001order and we'll begin with the Pledge of Allegiance which Margaret Gabby will lead I pledge alance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with liy and justice for all oh we want to thank you everybody to be here today uh excuse Kimberly dugdale because she's coming down with the flu and we don't want anybody else to get it so she's been asked to stay home which she gladly obliged uh we have new board members today like to introduce Michael Gro Bridget wood sylvana stons they they are all invested in this community in one way or another and we appreciate and glad to have you here looking forward to a new year with fresh ideas and have a new superintendent this
002is going to be an awesome coming year so I hope you're in for the Long Haul because it's a long haul but it's not that bad and you do get it you do get a free AIA pass yeah so you can go to game and just walk to the head of the aisle and show it and walk right in so you get cookies too yes you get cookies yeah and you get cookies once in a while so just so you know how this works three only three mics can work at the same time and so I'll turn my mic off and you can turn your on whatever but that when you want to talk that way so we're going to turn time over to Dr Wright to uh go through our recognitions this month we
003will excuse and not do uh James Wright bus driver will give him his award next week as he and his boss are both gone won't be here to receive that this week next month I should say thank you thank you Mr Merill so we want to start with a recognition of January students of the month will start at the elementary and then go to the junior high and proceed with the high school and we'll go in that order Mr Grace good afternoon if it is all right with the board I'd also like to make one adjustment because we have Nora is our elementary student of the month and Mr Johnson was her teacher last year and would like to be the one to present her award and then I would while he's up I'd like
004to give him his teacher of the month award so if that's okay with the board if I'd like to do that all right Nora come on up Nora is our student of the month she's a fifth grade student here and she was in Mr Johnson's class last year yeah Nora was in my fourth grade class last year and uh um I wrote on I wrote down here that she's always nice but nice is one of the biggest understatements you can say about her she's um she's nice in a way that I could never be and I'm saying you guys could probably never be it's really remarkable she's optimistic and um she's always the first one to give up a seat to someone she's always the first to put their arm around someone when they're sad
005she's always the uh first to tear up when someone else is crying and um she also paid attention like a hawk she stared lasers right through me until she learned what she was going to learn and um when she got frustrated she just kept at it and kept at it she a very successful year last year um I called her the table mom remember that when she wasn't at that table of girls it was nothing but fighting and bickering but when she was there on those days they were just fine so I was always like oh gosh Norah is not here what am I gonna do um and uh I also know she inspires her family too there's Mom right there and she's very much an inspiration to her still to this day she stops
006by my room every morning to shake my hand and say good morning it's awesome and um it is a real honor to be able to present that to her for her to be here for that so congratulations thank you all right our teacher of the month um he informed me that this is his first in what 18 years 18 years so he was you know jumping at the chance to get here if you can't tell Isaac is a guy of many emotions um we're were trying to see who scowls the most in their student or in their yearbook photo is it Tyson Adams or Isaac Johnson um and it it's pretty close to a tie um so Isaac teaches third grade for us he he specializes in teaching math um I think that it's probably
007his strongest area but everything that he teaches he does very well at Isaac is our first looping teacher at the elementary school also so this year he is teaching third grade um he semi voluntarily moved from fourth grade down to third grade and then we'll move back up with the same students next year into fourth grade um so to help handle our class load he uh he is our first looping teacher um Isaac puts everything he's got into it every day cares very deeply for his students um works hard and gets everything done um there's there's lots to say about Isaac uh but the reality is his kids want to be here they love his class they they love the fact that he talks to them like real humans every day which is good good
008um and so I'm honored to be able to to uh give this to Mr [Applause] Johnson if I could please have Pablo Perez come up to the front Pablo is an eighth grade student at the junior high and he has shown so much growth over the last year not just vertically he's got I think it's been about eight inches he's about eight inches taller this year than he was last year um but also he is showing so much more confidence um and and is so helpful and so I just want to read a couple things he was nominated actually by a couple of teachers and so I want to read uh some things that they said about him Pablo is a thoughtful kind and caring young young man with a great sense of humor sometimes
009he is shy but he has become so much more comfortable and outgoing and has let his personality shine Pablo is also a model student pushing through challenging tasks and not giving up overall Pablo is simply an awesome human whose quiet strength brings strength and joy to those around him in addition um another teacher said he is a pretty amazing guy always offering to help other students helps clean my class and put up chairs at the end of the day without prompting or expectation of rewards just because he is kind um and we see his kindness all over our campus um he he will give us a smile um and is just a great example of a leader at the junior high so Pablo Perez all right High School turn Grace Smithson please come forward so
010the high school would like to recognize Grace Smithson for student of the month for the month of January and I'm going to hand her her plaque and her free cookie thank you to Twisted sugar for the cookie donation and Grace is a pretty amazing student um those of you that know her or have come to watch some of the plays that she's been in you can see just a little bit of what how amazing she is there's a lot that you don't know about Grace I'm going to give you a little more details about Grace So Grace exemplifies academic Excellence leadership and Community engagement making her an outstanding choice for student of the month ranked second in her class with an impressive weighted GPA of 4.91 167 and unweighted 4.0 her dedication to her studies
011is evident she has excelled in advanced placement courses earning multiple scores of four and five on AP exams and has already completed 26 college credits at MPC Beyond her academic achievements Grace has made a significant impact through her involvement in extracurricular activities and Community Service as chairwoman of the mayor's youth advisory committee she has taken on leadership roles such as organizing town events and running Council meetings her passion for the Arts shines through her participation in honors choir drama Productions and dance earning her accolades such as a recognition in the ASU gamage high school musical award where she was the when which she played the baroness Ela Von Shader in Sound of Music an amazing performance additionally Grace's commitment to giving back is reflected in her volunteer work with organizations like backpack snacks National Honor
012Society and she also did a humanitarian trip where she built houses down in Mexico for a couple days with her exceptional combination of talent leadership and service Grace misson sets an inspiring example for her peers and community and all of us too so she is an amazing student and we're proud to have her as a bluid yellow jacket and proud to be in her midst really congratulations Grace good job we are fortunate to have such exceptional kids you know and except exceptional kids have exception exceptional parents and and when a child gets recognized for being good it's just recognition to the parents so thank you parents for doing the job of raising those exceptional kids and we appreciate it very much uh next next item on the agenda is item 1.1 and this is election
013of governing board officers for 2025 we need to elect a president a vice president and secretary secretary probably ought to be very easy Mary for always ask nobody wants that job and actually so we're open for discussion about a president um I'd like to nominate Dave Merl to be the president as with three no discussion three newbies and you know we got new superintendent coming on I think it'd be good to have continued leadership in that role we have a second to that I second it and nominations second with the nominations all right so um we have a vote for David Merill myself as the president of the governing board of the blidge school district for the year 20125 26 right all right so all in favor raise your hand that appears to be unanimous
014there are no negative votes condolences is more in order in many ways but U next item we have would be uh a vice president someone to fill in all the days I decided to not be here which might be a lot so is this open for discussion you can do it you're right so uh no discussion anybody would like to nominate I would like to nominate Michael gel if that if he would accept the nomination yeah yeah turnabout Fair pay so would uh any discussion on that we have a second then second a second from Bridget wood uh all in favor that also appears to be unanimous so we have a new president and a new vice president and we need to elect select elect a new not a new but I would nominate Mary
015Ford to be the secretary for the blid school district second that we have a quick second no discussion is that okay with you Mary yes all right thank you very much all in favor of Mary Ford being the secretary that also appears to be unanimous thank you okay next item is item 1.2 resolation the resolution authorizing approval and execution of funding proposals grants special projects vouchers warrants salary and other expenses approved between board members Dr R since we have a new board would you like to explain what that is actually yes sir so this is an annual requirement and we've uh we've asked this to the board every year and we re have obtained its approval we have a month between meetings and there's business that operates daily and so in order to get vouchers
016signed and to execute business there are times where we come back back to the board and say Here's the business we conducted we need the board to ratify it and so that's what this is it's an annual it's an annual sort of improvement that approval that occurs it's it is a and I guess because you are new board members this is not extraordinary every board has to do this otherwise we'd have three or four board meetings a month or one a week in order to execute our operations and have payroll issued and expenses that occur between the board meetings is this kind of like a a vote in favor of those vouchers in between the board meetings that's what we're doing it it authorizes the school district to execute that business and another necessary business
017between board meetings there only there are only what yourself Kimberly can can right do those so we all we are only authorizing two individuals to to to make funds available that way so and a process payroll which marry right another person does right any other questions concerns not can we have a motion to accept item 1.2 which in regards uh vouchers and expenses approved by the board have a motion from Margaret a second a second second from sylvana all in favor raise your hand that appears to be unanimous also okay item uh 1.3 this is IDE identify and record conflict conflicts of interest for the governing board members School administration and staff districtwide um May I yes so I have I have the forms right here Mr Merill has the forms if you have a
018conflict meaning you have a an interest a business interest or a personal interest in any area of school business so for years for instance I've always had to divulge I had a conflict the board had been doing business with my brother's Law Firm for 30 years well before I got here but I had to say hey this is one of the law firms we do business no longer he retired so I don't have that conflict my wife was a teacher I had to say hey my wife's a teacher I don't make decisions relative to her her compensation or anything with her employment she doesn't work she retired so those conflicts are gone um I have a conflict potential conflict I don't make the decision but we've had the trust as an administrator of our health
019not Health but rather indemic insurance for decades we continue to have them Kimberly makes that decision I don't I do Consulting for the trust I have been for 5 years so that's a conflict that I complete um if you have any potential conflicts better just to note them even if they're not a conflict so that protects you from uh well there are there I think it's a classified felony if you have a conflict that's not divulged so if you are uncertain just divulge it and say and then we'll say well that's actually not a conflict but good for you so you mentioned the sick Greaves um Foundation the last meeting I don't know what the school has to do with that but the brokerage that I hang my license with my broker is the president
020of that foundation and okay okay e do you want all of us to see that or you just want us to all of us have to do any of potential conflicts including myself and all the administrators and all the staff we start with the board Administration and then staff we send this out to staff members as well some have small businesses um some of the like let me see um that that also needs to be stated not just written here it needs to be stated for the public record and for for example like Jennifer's Jennifer Brimhall her business she was a partner with uh Eric Cox who has White Mountain Physical Therapy here so that was a conflict and um I think her husband did surgery for kids did that so that was a conflict
021that she stated at the beginning of the year and when something came up regarding that she Rec recused recused herself from that so so just take a minute uh and uh write that down and then I'll ask so that can be public record so for a while for a long while my husband carried the insurance that the school in carries or didn't and so if there are any changes or additions to that then I would have to right out at least for a while for a while I'm on the the board of the sholo I mean sorry blue Rich youth basketball league you think that's going to be a conflict it could be it's not it's not so much a conflict Michael is I would I would just include it and if there's ever an
022issue that requires a vote just recus yourself so we're trying to we want our my job protect the district and the board and we do that by just saying hey just let's get these relationships noted and that protects you I think that way if there was ever something where a fee had to be charged or something like that that there would public the appearance of no impropriety would be there completely and and if in doubt you can always recuse yourself and we normally have a full forum and it doesn't hurt we long we have three people to vote we're good today is the 14th right if you'll just hand those back to Mary we'll take care of that so I will state that I have no conflicts of interest with the BL School District other
023than they need win a couple more basketball games nobody [Laughter] laughed okay sylvana you have something to declare I have two children that are employed at the high school as teachers and that would be my conflict of interest if it occurs Thank You Bridget just the sit Graves SI Graves Foundation all right Michael yes I'm on the board of the Blu rage youth basketball organization which uses facilities here Margaret okay so my husband Dr gby accepts insurance for services thank you so that is taken care of item uh 1.4 uh directive of annual investment reinvestment of all monies within the school district service fund Dr Wright do you want to explain that also yes sir we have we carry a cash balance which is essentially the difference between the money that we have that's approved
024to spend and the estimated funds or the the actual funds that were captured based on taxes we have about a 90% 5% rate of collecting the taxes that are owed to us the funds that are NEX us of the budget that remain with the county we need to have the board's authorization to make sure they're in an interest bearing account we always use the the most conservative account that is insured up to $250,000 um we have substantially more than that in that account at any time but we have to have the board's permission in order to reinvest these funds and any other funds that are just sitting there we want to make sure that they're earning at least earning interest in a very conservative either a money market account or a savings account any questions
025regarding that we have a vot a motion to uh accept item 1.4 as indicated in the outline I'll move I have a motion we have a second from I second sylvana all in favor raise your hand that also appears to be unanimous okay item 1.5 governing board delegation of purchasing Authority we we touched on this briefly I think this uh just permits Dr Wright and Kimberly Doug dugdale to be the only signing officers for purchases yes sir any other questions concerns about that they're not necessarily named it's their titles all right because obviously we're going to have a new superintendent new Chief Financial Officer good point I'm sorry names are they Nam or titles Des statutorily the designated School of Executives we could put it for the record that would be Kimberly Doug Dell and
026Michael Wright okay and that can be amended amended when we have the retirement with Jonathan and whomever else right either it's Kimberly working in a different capacity that's supporting the district and a business manager whomever the board designates good question any other questions not can we have a motion to accept item 1.5 designating Dr Wright as Chief finan as Chief superintendent and chief Financial Officer to um Kimberly dugdale have that motion a motion for Michael a second from sylvana all in favor that also appears to be unanimous okay item 1.6 established meeting dates times locations for regular monthly governing board meetings we have this at 5 o'clock the second Tuesday of every month except like when spring break comes and stuff there are conflicts like that we do have other times when we have to
027meet early or late or on a different day uh but as indicated in the U in the agenda see any changes that you might need to make Dr you have something yes sir um there are a couple that I that got by me the first time one is the principles have asked us in years past can we please not have a board meeting two days before graduation and as teachers getting grades in so with the board's approval I'd like to suggest May 6 instead of May May 13 and there uh just as a matter of sort of explanation we use July 8th the first Tuesday instead of the second because provided all the budgeting forms are in we have to have the board's approval for the first budget by the 15th of July yeah so
028that gives us some time and then there's one uh we have the 14th because of the the break in the fall fall break um it it's the week to the 6 so we don't have a conflict there but it's the 14 that's it's does that fall on the second or is that the third Tuesday Mary yeah so I think that's on schedule uh I know there was one that wasn't the one I'm sorry Mary I made a mistake Veterans Day is the 11th we have been asked not to have a board meeting on that date because there are veteran activities going on that we do to support our veterans in the community so it allows the principes to have those special programs special programs thank you so that' be the put back it' be the
029third Tuesday and then as the board um the board president and in an authorized meeting you could adjust in these dates as need right there are times as Mr Merill mentioned where we might have to have a special board meeting because there's a a student disciplinary thing we have to hold an expulsion hearing the board has to take action or we have some other emergency we'll call A special board meeting those are rare but if they happen we have to they have to be duly not noticed which is the 25 period we'll reach out to you individually and as long as we had a COR we' move forward I think that is about coverage it Mr Merl so in this in this calendar um proposed calendar does that conflict with any vacations or any leave
030or anything that anybody had on the March 18th I may not be there running out of state on the 22nd so we will be gone that weekend okay that well as long as we have a quorum we should be able to operate in March March yeah all right so the the revision would be for May 13th to move to May 6th uh there are no other revisions to what has been provided in the agenda so any discussion comments not can we have a motion to accept item 1.6 regarding the upcoming calendar of board meetings for the year 2025 motion from Michael grenal second from Sylvan all in favor that also appears to be unanimous okay Miss hoffm you're next on the agenda good evening and Welcome to our new board members in October or November
031I gave a an initial AI presentation just to give the board some information on how we're navigating artificial intelligence in education it's becoming a really big Topic in not just K12 schools but also of course in college settings um and so initially we I shared with the board that we had uh initial staff um presentations with all of the staff members K through 12 to just go through some re sources um some risks and challenges of artificial intelligence and just give an introduction to all the staff on navigating some of that and we opened it up to explore some different platforms that could be useful to teachers uh and so that's what our teachers are working on right now is just looking at some different platforms such as chat GPT and co-pilot uh Gemini and
032things like that in ways that they might be able to utilize it but also looking at what kind of risks are there for students and there are there are numerous risks that we have to make sure that we're teaching our students and teachers about uh just recently um actually last week I was invited to present some information uh for NPC's division day and so we had a discussion about bridging K12 with higher education how do we prepare our students for what they're going to need to know about ethically moving through this artificial intelligence and education uh and so I'm just want to give you a little bit of information about that there it goes thanks for the so the um we spoke about AI literacy and I did bring this we brought this up with
033the teachers at the beginning of the year uh with our K12 teachers about the importance of teaching our students to be literate in artificial intelligence we're already working on digital literacy with our students AI literacy is a little bit different because it does talk a little bit more about critically evaluating different platforms and modes of information that getting and so um working with our students about making informed decisions based on information they're getting from that and knowing when something might be biased when it's misinformation um and then how do we use it how are we going to utilize it in the workforce how do you utilize it within your classes and know when it's okay to utilize it and when it's not uh and so these are some some some pieces that we're working with
034our students on right now um and this was a discussion with NPC as well about um how do we Bridge that gap between high school and higher education on what our students are going to need to know about artificial intelligence some of the things that we also discussed and uh we've discussed with our teachers here at blid as well is how you AI can be used for misuse of tools and so plagiarism comes up quite a bit um bias and Mis misinformation that the information that they're getting may not be correct and how do you evaluate that um inequity and lack of access making sure that the students all have access to the tools that are being offered um both in school and from home data privacy is a big issue with artificial intelligence um
035furpa and sipa and Capa I mean all these different um protection acts that we have for students are things that we consider when we're talking about students privacy staff privacy um and then it's a big cost so artificial intelligence it's a it's a cost there's a lot of environmental impact to it um but it's also costly as far as the new computers um that are coming out with the AI chips they cost more and it takes um you know it just takes a lot of resource as well in any organization that's running it um and so these are some things that we're talking about now not just K12 but at the higher education level locally as well um some of the things we also talked about detection versus prevention and this is a big conversation
036that's happening especially in English classes um across the world um as far as are we trying to catch kids cheating or are we trying to prevent it from happening in the first place by teaching them ethically how to utilize their resources um and so this is something that I think we need to spend a lot more time on with our staff uh and and the higher education is going to have to work on that as well and it's going to look a little different I think our model of education is probably going to change a little bit as far as how we are um how we're giving our presentations um how we're instructing students and then teaching them how to evaluate where they're getting their information from I'm not going to go into this anymore
037um I wanted to just make sure um that I kind of gave you a brief overview of where we are so this is kind of where we're looking at as far as how do we get our kids prepared for moving into higher education but also just moving into the workforce there are a lot of different companies that are that students will not need college for um that they're going to be going straight into the workforce that are already utilizing AI resources um and so getting them to make sure that they understand what AI looks like in society and what it's looking like in education building foundational skills on critical inquiry um and evaluation um and then incorporate and then teaching our students how we excuse me teaching our staff how we should be looking at
038incorporating some of these tools um and they maybe ways that we want to stay away from it and so I feel like um in blidge we're really ahead right now of where a lot of other districts are um we have a lot of teachers that are just looking into it it's we have also um staff that are hesitant about it because it is um it's very new and it's changing rapidly and we're seeing a lot of misuse on it and so it's going to take some time to really get those foundational skills in on that literacy component of it um but I think we're at a good spot right now to move ahead uh in a really strong way and so what we would would like to do is to present a kind of a
039policy of and practices in the fall that we'll be utilizing the trust actually has a very um a very concise policy that they recommend for school districts that just talk about the use um and how how we should be incorporating it in into schools um and it fits very well with our AUP already and so we'll be looking at including that piece of it but we can we'll be presenting that in the fall um and then looking at some more solid practices on where we want to implement AI literacy in classrooms any questions for me I have a a quick question and forgive me for my ignorance you mentioned the AI chip is that to gather data I'm assuming Nathan he is my expert on this the new chips are actually called mpus or neural
040processing units um they're just a separate chip and all they do is literally process um the AI stuff on board instead of sending it out um so when you're talking privacy security it's always better to do it locally um especially when miners are involved so that's what we're looking at um kind of holding out for those mpus to uh progress more um even computers that were launched six months ago those chips that are coming out next month will'll be about 40 times uh more powerful than the chips that they put in six months ago so rapidly changing um and AI uses more what does it use more of everything it uses more of everything bandwidth water electricity I mean you name it natural resources um and so it's just one one step yeah my concern
041was just gathering information about kids you know yeah no we're and we're doing our best to try to avoid that um and to try to keep everything localized if we can um on the local machines um and sending some things aren't available locally so we still have to will have to uh send those out uh but we're also looking into customizing AI um where we have our own custom internal AI um that none of our data goes outside as well so Ever Changing lots of moving parts right now may I add um to what Mr Neil said he's I trust his judgment on that the kids right now they're sharing a lot more of the data using these and all that than they were ever through AI at school but nonetheless we we are having
042our Protections in place just if I might Mr Merill for the new board members edification we had it this presentation about two three months ago with the the outgoing board I wanted to make sure this board had the advantage of the information and let you know that for a rural School District we're ahead of the curve Courtney has been working on this since September and she was charged and tasked with this responsibility and was recently selected in a very competitive Grant to participate in a conference that educators are going to share the problems this is a nationwide challenge our perspective is that this is not a fad I mean remember when the internet came away that was a fad it was going away if you remember when may or may not been able to use
043it a calculator when we we couldn't use calculators I was in high school because you're not going to be able to be able to not going to have a calculator with you yeah right and you had to learn cursive because you can't read the Constitution well Constitution is in text it's not going away that's not a fear but things are moving and this is moving very rapidly we didn't want to hastily adopt a policy which I thought was Wise by the board we need to understand what we can use school districts are taking two approaches one we're locking it down no one has used to it you can't do it well guess what they're still using it because guess what they have computers and they're using it we have provide openings to it and we
044allow access with protections as much as we can it's still going to be upon the parents to monitor what the activities are going on at home it's still going to be that situation we're going to work as well as we can and are we suggesting we're going to have all the answers there's not even software out there that can reliably screen and say hey this is this is has been lifted and this is not original work this is plagiarism it it's it operates at about 40% reliability well that's not good enough in time those programs will catch up but it's going to take some time this has evolved so quickly it went from kind of an afterthought a discussion about 18 months ago I kind of heard it once in a while in one of
045our meetings at the state level and now it's everywhere and so it's not going away AI is not going away our uh unless we're instructed different by the board we're trying to figure out how we can use it as a tool how we can manage it keep our kids safe how do we train and support our faculty members that are presented with this what tools do they need what technology do they need do our staff members need and then what does this mean we're just trying to stay ahead of it so by about next I would think September or October Courtney and the team will have enough information to come to the board and say we're comfortable with this policy my guess is that policy might be adjusted one or two times between now and
046then and the board if it pleases can adopt a policy right now we have practices and I think it's probably going to be an evolving deal for the next several years so I I would encourage the board ask any questions of Courtney or Nate that they might have I liked what you said about it's not going to be the product it'll be the process and the process is where you learn and that's where the teaching will come not just in the finished product so I like that process of thought right any other questions or comments thank you thank you Courtney appreciate that this does not require a vote so we'll just move to Dr right you had something else you want to say just wanted to thank Courtney's put in hours and hours and hours
047of her own time in this and she's become very Adept at it she knows a lot more about it than the rest of us and it is it is an area that is is so important and so I just wanted to recognize the amount of time that she's invested and has really done a great job of pulling a lot of complicated information together in a way that's pretty simple if I can understand it's pretty simple thank you Courtney well the next item on the agenda is item 3.1 and this is a recommendation to let Courtney go to Chicago to learn more and bring it back to us uh I understand this is not any expense to the district uh correct so it is um it's all expenses are paid through the international um Society for
048technology and education and the association for uh supervision and curriculum which is SD and ascd um in Partnership they're going to be meeting at a at the Google offices in Chicago um with a a team of Educators to just try to get some more strategies in place that we can bring back to our own districts to share but it's all expenses paid I I think that's quite an honor courney thank you thank you and I know you'll represent our district very very very well thank you any uh this is item uh 3.1 recommendation to approve the out ofate travel for Courtney hoffmire to go to Chicago to this conference so we need a motion to accept this I move to accept that we have a second one second from Margaret all in favor that also
049appears to be unanimous next item on the agenda oh totally forgot the consent agenda so uh item 2.1 through 2.5 I was getting way ahead of myself this is a consent agenda and board members if you have any item in the consent agenda that you would like to take out and vote on independently instead of just in group into the agenda the consent agenda we can do that then we can discuss that individual item U sometimes for example if there are new hires uh they might be here and we might want to pull that I recognize a new hire that way so I don't see anything like that for myself is there anything member of the board would like to take out of the consent agenda and vote on independently part of the consent agenda
050is a principal teacher and principal evaluations I don't know if that needs any discussion that's pretty self uh explanatory Michael do we know has that been presented to the board in in Prior meetings to look at the the actual evaluation instrument I we no it's not presented to the board but you can look at that individually I might add we talking about the valuation tool same one the strong tool that we've been using in the years past so there's no changes Mr grenal to what you were evaluated as a teacher and what our principles are being evaluated on we're staying with the same instrument it's not fair to have people that just recently retired they know they know what they're talking about ma teers yeah especially analytical Math teachers I wish You' come back to
051work I wish you come back go out of retirement come back teach we can be in negotiations on that all right so can we get a a motion to vote on the consent agenda which is items 2.1 through 2.5 have a motion from Michael I have a second second from Margaret all in favor there again apologize for taking that out of order I was listening to the cour got got uh wanted give you the do where you needed to all right next item is a superintendent report General District update from Dr Wright a couple of there's a number of important things probably top of mine I want to just bring the board up to speed with the timing of the principal interviews uh we have identified we Mary and Mr rolloff Jonathan have identified a
052number of folks that are stakeholders at the high school to participate which would include the high school administrators currently and a number of teachers and staff person there's there's six there are six people from the high school all from the high school because that's the group that he or she will be working with and that process will occur on the dates after Mary has time to confirm with Jonathan what dates work for his schedule um we're going to recommend a Saturday just because it certainly makes it easier um it's going to take about there are five interviewees that are going to participate it'll take as that many hours to conduct it we're really reluctant to go 9 10 11 o'clock to a school night so we're trying to find really a Saturday that works and
053so no one's rushed and it allows the participants to come and we will probably land on a date we'll have that date as soon as I get that I'll provide that in the form of a board summary um I would imagine it's going to be either the 25th of January the 1 of the eth rather 1 of February or the 8th of February one of those three weeks before the next board meeting and so that's the process what will happen is Jonathan will meet with the committee he'll he and Mary Mary will ask the questions or Jonathan will between the two she's the HR Director she'll conduct it just like you did with the with the superintendent and the committee will have a recommendation to the new superintendent and he'll come to the board with
054a recommendation I believe we have three internal and applicants or four internal applicants and One external applicant um and so I wanted to make that for the board's information the next is I'm sure your you're probably wondering about well uh we've all seen I imagine what's happening in LA with the wildfires it is probably the driest it's been the driest in the 10 years I've been here and I have people that have lived here for decades that said this one of the driest Winters they've ever recall so The Logical question is what are you doing as a school district Dr right to prepare we have been preparing for a wildfire for the last couple of years this summer before school started we had a a drill with all of our staff members to evacuate and
055we had they loaded up on buses they went to the elementary school thankfully it's a blessing we have a an elementary school that has a huge fire barrier all around it it's a block building with a fire retardant roof it is really a sound structure that is the safest place 8815 of our kids will not need to move they're in a great place if we had a wildfire start and we needed to evacuate we could do that in about 45 minutes time get them from here to there provided we don't have a parents blocking the lanes so we're going to work with the city and the town to get the support from law enforcement to say these roads would need to be blocked off for this time till our buses to get from this campus
056to there we have had the firewise U evaluation and there was significant thinning done around this campus uh with a little bit of irritation from the community and I heard about it believe believe me but my goal was hey let them be mad now and if the place stands we're good so the fire departments had large federal grants that allowed them to thin and they did a great job removed needles and a lot of the dead trees and trees that were too close together so we're in a much better spot but this spot is not nearly as insulated as the elementary school is so we're going to work and there are a couple areas that we're really concerned about foremost we want to ensure the the safety of our students and staff job one it's
057not convenience it's not making sure everybody's happy it's getting everybody there safe we also have students with exceptional needs we're we're cognizant of that we have a preschool that will have ex specific needs to get those students over there safely and in a way that doesn't traumatize them and they have special needs our students some of them will require three or four adults to attend to them that are exceptional need students we're we're going to iron all of that out way in advance and we're starting with identifying who those students are where are they at and what resources are we going to need to properly support them we're going to the next step will be once they're there what do we do we're we're not talking about reunifying getting parents get their kids back safely
058quickly safely yes quickly no not right now so we'll probably start with the junior high and before this school Year's End in the spring we'll have the Junior High physically get on a bus we'll have an evacuation drill we'll note this to the parents a month in advance they'll know it's a drill the junior high students will get on a bus and go to the elementary school and they'll get off the bus and we'll time it and learn from that activity we we don't want to put our exceptional need students through any undue stress or put them in any situation that we don't have to necessarily do so we're probably going to practice some things like we'll take let's figure out how many adults will it take to provide student onea whoever he or she
059is and here's a file this is what these students needs are and they physically need to be lifted and it's going to take a couple of strong individuals to do that and then somebody else to support this person we need to figure all that out well in advance and we will have that figured out and then next uh the next iteration would be in the early fall is to have the high school participate in the same thing High School presents a lot of unique challenges you have drivers and from sophomore through senior you have kids that are going to get in cars with their relatives and friends so the our first job is to make sure everybody gets out and everyone is safe now there's some it's like her and cats with high school kids
060and Junior High kids so we know some of them are going to do just do what they want we're going to ask them please get on the bus and come to campus we know that's not going to happen in every case but we're also thinking about now that we have uh those challenges what do we need to do to adjust well you need to clear the campus meaning every room in the entire Campus of this 80 acre facility will need to be cleared meaning law enforcement maintenance and staff will stay behind to make sure everybody's out and then once we have all of the students over at the elementary school and I mean k through prek through 12 1635 then we'll go about the task of organizing will have organized areas younger kids primary grades
061are in an area Middle School kids high school kids they're in different areas and then our exceptional need kids we'll know who needs medication who's going to need special attention because this is going to be traumatic for them what supports are we providing where are they at um what do we do if we lose electricity how do we communicate and then how do we go through the very arduous process of giving every child back to the correct parent so the our job one make sure that we have a plan in place our staff is I would say we're prepared if we had to perform an evacuation we could and we would we could always do better and our job is to be as prepared as we possibly can job one I wouldn't said a decade
062ago if you said Dr right what's your first responsibility your first priority how to said educating kids it's not it's keeping students and staff safe job one job two educating kids that's the world in which we live we have have spent an extraordinary amount of time well prepared um for any type of a critical incident active shooter anything like that we we have training in place we have protocols in place we continue to practice we had drills today K through 12 so for the Michael's been in our system he understands but for the new board members we have policies and practices in place to navigate those I think Wildfire presents our biggest risk the White Mountains is a very we have that's a very unique threat it's incredible how quickly it can move it being
063the fire can move 50 6 the speed of the wind we get 50 60 70 M hour winds we could be in a similar situation I will tell you this if there is a fire in the area with high winds we won't have school we'll be on a instructional time model which allows us to to work and learn remotely we're not going to put people in danger we're going to have our buses on sort of a ready status for the rest of the spring meaning our staff get them as close as they can and have the buses ready to deploy as quickly as they can because a fire can start in just a few moments some uh it could start through arson or just natural cause we have to be ready and we will be
064ready to respond very quickly we want to do it in orderly fashion once we're confident we've got a plan down that we can execute that keeps everybody safe then we're going to spend time on reunification because frankly if it takes a day and a half to get everybody back and everybody safe that's okay it's not about convenience parents are going to be mad no matter what I'm going to use I'm going to work with the town as IID mentioned the town manager law enforcement and the local fire departments and other first responding and the county to say here's our plan poke holes at it how can we get better but our first job is to keep everybody safe any questions from the board along any of those safety lines that's what keeps us up at
065night that's that's what keeps us up I will say though um I'm very proud of the work every Department including our technology department maintenance and transportation the time and effort they put in to think through these things and to really internalize this and to make it real and our staff they take it seriously we we have had incidents where we've had to have lockdowns over the last 10 years in most cases the teachers are taking it serious the kids are taking it serious and in incidents where we found they haven't we're we're not patient with that this is a really important responsibility vast majority of the students and staff do take them serious we'll continue to do our part to keep our our students and staff safe as we can we'll have a our expert
066that we've been working with for the decade Jesus via Hermosa will be putting on a training we invite the board to attend we'll post a possible quum on April 4th he'll be here to train all the staff he'll have a 4-Hour our meeting Michael said you were participated in the first one I think or one of the subsequent ones that you had um jeso come here and it's the most engaging three or four hour presentation you've ever been and you think there's no way that was four hours he is an exceptional presenter he is operated in and I would say in my opinion he's the foremost expert in school safety on preparing for active killers and how do you fortify your buildings and what processes do you have in place to try to do your
067best to prevent it and so that's that's our job we take it seriously our exterior envelopes of our campuses are all locked doors should not be propped open unless it's so hot or it's so cold that the classrooms have to be open because that's a more clear danger is that it's too cold or too hot other than that we we have our doors are locked it's inconvenient that's part of the good system it's supposed to be inconvenient and it's supposed to be something where uh well my obligation for for most is to make sure that the students and staff are safe so I take that obligation very safe very seriously and we'll continue I can assure you all the men and women in this room that have something to do with these programs uh uh
068take it seriously too any any questions on just any of that I'll be free to answer yes ma'am so I'm unfamiliar with your policy for for fire evacuations things like that so do you guys have anything in place like if we get put on like pre- evacuation the school is are parents allowed to go pick up their kids to lessen the stress and the burden on the staff and teachers and and things like that or is that a no for you guys let's I'll give you two potential sort of clear-cut cases one would be we started school we didn't anticipate a problem but there's a problem probably in Lyon or something now we're going to have to reverse course we've got a release School we've had early releases like that with a water main break
069and a gas leak we didn't anticipate it we did reach out to parents say please come and get your students if it is something where we're evacuating we're going to say parents please do not come because truthfully it's selfish to try to get down there and block it have you been watching the news where the cars were abandoned they left them in the thing and they had to get a front end loader to scrape that road um the best the safest place in this area is at elementary school there's a fire we have food we have water we had Medical care we have communication we have supervision we have everything they need restroom facilities that is a great place and you have dedicated folks there for your kids our first obligation in that case is
070please don't come get your child it just going to and our hope is that we have those roads blocked and and the police don't allow you to go through that's only going to last for like 45 minutes after that's done obviously we want to try to get kids with parents as fast as we can we would start with our our most our our fragile population first the ones that need that have very unique Medical Care we'd want to start with them and then the special students special Edge students kindergarten students primary grades work way up the the chain fifth graders and sixth graders are old enough to kind of take care we're there and they should be able to manage um so the answer would be it depends if it's something we think hey we
071have three or four hours to evacuate absolutely come and get your kids we make that broad announcement I will tell you I will continue to take a very conservative approach if I think that's a potential I will I will not one not have inperson school that day it would be instructional time model or two if we are here and it happened we'll release school so safety is Paramount and I'll tell you this um we will get complaints no matter what we do but I tell you this also if we keep everybody safe it's all going to end up okay and so that's that's our it's inconvenient it's a pain but our job is just keep everybody safe there's a lot of moving Parts it's like moving a little city you have uh and so we're
072thankfully I've got administrators Megan has special education background we're not operating in the vacuum we're not just guessing out at what needs are we have people of very specialized training Mr Webb has has got firefighting experience um we have people that have really unique skill sets are it folks folks are really Adept at helping us think through how are we going to communicate we just recently purchased radios that allow us to communicate because if you remember we had a pretty severe storm snowstorm two years ago we couldn't text we couldn't phone call right now at the elementary school phone uh service is intermittent there's a new tower being installed I hope that improves our reception but if it doesn't all of the administrators have phones and so we're working through all those items there we
073spent a a an hour and a half talking about one item today before the board it was like Hey or how are we prepared for wildfires that'll be a weekly at least weekly meeting for the rest of the school year and that'll pick up when the new superintendent arrives thank you any other questions that's a it's a good question and that's the that's the our the the biggest problem that you have is a parents first inlan Ean is rush to the school and in the in in the incident of or the occurrence of a a school shooting sadly there have been cases where parents have block ambulance access and kids have died because and it might have been their kid so it's just like we really need to work together and we'll we'll just tell
074that to the parents and beg for their help there'll be some that will ignore us but that's why we're going to rely on our partners at the town for law enforcement and fire to help us out with with that it's hard to get around a 35 foot fire trck or whatever and you have you know people in the right areas I will say this though we are we're very fortunate I'll say blessed to have what we have here while it's not nearly as insulated as the elementary it's not super high you know we don't have trees right up against the walls like we've had in years past we've the maintenance has really done a great job in the administration of identifying problem areas and it's not popular cutting down old trees it is not popular
075I guarantee you one of the few complaints I get I can guarantee you viig trees come down I'm going to get a call but you know what we're we're doing the best we can to keep people safe and uh so that's all I have on on the on the on school safety I will I go ahead did you have a question I want to add also we've been working hard for 10 years to get an SRO twice we've had a grant and we couldn't find one the town this time has insured us we'll get one they'll find one SRO we've got a grant for three because of Kimberly's efforts with those other two what we can use is off-duty trained officers from our police department and from sholo to provide support at the elementary in
076the junior high we already get great cooperation from the town and I I mean that we have a presence where people think we have sro's already well we have a presence here because they're always there's probably an officer on the campus at both most of the day and that's just because the town's helping us out we'll have resources to help out with that um with that SRO grants that we have so one we want full-time at the high school that will serve the high school it's where most of the high need issues are because the age group of the kids some at the Junior High um and then for safety reasons we want to have a presence at all three of our schools so that that's our plan going forward Kimberly's not here but she's
077worked really hard at getting that and I appreciate her efforts health safety and Welfare there is a flu respiratory upper respiratory thing going around we're asking parents and kids if you're sick stay home Kimberly she's a soldier she was not feeling well she felt well in the beginning of the day she started feeling not well I said please go home and she did so we're trying to keep each other healthy and safe um so we we'll practice that we do the best we can to stay ahead of that the instructional time model we're one of the few schools that have implemented that that gives us a lot of flexibility if we had a widespread outbreak of this we could still continue educating our kids and if it took a three or four or five days
078we could still continue on it would have to be remote but we can still do it under the instructional time on it gives us flexibility and then our our maintenance does a really good job of of cleaning our our buildings and doing things like you know sanitizing the door knobs and those things they work really hard and we're appreciative of their extra effort I will add that we've been struggling as long as I've been here to get a number of boilers replaced it's a part of a Machinery that heats water and distributes the heat throughout the this building and the main campus and the junior high all those are old I think we have one new one installed in the last 10 years and we have three or four more that we need to get
079one or one or more of those have already been approved we have funding for it but we've been waiting a year or two and we'll wait probably a year or two longer um it's an old facility it's a slow churning wheel even after you get things approved to get them actually paid for and installed we're still working at that um we had rooms that were 47 degrees early Monday we've instructed maintenance to please start leave that running it's going to cost us more money but leave it running on those cold days and we have a process in place to evaluate the facilities by 4 a if we have a broken Piper goes down we may have to have an instructional time model we've had electrical lines gas line broken water lines all of those have
080had where we've had to release school or not have school in the 10 years I've been here with this weather being so bipolar from warm to eight degrees it could occur I'm just giving the board the heads up when when that happens I let the board know I send you a a real early message hey we're going to have an itm today here's what's going on and you can feel free to call me a student population we for the decade that I've been here every December we'd lose 20 30 40 kids we didn't lose 20 30 40 kids we gained about 20 or 25 so that's good and we've gained a line share of those at the elementary in junior high so that's nice because they tend to stay and matriculate up to the other
081grades and uh I'm grateful for that I don't know we may get people moving and while I was talking to the high school day and we may get folks from California that said I'm tired of the Earth shaking and things burning I'm going to Arizona it's cheaper and it's a frankly a better place to live so come on up to Pinetop if you're listening we'll take you we're at 1635 on a student population basis on an a a daily average membership that were funded that numberers probably closer to 1575 um long story short student population is stabilized and we're seeing a small increase uh so I that's good we're not in the position of some larger School District I think Ma announced that they have to lay they they have 1,800 fewer kids those are
082that's Esa those empowerment scholarships we lost 200 kids scholas lost probably 350 snowflake has lost more than that and uh 82% of those kids were already going to private schools by the way so that's not going away I don't think they're going away but we made significant changes last year for the new board members edification Mike you were here when we had to make some make some adjustments um and we did and we reduced our spending by about a million two we did that in advance so we have funds next school year our next school year funds are certain um and that's we we didn't know what to anticipate thankfully our student population has leveled out some of those kids that are that were gone are coming back slowly a small amount that might change
083in the upcoming year and those our boys and girls sports are underway and we have I know we have a a fine arts program that will happen in about five weeks time our kids are busy and they're represent us well and we're proud of them that's all I have if there are no further questions Mr Merill I have none any questions from the board thank you Dr Wright appreciate that next item on the agenda is call to the public this is an opportunity for anybody here to approach the board like to keep your comments to about three minutes not seed your time to anybody else but uh if there's somebody here that would like to address the board we appreciate you coming up state your name tell us what you'd like to tell us nobody
084here to do that um then we just need to announce our next board meeting will be at uh 5:00 P PM February 11th in this location so I need a motion to adjourn unless there's something somebody has a question about I move have a motion to adjourn I need a second second a second from Sylvan all in favor of adjournment hi that you