001Um, can I get a call to order or I'm sorry, can I get roll call? Member Dorner, member Fay >> here, >> member Qualch >> here. >> Member Leto >> here. >> Member Nelson >> here. >> President Bennett Kill >> here. All right, we're going to start off with our uh board recognition of the Lincoln Middle School Art >> What? >> Oh, good God. We're going to start out with the pledge. To the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for it stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all. Thanks Chris keeping me on track. All right. Now we're going to do a board recognition for the um the Lincoln Middle School arts students that were featured at the 214 art expo. So Mr. Mr. >> Good
002evening. Uh my name is Miles Mr. I'm the art teacher at Lincoln uh Middle School. I'm here tonight to congratulate our amazing art students. Uh these students showed their impressive skills and techniques that were voted best overall in the middle school artist category across seven districts. Not only did Lincoln win best overall, but one of our students, Zuna, won best in show with her fantastic painting. Um, so I'm going to call up my the students who uh were entered into the uh expo and Zuna, Adilia, Autumn N, Chloe C, come on up. Uh, Edward M. Gavin F. >> Isabella B. All right. Leah M. Mia R. Veronica W. Callie K. And please give a round of applause for our fantastic art students. Thank you so much, Mr. Moroni and kids. The artwork is beautiful. We
003are going to take a quick picture in the back though. Can't escape the picture. So, if you can meet us back at the um back to the Perfect. >> Congratulations. Okie do. Let's move on to our student board members report with the building brighter futures update. So, um I think we have a video for the building writers features. So, we'll start with that and then Penelopey and Safhina are here and they will provide them their oral report from our meeting this week. Hi, Lincoln Lions. Michelle here with your December Lincoln construction news. We're back again with site superintendent Matt D. And we also have a new guest, Dr. Jason Casease, assistant superintendent for finance and operations. Welcome, Dr. Case. >> Thanks for having me. >> Uh, Mr. D, we've seen a lot of activity near
004the main entrance this month. What's the biggest change out there? >> The big news of the month is the completion of the temporary staff parking lot. We created this lot so your staff will have a place to park while we prepare the main site for the new building. So last month you mentioned you were getting the site ready for foundations. Are we seeing actual digging yet? >> Absolutely. We are digging area A. This is the first section of the new school. Footings are the complete base of the new building. Foundation walls will be next and then we can go vertical with steel. >> The new building is going to need some furniture. What are we doing to get ready for that? >> Is a great question. So, absolutely, we're going to need new furniture in
005the whole building. So, we spent all of last year starting to get input from staff and students about what the needs are within a classroom. We then piloted some furniture um and then we're looking at this year. >> And is that why we're sitting here with this cool new furniture? >> Absolutely. So, we're in what we're calling our pilot room phase two. So, we actually have taped off um a mock classroom here in the library to represent the size of what the new classrooms will be in the new building. And then what we've done is we've taken all the feedback about furniture and tried to bring in as much as we can to have staff and students try it out and fill out surveys about what they like. So, you can see that there's chairs
006that are a little bit different and more comfortable probably than what we're used to. We have desks that are at multiple heights. Um so, they can be low and they can be high. Everything's a little bit more portable. Uh even the cabinetry uh there's nothing built into the new classroom. So everything is portable, flexible, can be moved around. And so we're going to be working throughout this entire year um to gather all the input and finalize exactly what we want to order to be ready for the new building. >> Wow. Thank you so much. Um that's really cool. Digging foundations and picking out furniture, that's like some big steps. So that's it for Lincoln Construction News. Go Lions. Hi, I am Penelopey Prescott Dardi, a seventh grader at Lincoln. I'm Safhina Sadiki and I'm also
007a seventh grader at Lincoln. So, we started talking about bringing new opportunities to all schools in the district. So, we talked with Dr. Gore about the new program CHAMPS that we have at Lincoln and we wanted to see if it was making an impact. We hypothesi we hypothesized that not all all of our teachers were fully like putting them in and implementing them and explaining this new program to students and we think that their full participation in the programs would make a better positive impact. To do to do this, we are going to make a survey for teachers and students to fill out to get a better understanding of how the program is being imple implemented and how effective it is at achieving program goals. Our next step will be scheduling a meeting with principal
008Larson to talk about how to send out the survey. Disability awareness. A common problem is that kids are making fun of people with disabilities at school at Lincoln. Maybe watching videos about people with disabilities or making or explaining further how these disabilities impact people's lives would make kids without disabilities more aware and understanding of the challenges people with disabilities have to face. We feel when kids better understand disabilities, they're less likely to diminish kids with disabilities because they understand how they how they how their lives are and the struggles they face. Do you guys have any questions for our student board members who are fabulous? >> Wonderful work as always. We also um talked a little bit about some of the presentations for tonight including my superintendent goals. Do you have any feedback for the
009board members about the goals because we went through each and every one of them and that was fun to do for me at least. I don't know for them guys. I think it was really good because there was a lot of main things that really focused on the staff and students improvement and yeah, >> I think it was very interesting just learning about how everything works and like Yeah, >> I would I was going to say and this is sort of foreshadowing our presentation tonight with our student climate or our staff climate survey. Um Oh, come on in. We will make sure we recognize Zunaira. Come on in, Miss Garansky. We'll make sure we recognize um Zunaira. Yeah, come on in. I'm so happy you're here. Okay, we'll do that next. Okay. Um but when
010we went through the climate survey and um kind of talked about what um Derek is going to talk about tonight, our results, it was really powerful to debrief and talk about that even just to you know get their reaction to staff's perceptions of um their experiences in the district. So it's something that we're really excited to be able to get their lens and and feedback about. Was there anything that you thought about the climate survey that you saw from staff, which again we're going to talk about a little bit later, so just foreshadowing. >> I think it was like we had really good numbers and I felt like a lot of the teachers did agree. So I feel like we're doing a really great job. >> I think I was really surprised about how how
011high the numbers were and I think it would be interesting if we did something with the students to see how the students felt about these things. Um because it may be different than what like the staff and teachers and things. Thanks. >> Well, the Christmas tree is down. That's okay. Um thank you so much. So if there's any questions from the board, I'm sure they'd be happy to hear. I did I did have this lit up. uh when you brought up the superintendent uh your your thing, what what what would you for her goals, is there any goal that you thought during that time thought, hey, this would be great if if we would were to do this >> fast, >> anything pertaining to students >> or staff? Was there anything that you thought of
012like, oh, it would be kind of cool maybe if they thought about doing this >> like like clubs or like the superintendent? >> The superintendent thing, but that could be part of it, too, you know, having more clubs. I mean, if >> Mhm. Um, I think it would be I think it would be um very interesting to like give kids like more like I know like especially when winter break's coming up, but like giving more understanding of like all different cultures and like all the holidays going on and I think that would be really interesting if we like had more education on that like like giving students an opportunity to learn about like everything and everyone. >> Very cool. That is a great idea. I just had a quick question. You mentioned about disability awareness
013and of course it's very disheartening to hear that you know students are having these problems with each other. I was just curious if you had any thoughts about what sort of awareness efforts you think would be the most effective with the kids. Um, I think like we mentioned like maybe doing like videos to like do that or maybe like to like talk about disabilities and an advisory. Maybe just like having like a slideshow of like talking about oh this is what autism is and like um here are the challenges they face but these are things that they can do well like that other like kids can't do. like some people who are autistic can like are super smart at math and like can do that really well and it's like yeah just like educating on
014that. I think that we do have uh our disability awareness month but and I think that is very important but we don't really go into depth about the different disabilities. So I feel like maybe seeing someone or having like a visual representation of that would have helped a lot. >> Thank you girls. And I want to give a special shout out to Safhina because she came with very short notice. Our board member Josh could not come due to a conflict. And Penelopey, you would have been just fabulous if you had to do it solo tonight. But it's a shout out to Savina and their great um teamwork together that you were here to support each other. And clearly you can tell what talented kids they are and how wonderful it is to be with them.
015So, thank you both. free to go. But you're welcome to stay. Okay. Thank you. Yeah. And I'm so sorry. And Zunaira is here who is the winner of the art expo. So, is it possible for us to put Zinara's um amazing artwork on the screen? She won the entire competition and we just Mr. took your um your special uh certificate, but we would love to do a picture with you and recognize you. Was that good? Okay, let's give her a round of applause. The champion. All right, we're going to go in the back and do a big picture with the group of that blue one. We're so proud of you. Of course. Of course we would. You know what? 1 2 3 I hope I'm not coming. Thank you so much. >> Thank you. Okay,
016we're moving on to agenda item four, the appointment of our new board member. So, can I have a motion to appoint Alan Deech to the District 57 Board of Education? >> So moved. Second. >> Alan, if you like come up. >> Oh, roll call. Sorry. >> Member Fay. >> Yes. >> Member Qualch. >> Yes. >> Vice President Leto. >> Sorry. >> Member Leto. >> Yes. >> Member Nelson. >> Yes. >> President Bennett Kill. Yes. All right. All right, repeat after me. >> I, Alendech, do solemnly swear >> that I will faithfully discharge the duties of the office of member of Board of Education of Mount Prospect School District 57. >> That I will faithfully discharge the duties of the office of member of the board of education of Mount Prospect School District 57 >> in
017accordance with the Constitution of the United States. in accordance with the Constitution of the United States. >> the Constitution of the State of Illinois, >> the Constitution of the State of Illinois, >> and the laws of the state of Illinois, >> to the best of my ability. >> I further swear that >> I shall respect taxpayer interests by serving as a faithful protector of the school district's assets. >> I shall respect taxpayers interests by serving as a faithful protector of the school district's assets. >> I shall encourage and respect the free expression of opinion. I shall encourage and respect the free expression of opinion >> by my fellow board members and others who seek a hearing before the board. >> by my fellow board members and others who seek a hearing before the board. >>
018While respecting the privacy of students and employees >> while respecting the privacy of students and employees. >> I shall recognize that a board member has no legal authority as an individual. I shall recognize that a board member has no legal authority as an individual >> and that decisions can be made only by a majority vote at a public board meeting. >> And that decisions can be made only by a majority vote at a public board meeting. >> I shall abide by majority decisions of the board. >> I shall abide by majority decisions of the board. >> While retaining the right to seek changes in such decisions >> while retaining the right to seek changes in such decisions >> through ethical and constructive channels >> through ethical and constructive channels. As part of the board of
019education, >> as part of the board of education, >> I shall accept the responsibility for my role >> I shall accept the responsibility of my for my role >> in the equitable and quality education of every student in the school district. >> in the equitable and quality education of every student in the school district. >> I shall foster with the board >> extensive participation of the community >> extensive participation of the community. >> Formulate goals, define outcomes. formulate goals, define outcomes, and >> and set the course for Mount Prospect School District 57. >> and and set the course for Mount Prospect School District 57. >> I shall assist in establishing a structure and an environment. >> I shall assist in establishing a structure and an environment. >> Designed to ensure all students have the opportunity
020to attain their maximum potential >> designed to ensure all students have the opportunity to attain their maximum potential >> through a sound organizational framework. through a sound organizational framework. >> I shall strive to ensure a continuous assessment of my of student achievement. >> I shall strive to ensure a continuous assessment of student achievement >> and all conditions affecting the education of our children. >> and all conditions affecting the education of our children >> In compliance with state law, >> I shall serve as education's key advocate >> I shall serve as education's key advocate >> on behalf of students and our community schools. on behalf of students and our community schools >> to advance the vision for Mount Prospect School District 57 >> to advance the vision for Mount Prospect School District 57. >> And I
021shall strive to work together with the district superintendent >> and I shall strive to work together with the district superintendent >> to lead the school district toward fulfilling the vision the board has created. >> to lead the school district towards fulfilling the vision the board has created. Fostering excellence for every student. >> Fostering excellence for every student >> in the areas of academic skills, knowledge, citizenship, and personal development. >> In the areas of academic skills, knowledge, citizenship, and personal development. >> Welcome board member de. >> Thank you very much. >> You'll have to remember that oath next year. >> Yeah. Got to memorize. >> All right. Congratulations, Alan. and you're going to come up and join us in just a minute because we need to do appoint a new vice president. >> Oh my gosh.
022Okay. So, are there any nominations for the board vice president to serve a term of one year? >> I nominate member Leto for the role of vice president. >> A second. Did you ask Jill? >> Uh, I don't think she's watching right now, so >> Oh, dang. >> She will absolutely be on board, I'm sure. >> All right. Board member Leto is nominated. Are there any other nominations for the Office of Vice President? All right. If there are no further nominations, the Office of Vice President is closed. Can I have a motion to appoint member Leto as vice president? So moved. Second. Member Fay. >> Yes. >> Member Qualche. >> Yes. >> Vice President Leto. Member Leto. >> Yes. >> Member Nelson. >> Yes. >> Member Dorner. Oh, sorry. I'm really off. President Bennett Kill.
023>> Yes. All right. She said vote. >> So now we're going to do the administer the oath to the vice president. >> There's an oath to vice president. >> Yes. Okay. >> Do I just stand here? Do I have to go? >> You could stand there, I think. I do solemnly swear >> I do solemnly swear >> that I will support the Constitution of the United States >> that I will support the Constitution of the United States >> and the Constitution of the State of Illinois >> and the Constitution of the State of Illinois >> and the policies of this board of education >> and the policies of this board of education >> and that I will faithfully discharge the duties of vice president >> and that I will faithfully discharge the duties of vice
024president >> of the board of education of school district 57 >> of the board of education of school district 57 >> county of Cook. >> State of Illinois. >> According to the best of my ability. >> Congratulations, Vice President Leto. >> All right. We're going to do a little shuffle. >> Beautiful. It was, wasn't it? >> All right. Congratulations, Vice President Leto, and welcome to the board table, member Dee. >> Thank you very much. >> All right. >> It's cool up here. >> It is. >> Yeah. >> I know. You got to get the >> whole different vantage point. >> They get looked at. >> Okay. Our next step on the agenda is the public hearing for the tax levy. Can I have a motion to open the hearing of the 2025 tax levy? >>
025So moved. >> Second. >> Member Colchek. >> Yes. >> Vice President Leto. >> Yes. >> Member Nelson. >> Yes. >> Member Deech. >> Yes. >> Member Fay. >> Yes. >> President Bennett Kill. >> Yes. Dr. Case. >> Excellent. All right. Well, good evening. Um, thank you for being here this evening to listen to uh the presentation on our tax levy. As a reminder, we approved in November the tenative tax levy um which has been on display in our business office. And uh tonight we will talk about the tax levy um for approval to then be submitted. prior to jumping in. Uh there is I you know me I always have a glossery of terms but I'll point out the most important ones tonight which really um are talking about the tax levy and the tax
026extension um which some people use interchangeably. So we'll talk about that but the levy is the money we're requesting. Um that's what we're asking for. The extension is then what we will be receiving. Um so we ask for um um the property tax um amount tonight. um we levy for it and then later on we will find out exactly what will be extended to us. So why is it so important? So in this district in uh district 57 we receive a majority of our revenue through property taxes. About 84% of our revenue come from property taxes. So that's why it's so important to um look at this closely, understand what we're doing um and what we're approving um each December. This chart was included last month, but uh it's I think it's really important and
027something uh to make sure that we understand. Um this the three uh the first, third, and fifth rows um those percentages. The top one is talks about CPI, the consumer price index. Um that is something that's used to determine um how much we can increase the levy each year. That included with um some new growth within the district. Um that middle row um is what we've requested each year and the bottom row is what we've received. So last year we requested an increase of 4.77% uh we received an increase um of just over four 4.04%. Um and so you can see historically what we've asked for and what we've received. Um and so we uh will submit this levy and then um the the county will let us know exactly what we were extended. Um
028and as you can see it's typically just under what we've asked for. This shows uh so our accounting is divided into funds. Um and when we levy we levy by fund. So this shows uh what we received uh last uh this current year what we're levying for next year and the difference. Um and what we will look at and why some of these numbers um you'll see actually even negative numbers is we look at what our balance is in each fund um because our money stays within that fund. So if we see that our balance is starting to build in one fund uh that is why we will um change the levy a little bit. And what we also do is we tell the county that if um we do not receive the full levy,
029if if the extension is not as much as we're asking for um then they will reduce it in the education fund. So each year, one of the things that we're doing tonight is approving that that is what we will give to the county to say if it's less, make it less in the education fund. This is a new public act that's I believe it was last year was the first year. Um and what it is is that we each year are required as a district to uh determine over the past 3 years um what our um sorry uh what our cash reserve balances are um on average. Um it cannot well if it exceeds more than two and a half times what we spend in a year um then we have to develop some different
030plans. We're nowhere close to that. As you can see the number right in the middle there in yellow is 0.25. 0.25. So although the two and five are the same, it's the decimal is off. It's 0.25, not 2.5. So if we were anywhere close to 2.5, we then would be talking about developing a plan. We're nowhere close. Um meaning that our reserves are not two and a half times what we spend each year. But that was a new law last year and we do need to present it each year. So next year I think I'm going to make it look nicer, but for this year, that's that's exactly what the calculation looks like. This is our certificate that we will submit. Um so it breaks up uh for each fund what we are levying. Uh
031this is what will be signed tonight um and then submitted. Um and just a reminder for our timeline uh which started last month. So we approved the tenative uh levy last month. Um we um then publish in the paper our um truth and taxation notice. Um this hearing is um mandatory if we are a uh requesting or leving more than 5%. We are not. So it's actually not mandatory but we do it each year. We want to be transparent. We want to make sure that the community understands exactly what we're asking for. Um so we publish in the newspaper. Um we have our hearing tonight and then it will be filed really first thing tomorrow but by December 19th. I know that was quick but questions about the levy. um or the process or anything
032that I can answer. >> No questions. >> Okay. >> Thank you. >> Great. Thank you. >> Okay. We now have an opportunity for public comments on the tax levy. Are there any comments from the public? Seeing none, I'll declare the public hearing now closed. All right, we're now going to move on to our community comments portion of the agenda. The District 57 Board of Education welcomes community participation in an effort to both listen to our stakeholders and keep the meeting moving and want to remind everyone of our public participation procedures and guidelines which is available in board policy 2230. Individ individuals wishing to address the board can do so during the community comments portion of the agenda. Individuals should provide their name and limit their comments to 3 minutes. Please remember that this is not
033a dialogue between you and the board. The board is in listening mode during this time. Individuals wishing to contact the board of education are welcome to do so via the D57 website under the board of education tab. Individuals should behave with respect and civility towards others and abide by board policy 830 visitors to and conduct on school property. Do we have any members of the community that would like to comment? Seeing none, we'll move on to our next agenda item, staff and superintendent reports. Okay, thank you so much. Um, if it's all right with um Dr. Bonder, can we start with our guest? All right. Um, we have we're joined tonight by um Dr. God from um school perceptions and he will be going over the outcomes of our fall staff climate survey. So, welcome.
034We're so happy you're here. >> Thank you. It is uh great to be here. Um if you're okay, I can just say next slide and all that kind of stuff. Uh so, yes, here is the reports from your staff survey. What I like to do in this presentation is take everybody through the all of these results. I'll give some background on our company, some discussion of who responded exactly, go through some results and analyses item by item and index-wise, and then take any questions that you may have. So, next slide, please. School perceptions has been around for about 25 years. We have surveyed millions and millions of uh districts or done millions and millions of surveys of staff, students, and parents. I was very glad to hear the student board members recommend that you uh
035maybe survey your students as well. Uh we'd be happy to do that for you. Um we've helped thousands of school districts uh navigate their strategic planning and referendum planning uh projects with our surveys. So, next slide. We did this survey this past fall. The uh staff survey deadline was November 5th of 2025. 294 staff members responded. That's an 87% participation rate, which is exceptionally good. Next slide, please. Um this shows where respondents were located. Lincoln Middle School with 28%, Westbrook School with 25%, Fairview School with 21%, Lincoln Park School 20%, 4% in the district office, and 2% of staff reported having district-wide jobs. Next slide, please. About half of respondents were classroom teachers, 20-ish% were instructional assistants/paraprofessionals, 10% support staff, 5% administrators, uh, and 16% educational specialists. This is a pretty typical breakdown. Obviously, it
036reflects hiring or employment patterns across districts. And with 87% response rates, not a huge danger of disproportionality in any case. Next slide, please. So, results. First thing you're going to see are is an index analysis. We each of our individual items filters up into different underlying constructs that we track. But I'm going to use this slide to just share with you how our survey is constructed. We use a five-point liyker scale, but there's really only four options that any respondent has. Strongly agree is a five. Agree is scored as a four. Disagree is scored at a two. Strongly disagree is worth one. And then we have a don't know slash doesn't apply, which are just excluded from calculations. The idea is not to give people a neutral option, force people to choose either like to
037take a stand on either agreement or disagreement. You can still average out to a you know mathematical mean but of three but no individual whatever. So keep this in mind. The chart that you're about to see is going to look very familiar by the end of this presentation. Next slide please. So these indices these underlying constructs for measuring academics engagement support student experience and staff experience the first column well the first column of numbers is the current score on these indexes. Second column is the previous score the score from the previous survey. the percent change from the previous survey and the comparison score. That is the the mean on each of these indexes of districts that look like D57 by uh NCE National Center for Education Statistics criteria including enrollment uh rural urban suburban status
038percentage of students who are economically disadvantaged etc. So if you're looking at all of these the like the big thing is the pattern for something like uh an index here every current year's score is higher than the previous survey by a meaningful amount and is higher than the comparison district score as well. The yeah period that is the that is the takeaway from this slide. staff in this district are in general and at a high level very satisfied and engaged. And now let's go through individual items where same scale slightly different patterns. So next slide the survey comes in three or four pages. There's workday environment support and then an overall recommendations page. So on each page these are uh ordered by or presented in descending order of like percent change from the last survey.
039So information important to my work is shared with me in a timely effective and effective manner. Now the first column is the percent of respondents who agreed and we are just combining agree and strongly agree there. % of respondents who agree what the current score is, what the previous score is, and the percent change from that previous score. So 80% of staff surveyed agreed with this statement. 3.82 is this year's score. 3.59 is last year's score or the previous survey score, which is a 6.4% change. I'm not going to read every word of this every time because that would get too repetitive. What I want to point out is well I'll get there well we'll have time on this slide. So our schools and building student discipline practices and policies are effective scores are going
040up 3.24 as opposed to 3.09. That's a 4.9% change. But you notice the big difference in agreement percentage where only 62% of uh staff agree with this. Similarly with the next one, my job expectations can be completed during the contractual workday, better than the last survey, below a 3.0 sort of uh mean and 49% of staff members agree with that. So this is just some some of the variation that you can see. Agreement percentage matters, but so does percent change. So those are the two pieces of information basically that you're looking at here. Are things moving in the right direction? And how well in an absolute sense is are things going? So you'll I'll come back to this uh in a later slide in a little bit. Restorative practices have improved our school community. 69%
041uh of folks agree that is a 4.6% improvement from last time. Next slide, please. it really will go uh much quicker in these in the coming kind of things. So, district seeks input, 80% agree, 3.8% change. I'm satisfied with being a staff member at the school or building. 94% of folks agree. That is a 3.3% increase. Most days I look forward to going to work. 88% also up. School/building has explicit goals for student achievement. 97% of folks agree. 2.5% increase. Next slide, please. Our staff handle student discipline in a consistent manner. 63% agree. And that's 2.5% uh higher than last time. Our staff does a good job of educating our students. 99% agreement. Also up 2.2%. I feel comfortable sharing input. 92% uh agree up 1.2% from last time. The amount of work I am
042asked to do is reasonable and manageable. 70% agree. That is roughly flat uh from the last survey. Next slide, please. Staff members in my school building can express their opinions without fear of repercussions. 90% agreement, mostly flat. I feel supported by my supervisor administrator when I make a decision. 91% agree. Current score is 4.26. Last score was 4.29. A decline of 7%. This is a good point where like I haven't run the two-tailed tea tests on each individual item, but with around 300 people responding, uh, statistical significance in general will be at about 3%. So if you're seeing things that are over 3%, you're looking at real mean differences between this current score and the previous score. And things that are within that band, you can't be sure that you're looking at any actual difference.
043And so for those numbers, that's the important thing where instead of looking item by item, you're looking at general trends. Like almost every item is up, the couple items that are down are within the margin of error is the way that I would uh put that. And other than that, it's the difference in agreement percentage that is going to convey the most important information. there aren't uh comparisons for the item by item kind of stuff but what I can say is that uh for staff surveys questions regarding how discipline is going are always our lowest scoring thing. So that's why you will see like 63% of folks saying that uh this is going well is above average anecdotally is what I'm going to say uh or in comparison with other districts whereas it is perfectly
044normal also for staff members to be like our staff is doing a great job of educating our students for that to be like 95% and above is also very normal. So again overall trends and uh percent agreement is what matters. Next slide, please. For working environment, I have opportunities for training and professional development. That is up 8.1% over last uh over the last survey. District administration is doing what it takes to make our district successful, up 7.3%. The district is heading in the right direction, 88% agree, up 6.4%. The other thing to keep in mind is when you're looking at a current score, remember that in if you're looking at a 4.00, 00 it means the average respondent is hitting at least agree is what that means. So if you're that's a good way to
045interpret that current score when I'm seeing like that 3.99 or even like 3.88 it's in general when a staff member is seen that they're like yes I do have opportunities for training and professional development. Yes, district administration is doing what it takes to make our district successful. Students in my school building are kind to one another. 89% agreement uh up 5.9% from the previous survey. Next slide, please. The school board is doing what it takes to make our district successful. 86% agreement, 3.4% change over last time. All students in our school and building are respected for their values and beliefs. 91% agreement, up 2.5%. In the last year, I received useful feedback to help improve my work. 81% agreement, up 2.1%. And then a big one, I have training and support to work with students
046from different backgrounds. 81% agree. This is a big jump from the last uh from the last survey. Up 12.9% from 3.41 to 3.85. Next slide. I'm recognized when I do a good job. 81% agree. 3.94. That's, you know, off by whatever. The last score was 3.95. So again, within the margin of error. Same with I feel safe at work. Here's the big one where like you're like, "Oh no, down 1.4%." But 94% of folks agree with that. It's 4.32 as opposed to 4.38 within that margin of error. Next slide, please. Our school, this is a separate question, so we ask about each of these different things. Our school provides equal opportunities for students with from different economic backgrounds. 99% agree. 98% 96% 99 for each one of these groups we are above 90% agreement. Students
047with special needs it's 91% agreement which is lower than the uh than the other uh subgroups asked about. All of these are higher than they were in the previous survey but in both surveys the average response was somewhere between agree and strongly agree. Next slide please. and support. Our school has a process to ensure that every student has a connection with at least one adult in the school. 94% agreement up five and a half percent. I have the materials and supplies that I need to do my job well. 90% agreement up 4.3%. Our school supports students from diverse backgrounds. 95% agreement up 3.1%. Our parents and community score support the school district 95% agree which is also up slightly from the last survey. Next one please. All students in our school are given the equal
048opportunities to learn and experience success. 90% agreement up 2% I have the technology that I need to do my job well. 92% agreement up slightly. Staff input is valued. 87% agreement up slightly. I have access to the technology support that I need. 94% up slightly. Next slide. Social and emotional needs of all students are being met. 74% agreement. Mostly flat compared to the last survey. I have healthy working relationships with my co-workers. 97% agreement mostly flat. These these two provide a nice little contrast of being like here's where the agreement percentage is really important. Like both of those are pretty good. Well, neither one of those is bad. Both of them are flat, but the stark difference between uh the agreement percentages. The district's pay practices are fair. 49% agreement. Current score 2.94, previous score
0492.96 minus.7%. That's mostly flat, but again the agreement percentage is something to pay attention to. I'm satisfied with how I get paid, like the timing, the method, and stuff. 89% uh agreement current score is 4.11. You the reason you see NAS there is because we didn't ask that particular question on the last survey. And then overall satisfaction, this is where the district really shines. Next slide, please. So for the net promoter score that we use or the net promoter score question that we use, we do allow a neutral here of five. And for almost every district, that is by far the largest line. There's like some clustered at the top, a couple of folks with bees in their bonnets clustered at the bottom, and then like 23% at number five. Here, that is not the
050case. What we are looking for are eights, nines, and tens. Those are your sort of proactive promoters of the district. People who will bring up what a great place it is to work in conversation sort of unprompted who are advertising the district as a good place to work. And fully twothirds of the respondents of the survey fall into that category. only 9% of folks are neutral and just a small tail in the extremely unlikely to recommend in like the zero or one category. The overall average response here is a 7.82 which is significantly higher than the 7.28 it was last survey. In fact, it's a 7.4% change. That's really meaningful. Next slide. And we include Next slide, please. A couple of summary things. The five items with the highest average score. Our staff does a
051good job of educating our students. I have healthy working relationships with my co-workers. My school and building has explicit goals for student achievement. I am satisfied with being a staff member at the school building. And I feel safe at work. I feel safe at work is the most predictive feature in terms of teacher attrition. So, it's really great to see that being one of the five highest uh scores in the district. Next slide, please. The items with the lowest scores, my job expectations can be completed during the contractual workday. The district's pay practices are fair. Our school and building student discipline practices and policies are effective. Our staff handles student discipline in a consistent manner. Restorative practices have approve improved our school uh community. So, uh, the things to be said about this again, like
052some form of these five are always in the lowest scoring five for pretty much every district. And these scores are not bad. It's it's the ones that are below the threes that I would uh that I would uh focus on the most, but the other ones are a product of sort ordinal ranking. Next slide, please. The five items of the most improvement. I have training and support to work with students from different backgrounds. I have opportunities for training and professional development to improve my work. You can always tell where a district has focused energy uh between one survey and the other by looking at this slide. District administration is doing what it takes to make our district successful. Information important to my work is shared with me in a timely and effective manner and the
053district is heading in the right direction. These are like those bottom three in particular are huge in terms of we don't see those usually in the five items of the most improvement. So that something good is happening in the district in general that staff are pleased with. Next slide please. And with the least improvement again all of these are basically flat but I feel safe at work. The district's pay practices are fair. I feel supported by my supervisor and advis and administrator when I make a decision. I'm recognized when I do do a good job and I have healthy working relationships with my co-workers. Two caveats here, like these are the items with the least improvement. It's important to note that like I feel safe at work and I have healthy working relationships with my
054co-workers were very highscoring items in the first place. Like I feel safe at work was one of the five highest scoring things. So whatever grain of salt. Uh next slide please. I think that might be it. That might that that that's it. Thank you for uh having me. Any questions that I can help with? >> Does anybody like to start with questions? >> Pam, in comparison to other school districts, how do we rate with the fair pay? I feel my pay is fair. And also with the feeling safe. >> Feeling safe. uh the district is compares extremely favorably a lot like that the the variation in those is even people who work in like quote unquote bad or scary districts like you'll see like 80% agreement with the like I feel safe at work so
055it's between like 80 and 98% but D57 is at the top end of that uh spectrum the pay practices are also fairly tight in terms of variance but lower So D57 is more in the middle on pay practices are fair. And the thing about that question, here's a little like survey construction nery. Most of the time when we we ask that question in the way that we do the district's pay practices are fair precisely because if we ask staff like are you paid enough or like to respond to like I am paid sufficiently the data is all over the place. So like the district's pay practices are fair is often asking about the relationship between pay and workload and it has to do with the way that uh that like a a steps and levels
056system is communicated. So all three of those things are at work. And looking at the the the district's overall data as a whole. In this particular case, it seems to me from the outside that the relatively low level of satisfaction with fair pay practices has a great deal to do with the uh with staff feeling like their workloads are hard for them to manage. in comparison with how so it's not a question about absolute pay it's a question about the relationship between those two things it seems to me with you know little insider knowledge on how that works but if your question was about comparisons to other districts and D57 is right in the middle of that it's just in different districts that those numbers are driven by slightly different forces No problem. >> Kim,
057>> I was just going to give some kudos to our teaching and learning department for the immense work that they've done in terms of providing professional development for our staff. I think we saw that that was a need in previous years and you can tell how much that effort has paid off, right? In terms of the satisfaction of the staff and just hearing that feedback, I feel gratified and I didn't do the work. So, we're really appreciative of you and your department leading that effort. >> Yes. Ditto what Kim is saying. Kudos to you all. You did a great job and it's great to see these numbers going up up up. >> Uh I would echo what Kim and Eileen said. I think it's it's always great when you see the results of the hard
058work you're putting in, right? And I know we've talked a lot about that like we have a lot of activities going on and you've heard me probably annoyingly so say well you know what is the result going to be when are we going to see that? Well this is part of seeing that. So that's definitely gratifying. So uh I have a couple questions. Um in comparison to the last time we gave this survey did we give it at roughly the exact same time of year we did. Okay. Because I think that's important. >> Yeah that's right. I know in NSSO when we did this we didn't do that. >> Yeah. >> And it really skewed the data. So, >> okay. Excellent. >> Um I have a slightly different take on the feel safe at work
059question. I know we scored excellent at that >> but to me I mean a lot of these questions you ask 20 people what it means to them. You might get 20 different answers. Feeling safe is >> I think we all kind of know what that means, right? So, while I think it's great 94% is a high number, >> that still means that 18 members of our staff who took the survey are not feeling safe at work. >> Mhm. >> That's alarming to me. That's really alarming to me. So, I I wish there was a way we could identify who those folks are and and drill into that, but I I hope we don't take that score and say this is great and we don't need to do anything about it because you you couple that
060with some of our lower scoring areas like discipline, consistency, effectiveness of that and it it does start to tell a story that uh is a little bit alarming. So, I I think a clear area for us to to focus on hopefully this year. Um, >> and is it okay if um Derek responds? >> Oh, yeah. I'm sorry. The I'm not sure if that was a question more maybe for you and uh and >> I would like to >> Well, let me let me just real quickly just to emphasize for any staff who may be listening. >> Nobody can identify who you are basically about the confidentiality thing is important. I also just like I don't know without looking at the the data dump but I'm happy to do that after the fact that there are
061it is conceivable given the the different kinds of work that people are doing who are being asked about this that some of those 18 people would have just asked answered don't know doesn't apply and so wouldn't necessarily have been expressing disagreement. I can like that is an important item. You're exactly right. But I can get those actual numbers to be like are people like the numbers of people not the identities of people are they are they actually expressing disagreement with that or are they simply basically opting out of that? >> That's a hard question to imagine. People would say don't know doesn't apply. Right. >> That's true. But as you said, it's it is the case that people will answer that in different ways. In different districts where where some staff members are feeling unsafe
062because of student behaviors, that can be like that's one thing. If other people are feeling sort of emotionally unsafe or like feeling sort of threatened by administrators or that kind of like social pressure, people will identify different kinds of stress. And so just depending on the the kind of frame of mind that people go into a into the question with, that's the only thing that would make it possible to be like don't know doesn't apply. Basically, >> I would also say that there's three things I want to say. First, um, and I'm looking at my administrators who are in attendance tonight. I can guarantee you that even scores that scored highest, they are drilling down and figuring out, you know, because they have this this is district-wide data. Um each school and each building including
063our district office has this disagregated by um staff who answered you know that their workplace was that building and leadership and each of those places is disagregating you know scores not by individual names because we have no way of knowing that but by employee type. So to kind of really ask more informed questions, you know, are we seeing trends with this, you know, you know, improving with certain employee groups over last year? Are we seeing, you know, changes over time? Um so I think there's no complacency even in areas that are um more positive. Um and that just goes without saying that areas that are less positive, we're going to prioritize those first, but there's no rest for the for the work we want to do. The second thing I would say is um um
064in addition to this quantitative information, we also have great qualitative data that um our staff who chose to provided um additional narrative about the their answers and it was helpful as always for school perception to give us the analysis of those themes and that elaboration because that's also illuminates for us like what might have you know led into they're they're choosing what score they chose. Um and then third, I would just say, um I guess reiterating the first point, it's really the two, but the the magic of this is really um lifting up the log and seeing everything and trying to get really really informed and the data that we're talking about tonight is probably the highest most kind of um general overview. But be assured that the level of depth we can go by
065disagregating, you know, employee groups, school sites, all of that, it's really satisfying because there's a lot that and I think the improvement is actually the reflection of the work that we've been engaging in over the last year after the first time doing this. I think I was very nervous because I was generally um encouraged by the results last year and I thought gh that was just beginner's luck and next year it's going to tank and it's encouraging because um through the partnership with school perceptions and their expertise in this work they have been really important thought partners and um consultative to us and saying if you want to keep your staff engaged in honest feedback, you need to demonstrate that the changes you're making are directly aligned to the feedback they gave last year. And
066so I think we did a um a nice job of trying to at least say a these were our results. We're not afraid to talk about them. We did that at each school. B next year we want them to be better and you're telling us what you want to improve. And that happened at the district level. Importantly though that also happened really successfully at the school levels where you know leadership teams at the school level and with staff and all groups really um were provided you know I think the insight and to say your voice does matter. We want we want 100% satisfaction in all these categories and it won't be satisfying to any of us until we do. Um, so I just I I probably should have interned with some of that background, but
067I do think, you know, set continuing to make things more um adapting to what people's needs are is our mission. So, >> no, and thank you, Dr. Gory. And I, you know, I having been part of this exercise in my professional life many times, it it is it is very easy for companies to look at the overall data, say, "We're doing great. >> We're improving. We don't have to worry about this. we'll wait till we have the next survey next year and and the fact is I mean we are doing very well. I think the the challenge is to to look past that even though you don't want to and say well where can we still get better and where should the focus be next year and I have zero doubt you and your team
068will do that. Mhm. Thank you, >> Pam. I just wanted to add to the question and answer about safety, what our community is facing right now at the village level and at the at um at the uh resident level. there is something that is um overriding the thought of safety and I know that there are members in our community that are trying to improve the safety for all of our residents and all of our students and that's something that is an umbrella over every school district and every school and every student. Are there any other questions? Go ahead. >> Kind of piggybacking off of what Chris was saying, um, if I understood it right, around roughly 300 people filled out the survey. >> 10% of those folks fell into the detractors, right? The 1 2
0693 4 5 on I think it's slide 25 or 29. Um, are there Here we go. Are there any questions or items in the in all those slides that you showed us earlier that are leading indicators that staffs may be looking for other opportunities outside of the district? Um said differently like how should we be looking at this report and saying if we could make impact on any one or two of those items um we might be able to reduce the people being interested in looking elsewhere. Um because if 50% of those 30 people that's 15 back fills in a year that's very taxing. So how can we look at that bottom half? Let's not celebrate the top half for sure but let's look at that bottom half and see if there's anything we could
070do to support those folks. >> Yes, we have uh done quite a bit of uh research on our own data in terms of leading indicators. I feel safe at work is the most important indicator or the highest predictor of mobility. Very ironically, the discipline questions are not indicators of who is likely to move that like and but that's because everybody thinks discipline is not going great everywhere and so it doesn't differentiate between people who are going to it's basically not a problem until it starts making people feel unsafe at work. That's the big one. Pay practices also is not as predictive as you might think. We have this is me being like here is the research that we have done and I've talked about this several times but I don't have it in front of
071me. Let me we have the the list of like the top five predictors that explain something like 80% of the variance and I can deliver that you know. >> Do we do exit surveys for folks that do decide to leave? How does their answers um fit to this narrative of what we're seeing here? Well, actually, um, Miss Schwarzel is in the audience. Would you be willing to speak to that question? >> You can just generally overview. >> Come to the microphone, please. >> Looking at the data over the last few years, we've really come to there's a number of factors. It's usually not like the good play pay practices is probably that is probably a fair statement. It's usually not pay practices. It's a variety of things. Upward mobility, moving into moving out of the
072education field, moving out of the area or looking at their commute um are probably the lead leading but biggest is probably looking for a opport another another opportunity in education different from their current position. >> Thank you. If I could just add to that just having been part of these surveys again in my professional career, I we have heard from the company we use >> that almost every single survey one of the lowest scoring answers is am I getting paid enough and is my workload >> right >> adequate right it just seems like no matter what industry and that is not in any way to diminish the answers we're getting. It doesn't mean we shouldn't take it seriously, >> but that is a pretty common those two answers are pretty common across the board no
073matter where you are. >> And I'll also say like this is you can ask this question directly, but Dr. Gore referenced the qualitative data that we uh break down. One of the things that was is striking to me who works with school districts everywhere, district 57's staff engagement survey, the numbers are really are great comparatively. This is if a teacher is looking or an education professional is looking for a place to work, this is the place that they are looking to be. And yet when we look at those qualitative comments, the patterns aren't the same as we find in districts that are performing much worse. It's I need more support for for uh student behavior problems. We need to do something about workload and pay. It's it's those things no matter where you are. So
074like it is not at all surprising that like the re the idea that people are like well I should move out of education is the is one of the things that people are looking for. It's really hard I don't need to explain this to a school board in education generally the constraints are very real within the profession everywhere. I just wanted to add to member deach. Importantly, we do um exit interviews, but we also recently Miss Schwarzel has um implemented and and we've been expanding the stay interview process. So, you know, the idea being, you know, we want to know why people who are not leaving are choosing to stay and you know, what are some of the themes that um we get from that. So that's been a really rewarding, insightful process that probably
075has been happening for the past couple years. And um it's been really fun. Last year we expanded it to having more variety of options of who people could choose to talk to. And um through that um I've had the chance to talk to people and learned a lot. Um I know our administrators as well. And those are always really insightful conversations too because you're really getting kind of that focus group feeling of like what why are you staying in this district and how can we make sure that that's not um accidental in the experiences for all of our staff. So, um I just want to um say thank you to our union and I'm sorry I if you may have questions too um our union leadership um Amy Traverson and Melissa Felenthal and um Sarah
076Silia and Carol Stum as well as um principal Katie Kelly um at Lions Park um they really were part of our leadership group as well as Dr. KS and Miss Schwarzwell to work with school perceptions and make sure that the questions that we continue to ask are still the questions we want to ask. And I think the participation in the survey is a direct link to their commitment to the district as well because um they have done a lot of um trust building among their membership to say there is a desire you know to improve and we are going to hold the district to those expectations but they are also willing to say we can vouch that there's an earnest and genuine desire to get this feedback and you know trying to make it safe
077for people to say hard things >> because if they're not willing or mistrustful that people really care which we still have um a degree of that for sure. So you know that partnership I think is um reflective of the health of that interaction as well. >> All right. Thank you so much. >> Thank you for having me. Welcome member Dorner. >> All right. Um, do you want to do the extended school year? >> Yes. So, Dr. Vander, >> thank you. And in your board packet, you have information regarding our summer programming for this upcoming summer. I um have done a couple of board memos in the past couple of months just sharing about summerbridge and summer enrichment. Um so we will be making some modifications to summerbridge to make it more targeted. And then summer
078enrichment was something that we piloted last summer. It was very successful and we plan on expanding that. Um so staff will be um receiving a survey in January and we are hoping to expand the diversity of options for our families. Um but summer programming will occur in July um for 15 days similar to what we've done in the past. Um and then we also have summer band and orchestra. Uh I'd be happy to answer any questions. >> Dr. Dr. Fanhar, uh, just a couple quick questions about the memo. One, are there students, this is in regards to summer bridge, are there students who do receive both literacy and math support? And if they did, because I, because that program, correct me if wrong, is available to students who are receiving that support? Is the program
079set up such that they would be able to go to the program for both literacy and math if they're receiving that during the school year? >> Yes, they can. Um, so I'll be working with the teams at each of the buildings to really target it to students who are receiving that tier three support or most um, significant support uh, for our intervention. Uh, and we do want to make some changes so that families can elect to have their students attend summerbridge for one portion and enrichment for the other to hopefully boost attendance. However, if we have some students who qualify for math and reading, that's something that we would offer. And and families would then be able to elect, do they want their child to be attending both or pick one and do enrichment if
080that's something that they choose to do. >> And then my second question was for that program too, I noticed that it was does tuition based meaning the family is paying a tuition fee. Is there if there was families who were interested but couldn't afford is there some sort of fee waiver or financial support available to families who wanted to participate but >> that is something we did with summer enrichment in the past and I that's something we can offer again. Yes. >> Any other questions Chris? >> Uh thank you Dr. Vanderhar. Um I only had one question. I love the summer enrichment program. I think it's awesome we're doing that. I wish we had this when I was a student here, but hey, that's okay. >> Uh, are we just curious, are we offering any
081new programs that we didn't offer last year? Any changes? >> Any new programs? So, the summer enrichment is what we piloted. So, we'll do some um something related to that. And again, we're going to diversify the options. Um, but there's no other programs for any other specific group. That's my fault. I didn't within summer enrichment. When you say we're diversifying the programs, what are we doing differently? Just >> Sure. So last year we really focused on um some of our um things that came up from different committees. So we had um some design thinking classes, uh steam classes. We also had a class for students who were um going into middle school. So, and we had some classes that were more targeted towards um like uh the genre different genres in reading to target um
082boys and and that. So, we plan to offer similar things uh like we did this past summer. However, we are going to um open it up to staff to offer different opportunities. We also received feedback from families about what they were interested in. Um, so that's something that we'll also try and target. >> Great. Awesome. Thank you. >> Thank you, Dr. Ronda. >> Thank you. >> All right, moving on to our Cook County Tax Advocacy Update. Dr. Gore, I will try to be brief. Um, but this is a topic that's becoming a passion project of mine. Um, I recall you told me to chase this and I am chasing it. Um I am um there's a a couple updates but um I think the highlights are we are um moving into a mobilized stage within
083our coalition as we like to call ourselves now um which really um consists of Cook County superintendent and school business officials. and we're trying to unite the North Cook group with the South Croak and with the West Cook, which is feeling very like a Marvel movie. Um, and so it's been fun to kind of mobilize this. Um, unfortunately, we don't want to be united by the common um, situation we find ourselves in, which is the lack of um, tax distributions. And today is the 16th of December, and we've received zero dollars. Um, and that is probably shocking information because everyone has passed the date of um, paying these taxes to the county. Um, why these dollars have not been deposited um, to us as school districts or other taxing bodies. Um, that question is unclear
084and it's not being provided by Cook County officials including um, Cook County Treasurer, Cook County President, and Cook County Assessor. Um so frustratingly we've really taken sort of the offense approach which is requesting meetings with um commissioners which they have um graciously provided including Commissioner Trevor, Commissioner Morrison um as well as several others. We have engaged with our um lobbying kind of advocacy channels including Adred um and other um state representatives um Tracy Katzman Moles and um um a couple others have been engaged in this topic and we're trying to keep them connected to the topic as state legislators. Um, but today we had some exciting movement because today was the day that we unleashed a spreadsheet unlike any spreadsheet before. And that spreadsheet which was created by none other than the associates of our
085Bob Lewis which I am now calling him ours who is our beloved um PMTA which now they've merged. So we all will call them now PMTA. Um but basically they're our financial powerhouses and our consultants. They have um created a spreadsheet that when the school business officials andor superintendent completes for their school district, this will on the back end populate an estimation of monies lost through interests not earned which applies to all Cook County school districts which there are 150. A fun trivia fact, money is lost by the issuance of tax anticipation warrants, which ours sadly it applies to, including both the cost to do that as well as the costs of interest we are paying on that short uh term loan. And third, many districts such as district 214 has had to break investments
086and the penalty costs of these investments to free up liquidity to cover payroll and other essential obligations. These are major dollars. And so within these three categories, um we're talking about tens and millions, maybe even hundreds of millions of dollars just linked to the lack of payment that is statutoily due. Um, interestingly, this is in state law. So, um, we intend to get 150 school districts data. We know who they are. We have names and we are going to track it down until we have it. And once we have that grand total, we feel that that is the best um, you know, sword in our in our in our toolbox. That's not a good that's a merging of metaphors. I want to be nonviolent here. Um that's the feather in our cap. And we believe
087that when we quantify and we speak dollars, which we know um people sit up a little straighter when we quantify tens and hundreds of millions of dollars, we start to become more powerful in our advocacy. So that's our intention at this point is to say we're going to put that money, we're going to put that dollar amount in front of anyone and everyone that can hear. We have resolutions ready and are spreading these resources. Um, we want to mobilize in in front of the county board tomorrow. I'll be speaking um virtually at a innovation and technology sub meeting subcommittee meeting. I know, surprise surprise. They're going to get a little Dr. Gore tomorrow, but I'm kidding. But there will be lots more representation and advocacy at these events as well as on Thursday there is
088a Cook County um commissioners meeting of the whole I'll be speaking there. Um in January there will be one as well. So, we're going to be, you know, keep mobilizing and I think reinforcing this message and simultaneously as we start getting these dollars in, we're going to start speaking some pretty scary truths about the actual cost, not just the, you know, abstract cost of what this means. you know, because districts like ours who don't receive a lot of money from the evidence-based formula funding um from the state, we're the types of districts that are hurting the most because we aren't receiving regular state money um because of the property values and the property taxes we receive. And going back to um Dr. case's mention of law about making sure we don't have inflated reserve amounts.
089Districts that don't have these reserves amounts are really looking very carefully if they're going to make payroll. And um sadly the perhaps the biggest frustration that we're dealing with is there's zero communication. So, we aren't receiving any proactive communication from our Cook County um you know, president, the assessor's office, the treasurer. Um none of these offices have provided communication short of communicating the opportunity for a bridge loan of which zero school districts in Cook County are qualified to obtain because their ratings are higher than the counties. So, this is the only communication that's been received. So we are joined by again really talented um people like Bob Lewis his teammates and Aerys Dillianis my fellow Greek who works for Franic and he's a powerhouse too in these matters. So I can assure you that um
090we're staying on it but I would love to answer any questions if there are any. >> It'll help me warm up for tomorrow. >> I was going to say sup super gore has more than one meaning. Um, I'm excited to see what you are doing and I cannot wait to see what happens because I think it's unbelievable that the county is doing this and the fact that they put out the bills and should have received them and we still haven't received money and the lack of communication. I mean, that's astounding in itself. >> So, thank you for what you are doing and appreciate it. >> Mary, I wanted to ask really quickly about um, have we engaged the press at all in this process? We have and the press has indicated an interest in uh
091the data and so we are excited to be able to get our story out more widely and think that it will be beneficial um for our message to engage the press with what they need which is the stories and the data. So um that's that's been great. Mhm. >> Well, Mary, I just I I really want to thank you and commend you for your leadership in this area. You I I could see the way your face lights up as you as you talk about this. And >> I never knew it was in me. >> And and honestly, we in in our community, we're we're lucky to have you leading the way here. So, so thank you for that. And and as I say all the time, never underestimate the power of a spreadsheet. >> I
092know I've become a spreadsheet person. Jason is just proud of me because They don't let me touch them, but I admire them. >> But but honestly, I mean, I think and you hit it on the head. I mean, it you need to turn this into not an abstract problem, but a real one, and you're doing that. So, I very much look forward to to where this goes. But, >> but thank you for for all you've done. >> I'm also interested in understanding the opportunity cost. Yeah. >> So, the spreadsheet will tell us what it costs us and how much we're losing in all of those different areas. But I wonder if there's also a strong narrative that would resonate with others outside of D57 on the things that you Jason others are not able to
093do because you are playing phone tag with the state and if that resonates maybe more or differently with the press and others it might be an interesting >> not not like a footnote but some part of the narrative. >> We kind of joke in our group texts of um fellow superintendents like our day jobs are getting in the way of us doing this. Like I kind of think this should be a full-time job. um you know but actually it's a credit to my teammates that I am able to pursue this because it is probably frustrating to them about times that my door is closed or not being able to connect about things. So it it does have a cost. I think my availability to support their work or you know be there for them is
094definitely um the impact. And I also think um it's been in helpful to do this work with a group of people who are interested and I think it's been nice to have the teammates that trying to divide and conquer and make sure that we're distributing the work. Um because you know it's there's no short of capable people that are interested in this. I also think that districts like ours who just passed a referendum and just had the very um important experience of just of standing in front of taxpayers and asking them for such a significant investment and realizing how painful this type of ask is. I think I feel uniquely um passionate about this because I keep saying like if you've ever had to stand in a room of people and tell them the amount
095of money that it costs to rebuild a school that's 75 years old, you know how real this issue is and you know what's on the line in terms of people's trust in the work we're doing. Um, and so I think we take personal um, insult to think that we couldn't fight for the taxpayers cuz these are real dollars. So when we're talking about a district like ours, maybe our number is going to be $100,000, maybe more, maybe $400,000, and we don't know until we get that money. Can we imagine what we could do with that in our budget? And that money is just gone. when you get a district like 214 or Shamberg 54, we're talking a lot more money. So, at scale, when you, you know, think of 150 school districts in Cook County
096all the way down to, you know, Dalton, um, these are very far. I mean, it's a massive county. So, we've got to I I think that and the other thing I keep realizing in this process and in these communications is that if we were private industries, if we were seen as corporations that were privately funded and we were losing revenue and and profit, can you imagine the outrage at a corporation that employed 300 people in our area or a high school district that employs thousands of people? There wouldn't this wouldn't be acceptable. So I think it's just making drawing a line in the sand to say, you know, we're protecting the expectation. We're not settling for less than what would be expected of us if we were, you know, we wouldn't be allowed to do
097this. So I think there's a lot of complex layers. There's a there's a whole lot of fingerpointing. Um, I'm not as optimistic that we'll ever get a resolution that we'll find necessarily satisfying, but we won't stop until we've at least exposed the problem into the knowledge of the public. So, that's the goal at this point. I was just going to say really quick, Mary, to your point, um, what you just mentioned, I think it's important to recognize that even though this is the first year that we're experiencing any real hardship from this pattern, it is in fact a pattern that this has been what I think the third year that this is number four. >> Three out of four. >> Oh, three out of four. The third year out of four that this has happened.
098And it it's probably only because we haven't truly been hurt by it that we haven't raised it as an issue. But if it is, as you're saying, a matter of state law that there's a timeline to this that needs to be respected. The fact is it hasn't been for several years. So it it's unfortunate that or or maybe it's fortunate that, you know, we were able to sort of get by in previous years and didn't have to make a big scene about it, but it's time to make a scene. So, I appreciate all of the work that you're doing and the patience of your your um cabinet that's sort of taking you away as you're working on this issue. I just wanted to add that I recognize that our school district, other school districts are
099at a dis disadvantage um compared to other uh public tax agencies. I know one in particular that has enough in their reserves that they did not have to even consider doing this. I don't think the village had to consider doing this. I don't think uh the police department, anything that's associated with the village, any of those organizations. I think um I know one in particular had to fight uh very strongly public sentiment and village uh back um maybe 20 years ago uh when this happened before in order to build up their reserve to 9 months as opposed to the three or four that the village had sanctioned. Um, so I I think I feel like we're standing out in the cold as compared to other taxpaying organizations, taxpayed organizations in our in our community. Thank
100you so much for your work, Mary. All right, we're going to move on to your superintendent goals. There was a copy of those for your review in the packet. I'd be happy to answer any questions that you might have. >> Does anybody have any questions for Dr. G? >> I was going to wait, but since no one else jumped into >> my question was, could county work be added to the I'm just kidding. >> Actually, I thought >> I was hoping the student board members No, I'm just joking. They had no idea. I'll tell you what, I wasn't going to say that, but that is actually uh gerine to my my first comment, which >> um and I'll just say this again. You're probably sick of me hearing this. I still think you have way
101too many goals, but I know as a board we've discussed this, and I am I am in the minority in thinking that. So, I I applaud you for being as diligent and working as hard as you have on on taking on all of this because it's a lot. Uh, two questions I had on goal uh 1D. I I thought we also were going to include uh ELA growth on spring map goal as well as MAP. >> Oh my gosh, I'm so sorry. Yeah, we did and we are and so luckily that has not been calculated until the spring. But I'm sorry that I had failed. I think I brushed over it because I probably forgot to correct it after the October one and then I think I skipped over it knowing it's a spring goal.
102So, I apologize. We are It's going to be reading and math. >> Okay. Excellent. >> Uh and then the other question I had just on the full day kindergarten council. >> Um I guess it would be interesting I think for the board and the community just to hear what they're doing or what they're up to. Is is that possible to have >> maybe next month or Yeah. Would that be okay? Are they're gonna you're going to meet next month, maybe either in February. It makes sense. And maybe, you know, we've got our Westbrook team here, too. That would be great. >> They're doing some really exciting. >> Yeah. No, it it looks like it. So, I I think it'd be great to hear more about that. So, thank you. >> Thanks. >> And I clearly
103it goes without saying the work is not singular. It's the work of the team that I get to work with and their hard work is reflected in this document. So, I wasn't taking anyone's credit here. It's really the the team of the cabinet and um Sarah uh Taberski is not here, but her work as well as well as Aaron's too. >> That's right. Leaders get results through others. Right. As they say, >> they're very great. >> All right. Thank you very much. >> All right. Let's move on to the next item on the agenda, the school maintenance project grant. >> Sure. Um so, this is a grant uh through the state. uh they will uh reimburse. It's a match grant, so they'll reimburse um up to $50,000 um on maintenance items um as long as
104we spend the same amount. Um so we look for projects that will be in excess of $100,000. And so this year we'll be filling out the grant for um uh the bridge that we're uh repairing over at Westbrook as well as some of the safety um enhancements that will come through the audit. So, if approved tonight, then I fill out the paperwork um through uh the website. Any questions? >> Good job. >> Awesome. I'll just keep going then with uh so student fees um each year we bring student fees um to the board in December uh to then be approved in January. the timing is um in time for us to then be ready for uh registration um as that has to be uh fees have to be inputed into the to to the software.
105So um this year uh I bring to you student fees that have not been changed since last year. Um one thing uh we I was looking at a little bit was just um I looked at everything a lot but uh one thing I looked at a little bit more than everything else was um the fees for lunches. That was something that I've just been talking to Quest about. Um they um their their costs change each year. Ours do not. Um I still uh and looking at some some of the costs from the surrounding districts, I think we're in a good place. We it's not a money maker. It is it is it does cost us um to provide those lunches. Um so in other words, um what students are paying or families are paying for
106the food is not covering 100%. um it's not a huge number and I do think that the more that we can keep um lunches um available for students uh economically um that that's better. So uh we've worked on it. We have looked at how we can change some other costs and things like that, but we have made some meal deals and different things in order to make it um appropriate for students to be able to afford and understanding that I just budget each year. Um so that's one thing I looked at. Uh but we had nothing's changed. We've kept all fees the same that that I'm proposing for uh the board for this year or for next year. Any questions? Oh, um I was thinking as you were saying about the costs for lunches that
107you know in this era of inflation and sort of the dollar going a much smaller distance than it used to. Um, I don't think it's just in the past year that these numbers haven't changed, right? They've been the same for quite a while. >> Correct. >> Do you recall precisely how long? >> I don't, but it's it's been a it's been a while. The the lunch I don't I don't have exact I know that in my time it hasn't changed. So, it's been at least 5 years. >> Sure. I mean, I'm certainly not advocating to increase any of the costs, right? But I I agree with you that it's important to keep things as affordable as possible for families who are also feeling that same pinch, right? Like we are all working with the same
108dollars and they just don't go as far as they used to. Um but I was curious, are there any areas where we're noticing on the district side sort of a an increased loss, right? You're saying most of these programs, they're not revenue generating. Are we finding that that gap is sort of growing in terms of what we're spending compared to these costs because these costs have been the same? >> Sure. No, it's it's a great question. I think some of them like when you look at a club cost for example, that's really the idea is that the club cost is going to cover the cost of the staff member that's running the club and that hasn't changed very much. So that's we're pretty good there. Transportation, we've talked about in the past that it doesn't
109cover uh the full cost. Luckily, our transportation contract for this year uh pretty much state even from last year. Um but transportation is a tough one because many districts around do not charge for transportation. So trying to increase that. Um the I would say when I look at the fees, you know, there's not so many of them, but when we look at them, they're they're not um they're not it's not big losses that we're seeing. A lot of them are um associated with like a stipen that that stu that teachers are receiving as well. So we look at that. Um, and then the other thing to take into account, I think, is, you know, the fact that, um, we just went out to the to the community for a referendum and the idea of trying
110to keep fees the same was something that I was thinking about as well. >> Any other questions or comments? Chris, >> uh, yeah, and Jason, thank you. I I really applaud how you've been able to keep these fees I How long did you say 10? the longest I've been on the board. So, probably much. >> Yeah, absolutely. It's been it's been a while. I have history, but definitely >> years and and I, you know, and you find a way to make that work in our budget and that's awesome and I I'm sure the families and community appreciates that. I know we do. >> Um, I did just refresh my memory and maybe for anyone wondering, I mean, I I have gotten asked a couple times, hey, you know, why isn't the bus free because it
111is in this district or that? And could you just refresh everyone's memory on what what percent of transportation do we cover relative to what we ballpark? Sorry to put you on the spot. >> Yes. >> I want to say yeah I'm going to give a number that's not exact but I want to say it was around 35 or 40% of the cost. I'd have to double check and I get >> that that >> uh the the fees cover about 40%. >> So it's just important I think for anyone listening to know I mean we are still covering >> Yes. >> 65% of that cost. Yes. >> And that cost has gone up. I know it hasn't made gone up this year. >> Correct. >> But it's absolutely gone up in previous years and will again
112next year. I forget by how much. So >> yes, uh the last two years. So if we look at the last two years, it was um I believe it went up about 20%. And that was because we had um uh some lower percents during the co years when everyone else was going up a lot. So it did catch up. Um but then we were able to keep it straight, you know, this year. um keep it flat, but then it will go up next year. >> So, I mean, yes, $375 is a lot of money, but I think it's worth pointing out that, you know, we are subsidizing the overwhelming majority of that cost, and that cost has gone up while that fee has not. So, >> absolutely. >> So, great. Thank you. >> Sure. >>
113Okay, let's move on to our foyer report. All right. in your packet, you um received um a foyer report which the highlight of which is that since our last meeting, District 57 has received 15 foyer requests since November 19th uh 2025 and December 15th. You can um see a detailed report in your board packet. Thank you. All right, let's move on to the consent agenda. Can I get a motion to approve the consent agenda? Oh, I I did the bills. They were great. >> Nice work. >> So moved. >> Second. >> Vice President Leto. >> Yes. >> Member Nelson. >> Yes. >> Member Deech. >> Yes. >> Member Dorner. >> Yes. >> Member Fay. >> Yes. >> Member Qualch. >> Yes. >> President Bennett Kell. Yes. All right. So, now we're moving on to some
114unfinished business. Can I get a motion to approve the 2627 school calendar? >> So moved. >> Second. >> Member Nelson. >> Yes. >> Member Deech. >> Yes. >> Member Dorner. >> Yes. >> Member Fay. >> Yes. >> Member Qualch. >> Yes. >> Vice President Leto. Yes. >> President Bennett Hill. >> Yes. All right. Moving on to the press plus issue 120. Can I get a motion to accept the press plus issue 120? >> So moved. Second. >> Member Deech. >> Yes. >> Member Dorner. >> Yes. >> Member Fay. >> Yes. >> Member Qualch. >> Yes. >> Vice President Leto. >> Yes. >> Member Nelson. >> Yes. >> President Bennett Kell. >> Yes. All right. Now, we've come to the second opportunity for community comments. Is there anyone any members of the committee that would like
115to address the board? Karen? >> No. Okay. Seeing none, let's move on to our new business. First item on that agenda is to adopt the 2025 tax levy. Can I get a motion to adopt the 2025 tax levy? >> So moved. >> Second. >> Member Dorner. Yes. >> Member Fay. >> Yes. >> Memberwhe. >> Yes. >> Vice President Leto. >> Yes. >> Member Nelson. >> Yes. >> Member Deech. >> Yes. >> President Bennett Kell. >> Yes. >> And we'll move on to the approval of the school maintenance project grant. Can I get a motion to approve the school maintenance project grant? >> So moved. >> Second. >> Member Fay. >> Yes. Member Qualchuk. >> Yes. >> Vice President Leto. >> Yes. >> Member Nelson. Yes. >> Member Deech. >> Yes. >> Member Dorner. >> Yes.
116>> President Bennett Hill. >> Yes. >> All right. The last item of new business is uh a response to a community member's request for information. Um there's a draft letter in um that everybody has taken a look at and I would like to get a motion to accept the response to that community member's communication so that we can send that further to community member Brian Reynolds. >> So moved. >> Second. >> Member Qualcha. >> Yes. >> Vice President Leto. >> Yes. >> Member Nelson. >> Yes. >> Member Deech. >> Yes. Member Dorner. >> Yes. >> Member Fay. >> Yes. >> President Bennett Kill. >> Yes. >> All right. Let's move on to the communications. We'll start with the NSSO report. >> Yes. The NSSO governing board met on Wednesday, December 3rd. Sorry, I'm getting my
117notes up here. Uh so the new articles of agreement which established the operational board uh has been officially ratified and will go into effect on January 2nd. Uh I believe the first operational board meeting is sometime in January. Mary, do you I forget the exact date but it's early January. Uh so that's exciting. Uh largely because you may recall it was about a year ago that we developed the strategic plan and really for that first year since we developed it, this has kind of been the the noose around our neck so to speak. And so it is good that we've you know it was an important topic the whole idea of governance and and changes that we had to make but it's nice that we are now past that and able to move to other
118areas of the strategic plan. Uh to that end uh curriculum and and looking at curriculum was one of the pillars of the strategic plan. Uh assistant superintendent Molly Dunn has put together a program task force to identify potential gaps in NSSO's offerings today. uh and what might make sense, right? So, you know, if we have a couple students in each of the member districts that all seem to have the same needs uh for services that uh the co-op doesn't offer today, is there an opportunity there that makes sense? So, uh that is going on. Uh facilities, another uh key pillar of the strategic plan. uh we are looking at uh different additional funding models that we could potentially leverage uh to uh to fund some of the projects that we have coming up facilities wise.
119uh in taking a look at the five-year facilities plan that we developed along with Archon I think two years ago and just looking at that again and does it still make sense and are there any of those projects that have to be moved up or could be moved out and just making sure that that that's making sense. Uh Molly Dunn, the assistant superintendent of teaching and learning uh discussed the January 5th uh workshops that'll be happening. I think this is the third year that that she's organized that uh these will all be held in one location unlike past years which is great. They're all going to be at Harper. Uh 15 sessions have already uh already have a waiting list have already filled up uh which is pretty exciting. There's speakers coming in from all
120over the country and I know Molly is just praying for decent weather and and when is the weather ever bad on January 5th, right? So so hopefully that will go well. Uh negotiations with the bargaining unit are underway. Uh I'm one of the governing board members who's part of that committee. We had our first uh negotiating session on December 4th. Uh and our next will be on January 7th. Uh we are using a modified version of interestbased bargaining which is uh kind of interesting. But uh so far so good and to the extent that of course I can I'll obviously keep all of you updated on how that's going. Uh the winter wonderland, which as just a reminder, the second of NSSO's big festivals that they have, uh is on Saturday, January 31st. Uh so
121there will be ice fishing and uh sledding and snowball fighting. Well, I don't know about that. Maybe not snowball fight, but but it's a lot of fun. So hopefully we'll have uh decent weather for that as well. So I would encourage all of you to attend if you can. Uh we do not meet in January. Uh the operational board does but the governing board does not. So our next meeting will be Wednesday, February 4th. >> Thanks, Chris. Um next is the Ed Foundation, which we don't currently have a representative for. Mary, were you able to go to the last meeting? >> Unfortunately, I wasn't. There is one on Thursday, um which I also will not be able to attend. It's not matching up well with my kids, um activities, but um I will connect with
122them and make sure if they have any updates. I know that they are in the process of determining, you know, the grant selection and I think we'll have some exciting updates from them soon. But >> thank you. We can move on to our PTO reports. Why don't we start with Lincoln? >> I'm very glad that you uh looked over this way because actually um one of our ED Foundation members is also one of the co-presidents for the Lincoln PTO because everybody is just, you know, spread very thin around here. Um, so if I can speak to that a little bit, um, she did mention, Nicole mentioned that, um, the grant cycle had closed and they were reviewing the grants and trying to figure out, um, how to fund all of the various things that were
123solicited. Um, I think she had mentioned she was planning to partner with some of the u school specific PTO's to just get a better read on the costs of these various things. Um, so hopefully we'll hear more specifically what exactly was funded. Um, she mentioned, I don't know if this was shared previously, that the date for the gala this year will be February 28th. Um, it's going to be held at the conservatory. I'm not sure exactly where that is, but some people seem to know. Um, and it will be from 7 to 10:00 p.m. So, a little bit of a different um setup in terms of the uh the practicalities, right? It's it's going to be earlier as opposed to, you know, competing with various spring events in April. um earlier in terms of the
124year, but also in terms of the time frame. Um I for one was very excited to hear the party will shut down at 10 p.m. cuz that's when I also shut down. So I was like, "Yeah, you did this just for me." Um and then I think uh Nicole had mentioned that rather than like a formal sit down dinner, there will just be appetizers and drinks available and sort of really leaning into that casino vibe that everybody seems to enjoy. Um, so we'll be more come and show up and hang out and bid on various things and less, you know, sort of a big to-do, which of course is a cost-saving measure for them and maybe a little bit more attractive for some people that don't like to sit and eat next to strangers. So,
125um, keep an eye out for more information about that. And then as far as the Lincoln PTO meeting, um I think I I really just want to share one really key uh point which was with regard to executive positions on the PTO for the coming year but for the year following. Um, I just sort of want to make a plea to anybody who might be listening to really consider, especially uh for anybody who is a parent of children in in the district, the the level of work and enhancement that the PTO's of all of our schools uh provide for the quality of our student experience. I think often goes unnoticed. I think we take for granted the amount of effort that um these volunteers who are also parents and also as I mentioned sometimes hold
126multiple roles across multiple volunteer organizations for the sake of our district. Uh we take for granted the work that they do to make the school experience and the school community fun and and to truly make it a community, right? I mean, as teachers and staff, you they have access to the kids every day, but the PTO and the work that they do really helps foster those friendships outside of school by providing funding and just opportunities for various, you know, weekend events or school day off events and things like that. And the Lincoln PTO is in a really precarious position in terms of their leadership. um their current leadership has been serving I think in their current roles for several years now and many of them have sort of followed up with their kids to Lincoln
127right having served at Lions or Fairview um on the PTO's there as well these women have done so much for our district and I I feel confident speaking to them or speaking for them that they're probably feeling pretty burned out right we have exhausted the um the efforts of this cohort of volunteers in particular. And I would just like to put a plea out for anybody who is willing to step up and serve in these roles, particularly for next year and the year after. Many of the leadership of the Lincoln PTO has students who are eighth graders. They'll be moving off because they won't be eligible to serve anymore. And that puts that particular PTO in a really dangerous position of not having a leadership who can plan these things that I think as parents
128and certainly as students we've come to expect and enjoy. Um so just putting that out there. Please please please consider it's it's not a high pressure thing, right? It's not like you have to have, you know, a trained leadership certificate of experience or anything like that. Um I think any effort, any interest would be really appreciated. So, that's my report. Um, I believe the next month's meeting is January 6, sorry, no, the 26th. January 26th in the Lincoln LRC at 6:30. Thanks, Kim. Lions Park. Westbrook has not had a meeting. If the December meeting was cancelled, it would have been Monday night. So, the next meeting is the 3 Monday night, 7 o'clock uh of uh January. And Kim, I had a question. So, what was the date of the um gala again? >> Uh
129February 28th. >> Thank you. >> Mhm. >> I wonder if it's Friendship Conservator. Yeah. Yeah. It's it's >> on 83. >> Oh, just east of 83. >> I know where that is. >> Yeah. >> Okay. >> Thank you, Pam. Lions Park, >> Lions Park. Uh PTO has not had a PTO meeting since our last board meeting. Their next meeting is on January 12th, 2026 in the Lions Park staff lounge. >> Thank you. Fairview Fairview's meeting was cancelled. So, and their next meeting I I don't have it. It's in January. Thank you, Eileen. All right, board president report. I just have a couple of items. Um, first I just wanted to announce that um Kim has agreed to be Alen's mentor. So, thank you to Kim's for her volunteer for that. Um, and Alan, you get
130to have the Ed Foundation. So you're going to be our representative to the uh liaison to the Ed Foundation taking off so we can have a chat about what that means. Um yes you can go Thursday. >> Yes but our leazison opportunities are really about going to the meetings and communicating from the board to these organizations and then from the organizations back to the board. Um the last item is about the governance committee. Since we are down a member of our governance committee, um I'd just like to ask if anybody is interested in joining to shoot me an email and um we will be selecting our new governance committee committee member um at the January meeting. Okay, that's it for me. All right. Um, we don't have a need for board discussion. The next item
131on the agenda is board topics for future meetings. Um, one thing that I know that we've talked about recently is the idea of being sort of halfway or a little bit more than halfway through the current strategic plan and wanting to have an opportunity to relook at that and, you know, potentially just revisit if the goals need to be adjusted or thought about. And so I just wanted to throw that out there as a actual formal topic for some future meeting. >> Thank you. Is everybody in agreement to have that on the future agenda? >> Great idea. >> Okay. I do have one item. There has been a considerable conversation in um the surrounding school districts and villages about um immigration customs enforcement and customs and border patrols using district properties. Um, District 21 and
132Main 207 recently passed resolutions prohibiting access to district properties as staging areas, processing locations, or bases of operations for immigration enforcement. Um, and what I wanted to propose is that we um discuss and consider the adoption of a resolution to prohibit that. um take the next month to speak with council and look at um surrounding districts uh resolutions and um how excuse me um get administration's perspective on um the impact of that on our district or what we might do moving forward. Does anybody have any objection to putting that on a future agenda? Ma'am, I don't have um objection. I have um considerable uh input from the community where that is something that would be desired. It's very much desired. >> I don't have an object. Can I just be clear on what are we
133directing Mary and her team to do anything in advance of the next meeting or would we discuss what we want her to do at the next meeting if we make this a topic? >> Um it would be a research basically. Um the only thing I would direct administration to do is to consult with our council. Okay. >> And look at current practices, current resol. And >> then we discuss that at the next Okay. Okay, great. Thank you. Um, all right. We do have a need for close session. So, can I get a motion to move into close session? Are there >> so what purpose? >> Oh, yeah. For what purpose? >> Oh, Lord, you guys are keeping me honest today. the collective negotiating matters between the district and its employees or the representatives or deliberations
134considering concerning salary schedules for one or more classes of employees. >> So moved. >> Second. >> Vice President Leto. >> Yes. >> Member Nelson. >> Yes. >> Member Deech. >> Yes. >> Member Dorner. >> Yes. >> Member Fay. >> Yes. Member Qualche. >> Yes. President Bennett.