairly consistent, uh except for one or two areas, but again, about uh 1,114 students is what we had when they did the official count. You're looking at about 85% white students, 10 or 11% Hispanic, 3.5 identified as more than one race. The number that has grown and we have seen grow is low income. I was just going to ask. Yeah. So 25% it's it's it's growing upward. What that means for us as as a district is that uh we we may have some challenges that we have to
027meet, but it also means that we may get extra funding eventually. How much? We don't know. But uh if we can get $50,000 of extra funding or more for free breakfast or things like that, those things matter to to students, particularly our students in this subgroup. Um, so we'll keep an eye on that as that goes and as it increases, we'll meet the needs of those students and whatever their social or academic needs are, we'll work on that. Um, students with IEP, it's also high. We're at 18.5%. Um, our EL students have stayed fairly low, uh, 2.1%. Um, the number of truents we have is 5.7%. Again, what's a truent? The state has a definition that you and I might say isn't a true one. Um it's a it's a certain number of absences absences
028in a year or more you're considered tru whether whether it's excused or not. Yeah. So you can find uh students labeled as truent who are actually very good students. Uh there could be several reasons they missed that many days but the state takes that in and counts that. Um, another thing that we see, it's it's interesting because at at 157 we see the state mobility rate, I believe it's higher than the state average. Um, here we're at 3.3%. This the student mobility rate is important at at a lower number. That means that our our families, our students have more consistency. They're not moving from school to school as much. Um, and it really has an impact on the success of that student. The interesting thing about the low income is when they go to high
029school that number drops to about 12%. So what we find is that uh when you qualify for certain benefits you automatically get registered as school or identified in the computer as u low income but there's also a self-reporting mechanism and what we find is that when people exit the elementary school and go into the high school they're not as likely to fill out the forms again and that's something that we've worked on. Um number of teachers, we're at 92 teachers, 51% with a mast's. We have zero provisional teachers, although I think that's going to change as shortages come up. We're struggling to find even uh ELA teachers for the middle school right now. And that's not just nippers, that's just teaching throughout the state. Um when we get into special ed, it becomes harder. When
030it gets into, you know, a Spanish or it gets into another niche like art, music, uh those teachers are very difficult to find. Um but, uh at at this time, we don't have any provisional teachers. Our student teacher ratio is 15 to1. We have excellent retention of our our staff at 91%. Um the state records teacher attendance uh and teachers at at district 2 64.2 had 10 or less absences. That's means you have a lot that had more than 10 absences. In fact, it tipped over the state average. A couple things to remember there though. In a year, you could have several maternity leaves. You could have long-term medical issues. And you can have things like that that will hit your staff one year or two years that will make it look like, hey, we
031have a lot of teachers missing a lot of days, but it's not necessarily teachers missing a lot of days. They're legitimate absences. So, that's one thing I wanted to clarify with that. We haven't seen anything that would indicate anything other than these are legitimate absences due to medical or maternity uh leaves. teacher evaluation of 100% or at least proficient or excellent. Um, going to the student teacher ratio of 15 to1, it's pretty good number, right? When I think about the state average and some other schools that I've researched recently, seems it's pretty below I think even the the district or the um the local. Yeah, our class sizes are staying um I I think competitive to other districts or smaller. You do have classes though that you know you can have a class of 12.
032Yeah. And then across the hall, class of 26. It depends on on on the the sectioning and things like that. But you're right. I I think our our staff ratio to students is is where we need to be at this time. Um I'd like to flip a little bit now to our financials and give you a little bit of history of where we've been. Uh since 2010, you're going to see our levy history. Uh, and you're going to see it always stands out when I do this. From 2012, 13 up through 19, you can see there were several flat levies and then abatements. Um, those aren't bad things necessarily. Uh, but what you see is that from 2012 up to 2019, your levy that you got really didn't move a whole lot. So as salaries
033are going up, benefits are going up, the cost of a child is going up, all those things are going up, you're eating into any surplus that you have. Um, so we have been very uh good about looking at that, discussing it as a board before looking at the new money on the levy. Um, but that's something to keep in mind as we go forward and I'll come back to that in a little bit. If you take a look at our tax rates over the last uh actually this is not a seven-year trend, it's longer than that. Um uh I'll have to change that, but you'll see that there's a trend that is going down in both districts. So as you look at the EAV in our community or our district, prices are going up values.
034If you have a house in our district, it's going up. Um and so as that goes up, the tax rate gets pushed down. where your taxes go up is on your assessments and and the district doesn't have any control on your assessment. So, if the assessor says your house is now worth $20,000 more, true, your tax rates lower, but they're going to tax that addition of $20,000 on the lower tax rate. And that's where when you talk about new money for the levy, that's what we're kind of talking about. Um, I know just on a personal thing, we put in a patio and I think the assessment came out and, you know, you can kind of argue with them a little bit. I feel it was a little high, but that's okay. But that's everybody,
035right? So, when they assess your property, um, I always tell everybody, please, if you if you have a challenge, please make it, but we as a school district really don't have any control over what the assessor is going to say about your property. Uh what I want to talk a little bit about next is some of the projects we've been doing because I do talk to a lot of people in the community in my neighborhood different areas and they say hey we see that you know they talk about needing money for capital improvements in the buildings. What about the money you have? So what I've got up there is a list of say over the last seven year the biggest projects we've done um to make improvements to our school and it's been about $2.2
0362 million. We've actually spent more money than that on what I call the smaller projects because we're doing a lot of smaller projects, but our money that we have in reserve is directly going to fixing our buildings. Um, every year we're fixing taking sections of roof. Uh, you know, we're we're doing all kinds of different infrastructure, whether it's windows or doors or HVAC improvements. A lot of things that you don't necessarily see, but I think it's important. So in this list you do see what we have our larger projects also what did the grants fund for that project and then on the side you'll see the smaller projects or um things from recent annual maintenance and that's another thing when we get into annual maintenance we'll talk more about when you start talking about an
037old building uh particularly in Nipper but all three of our buildings are old and have maintenance that has come new um the boilers alone loan on nippers can be in the thousands of dollars just for maintenance. That wouldn't even include when something breaks on it and you have to have an emergency call and those types of things. So, one of the things we'll work on is getting an updated list of what are we spending in basic maintenance to maintain these older boilers, the pipes, and things like that. It'll be something that we'll need in the future. But it it's it does take a lot of resources to keep the old buildings, you know, heated, cooled, and not from leaking. The next thing I put in here, and I'll leave this, I'm going to make this
038public so people can have it. I'm not going to go through all this, but it's there for you to look at. I've worked with Mr. Link. So, these are our um life safety items from our life safety study. Um, you'll see it says the priority code. We're working on A's now. Sometimes we get some B's in there. These are things that are either completed or will be completed by the end of summer. And as you go through, uh, you'll get to the point on the next one where you'll start to see we have estimated cost of what it was going to be. Uh, we will eventually go through this and then put down after we complete it what the actual cost was. But you can see again, talk about these little things. When we do
039these life studies or life safety studies, it's fire uh fire exit signs. Um a smoke detector, $1,500. Uh a poll station for a fire system might be $2 or $3,000. It all adds up, but we have to have it. So again, when when people ask about what we're doing in our buildings to make them new, up todate, uh I'm going to, like I said, put this out for the public to see. I think it's a good reference for everybody to go back to. It goes through all three schools. Um, and again, we have until, I believe, the end of next summer to complete all the priority A's and then will also be 3 to 5 years on the priority B's. These dovetail into the uh long-term facility plan, which we're working on. Um, but the
040long-term facility plan will take a bigger picture of, okay, this is happening, but what are we going to do with the actual structures? How are we going to get those some of the big items up to date? You know, um some of the larger sections of roof, the piping, the some of the HVAC we haven't um dealt with yet. So, again, that's for your reference. Uh I always give at the end of this uh a couple recommendations or or what we're doing well and we're going to continue to do well. Again our our focus is on math and reading and those are the two areas that uh we try to uh spend our time and focus on. Reading is something that is done in all classrooms. So as a history teacher I worked on reading
041with my students through um various things that are aligned to the standards. Um so again assess all students needs in math and reading. We do that adjust interventions and accelerated programming as needed. We want to continue to expand algebra 1 into eighth grade to the point where algebra 1 is your go-to for an eighth grade math class. That's kind of the standard, but you can't just flip the switch. It's going to take several years more for us to build that capacity um to get the majority of our students there. Our MTSS framework, we want to strengthen supports, improve data uh that we have to identify our students academic and behavioral needs. They're doing a good job of that. We're going to continue to improve on it. Um, we're going to empower our PLC's, our teachers
042with their assessments to develop common assessments across grades, subject matters in school. So, the idea is for a unit one test and I uh reading for fifth grade or fourth grade reading across both schools, um although you teach with your own teaching style, you may have your your smaller assessments, your informal, but the main assessment, the formal assessment should be the same and it should be aligned to standards. And then after we take it, we get the results from that and then we go back to our PLC and we talk about, hey, how did our kids do? What did you do well? Your kids seem to do really well. What are you doing that maybe I could learn from? And uh that's what Pat's been working on for two years. Our teachers have been working
043really hard on that. Um and they'll continue to do that. Uh and then again, I always academically just stay focused uh on what we do on the student to prioritize their needs both academically, socially, and emotionally. I think the principles can tell you and the teachers can tell you that as time goes, we continue to have a lot of social and emotional needs within our students. And so, we have to make sure that we're meeting those. Finally, the last thing, I know it's been kind of a long one, but I I wanted to go through this. Uh, you know, our next five years, we're going to be looking at capital improvements and facilities. Um, our life safety system or our items, uh, we're going to continue to work on it. As I said, our A's
044will be done within a year. Our B's will be done in 3 to 5 years. Uh Mr. Link has given us a budget where we're chipping away at it a little bit every year. So instead of having to come up with 300 $400,000 to replace all the windows, maybe we do 5060,000 a year and we do X number of classrooms. Um that's easier to budget and it it still allows for those things that come up. Uh develop our maintain our our 10-year maintenance plan. Uh our long-term facility plan. I've discussed I think finalizing that in early fall. Uh I've talked to Allison from Walt. She'll be coming back and working with the building and grounds team uh starting this summer and so that we can kind of get a final plan to come forward, have
045the board approved, show the public, and then take our next steps from there. And then again, prepare financial plan to address our aging infrastructure. Uh we'll discuss more about um levy, new monies, any possible grants, and then the possibility of having to bond in order to meet the needs of those buildings. So, there's a lot to go through, but I like to once a year kind of update everybody where we're at. Also, put something a document together that we can put out for the public to see. So, thank you. Yeah. Any questions? I appreciate you putting this together. Thank you. That moves us on to 5.52 assistant superintendent of curriculum report and Dr. Henry Dr. You have to keep this short. Okay. Just like me. So um you'll see in a few updates accelerated placement
046letters for students will go out in uh a couple days the end of June. Uh we do have a couple updates to the accelerated handbook and the early entrance kindergarten first and full language or full grade acceleration and that reflects the shift from going from I ready to just uh the change out of uh assessments and uh the other part is we had our auction today and unfortunately um we had no items for bid on for that to be put out. So those items will be discarded and uh free up a lot of space for us um in the buildings. Is it common to have them all sold? No. Um, and I think the best seller we ever had was 157 when we were selling um KitchenAid mixers a few years ago. Oh gosh, I'd
047buy one. We We sell things. Oh yeah. Yeah. Let me know. That was our best one ever. Thank you for your report. Any questions for Dr. Thank you. That moves us on to 553 NMS principles report and principal CE. Good evening. Uh so since uh the conclusion of the school year, we had a lot going on at the middle school. Uh there's now some people who are working on the building going in and out. Um the major projects, the back of the building, the roof has been uh torn off. The back roof is being replaced. It's not even done and it already looks better. Uh so that's that's an improvement right there. Uh, I can't wait to see what it's like when it is done, especially when that's where the public drops kids off. You
048know, we're looking forward to that being updated. Uh, the gym floor was sanded. Uh, new design on the floor. Uh, looks really good. I did include a picture of that. Um, what it looks like and then we have a new very large logo going in at the end of the month that, uh, we're very excited about. Um, that will be put up, I believe, on the 30th. Uh, school celebrations. Um, we had, uh, three NMS students at the end of May. uh placed at the state track meet uh in Peoria. Sophie Nelson took third in the long jump. Sam Renorf took 10th in the 100 meter, 20th in the shot, second in the long jump, and 11th in the 200 meter dash. Sam had a quite a weekend, and Kayla Shay placed fourth in the
049discus throw. Additionally, uh, and this happened after my report was submitted, but in Special Olympics, we had a student Savannah Link earned a gold medal in the, uh, 100 meter dash. That's fantastic. Uh, which took place over June 20th, 21st, 22nd. So, I didn't want to say that, although it's not in my report because I win. So, that's fantastic. I did not forget. Um, and then at beginning of June, we sent 13 students to that BS international conference at Indiana University. Um, we had a team place 14th out of 72 teams and met students from other countries, other states and from all accounts had a great experience. Thank you. Is the international conference ever international? I think it's been in Indiana as far as I know. Oh, okay. Massachusetts a couple of times. Oh, Massachusetts.
050Okay. All right. Just wondering. Thank you for your report. Appreciate that. That moves us on to Are there any questions for Principal Cre? moves us on to 554 RGS principles report. Principal Tallbury. Hello everyone. Um since our last meeting I wanted to share with you that we had we celebrated our fifth graders that are moving on to NMS. They did a really cool uh piece where they had their walk of stars. Basically like the Hollywood walk of stars. Spain uh did a great video of the kids that were able to be videoed and shared that with our community with a very positive response to honor them as they make their way to NMS. Uh we also had our field day. Kudos to Rachel Johnson Schmidt, our uh PE instructor who coordinated 100 volunteers uh to
051come out and pull off an amazing day. It was very warm. Doug Tank was a hit. Seems to be a big thing in the district tank. Uh so greatly appreciated for all for her work on that. We just did our kind kickoff right after school led out. Uh slightly different format but very wellreceived by families and we're looking forward to having our uh kindergarters in in August on August 14th for the orientation. We as well have been going through some major updates. What you're seeing there is a very bare gym floor uh completely stripped down. It has now been painted and sealed. I would be able to give you an updated photo which I can share with you or otherwise swing by and see it if you can get in through our front doors. Um
052and then you can see our office has been torn up that is getting renovated as well. Um it's very sticky. Don't walk through that space because we don't have traffic. And then finally uh we also have uh the library space that's being renovated as well. We have our little homage to SGE with every yellow and green uh squares, but we also have a lot of other natural colors coming in there uh as well. been rearranged and it is a beautiful space now for everybody to utilize which we're excited for. And then just some upcoming things for you. Terrific. Thank you. Any questions? Uh just uh just comments. Uh I had the opportunity to tour the schools over the last few weeks and uh the projects that are coming along are looking great. Uh especially notably
053the gym floor. Um, beautiful job at NMS and uh, RGS. Who did the work, Chris? I brought in stalker. Okay. Yeah, he's good. Looks nice. But anyways, just thank you for your report. Uh, but beautiful work. Thank you. Um, quick question. Uh, I see at the bottom your uh, first day of school is listed as the 20th. Uh, oh, and just want to make sure it's the 19th. Okay. Thank you. It is not. I apologize. The kids will be so disappointed. I know they're gonna all miss the first day, but that's a count against the truenc. All right. Thank you. Uh that moves us on to 555 SGE principles report. Principal Pitman. So like the other two schools, we had a very busy uh month of May. Um we um first of all started um
054in June 3rd. We had our kindergarten screening um as well. We had 28 students attend that event. So that was really nice to to see that many um and Roxan, my admin assistant, she was she saw a student um who registered for that and did not register for kindergarten for next year. She called them and reminded them, hey, can you make sure you register because we want to get those numbers as accurate as possible. Um but we had a really good good turnout. PTO was there as well. gave a little um some prizes to them and a bag of goodies. So, thank you to them. Um and our next um event will be our kindergarten orientation which is August 12th um which is always a fun time um to see the new students and their
055parents coming in um you know officially for the first time. Uh one of the school celebrations I want to highlight is our field day. um you know it was uh Mary she's been our coordinator for that along with Mr. NY or uh PE teacher. So um it was her last year to to organize this. Don't cry Mary. Um but uh again we had over 100 volunteers. Um it's always a great day. U we had perfect weather. Not too hot, not too cold, not too sunny. It was perfect. Um I still burnt my head though. Um but uh we had a really great time. um no that day and uh the kids really enjoyed it. Um summer school does end tomorrow. Um we've had it's been very well um has been smooth. Um it's probably one
056of the smoother uh summer schools we've had in a long time. Um teachers have been great. Um and uh attendance has been very good as well for summer school. So I was very happy with that. Any questions? I mean you could still Mr. N does tell me all the time that I'm always welcome to come back. Thank you for your report. That moves us on to 5.6, transportation report. Do we have any questions on the transportation report? Okay. 57, the technology report. Any questions on that one? 58. Any foyer requests? No. Great. Any old business? Okay. Then it moves us to item seven, new business with 71, approve hiring of additional RGS kindergarten teacher for the 2526 school year. Yeah, we can pull this. And the reason being is after talking further, this isn't an
057additional position. It was already a position. So, we had four kindergarten teach. We're not adding a fifth. We're just putting the fourth one back into kindergarten. So, we're not seeking approval to add another full-time employee. It's just we will be filling the position. Gotcha. Yeah. Okay. So, there's no approval of hiring that's needed for this right now. Okay. 72 pre-approval of payment on July bills. Yeah. Okay. So, there is no July meeting that's scheduled. Correct. So, this is when we go ahead and um we vote on this. We need a motion to approve the prepaid. Yeah. So, uh, we need a motion to have a pre-approval of payments on July's bills. Second, sorry, hold on. Mail. Oh, sorry. Johnson. Yes. Then it was me. Yes. Meld Stanbury. Yes. Tupelo, yes. Schwarz, yes. Quinn, yes. Motion
058passes. Moves us on to 73, updates to academically accelerated and early entrance to kindergarten and or first grade and whole grade acceleration handbooks. So you see the two documents. Uh we worked on these a number of years ago to establish what cut scores we would have and process we would have for um accelerated and for early entrance. Um, one of the mechanisms we used were the assessment for I Ready to establish uh cut scores of either 80 or 90% for math and reading respectively. Um, we're moving away from I Ready to EXL. So, it's just a shift in name from I Ready to EXL. Um, it's reflected in a the strike through I Ready and and the blue is so I just was seeking approval for for those and we can um update them in
059August. Yeah, I didn't see any other changes to the forms. Okay. Okay. So, we need motion to approve the updates to the forms previously mentioned. Second. I don't see a motion for this one. Oh, do we vote for a motion for this one or no? Just information. Just information. We don't need it. Great. It was approved anyway. Yeah, that's fine. It's always good to have approval. It's always good to have motion. However, 74, we have to approve the second reading of press policy update 118. Yeah. So, these are uh right now there's nothing outstanding in there that would grab your attention for significant changes. A lot of legal changes to terminology or updates from um state legislature. Uh probably as we get closer to another veto session, I think you'll start to see a lot
060of things uh maybe in the next press that we get that we'll want to review. Okay, any questions on this? We need a motion to approve the second reading of press policy update 2018. Motion second. Shoefeld, yes. Stanbury, yes. Schwarz, yes. Milfeld, yes. Johnson, yes. Quinn, yes. Motion passes. Moves us on to 75. approved second reading of shared services job descriptions for technology and building and grounds. Yeah, this is again just modernizing what they do as well as our new shared service uh system for buildings and grounds. So you don't have any questions, we would seek approval any questions. Okay, so we need a motion to approve the second reading of shared services job descriptions for technology and buildings and grounds. I motion second. Schwarz, yes. Johnson, yes. Melffeld, yes. Stansbury, yes. Shoefeld, yes. Quinn,
061yes. Motion passes. Moves us on to 76, consideration of release of close session minutes. Yes, we went through the deal with personnel and so at this time we're going to recommend that they stay closed. No vote needed for this. There is a vote needed for this. Do a voice on this one. Okay. So motion to keep all closed session minutes closed at this time due to the continued need for confidentiality. Motion second. Mfeldel, yes. Johnson, yes. Stansbury, yes. Schwarz, yes. Shoefelt, yes. Quinn, yes. All right, that moves us on to 77, the IASB conference for November 21st through the 23rd. Yeah, great time. If you can make it, definitely I I suggest you go. We want to get um rooms reserved as soon as we can. So, we're close to everything. The longer we wait,
062the further back from the venue hall that that will be. So, if you think you might go, let us know. and then if it changes, we can still switch that out and get refunded up to a certain point, but I strongly recommend it. So, for the for the board members here that have been to it, can you provide some insight to the newer board members? Uh, wait, that would just be Tom because Katie is not here, but I do think it would be important just to hear, you know, what you've experienced at the at the conferences. Go ahead. It's a lot of information. Um, I highly recommend going. There's different things that you can look into. If it spikes your interest, you can go. If you have questions about it, if they explain it, um,
063just if you can. Yeah, for sure. Appreciate the recommendation. So, Friday is like a lot of focus workshops, you know, those localized words. you do a half day up front in the morning or afternoon and kind of mostly this year to kind of do both. So you get an opportunity to do either one. Um but there was one I saw on here um which was introduction um board scenarios for new board members. Um that one which has Laura Martinez and Arana Bard. Um Laura Martinez, she's worked with our board a few times. be very forward willing to communicate. There's a couple others in here. Dollars and decision school finance board members. Uh T did that one last year and this is with u she's phenomenal. So breaking down a lot of different finances and different
064things like things started actually clicking for me of like oh you know fun 10 20 whatever. It was it was very eye opening a lot and a lot of them they try to keep you and you know keep you going like hey we they understand it's it can be boring and they keep you engaged and it's at a level where you can understand if you're not a finance person. It's not PowerPoint to death. Um so it's they're they're they do a good job. It's also a good way to networking with other board members. I know Natalie and I talked to some from Hebrin and you kind of can talk to other districts and figure out what they're doing big or small and what's worked for them, what hasn't worked for them. So, it really offers
065a lot of insight, too. You'll they'll do a whole thing where there's like an app you can go into and there are jobs, loads of different things to call over like, hey, go to this building and go see, you know, this security thing or transportation or you pick it, they've got it. Um, so there's something for everybody there. Sounds extremely beneficial. I I will definitely try to go. I think the link's already updated, right? Uh, the ISB website and the link and all the information that's on the some of the flyers. Oh, yeah. I saw those, but we'll send the link out, I think, just everybody can take a look at it. Very good. Uh, that moves us into item eight, closed session. Do we have anything? I don't see anything unless you do anything.
066Nothing for close session. All right. That brings us to uh there's no actions after close session. So that brings us to adjournment. So we need a motion to adjurnn. Motion. All in I think it's just an all in favor say I. I. All opposed. Same sign. All right. Meeting adjourned. There's like a three and a half second on that. See, watch this. And it's still I don't know. Maybe it's way more. Oh, there you go. session.