Board Meeting 3/10/25

001e e e in the dark you want the lights up out there up up we know where to do that we think this is it over here the magic of me walking back magic of Dr Hunt ready okay we're ready all right we're going to call the order the uh laort Community School Corporation school board meeting for Monday March 10th we'd ask that you would please silence your uh phones and devices out there and then uh please stand and join me in the Pledge of Allegiance I pledge aliance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with liy and justice for all okay uh Roll Call Secretary homequest Mr Arnold pres Mr King here miss batty here miss Farley pres I

002am presid vice president Jackson here and president Seer here you're all present 7 all right next item is public comment we have no public comment tonight so we'll move into the consent agenda there's four items in the consent agenda that you've reviewed uh the approval of minutes for of the February 10 2025 school board meeting financials for ratification and approval Treasures report and the Personnel recommendation and travel requests do we have a motion to approve the consent agenda thank you Tucker a second a second thank you Monica all those in favor say I I opposed okay that passes 70 uh then we have a special Personnel recommendation that you've had in front of you uh do we have a motion to approve the special Personnel recommendation so thank you Amy second second thank you Jim

003all those in favor say I I oppos that passes all right the next item of business is a program of studies leaport high school and leport middle school we have uh two of our esteemed principles Mr up and Mr wson slight delay okay okay moving a warp speed here today yeah that's right if you want to go ahead the okay first of all thank you for having us here tonight to discuss the program of studies at both the high school and in the middle school so I I thought I'd start quickly with the purpose of the program of studies it's one of the driving forces that uh that we have at the high school along with the student handbook the program of studies is one of our most important documents that we have it's basically

004a document that helps students choose and complete a four-year graduation plan designated areas that they use the credits of course how many credits they need to attain what course pathway they would like to choose and we have many different Pathways for them to choose and the graduation requirements which I'll get to in just a second the employability skills as well as the postsecondary skills all of these combined eventually will lead to a our students becoming a graduate of leaport high school so yearly what we do with the program studies as we take a look at all the programs our course offerings our Pathways what's working what's not working what needs to be improved and ultimately what leads to the most number of students that we can have graduated you can see that in the past

005three four years we've done a pretty good job of making adjustments to our program of studies that leads to graduation for our students I will say a Shameless plug here last year we our graduation rate was 9 1.69% that's the highest it's been in 20 years so I want to just say congratulations to the Port High School staff for all the work that they've done to get this to this point um speaking of the program of studies what we're here for is just to give you guys an opportunity to see what we're doing next year what changes we're going to make I don't know how familiar you are in December of 2024 the Indiana State Board of Education passed the redesigning of high school initiatives which is a new diploma requirement so right now um

006and and I I praise our counselors every day there's a there's 11 different diplomas students can earn at the high school so they are on call quite a bit when students make a move from one to the next it's it's quite a a daunting task but they're doing a great job so this new redesigning of high school diplomas will start with the incoming class the ninth grade class the 2029 Co cohort students that are in 25 uh 26 27 and 28 cohorts they're going to remain on the same path that they originally set forth with however if they choose they can they can um decide to take additional classes to meet the redesigning high school diploma now I know this isn't a redesigning diploma High School uh high school meeting but I could talk to

007you about an hour's worth easy on that and all the things that they're trying to um make decisions on yet for us and we are in the middle of scheduling right now so it makes it a little bit difficult because we're having students choose and we don't have all the answers yet so it is a little bit difficult but we're doing the best that we can we feel very confident with where we're at um quickly just some of the changes for the new diplomas and this will reflect in our uh program of studies so we move from the core 40 to the base diploma now they call it which is 42 credits but then there's also instead of academic honors and Technical Honors there are six different seals which again I won't get into because

008this isn't the meeting for that however if you go back to the base diploma you can see that there are some uh maybe some striking things I guess if you're um looking at what is required Now versus what is required in this new diploma so in English English n is really all you have to take along with four other English credits um right now that's not the case math the only uh true um sequence that you have to take is algebra one okay so it's totally different in today's you have to get through Algebra 2 which would be Algebra 1 geometry and Algebra 2 now it's just algebra 1 okay so a big shift in terms of what students have to attain and then of course you can see the other ones that are listed

009up there um for the new diplomas the next one so what's new uh 2526 of course the redesigning of high the high school diplomas our counselor along with our associate principal Jen Hunt right now are over at kesling at a parent meeting discussing the new diploma requirements for those incoming freshmen next year new courses for next year include a mandatory computer course it's called Computing foundations for a digital age so that will be in our program of studies personal financial responsibility is a is a requirement that we started last year but now this year it's mandatory so we were a little bit ahead of the the curve there on that one we use Ramsey education I'm not sure if you are familiar with Ramsey or not but we use that particular program for personal financial

010responsibility we're moving right now PCC which Mr Wilson will talk about here in just a second it's in the it's at the eighth grade level now we're moving that back to the high school while the eighth graders will now take exploring college and careers and then move on to preparing for college and careers at the high school current Pathways we're going to have the second year of welding now we started that it's very uh popular program that we have we have Li liberal ARS pathway that we're implementing next year and we didn't know for sure where this one was going but a criminal Justice pathway Jen gos has done a great job of promoting that we have over a 100 students now in that pathway which is brand new for next year and then of

011course we're trying to expand the work-based learning initiatives that this new diploma is really pushing for the class of 2029 we do have business and Technical math which are replacing some of the uh geometry requirements replacing the algebra 2 requirements so students don't necessarily have to take those classes anymore so we some additional math courses for students that might struggle in math um Algebra 2 seems to be the struggling point for students who really have a hard time in math so now they won't have to take that but we did have to find additional math courses for them to meet the requirement so we've done that big change to we're moving to the loud a system instead of Val Victorian and salutatorian this is a an initiative that started in 2022 with teachers and parents

012and students and we finally got to it uh starting next year the loud a system recognizes more students for their accomplishments so we will starting again with the class of 2029 we'll have sumacum loud which is your 4.0 Magnum loud 3.8 to 3.99 and then Kum loud with the 3.5 to 379 and they'll be designated with something that they wear at the graduation ceremony so it just recognizes more students for their academic accomplishments all right um as Mr talked about there is an impact at the middle school um we do have a program of studies in 56 there is no change in the program studies there but in 78 we're going to have some minor adjustments as a result of the changes in the different diplomas um as Mr Rob talked about PCC will be

013at the high school now and in 8th grade we're going to have exploring college and careers eight and the purpose behind that is so that students have an exploration of all the different Pathways and by the end of their n uh eighth grade year they'll have their four-year graduation plan in place and that plan plan is supposed to be Revisited every year and as a ninth grader they'll go back to it the counselors will see if they're on track and if they're still thinking about the same um course to study um in addition some of the high school credit classes starting next year we're just going to have algebra and geometry for high school credit um with the with the diploma seals they're still the college track and we really need to have the algebra

014and geometry at our level for high school credit so by the time that um students become seniors they're able to take especially um cist BC and also statistics they can take uh have a better uh base for college but also as a senior if they're done with all those cours work they could take college credit classes as a senior and get college credit for it um all the other courses that currently that we're having for um High School Credit they're going to switch back to the exploratory nature because we found over this past year that a lot of the kids in eth grade are not taking those courses as serious as they need to they don't understand that these courses for High School Credit Now and so we're making that adjustment and on top of

015that both at the intermediate and especially at the middle school um these courses should be exploratory in nature so they have a good foundation so they can be more successful at the for high school so we're excited about these changes I think it's good for kids uh you know over the LA course of the last couple years we've made some changes in our programming and U both the high school and our level of administration we're constantly talking about what we can do to Contin to improve to get more kids be um prepared once they graduate from leport high school so we what are our challenges moving forward right now the big challenge is we we still have unanswered questions from the Indiana Department of Education with these new changes being made the example would be

016like the new computer course that they're allowing we're not exactly sure what teacher licenses are needed or what teachers can actually teach that class because in the new diplomas too you only have to have one PE credit so what do we do with our PE teachers we're hoping that the io idoe will be flexible enough for us to allow maybe some PE teachers to teach computers and yes they can do it I promise you they can um but we're still waiting on that so it's the challenge right now and again we're hearing bits and pieces as they make decisions um not only on that but we also we have work-based learning opportunities that are still yet to be some of the questions are yet to be answered on some of those and then of course

017as we move into this new diploma what are our needs going to be and that's going to that's just going to take time but again like I said earlier we feel really confident where we're at we're making the right decisions our teachers are flexible enough to be uh I guess the state calls it permeable to make the changes that need to be made so our students are successful moving forward okay questions I just want to comment uh good job on the graduation requirement or the rate that's yeah that's good thank you y and I appreciate all this too there's a lot to keep up on and keep after and just like I said the biggest thing is the unanswered questions we need the questions answered when we go to talk with parents and we say

018we're not sure yet some of just don't quite understand that we don't either so is there anything that uh we as a school board could do to help I I don't think so I think it's all I think they're just all making decisions as they go okay yeah but appreciate the thank you okay uh next order of business is a superintendent report Dr Wood okay um so I have several items for my superintendence report um from a variety of different subject areas um so I'd like to begin with an update on our transition timeline um as I've been reporting on over the last several months um so first to wrap up a few items from February that we discussed in the February meeting but were not finalized at that time um we have identified a

019community partner to run the Child Care Program that is going to be um offered in conjunction with our preschool program at the new Little Learners Early Childhood Center um we are in very early preliminary uh conversation with this partner um which is The Learning Tree Academy um so Learning Tree Academy operates a licensed and fully accredited daycare center here in laort as well as several locations in the Porter County area um and we are working on a contract with them that they will operate three classrooms um at the Early Childhood Center for our child child care program that will be set up to work in conjunction with the preschool program um so to be clear children would participate in preschool classes that are run by laort Community Schools um and then parents would have the

020option to sign them up for daycare so that after that halfday preschool session is complete they would be walked down the hall to the child care room and be able to participate in daycare then for the remainder of the day until parents are able to pick them up after their workday um or vice versa if they participate in an afternoon session of preschool um so this partnership um is going to allow accessibility to our halfday preschool program for families is that um currently may not be able to access our program with the halfday model um so again we're still in the very early process of finalizing the exact terms of the contract um but we expect to have information available to families who are interested in this opportunity within the next few weeks to coincide

021that with preschool registration that will be coming up very soon um so on that note our planning for preschool is coming along very well and we finalized the program plan for both our main campus um at the Lincoln Elementary site as well as are North and South satellite locations um which we will be holding at critchfield elementary and Kingsbury Elementary I will cover the details of that plan in more depth um later in the meeting when we ask for your approval of the plan um and we will be Distributing details on the plan with the community this evening after um the meeting is complete with registration opening for families to start signing up on March 17th um next we are making very good progress identifying community and Industry partners for the slicer Career and Technical

022education site here in this building um so this coincides nicely with what we just heard about the new diploma requirements and the different model that we're moving through as a state in regard to setting students up for Success After High School um so we are very fortunate to be able to start working on the planning for our new CTE site at the same time that these requirements are coming out so our students are going to have a lot of amazing opportunities um when they get to those Junior and senior years um and are able to start participating in some of the CTE offerings we have a number of Community Partners that we're working at working with um to develop some of these programs and we're continuing to finalize more Partnerships as we get closer to

023the start of the school year so just to highlight a few of those that we are currently working on we've signed a letter of intent with ibch Community College which includes partnership opportunities for several of our CTE Pathways that will be offered to students through the port high school as well as within the community um so ibch has previously run an extension campus out of their valarezo campus here in leaport um it has previously been located at the former rpool location um and moving forward as we engage in a partnership with them we anticipate that we will be able to offer Ivy Tech classes here in this building so we're very excited for that partnership opportunity um we are in the process of speaking with both Northwest Health and Franciscan Health as we are working

024on developing our health careers program um which we will begin in a brand new space here and slicer CTE next year um we're working with the health Foundation of leaport as well as their mission is very much aligned to our goals within the health careers program um so we're really looking forward to engaging with them as we develop classroom space and also create Hands-On learning opportunities for our students um for this program also we have an ongoing collaboration with the play for Jake Foundation um not only providing the life-saving screenings for students St but also working with our pre- nursing students um to provide hands-on experience directly in the medical field so lots of opportunities for that program um we've talked about in previous meetings and and mentioned a little bit previously as well um

025we're working with a partner to provide the CDL pathway um as we develop that and that will be in conjunction with our transportation center and also part of the partnership that exists with ivtech so very excited about that and the opportunity for our seniors to earn a credential of value along with their high school diploma as we begin to develop that program we'll start with offering the credential and expand that into the full pathway as we develop that pathway through the next few years um our welding program as you know is in its first year here at slicer CTE and we have developed a partnership with New York blower as a community partner for this program so recently um New York blow are committed to covering the cost of the aw us which is the

026American Welding Society certification in structural welding for our current welding students um so that's an amazing opportunity for our students to be able to participate in that examination at no cost to them um so New York blower will be sending out their own certified welding instructor to our shop to administer that certification test um and so we're really excited for that opportunity and continue to work with New York blower as well as other industry partners for our welding program as that continues to expand um um and then continuing to finalize a few other programs that we're launching next year um some of which may not begin here in this building next year as we start the early principles and foundational courses of those Pathways um those will be housed at the high school but eventually

027will'll expand to the higher level um Capstone courses here um in slicer CTE and so some of those programs that will be beginning with those principles and Foundations classes for next year include col Ary Arts criminal justice and engineering and Robotics um so very excited about all the opportunities we have ahead of us for slicer CTE um finally we have one item on our transition timeline that is uh slated for the month of March that we're actually going to be tabling for now and revisiting by April um we had initially anticipated being able to finalize our transportation zones this month this month um and that refers to the zones in which students do not receive bus transportation due to their proximity of their residents to the school that they're attending as we've been working through

028this um with the new boundaries for students who currently are attending Lincoln um we had a number of questions come up and we just haven't had enough opportunity to work through those questions at this point um to allow us to release those walking zones um to the board at this time so um we want to make sure that we're thoroughly reviewing and considering all components of of the zone so we're we're going to table this item for now and we plan to release that information at our April board meeting um and then there's one additional item that I would like to discuss as part of my report this evening um so a few weeks ago the State Board of accounts completed the banial audit of our finances which is a process that's required by law

029for all school districts um within the state of Indiana every public school goes through this process and it is on a 2-year cycle so this audit process involved a thorough review of our finances from July 1st 2022 through June 30th of 2024 um and it was conducted by a team of several individuals from the State Board of accounts who spent approximately six weeks on site um conducting an in-depth review of all of our financial processes throughout that time frame that was mentioned um as a district we have committed to transparent financial management um and we've worked to this end to release updated and accurate financial information on a regular basis so upon receiving the results of this audit it's important to me that we continue in that same expectation of transparency by sharing the results

030of the audit with the community audit results are always public information and can be found on the State Board of accounts website a lot of people don't know it's there though um so we wanted to make sure we were taking that extra step to inform our community of this audit and the audit results um so we are creating a page on our own website that will link directly to that state word of accounts page and also provide some additional information to the community as well as some frequently asked questions in regard to the findings of the audit and what exactly it means um the audit reports can be rather lengthy um and so to get through and to process all the information we wanted to make it as accessible to to our community as possible

031um so I would like to take a few minutes to outline some of the results of the audit just for for the sake of transparency um in summary the audit identified several areas where I F financial reporting procedures need Improvement mainly related to Bank reconciliations Federal Grant Management and internal controls um so all of these findings concern procedures and recordkeeping not missing money or improper spending um so one of the things about a stateboard of accounts audit and the process that we go through is they are looking for ways that they can help us to avoid potential problems in the future so many times when people hear an audit they think this procedure is in place in order to catch things we're doing wrong but in a lot of ways it's intended to look at

032our procedures and say here are things you could be doing better to make sure something doesn't go wrong in the future so looking at it from that lens can help to understand um that the feedback they provide us is intended for us to utilize that information to to refine our procedures so that we make sure that we don't put ourselves in a position where something bad could happen in the future um some of the improvements have already been implemented that they suggested in the audit report um there are a few items in here that actually were part of the previous audit but because of the overlap of time when one audit ends you're actually already in the next audit period um so things that were brought up as findings in the last audit wouldn't have

033been corrected in time and it would still show up on this audit so there are a few items like that that you'll note in there that were fixed back in um May uh March of 2023 but it's still is within that audit period so it shows up on the report so just a brief summary of the items that were listed and then again there will be links to this information on our website um the first item that was listed in the audit report was in reference to the school corporation's inability to reconcile bank accounts since the implementation of the Skyward accounting software in 2016 so again since this dates back to 2016 this is a repeat finding um that the board reviewed last audit period and that continues to show up in our audit report

034um and and quite frankly this is not going to be rectified until we move to a new accounting um software program uh which we are in the process of working on so we we have had a meeting with Boyce Financial systems um we are in talks with them in discussion um we would have to move to a new program with Skyward anyway as they're upgrading their their models so we are looking at moving to a software program that is um going to work better with the procedures that we have in place um here in Indiana and this this new platform is actually one that's recommended by the Auditors it is a local company um founded in Indiana so it's specific to Indiana Law um so in any case the software issue um connects back to

035the original setup of the software when the conversion happened in 2016 um and until we're able to move a new to a new program we are reconciling to receipts using an external spreadsheet and not doing bank reconciliation within the software itself um so I I do want to point out that this reconciliation error is such that we are holding more funds in our bank account than are reflected in the software so it certainly is not a question of any concern to missing money there's actually showing more money in the bank than the software is showing um so I wanted to make sure to emphasize that point so as to eliminate any concern that there is any money missing um item two is that the school corporation lacked proper internal controls related to the reporting of

036Federal grant dollars on the sea report um the sea report is a federal report that we utilize to um report information back to the state regarding um Federal grant dollars um so this particular finding was connected to the reporting of special education do dollars um as the Lea for our special education Cooperative we have a lot of reporting that has to be done as our Corporation but keep in mind the corporation is actually a conglomerate of five different School corporations um we were reporting funds for the entire Cooperative on that report not just funds specific to leport um and that's what the finding was about so there was no mismanagement of money only incorrect reporting of the figures on that one particular report um so again you can see how some of these findings are

037intended to help you make sure that you are not missing potential errors that would be coming up when we're talking about just errors connected to reporting um the third item the school corporation lacked proper internal controls to ensure that the special education Cooperative followed proper non-public school expenditure requirements this is also a repeat finding it was rectified back in March of 2023 um but again because of that audit period overlap it still shows up on this it is just connected to the tracking of dollars that are utilized for non-public schools in connection with the requirement to support those students in special education needs item four um is that the school corporation lacked internal controls to ensure that vendors paid with federal funds through the special education Cooperative met the federal procurement guidelines um federal guidelines

038require all vendors who receive payment through federal funds um fall within a certain thresh or within a certain threshold must be properly vetted to ensure they're not suspended or disbarred um we have not contracted with any such vendors but we didn't follow the procedures to check the box to prove that they weren't um so that's something that we have already corrected and we do have the proper controls in place as of this time um next the school corporation's Capital asset listing did not include all required asset information for all assets purchased with Federal Awards this was specifically r related to the $8 million hbac project that we completed with Esser funds um all of the funds were properly spent and accounted for but we are required to maintain BAS basically a list of all of

039our assets and have that unile at all times and that $8 million uh that $8 million worth of equipment wasn't added to that list within that audit period so again also that is being addressed at this time um it just was not on the list within the audit period as they reviewed that um item six is the school corporation did not have procedures in place to ensure that construction contracts using federal funds were paid a prevail ing wage rate um so it's important to note for this item we absolutely did pay prevailing wage for all work that was performed with Esser dollars um this finding is a result of the contract that was related to those hbac projects not including the specific language um that indicates the prevailing wage requirement we had it on different

040documentation it wasn't in the contract itself it was a finding on our audit um but I can absolutely guarantee that we paid prevailing wage for all projects that were conducted with those Sr dollars um our supplemental report noted an additional comment related to average daily membership um and and for anyone in our community that might be watching the meeting this might be something that some of our community and our families have experienced um as we are now reaching out to families to obtain some additional documentation for student files um so this is connected to the report we submit to the state that established is how much money we receive from the state based on the number of students who are enrolled in our district um so the the State Board of accounts reviews student files

041to ensure that the students that we are reporting as attending here in laort community schools are actually residents of Indiana and therefore qualify for those State funding dollars um in review of our student files the Auditors identified a number of students at our high school whose files were cleaned out at one point um we've tracked this down to a period of time when those students were attending at the middle school um and we had an employee at that time that went through and cleaned out some files to save space in filing cabinets thinking that we already processed these files and and um proved that these students attended here we shouldn't need this anymore the Auditors do go back and look at that um throughout the time that they're here so those files now have traveled

042over to the high school and with that documentation missing from those files the state has asked us to go back to those families and request that they turn in those residency documents to us um and we collect that just through a copy of a utility bill or a rental or mortgage statement or something like that um so we are in the process of getting all of that information so we can go back and complete those files and we'll have that rectified um here within the next few weeks um and then finally specific to our high school we had one finding with the high school ECA accounting and that had been connected to um utilizing the incorrect reporting form for online ticket sales um there was no issue identified in the actual reconciling of ticket sales

043or money collected it was just simply the wrong form we were utilizing to report those sales to the state um so again I want to say we've developed a page dedicated to this topic on our Corporation website anyone who wants to learn more can visit that page you can download and read the stateboard of account reports for yourself um and I would encourage anyone that has questions to contact the corporation office and we can certainly get answers for anyone who has any concerns and that completes my report anyone have any questions or comments I have a question and a comment um question goes all the way back to the first point that you made about the um daycare is are students I'm sorry our families able to enroll students in the daycare that are not

044preschool students so for example like a family that has a preschool student and maybe has a younger sibling and they want to have them in the same daycare is that open to the public or is it only for our kids we don't exactly have the answer to that right now simply because we don't know what kind of space we are going to be looking at so we had um approximately 50 families who filled out the survey um connected with our preschool Roundup um had indicated uh a need for child care um so that was a pretty high number so so we know right now for this first year we have space for three classrooms of daycare um so so the answer to that question is probably that we might okay but we are going to

045have to see if we have space based on the need for our preschoolers our preschoolers would be our priority um one of the things that we are working with Learning Tree Academy to try to develop is that if we had that situation and maybe even an infant in the same family that would there be a way for to provide a family rate that um the the parents could um utilize and we could provide connection with their um other site that's in Laport if we're not able um the other thing is that there are specific depending on the age of the children there are spec different requirements for accreditation purposes um and so as we develop this depending on Space we don't know if we're going to have a classroom that would be equipped to meet

046the needs of children younger than three um it'll just kind of all depend on what we have available and how um how much need there is within that group um we also have our employee Child Care Program um there that we're working with Learning Tree Academy to um potentially take that component on as well um and with that program going down to 30 months um so you know so we have some two-year-olds that are enrolled in that program we're working through um and these are some of the details that just take some time to to get together and why we don't have a final contract yet um you know that that may be something that our employee um daycare might be located at their main site um which is on Monroe um so it's not

047very far um but we would work with them to still provide that opportunity and you know the um would be a benefit for our employees yeah yeah and the grant that we have right now that is offering us to or is allowing us to to provide that as an opportunity um that is only through this year um so we would be looking for a new potential model for that anyway next year so as we're kind of working on a contract with Learning Tree we're hoping to be able to sort of bundle it all together so we can still provide that opportunity to our employees in conjunction but we recognize that we might not have the space to do it um in that building it might have to be just just a benefit that's offered um

048through their main site sense um and then I was just going to mention that Jim and I were actually at the meeting with the just for public knowledge we were there and um just wanted to confirm that you know all of those things were discussed we listened to the findings and I'll just go on record saying there are a lot of moving targets and things that we don't quite know we have to do until you know new things they're looking for and things like that so um just confirming that you know we were there and and everything's on the up and up and I would say too um another comment would be that one of the Auditors in that meeting also did share that for a district of our size and also with the added

049element that we are the Lea for the special education Cooperative um I know it sounds like all of that was a lot that I just went through as far as findings but that she shared with us was very typical of what they see with other districts of this size and with that added component that we are also serving as the Lea so um I I would also put that out there as a disclaimer that you know there are other corporations within our local vicinity you know that are much much smaller and are not dealing with the level of federal funds that we are um and that makes it really difficult to compare to smaller districts but for our um and auditor herself shared that so I I wanted you to know because it was kind

050of um a lengthy explanation of all of the findings but I I think that um we we are not out of the the norm of what is seen in other comparable districts else have any questions or comments I would just like to say that if that's not outside the norm can we effectively say that maybe next year they won't be as as many findings as of next year so that we are working towards yeah definitely and the other thing that I would say as a disclaimer to to this particular audit and and it should mostly be wrapped up by next audit is the added component of the user funds um which you know those those were our covid grant dollars and that was Federal money um I wasn't here of course when when that money

051was released but I was a superintendent in another district and I can tell you that some of the things that were associated here were all connected to those essers expens four of them um the state and and remember the time that all of that happened during the pandemic everything was just out of the ordinary and we were all operating in in very unusual times and the state released that money um and told us here it is now you can use it for these things and then six months later we would find out well you were supposed to do these things to be able to do that and so then we would have to like backtrack and scramble and and that was um it was just we are very appreciative to have had the opportunity to

052access those dollars and provided a lot of opportunity to our students and our staff during a very challenging time however it was a very difficult process to navigate from the the financial management standpoint because it was almost like the the the states were receiving the money to disperse it out from the federal level and it was happening so fast that it was kind of like here it is ask questions later and then you know when you you started spending it and then found out that you couldn't do that or you were supposed to have done this and that kind of thing so I would say to that most definitely we would expect to see fewer findings next time because simply of that element that was part of of this audit and and the previous audit

053as well the Auditors acknowledged that as well and they said in the meeting they said that exactly what you just said that it was pretty much here's your money and then like oh wo whoo here were all the rules you were supposed to follow so every corporation that they've audited has been plain catch up with those Esser funds and Reporting thank you so um I have a couple uh comments and questions to so uh to your point Monica it'll be two years though just they do every two years right um this is the second audit that I've been a part of and uh Skyward and reconciliations were a problem in both and so we're actively exploring moving office Skyward um from an accounting standpoint right but not necessarily for grades and and things of that

054student man State financial softw Financial right and so by all indications you've used this voice in the past and you have good experience hearing about it and it's a state Indiana company we would hope that when we shift to that if we shift to that that that would help our our next audit now we're we're in an audit period right right now we're in a window now right so we could get this corrected before the next audit but still get a because correct Dr Wood's Point too what's frustrating too is when some of these things were actually corrected but because the audit period when we did that when the findings came out originally and the last audit period we implemented those corrective action plans there in place but because it led over to the next

055then then that would be a finding so yeah there's like a six-month overlap in every audit actually more like a 9month overlap by the time you get your corrective action plan in place so that's very common to have a repeat finding just because of that and I think it's worth noting for the public so this is not a free audit right this is not an audit that the state provides to us at no cost correct right this is an audit that we as an organization pay for to the tune of approximately $65,000 $65,000 operations so we spent $65,000 of of operating funds so we we've talked about our operating budget and how we struggle with our operating budget Etc so this is this is a so there were some calls previously to hire outside audits

056with outside like we spent $65,000 of our money to have this audit done we don't have a choice either correct so uh so I just kind of and this is a fully outside this is a fully third corre party vendor yeah so I just I just want that to be kind of out there for the public um and then uh the very first public audit that I sat in um I remember uh Mr Arnold the very first question he asked was is any money missing and the answer to that audit was no and the answer to this audit is no right correct so um I just want to make sure that that's that's that's out there too um I have a question on the daycare so will the daycare uh is is the intent to

057be able to use that daycare on days when there aren't School we're working through that detail so we would like to be able to offer that also during breaks and potentially even um throughout the summer for you know most families don't have jobs that work on a school calendar so um that is a component that we are working on and we are hoping to plan into um the overall picture and I also want to say I think that this is also probably phase one of hopefully uh a more elaborate partnership that we can build in the future we love to be able to offer something to families even for elementary AG children Beyond just the preschool age for that part that exact reason we offer before and after um care right now to families for

058um for working families that need to drop off early or pick up later in the day but we would love to be able to offer also you know a camp program during the summer or something like that to meet the needs and so we're hoping that over time we can expand our partnership with Learning Tree to be able to offer that as well great okay cool and then the last thing is that just want a little bit of a touchdown dance on the CTE stuff there's some very good things going on here when you think about Ivy Tech being in this building offering programs for our our kids plus the community you talk about healthc care spending you know outside organizations coming here to teach our kids or collaborate with us on on education you

059talk about a a a senior graduating high school with a CDL in their pocket like these are these are really really good things for our community and our kids you know welding criminal justice I'm probably missing some but these are very good things and I'm very proud to be you know kind of loosely associated with it because it's just going to be it's just going to be really good for our future so good work um I know it's a lot of work Jen gos as well and everybody has been working really hard on this and I just don't want that glossed over by you know 17 findings on a a $65,000 audit right so I want make sure that these C things are are are well recognized as well because there's a lot of work

060these are really good things and as the state changes the diploma requirements we are well positioned to be able to offer those diploma uh requirements to our kids uh as opposed to you know some of our neighboring districts are going to struggle a little bit with some of those things that we are well ahead of them on those so that these are all like really good things so um anyway um any else who did you want to do the touchdown dance Jim uh Jim could do the touchdown Dan yeah that' be good well he doesn't score many touchdowns though at the same so um all right so anybody else okay so we'll move on to the uh Elementary assistant superintendent report Dr tanle all right good evening my first item isn't elementary it's actually from

061Lort Middle School a noteworthy celebration from one of their Academic Teams the leaport math counts team uh participated in a regional competition and play second place this team qualified for the state competition that will be held next week at PR University the team consists of and apologize for not getting these names correctly but I'll do my best Sebastian nsky Sam Burton Olivia mijan and Emily Hayes in addition Sebastian took second place overall and this is the highest place from a leaport student in the past 20 years so congratulations to coach Matt Kirk Patrick and that team that's amazing very cool um secondly I wanted to update the board on our process for um committing to following up on Staffing for our Lincoln staff as that building is decommissioned thought it would be just good to

062give you an updated we are in that process of doing Staffing for 25 26 um there were openings posted recently um for the positions or for additional sections at hman so the majority of those students are coming from Lincoln are going to hman so additional sections are needed and so we've already started to process some of those transfers no additional sections were needed at Hanley or Riley we just absorbed of those the smaller amounts of students in those schools and so so far we're we've worked on three teachers plus a counselor and two support staff and one was a media assistant one was a librarian so we've made some good Headway already and in the next uh few months as retirements or resignations or we work on additional kindergarten enrollment we'll be uh doing more

063making more Staffing decisions so things are going well there and then lastly some more good news we were notified from the health Foundation that the 2024 playground grant that we originally received but we couldn't meet their special conditions for that Grant they're allowing us to amend that Grant um it used to include Kingsford Heights Lincoln and chrisfield with the decommissioning of Lincoln we'll be focusing on Kingsford Heights and Crisfield and we'll be amending that Grant um the scope of the whole project is going to change we're getting fresh uh quotes uh new designs and we'll be working with those new two schools in the next few months and hopefully have a new playground maybe next fall late fall early winter so I'm thankful to the health Foundation that grants about $760,000 plus the PTA PTO

064of each of those schools have raised about $45,000 each um you know you may ask what were the special conditions that we couldn't meet in 204 for them to allow us to meet at 25 and it had to do with the port in place surface and accessibility both are very expensive and uh we did incorporate those in our first designs but having money spread across three schools made it very difficult to do the port in place and and increased inclusiveness on each playground but now with two schools um we believe that we'll be able to do some do some new designs and be able to meet those special conditions that concludes my report any questions or comments for Dr T thank you uh next item is the financial dashboard uh from Dr Hunt thank you

065president cber if you would go ahead and pull that up and I'm I'm going to start and actually flip-flop a little bit and some of the importance of what this financial dashboard obviously will come in line with what I want to discuss as far as the legislation update is concerned um so I don't know if you have been following there are three major bills right now that I've been keeping really close I think most uh business officials superintendents around the state have been paying close attention to these bills um Senate bill one which I mentioned the last meeting house bill uh 101 uh and then there is is House Bill 518 um I want to share some information updates on that so the last time that I spoke on uh the legislative update I mentioned

066Senate bill one if you recall in my information I shared with the board what that Financial impact could be as far as our operations fund is concerned because this is a property tax uh Reform Bill um honestly this is the bill that was proposed um by Governor Brun um that has gone to the Senate so as as far as an update is concerned um the report that was made last night made on that impact of the bill uh changed actually the week after I made that report so when that information came out there was actually some updates or amendments to that Senate bill one um and so I want to share that with you so with Senate bill one the fiscal year 2026 uh potential decrease to revenue is uh $251,200 th000 as far as

067that impact so there there was a difference there fiscal year 2027 a potential decrease in revenue of 530,000 and then fiscal year 2028 decrease or potential decrease in revenue of $754,900 um and so since that time obviously the bill had then been amended um it's at the point right now that we're halfway over a little over halfway through the session so uh that bill Senate bill one has been uh sent over uh to the house side I will tell you this and this is a bill that I'm another bill that I'm keeping an eye on it's not actually a bill that's dead it was Senate Bill 1402 which had some language on the on the house side as far as their recommendations uh for Senate bill one um this is coming right from an article

068that basically that Jeff Thompson or Senator Thompson um excuse me representative Thompson who is heads the the Ways and Means Committee um had basically said that his intent was basically to strip down Senate bill one and include the language in to uh House Bill 1402 so again we're keeping a close eye on that that happened last Thursday the the news broke about 1402 so then again everybody started to pay close attention to what was in that particular Bill and what the potential impact could be with Senate bill one I will tell you this I I continue to ask um members across the state uh those that are really in the know if they really have an idea where this might fall as far as the impact for property taxes that again assess do with property

069taxes which again impacts our operations on and again where this might fall and really I'm not getting any clear answer as to where that that might fall so again keeping a really close eye um on that Senate bill one which is again now over the house uh speaking of House Bill 1001 I just wanted to share some information on that so the House Republicans version of House Bill 101 uh was released Friday February 14 2025 on Monday February 17th 2025 the bill was h in the Ways and Means Committee were amend and vote only with no testimony uh representative Jeff Thompson presented an amendment to house V 101 and after discussion the amendment passed on partisan vote 14 to8 the amended House Bill 101 was then passed uh by the committee of 14-7 and now

070goes it went to the house uh for the the second reading then actually the vote on March the 20th um which was held and that uh the state budget passed at 66 to 27 uh again like I mentioned the house bill is now at the senate for their consideration uh the house just to keep in mind the house Republican budget proposal did include moving the 160 million um for curricular materials appropriation into the foundation portion of the school distribution formula uh the bill also repeals Indiana code 20- 40-22 which is curriculum materials fund so that curriculum materials fund is no more um and then uh the Statewide increased for the tuition support formula will be at 2% or $180 million for fiscal year fiscal year 26 and 2% or 90 million increase for fiscal year

07127 uh again the $160 million for materials was not counted those figures but I will get to that in just a moment uh the per puple amount for curriculum materials will be included uh your tuition support formula calculations so again as we look at the calculations or what we call the run as far as that's concern we take consideration that $160 million or for our in our case it would be about $870,000 that is part of that overall budget and so we need to to take that consideration um um the one thing is is that special education what they're proposing was a 3.5% increase in fiscal year 26 and a 3.6% increase in fiscal year 27 Career and Technical Ed an 88.7% increase in fiscal year 26 and an 88.1% increase in fiscal year 27

072honors a 2.2% increase in 26 and a 2.1% increase in 27 uh non-english speaking was a 88.6% increase in 26 and a 7.5% increase the one point it's unfortunate the complexity factor and the complexity really is based upon snap andana or direct certification um in for food stamps and Welfare uh that is actually a decreasing by 7.1% in the budget um for fiscal year 26 and another 7% and really that's a it's a disadvantage for us as far as with the funding that is based upon that information and again it's really geared towards working with our students uh that may be disadvantaged um so that decrease in the budget is is concerning to us um the port School corporation's estimates are as follows I just I share this information as the budget is as a

073whole as the state is concerned um but this excludes the curricul material portion so what I basically did because that it's included in the run as we look at the amounts for um report Community School Corporation in general what was proposed in the Run was actually a 1.9% increase in the education fund as it it's an entirety based upon the estimates that we have but in reality if you take out that curriculum materials and again the reason I do that because we have not it's not part part of the foundation amount or the education fund uh in the past so it really results in a 2% increase into our education fund not a 1.2% increase in the education fund um and then fiscal year 27 um it was a 1.2% increase so again these are

074initial estimates again these are not passed yet they're not become law but it's something to keep in mind as we start to you know through and look at the future as far as the budget is concerned so in essence what I'm looking at right now based upon both years was about a 1.4% total increase into the budget so and want to share that with you trying to keep you up to date as far as what is going on the other bill um that I want to share with you um and this doesn't impact us currently but that's House Bill 518 House Bill 518 is uh it's the category in which the sharing of property taxes with Charter Schools and there are two tests that are associated with this test number one is if you have

075over a 100 students that are are attending charter schools from your District if you do have a 100 and above that you check off the box for test number one test number two is if you have charter schools within your school district that's the way it currently reads I'm not going to could change um but in reality what could happen is that would be a sharing of property tax again which makes up our operations fund that could be going to Charter Schools or could be shared if if again that bill were to pass but that's House Bill 518 one other item I do want to talk about on a federal level as we talk take a look at what type of federal funding there could be and or the lack thereof a federal funding impact

076the one area in paying really really close attention to and a number of business officials are doing the same thing is Medicaid if the federal government does not supplement they currently supplement Medicaid if they do not supplement that that comes on the backs of our state budget as well as to fund Medicaid that's something else I'm keeping a very close eye because that is going to impact the budget and if you recall there was a divid into the coppers of last year as far as the budget is concerned because of Medicaid and they they did a short calculation on that and so that they dipped into coer so that's something else to pay really really close attention to um but again I will entertain any questions that you all may have right now I know

077that's a lot to again to take in at one time um like to continue to update the board as as much as possible on any type of events that are happening I again I stress this I pay close attention to um what is happened down at the state level as far as legislation and the budget is concerned because again we're we getting impacted on a number of different fronts usually we're concentrating on House Bill 101 which is the Bing in budget and again on the education fund but when you couple that with what could happen with Senate bill one and the property tax reform that again could have an impact on what kind of funding it would have for I don't take any questions any so just to summarize it's fair to say a lot

078of what's being discussed down state does very little to help Public Schools right financially yes right Public Schools yes because when you take a look at budget when we're going to give you less and less every year is the summary and as we we mentioned this too and this is not any new news obviously we keep a really really really close eye on the operations fund the operations fund is is a very difficult fund um and again with it being impact with the potential of of of tax reform again that's something we have to pay really close attention to yeah awesome so for you saying for House Bill 518 that it would give Charter Schools access to property tax sharing yes is that in proportion to the amount of students that they are taking from

079that area or okay I just wanted to make sure didn't know if that was a stupid question yes thank you you're welcome any other questions on this okay you want to go over your dashboard I do I do want to go over my dashboard because again it goes hand in hand again as we focus in on obviously the financial solvency of the corporation uh I do want to go over the dashboard uh just like in the past going to start with the education fund budget uh keep in mind that our goal for uh 2025 is is a goal of 96% um expenditures um so up until this point as of February uh into February uh We've expended a total of 7,798 69 uh in February we did have an expenditures of 2,929 26640 uh again

080that puts us at 16.7 um and if you look at obviously 8% over a 12- Monon period of time we're just slightly over that goal so we're in line um there was more expenditures and that education fund to begin with when it came to again we talk about the Cooperative um our quarterly payments so that took place in January so obviously that's why it's drastically reduced in in February and then moving on to the operations fund uh again goal of 96% of a total budget of 17,1 3,697 um we had expenditures of 1, 242,000 um in our $444 uh which puts us at a total in February of 2,499 26185 which is 14.61% uh and again we're just under uh that goal which is a good thing um as far as that 96% is good

081sir moving on to then the cash flow uh looking at education to begin with we had cash receipts in the month of February of 4,488 14788 uh dispersements of 6640 education to operations fund transfer of $672,500 51556 uh operations um and receipts in the month of February of 148,00 $ 7326 cash dispersements of 1,242 4 58444 and the transfer of $672,500 receipts or expenditures in the rainy day uh which put us at a balance of 6138 3747 uh which of of the oper operating balances uh for the three funds of 9,685 12251 which puts us at a 16.05% uh operating balance then moving on to comparisons I always like to compare one year to the next um and so what we're going to be looking at is February of 24 versus February of 25 um

082went over the cash receipts already um for 25 but compared to 24 which was 4,39 $68 28 we have a difference of actually higher of $ 87,3 18240 uh cash asurs in February 24 4,182 7965 compared to 4,159 820 29 which is actually have a decrease of $2,889 36 uh Ed to Ops transfer uh difference um $13,421.93 [Music] 76 and the operations looking at the cash receipts um in 24 of $2,431 compared to $48,600 7326 uh difference in a positive of $ 46,6 23.95 uh cash dispersements 1,238 99456 and 24 compared to 1,2 $ 44 a difference of an increase of $3,582 88 uh at Ops transfer um 6386 compared to the 672 489 which is a difference of 34473 positive uh any chaos balances at the end of February in the operations fund uh

083it was in the red 748 8933 and and 25 to the positive of 48765 n48 a difference of 1,236 55283 an increase of 16369 lot of information again to go over in a very short period of time I always will entertain any questions that again it's it's good to show these comparisons between the two years and the differences that we are making and moving in the right direction and I again I go back to legislation we we have to be prepared for anything that may come our way um as far as uh reserves are concerned is obviously changes would need to take place in which to rectify based upon any type of U legislative changes or decreases it to revenue that concludes my report anybody have any questions or comments for Dr Hunt but I

084just want I appreciate this last slide I think it's good to look at like you said um any reason why our uh operating fund was up so much in uh last month it was up 40 almost 46% in receipts from previous any I mean is there anything jumping off there or why why it's increased from the previous year is that what you're saying there is actually and so with 15% of the education fund this is what really is a lot has contributed quite a bit there was a significant increase in the education fund as a Reconciliation uh based upon special education members okay and so based upon that and because of that amount increasing significantly that's the reason why there was a difference that much of a difference between the two years yes okay any

085other questions all right so we are going to move on so on the agenda are reviewing uh four sets of board policies we're going to table those uh a little more time to review those um we're going to move on to new business so um first one here is consideration for the recommendation to approve the acceptance of Grants donation gifts and requests Dr Wood okay we have two donations that we are seeking approval of this evening so first is a donation of $1,000 from the Hanley Elementary PTO towards the fourth grade day trip to Camp tosa the second donation is a total donation of $1,367 from the slicer Performing Arts Club with $1,137 going to the pack EC for spring musical shirts and $230 going to the band for Winter Guard shirts any questions or

086comments for Dr Wood want want to make a motion to accept these thank you Jess second thank you Tucker all those in favor say I I okay thank you for for those next item is uh consideration for recommendation to approve the lpcsc Open Enrollment student transfer policy Dr Wood um as we are moving into the spring and beginning all of our planning for next school year um one item that we are bringing to the board this evening forie and recommending for approval is the Open Enrollment or transfer student policy um so this is a requirement through Indiana statute that requires school districts that are accepting students from outside of the district attendance boundaries to establish certain protocol that are aligned with Indiana code um so we are proposing the policy that's included in your board

087packet this evening um that basically just outlines the the parameters by which we would accept students from outside of the district so all of the um statements that are included in this uh transfer policy um are directly aligned with the Indiana code um so we've taken that language um almost verbatim and pulled it into our local policy and then our our principles and also um our Corporation office will utilize these guidelines as we begin to collect applications from students out outside the district um and review them for potential placement within our district schools so I would state that we are um planning to open that process to to families and students on April 1st um so as of April 1st that information will be available on our website for families to access and there will

088be a form online um that families will be able to fill out um and request enrollment for um their children for next school year okay anyone have any questions for Dr Wood on this okay someone want to make a motion to accept the Open Enrollment student transfer policy so move thank you Tucker second thank you Jim all those in favor say I I oppos okay next order business is consideration for recommendation to approve the outof district transfer capacity so directly aligned with um the policy that you just approved um written into Indiana state law is the requirement that annually corporations that accept students from outside District foundaries are required to establish the maximum number of students that can be enrolled from outside districts um and so this is a process that is outlined by grade

089level um so we will be establishing the maximum number of new transfers per grade level um so with our district when we're looking at our grades K through four and obviously having multiple Elementary buildings that students um are in we we do not publicize the number of seats that are available in each Elementary building that can fluctuate a lot especially into the summer when families move and and Resident um enrollment fluctuates um so we release these numbers based on the maximum new transfers that we can take within that grade level part of the form that families will will fill out then is they will request their first second and third choice for elementary building if they're enrolling or wishing to enroll a student in grades K through 4 um and then we will M maintain

090internal um records of the number of students then and number of spaces that are available within each building we do every attempt to place students in their first um selection of building um but again um that can fluctuate throughout the summer as as we have movements in and out um so as we consider our our capacity for next year um and again this will be published on our website and we will update this if there are significant changes with applications received throughout the summer months um we will be accepting applications throughout the entirety of the school year next year um so that will be an open process that we will keep in place throughout the entire school year um we are establishing a general cohort size that we are targeting as our maximum um and

091keeping in mind that that we're significantly far off of this but we're we believe we have the space to accommodate up to 475 students districtwide in grades K through 2 and 500 students in grades 3 through 12 um and we also advertise um a large number of openings through leport online school as well um our our policy as well as the the transfer student capacity all of this will be be available online in in connection with the um application that parents will fill out um when they go to apply and again all of this process will open up on April 1st so I would request your approval to um for these numbers that we will be advertising as the number of Open Spaces that we have for out of District students most of the numbers

092for the grade levels I think range from about 50 spaces open at the low end um to as many as as 94 um in one of our grade levels so we have plenty of capacity to be able to open up to students who wish to attend here from outside our district any questions for Dr Wood anyone want to make a motion to uh accept the out of District transfer capacity for 2526 school year so thank you Jen second second thank you Tucker all those in favor say I I opposed okay next order of business is consideration for recommendation to approve transferring preschool facilitators to contracted teaching position for the 2025 2026 school year Dr Wood um this recommendation is specifically in connection with our our current preschool facilitators which are our Educators who are teaching

093the preschool classes in the um Elementary buildings so this is not in connection with our current um Educators that are part of the Little Learners Preschool here in this building but the preschool classrooms outside of our district our practice has been to fill those positions for teachers um as facilitator positions um so they are paid in hourly rate um and not paid on a teacher's contract um and we do um hold the expectation that these staff members are um do hold teachers licenses um so as we've reviewed this and as we move to um next year and looking at the um Early Childhood Center and bringing all of our preschool programming into one building um we have a number of of reasons that we are asking the board to consider um transferring these facilitator positions

094into contracted teacher positions um first because we want to retain Equity amongst all of our teachers that are working whether they're coming from the Little Learners Preschool or coming um from one of our external uh classrooms that's in one of the elementary schools um but also we we want to be able to hold our teachers to um the standard we're already asking them to have a teachers license and we need to reward them and and offer them a contract that um is is typically a part of that and so um I am asking for your approval this evening um to make this change to to transfer all current preschool teacher facilitator positions to contracted teaching positions um this would be with the 2526 school year um and it would require that these seven newly created

095positions would be created with starting salaries um of $4,680 which is in alignment with the um first year level of pay that those facilitators are currently um listed at um and and we would establish those positions with salaries specifically because our preschool um staff are paid from Title One funds and from our neeva Klein endowment dollars um and so we are very strictly budgeted to those requirements um but we do have the space within those funds to be able to offer the benefits package that is associated with the contract um so I would ask for your approval of this proposal to go into effect for the 2526 school year do anyone have any questions comments have a clarifying question so seven teachers currently are paid an hourly wage um with no benefits correct and so

096this will be moving them to a salary uh which will be the same as their hourly wage they will get benefits to include uh Health Care retirement Etc and then this will also put them in line with the teachers that they will be teaching next to who already have the same type of a thing so this is going to add some some net new costs to us uh which uh you know I'm in favor of but um just just for clarification that this is some additional money for teachers yes all right any else have any questions or comments anyone want to make a motion to uh accept the approval of the lpcsc Early Childhood plan that she just laid out thank you Monica second second thank you Justin all those in favor say I I

097oppose okay thank you uh the next order of business is consideration recommendation to approve teacher no uh to where am I am I 95 yeah okay sorry um the back up two minutes consideration for recommendation to approve the lpcsc Early Childhood preschool program plan for 2025 2026 SCH year drood thank you so in November um the board approved the repurposing of Lincoln Elementary as the districtwide Early Childhood Center for Lort Community Schools um so at that time we stated that we would be conducting an information gathering survey um to determine if um we needed to expand beyond that Center to potentially offer a couple of satellite locations um recognizing the very large Geographic size of our district and understanding that um some of our community is very far from the center of the city um

098so we did conduct that survey through um throughout the month of February and gathered some information um I believe we had over 160 responses to that survey so it was good participation um and and we received um a lot of good feedback um there were multiple components that we asked the community to respond to including the location of those satellite locations as well as other components that we were planning to offer with our Early Childhood Program which included some of the um items that we already talked about in regard to the day planning and and so on and so um the plan that you have before you this evening and I'll go through a couple of components of this um and also state that this will be communicated out to our community this evening um

099so families will receive um notification of of all the details of this plan um there is a lot of information in this but it will be released in writing so everyone can review it closely and also posted to our website as well um so in regard to the satellite locations we had a number of families who did indicate the request for both a north and a South satellite location um understanding that these satellite locations would be limited in program offerings and that they will only offer preer Garten programming to a number of students that will be capped at 36 students total um will not provide child care like we will be able to provide at the center um also will not provide special education services so for students that need access to special education services

100that will only be offered at the center um and transportation will also not be offered to the satellite locations um the north satellite location um will be located at critchfield elementary due to the overall overwhelming majority of families who requested a north side that we're living within the critchfield boundaries um for the South site we are recommending Kingsbury Elementary um and there are a number of reasons for that that I will outline here um first Kingsbury was the most requested school for the southern satellite locations amongst those who responded to the survey um Kingsbury is centrally located to the other Southern elementary schools with both Indian Trail and kingsb Heights approximately 6 miles away um for both of them the population of the Kings attendance area is the largest of the three locations considered within

101the southern part of our district Kingsbury's building has the largest capacity in terms of the number of students the building can house um Kingsbury is a non-title one school which means that we have to fund the program using the endowment fund that we're using um which is our Nea Klein um donation um to fund our school-based Elementary programs from the accounting standpoint this makes it a lot cleaner to locate the satellite locations in our two non-title uh buildings which are critchfield and um Kingsbury um and finally as we plan to pursue accreditation um for our preschool program um we have determined that satellite locations that are within five miles of the main campus can fall under the same accreditation umbrella um as the main campus and Kingsbury is the only School within our South area

102that is within the 5 Mile radius at 4.8 mil away um and so as we pursue accreditation we will be able to fall or complete one accreditation for all three of those programs as the the two Satellite locations will be within that five mile radius um accreditation is important for a variety of reasons for one it verifies that we're offering quality programming um and and you know basically the stamp of approval from the state but the other piece is that we have and we've discussed this before we've been able to offer preschool programming to our community for free for a long time um and that is due to the generous donation through the neeva Klein um endowment fund that was set up specifically for the purpose of helping families access early childhood education um that

103fund is not going to last forever it will probably um be within the next several years that we will have um to have discussion about how to move forward um unless the state comes through through and starts funding preschool programming um from the state level um once that donation fund is gone we are going to have to have the conversation about adding a tuition element to preschool programming we are several years out from that but it will come at some point um and so as we move forward with our Center model it's important that we go through the process of accreditation so that when that time comes and we do have to Institute a tuition model we will be able to accept vouchers for families that qualify for vouchers to help pay for um preschool

104programming and so that that's why the accreditation piece is so important to us it does take a few years typically to go through accreditation and so we will begin working on this as soon as um the the the center is up and running next year so that we ensure that all of those pieces are in place well before we get to the point that we would have to start exploring um the potential to start charging tuition for preschool programming um so overall the the um selection of Kingsbury for this is is a comprehensive kind of big picture decision um that we feel this is the best um location for this South satellite um in regards to the program plan itself again our main campus will be um at at the Lincoln site which is 402

105Harrison Street at the main campus we will be able to offer two or three day a week programming for three threey olds which is a new benefit to our community that we currently are not offering three-year-old programming so very excited to be able to expand down to that three-year-old age group um students have to be three before August 1st to qualify for that class um we will have the five day a week program for prek which is age four before August 1st and we also will be able to offer a transitional kindergarten class um which will be an opportunity for students that qualify for kindergarten but development mentally may need one more year before they're ready to go into the traditional kindergarten classroom to ensure they're really provided the the best um chance for Success

106long term once they do enter into the elementary setting um we are again working on the fee based child care options in conjunction with Learning Tree Academy um so more information about that will be forthcoming um our satellite patients again will not offer special education programming or um Child Care um and we also will not be offering Transportation I will um state that we are in the process of working through um and exploring some options for our two schools we have that are going to be more than seven miles away um from the center um and this Indian Trail and Kingsford Heights um we've had a few meetings with our transportation department to determine because of the GE graphic location of these two communities is there a way that we can provide a single bus

107stop type of opportunity for the children that live in those areas to be able to have access to come to the center um for preschool programming and so we've we've had some conversation we are working through that um it is we are not to the point yet that we can say yes we're doing this and here is what it will look like but it is very important to us that we work to ensure that our communities that are further away don't find the model that we've established inaccessible to them so um more information will be forthcoming we're going to try to work through that as quickly as we can because we are opening registration by on March 17th which is a week from today um and so we know that um families are going to

108want to have the answer to that as soon as possible so um we will certainly follow up especially with our families within those communities um as soon as we are able to finalize those details um so that is that is our our program plan in a nutshell um we're very excited about the opportunities we'll be able to offer next year and again this information will be available on our website and posted out um emailed out to families um so that they're able to kind of Thoroughly review all of this as I know it's a lot of information to digest at once any questions or comments for Dr W okay uh anyone want to make a motion to approve the recommendation as laid out so moved thank you Amy second second thank you Tucker all those

109in favor say I I oppos okay now we're moving on to the recommendation to approve teacher evaluation plan domain 4 professionalism rubric updates Dr T yes so this recommendation is an outcome of a district committee that has met for several years to continuously update our teacher evaluation plan specifically this is recommending changes to domain 4 I believe I've reported on this in the past that domain 4 previously only had two um areas it was a two category system a binary system and we want to align domain four with the rest of the domain so you'd have four scoring categories so the committee has been working very hard with me to update that language you have a copy of that um domain so you can see what it looks like for the four different scoring categories

110this would be in effect for the 2025 2026 school year and I recommend that the board approve the changes as noted anybody have any questions or comments for Dr tle what is the overall percentage that this is out of their like overall so T domain four Prof professionalism is 15% um there are three other categories I think effective instruction is 55% teacher leadership is um um 25% and then the remainder is uh planning so it's the smallest amount good question okay any want to make a motion to approve the teacher evaluation plan is laid out by Dr tle thank you Jim second second thank you Monica all those in favor say I I oppose okay next order businesses the recommendation to approve the 2025 school summer school program yeah thank you Dr T this summer

111school program that I'm recommending is K through 12 and I've noted that it's primarily focused on reading at the elementary level we won't be offering any courses at the middle level and that the high school level will be primarily credit attain uh um not retention credit attainment uh recovery there might be some situations where students need to work ahead um we're looking to also possibly offer an inperson algebra that depends on how the rest of the semester goes for kids that need some inperson but primarily it will be Credit Recovery online um the location will be Hanley Elementary for the reading program be grades two through four and then the high school of course uh would be primarily online if we have an inperson class it would be at the high school and then there

112would be a credit recovery Jump Start program that's an addition to the credit recovery program at the end of the summer you'll also see on your spreadsheet there a course um called supervised a experience and we run that every year with our agriculture program kids do certain projects and um supervise experiences in agriculture throughout the summer usually with accompanied with their 4AGE projects um so that's also part of that I wanted to note also that all of these courses are eligible for State funding um so that's good and they all align with with graduation or state requirements for I cool any questions or comments for Dr tanle any want to make a motion to approve summer school's program thank you Tucker second second thank you Justin all those in favor say I I oppos okay

113next order business is a recommendation to approve Ela free textbook adoption for grades K through a night right I'm no that was that was a joke about free textbooks sorry I missed it's a long night um I'm recommending that the board approve our K througha English language arts textbook adoption um the product is CK P that stands for core knowledge language arts literacy curriculum I reported on this last month so it won't go into too many more details except we've had a committee that's been working on this since last summer this is a state of approv program it aligns uh very closely with the science of reading requirements that um all districts have to um abide by right now um we've invested a lot into our teachers into uh literacy programs such as kendor this

114doesn't replace any of that all of that was building a good foundation for our teachers it will really complement well the things that we're doing but it will really um bring things together and close those gaps those holes that we were missing and so our teachers are very excited about this um with your um your approval tonight we will start um a pilot on one of their products for the rest of this year and possibly even into summer school with our reading program um we've been working with the provider to set that up so that would give our teachers a you know a little bit of a running start we also plan to train our principles in April um and then we would start PD for our teachers right away at the end of this

115year um then going into next year for one of those first staff days um and in August we would also have training provided for teachers want have any questions or comments I'll just acknowledge I just want to say thanks to the teachers and the committee members that put the work into this to us I feel like this is just one of those things that like obviously you need to do a new textbook adoption but it's super important and impactful for our kids and I know it's been a long road for those people so it has and part of the um the pilot that we're going to do we extended it to that group of teachers um just to 30 of them to say hey thank you you put put a lot of leg work into

116this we want to give you first chance to do the test drive so thank you for saying that any other questions or I I have a couple questions uh so th this is a multi-year plan is that correct am I think six year plan six-year plan right and is it roughly $1.2 million over six years is that am I looking at that right so correct roughly 200 Grand a year okay yeah um it's about 300,000 a year but we're going to offset some of the funding with some of our grants so formative assessment Grant and so um when you take that off what we're anticipating is 273,000 a year over that's before the free kicks in yes right so um and then this includes uh the all online components too right so I know we've

117talked about that in the past like how many kids are really ed books now versus you know so this does this give uh kids options then to to do some of these things through a a tablet or Chromebook or something like yeah there are materials associated with it at the primary levels and then the higher you go it becomes more online based okay yeah especially at the 6 through eight got it okay thank you okay does anyone want to make a motion to approve this textbook adoption schedule so moved thank you Amy second second thank you Jen all those in favor say I I I thank you the last thing I would say about that is our high school will be bringing some recommendations for some of their classes um at the next school board

118meeting of Music art family consumer science and business that's the other area so they weren't quite ready for this meeting but they will be in April okay you lost your chance Scott all right so next consideration for recommendation to approve bids and awards for the lphs serving Line Equipment yes thank you again uh if you recall last board meeting on February 10th the board did approved for us to move forward uh with the serving line project at Lort High School uh and since that time uh the food service department we were able to run legal advertisements uh twice and two different County newspapers which then satisfies the requirements by not only Indiana code uh but also by federal procurement guidelines um and so since that time at the bid opening was slated for March the

1196th uh we only received one bid um we thought we were going to receive more but this was actually one of the vendors that we were or contractors that we were really interested in um but uh the bid was submitted by CNT design which we've worked for with before uh in the amount of $41,250 um this is going to be paid out of the Food Service fund this is not coming out of geob bonds nor the operations fund but it's actually the Food Service fund hence the reason why we had to go through the the proper procurement processes uh but by wording the bid that was submitted by CNT design uh this keeps us in really good line um as far as securing all the equipment everything is in line to make sure that that

120project is underway as soon as school lets out and it is set ready to go to begin the 25 26 school year so I asked that the board uh approve the bid is submitted and award to C design uh the littleport high school cafeteria serving equipment project in the amount of 103 anyone have any questions or comments for Dr H so uh this is the uh you had talked about this last meeting kind of setting up a almost like a college kind of a cafeteria setup okay awesome yeah efficieny should be there a lot more efficient um and then which gives our students ample time to eat and not rush so we're excited about it and then since we talked about this kind of earlier in our um so this this is coming from the

121uh the the the school lunch which is federal money Federal money so do we ensure all the federal guidelines were covered here on the procurement and we do that every I mean just to let you know every time that food service purchases anything we go to sams.gov to make sure that there's no suspension in environment that is attached to any type of orders that we make so that that's our internal controls to make sure those happen and then obviously because of the size of the uh of the purchase if you will it falls into a category which you have to be bid out it's exactly what we did we did the legal advertisement so the procurement process was was great okay this is exciting the uh anyone want to make a motion to approve the

122bid for the serving line as laid out thank you Jim second second thank you Justin all those in favor say I I okay last item on the new business is the recommendation to approve e Category 2 uninterrupted power supplies project Dr H yes thank you again this is it for this evening uh School corporation's current uninterruptable power supplies or UPS have been in place as far back as 2012 and as recent as 2017 uh with eate funding still available in Category 2 this presents the ideal opportunity for lfor Community School Corporation to update or excuse me upgrade the current UPS across the district the entire District um by utilizing eay we are able to purchase um the U the equipment at a cost that's lower than it's U even to replace a battery in our

123current lead asset based models uh these models also come with a 10-year warranty on the battery which far exceeds the normal battery life we see in the current Le acid a battery uh the overall cost of the project is actually $175,500 but with the eate discount the amount that the for Community School Corporation would be paying is $ 26,33 194 uh the proper legal going back to this the proper legal advertisements uh were run for proposals received uh the review of the proposals were conducted an evaluation Matrix was utilized prior to making recommendation I am seeking approval for the interruptible power supplies or UPS for the corporation infrastructure cabinets and award trust Tech llc at the cost of 17553 60 pre discount uh this will be assessed at the 85% discount rate me the total

124at$ 26,33 to be paid out the operations um which was actually allocated so we had actually budgeted for this particular project and so I asked the board approve this project any questions or comments so before we had spoken and erate might be something that's this is in place already this is we have not spent this out yet yeah but I'm saying previously we've spoken you something that's been looked at as maybe a program that will be cut in the future potentially so if we would have waited and that was cut we would be spending that full point to jump the gun so yeah you're to your point absolutely yes taking full advantage yes thank you and then these are just for clarification here these are lithium ion batteries that are replacing lead acid batteries I

125read through the material which is great yes and they come with a 10-year warranty and they last a lot longer so that's also great speaking with Mike about this too I mean replacement those assd batter we paid $14,000 this year as far as some of those things are concerned so this actually is a really big cost okay does anyone else have any I guess one last question is there any um safety considerations as far as like fire protection or anything that goes into lead acid versus lithium ion still the same as far as supression there's really not too much difference between the blood acid and the in that regard especially when you're talking about capacity batteries thank you okay does anyone want to make a motion to approve the rate uh UPS project so move

126thank you Amy second second thank you Jim all those in favor say I I post all right there is no other business uh board comment uh Jim do you want to give us uh additional legislative updates yeah I'll keep it really quick and I think coule um two major bills directly affected School Board are still alive House Bill 1230 and Senate Bill 287 now House Bill 1230 made it out of the house it was amended which means the next time School Board elections come up you're going to have to choose either Republican Democrat independent or nonpartisan so they did throw the nonpartisan amendment in there which swayed some of the people that were going to vote no against it said well they can you can WR nonpar I listen to an hour and a half

127testimony for me in of boxes here and it was unbelievable the testimony I heard from people that want this school boards turn partisan that want you declare Republican Democrat right now that's the bill if any either them pass that's the one that the School Board Association defers now Senate Bill 287 on the other hand requires a declaration a Republican or Democrat depos it and you have to run to the primary as well as R general election so it means it's a full gamut of the of the uh political process uh 287 is up for hearing in the house committee this Wednesday at 10:30 so we'll see how comes out there's any amendments it was heard last week and it was just no vote was taken West CO just held a bill until next week so

128we're going to hear it again and vote on it amendments and so forth this Wednesday so I would suggest you folks sorry get a hold of Representative PR sen by the way senic V know fav our school board V for us long but uh represent prel a hold of them and and make your intentions don't out there because it's very very important that we keep these school boards not partis correct and ironically the people that are really wanted partisan are people from down in Central Indiana like Hamilton County they had a number of board members and a number of people who speak Down Here Wanting it's partisan so the the arguments don't be hold water as far as I'm concerned when we have our next board meeting April 14th that is the final day for

129bills to be heard in each chamber on second reading that that'll be that Monday the next day is the day final for third year and then it goes to conference committees where bills are hashed out and you know they heard different pros and cons see if the author of Bill accept it vote on and so they hope to be out a session by April 24th that's what their the target date is so it's very likely done and I want to commend Dr Hunt because talking about Senate bill one Senate bill one as I told you very right off the bat we talked about it when I mentioned it that first May the governor that that was not uh acceptable to Senator Bray and representative Houston they weren't on board with that bill and there was

130a number of amendments added in that bill and when it passed out of the Senate it would Chang quite a bit to help us out not totally but it helped us out and Senator or excuse me Governor Brun said right on the bat I'm going to r that bill if it doesn't come out way he likes so he drew a line in the sand right away and basically saying this is his own party so uh that's to be watched very closely sa one and kudos to him our own laort mayor Tom dery went down there and testified the end of the Ways and Means Committee last Thursday about that bill it took some heat from the Republican tell us what a drastic Cuts it's going to be at Public Services not only School ports of

131course but government in itself so he was down there you know fighting for us down there and his attention only took some criticism from the lieutenant governor criticized him for his appearance in his testimony so having said that next time we meet we'll have really down to where the final bills prepar and what we can expect so that's what I was saying before I talk the Tucker talk about our Su I want to I noticed the other day and I spoke to Dr T ball game the other night I maybe I missed it but our sign language class was out on the floor during the star spangle Banner a couple of days ago and I happen to catch now if I miss it I was you know it's my fault but I caught it that

132I I tell you kudos to that class those people for what they do they need to be recognized for what they do because I thought that was just outstanding to have them serving standing in an arch circle out there doing the sign presentation during the star B so please relate to them the Hope J when you see the instructor fine jobs you do I just other people around me were mention that as well so with that I think uh Mr K has something El to mention yeah so as Jim mentioned we uh we went down to Apolis about two three weeks ago now to meet with isba um we were received with some of our local board members so we met with other board members from Michigan City valo new Prairie Phil King no relation

133but uh you know it was really cool to get to talk to some about some of the regional issues that all of us have um and some of the things that we're facing coming up um we didn't have a chance to meet with uh representative prle or our state Senator Mike um but we got to watch the session a little bit which I thought was very interesting and uh I think my biggest take away from the whole thing was it seems like this large and and kind of far off thing but in reality it it affects us greatly every day um more than I even realized actually and and you know it's something that I think we need to take a greater part in for sure so and that was at the isba state out

134State yes right okay awesome we else got any questions comments I have a question for Jim if you know what's the difference between independent and nonpartisan independent there's party an independent party oh okay Independent party I got not partisan not partisan um I will say it there it was a close count on that in the Senate the vote was 26 to 20 there was six Senators that uh excuse me there were four Senators that that didn't vote were not there and Sen all it was a close was a very close vote on that question um for the Senate Bill where you have to actually run in a primary would that also make it so that school board members are able to be voted on like as a straight ticket vote like if someone clicks I

135should have brought that up straight ticket voting does not include school board that you have to vote independently that was passed number years ago okay um so we we want to get a work session going I talked to a little before this so uh we think we need a work session before our next board meeting so Dr Wood and I talk a little beforehand I talk to you guys to so April 2nd is kind of what we're looking Ates that work for everybody and then uh 4 o' 4:00 work yeah 4 o00 yes okay cool okay so we'll do 4:00 and April 2nd we have a work session that's open to the public if you uh want to come see us work um okay no other comments from anybody all right so the next board

136meeting is April 14th uh at 6 o' right here uh seeking a motion to adjourn move thank you Justin second second