001I'd like to call this meet into order and we'll begin with the Pledge of Allegiance and I've asked Mary Ford to lead his n ALG 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 all right we'd like to start actually with uh excusing a couple of members here today Kimberly dugdale is on a training travel training today for fin School finance and Diana Butler is under the weather today won't be able to attend with us so we all have probably heard the horrible news that uh uh Mr Ferell fish Mr Fish was uh taken in a terrible accident with his wife this last I think it was Friday Friday afternoon and uh it came as a
002shock uh he is pretty much when you think of Blue Ridge he is one of the persons that you think of I think everybody in this room either had him as a teacher a coach athletic director or principal uh our history goes way back with him I was thinking I talked to him one time and he said he graduated from Lakeside High School and a there's a picture in the superintendent's office in the district office of the first winning Blue Ridge football team and it was actually Lakeside had high he was one of the coaches for that football team way back in the 60s early 60s so he graduated right from college came to work here and he never took another job anywhere else he worked his whole career in the Blue Ridge School District
003and he uh was funny he had a Mr Fish joke almost every day and uh I think if you just remember the man you can remember some of the funny things that he did and said just recently he saw me with this little beard on my face and he says hey Dave why are you growing that hair on your face and I said well my wife says it makes me look smarter and he says well I ain't working Dave you know that's the way the man was he was a legend in B and he going to be missed many people saw him jogging in his 880s he would run uh four five miles every day in his 80s um I love the man I think a lot of people he affected the lives of generations
004in this community for good and I would just like anybody in the board if you had something you'd like to say about feral fish you're welcome to say it right now I'd appreciate it I think you said it all well um I came here as a teacher in 1973 and phell interviewed me for the job and he was the principal at the time so it's going backways backways yeah and I came in 75 and he hired me over the phone I took the job before even I'd never even been here before so he was the one I talked to one of my favorite pharoh legacies is um no child could outrun him so if a kid was doing something wrong he chased him down and took care of it yes he was a character and
005he was one of the reasons blidge is such a great School District um if I'm not mistaken blidge has one girl's basketball championship and he coached that team to a state championship so if if you uh wouldn't mind we'll just take a moment of silence to remember frell thank you so much the uh recognitions for the month of September I'm going to turn over to Dr Wright thank you Mr Mero it's always one of the enjoyable things to do is recognize our wonderful students we'll start off at the elementary level with Mr Grace if you could please honor your student of the month and then we'll move on to miss hoffmeier and then Mr web in that order please so at the elementary school um we went back and forth on our student of the
006month and we had several people that nominated uh kej Wilson kej come on out [Applause] so keyj is a second grader at our school um his teacher Miss poer writes kej is an amazing young man he's very respectful not not only to adults but to his peers as well he is thoughtful considerate and cares about how people feel kej is not afraid to stand up to people if something isn't right he shows great leadership skills and is always willing to help anyone in need KJ is an inquisitive and has a love for Learning and he is an absolute joy to have in class QJ is a great honor to have at our school I see him every single morning um give his younger brother hugs as he lets go of him at the at the
007sidewalk he's an amazing young man he's very deserving of this award kej [Applause] congratulations I requested uh two students of the month this month um if I could please have Kye Meadows and Vince Johnson come up Vince and Kiren are eighth graders at our school year last year they started showing us some of their leadership skills this year they took it up a notch when they started a movement in the cafeteria um they started uh just they asked one day can we stay in and clean the cafeteria sure you can absolutely do that instead of going to recess they stayed in and clean the cafeteria the next day they did it again and a couple kids chose to stay in and help them and they did it again and more kids chose to stay in
008and help them and so every day um they stay in clean the ca the cafeteria after all the students leave with six or seven other kids that choose to stay in and help our cafeteria staff clean up great leadership um I'm excited to see what these guys do as they move into the into high school and career because this is the kind of leader we are super excited to see congratulations [Applause] so high school we are recognizing Jack Woods um he's not a stranger to the board he is an amazing young man he's actually um representing the school at a cross country meet today so he's down in CQ and that's why you couldn't be here tonight um Jack is amazing student in the classroom in the Halls um he represents the school well as
009you've witnessed here in the board meetings when he talks he demands respect attention from the audience and we he's heavily involved with FBA he he's a key part of the student story and why the student story is successful as it is right now so um his leadership skills his performance in the classroom and the way that he treats the other students and adults are those are the reasons why we're recognizing Jack wood so help me congratulate Jack and I'll make sure that he get award congratulations to all those youngsters and now we'd like to highlight a couple of our teachers of the month and we'll start at Mr web again you have both of them [Applause] so we'd like to recognize Mr bestest U Mr bestest is he's social studies teacher at the high school
010he does our AP Government AP US History um and does dual enrollment classes with NPC um so he's got our higher level kids and he requires a lot from them in their classes and he's um this last year as we finished up our AP exams his students that did the AP Gov test 91% of the students that took the government test passed it and 83% of those that took I think it 83 took the the AP US and passed it so those are phenomenal numbers and that's I mean it's you're not going to beat that anywhere so um does a great job in the classroom he's also our NHS sponsor and this last year it's a second year in a row that we've been recognized by by talent for the efforts with his leadership with
011the kids and it's really a kid- driven program and the kids do so much but we got to have the leaders that help push the kids and and so Mar is is a a key part of NHS and providing that leadership to the kids so um another thing that we're excited for Mark and what he's doing with the school this year he is actually meeting with Juniors and starting our scholarship process not only for University bound kids but students that are um they might be in a trade school or they may be looking to stting Community College we want to start them thinking of postsecondary and and Mark is the perfect person with his background with NPC um his skills in the classroom he's able to help give those kids some some goals and some
012aspirations to to start their planning early so we're excited to see what what happens this next year as he works with those kids so we want to thank Mark for his work and recognize him as teacher of the month thank you and then my next one is Brian White we want to recognize Mr White so I I I hired Mr White when I was at the junior high and he came in and he ran our um kind of our alternative school at the junior high and so he's he works really well with those kids who maybe need a little extra guidance and assistance motivation to be successful in the classroom um he worked at the junior high for several years I think he was with Courtney maybe one or two years two years and then
013taught social studies there then he came up we had some re assignment and some shuffling with some positions and so I needed him up at the high school at the end so he started off with the ASU um learning lab and then went into the alternative classroom he helped with classes there um he's helped with our ISS kids so he's really he does great with those kids who need a little push a little reminder um what it takes to be successful in the in the classro and so uh Brian's been great at whenever we have a need he's willing to jump in and and fulfill that need whatever it is whether it's 7 to class he'll take two or three classes in with his class when we're short teachers and so he's always willing to
014help out so we want to recognize him for his willingness and his leadership in the classroom and on the field he's also Al coaching baseball and helping with football so he isn't able to be here tonight cuz he's actually out there coaching so we want to recognize Brian White and his and his work at the high [Applause] school just real quickly Diana Butler is just joining us Mr Merill she's on a speaker on my my phone here in Diana we've just recognized Mr vest for Teacher of the month and Bri white for Teacher of the month and several students for the U students of the month and now we are going to recognize our be star and Miss hoffm if I could please have Dean Moya come out deian is our uh our health Tech
015and our attendance Clerk and we compared her to Mary Poppins today um because she's just she is able to take she's able to find anything somebody came in and said do you have toothpaste I sure do come on back she's got everything you need um and she can fix everything she came Onan came on with us in October I think of last year um and so in the interview she was a delight and after leaving the interview we all said we have to call her immediately so she doesn't take any other job she is she has just proven to be such an asset at the junior high she is compassionate yet she holds students account um she is just somebody that we rely on for multiple things you can give her a task show to
016her I mean this is how we do this one time and here I'll kind of show you but she figures it out and then she teaches us how to do it better so she is just um just um an Irreplaceable person at our at our front office and we love having her this junior high thank you [Applause] our uh Mr President our last bit of recognition um if you'd indulge me for a couple moments is to recognize Margaret Gabby for 37 years of continuous School Board service I'll let that sit sit in there's some people in the audience that aren't 37 years old that is a lot of commitment I'll also point out that we have Diana Butler on the line Diana Butler and Chuck have both invested more than 50 years of service to
017their schooling community um Margaret Miss Margaret is on 46 years so the short timers are 12 and 15 years respectively with M Miss Brimhall and and president Merill this is a it's a privilege to have people that are this dedicated to serve in this community and it's it's a gift to have people that have had long tenure and vested interest in this school district and they all had children attend and graduate from the school district it has been my privilege for 10 years to to serve as their superintendent and I still have another nine or 10 months left July 1 that'll be passed on to someone else but it is a privilege if if we could U if the board president would like to take a picture with Margaret or in the board itself um
018if you would indulge us for a moment president I do think the whole Board needs to be in the picture it's just not me then you can add up all our yours put that in of 37 that's yeah pi than thank you have to find a ww in in a moment uh well after after this Mr President during Miss Hoff me's presentation on the junior high she's also going to talk about the Diana Butler student Commons area and so I wanted just to bring that to the board's attention too and I'll turn the time over to you Mr President thank you back in the mid 90s I served as stin on the school board and Margaret we served together back then that was just yesterday right y all right next item is 2.1 on the
019agenda and we'd ask we've asked uh Dr Mark jorstad to come and give us a presentation and this is open for discussion from the board during this presentation and questions from Dr Jad thank you for coming up appreciate you and I want to start by thanking the board board members for your service for what you do I know it's a highly paid job and you repeatedly thanked for it but um leadership and service like you're giving is really the essence of democracy and it's it's what's so important about our Public Schools remaining functioning vivacious Lively important places for students so I thank you for that and secondly ASA I represent the Arizona School administrators we're honored to work with you on this uh Endeavor of choosing a new leader it's one of the most important
020decisions any board makes and and we uh take it very seriously and appreciate and are honored to assist you in this task okay so let's we're going to start by looking at I'm going to give a little presentation on the search itself the components give you this is an overview so you'll be familiar with it you have a handout in your let's see if I have this up there I do okay and you have a handout if you wish to follow along okay if I set this down like this am I can you hear me well enough no okay I want to go into cring feelings when I have this mic in my hand but I'll spare you okay so let's take a look at the search itself the components of a search how we
021will work together to find the perfect leader for Blue Ridge so we have two goals two goals in a search like this the first goal is the outcome of course select the highest qualified best fit superintendent to lead Blue Ridge Unified School District into the future and notice there's two terms there highly qualified you want someone who is highly qualified ified in many ways but also they need to be the best fit someone who's the best fit for example a large Urban School District might not be the best fit for a smaller rural district and vice versa so we'll work together on qualifications and fit and secondly there's a process goal that this process is transparent to the public there's no questions or secrets about what happens it's it's out in the open we have
022public meetings you vote in public you go on record and and that's very important as well there's no back room deals and suddenly someone comes out with a surprise superintendent announcement so we'll work on those goals together I can be a runaway train when I get presenting so if you have a question just interrupt me don't wait because I might never stop and you you probably won't like that you'll somebody will have to get a hook dragg me out of here okay let's look on the next page this is the timeline we've got six phases in our timeline and I put some dates down for those phases and again this is up to your approval as as we work through this tonight you will be approving the process so understand some of these dates are
023suggested we we've I've consulted with the superintendent we've looked at calendars we think they'll work but again you are the board you are in charge of the search I'm not making these decisions I'm facilitating helping guiding keeping you within the legal parameters that Governor search but it's your search phase one on the top left there develop a profile that's a profile of the position the timeline and the extent of community engagement those are things that we will do tonight action items then we shift down to phase two posting recruiting and and if you decided on a community survey some districts do some don't but we'll be posting this job uh very widely we'll be recruiting I'll be calling people I know who are looking for positions who are well qualified and trying to interest them
024as well we use some national job boards because some there's some people out there who are on indeed or zip recruiter who want to apply that way but we'll also we'll post very extensively in Arizona we will the Arizona school boards Association will list it the Arizona business and education Coalition the Arizona Department of Education of course our organization the Arizona School administrators we'll we'll post widely and and as well I know people and I know people who know people who are looking so we will also make a lot of personal contacts to try to get a a good good I would say a good platter of candidates from which uh you can select then phase three we'll we'll leave that open for a month if you approve this tonight the the information on the
025posting what I call the posting document then give us about a week to make it look pretty to add pictures and dress it up a little bit then we'll try to have it posted well we'll we will have it posted by September 18th possibly a little bit earlier but I don't want to promise something I'm not personally doing um so but by September 18th it'll be posted it'll be posted advertised and recruited till October 23rd so that's a good five weeks and and we should by then have really coralled who who is interested and sometimes it takes people look at something they think about it are they interested they maybe call me and ask about the job ask about the community so on they it takes them a few weeks sometimes to decide to get
026their letters together to get their uh references together so by October 23rd we'll close then a week later we're proposing that a week later on the 30th of October that's a Thursday preh Halloween Thursday we'll as a board together along with with me facilitating you will screen the applications I will screen them in advance and make sure that they're complete they're thorough there's nothing oh odd about the candidates that might that I know of or that I will I will do not a deep dive but I will do a dive into their record as well and make sure that it's pretty good now once we get to a finalist candidates we'll do a much deeper dive but uh but we we will bring forth uh the and you will take those applicants then the applications
027and personally screen each one I'll provide a rubric for screening and scoring screen the applicants then as a board talk about whom do we wish to interview from this group Mark I want to interject right here I think this step right now it's is as a board and I think I can speak for the board we want to open that up beyond the board there's there are three board members that have been elected will take office in January we'd like to be we'd like them to be part of that screening plus there's faculty and administration that we would like them to be part of that screening too in other words the applicants that you feel are good for our district we would like them to meet with these non-board members so that they can make
028a recommendation to the board of the ones that you have submitted and the ones that we are going to interview if if that's okay with you I think that's what the board would like to see I I know we haven't discussed this but I you know I think shuck shaking his head Jennifer shaking her head and Margaret shaking her head I think I think we want to open that up we don't want to open it up to like the public to interview these people but there those three individuals will be working with this person for the next year so you'd like them to sit in on the screening process or the process correct correct the the uh fine screening process yeah we want you to screen the best applicants for us and those that you
029suggested to come to the district and they're interested in doing that we'd like them to be a committee that would sit down and meet with them interview them get their feelings about that person you we'd like the principles to be a part of that we'd like the office staff to be a part of that maybe some key community members to be a part of that but we'd like those three individual board members that are coming out to be a part of that when you're saying interview them you mean interview the candidates as well correct correct so that they can get a feeling who they are so starting at phase three in progress yeah starting at page three F page three phase three is where we'd like them to be instead of the board doing the
030screening we would like them to be part of that screening process you the board would do the screening as well correct you don't want toate the part of that that would be anation of really what's leg responsibility I'm not hearing everything you're saying you you want to do that right we're not going to shove it off to them but we want their input we want to know who they they think they would like to see as the new superintendent of the applicants that you send us we would like to know who they think the best one is and then we will all those that you have brought to us then we will screen those individuals with their input so if if uh us four were applicants we would sit down with the individual members of
031this community the new board members and they would make a recommendation to the board on one of being the superintendent then the board would sit down with those applicants and interview them and make their own final determination I think um I I need to maybe just issue a caution that's happening in my experience is we're not there you go sorry I'm so so used to having a playground voice that people um in my experience doing something like this can work but I just need to issue a caution people get if somebody's left out feels they should be included in this screening process a member of the community so then you you run the risk of frankly alienating people you know you can't please everybody but there are key people that we want to please and
032I think those key people need to be involved the board members Bo the future board members specifically and the principles uh I would I would department heads maybe my suggestion only as a facilitator would be that you use the three soon to be elected or board members because they are they do represent the community correct if you start singling out other individuals in the community well I I don't mean so much to the community but I do think we need to have the principles involved and maybe uh dep department heads uh and finance director you know they need to be involved in this decision too and then the board will make the decision because that that decision can't be made by them it has to be made by us in executive session so with all
033that input then the board will sit down in an executive session and make that decision but we want the input we want to be open in this we want the input from the those key stakeholders so in this kind of screening process it's oh I'm sorry Mr wal were you going to well I didn't I didn't mean to interrupt fine well um you mentioned that you were going to review all the applicants and Screen them and then we're going to screen them are you going to narrow the Fe are you are we going to be looking at all of them I I will only narrow the field if there's something if I detect something false in the application or something it comes in too late or or I discover something in the individual's background that
034I think would become a problem for the board for example a year maybe it was two years ago I I had 21 applicants for one job and I was reading 21 applications and I got to a certain point and I thought was reading the letters of reference I thought I've read this letter before when it it turned out yes I had the a an individual submitted purportedly from two different people two letters that were word for word the same from evidently supposedly from different individuals but somehow these individuals in different states ended up writing the exact same word for word letter and so I I threw that one out I just thought you know that's yeah well I I do believe we're going to trust you that's what that's why you're here we're trusting you
035to get to bring us the cream of the crop but when you bring the cream to us we want to we want to separate it ourselves too Y no and that's that's vital but we do want input we want input from these new folks and I and you might want to touch on why we started this process now so that we can get the cream of the crop instead of those that have signed contracts gone different directions well and you you do get uh by starting this early because many districts start the process around November or December and then they're active in January February and March and then good candidates are interviewing at several districts at once and I just last spring had a situation where one District said this is the person we want
036and I called that person they said they've just taken a job with another District in Arizona so by starting ahead of time you are not competing yet and probably won't be competing with other districts and generally there are 30 positions that that become available in Arizona every year 30 superintendent positions rural and urban all across the state that's that's what we' heard that's why we decided to just go ahead and jump on this to get this process started because it is a process and to be legitimate it takes time and we want the very best so if I can summarize a little bit what I believe that I heard so so I that there will be an initial screening of the applications by the three incoming board members the the the principls I'm not I'm
037sure we're not communicating well it's that's my fault I'm sorry you'll do the original screening you will bring us the cream of the crop and at that day when they're all here there will be a room where they are in and they will they will sit down and they'll meet those those individuals those say five individuals that you've referred to us that they' come to be interviewed they will interview them they'll talk with them they'll get a feing from them then they'll communicate to us who they think they would like to see their list one two 3 four five whatever and their rate of priority and then we as a board will sit down with those applicants and make that final determination so at least we'll have their input I think you're missing phase three
038is what basically what he's asking so we have a phase three so who do we want in phase three so phase three is before they're invited to come to our community we review all the applications correct so they're not even around no that I believe that's what phase three he's going to refer we're not going to review every applicant I think that we do review every application and then we pick our favorites from the application process and we invite six eight I don't know how many people we invite I my well it depends on what you're saying though first is yeah you should see all the applications except ones that I've filtered out for being obviously we're talking the same thing well if we're fortunate and have 20 applications we're not bringing 20 people here
039correct so that phase three screening would be basically the board and we're asking if it we could include the additional three or is that you want to include them in phase four J I think that would water it down so far we would never get the process done right so phase four is when you're wanting the input from the additional three board members that will be taking office in January plus the um stakeholders stakeholders in this primary stakeholders right yeah so are we clear on that now so that's the board will screen the applicants read every application except ones that maybe I throw out for for reasons of being problematic I'm not sure about that I'm I'm not sure that's why we hire you to bring us the best not just everybody that's applied that's
040what he said he said other than the ones that he's do yeah um if I could add a comment I I've participated in this before and I think the the exact number that you bring to us depends on how many apply and how many are viable candidates at that time and then we can talk about can talk with you about it and come down to a number that we're actually going to review correct but if there say there are 50 applicants you don't want our opinion on all 50 applicants to make your decision no and there won't be 50 well I'm just saying you can see how it could get really watered down so we want you to bring us the best and then we'll discuss those best I mean we'll review that and then
041you can we'll start that third phase after that so it and it depends on for example last year I did searches at Cottonwood O Creek there were 21 applicants Mingus Union there were 19 uh Globe there were 12 uh Baghdad there were n or 10 and those boards scored all of those okay and that's a long meeting I I actually as far as the board goes do you want to if there are 20 do you want to score all 20 of those or do you want to take the top 10 that he gives us I would I think the screening process 50% of those will be able to throw out quickly depending on what you know like we would love to find someone that has his um experience or at least I would in a
042rural school district and maybe history so um well are we taking are we taking his work away from him no I think that we're allowing let me give let me be blunt so Mike for example wouldn't have we had a specific screening criteria that we wanted to replace um our previous superintendent and it was rural School District experience Mike would have never qualified for that if someone took his application and said well they really wanted that but we loved what we saw with his experience that he had in the CTE portion of of something that was really important for us so if we start throwing out applications based on an arbitrary where we feel like this is where our classification is and then we get some really cool Stellar candidate that creates something a little
043bit different for us I would like to see that and if we gave him that list of arbitrary NOS then we would have missed out on a an opportunity because Mike was like we all I remember we were I mean we were like do we want this guy's a little different so I think the concern I think you just have to wait and see who applies and how many apply and how many are truly qualified and when you get down to that point then I think we decide how many of those we want to really review ourselves right so we'll be probably in close communication with you there to start with in terms of preparing sorry you're really looking at the board screening initially I would screen the board would screen and you would bring
044in selected candidates and at that point the other three board members would get involved correct at that point then when we get it down to like three to five people then the other board members are going to come in I mean not the board other board members the the new elected board members those that are on the ballot that nobody ran against so they got they they're here by uh default because nobody actually they're so popular everybody said I can't I can't run against them so yeah so so I think that could that could work and okay the the process if we encumber it too much then you you you but up against your hopeful deadline that's I don't want that to happen I want this to happen in a timely way so when we
045get say five or six that we've all settled on then we want to invite those uh shareholders stakeholders whoever you want to call those those people that have a vested interest in the new superintendent we want them to to sit down with those people and determine who they would like to see in there and we would take their recommendation we might not go with it but we probably all will be feeling the same way because we all have the same desires for the school district I'm sure would you like me then to design phase 4 November 7th the actual interviewing in such a way then that includes an initial frankly interviewing of these people by this this group um I I think that's probably and then after that they would make a recommendation to you
046and that I'm thinking maybe that same day yeah it would be this might be an all day yeah night because you really don't want to have people coming at their own expense more than once correct correct yeah I could I could design that and it's very important on interviewing that the process is standard the questions are standard every candidate is treated the same correct so you don't want to give any inadvertent uh occasion for someone to claim bias or or something at a later date but I could I could make that work um good we would leave October 30th and for the date the board screens the applications and selects candidates to interview right and then uh the November 123th we would sit down in executive session to do negotiations yeah and by probably if
047things go well by the end of the day on November 7th you may have the person that you're most interested in but then you would negotiate with that person individually yeah that you and the board generally the board that's what we wanted isn't it yeah the board usually designates one person often the president not always to work with the attorney of the district and the candidate on contract negotiations 29.95 [Laughter] that's a joke that's a joke Mary so I think we've just covered phases 1 2 3 and four this phase five the board and attourney enter into contract negotiations in phase six then at your December 10th meeting you would hopefully present a contract and a candidate to the board for final official approval I would love that that would give that person time to
048get settled in and see how this District works and and just hit the ground running July 1st so phase four will be a very important day November 7th and and I'll what I always do in that and I'll just bring that up right now as I include a little bit of guidance and training on certain things in an interview to make sure the process is standardized everybody gets the same questions and it's it goes off the ra easily so great that's why I think that's important and I would as as your facilitator right I would facilitate those interviews in other words bring the candidates in here they are and groups one group the board the other group The the invited interview interviewers correct when I would facilitate their interviews as well so I think we're
049on the same page now okay all right thank you thanks for being patient with me no all I graduate of snowflake Union High School and have a hard time communicating sometimes this is a it's the most maybe not the most important almost the most important decision the board ever makes because if it goes wrong it has real detrimental effects when it goes right as your previous one did not a pun on the word right but uh the district benefits for many years so the next page let's see if I can this is still work okay here's just another look at the search process what happens in executive session and what happens in Open session so phase one we've we we're doing that right now and that's in Open Session we'll vote on it you I
050shouldn't say we you I'm using the Royal we but I'm not part of it phase two posting recruiting no community no um no board action needed phase three screen applicant and select candidates determine interview format that's the board usually that's done in executive session then you come out of executive session and you determine you make a formal uh motion to acknowledge what you've done and at that point by the way we usually tell candidates your candidacy is confidential until or should you become a finalist at that time when districts announce finalists your name will would be made made public because sometimes you have Sitting superintendents who want to be a candidate maybe they aren't ready to release to their District that they're interested but if they become a finalist then they need to understand yes
051can I ask you to hold the microphone a little closer I have trouble understanding I my fault I start gesturing I'm a I'm a wave my hands type of person when I talk and okay I appreciate you're calling me on that so then phase four now this would generally phase four the interview the candidat select a finalist that occurs in executive session but we're including a lot of more people now who aren't necessarily the board members so we would probably hold that you want to hold that in the public I'd have have to get legal advice I don't think you do no so we'll say we're going to hold it in executive session I need to get the advice of a lawyer on if that causes difficulty when you have non-board members in executive session
052but I would think if you have the designated including three who are coming on to the board that that could be workable yeah I don't know we'll find out can you find out for us who is your attorney we have a number of them uh for a generalist we probably called Dave that's a good one Dave is good yeah he'll he'll know the answer to that okay I've worked with him quite a bit Above All Above All We just want that input on those people from from those individuals and from the stakeholders one of the things we do on this evening is determine the extent of of input and you've just discussed and determined that okay the other thing that happens possibly that night if you would still want it depending on how long a
053day do you want do you want to have the candidates who are chosen to be interviewed you want to have a community meet and greet for them that's up to the board I mean you we'll do that after the decision's made yeah okay phase five that's the negotiations and phase six is on the new superintendent cont phase five will be strictly the board only yes that won't include those those and generally you have a board represent the board selects one person to really you don't want four or five different board members calling a candidate or the candidate's attorney and you want one one point of contact to avoid confusion that'd be the last great thing Margaret got to do right okay should we move on thank you this is great no you're you're doing it
054a great job of working these things out I appreciate it you can tell this group has worked together a while duties and responsibilities of the Arizona School administrators and I'm just going to lay out here's what we will do then what you will do Consulting with the board throughout the search process and I'll be Consulting with the board extensively as we've done tonight and as we'll continue to do ASA will provide agenda language for search related board meetings items so make sure those items are are legal and and written correctly collaborating with the board on developing a timeline which we've just done publicizing the vacancy and providing related documents that will be upcoming communicating with all the applicants so the communication with the applicants will occur through me if an applicant calls you for something
055you would say appreciate your interest contact Mark J said at of the Arizona School administrators here's his phone and email otherwise you too many cooks tend to get things confused so so I'm the point of contact and I will notify all applicants I'll notify the ones who are selected for an interview I'll notify the ones who aren't and and I'll do the legal notification as well that when somebody's someone is discussed in an executive session they have to be properly notified legally notified I'll do all that scheduling and facilitating the entire interview process and this one maintaining strictest confidentiality and that's extremely important and when we're going to have a broad if I could use that term broad executive session as is envisioned it'll be really important for everyone who attends that executive session to
056understand that what happens in executive session stays in executive session and so we'll I'll I'll go over that in detail but but you don't go out later and say I really favored this candidate but everyone else want I have a I have a question if we prefer um as we get closer to that date to having an executive session with the board the existing board members and then bring in the new board members I mean the only time we have time to actually discuss amongst ourselves on a topic like that would be an executive session and then bring them in is that considered possible so this would be the if I can think of it this way the third meeting that day well that that meeting we're having the executive session I guess that's three
057and that includes not just the three board members but if I understood correctly includes like yes but is there is can you see a situation where we would divide that up and have the board members meet first and then we bring in the the uh incoming board members and the um principles I I or not I think there's problems that I think the final decision has to be made by the city El yes yeah we realized that but I I like you said The more we get into executive session the harder it gets and these board members have not even though we're including them they have not had any training on and I will review that okay a little more extensively than I normally do considering we'll have that would be great principl certainly are
058familiar with maybe not haven't been in executive session but they're familiar with school law executive session right so what I'm what I'm hearing potentially is when we want to have that final discussion that that's when we enter into executive session where we release those individuals that were part of the preliminary portion of the executive session and then we convene into the executive session with just the board members is that that's what I'm envisioning okay so we can control it like that we we don't have to have that set up ahead of time or what what I will try to do is is schedule out a draft a schedule for that day roughly depending on saying maybe five people four or five being interviewed see how it works logistically and then maybe runed by uh Mr
059Merill the board president and make sure that we're all on the same page here before we I mean that's a couple months away so we we got some time to do it and if you give us time to think about this we might come up with some other things too sorry no that's a we want to do it right yeah and the duty of a board member is to make these decisions with the most careful consideration which is exactly what you're doing right now so that's the duties and responsibilities of Asa the duties and responsibilities of the board are adhering to all statutes related to the Arizona open meeting law that's very important as as you know people have lost their board positions by not adhering referring all Communications with applicants to the the ASA
060search consultant until the board enters into contract negotiations with the finalist so if an applicant calls you and says could we have a can I meet with you and get your take on the district you would say call Mark Jord said at the ASA office it's very important for you as individual board members to remain Above The Fray to remain above the fry so to speak and not give any reason for someone to perceive that a certain candidate has gotten information other candidates have not g so that's that's a very important thing being pres for required meetings which you are and I thank you providing ASA consultant with required information and approvals in a timely manner determining final candidate that's up to you and entering into contract negotiations is up to you what I'm here
061to help you with is adhering to equal employment opportunity laws and helping you maintain strict confidentiality and especially setup procedures that enforce STP confidentiality and also to advise you on open meeting law and other statutes that apply to a selection can I move on guidelines recommendations it is recommended that the board follow a moratorium on contact with the media if the if I don't know if you have an active media here an active of newspaper who reports on every I've been in Prescot for example the reporter had me on speed dial and but it's very important that that one voice answer those questions rather than you can make an offand remark about oh I'm really interested in the qualifications of a couple of the candidates and suddenly the rumor mill starts and there's names attached
062to those candidates and it becomes that mive especially in small communities and I was born and raised in a small community was a superintendent in a small community perception getting that rumor mill going is is we've got to be so careful about that about um everybody's in everybody's business and sometimes that's good actually neighbors look out for each other but it also can lead to rumors false information coming out and so it's better if I'm the source of that then if false information goes out it's on your incompetent coun consultant not in the board member it is recommended that board members do not contact potential superintendent applicants finalist prior to or after the screening process but what if you have a candidate you think might be a good one should you call that candidate no
063no call me text me email me I will call that candidate and I want to say similarly if we have staff members who know people who they think would be good candidates uh contact me and and give me their names and I will reach out to those candidates we've often come up with good candidates by someone knows someone who's always wanted to come back to Blue Ridge and now is their chance so we care well the bottom line is we want to avoid any action that gives cand a perception that their candidacy has an advantage questions on that on any of these things any questions from anyone no I think we I think we hit you with a bunch of questions early no and that's good I mean I think we just made some accomplish
064some very important things here okay I think we're all on the same page now yep so let's if we can if we can move on to uh 2.2 then we will um you'll have a chance to make some other decisions and and make them make them official as well all right so Bard we we don't have to vote on item 2.1 item 2.2 we it's an action required item so we'll have to vote on item 2.2 this is the governing board will discuss the components of a position advertising document and may consider approval to direct the Arizona School administrators to construct and publish an advertising document related to the position of district superintendent so Mark yes and this is the the several page posting document that I believe was sent to you a while ago
065this will form the content here will be once once you've approved it will be transformed into a flash year more attractive graphic and photofilled listing for the candidates that that we will post out on our job lines that we will make available that the for the district to to send it out if they have people they wish to send it to as well so what we're really looking for here is the content has everybody had an opportunity to review that we we were sent it early and uh I I can't I had one question and I I didn't highlight it I'm sorry I'm going to have to just review it one quick time yeah and I can highlight a couple things that frequently bring up questions go ahead and do that while I'm looking let's
066let's look I think the the information is is correct that's come from ad and it's also come from yeah your District leaders on things like enrollment and budget and tax rate and so on but uh let's take a look at this would be page three in the middle of Page Three position requirements let's just make sure that you're fine with these position requirements 5 years teaching experience in a public school system master's degree from an accredited University three years principal or building level administrator experience current Arizona superintendent certificate or ability to attain one fingerprint verification from the state of Arizona doctorate degree preferred not required finally knowledge and recent leadership experience in Arizona schools and Rural settings preferred which one of these do you think is is required in state law state law I believe
067the superintendent certificate doesn't it no no who you tell us Arizona fingerprint verification oh verification yeah that one are really up to discretion most districts want a superintendent certificate or ability to attain one but some districts have brought in right outside candidates with no educational experience but leadership experience I I knew what my question was the doctorate degree but that's you answered it when you said preferred I clearly listed as preferred correct it'll be clearly spelled out that that's similarly you would really like someone who's done some rural leadership experience in Arizona that would be the ideal thing that they know what they're getting into we might have some great candidates that don't have that so that's why we put that as prer as well there's also salary and on page four salary and contract
068the salary range and it's often you publicize it as a range because depending on the candidates education prior experience qualifications they might be in different parts of that range so this the suggested range here the salary for this position is 160 to 175 and that's that's based primarily on salaries offered recently in comparable Arizona districts for example Blue Ridge your blue sholo hired a new superintendent last year they listed that I think at 150 to 165 and I I believe the salary offered was closure to the higher end of that range but that's a very comparable District um Prescot I did a search there a couple years ago and and they ended up over 150 and that's a somewhat similar Community as well can we reduce that to 150 to 175 you're the board certainly
069can reduce that or if you want to give it a bigger range one you I think a larger range would be just fine okay yeah but then you the benefit package too right which increases it substantially so I think with a larger range it gives us more flexibility and again this is the range for the position now if you get somebody who just is is wonderful but maybe they don't have the experience you get to the bottom end maybe if you got someone who's wonderful and has every qualification and everything else then maybe you go to the top or it depends on what happens in negotiations this is not locking you in but it's it's suggesting if some candidate wants to make 250,000 they shouldn't bother applying correct probably anywhere in Arizona but okay then
070if you look down toward the bottom there's just a couple other things there in the underlined and part there an applicant's file must be completed and filed with Asa by 5:00 p.m. Arizona time and we we close it we close it down then and it must be complete and I I've as they come in I review them carefully if they're not complete and they's still time I contact the candidate and say say you didn't do this and this and this so if you don't do those things we will not continue your candidacy so so they get plenty of warning on that right if you don't have a deadline you never get it finished we have to have a deadline right yeah because then this triggers the screening process and interviewing and unless you want to
071and my understanding is you don't want to you want to beat everyone to the punch so to speak correct so this is I think this will work then we lay out the dates and the bottom the search timeline vacancy announced September 18th then on the next page deadline for applications applicant screening now on that I will change that to with your permission applicant screening by the governing board and committee or do you want me to just add that because we're kind of com no the committee isn't screening the committee is interviewing correct okay sorry I did actually get that I added finalist interviews if needed because sometimes you have a group like you're envisioning and you come down to two candidates and they're both very strong and half half the members want one half the
072members want the other and and you say you know what I'd like to have them both come back and probe more deeply in my experience the last seven or eight that I've done that has not happened what's happened is the opposite sometime you had one board interview seven candidates which is a lot of people to interview that's s hours of interviews right there after the seven hours they when we started talking they said they all wanted one candidate who stood up and that was it other questions comments concerns additions changes to this posting document to the content the visual will look a little different any questions anybody no questions I guess I need to ask for a motion to vote on item 2.2 I have a motion from Jennifer have a second from Margaret all
073in favor I'm uh Diana do you want to say I thank you for letting me take part do you want to vote on this item Diana I or nay I thank you Diana all right thank you item 2.3 board discussion and action concerning stakeholder participation and involvement the governing board will discuss and may consider approval of the extent of stakeholder involvement that may be included in the search proess process for a new district superintendent and direct the school Arizona School administrators in conjunction with District administration to develop specific plans which may include Community meet and greet I think we kind of hashed that over already and we we have a a consensus on that what we would like to see I just have one question how frequently is a community meet and greet and how
074productive is that probably three the four districts I work with do that how productive is it I I wouldn't say it's been influential in the decision making at all just being honest based on without violating executive session I won't give any specific districts but when they've gone in to to weigh carefully at the very end it's the interviews and that really Absol it very do you ever do like lunch or something that the community can come and meet and greet during a like a lunchtime many of them have it right after school because that gives staff members who have a strong interest a chance to to meet and greet I've also done very formal sessions where the the finalists sit up on a little stage like this one and I'm the moderator and I ask
075them questions submitted by the audience there's not a questioning by the the audience because that gets into a a situation in which the loud voices which aren't always the most thoughtful voices Prevail um so a controlled environment like that I have not seen it to be honest in eight or nine searches influence the final decision of the board by then the board has spent quite a bit of time with the candidates even though they haven't discussed it one thing is when we interview a lot of candidates we don't at the end of each interview when that person leaves we don't chew the fat on that candidate we wait till all of we talk to all of them but what about the Buy in so afterwards you know we live in a community that likes to
076have a say and a lot of things so if they get to meet if they if there's a meet and greet I think that's the only benefit is the meet and greet is they're able to see all those candidates because we we live in a community that might say Well they're trying to withhold the candidates from us you know I I think we had kind of against that I am too I am I'm kind of against that because then that opens it up for everybody to have an opinion yeah which and that's just going to water down the process and it's going to be that's what we're here for yeah we've got to make the choice we've got to make the decision and and honestly I think if you had those people come up I
077think that would just be add another day to what they would have to take I could note that you've given the kind of community input that you're proposing here is is beyond any search that I've done I've done about a dozen of them in in terms of envisioning a committee actually participating in the interviews that's that's huge Community involvement not by the whole you can't get the whole community in the right but you got Representatives your new incoming board you've got uh some of the the teacher leaders the staff leaders I you're giving very good I mean that that's critical input because that's decision making input sitting in on the interviews that's I think too one of the reasons we decided about this with the with the um principles especially and the financial person is
078that we have a team that works really well together right now and I think they have a right to participate in it so that doesn't bother me at all I think that's something we have to do but having a meet and greet before we've made a final decision I you you already got quite a bit of activity for that day depending on now maybe you only end up interviewing three go a little more quickly than usually an interview is an hour 15 minute break between each interview so even three people ends up being four hours five or six people ends up being 9:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. in a little break and it's challenging well and then we would require all of the candidates to be present all day correct and waiting for that meeting
079I think we're getting ahead of ourselves a little bit yeah these are the thoughts Che we'll think about you have any thoughts on that we have to vote right you have any thoughts on that opinion okay Diana do you have any questions about uh the input from community no I think we just need to be sure that we get it okay thank you I think youall heard that di said I think we just need to make sure we get it and I think we're going to get it so any further discussion on on item 2.3 if not can we have a motion to accept item 2.3 as presented that one's not oh that one is an action item okay pardon Jennifer I got confused I have a motion from Chuck a second from Margaret all
080in favor say I I Diana we lost her we lost her that passed unanimously okay item 2.4 is also an item that is an action item so we'll have to vote on that this is U governing board will discuss and may consider approving questions specific to District to be included in District superintendent position application advertise to Arizona School administrators you went through that already uh Bard there any other questions or qualifications that need to be in that uh public notification you actually have this this refers to custom questions in the application custom yeah and you you have a you have a um a short one pager on that that you should have is this is just This concerns now the application itself we use right this is on the anything we want specific on that
081application if you want to add a custom question to right to what you are to supplement what you already have yeah I understood that is there anything specific you have listed the the questions that they're asked to provide no I think it's great it's this first page correct it's the one that says Blue Ridge Unified School District superintendent search September 10th M potential custom questions for application I really think it's thorough it's toward the end of the packet I would think it's this one very it's we've got it we got it all let me let me just point out a couple things about the and I'll be be uh quick for example one of the questions that's included is describe your management leadership style they can do a maximum of 200 words it's really interesting
082what you sometimes find out some people's management style they'll say love all the kids that's it then the next candidate will have a beautifully crafted five paragraph essay of 199 words hitting on the highlights of their management style and it's up to you as a board to decide who spent more time on the application who didn't it's interesting what's what's revealed by questions like that or what's not revealed so do we want to add any more specific type questions like that are we pretty well covered then so I think we're ready to vote I think this is very thorough that's wise because the more you include the more you have to re exactly right I think this is thorough yeah I agree all right so item 2.4 I have a motion to accept item I
083mean to vote on item motion from Chuck second from Margaret all in favor say I I I thank you Diana okay item 2.5 is just uh information uh and I you probably covered this already but it's um Consulting will Pride an overview of the next search and discussion details and we went through that in your presentation already yeah and we you discussed it extensively on the screening and and I think we're right is there anything else you'd like to add while you have the mic in your hand no I commend you on really working a complex uh situation out and rather successful I think it'll work just just fine if I have questions as I'm really trying to prepare a written version of this I will can relay them directly through superintendent Mike or if
084you want to I can call you as you can call me anytime okay except after 9:00 yeah I'm just kidding all right thank you very much appreciate you being here thank you board members for your thank you patient cauti we it's not an action item so thank you next item on the agenda are the goals uh to be presented to us um for the upcoming 2004 2025 year who wants to start everybody's pointing to Ryan so we'll start with Ryan we'll do you Courtney and then we'll do your Lauren okay and we have your goals here right if if the principles could keep the mic close to their mouth so we the board could hear it'd be great um so at the elementary school uh just to start off by sharing some of the great
085things that are happening um here and I don't I don't think this is my updated presentation get an update no we have is this is this your updated one that is four pictures in the bottom yes yeah we have it we have yeah all right I'll go off memory you want to borrow mine if you know mine I'd love to see one thank you so just to kind of start off one of the biggest things um since I've been here this back to school night is our biggest event of the year uh we typically have people overflowing into to what used to be range grass and now it's mud when it rains but we had over 1,600 people show up to back to school night this year which was just incredible I mean our hallways
086were filled people were happy the the kids were happy to be back it was it was a tremendous night um we got a lot of people registered that night and our staff just did an outstanding job trying to manage that many people going through the building um we had a couple things that we had to to change up in the moment and we were able to take care of those the following week like printing badges for everybody um and we were we were able to get it done and the the following week when we started school we printed I don't know 225 badges in one day made sure everybody got one and had what they needed uh it was really good so back to school night it was a it was a blast um I'll
087just leave that one up there uh we all recently as recently as today actually so this really nice Banner that's back here we to I took it down and took it over there and we used it as our backdrop so we have we don't typically allow parents down the hallways on the first day of school um it prolongs students getting into the classroom it prolongs that attachment between between the parents and the kids and it's just easier if we do it all outside and then we can get our day started and most parents almost all of our parents are really on board with that uh so I I hauled this giant Banner over there um and we we got one at the elementary school so it's something that we'll be able to use for all
088of our photos moving forward and everything like that so we got a new one um to use as a backdrop but it worked really well people loved it uh and so back to school went off without a hitch we didn't have any any issues with uh our transportation or anything like that coming in on the first day and it was it was great um a couple additional changes this year we got a new PE teacher uh it is Mark calesi um he came on with the understanding of we want to make sure that kids are seeing teamwork and foundational skills to sports um not a bunch of for lack of another word to say made up games that don't get them anywhere we wanted to help our Athletic program by getting kids to understand the
089basic rules of sports and understand that teamwork is necessary and so he started off with with soccer and he I walked in there at one point and he had 24 kindergarten kids all with soccer balls and it was absolute chaos um but he had his whistle and he was coaching and he was I mean he didn't know all their names on the first day but they were kicking soccer balls and by the end of it they were they were dribbling the ball down the the court um when they were playing inside and kicking into the goal and doing things like that um and our bigger kids they were learning the art of passing the ball and he had them doing touch passes which is I have a soccer team myself we have not mastered that
090skill yet um of when the ball gets to you just pass it on to the next person and so he was he was doing that and um he has moved into basketball which is the sport that he actually prefers and so they're they're moving forward with that but it's great to see our kids seeing that teamwork and those skills being built from from the lower levels um he also goes over the rules and things like that with them which is an area that I I visit our recess and rules are of sports are lacking um slide tackling is a thing that they all think they can do and and it's just not um and so has been working on that really hard uh the next slide shows a couple things that we had that were
091centered around literacy um so we had Bas a high school from down in their academic decathalon team from down the valley come up um Miss D organized all of that they came up and did a full day of community service uh at the elementary school and they donated over 6,000 books to the elementary school um that they they fundraised for down in the valley and they had donations for down in the valley and they brought them up sorted them out by grade level with our librarian and they were able to pass those out um we were also uh joined by Wendy Winters she is part of the Arizona kids need to read program she came in um once again facilitated by Miss Dy and every single kid preschool through six got a book like she
092gave them a book through her program every kid preschool through Kinder preschool in kindergarten they also got a stuffed animal that had a light in it and if you would press the middle of it and my daughter got one she absolutely loved it if you press the middle of it the light comes on but you have to read to it before you can do that and so my daughter came home and she had this this stuffed bear and she read to it and pressed it and the light came on and and that was the power that that Lit these these things up and and it was great our preschool absolutely loved it um our kindergarten kids she came in and read to them and they got to act out one of her books with her
093it was a it was a great day um we also had several service dogs come in through Miss D class as well that kids could read to so some of our lower levels some of our kindergarten kids they got to read to the service dogs which is just a great opportunity kids the kids don't see any um pressure to do that they they could sit there and read and the dog doesn't care um if they're reading the right words or not and and so for our younger kids they're just telling a story they're flipping the pages and telling a story and and it makes it a great experience um following Pages show some of our staff we have a great staff at the elementary school like I couldn't be more blessed with the staff that
094we have they are I would assume that it's parent conference week right now and probably 60% of my staff is still on campus holding parent conferences right now um and they were yesterday and they will be tomorrow and they want to make sure that every parent has the ability to come in and talk about their kid and what they they can work on and what they're doing great and and areas that we can improve and so we have an absolutely outstanding staff we had four people retire last year that impacted this town and this community and in ways they'll never know um they are missed this year there's no question about that but um our our staff is is just great I mean I don't have a whole lot of other words for that so
095forgive me on that one um a couple other things that we did we had our yellow tracks were back last year we had almost a hundred kids that came over and our high school track program put on the track itss program for our kids and taught them field events and um some of the sprinting events and things like that it was an after school program that we it was free we provided the transportation over for them and we had about a 100 kids take up on that which is just great um especially be a be able to interact with our high school track team um who did a fabulous job uh last year we had four kids from Blue Ridge go to the County Spelling be three of those four were from the Elementary School
096um and so in that the packet that you have you can see some pictures of them they were all finalists and then we had one of our students that is at the junior high place second in the County Spelling be um which is great they spell words that I could never dream of um and so it's just outstanding experience for them perfect attendance has been on the rise for us I know that's been something that that has been kind of all over recently on chronic absenteeism and things like that our our attendance Is On The Rise um when we started our perfect attendance breakfast we had 79 kids that first quarter that had perfect attendance so just shy of 10% of our campus showed up every day um to end last year we had over
097187 kids with perfect attendance in the fourth quarter of the year which is a difficult quarter to have perfect attendance in the first place but I mean we are just working that one and and making huge strides we also had 11 kids on campus that had perfect perfect attendance they didn't have any tardies they didn't get checked out they didn't show up late they didn't leave for an appointment and come back or anything we had 11 kids with perfect perfect attendance and so we had a uh Apple iPod Touch donated that we let them draw for um as well as some gift cards and things like that that were donated to us from the community um our ELD program is is growing and they're showing growth we had three students at the elementary school show
098proficient last year on the aella test which is is Big um we're getting a lot of students these days that that are uh emergent to know English and and so we're making progress and and getting kids moved into that proficient and into the monitoring stage following that um as far as our goals go to be able to support this strategic plan um we implemented a PLC classroom on campus to reduce distractions and and be able to show visible data uh you can't have the kind of data we want up to see all the time in a classroom because of of privacy laws and things like that and so we have that in our PLC room and we have visible data showing where kids are at and tracking how they're doing and how the progress is
099going so that we can Target our in instruction to be what they need um and that's how we're going to to make the next steps in our our journey forward is by really focusing in and looking at what we're doing and and evaluating that based off of the data um the other one is to continue the implementation of our data management system we are taking more meaningful tests now than we were um which is important to our first goal um we need data that is actionable data that shows up quickly that tells us you know that lesson today didn't work but if we take a test and nothing happens with the data from that then we just waste a little bit of our time and so that's that's a big goal for us is to
100make sure that those data in or those data conversations are happening um that we have the right people scheduled to be in those rooms to be able to best affect students um um and then lastly we are working with uh with our committee on campus some parents our site Council to try to involve and get people in the doors um it's a partnership at especially at the at the youngest of Ages it's a partnership with these kids education and so getting their parents to show up is or meeting their parents where they're at is uh is something that we have to do and we have to constantly be looking at any questions on all of that so far all right um as far as professional development for the 2425 school year it's in it's coming
101down the pipe that by August uh 27 correct 27 28 uh all all staff that are teaching all teachers that are teaching an English class or reading class in K5 must be literacy endorsed now if you have a reading endorsement you are already covered there but you have to be literacy endorsed in order to teach English in the K5 setting um and so we were able to work with with uh the district office and and Kimberly and and uh part of preparing for that is taking Parts A and B and it's a training and it's a two-year training and we were able to enter into a partnership with Susan Midkiff for that she has a couple kids in our school district and she presents the letters training um and so we are starting that in
102October so October 14th will be our first day for that um the letters training is language Essentials for teaching reading and spelling um and it'll be an eye opening experience for for a lot of our staff because it is a very deep professional development that will help them understand exactly what the child's mind is going through as they're trying to grasp these Concepts and so I'm really excited about that I know Kyla's really excited about that um and we were able to get all of our teachers at the elementary school signed up for that training um and we're going to be able to to help them towards that at the end they'll still have to take their test for their literacy endorsement but there'll be a big step closer there and and we'll have teachers
103that that have seen that very good professional development any questions there all right um as far as upcoming events we have our book fair going right now and we have grandparents day breakfast tomorrow um just coincidentally they're together uh it makes our book fair very good for our campus um but the book fair is going and so that's that's an exciting thing and then uh we are gearing up to for the parade um we are the reigning best school entry from 2023 um just saying got a plaque uh we are the reigning best school entry and so we are gearing up to uh to have some more students even this year than we had last year um it's it's a little bit more difficult because we have to our students have to be more closely
104monitored um than than they are when they get a little bit older and so we have a lot of parent teers that are chipping in for it and we have a lot of students so we should I think probably have around 70 students 75 students participating in the parade this year which is is great um and then the last photo was one that we took last year uh that is the class of 2024 so the outgoing seniors and the kindergarten class and so we took it out back behind the building and so our their last year and their first year so we took that one and I just thought it was a pretty cool photo to to include in there um and so yeah that the elementary school we're moving forward and and I'm I'm
105super happy to be a part of it so if there's any questions love this thank you Mr Grace appreciate appreciate everything you've done there Elementary School looks like a fun place to be right now we are trying cool thank you very much all right Junior High uh so I'm going to do a quick recap on our 23 24 year uh and then go into our goals for this year so uh I just want to so I um one of the focuses we had last year and we continue is kindness uh and so the uh be kind to show kindness every day um we're on a good start for that again this Year too we've got a lot of leaders in our students that are are really stepping forward and showing a lot of kindness and
106we saw a lot of that last year as well um we do try to strive to make sure that that we we give that message to the students that they matter and they belong uh and we feel like it's it's working there are for junior high they are a happy Bunch for the most part I'm looking at Miss Gro for some wouldn't you say they're pretty they're a pretty fun Bunch um so it's on I guess for the raid is what I'm hearing we've got some competition here with the elementary school um we had a great turnout last year this was our uh our parade turnout for elementary junior high and high school and so it was so great to see all of the Blue Ridge uh schools out in attendance for that so we
107are going to be working on trying to have that same kind of attendance this year as well it's a great time for the kids and although we asked them to just Loft candy really carefully at the uh at all the parade attendance it turns in into we have to have people dodging candy because those kids get into throwing candy at the at all the parade uh attendees so we had a huge amount of student engagement last year I owe we owe a lot of that to our student council and Miss Gro actually um is has been our student council sponsor for quite a few years um and Miss Pollock who runs yearbook and they actually put so many different events together for our students last year and made it such a fun school year uh
108but above that all of the engagement that the teachers have just different events that they have going on in their own classrooms different engagement strategies we you can walk into any classroom in the junior high and see students engaged in learning uh and then all the extracurricular activities as well we had a great turnout for sports last year and our music program and I'll get to that in a little bit as well um but aside from that we also had some uh some field trips that students got to participate in a lot of dances uh at the junior high that were super fun and Coach Robins actually led a lot of those line dances and taught students some really awesome moves at the junior high and so we appreciate all the involvement from our teachers
109and our staff because they really put these amazing events together for the students um a little bit more we had our um we had our talent show at the end of the year we have some really amazingly talented students at blidge and so we were we were blown away by some of the things that we were seeing from that talent show um also that bottom picture of the student we the I just have to go back to kindness really quickly with our students at the junior high sometimes sometimes junior high students can be tricky but they will always surprise you with the amounts of kindness that they show to others uh and so we love that about those 13 and 14 year old students couple of achieve achievements that we had last year um a
110lot of community service work and that again teachers uh put together community service projects for the students we had some students that built a little Library Library where in our hallway where students can just take free books and return them when they're done um we also had our second place winner uh Spencer whitting at the Navajo County Spelling be and then we had two patriots pen we actually we had a few Patriots pen essay contest winners we do this uh project with the VFW every year and we always have winners that go on to uh to District region and state and so uh jet gerardi was our first place winner in uh the school or excuse me in the District um and then parley uh Brandon I think was was third or fourth place but
111then went on parley went on and what received first place in the region and then fourth place in the state so we had some State winners as well at the Junior High in that writing contest and that's a really great it's always on patriotism and democracy um and so it's a really great contest for the students to be involved in we also had our performing arts or uh all of our band choir and Orchestra all received either Excellence or per or um superiors at their festivals last year and the numbers are growing in our music program which is really exciting we have so many Elementary School students that are that are already participating in our after school music program um and filtering up to the junior high so we're excited to see the growth there
112um and then our Veterans Day assembly another great turnout um that's always a really big event at the junior high and again with the help of our student council uh it was an amazing event and this is our class of 2028 who are now current freshmen and uh they brought all their energy to the high school this year and so the teachers and staff were just very grateful to all of the help that they give and the support they give to the students I apologize for the small font I was trying to keep my slides a little bit less but if you look at our math goal and our Ela goal for the 2425 school year they're very similar because what we're looking at is two things we um we want to bring our achievement
113up for sure in our proficiency levels that the in our uh in our meets and exceeds we are we're looking at the we have actually a a large number of students who are partially proficient and they're just about to that point and so we're recognizing that those students that are right there at that cusp need a little bit of extra support um to get them to this to that proficiency level and so we're working on looking at some standards just what are our gaps and so we'll be looking at at at pulling those um pulling all that data and we'll go into that in just a minute um with our uh with all of our action items but we do want to make sure that we're bringing those levels up um we weren't happy with
114our scores this year and just as Mr Grace had mentioned uh attendance for sure plays parts of that um and so we already have some different incentives for students to be at school every day and so we're excited about some of those that are those things that are happening the other piece is that we're looking at our community engagement and and improving our are increasing our parent engagement as well as our community engagement and so we have some different action items on there and that's on the next slide so here's a couple of our action steps uh in math and Ela we're looking at analyzing our scores from last year and and we're looking at some Coral um corollary uh information as well like attendance and how much did it impact students on their scores
115um and then what other gaps are we seeing in what areas um also implementing targeted intervention for students um administering regular Benchmark testing our teachers are already very involved in adjusting some of those uh those uh benchmark assessments so that we can we can really hit those standards that we see that are lacking um progress tracking instructional alignments to standards and then um apparently student progress tracking is very important because I put it on there twice um and then as far as our community engagement we are we already had our first stakeholder meeting uh yesterday and so we'll have our quarterly stakeholder meetings where we invite different uh community members to uh to give us input on things that are happening in the school quarterly family events we have our sporting events but we also
116are looking to open up some more engaging activities for families as well um providing a little bit more language and accessibility support to our our parents um especially our non-english speaking non-english speaking parents um and then communicate through multiple platforms I feel like our social media platform has really grown and so we're getting a lot more information out that way um and then our newsletters that we're sending out every couple weeks as well to the parents um and we'll be sending out our first parent survey this week as well just to get some feedback from our parents on how they think we're doing and what kind of things we can do to improve we want to make sure that all of our goals are aligned with our district strategic plan and so we were uh
117strategic in making our goals um we're also going through the cognia accreditation this year and so we want to make sure that all of the pieces that we're looking at and everything that we are um analyzing is Meaningful to student achieve and student wellness we also have some upcoming events we've got our parent teacher conference this week on Thursday and Friday um and then we would love to have you join us for our band concert we're actually splitting up the band concert and the orchestra and choir so our band concert will be on the 23rd and then on the 30th will be our Orchestra and our choir performances um and then I also wanted to share with you this was just uh this plaque was just installed today just this morning in the new Diana
118Butler student Commons and so um if you can I'm not sure if you can read the piece underneath it we you can make that can you enlarge that a little bit teacher administrator and Schoolboard member five Decades of dedicated service to blidge uh schools and the community of Pinetop Lakeside um and so that is hanging up on our in our comments as well as um can I move to the next one or that okay awesome as well as the sign that's uh up in the Commons as well for the Diana Butler student Commons I did not have a chance to work with Diana personally um you know other than through the school board but I can I have heard so many stories of people who just have loved working here so what an honor to
119have this up in the junior high Commons um because she is she's a legend at bluid uh and so that is all I have any questions for me questions thank you thank you I think that's uh very special about Diana did you hear that Diana I heard that Dr Wright sending you pictures I don't know who she's talking we can hear that she said I don't know who she's talking about thank you Diana thank you all right I just want to begin by saying that the elementary they had a a great float last year but they didn't win the overall award the high school won the overall award so that's up for grabs too so we that back to just saying exactly but who got the plaque the the high school has it so it's
120actually in the student council room okay so um begin with some of our celebration CTE shout outs we had eight students plac in the state FBLA to qualify for state and then we had some of those students go on to the National comp competition as well first place winner in the theater skills at EAC competition that student actually got a full-right school scholarship to EAC which was incredible that that student wouldn't have gone to college had she not done that program um silver and bronze winners at the state culinary competition and then we also the other CTE programs they've had um success at the competitions that they're required to do as part of their ctso their Carl Perkins participation Fine Arts the um theater production this last year uh they were nominated with the ASU
121gamage High School Musical Awards and they were one of seven of 25 finalists in The for The Sound of Music so they did a great job for such a small school and all these big schools that have all of the population to come into these plays we're surprised that here's the little bluid you know making a show and then also um coming away with the first place winning for best sound in the state so Mr bloomstrand and his tech crew did an amazing job with the sound so if you saw the sound music you saw what a great performance it was and we're looking forward to the next play that's coming up um as Courtney mentioned same thing at the high school choir band and Orchestra they received the superior ratings in their competitions this
122last year as well um additional celebrations we had AP courses that were continuing to even with uh making Cuts were able to maintain our AP numbers except for one class this this year which is incredible for the size of our school um increase the number of students taking AP exams and a record number of exams taken and then the number of students that pass with the three or better that's the highest number that we've ever had in that area as well um again we're the only School in the area that offers this type of and the number of AP courses that we do I think there's only one other school that offers an AP class and that's one um we had an AIA scholar athlete this last year Josiah gel was one of the finalists
123um he did was not the finalist but just being a finalist is pretty incredible um that we also had um brick horn was a National Merit scholar semi-finalist so a huge accomplishment there um next one we've had since by been at the high school this last year we've had the most participation in athletics and extracurricular activities that we've had since co co head it took a while for the kids to have that initiative to get back in there and participate um we had our state pickleball team our first year at doing it and then they got the they were actually the state pickleball Champion so that's pretty cool um we have a state wrestling champion Eric gindo his second time and we're going for a three Pete this year and and hopefully his senior year
124next year as well so great he did a great job in in representing the district um first second and third place winners in voice of democracy this is the older brother to the Patriot pens that Courtney was talking about out so our our school's always done well within that area and so this last year we took we swept it with first second and third place winners um we also had a Heisman State scholarship winner in Leilani hlin so a lot of individual recognition a lot of cool things that the kids are doing um and then just within these pictures just kind of as I go through the the next slides it just shows how many different activities and um things events that are going on I thought that the junior high was busy with all
125things that you had going on but then you get to the high school holy cow there's just something every night tonight we have volleyball game we have um the spaghetti dinner that the soccer team is putting on and then there's also the talent show the White Mountain um Talent Show competition that's the finals are tonight so that's just one night and you've got three different events going on a lot of different things happening at the at the high school here's some of our sports athletic teams um you can see the bottom picture the just theed representation that's our uh I believe our track team coach gineo is there and just track is amazing it gets those kids out there they they have a blast and and they they're competitive while they're at it too but
126they also build some really strong relationships not only with our kids but with kids from the other schools so they can see that you know what we're we're competing but we're still we can be nice and we can have that Brotherhood Sisterhood within the team and then also with other schools in the area and that's great that we have that ability to do within our our athletic programs here's some of our other other teams you can see the chess team our fbaa organizations our construction trait um they there's robotic competition that they participated down in White River um any chance that the kids can participate outside of classroom activities that's what builds the engagement and we want kids to be involved and that's what we start off the beginning of the year in our assembly
127and say hey get involved if you're not doing sports if you're not they're going to stay engaged in their classwork and they're going to be successful students so that's why we encourage so much participation here's some of our our navat programs we you hear when Matt Weber comes and talks about how great how strong the participation is at blage well here's the proof of it with the kids and and they love going to navit they get to spend half a day um in their Nava class and they come back on campus and then they finish the other half here on campus and they come out with some amazing amazing skills they're working after graduation the picture of the firefighters I see several of them that were hired within fire departments and are busy working and
128you know there's they have a start for a great career and here's some more of our um the drama we see some of our drama participants um chess band again just more areas that kids can participate in um and even though you'll see a lot of students repeat in some of those you're go like oh they're got kids popping up again but then you have others that like this like the top left picture where that's our our theater crew um Miss Evans has a great program where these kids they wouldn't be involved had they not had this opportunity to to do technical theater and so we're seeing doors open for students in many different areas all right so one of the things that the high school has been historically great at is our CC College
129and Career Readiness index and again we had a great showing with with what the school did and that's a combination of college preparedness and then also the career PR preparedness with our CTE programs our Nava programs the skills assessments and then also the participation in dual enrollment classes both with um CT classes and then also the academic classes um here's some different numbers that you see we had 95 college level English math and social studies courses that were passed um that's eight eight higher than the year before um 106 CTE classes passed with a a sear better and that's college credit so each one of those college credit that's a that's basically a scholarship for those kids and you've got 151 CTE classes completed with a CR better um the 30 the industry credentials are
130in this is within the CTE program you you have a test that you have to test to see what what skills you've acquired within the class um and then this is up high we did what one one skill better than where we were the year before and then our CTE sequence and skills assessment um we had 75 that was up 11 um and then the bottom one is just that's another factor that we look at within the um College and Career Readiness index with the number of students at met the cut scor on the acts testing um same diagram that Courtney shared showing our district strategic plan um within what the high school is looking at doing we want to make sure that we're in line with that as well so what we're doing is
131we're focusing on a composite score with the act all Juniors take the ACT exam and they start the as their High School career they do the ACT Aspire they don't do a test their software year then they take the ACT their junior year so what we're doing within the school and this is taking advantage of our um DNA testing our our program that we use to help the classes prepare for testing and so we are giving mock act and then act like questions within that these Benchmark testing so it's going to help prepare our kids for the ACT once they finally get to do that through Junior year um we're going to do ACT Testing earlier to where the kids and another thing that's going to help it is actually the structure of our schedule
132our master schedule where you're you have math and English and science year round so where a kid may take it first semester they may not have that skill and then in second semester when they take the ACT so hopefully we're going to see an increase in the ACT scores by having those year round classes and we're going to focus on changing our school culture for testing encouraging the kids like hey do your best we have a lot of kids I'm not going to college why do I need to do the ACT test so we trying to encourage a participation have some incentives for them schoolwide we're going to do some vocabulary reviews so kids are familiar with those the different vocabulary that they're going to see within the AC test ACT test um and our
133final one that we're looking at is increasing our parent involvement and that's through our district communication communication at the high school we're sending out the newsletters that we've done um and we thank the district for getting us the s'mores newsletters it's a great tool and and I think it's really increased the engagement with those that are reading it so that's where we're looking at we're this was the end of the year celebration picture with our graduates and we hope to have another great year like this at the end of next in 25 so any questions no thank you I have one comment can we be included in the list that gets those uh newsletters that go out to the parents you bet at every level sometimes we don't hear about them until you come later
134and sometimes we know about it and we attend but sometimes we don't see that so that's defin thank you thank you um since goals were presented I think we probably need to vote on those goals and accept the goals as given I move we accept the goals all right I have a second on that second check all in favor say I I thank you Diana also appears unanimous okay next item on the agenda is the consent agenda um after reviewing the consent agenda board members are there any items that you'd like to take out and vote on independently if not can we have a motion to accept items the consent agend as presented which is items 4.1 through item 4.5 have a motion from Jennifer I'll second that motion all in favor say I I
135thank you di all right additional business today we have some new hires um I don't see any of those new hires here so um they don't need to be introduced so we have a motion to accept the new hires item 5.1 I have a motion from Chuck second Margaret all in favor hi sorry Jennifer I saw you all right item four 5.2 recommendation to approve the updated version of the Schoolboard model policies Dr wri do you want to go over the changes that we have in that if there are any these are um updates to keep us in alignment with ex these are all updates to keep his alignment with State Statute changes and federal changes um probably the most publicized is Title 9 and the a the trust that models the policy and provides
136it has taken a neutral position and just says that it encompasses the changes such as Title 9 coordinator and the informal resolution we haven't made any changes um the I'm aware of the board and the community's position on critical things such as bathroom use and we are managing it to those expectations there's no drastic changes the other changes are just rather perfunctory Food Service you have to make changes based on that foundational Child Nutrition uh the statutes of false reporting uh by folks and what those penalties are and then school safety generally the emergency plan which we exceed every year and notification of registered sex offenders that want to run for school boards some of those things teacher contracts cannot be administered before March 15th we normally did it around so it's not a a
137subsi of change for us and a disclosure of background checks by all applicants if they fail to do that we can terminate them or rather the board can and uh there's also protections for vulnerable adults and U the graduation just sets forth the standard by which we observe academic CR uh credits uh the state is making sure that the public school districts do not have a pejorative effect on kids coming from homeschool in Esa we have to effectively receive those and we do that doesn't change any of our practices uh foster care there are some uh adjustments with that to make sure the foster care students are protected we adhere to all of that Student Records it tightens that up a bit we adhere to the the educational records the federal and state requirements and
138then um foster care there's a couple of minor changes and that's that's really it there they're not any big Monumental changes in any of that we're adopting the policy model as a whole so you don't get confused with well I thought we adopted this one last time and we haven't dropped this other the whole group of policies numbering now about 208 are updated regularly I'd say probably twice annually so that that is uh the information there any particulars needed just for clarification this is recommendations from the trust right yes sir okay any questions we have a motion then to uh accept item 5.2 to approve the updated version of the Schoolboard model policies I have a motion from Jennifer a second from Chuck all in favor say I I thank you Diana all right item
139number six Dr Wright will let you give us a give us an update on things that are happen in the school district yes sir given we've been well updated I I'll be as brief as I can I think I'll lead with our 301 payout this year we're going to be able to pay $9,200 for our teachers 301 pay a third of which will be paid in December and their balance in the last week of May or the first week of June um that has to do with pay cycle and the faster how fast we can get that uh completed on time and the goals and all those things gathered uh this is in addition to the 15 $100 stien that we just had paid last year I think the number was $7500 so $9,200 represents
140our best effort um we're doing the very best we can we recognize that everyone is feeling the impact of inflation the cost of living is tough and so it represents our best efforts uh the tomorrow we'll represent and honor the heroes of September 11th ordinary citizens and First Responders alike we do have instruction at all great at well I think it's 7 through 12 has to have dedicated instruction time toward that end we've done a good job before that was mandated um we will recognize those fallen heroes and continue to do that there's also a food drive that is in place tomorrow from 7 to 8: p.m. a group of combined members in different churches faith-based organizations uh and other community members want to gather more food stuff for the backpacks that will take place
141over in the portable that is between the Frank gerardi gym and the high school the last little portable building adjacent to the parking lot where we have our special education and the church have signs up for that there'll be some signs directing people to that um I'm not sure if they will or not we'll put social media and get it out on all the options there and that's what we're trying to do right now we're not doing the signs they should be doing the signs I just hope there's some signs up some sign we'll work on getting that there thanks and and we're looking for food stuffs that can be sent home to uh children in backpacks granola bars nutritious things cans of tuna things that can be used over the weekend uh the need
142is growing it is has never been greater and so any help would be much appreciated homecoming week is is the week of September 23rd it'll culminate with the football game on the 27th and homec coming dance the next night is that location here at the high school Mr Webb and then uh the the pinp Fall Festival is the 27th to the 29th br will continue to participate and dominate on the floats there's a little bit of competitiveness going in there we love it a pair of teen year conferences are going on at the elementary school and Junior High Level this week and uh those are really the most important announcements and if there are any questions I'll be glad to share thank you sir thank you Dr right next item on the agenda is is
143call to the public and we've got one call to the public we'd like to have you keep your comments to a minimum of three minutes you can't seed that to anybody and if you're angry don't direct your anger comments to any individual or we'll have to ask you to leave anyway come on up okay okay so for the record it was Michael gel and he said everything has been answered doesn't need to address the board at this time thanks Mike um okay next item is uh just noting when our next meeting will be it'll be October 15th at 5 o' on this location um conflict yeah okay thank you wanted to make sure that was after fall break I believe it is but I wanted to make sure hope so if not we'll send a
144letter out to everybody notifying so uh what we need now is a motion to adjourn I'll make the motion to adjourn have a second from Margaret all in favor say I