001What time is it? I like to call this Board of Education regular meeting Tuesday, April 21st, at 7:01 p.m. Can I get a roll call? Mrs. Garwood? Here. Mr. Bulger? Here. Mrs. McPhillips? Here. Mrs. Urban-Barnfield? Here. Mrs. Theodore? Here. Mr. Berardi? Here. Mr. Tremuzio? Here. We have a quorum. Let's stand for the flag. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. The mission statement of the North School District 80 is to inspire educational excellence, make a difference, and thrive. Uh celebrate the success of the students. Yes. Actually, we do not have any students coming tonight, but we do want to celebrate our assistant principals. And who Mr. Preble is here this evening
002representing the assistant principals. And our admin assistants, which we have Mrs. Krieger here representing them. We would like to thank them for their work. Let's start with Mrs. Gouloo. It's a lovely picture of Mrs. Gouloo can't be at the meeting tonight, but we want to thank her for all of her work at Giles School working with our students and helping to build them up for their future as they move on to high school. So, I want to thank her for all of her work. And Mr. Preble, uh during assistant principal week, it was a challenge for the students and the staff, of course, to dress up as Mr. Preble. And so, you have to see some pictures that I shared with you of our staff and our students dressing up like Mr. Preble with their
003uh coffee is a coffee that you drink? Uh generally, yeah. And their hair. I had a walkie-talkie in the office today. They walked in. And they brought my bald head with me from the office. I love the picture of the little girl down below with the pink little walkie-talkie in her hand. But we we want to thank you uh Mr. Preble for your work here in the district and for always stepping up and always being there and always following through and communicating so beautifully with everyone in the district. So, thank you very much for your work. >> Thanks for having me. Okay. Can you release that just really super quickly? You may now. Okay, there. Thank you guys for being there. Mr. B, I think you can bring this to Miss Cool. So, thank you
004very much. I want to thank you both. I'm good. Thank you, guys. Thank you. And I just want to also give a special mention. Tomorrow is Administrator's um Assistant's Day. So, I want to thank Mrs. Garcia and Mrs. De Cintio who work in our district office. Fun picture of the two of them here. I think I believe this was Mrs. De Cintio's birthday, I think. Where they were or they just like to wear tighter things out to lunch. I want to thank them for all of their work as well as um Mrs. Robles and um Mrs. um Thank you. Vasquez. Their work over there at Giles. They're great. Mrs. Robles and Mrs. Vasquez have been there for you years and doing wonderful job in the Giles office. And then of course, Miss Peters and uh
005Olga, should I say your name? Less than an hour. Say it again? Less than an hour. Yeah, Less than an hour. Menara. I went to high there, too. You can tell by which one. Uh and all that work here at the school. Yeah. Yeah, they do a great job. The principals and the directors, the coordinators are taking them out to lunch tomorrow. Uh the building people out to celebrate assistance and administrative assistants day. So, thank them all for all of their work. That is what I have for celebration tonight. Thank you. I do have a problem with this. Uh I need a motion to approve the agenda as presented. Motion. Amanda. Second. Amanda, all in favor say aye. Aye. All opposed, nay. Motion passes. Recognition of visitors. Any visitors? Correspondence. Any correspondence? Public participation. Board
006requests. Uh they can be found at the district website as they are every month. Presentations. So, the board asked the BLT committee for Giles to follow up in April on how the hall pass system is going. So, we'll start that tonight. And we have three teachers from Giles that have come to uh present their contribution. So, from the BLT team, we have Anthony Colella. We have Steve Aborka and Annmarie Annmarie Pietraszek. And uh we're happy to share the what we've learned so far since we've implemented the digital hall pass system at Giles School. So, our goal with the hallway system is to maximize student uh instruction time and time spent in the classroom. Uh also just to increase the overall accountability in the building. Uh maintain uh student uh safety and support, but also staff
007student safety and support. Uh and then also reducing the time uh spent at the schools' uh water fountains. So, we implemented this towards the end of January and we're still running it now. In that time we've issued about 25,000 passes. Uh and that we have two categories that we put it in which are listed there. Uh and it's and different places take some different amounts of time. So, we do want to point out some of the main ones. So, like it's not a surprise, but most of the time students end up using the bathroom, which is what most of the passes are for. So, that's our big one. Uh going to the classroom is the second biggest one. And the third one would be uh the water fountain because they're going to get drinks of
008water if they have water bottles and such. So, uh a little more examples there. So, what like on average that's 7 minutes in the bathroom where can we improve that? Uh it really kind of depends on where they're going, so it could be a huge range. Uh but it also provides accountability to those students and know where they are. Like we know where they're going to see you know who's in the hallway and we know where uh who is like where. And uh water fountain there is only about 5 minutes there, so that kind of points out to us that we've got an area we can improve probably some of the cool little there. I see if we can make it more efficient. So, something like that's kind of a good a little bit prolong
009these breaks that are not students are doing that. As this test question about what students will do it for and think we're doing things you know, that this system is working the best for us in those things. Again, so another big piece of this for benefits is the accountability, the overall accountability of the building. Um so during any student issue, you're referring to it for data. It's data driven. Um just the overall elimination of paper passes and saving uh paper. Um and then just looking at the the list and and no noticing like uh certain students that have maybe not used uh or made choices in the hallway over the course of the time, it's identifying those students and just restricting certain students from not using that hallway productively. I see. And the system allows
010us to do that. Okay, so we asked the students, so how are you guys liking the If our office kids like the new pass system, and honestly, overall, they really liked it. They're not saying have as much time searching for their their paper passes at the bottom of their backpacks, accidentally bringing up like a March one and it's April like they're they're really enjoying that it's quick with their ID badge. We scan it or we type it in and they're on their way and they can come back and check in. So it's been really nice. They can go more frequently, too. Um they're not just limited to the times that we say they can go. If they need to use the restroom, they can go basically whenever they need to. Um they feel more secure,
011which is interesting because they know that the teachers know where they're going. So even though you might think, "Oh, that's really limiting with them," they feel a little bit more secure with that. They like being able to save their PBIS points because in the older grades, you know, personally with eighth grade, they're able to, if they lost their their pass, they purchase another with the PBIS store. Now they don't have to do that because you know you can't get any passes. So they get to save their passes for their things. Um and yeah, and what I find interesting too is one of the students said that they feel like it's safer in the bathroom because the stalls are filled up. So we're limiting the amount of students that are in the hallway probably because we
012know where they are. Um the staff likes it too. Um less paper use, which is kind of great. We reduce the student meetups. So some students can consistently like like schedule meetups in the hallways with their friends. They would We have three minutes to go get some water. They sit there, they they talk, and they come back. While the students don't like that, I mean we aren't able to kind of put the kibosh on their friendly meetups. We like it because they're back in the classroom more quickly. Um again, we know where they are and we're really spending less time wandering the hallways. There's there's more instructional time that they can use inside of the classroom. Okay, next steps. So our next steps is to continually review the data and develop a plan for areas
013of need such as what we have identified already as the drinking fountain. We would like to uh know and monitor our frequent flyers uh to support them in staying staying in the classroom. We would also like to continue to have staff in the hallway and that also placed in key spots that we have identified and then continue with staff education and checking students in. So, one of the ways that we've done that already is we go to the students help the staff members. If they're in an important lesson and they're teaching, a student will walk in and say, "I'm back, can you check me in?" And that's just a nice gentle reminder to make sure that they're constantly doing that because sometimes the teachers are so into their teaching and um we want to make
014sure that we get them checked in again. So, um those are our next steps. The next slide talks about costs. This year we had a free trial. It didn't It didn't cost the district anything. Next year the quote to implement the Hall Pass system is $495 um for to have the system for next year. That concludes our presentation. Do Does anyone have any questions? I don't have a question, but I have a comment that I am so glad to see the students mentioned. We have two quotes that are I guess there were more students that thought as well. But for them to say that they felt safer is worth a million dollars because we're the adults always talking about it and you overlook that they're thinking of it, too. They're thinking of their safety, too.
015And to see that is really good. I know we looked at that. They see something like this and they think Thank you. Really good. So, the thought I'm wondering long time at the water fountain or whatever, it's probably just a normal water fountain. Yeah, yes. That's what we're we're learning, yeah. One of the things is with the more frequent changing of the filters, we we see with the newer filter, water flows a little faster. So, if they have a water filter bottle filter or whatever, >> No. Any other questions? Thank you very much. Thank you for coming in. That would be a recommendation. I mean it doesn't cost, but we do feel that the benefits that that have been there have outweighed outweighed the cost. When do we need to commit to move forward with
016the renewal of our with the payment? Uh it's there's really no timeline. Whenever we do it, it's yeah. Typically this time of the year is when Dr. Mr. Becky are getting together all the curriculum, getting everything ordered, getting everything else set up for the next school year. Thank you all very much. Thank you. All right. Facilities plan. Okay, thank you. Last month we spoke about we kind of circled back around to the facility plan that Mike had presented to us back in December. So, you asked me to get all of the items that were identified as life safety items and have you and Ashley and Mike back, but I asked to come back and present those to you. So, there's the presentation that you have in board book and I have up in front of
017you, but there's also a couple of pages. One says Giles and one says Lady that has a list of all the life safety projects. So, I'm going to go ahead and turn this over to Mike. Okay. Thank you, board. I'm going to have Mike back for a moment just to be back here and look at all your facilities. Um so for both schools, we went through the list, the 10-year long-range plan and looked at components of that lines, items that you have a copy of that would be potentially eligible for amending your life safety survey. So, an amendment means you submit back to the state these items and you ask if they are to be approvable. Um to then use and leverage for life safety dollars. So, with this this scope of work, um we'll
018go through this and if you have any questions, um but really it's really a way to focus a little bit more on the items that could be eligible for life safety dollars. Okay. So, at Giles, there are interior renovations, uh which include replacement of the toilet rooms, uh flooring, the VCT flooring, uh ceilings, tiles, doors. Uh these are components of the building that are aging, uh deteriorating, and in that case, you are planning to replace them. So, when you plan to replace uh items that are um at the end of their life, that are and cannot be maintained anymore, those will be eligible for Okay. Uh site work would be pavement, so all the playground areas and the sidewalks and the ramp and the concrete exterior and rails. That's about 90% of the cost. These
019are numbers directly from the from the engineer. I just jumped in really quickly. This does not mean all of the toilets, and all of the flooring, or all of the ceiling. This is just what they've identified that's at end of life. So, keep that in mind as you're looking through that. It's not every every every door. It's only the doors that were identified that could qualify as a needing of life safety replacement. So, you have a door of a classroom or storage room. That's a a door that needs to be closed properly that needs to be in the correct in the in correct condition, right? So, when those elements start to deteriorate, it starts to affect the fire prevention and the fire rating of the door and just the overall overall security of the and
020cycle. Okay. Uh mechanical systems, we have air handlers that need to be that are on the list to be replaced within the next 3-5 years. And all these all of these are within 6 years of any interest. And about half of them need to be addressed within the next 3 years. And some of them within Uh plumbing, uh mechanical is also exhaust fans that are currently in the toilet rooms. Plumbing, there are sewer pumps, uh sump pumps, uh valves that are associated with the control of the mechanical electrical electrical panels. The electrical mechanicals are higher priority items. And then the exterior that is mostly roofing. There's also some additional tuck pointing that's included in some of the some of the letters. Overall, most of the >> the top 10 most downloaded apps in the country.
021Uh ADA, uh there's a some door openings and handrails etc. for life safety amendments is $6.20. Uh we also have life safety items from your last 10-year life safety survey, okay? So, those are key items. I don't know how much Where is that? Oh, those are but uh those are components. Those are most of that is uh we have some some handrails and uh some patching holes walls and like toilet rooms and storage rooms where you can't see them where they holes and where the piping and stuff they never really patched them so that needs to be patched. So, that's the summary on guidance. Um with lead, similar approach here in your your estimation like the rooms. Not that they don't function now, it's just within the next 6 years you want to be improving
022those. You want to be replacing the finishes, the fixtures, the lighting and set that up for the next 20 30 years, right? We're at a point where that needs to And and that we Um site work, similarly um here in the court area with drainage challenges there. The asphalt, the sidewalk, all that needs to be replaced. And um there's also some around the perimeter there's some additional asphalt. Uh mechanical, similar air handlers, exhaust fans. Uh plumbing, similar uh pumps, same kind of sewer sewer and some pumps. Electrical and I think you know, the two buildings kind of have similar systems that were put in place. So, as they start to age out, and we plan ahead, right? We don't want to wait until something breaks. We want to project this out 5 years, 5 to
0236 years. Okay? And then the minor total work. More exterior work here. You know, a lot of those are there. Um there's some minor stuff there. Some caulking around the doors. That's all that is. And your roof, we have when they soundproof the building, there's kind of like these metal sheds that cover the duct work, right? You can see them like you when you come from water two, you can see them inside there. Water tank. Shed like metal roof, right? So, that is rusting. That is green algae with a coating. So, all those things, I mean, a lot of them are not very exciting, but they do need to be done. And by submitting for a life safety amendment, we're able to tap into the life safety fire prevention funds to accomplish all of this.
024As a priority. Okay. And Mike has identified some ADA work, and you can see that's not a it's a small number. Yeah. ADA, what to get approved on a life safety amendment for ADA is is very minimal. You know, we can't get an elevator approved on a life safety amendment. You know, we're going to be addressing some of the stair issues, especially at the leave of non-connection of the two second floors between the fourth grade area and the third grade area. All of those things that, you know, we we have on a list that we've talked about that need to be looked at for, especially in for ABA purposes, but they wouldn't qualify under this grant. They're very specific, you know, they have like the door, you know, the doors where people come in, one
025bathroom. So, it's like very specific what can get covered for ABA. Correct. And also with the site work, there doesn't need to be a a specific public hearing for that. It has to do with pavement. This is not a subcategory. So, the next step in this is is really just a simple an understanding for yourself as a cabinet to qualify projects like that. If there's any questions I'm happy to answer. In general, depending on what the state says to this, that affects how we're looking to life safety line. So, we the the next step would be creating amendments. We put the amendment together. Correct. Mike would write those or Mike would would write those and put the amendments together. So, when you when you submit an amendment, what is the timeline? You have a timeline
026you have to complete by. Yeah, so once the amendment is approved, you have 5 years to complete that work. So, with these projects I mentioned, these are falling within the 5-year global 6-year meaning and not on the 3-year team. So, once we get this kind of project put together, we will kind of package that and send it to the state saying, you know, we have these projects, we have exterior work, we have flooring X million. They review that. They don't necessarily approve all of it, but from what I see here, these qualify. I think they'll find some money for this. Um and then once it's approved, then you would proceed to go to some plans and that's when we would make work saving documents. You do need to get approved prior to signing the plans
027before you can start the work. But for the submittal, you have to submit a correction from the administration or you know, the the scope of the match to the There's also, as Mike and I discussed last week, there's a little more drilling down of that list that they gave you and they know what it is. It's you know, when you work on the map, this is talking about 83, but it's it's not written down there exactly. Like which bathrooms? Like you might say, "Well, what what bathrooms are we looking at? What doors are we looking at?" I think we would need to get that so specific also or you would want to see that so specific before anything else is done as well. And they have that, but just that's not what we presented today.
028So, it's just more of an overview of what we're talking about. And you'll see this is slightly increased from what we talked about last month because um you know, Mike really took another hard look at it and his team and the you know, what has been getting approved. If we're looking at this avenue, what could we possibly put in it? So, if we're going to do it, then we'll get it as much as you can do with this plan this way. What month was it when you initially came and you presented? December. What was the overall general the overall for each the overall Yeah. Um so, for um guidance, um it was Yeah, for D, it was like 50 >> Yeah, yeah. No problem. This is what I meant. So, this is kind of some
029is a more specific blessing. Not everything uh was long-term plan with qualified money. Sure. Like the renovation of the library. When you're doing that, almost to improve kind of the functionality to to meet but is that necessarily like What is saying to you? And I will add here, too. We've done not this work, but we've done a lot of work. For example, when we look at the the valves, you know, and the plumbing, we did very large plumbing projects when you put in the mixers for the valves, but they need to they're supposed to be at every sink and not just mixing ones. They're supposed to be mixing at every sink. So, things like that are um you know, not things that we were able to do, but if we're looking at this, we could
030get covered in that. We do have mixing valves. That would be so nice. And you can continue to you know, address some of the next few items that have been uh over the last few years. Also, and also an opportunity to look at all the projects that are right here. And they you know, this is the highest priority here and some of the and tackle all the new cabinets or the site work and start all the site work and start to kind of put these into projects that can be funded and also have certain priorities as we go. functionality or community priority. This is not a change here. can answer the things working. Um so so I would feel like those things they can When you do a life safety bond, you have to complete
031the work that we identified for the bond. So you can't take the life safety money and say, "Oh, you know what? We actually want to do X instead." You Once that a man amendment is is submitted, you're you're you're kind of locked in at that point. You need to do that work. by the deadline. for the bond. So if we say we have you know, $8 million worth of improvements, we want to use it to leave it and we all fall under life safety. And we use it in that order, we will to ISBE. Are we committing to doing the work when we take out the bond? Or when we submit the list list to ISBE? And if that's what we identified. When we submit that list to ISBE. So once we submit that list
032to ISBE, our 5-year clock starts. Whether they approve it or not. Only if they approve it. Okay. Yeah, only if they approve it. If they don't approve it. amendment Excuse me. You meant Yes, thank you for clarifying that's actually very large. They have to approve it. They approve the amendment. Okay. And they could approve parts of the amendment, not the whole thing. For whatever reason. That's what we're doing. contractually about getting to complete that. Right. We get that back. All the time. number that had a as project. >> I I'm assuming a lot of this work um has to be for you both through the whole process and through the evaluation to love it after a 10-year lifespan, you know, because I know we talked about toilets, right? And I mean all every single one
033of them have to be replaced in another 5 years with the second everything. The toilets are like How many projects on here once completed have a minimum of a 10-year like you don't have to worry about it for 10 years? Yeah, I mean you're talking about the toilets that are Sure. Um usually like a as you know, when you sell a building like half period is like 20 to 30 years. So you want to from a community's point of view, you know, you want to lay You want everything you build to last Sure. Sure. You know, you don't sell like you know, you can't install things that last And so that third year this uh there's something like a bathroom or hot condition. I think it's something you can install like a roof, you know,
034you can get a 20 20 25-year warranty. Uh but it's something that you can install that's going to have to be replaced. So that thing about it being like that really makes it short lasting. Or again Um it's something like asphalt roofing because it doesn't stick asphalt to the roof as good as it does. Um If you take a look at rough numbers, you know, previous presentation is about 20 almost 20 million and this is roughly 15 million which is strictly life safety. Mhm. You know, that's No big deal with the 85 million of communications that the library had to talk about and so I have some exterior work to think about. You know, the buildings are our assets, right? So, you want to continue to operate the school district and you continually put money
035towards these. Um think about the the the health and you know, the bathrooms, flooring, ceiling, lighting has to do with wellness. Trying to have a It has to do with virus here, but it has to do with the whole environment. The juror removal alert and So, a lot of those same things and the lighting, the flooring and the handrails. Um those all kind of are not just kind of pieces of infrastructure, things that we use every day. Um going above and beyond that, like if we were thinking about linking the two sides of the building here, we could get into that, you know, what that would cost and that that's a different So, I think there's some some projects that I think it's still on the site. And get people, you know, the you know,
036a behind some of the the dollars there because you got to spend Nobody wants to spend money on things you don't necessarily So, I always say no one opens up the ceiling tiles and says, "Look at those copper pipes. They're beautiful." Yeah, we spend a lot of money on them. Yeah, but at home, I mean, if your roof isn't functioning correctly all the time, you need that kind of thing. So, that's what we call infrastructure. You need cooling and heating and we need places to summit and cure it's all mechanical. Do you have any other questions for I'm good. All right. More of the next steps internally with the board and to share with the open your opinion. I do in my discussion and wanted to have that any information or about the last last
037um last month. Fire as um bonds and revenue tax. We talked about our point of view that we don't what the governor still is and what he might do is start breaking up people and getting at us. We can talk about get a sense of where you stand on that. A better picture. I mean we're going to follow it. We're going to start to follow So we do that also. And then that's that pattern. Um you may know the person that reviews it down in Springfield might change their become more strict. Um government changing the rules. You know, everyone wants to apply too. So It's very official. That's that's the thing. So okay. This is it. How long do you uh just as a as a typical turnaround, what do you say it takes? One
038month. Two two months. Okay. It's a good timeline. The we get direction we put it in and zero those out. One month. Um and then once you have approval you can start the design work. I should have this Um we break ground this summer and we can get the project in the fall and then summer is your completion. And we But I mean we could do project this summer just getting two weeks out. Well, thank you Great. Thank you very much. for the information there. Thank you. Let's go now. So thank you for your time. Thank you. Um administrative reports to bring to the committee, Mr. Casey? Yeah, I just something really good. Much to add. Um We officially open registration tomorrow for the 26-27 school year. Our transition to MySchoolBucks has gone well. In
039fact, you all should have gotten an email from MySchoolBucks starting to move us towards that system. Remember, lunch fees are still with PushCoin right now. That won't start till next school year, but we're going to start with all our curriculum fees, tuition, into MySchoolBucks. One of the best things about MySchoolBucks, which I know is an interest of the board, is the you can go into PowerSchool, and then the left side will be the toggle to MySchoolBucks. So, one less system that we need to go into. So, that would be two two less systems that we've gotten rid of this, you know, during this year to kind of streamline things. I know we still need to work on grades. With mastery connect, you know, that is something we still talk about quite a bit. Um, but
040that is at least another step in the right direction. So, we're really excited about it. And if then down the road, if we did change, you know, our SIS system or moved away from PowerSchool at some point, just just to say this, MySchoolBucks can move around with it, too. So, we haven't closed ourselves up from other opportunities. But, I think you'll really like it. It's very easy. Um, you can see exactly what you're paying. You can make a partial payment. Oh, and right now, I don't remember, until June 1st, our early bird discount is open. So, fees are $325, but until June 1st, only $275. So, get out there and pay those fees. You'll hear me say that lots of times until then. So, just wanted to uh share that with you. Very exciting news.
041That's really good. What What's the status of tracking residency, or is there any difference at that? Yeah, we're still using the same system that we've used with PowerSchool. So, so they last year we we did the form, everyone still has to upload all three of their their proofs. Uh all all new students or kindergarten registration is in person. Um mostly kindergarten cuz next year we are still charging tuition. The year after will be the year that we will not. Um and anything else that you just wanted to bring up and discuss? All right. Thank you. >> Okay, special education, Mr. Masters. Yeah, so a couple quick things I did want to point out. April is autism acceptance month. I know I shared a little bit with the board in the past, but it is a
042great time to celebrate and promote our understanding for students with uh developmental condition known as autism. It is a communication and social interaction disorder that does affect approximately 1 in 36 children. So, really schools are a real great place to kind of foster that development in a lot of those areas and really build up that that skill set as they transition into adults adulthood. So, really want to take the time to recognize that. In terms of our preschool, our team is looking forward to their upcoming field trip to Brookfield Zoo that we're having a little bit later in May. So, lots of different skills that they'll be building up as as they get to see all kinds of great things. Um also wanted to take some time to celebrate our multilingual department. They had a
043very successful cultural night. They had a wide a very large number of attendees. They had a lot of great experiences for culture different cultures representing different cultures, excuse me, for food, music, crafts, activities. Really well attended, very exciting. And then we will also be holding our BPAC. I apologize there was a typo in the report. It's our our parent advisory committee for 19th. Um and finally with the special education, we also had a parent university that was held virtually that was also a great success. We had a number of parents that came out to that and we were able to talk a little bit more about the social emotional well-being and how our social workers and psychologists actually support our students throughout the days. That concludes our report. Thank you. And we will mention they
044have to do that event virtually and and it seemed to work out. Not the cultural event but the the social worker event. So that's definitely something we're going to explore more. Giles School, Mr. Biagi. Yes, thank you. We have April, May and June are busy months at Giles. We have a lot of activities that are all listed on the District 80 public calendar. Two that I would like to highlight right now is the seventh grade Springfield trip which is May 26th and the eighth grade Washington D.C. field trip which is the 11th through the 13th. And then finally, the eighth grade graduation is Tuesday, June 2nd at Ridgewood High School with a 7:00 p.m. start time. That concludes my report. You received your invitation to the eighth grade graduation tonight. Please let Mrs. Fresen know
045if you will be in attendance and how many seats you'll need. Leahy School, Mr. Raviola. I want to share out that our before spring break we had our fourth grade versus staff basketball game which ended in a tie for the first time in well, at least that I've ever seen. So that was pretty cool. Um nice to see Mr. Prevel out there, you know, dunking on some fourth graders. Just a really good time. Also, one of the reasons we do that as part of the Kids Heart Challenge, raising money you know, for that which our students wrote were able to raise $17,000 which is an incredible amount of money that goes to the great organization. And when they were putting that together or setting their goals for that, they across the board, you know, that
046donations have been going down for that event. So, they were kind of wondering, well, what is going on here that you guys seem to be doing really well with that. But, you know, Mr. B and Mr. really liked that up and the kids seem to get involved with that which is great. And want to shout out our rock, paper, scissors champion, Veronica in third grade for uh you know, winning that tournament there. With that rock, paper, scissors tournament. So, I listed a bunch of different events that are coming up and we are at the phase of wrapping up this year and prepping for next year. We're really in that phase right now. So, a lot of work going into making sure we're getting everything ready for a successful You? Discipline reports? None. Uh this month
047we have no report. Reading? We have no report. Uh board committees? Education? Nothing to report for staff and development and we are planning a meeting today. Building and grounds? You have some things for discussion? Correct. And we just had a presentation. The April intervention, nothing to report. Negotiations with human resources uh will be addressed in closed session. Finance, uh nothing to report. Communications, uh Joe, he had a newsletter in the works. Uh One last one for the year, I think it's Uh Norwich Park District, uh we will address in closed session. Discussion item. Thank you. We will begin with Community Kindness Day, which is taking place this Saturday. We have two events that are going on here at the school. PTA is sponsoring a rock and paper I'm sorry, bookmark decorating. And then Gratitude Generation,
048it will also be um sponsoring activity here at Lee uh breakfast sandwiches for seniors and local senior homes. So, please come by to the school from 9:30 to 10:30 on Community Kindness Day. Um you can check out all the other activities that are going on throughout Norwich and Howard Heights uh for this Saturday. Lots of lots of fun things and good things to be involved in. Uh we the Village reached out to us to invite us to take part in the Memorial Day celebration, which will take place on May 24th. A little early this year, so for Memorial Day. Sunday at noon. This is the 33rd annual Memorial Day um uh ceremony. Uh they asked us to present a wreath from Norwich School District 80. Um I know Mr. Trejo, he will usually attend. So,
049we can let uh Mrs. Garcia know and then we'll order the wreath. Uh and um make sure that someone is is presenting there. Okay, got you. Okay. But, how how how are we going to do one of the games? Thank you. Always a very nice event. Okay, so last month, um, when Mr. Biagi and Dr. Raviola spoke about the schedules at Lee and Giles, uh, Mr. Dr. Raviola talked a little bit about enrichment opportunities or acceleration opportunities. So, I'm going to put those down on paper to share with the board tonight. So, in third grade, um, and the invitations have already gone gone out to the families. Anyone that's in 85th percentile or above in their i-Ready assessment, um, in ELA and math, will be receiving an increased pacing and deeper, uh, look into the
050standards. So, this will be done through some pulling, some pushing in, uh, different, uh, moving kids around in different classrooms in third grade in order to have the students work together who are above that 85th percentile. We started that this year. Had a slightly different look because last this year the students didn't have a homeroom. They were just kind of coming in and out of that, uh, support classroom. But, next year they'll actually have homeroom. So, building that into fourth grade, uh, we are looking at students at the 85th or above, um, percentile also. But, in ELA, the students will actually be all together in that homeroom in fourth grade. And they're actually going to be working on sixth grade ELA standards. So, we'll be moving them from completing third grade standards over to fifth
051grade standards with some opportunities during WIN period to fill in any gaps or work on anything that might have been missing on the fourth grade standards. And then looking at um math for the fourth grade next year, they're going to start off the year looking at fourth grade standards. They're going to increase their pacing with the hope that we'd be able to get to fifth grade standards by the end of the school year. We're not sure cuz this is new, um but that is what what our hope is. Um then we will have our second shift, which will then shift the students who are leaving fourth grade a year from now going to um Giles and being able to meet them where they are and hopefully going on to sixth grade standards in ELA and
052in math. We'll see where math ends up. We also, Dr. Raviola and Mr. Biagi, are having a um meeting with Ridgewood to talk about our acceleration, to talk about placement at Ridgewood of our students, and just how we can continue to grow our programs. We do have some acceleration that happens right now at Giles, but this is really just putting together a much more formal program that starts off with guidelines in third grade, then it moves on from there. So, as we continue to um move forward, we'll continue to add a grade each year and continue to work with Ridgewood on um how they can help meet our students on an accelerated level at Ridgewood. Ridgewood has great opportunities um and many of our students do skip over some introduction math classes or move to
053math um integrated two or even move to math integrated honors. So, um Mr. Biagi and um Dr. Raviola meeting with the Ridgewood staff to look at specifically where our kids are going, what what cut scores that we are using for that, and how we can continue to uh improve on helping them grow. It's very exciting stuff happening. Uh Whitley has at your seat tonight has completed our single audit FY25 funds. So, when a district receives over $750,000 in grant revenue in FY25, then you have to have a single audit. Our single audit, which I we shared with you, no findings or questions cost were found in the audit. Moving forward in FY26, the state has set that threshold at $1 million now for a single audit requirement. We most likely won't meet that threshold uh
054for FY26. So, this might be our our last single audit in a while um unless something dramatically changes, but um it it it is there in front of you from Whitley, and there were not any any findings, nothing to report on it. Or even any questions cost. I just want to share with you that before um spring break, we had discussed the Giles wood ceiling project, which is part of the Giles infrastructure grant. We've been talking about this project for a long time. There are some wonderful pictures. Um I especially like the picture on the right that shows the new signage um at Giles school as well. Really looks lovely. The It's so much lighter, brighter. Uh it really is a great new uh ceiling area. And it really does not feel low. We were
055worried about it feeling much lower, but uh it really doesn't feel it. I think it just we You'll notice also there aren't any other things hanging down other than a um the fire safety measures they're still there, but our B&G staff was able to do all the electrical work and move all the speakers, move all the Wi-Fi, move all of those things up into the ceiling now. So, it's a much a much cleaner look. Much crisp and clear. We'll continue to do that work um at Giles as we shift over to Giles, but since we have the opportunity of getting this done during spring break, um we took that opportunity. It's a better for the companies that cuz they time better for them to come in and do it, which they did and it really
056was really helpful. And again, this is part of the Jobs Infrastructure Grant. Looks great covered. The lights covered, the floor to ceiling tiles covered all the work, all the labor. Very very nice. Okay, so my last topic today as uh the board asked me last month to talk a little bit about funding and referendums and bonds. So, I'm just going to give you the the little quick version, but I'll be happy to answer any questions or Mrs. DeBoer is here as well um if anything is above me. So, you have a property tax extension limitation law, which we call PTEL. And PTEL is how school districts like get funded, the money that comes into us for taxes. And that is based on the increase we receive every year. It's based on the consumer price index.
057Or anything that limits us to less than 5% over the previous year's levy. So, let's just say, you know, we've had some years where CPI or the consumer price index is 8%. We are we are capped at 5% um that we can levy or we can go to the county and say, "Okay, this is what we want to bring on uh as new tax dollars to our district from one year to the next." There's a little over an increase in there for any kind of new construction that goes on. So, we typically will levy a little higher just to capture any new construction, but there hasn't been great new construction in Orange. Pretty landlocked. We have a lot of areas of of field that are sitting out there waiting for new houses. So, that's the
058money that a school district gets every year other than what we get from the state for evidence-based funding. So, there are two different ways to look at changing that amount or bringing in more money into a district. And that is to exceed your tax limits. And that is by doing something that's called a referendum. There's two different ways you can look at a referendum. You can issue bonds or you can look at a limiting tax rate increase. If you issue bond If you If you issued bonds, you issue them for a specific purpose like life safety as we were just talking about the money. And you have a limited amount of years of paying that back. Example, 30 years, 20 years, 15 years. That's just an example. So, you say, "Okay, we want to go
059out for we want to issue a bond for a million dollars and we're What we're going to do with that million dollars is X." And then um it'll be an increase on taxes for a a number of years. Let's say 10 years. And it increases taxes. Once that million dollars is paid off in that 10 years, then that falls back off and the taxpayer doesn't see that addition. So, that's one way. The second way is looking at a limiting tax rate increase. So, what that does is it says, "For this year, we want to go ahead and increase above PTELL or increase above that what is available in that 5% or uh CPI. And we want to we want to do that for that year, but then that kind of sets our new base. So,
060let's say just for easy numbers, we're getting $10 million. And we say we want to do an increase so that we're now going to get $15 million. That $15 million becomes our new base. It never goes back down. So, taxpayers don't see after 20 years or 30 years that fall off and that change. So, those are the two kind of ways that you can look at at extending the tax rate. So, then you asked me to uh look at some areas uh some taxing bodies in North Royalton Heights that have done um exceeding tax limits and how they've done it. So, just the most recent in March of '26, which was just last month, North Royalton did a building bond and asked for $14 million. Before that, then and these are kind of going backwards
061and in a in uh date. Union Ridge in March of '24 did a $35 million building bond, which passed. Red didn't pass, green passed. North Royalton did not pass, Union Ridge did pass. However, previous to that $14 million in March of 2026, North Royalton did a building bond in April of '23 for $9.7 million, which did pass. And at the same time, they also did a limiting rate increase. So, again, they took their tax, they took their base, and up their base by 17%. So, they actually passed both of those in April of 2023. Now, big difference here, when you do a building bond, you are identifying these are the projects we're doing. When you do a thing when you are doing a limiting rate increase, you can use that for anything. It can go
062to anywhere you want to go. Does not have to go to building capital projects. Does not have to go to life safety. You can put it in the other fund. You can put it in any fund that you need to go to. When you lobby it, you decide where it goes. Okay. Going back. And you'll see Pennoyer many times on here with unsuccessful bonds before their successful bonds in April of '23 and their limiting rates in April of '23. So, in November '22, they asked for 7.9 million, which did not pass. Uh the Norwood Park District did a building bond for pool renovations and I think a little bit to their um uh a park house on June of 2022, which did pass for 6.3 million. And in June of 2022, the Norwood Park Fire
063Department, which I believe was for like a new ambulance, uh did a limiting rate increase of 10.3 million. So, again, uh Park District building bond, specific plan, what they were using it for. Norwood Park Fire Department, limiting rate, they can use it for anything. I I said they would call something about an ambulance there. But you might remember that. Norwood Park District then in April of had an unsuccessful building bond of 3.5 million. A year later, passed a a double amount of a building amount. Penoyer then had three consecutive years, I'm sorry, 2021, 20, and 18 of unsuccessful building bonds, 8.6, 10.9, and 25 million were the three of those building bonds. They had a couple other little attempts of things in 18 that I didn't write on here, but they were very uh different
064kind of trying to get some some additional funds in different ways. Um and they were highly unsuccessful. So, here we get to Norwich School District 8. We um did a limiting rate um increase in April of 2017 of 14.8 million. Kind of my estimate what I'm going to remember on that was about a million dollars, 2 million dollars, somewhere in that range. 1.25%. 1.25%. Thank you, 1.25. Which was 14.8% of an increase. So, that's a limiting rate. So, that means that when you vote for that, that money can be used in any way possible. You can use it however you want to use it. In April of 2006, um Norwich School District 80 did a limiting rate increase of 73.6%. Yeah, 600,000. That is not the right number. Sorry, 600,000. April of 2016, 73.6%. So,
065that limiting rate bond would have been something that would have brought the base up and then left the base up. It wasn't like a let's pay it off in 30 years and let's, you know, then it's over. Or, it wasn't a the use specific projects and then it's done. It was a limiting rate increase. Ridgewood High School in 20 06, and that was the say 2006 of November of 2006. Uh asked for a limiting rate increase of a 60% increase, which did not pass. But the same time in November of 2006, again that should say 06, did pass a building bond of $40 million. Which I believe is kind of getting close to the end of it. Cuz it was 06. Somewhere Somewhere around there. Um let's see. North Plainfield, I think we already mentioned.
066Oh, Ridgewood before that, sorry. Ridgewood before that did a couple of different limiting rates, a 30% limiting rate in February of 08, November of 08 a 30% limiting rate that didn't pass. In 07, um went for an increase on limiting rate in 07 and 08. That didn't actually say the percent on there. Those all did not pass. That is everything that um has happened in the in the, you know, past. Couple of little things that the village had had done that were at referendum that were not money uh related, just asking referendum I mean just asking questions on a ballot. Those I didn't include. They weren't They weren't bonds or building bonds or or any limiting rate increases. Yeah, one was like should we join the ONCC and like or bike flight that I recall.
067So, our district is the only district in the surrounding area that didn't pass any bond. Three Rivers and the board did the last 20 years. Correct. Yeah, you know what? Three Rivers was March of '04. Pennoyer was April of '03. And Pennoyer did a limiting rate and they did a building bond in April of '03. Yes. 20 with 20. I don't know why I keep doing So, what I'm going to say that it brings to me. I I'm not remembering as I'm sitting here the exact number, but that 73.6% limiting rate was something like to a house value of $100,000 was like a $486 increase, something like that. And so, this is 73.6% in April of before our school year. Any other questions? Is this the information you were looking for? Yes, yes, this is
068the information I was Sure, it's in the board book, but I can at least send it to >> No, I don't have the board book here. It's in the board book? No. Yep, absolutely. I'll email it to you. I apologize I don't have it all the time, but No, I apologize. Thank you for all that. It was a lot of preparation. >> Um Set agenda. I need a motion to approve 15A through 15H. I'll motion. Brent So. Manning. Um for the uh Is there any discussion that anyone has anything to say about this? Well, okay. Uh all in favor say aye. Aye. All opposed say nay. Motion passes. Board comments? Bring up, discuss. Okay. Close session. Consider motion to adjourn to close session to discuss the appointment, compensation, discipline, performance, or dismissal of specific employees,
069collective negotiating matter between the public body and its employees or their representatives, or deliberation concerning salaries and annual goals for one or more classes of employees, purchase or lease of real property for the use of the public body, including meetings held for the purpose of discussing whether a particular parcel should be acquired, uh student disciplinary cases, and review of close session minutes. Can I have a motion? We have Close session. Uh I'll second that. Uh all in favor say aye. Aye. All opposed say nay. We will go into close session. It's 8:08. We're going to close session at meeting team. Session at 11:40. We'll move on to action items. Meeting A Consider approval of the District 80 certified staffing plan for the 2026-2027 school year. Can I have a motion? Motion. Second. Fanny and Lauren,
070roll call, please. Mrs. Theodore? Yes. Mrs. Erbaugh-Barnfield? >> Yes. Mrs. Lavalle? Yes. Mr. Poljak? Yes. Mrs. McPhillips? >> Yes. Mr. Berardi? Yes. Mr. Treviziano? Yes. Motion passes. Meeting B, consider approval of a memorandum of agreement between the District 80 Board of Education and North Education Association of Teachers Association regarding tenured teacher evaluations. Can I have a motion? Motion. Second. Jim, Lauren, roll call, please. Mr. Poljak? Yes. Mrs. Erbaugh-Barnfield? >> Yes. Mrs. Lavalle? Yes. Mrs. McPhillips? Yes. Mrs. Theodore? Yes. Mr. Berardi? Yes. Mr. Treviziano? Yes. Motion passes. A, the board will consider approval of Dylan Golden, buildings and grounds maintenance department. Two, consider approval of Patrick Woodward, boys softball coach, Giles School. Three, consider approval of Tom Balazos, boys varsity basketball coach, Giles School. Four, consider approval of Sam Rogers, boys junior varsity basketball coach, Giles
071School. Five, consider approval approval of Tom Balazos, girls varsity basketball coach, Giles School. Six, consider approval of Patrick Woodward, Giles junior varsity basketball coach, Giles School. Can I have a motion? Motion. Second. Amanda, Fanny, roll call, please. Mrs. McPhillips? >> Yes. Mrs. Theodore? Yes. >> Mrs. Lava? Yes. Mr. Kulczyk? >> Yes. This is Urban Barnfield? >> Yes. Mr. Berardi? Yes. Mr. Trebizio? Yes, the motion passes. I need a motion to adjourn this meeting at 11:42. I'll do it. All in favor signify Aye. Those opposed say nay. We're saying Means now adjourned. Thank you. Thank you.