001Well, good morning to everybody. We're glad everybody has made it in. appreciate all of our board members being able to take time away from work today for uh and other activities for uh uh our second board retreat that will take the time to look at the uh processes and data from all of the buildings over the course of the year. Uh and you've got the information packets in front of you. Again, this should be an open discussion of the data that the principles and present through the course of the day and uh for you to gather more information for yourself to continue being great board members and representative of our students in our community. So, uh before we would begin, I'll defer to President uh to President Morgan, excuse me, uh if we would go
002ahead and do the pledge of allegiance. Sure. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. >> Thank you. I will say, as we did last year, if you need to get up and go to the restroom or get something to drink or if you've got a call from uh uh your full-time employment or family emergencies, don't hesitate to just get up and uh uh step out and take that if necessary. And uh we are just about three or four minutes ahead of schedule here. So, I'll let Robert get his slide presentation. Uh go to mode, Robert. or click view mo I think there's a present or viewing >> superad you want super
003salad >> salad >> okay and for the speakers please uh I don't know that the mics are on up there uh click the button until it's green. >> I will say Chris Samic is behind the big Prometheium board running the live stream. So, uh we can refer to her as the Wizard of Oz today. Be behind the behind the curtain, so to speak. So, but we are we are live. Correct, Chris? Correct. >> All right. Thank you. >> And board members, is you have questions today, don't forget to turn your mics on. >> So, we ready? Um, just a couple quick data points from the high school. Attendance was not up from the state yet. They're always really punctual and on things. Um, so that information was not out. Everything that we had kind of
004monitored throughout the school year, the school attendance was always trending around 92 93%. Um, which if you guys recall, especially like even last year with the new attendance laws, I mean, those rates had dipped anywhere from the 50s to the 60s. Um, so we really tried to be proactive in getting a hold of families, communicating any day out of school is a day out of school. Um, Mr. Steinmets was very heavily involved with uh local probation offices, our SRO's, etc. So, as kids were missing, we were catching that and then getting those kids called in, talked to, um, you know, and sometimes very valid reasons why they're why they're not there. Um, but in those meetings, we would look at, of course, grades, the impact, and then what things we could try to do to
005to circumvent and help kids get to school more. So, right now, excuse me, initial data um that we've looked at, again, it's not finalized. Those numbers are trending up very good. Um and the 90th percentile, we were very very pleased with that. Graduation rate, I I listed it here. You you have to understand again, every kid in the school is expected to take the SAT. students that are in the severe disabilities rooms with with some type of cognitive delay um that are coded to take the alternative assessment. Those students count against our graduation rate. I think we had four students this year that fit that that criteria. Um we're allowed 10% of our graduating class to count toward the grad rate where it doesn't impact it. So, one of the four, it's just a numbers
006game, um, will positively count toward the grad rate. The other three is a negative impact. So, our grad rate will not finish at 100%, but please understand when I say we graduated 100% of our kids. That's those kids that took the SAT. That's what I'm talking about. Um, we should finish up when everything's said and done, and it won't be till October, but we're going to be 97 something. And for the third year in a row, that's the highest in school history. Um, so the kids and the teachers are doing a tremendous job. You see this in the board reports every every quarter I ask teachers to go through every period and list their pass and fail rates. So we set a goal in the building. I want every teacher to have 90% of their
007students pass for the the quarter um the semester, the grading period. We always track that. For the first time ever, we've been close, but for the first time ever, every teacher second semester saw 90% of their roster pass their class. Um, so again, that's that's a tremendous accomplishment. Um, CTE reimbursement, this is a big deal as well. Andy knows what I'm talking about here. When we have kids take uh CTE classes, Hooser Hills classes, our pathway classes, those are reimbursed by the state. I'm sure you're all aware of that. We brought in almost half a million dollars of funding this year from our reimbursements. That's a very big deal. Um that money gets tied right back in and and salaries and things like that. So, um some of the teachers that teach these classes, there's
008a lot of different ways to look at it, but some of them are literally paying their salary. Positive changes to the expo. A lot of you guys um have sit in and watched those expos. I bring this up because, you know, 20 years ago when the expo started, very good project, right? Really cool thing that they're doing in the school. And it was about a new opportunity for that student. They could go explore something new. As as things have progressed and changed and everything now is about career and workforce ready, um, and it's all tailored toward jobs or or preparation to college, etc. We changed the expo. Instead of this new experience, we said, if a kid's going to work for three years studying a career pathway, why doesn't that become the expo? That's what
009they talk about. And so, I had heard a lot of positive comments this year about the expo, just how engaging the kids were. And I think why you saw some of those changes, kids were speaking directly to what their passions are. They were speaking to what they've studied and looked at for three years. And so that that was a big positive change. Um we're going to obviously continue that and hopefully that continues to grow and and even manifest even bigger and better. Uh work-based learning. This is again initiative from the state. Kids should study a pathway for three years freshman through junior year. senior year. We want them out somewhere in the community hands-on learning what they've just studied, applying that so that when they leave us, they're ready. And that that doesn't necessarily mean
010all workforce can be college as well. Um, a lot of students go into the medical field, so they're getting some direct medical experience that senior year and then when they head off to clinicals at college or whatever, they've got some some footwork there, you know, some foundational skills. So, we are seeing a huge increase in that. To give you an idea, we had about 40 45 workbased learning kids this past school year. Now, transitioning to next year, we've got 40 kids just in one class. So, we are really increasing these experiences for our kids to get out and apply. You know, how many times you sit and talk to a kid and why am I learning this? Why do I have to do this? We're trying to make what they learn, what their interest is
011applicable and relevant to their experience. So very encouraging to see that number um really more than double. And again, when we talk about dollars, workbased learning is reimbured as well. So this is another boost to the the corporation areas to improve. Um, when I talk about rigor, we had a the staff and I had a a nice heart-to-heart when we come back from Christmas because I kind of felt like as a school, you can get complacent, right? You you can start to go through the motions of the routines and and it just becomes second nature to you. And I felt like that's where we were kind of operating. um things were just they were just kind of flowing. Kids are passing and that's fantastic. And there's some kids that really struggle um and and maybe
012they earned that D and and we feel like we did our job. So when I talk about rigor, it just it doesn't feel like enough. I think there's some kids getting D's that's capable of a C or a C that can get a B. So we've we've got to push and demand more and expect more. We want to raise that bar. So I I think pushing that rigor um is something we need to do and good enough's not good enough. We we want a culture of excellence in everything we do. So that was a uh a big focal point second semester for us and I hope that continues. Just the the workbased learning I touched on. Um as you can imagine, you put 40 kids out, you got to find 40 people willing to take
013them in. Well, when you've got 160 in a class, you got to find 160. So, we have to continue to develop and build partnerships in the community to be able to find placements for these students. So, we have a career coach. That's his focus. Um, this summer, I made some phone calls, had some lunches with some local local people, and I said, "Look, my rolodex isn't isn't very big, but yours is. This is our mission. this is what we need. I need you thinking about who you can maybe recommend we partner with and getting that person in contact with our career coach. So, we're trying to really expand. Um, just to give you an idea, Monroe Hospital, they've been thrilled with the kids that have come in there. They've called asking. Several veterinarians have asked
014for some of our a and medical kids. So, we're starting to even, you know, expand out of the county a little bit. um but develop some of those relationships. We need to do admin more time in classes. This is just me being transparent. You know, it gets busy. It's easy to say, "I need to focus on this fire." We've got to make sure we're in the classroom. Just like we talked the other night, we're coaching our teachers. Um helping them be the best they can be. Um so, that's that's going to be a priority for Jake and I this year is just more time with them. How do we promote? Um, you you've heard me say it before, like we're not a business, but yet they're wanting us to operate like one. Th this is
015a competitive market. What we do matters in terms of who attends our schools. And so, I think we have to do, and I'll just focus on the high school, we have to do a better job of promoting exactly who we are, what we are. To give you an idea, had a student from another school district. They want to transfer here. They did transfer here, but they met with me this summer. We took a tour. We went through everything, sit down about a 2-hour conversation, and the mother, she said, "I'm I'm blown away." Like, our current school doesn't have these opportunities. We had no idea Owen Valley did. Had we known, we would have transferred sooner. Our daughter's going to graduate this year. We would have brought her here. And that just was eye opening to
016me like people would be interested in what we do but we've got to make sure we're telling them. They hear Patriot Manufacturing but we do a lot of other things that are really really good. And I hear very few stories of kids graduating that aren't finding success wherever their niche was. If it's if they're a collegebound kid, they're typically kicking butt in college. If they're workforce, they're they're doing well. They're maintaining. they're providing. So, our kids are doing good things, but I don't know that we're always sharing that. And in this day and age, it's not just about our local community because others are looking. They want options, right? It's a it's a smorgus board out there for them. We got to show them that ours is the best. Uh consistency across the board with
017practice. What I what I mean by this and I've involved Matt Matt Taylor um some of the programs is I just hit my seat button some of our uh programs that you guys have invested in me I've learned some different things in terms of high reliability schools. So we're doing a lot of these things that they're preaching at these conferences but we don't have a system in place for them if that makes sense. So when you say it's best practice to teach for 15 or 20 minutes and then get hands-on, our teachers are hearing that, but there are specific systems that we can train them in, language, questioning, etc. that these practices operate in. We don't have those systems in place. That's important because if you don't, you don't have consistency. So Jake um and
018a handful of teachers went to a conference in Florida looking at that this summer. We're going to start digging in. Then I'll take that group of staff. We'll dig in some further and then look to train and and bring this to the rest of the staff. Won't be a fast process, but we want to create systems that develop consistent best practice. And I know that's that's a very that's a 30,000 foot view for you, but um we just want to be consistent with good things. We've got a lot of good things going on, but they eb and flow. So just training and preparation. I don't know why it did it like that. Talked a lot about the careers and the trades, the workbased learning. Um this is where the state is at. This is what's
019required. They don't just want kids to go to Hooser Hills. They don't just want kids to learn a skill. They want kids to be certified, workforce ready. You know, Jack and I have had this conversation in the past. Kid goes to the EMT program, they should walk out certified and be ready to work, employable for an agency. that that is a major focus and goal for me and what we want to provide for the high school. Um so we have to think about what things we can bring here. Hooser Hills is starting to put the squeeze on schools in terms of numbers because the state's pushing this. Every school that goes to Hooser Hills, there's a big push of kids, right? Facilities only so big. A house can only hold so much. So, we got
020in a pretty nasty situation at the end of this year when I've got 12 kids in a medical field that need to return to Hooser Hills. I've also got 10 new ones that would come next year. And Hooser Hills tells me I have 12 spots. Which kids am I telling you go, you don't go? It's pretty big predicament. And especially when you're looking at getting kids certified. If my juniors to be seniors, if they have to go back to Hooser Hills because they have to finish that certification, then that means my current juniors, there's no point in them going as seniors because now they're not going to get the C. So, it's not a every other year deal. It it's a two-year cycle. Does that make sense? That's a problem. That's a big problem. And
021the state is also measuring us on how many kids we're going to start getting certified. So in my opinion, for what little it's worth, we have to think about what skills are most marketable to our kids in our community. And I say, let's cut out the middleman. How do we get creative and get them here on our campus? How do we control just even there there's been fr you got to realize there's frustrations with I send 10 kids and four of them get certified. Well, I want to know what's going on with those other six, right? There was no discipline. The the work was turned in. You know, the kid in all in all areas looks like the kid was working. Why are they not passing? I don't have access to that teacher to go
022talk about instruction, practice, etc., why we're passing, failing. It's just we send them and we hope for the best. I don't like that. I want control over what we do and with our staff. So, I think we have to look at how we if we're going to invest, to me, this is a direct investment in our kids' future. >> Are you taking questions in the middle of this? >> I'll take whatever you want. Are you talking about the EMT programs specifically? >> Uh, all all of them. I mean, welding. Um, and again, a lot of this data, I I don't know. I don't I don't know much about welding. I don't study it. They say a certified welder that gets through the program and a finally has their job, they're six figure jobs. And we
023got kids that go through for two years and then don't pass the exam. And I don't just mean Owen Valley. I mean, I I know kids at Edgewood. I know kids at Eastern, they're not passing these certifications and that's a problem and and the initial >> no control over >> none. None. Now, I will and the goal today is not to run somebody down, but again, this is the partnership we have. So, that's what I'm speaking to. There was a a previous director there and I asked these questions too. Very very resistant to my questions. And you've got to understand, Robert, our job is to graduate them. The certification is an added bonus. Well, I disagree with that. The expectation is you are going to graduate, but you're going to get this certification because that's
024the program you're in. And as a facility, as an organization, we're going to make sure our kids are prepared to do that. And that wasn't happening. Um, and there's some instances where it's still not happening. I think they've got a different director, a much different vision, etc. But, um, you know, again, we have no no control. And I just think if you're if there are kids, there are grad numbers, there are state statistics, I think we need some ability to work with those instructors. Um, we don't and I really don't like the fact either when you start squeezing numbers, you know, I mean, some of you have kids here. So, you know what? What's that look like? Neighbors kid gets in. You know, we have to try we don't necessarily have criteria on who should
025be a welder and who shouldn't. Um, what what are we we're looking at GPA at Owen Valley. We're looking at behavior. I mean, we're not going to send a kid that's got an attendance or behavior issue over one that even that's not always good data either, right? Because some of those kids that are behavior problems, why are they behavior problems? Because they're sitting in algebra 2 because I make them. because the state says they have to be and they don't care about it. But this hands-on welding, that's their niche and that's where they need to be. So, I I don't like being the one that dictates who stays and who goes. If I got a program in house, I can put them in there and then we can work with those kids in real time
026as necessary. If that makes sense. >> Yeah, Dina. >> Um I don't know what the rules are. If you could get the classroom training at the high school get the instruction then would it be allowable to go out and somebody mentor them you know be like an internship >> yeah that that would be the goal the goal would be we would train them in house and then like I said that senior year we would get them out um excuse me that's exactly what we want to do um some programs won't allow But because the junior year is that coursework and that senior year is the the certification part of it, excuse me. But medical is an example. So that certification comes the second year for those kids, but at least three days a week they're
027in some type of medical facility doing hands-on. So sometimes the program automatically adds that piece in, if that makes sense. Um we we had a young man that was uh wasn't at Hooser Hills but he did some welding and mechanical stuff in house and then so for his work base he went out with HFI the minute he graduated they hired him snatched him up. Um Mr. Cen who who just uh resigned he's taken a job with his dad. They're going into business together anyway. He partnered with Boston on a lot of things. So Boston has has fed us like some CNC machines. They really trained Ryan on a lot of this precision machining. So that was kind of his niche. Um the guidance counselor, Miss Richmond, took kids on a career visit uh to Bedford,
028I think. And they're going over these machines with the kid. Well, our our kids are firing off these answers, right? Like, yeah, you do that on this. Yeah, this is how that works. Yeah, the guy that ran the tour as we're walking to the bus, he follows the kids out and he pulls that student of ours and he said, "You know, what's your name? How do you know this?" Well, we do this stuff at at my school. And he literally brought him an application and that was a midterm graduate in December and in January, the company's in Morsville. He started at $26 an hour just based on the experiences he did at the high school. So that's I mean that's what we're looking for. Um but again we don't want to limit kids and when
029kids aren't succeeding we need some say so some hands-on in that. Now I'm not telling you to go build a $5 million career center but what facilities and things do we have that we can invest in remodel tweak etc? What certifications can we can we supply to our staff? Um, this this just needs to be at the forefront of our thinking because we're getting squeezed at Oser Hills and I don't want to see our kids left out. And and again, when you talk about innovation, right, people are looking at you. There's nothing that says that if we start a program at our school, we can't take kids from Edgewood or Cloverdale. And guess what? They got to pay us to do that. So, yeah, everything's about cost money to make money, right? So, you're going
030to invest some, but this also can turn into dollars for us. And you got to realize, too, it cost us to send kids there. So, any program we keep in house, you're not paying to send kids there either. That money stays here with us. And I only bring that up because we're not trying to make dollars, but in terms of the thought of how do we spend money and spend it wisely, there is a return on this. It's not just something you're paying out, if that makes sense. Rob, Robert, speak to the what we attempted to look at with the cosmetology. That's a prime example. And >> yes, so so cosmetology was a a big program for us. Um we had a lot of interest at Hooser Hills and again remember think junior senior program,
031right? So we got some juniors that just went. They're going to go senior year and finish up. And that's a program that if you just pay for it, it's about 22 $24,000 to get certified. Our kids buy a $600 packet supplies and they're to come out certified. So they essentially get a $24,000 education for 600 bucks. Those juniors go into senior year. We get a call from Hooser Hills. Hooser Hills doesn't like the program. They cut it. It's gone. So, we have a facility, a space that we can very easily remodel and we can bring in cosmetology. I sent out some feelers with within I I kid you not within hours um of sending out a questionnaire of who's interested. I got 17 young ladies that want to do this. And when I hear cosmetology,
032I think hair. I didn't realize it's hair, it's nails, it's skin, it's massage, it's all of this. So, the trick would be can we find um there's licensed cosmetology, but then there's licensed training for cosmetology. How you like a teaching license? We've got some people that want to teach this, but we've got to get the teaching portion of their license fulfilled. But when we do, I've got a room that we can fill up and I got 17 girls that can get $24,000 educations for free. And the minute they're done, they're they're marketable. Um, one of our former graduates, um, his mother owns about 50 Great Clips. So when you talk about a direct pipeline that may not keep them in Owen County, but they can get a job like that right out of school. And
033again, it's these young ladies niche. Um Andy and I have talked and looked welding. Welding is We have 15 freshmen that indicated they want welding. Hooser Hills won't support that. What does it take for us to get a welding program, equipment, certified instructor, etc., and running it here. And it's about $4,000 a kid to send over there. So, yeah, it costs some money to get it up and running. What's 15 times four grand? Doesn't take long to recoup that investment. And again, then you're doing something in house that you've got control over other people don't have. Um, and the biggest thing is then we're getting kids prepared for six figure careers. I think that's pretty pretty cool. So, it's it's just a matter of what are the biggest needs for our kids? How can we
034think outside the box to make it happen? And and Jake knows he's probably tired of hearing it. It's what's drove me nuts for a year trying to figure out how we get this stuff going here. Um, but that's that was a very long bullet point one. >> I got I got a question on that. >> Yes. Um so uh maybe jumping ahead here of it seems as if that we have with the changes to the diploma types and all that that our infrastructure of of what we have done in the past we're going to outpace that quickly. >> You just hit the nail on the head. And what staff, you know, it sounds like, and my concern with the changes from the state is that schools are don't have the staff to do the work
035that's being required. Um, and budgets are tight and to just go out and hire people. um what does it look like to upskill folks within our our buildings to to be >> and and that's I think the direction we have to think. It's not necessarily about do we go find additional staff or different staff. It's who do we have that is willing to go get certified? What does that look like? >> And what is that I mean what do they get trained in? I mean, what what is there? >> So, like if somebody had the the CTE license, the career and technical license, there's going to be a component that's added on to be like a and I it's it's a blank right now, Derek, but there's like a a certifier certified license, and it
036basically means that you're qualified to train a trainer of trainers, if that makes sense. >> Yeah. And so I'm not quite sure what that all entails because I think they're really specific to each area. Um before Ryan left, like I said, Ryan's niche was kind of that precision machining. We probably could have went that way with Ryan. Um so as a district, do we say this is a direction we're going to go? This is maybe a $15,000 investment in education and we we do that. Ryan, you're if you're willing to do this, we're willing to pay you, you know, for it. That kind of thing. I think those are conversations we need to have. Um, that job is still open. So, right now, I can't tell you. We We might find a construction trades guy
037and instead of welding or precision machining, we're looking at construction trades because again, a very very big field in terms of demand. Um, so really you kind of tailor it to what the skills of your employees are. the the fir the only one that's come to mind right now that we have in house would be a Steve Livingston. Um and Steve's phenomenal. Um and Steve would be one that's willing whatever you say this is what I need of you. He's going to say sign me up boss. But Steve does so many other things that I I don't feel we can even attempt that. Um ideally we would find somebody we hire in this open spot. Where's your wheelhouse? and we we agree to to pay for that. And that's actually the last bullet point I
038was going to talk about. But no, you're you're thinking exactly how I was in terms of we can't just hire five new people, but what do we have that we invest in to meet these goals? >> And and I would say that a big challenge that we're going to have with the changes of what we're being asked to do is identifying what labor market trends are. because say cosmetology is hot now, maybe it isn't in 5 years. How do we adapt? How do we identify that? Uh is it biomed engineering? Is it, you know, I don't know. And and I think you look at at each community, you know, like Andy knows this. He's been at different districts. I've been at different districts. The message I preached at Owen Valley, it's not the message I
039preached at my previous schools. The the data needs are different. So I think each county has different needs and and you look at those and yeah over time sometimes they change and you eb and flow. You know we have a lot of individual pathways at the high school and we keep an eye on those and we just eliminated one of them. Um believe it or not the computer science program which you would assume technology very big. Why would you eliminate that? The demand from our students is so minimal that I'm tying up a staff member. I'm not going to do that. So, our computer science is being weeded out because demand's not there. And we'll invest those resources in other things. So, yeah, you've you've gota you've got to be willing to eb and flow.
040Um, the nice thing about like a CTE, that license covers a wide range. Now certification for to get kids certified that may not but like let's say welding's hot now and in six years that changes that same license can then be applied to a different trade. Now they may need some additional training but it's not like you're throwing everything out the window. You know what I mean? You're just you're just adjusting. Robert, one of the other things also I want you to impress upon or talk about, talk about the importance of the career coach. You know, Mr. Doring, who is our career coach, that is a grant-f funed position and our grant will run out at the end of the at the end of the 2526 school year. So, I >> So, I I would
041in action, I want you to I want you to relate. It's a it's a very fine line when you get to talking about resources and dollars, right? Between what what are musthaves versus wishes and wants. And so when I when I speak to the career coach and we can whatever name you want to plug in that spot, there are requirements with the state that our students are met with. And what I mean by that is when I say met with, I I mean met with one-on-one. We have to have meetings with our kids no more than five at a time. So I can't just bring down the senior class and we talk about career. We cannot meet with more than five students at a time. And those five have to all have the same career
042interest. So like if I've got 12 kids that are in the medical field, I'm going to have three meetings just for that one area. So the career coach has those meetings. Part of what those meetings do, we keep record and track about their career interest. Then it's his job to go find those experiences out of school for them to get the hands-on the workbase or you know I want to become this. this is my career aspiration. He is that person that also can line up and say these are the things you need. These are the steps you need to take. These are the applications. These are the scholarships etc. His office is right outside of mine and I've heard him have multiple conversations. You know what do they say college is for? To teach you
043how to think, right? I I he gets a kid in there. I want to go to Depal. That's great. What do you want to be? and it's kind of a $30,000 a year job. So then that conversation says, "Have you ever looked at Depal? Do you know what that price tag is? Just curious." No, cool. Because it's about 50,000 60,000 a year. Oh, are you paying for that? Are mom and dad paying for that? Do you have money set aside? Like these are the conversations that start to happen. The guidance counselors are overwhelmed with everything else from the state. um they don't have the time to do it. So that's what the career coach is doing and it is a much more one-on-one type of conversation. So that that position um that's a big reason
044why the work base doubled in size because they're able he's got the time to make the phone calls, find the contacts, and again you're reimbursed for those placements. So in terms of a salary, if he gets kids out there at 800 bucks a pop, you know, 160 of them is eventually our goal, you know, those are dollars that pay for his salary, but that's a with the changes to the state, like we've talked, that's a vital position. Um, if he's not there, it's obviously going to fall somewhere because it's required. Who picks up that slack? I don't know. We're already going to Mrs. Fischer's retiring. We're absorbing a position in the office. Teachers have full loads. So, I don't know what that would look like. I don't know how we would accomplish it. Beth and
045Bonnie would probably quit if I said this is on you now. Um, so I, you know, I don't know. It's, you know, the adage, we're asked to do more with less, and that's what the state's given us. But that, yes, that is a vital vital position for us. I'll go real quick. Um, that second bullet point, you know, you don't like the term keeping up with the Joneses, but again, I can't stress. It's a competitive market. What What is What is the one thing that communities view and see at their schools, it's it's their marching bands, it's their choirs, it's their football teams. These are the things that are public. These are the things that are visible. Um, nobody's coming in. We we don't have 3,000 people show up to watch our history exam. They
046don't they don't come to watch. And I'll tell you what, Mrs. Oric does an awesome debate. Things that are visible to our community, we have to invest in them. And if if you go drive around within 30 minutes, you see people are investing in these facilities. And like I said, I can't stress it enough. The uh the family I showed around for the transfer, it was for athletic reasons. There's a program they we excel in. They want to be a part of it. Kids come here or other places for these purposes. What what is concerning to me, if you know how the IHSAA works, sectional alignments come every two years. They track enrollments and then they adjust sectionals based on enrollments. So then Brad goes to a meeting wherever you get assigned and the way
047the process works, who wants to host this sectional? If we raise our hand and nobody else does, we're the sectional host. if not multiple. Maybe you take it one year, we take it one year. Maybe you got three or four that want it. And now you got to have a conversation about who's going to do it. The last alignment and meeting to determine sectional host, Owen Valley was told they would not be an option till 2027 because of our facilities. Now, if we fall in a diplomatic process to not be a host, so be it. but because our facilities are not adequate to host that that bothered me. That's concerning. And so again, there's wishes, wants, and needs. I I think any school that we compete against, our facility should be on par enough that
048somebody could say, "We're comfortable playing at your place or at our place, but not we're staying here because yours isn't good enough." that that ought to bother us, you know. I I don't want someone coming to my house and saying that place is a dump. I don't know how he lives there. You know, our school, these facilities, this is what our public sees. They have to look and be on par with everybody else. And again, it takes money. So, I don't know where or how it comes from, but that has to be a priority as well. And then just this summer at some of my classes, the last point and I'll shut up during COVID with the ESR dollars, they started a district really started taking those dollars paying for teachers to go back and
049get advanced degrees. You know, this this guy would be a great leader. We're going to pay for him to go get an administrative license. This teacher would be great in this area. We're going to go send him for a chemistry degree. Now, those dollars are gone, but they saw such a benefit and return on that that they're taking their title dollars and they're still investing in those those teachers. Those teachers sign a commitment because again, you're investing in them. Once I'm done with the program, I guarantee I will stay with you for five years or I pay this money back type thing. But I think we need to look at how we can invest in what we have, who we have, you know, with the changes that come. Um, we've got some people in the
050high school that I think would be great leaders. What type of programs can we pay and invest in them? And that'll keep them here long term as well. So, I think from K to 12, we need to look at how we can invest in our staff and our people um you know, to grow their their practice and benefit the practice for our kids. I think that's it. >> Question I've got for you is uh because which facilities are most in need? >> This pertain to baseball and softball. baseball >> because I'm thinking >> our football field soccer >> track. >> So our our in the meeting what what come up one is location. So we had Cascade uh George Washington High School and Speedway come in. So we're viewed a little south but Speedway Cascade
051both have turf softball and baseball. And then our gym, I would say, especially with the new addition we just did to the floor, our gym is untouchable. People want to come to our gym. It's awesome. >> Our football field, our soccer field, it's awesome. If there's any complaint on the on the on the football field, it's that our kids say it plays too fast. >> And it does. I If you're used to playing on grass and you throw a soccer ball out there, that gone thing moves. Um, but we went from, and it's true, we we did we we lost a few sectionals. We went from hosting volleyball um every other every third year. Um we went from hosting we had a baseball or sectional a baseball or softball sectional every year and then we
052had basketball every other year. Um boys or girls basketball. I hosted one of the two since I started. I've had one of the two every other year. So we um we did we did lose. We lost some. It and it stinks. I mean, it comes down to our fac our baseball field's not bad. It's and our softball field is not bad. Our softball field is not bad, but it does hold water. I mean, look where it's built. But, um, it's uh it's it's dirt versus turf. Turf is a drain. I mean, >> it's not just that like >> it's excellent playing surface for the kids like that. It plays great, but a spectator can't sit at softball because there's dugouts in the way and they can't see. Um Brad's limited on I think his ticketing
053ability is terrible. So Gates, um to me, it's what the fans see. Um you know, the setup of baseball, it's it's just it's hard to view. It's not good. You got to have a facility people want to come visit. Um and it's not ours is not up conducive for that. Um, you know, I mean, there's a lot of things we could talk about like you you've got a very successful high school wrestling team that practices in a middle school classroom upstairs. That's a burden on Tom's building. Um, it's it's they're out of space with the kids now, especially that girls has a team. Um, so now you talk about what what do you remodel or do? Well, your weight room, etc. Like Is there a facility that needs to be added on or looked at
054added on to accommodate some of these things? Um, you know, the the big thing when we did the football field, we were very conscious about not saying this isn't a football field. This is a multi-surface, you know, facility that houses all of our kids. And I will say it is utilized by not just PE and football and soccer. How many of you I would have never guessed it. How many of you would guess the bass fishing team practice on the football field? But Chad takes them out there and they work on casting technique and you're going to hit this marker at 20 yards and things I would have never thought of. >> Well, we practice we practice baseball and softball out there and it rains. They they throw out the the rubber bases and >>
055seen the band out there >> and the band's out there, too. So, so my my point is when we talk about just like your homes, when we talk about spending our dollars, what are the investments in return on our dollars? Um, you know, and and so these areas, you got roughly 200 kids a day that go through our weight room because we bring in two middle school classes as well. We don't have any other classroom and I'm calling it a classroom that gets utilized as much as that you know and then that doesn't even factor in how it's used after school additionally with kids. So some of these areas again they they need adjusted they need invested in >> and uh what's the the benefit to hosting sectional? I mean, is it financial? Is it
056just eyes on on the school? I mean, >> eyes on your school. You do get paid a little bit for it, but >> it's it's more or less just you're showing off. >> You're flexing on everybody. >> I think just the ability again, >> I think any of us would be offended if somebody comes to you and say you're not good enough. >> And that's what was said. >> Yeah. >> You know, your your facility is not good enough for this event. And that I don't know. I say it should I don't know it offends me and so I because that's not we don't want again I go back to it was in one of the first we want a culture of excellence in everything we do and knows this we talk I travel a
057lot I'm at a lot of these events I'm in a lot of states and I know you're the same way >> we're both guilty of the same thing >> we're out of town you know where we're going I'm finding the local high school and I'm driving around and it drives my life nuts. Why in the heck are we? Cuz I want to see. I I want to know. I want ideas, right? Like you don't always have to reinvent the wheel. If other people are doing it, my god, steal it. But it doesn't matter where I'm at out of town. I'm I guarantee you, I can tell you what, Pigeon Films, Gatlinburg. I've been in Miami. G, you know, I'm checking them schools out. Um even even decorations, window pfs, like what ideas? I mean, Derek,
058also it gives our kids an advantage. >> Yeah, >> it does. Um, if we can get those schools down here and play on the dirt instead of the turf right now, we're bringing them. Um, because it takes it takes a different hop, but and then coming into basketball, we get more of our people in there. >> Um, that's that's an advantage and it's it's to be honest, by the end of it, we're like, God, I don't want to do that again. But it's fun. It's a blast. We get we have um we have the Patriot platoon that that's that's a new name for it, but that's other kids get to come in and be a part of it because they're showing teams around. They're taking waters to people. Um it's it's just a way to
059show off our school. >> And if you guys haven't been up and checked out the gym now, which I know some of you were at graduation, but but do that. um that that outdoor facility down at the track as far as I'm concerned that's as nice as there is or and I would put that up with with any 6A school. We may not have the 60 foot jumbotron but that that field and facility is nice and I think our gym right now is absolutely beautiful. Um and it's we need the rest of it to catch up. >> I need to wind up the high school presentation so we can run into the prep for the middle school here. Any further questions or comments for Robert or his team? >> Um, just real quick about the
060career paths and all that. Um, I think it's a great idea. Um, I want to know, do you have a plan in place for how many kids are going to be able to figure out for each, you know, certain subject I'm going to call it. >> We don't ever cap it. So, so the way it works, the guidance, so in eighth grade, you have your preparing for college and careers. So that teacher is very well aware of what our pathways are. So in 8th grade she's kind of telling them next door you can study this and this and this and then we schedule visits. So like those kids will come over today we're going to see the engineering pathway. Today we're going to see the A pathway. So these kids also get to see them.
061And then when the counselors, the high school counselors go over for scheduling, they'll meet and they'll say, "Okay, Liz, when you did your PCC class, what stood out to you? What are your interest? What are your goals?" And then through that, they schedule it. So, we don't cap any program. It's wherever they want to go. Um, Hooser Hills is the one that caps us. So, but they don't go there till junior year. So they'll even start a pathway as a freshman even if as a junior they might transition to something different if that makes sense. But every every kid at C used to like right now academic honors is considered a pathway. So some of our high achieving academic kids they weren't doing some of the hands-on because it was all academia. That's gone. Like
062it's it's one diploma now. So A to Z they're in a pathway. And so we're not capping any of those. We have so many and the kids interest are so wide it all works. >> So what I'm saying is if you switched more eventually from using your hills for a lot of the junior senior year of these pathway programs and we would no longer have to have cap. >> Correct. Correct. Yeah. We would not cap anything because it's all in house. So and we would never have the demand to overburden them. Like I talked to the welding guy at Hooser Hills. He he said he feels like become a dumping ground. He's got 50 kids a session and 16 machines. So, we wonder why kids don't always pass a certification. You've got way more demand
063than you've got means to educate. I'm not throwing anybody under the bus. That's just the statistics. We would never have that problem. And it doesn't mean just because we do it in house every kid gets certified either. But we've at least got handson and we can Oh, this is where we're weak. We're going to make an adjustment. I don't have that. Now, >> Robert, you use the term a higher liability. I thought you said you said just ability higher liability schools. I thought what you said >> reliability >> high reliability. >> Reli Okay. All right. >> Yep. >> Like it was early on. My ears had woke up yet. I don't think. >> And it's it's just like I said, it's just a system of of there's levels of it. Um like safety and security
064is one of them. You know, the thought is teachers got to feel safe and secure before they can appropriately educate. And when I went through the IPLI that that you guys graciously approved me for, we did surveys with the staff. And so I have I have three different surveys to know where our staff feel like we're operating at and kind of where we need to go. And I will brag a little bit that um you know, you get up there and you look at these results and when you ask 50 people their opinion and Jake and I were surveyed, you can see things all over the place. The high school, like there were comments made about how unified the high school's responses were. Like everybody, when I say everybody, about 95% of our staff, they're
065on the same page with where we're going, where we're strong, where we're weak. like we're in tune thinking alike, which is I I think why you're seeing some things trend differently than what it has as well. >> All right, I need to excuse you so I can get Tom in to set up his presentation and we'll work through the give him his 30 minutes. So, >> thank you guys. Appreciate it. Thank you all. >> Good luck. >> Kids will be here soon. What's our situation up there? >> Yeah, plug yours in. >> I was trying to make it easy. Well, I thought it would be Oh, there it is. Helps when you put plug it in the right spot. >> Are you guys ready to roll? >> I'm giving you some fresh batter. Oh, okay.
066>> Here you can share microphone, Jack. >> No, thank you. >> All right. That's got fresh batteries. >> That one's got fresh batteries. >> It's We knew because Robert was so windy. >> You can watch the video of this later. >> Are we still recording? >> Yes. That's okay. >> So, are we good? >> You're good. >> All right. So, >> do I am I still done in 15 minutes? >> You got 30 minutes. >> All right. Okay. Hey, um first of all, I just want to thank you guys this opportunity. I know sometimes looking at numbers on a piece of paper, it's kind of challenging um to be able to, you know, where's the true story behind the numbers sometimes? And I'm a numbers person. U I was a math teacher. So, um, the
067these two know that I kind of live in this world all the time and kind of looking that how how can we do the next next thing. So, um, we're going to kind of start just talk about our attendance because I wanted to kind of focus on our school improvement and then anything else on those sheets that you guys had questions about. Um, welcome to to to talk. Um so our student uh so this was pulled directly from the state ed uh attendance data port that actually syncs with powers school. Um and so this year we showed a 94 uh just a little over a 94% attendance rate um for the school uh which was just a smid above where the state was at. The state was sitting at 93.8 so we were about a
068half percent above where the state was at. So we thought that was that was pretty good. Uh, as you can see over the last three years, we've actually been ticking up just a little bit more improvement each year. Back in 2223, we were at n just over 93% 93.4% in 2324. I went ahead and included 2122 because this is as far back as the data went on the state page. Um, that was a COVID year was when we were quarantining kids and you had kids on e-learning or virtual learning. So, we kind of feel that this first one's kind of an outlier. So, we're kind of that's what we've been looking at the last three years and how things have been since we're postcoid. How are kids getting back in the groove of things um
069and improving? Um as far as our unexcused and excused, um we have seen some improvements in our unexcused and excused. Um eighth grade um is where they fared 1.48 or 1.5% of the absences were unexcused where and seventh grade was about the same. Um but then in our excused uh they were just a little bit less. Um we also look at chronically absent students. Chronically absent student is anybody who's who's missed 10 days of school or more in the school year. Uh and a habitually truent student is anybody who's missed 10% of the school year. So and they use 10% because if you have 180 days that's 18 days versus a kid who may have signed up for only a semester. Maybe they enrolled late you know if they miss nine days in a semester
070is where it comes from. So in 23 24 our chronically absent students were hovering just right at 15%. We did decrease that to 12.3% this year. And then our habitually truent students the kids that miss 10% or more went from 5% to um just about 1.3% this year. Couple of things that we think um that that we were really focused on is is we last year in March we created the truency diversion program where the probation office is sending out notices. They're sending out affidavits. Mr. Pots and the and the probation team meets with kids. So they talk about grades. They talk about what's going on at home. They talk about why kids aren't coming to school. Uh and so in 23 24 we start since we started it so late kids have kind of
071developed those bad habits. We had 43 kids that we had identified that we sent through that program and some of those were kids that kind of carried over into this year kind of on a watch. Uh and then some of them since they eighth graders were in the high school. This year we sent 24. So those were kids who had 10 unexcused absences or more um that we sent through the prosecutor and 24 of those. And the program they meet with them on Wednesday mornings and the program is just to kind of have a conversation with the kid. That's how it initially starts. How are we um you know why aren't we coming to school? You want to talk a little bit about that? >> During those meetings, we spend a few minutes with each
072I'll move up. During those meetings, we spend a few minutes with each student and the Trinity people and we talk about their grades. We go through their grades first and say, "How are you doing? What can we do differently academically to support you, to help you?" Those kind of things. Then we talk about what is going on? Why are you not at school? Is it is it, you know, um something I just don't want to be here or whatever? And how can we support you and get you there? And then we've had really good luck with the kids that as the data shows in that a lot of those kids that we've been meeting with on Wednesdays, their attendance has gotten better and we've even had uh quite a few kind of dismissed from the
073program. Now, they always talk to them about, okay, if you're dismissed, if it goes if we start to see it trending in a bad direction again, then you're right back at it. But it's very positive. The kids don't feel intimidated coming down and talking to us or anything. They treat them really well and it's just how can we support you and help you in that getting to school on time and getting to school when you need to be here. So, we did send uh there were four kids that they kind of sent to the prosecution side um the educational neglect side. Um two of those kids that I remember uh when I was talking with probation, I don't remember all the names, but two of them I do know have eventually decided that in-person learning
074was not necessarily for them and so they've chosen other educational avenues. Most of them went went virtual. Um so, but we did have four that um they kind of did push. Our school improvement goal was to improve that number by 2%. So, as you can see, we um they we we we kind of shattered that by improving it by almost 4%. Um student discipline um over the I'm going to turn this one over to you because this is your this is your game. >> Um I think you know for me I I think kind of school culture is a living breathing organism a little bit and you got to kind of constantly nurture it. And that first year when Mr. Arthur came I think we were uh which would be 23 24 we there was
075an uptick in referrals we were setting that culture of how we want the school to run and setting expectations with teachers with students those kind of things then Mr. Arthur put in a whole bunch of programs to try to support students and teachers. And then also like one of those for example that helped reduce those numbers was an extra bell. It seems so weird and it was so easy. Um a one minute warning bell, you know, on a 4-minute passing period. Now there's a one minute warning bell. Hey, you got one minute left to get to class. The number of tardies that we had on students being late to class infinitely dropped. you know, it went down so much and you know, that helped some of those discipline referrals and just getting that culture in
076line of how the expectations are going to work at Owen Valley Middle School has I think we're going to continue to see a trend in the right direction is my hope, you know, and seeing those things and just little things like at Tardy Bell took care of a lot. >> Whose idea was that? It it was um it was my idea that we brought up to the staff in December and we said, "What do you" And I really brought it up to them because I'm thinking, "Okay, so is this going to get is it going to be too many bells?" Because there's actually three bells in one passing period. And and the and the plan was and so they were all supportive of it. So we tried it for three weeks and then it turned
077into the semester. And actually the kids even complimented. They're like, "Oh my gosh, this is the best thing ever." like I know exactly what I I just think they get involved with meeting with their friends or meeting with staff members and they just had no recollection of time and before they knew it the tardy bell rang and so it kind of it's a completely different tone. So um it's it's almost like a train bell uh and that that kind of goes off so they know the difference between the bells because it's just a completely different tone. So yeah. So, and it was just something real simple that we just did that kind of made a huge imp. I think it the number was like 75% of the kid like our tardies went down by like
07875%. So, >> yeah, one of those for everything I do. >> Um, in school suspension as we can see that all has dis decreased. I think really I think that's just a matter of teachers and students understanding culture and expectations like that was it and I think it just takes time for some of that to be implemented and take effect and then out of school suspension that declined from 90 and 22 23 to it went down a little bit it went up this year a little bit sometimes like you know on some of those things u we had a few students move in that that brought some stuff with them. And we we really worked with those kids for a lot of this school year trying to correct behaviors and stuff like that. And and
079some of those out of school suspensions were a result of just like we inherited this student from another district and then trying to get those students. Those out of school suspensions on those numbers are not a high percentage of our students at Valley Middle School. You know, we had about 330 kids in the middle school. The kids that got out of school suspensions, you're probably talking about 10 kids or so that were make taking up the vast majority of those numbers. Most of our kids are not getting in trouble. You know, it's just not the vision and the thing that we see. you talking about a very small percentage and then that leads to also the expulsions and then like uh in the 2425 where you see a uptick in expulsions most of those expulsions
080happened late April early May where we had worked and worked with different programs and different mediating factors to try to help those students be successful and just couldn't let it ride anymore and had to set that expectation. Um, moving into our iLearn data. Um, I will say that, um, my entire staff, math and language arts were so disappointed when our numbers came in. Um, it was almost I had to end up giving him a pep talk. We went through some, when I say we, I mean the state put us through some um, challenging situations this year when it come to iLearn. When we're regarding to ELA, so the language arts is divided into two sections. It's divided into reading. It's divided into a writing portion. and seventh grade, we're usually always able to kind of
081maintain where they're at. You know, they're coming from four elementaryaries into to a middle school where there's more flexibility, more expectations, a little more freedom. So, and and actually from the blue the blue graph here is actually how they performed in their previous year. So, for that's 34% of them in sixth grade past iLearn and in seventh grade, we had 34% of them. Uh eighth grade, we usually see a huge jump in eighth grade. And as you can see, we didn't see that huge jump. We saw it went from 37% to 38%. And typically we see a bigger improvement because they're working on it's it's the writing component. And and in past years, the writing component has been divided into two parts. Part one was where they had to read and collect all of their
082information and then part day two or part two of the test is where they had to do all of their writing and they and they um they took care of that. The state decided this year that they wanted to condense that into one day and make it a smaller test. Well, anytime you change a test, you have two options. Either A, you have to give them both tests, or B, you have to get the norm referencing across the state before you can set the scale score. And so, they opted to not count the writing portion in the iLearn data this year, which I know especially the eighth grade teachers, um, that's a huge component of their curriculum. They work really, really hard with the kids on there. We will typically see our eighth graders, we'll
083we'll get mid30s. The last few years we've been in the mid-30s for seventh grade, but when you look at eighth grade, we'll see a 10 to 12% increase in their I learn scores. Um they'll be in the mid to upper 30s. U Mrs. Hecman's goal, she's kind of our eighth grade leader, will be in to her goal is to break 50%. Um as you can see, the state average was still even 43%. So we're still just ticking under that a little bit. So given that writing component that wasn't part of it you even the state even said I don't think you'll see a difference in I learn scores we saw a difference in I learn scores uh as a result of that so hopefully once they get that norm referencing done we get back on
084track for next year um we'll be back on track there's I will say this that there is more information in iLearn so I kind of this year started assessing the scale scores now you're not going to assess a third grade I learn the same as you're going to assess a seventh or eighth grade I learn but there's a consistent about 30 or 30 point gain each year that they need to make. 72% of our seventh graders increased, 56% of our eighth graders increased. We also looked at their Lexile score. Keep in mind this is one test on one given day. Um, do I >> Your eighth grade didn't pop up. >> Oh, there it is. Oh, sorry. That was eighth grade. Oh, it will pop up. Oh, >> it will pop up. So, our seventh
085grade, um, when I looked at their Lexile scores, which is a Lexile measurement is like what their reading level is. And so, our seventh or seventh graders were at 63% increase their score. Um, our eighth graders, 72% of them increase their score. And then we looked at, okay, so what level are they on as far as their reading level? Seventh grade, we saw that 56%, and remember this is one test, one day. So this is um we noticed that 56% based on this test were on G grade level while 61% were at grade level um for their reading. Switching to math um math had another challenging year like language arts. So u a few years ago the state came through and decided if you remember the legislature said we need to cut 25% of the
086standards. Well, a lot of what they did is they kind of realigned some of the standards. Um, and they moved some things to different grades. Um, as a result, this year was a transition year and they decided that that we would assess kids based on the old standards and based on the new standards. And so, um, teachers were trying to juggle between the two of them, create curriculum mapping. Um, I know Mrs. Yer was our primary seventh grade teacher. Um we did see a dip from 34% to 29%. Um our our the state average was 36%. Um and then in eighth grade we saw a decrease of u 26% for the previous year in seventh grade to 23%. Um they have worked with this year our math team they've been working on curriculum mapping to
087make sure that it's been realigned. I know like when they took the checkpoint one test in October um over fall break I was analyzing some of that data and one of the components just for example was solving equations 90% of our kids were below proficient and like the Monday we got back from fall break I'm like what happened 90% of our kids cannot be below proficiency and so they met we met we had a discussion and they're like well I didn't we we we didn't teach that what do you mean you didn't teach it this was supposed to be on the assessment what do you didn't teach it. We dug deeper and their pacing guide was off based on where it needed to be. So then they spent the next three or four months realigning
088their pacing guides to make sure that they were in line. We pushed back one checkpoint um to give them more instruction time. We've eliminated I Ready. I Ready was another assessment component that took 12 instruction days. We've eliminated that to give them more instruction time to work with kids. Um, and so we've also worked with Ryan Flesner from Butler University last year on instructional strategies. Um, and he's provided some resources to the teachers. Um, so I think I've got a really solid team right now. Um, and so um, and I also feel just to be quite blunt, I think we've done a lot more electronic digital stuff and they're pulling away from some of that and doing the oldfashioned paper pencil. Um, so I think that's also we're going to see a benefit there. Um
089just like on um so looking at their scale scores 58% of them increase their score 57 for eighth graders increase their score. Just like Lexile there's a quantile score that you'll see for um that kind of measures their their math their math ability kind of like their reading ability. In seventh grade 80% of them increased that score and in eighth grade was very very similar to that. um when we looked at are they on grade level 57% were identified as grade level and in eighth grade 72% of them were below grade level and in this class as as you guys have known I've talked to you guys the last few years we've struggled with some of our staffing last year it took me threearters of a year to find a math teacher um and so
090we had a sub so that's why this eighth grade class has been struggling but I think we do have a solid team now and I think that's why you're starting to see some some changes on on the other side. So, I went to a conference this summer and they talked about when you start implementing stuff and um that you a lot of times your growth you see is a J. And I'm really hoping this is kind of where we're sitting at. So, if 2024 is where this is where we were sitting in 2024, ultimately our goal is here to be consistent with state average, I believe this is where 2025 hit. Um I think we've implemented things our curriculum maps have been realigned. Um we have writing will be come back in portion standards will
091they'll be on a single set of standards that they're going to be assessing. So I think there's just a lot of components and I'm not trying to make excuses. I'm just trying to look at at reasons like hey why did we perform the way that we performed? Um so I'm really hoping this is where our 2025 results are so when I come back next year we can say that our 2026 results are up by the goal line. So, um, kind of speaking, Derek asked me a question. Um, he visited one day last year and he asked a question. He said, "Tom," he says, "Everybody comes in and talks about their iLearn data, but it's numbers. Are we doing what we need to do for kids?" And I truly believe that, can we improve improve our
092craft? I'm under the I'm under the belief that every year we have to just get better at what we do every single year. It's that 1% mentality that we get better. Um, I think this this slide here kind of tells a whole different story because our ultimate goal since we're kind of crammed in the middle there between elementary and high school. our job and this is what this has kind of been our mission statement that when I came in as principal that I shared. We have to take elementary students who are in one room typically with one teacher and turn them independent learners to be able to to to learn on their own and to be able to be organized on their own where they don't have that one teacher that's kind of bringing them
093along. Um that's that's kind of our thing. So we're kind of that transition. I always call it the bridge. Last year, we issued 421 high school credits to 168 students. So, each of our eighth graders, and we had some that didn't earn high school credit. I'll be honest with you, they didn't do the work. Each student, uh, each eighth grader going into high school earned approx on average two and a half credits um, walking into high school. So, they're already ahead of the game. Um, the grade breakdown, as you can see, 59% of their A's. Some of that was from like our algebra classes where you're having honors classes and that's kind of their expectation that they set. Um we do send a letter to the parents that say, "Hey, your kid is in a
094high school curriculum class. They will be earning high school curricula or they will be earning high school credit." Um if you do not want to have this credit sent over to be calculated in their GPA, you can denounce it. So anybody who passed it, we sent it over because we figured they may need that D because they may need that credit if they get credit deficient. but the parent had the option to pull back and say we don't we don't want to take that grade over to the high school. So, it's kind of a I get to try this out, but if it doesn't work out, there's no penalty for them. So, um as you can see, we had 34 kids that earned one credit. Five kids or seven kids earned five credits, and then
095there's kind of the breakdown there of how many credits they'll take over. These are the classes we offered. Um Earthspace science and algebra 1 are dual credit classes. Not dual credit classes. They are um two credits. So they have each uh two semesters. So they earn a credit for each semester. In other words, everything else was one one semester. And then um I met with these guys. Well, I sent him a text um and said, "Hey, um I I kind of want to talk to you guys about beyond the numbers and like, hey, what are some things that we've done that's just really improving things like the culture and some of the instruction?" Um this side was y'all. We didn't have much to do with this side. Uh and Andy as far as our school,
096as far as the secure entrance, the new office suite, the library, um repainted floor, um we've done some electrical improvements in the concession stand, so we can now sell those fabulous pretzels. Um and then, uh we were able to secure a new scoreboard. So, I don't know if you guys remember, we had the the large scoreboard, LED, nice screen, and the other one had the bulbs, and our bulbs kept going out. So, Owen County State Bank donated money, and that smaller one has been replaced. um actually was replaced last year. Um we're continuing offering high school offer high school classes. The only ones that we're not offering now is PE and that's because under the new graduation requirements the the state cut those um >> they they cut the PE credit. However, we have picked
097up so every eighth grader will have the opportunity to earn two high school credits. um they'll earn the preparing for college and careers credit and they'll also earn the co the computer science credit that they'll actually learn before leaving eighth grade. Um because those will not technically be offered at the high school um unless it's in like a credit recovery situation. Um they're working on increasing the rigor in mathematics um like I I will meet with Mrs. Yer frequently. She'll be like, "Tom, did you realize this question was a below? Now I've got to increase my rigor." And so then she like reformats her questions to kind of push that question up. Um, English has a set of new novels and they tried to gear them towards like, hey, what are the kids interested in?
098Um, we offered last year we offered resource period just about every period but one and that was a place where kids could go get extra help where we've reformatted our advisory period. We actually even renamed it um from Pride to Patriot Hour. Kind of matches the high school. Um, but we also are providing some community- based courses. Hunter's Education is coming back. We're building some partnerships with um the 4. Um they're bringing in and offering some classes um and then a few other um that we're offering. But but ultimately, we wanted it to be a flex period. We're offering our social emotional learning then, but we also wanted to offer an opportunity that the kids go, "Man, I just really need help with this social studies." They can go see their social studies teacher and
099get help because it's a free period. It's like it's about 40 minutes. Um they can work on homework. They could it's we have silent sustained reading for 15 minutes during that time. Um after school weekly tutoring for math and language arts. Um and we're working on getting the wood shop up and going, but we had the Girk donation where she donated like $30,000 worth of equipment um this year. Um student life. So since I've been principal, we've been able to bring back student council. So now we've have student dances. Um they've done they've sponsored spirit weeks. Last year when we lost all of our snow makeup days, we had to go to school those days. It's a long hall to go from January till spring break without a day off for the kids just to
100get a break. So in February we created the Patriot games. It's like Uker tournaments, checker tournaments. We had a Mario Kart tournament, free throw basketball submitted to win games and a few other games. In my eyes, it was a one-year thing just to kind of help us get through the winter blues. Mr. Pots said, "We're going to this was so much fun, we're going to do it every year." So, and we take that advisory period so it doesn't impact athletics and just it just kind of breaks up the winter a little bit for us. So, um, like I mentioned, spirit weeks, we brought back the Washington DC trip. Last year, we took about approximately 45 kids. Um, this year we're on track to do that again. Um, and then we're adding microwaves in the cafeteria,
101student council and National Junior Honor Society. So those will be accessible for the kids so they can bring other things um in for lunch. And I'm going to turn it over to you for athletics since they've heard me all morning. >> Part of student life probably ought to mention too is for our higher needs students. They offer a holiday road trip. >> Okay. So, um, we gained archery this year, so students will be able to participate with that. Um, Bill Brown has been really helpful in helping us get ready for that, helping me understand the qualifications needed to be an archery coach and what um, tools and equipment that they need to be successful. We host Patriot Invitationals for cross country, volleyball, um, boys and girls basketball and track. Um, softball and baseball, that's something
102I'd really love to do, but the spring is hectic anyway because we share fields with the high school. Um, and we had an extremely rainy season this last year, so that would not have happened. We also hired well we are going to hire another cross country coach so that way we can have better supervision for the boys and the girls. Um we also have made it possible to have assistant coaches in track baseball and softball. same reasons. Um, better safety and I think it's great for athletes to be able to learn from different personality styles from coaches. Um, and something that's going to be offered at the high school this year is an officials class. So, um, Robert and I work together. When students go through this class, they can be on a provisionary license.
103so they can official games with a licensed official. So that will save us a little bit of money um at the middle school level as far as paying officials and also give them experience which is helpful for workforce and um I think our middle school students really look up to our high school students. So that will be great for everybody. >> Um so community outreaches. So, our student council has volunteered at the My Path to do some My Path cleanup um in the spring. They did a Christmas food drive and then they've also raised money for humane society. Um beyond just um the the dances and the fun things at school. Um and then our National Junior Honor Society, um they'll go to Read Across America, so they'll go visit the elementaryaries. They've done bus
104driver appreciation week. And then they also have been to nursing homes. They usually pick up one of the nursing homes and go caroling. Um, as far as our teacher culture, I believe uh Mr. PoS was came in as a teacher, so he's kind of seen how it is. But I'm seeing teachers, and I put this up here because it kind of paints a picture because I I feel like when we were walking in, I was seeing a lot of teachers walk in at their contract time and walk out at their contract time. And and now it's it's they're a little freer. Not that there's an expectation, and that's not what I want to say, but but like they're there before I get there. They're there when I leave. And so they're I'll see them there
105on Saturdays and and again not that that's but it's a they're they're >> I think they're invested more you know right now I think that is the way I would describe it as you know I've been in education for 30 years. I've been in Valley for 28 of those 30 years. Um, I think we're in a really good spot right now. And and obviously in my 28 years at Owen Valley, 26 of those were as a teacher and and I and a lot of these people are my friends, right? And whenever I talk to them, they feel invested in what we're doing right now and what we're trying to accomplish at the middle school. So that is going to roll over and help out students. You know, when the teachers are invested and they're really
106feeling like they feel worthwhile and they feel supported, they're ready to invest. The kids are ready to invest and I think we're just going in a good direction right now. >> I'm seeing them volunteer for things. So, if something will come up, I usually have somebody saying, "Hey, I'll take that role on. I don't have to beg and plead too much." Um, staff activities. I think the first time, and I can't tell how long, like they planned a Christmas party. Um, and it was kind of small to get going. So, I'm hoping the momentum's going and the collaboration, they ask for common preps. They said we we meet and we talk during that time. So, they use their PLC time, but they also utilize that common prep time to really talk to each other. So,
107where do we go from here? So, naturally, we're still looking at our learn data. That is not something that is um but I believe we've put some things in place. Um, this summer I I went through the sixth grade data for our incoming seventh graders and our current eighth graders who were seventh graders and we were trying to create a multi-ter support system through math lab still and identifying those kids like what support who needs support and what supports do they actually need. So we've identified those um continuing improving our communications through family u Mr. Steinmets and I were kind of going through some of the new state laws. We have a meeting next week with probation to update some of our procedures based on the new law. Um, our goal is to kind of
108decrease our referrals to kind of meet kids where they're at. So, Mr. Pototts, Miss Ziggler, and I have been reading a book called Help for Billy. It's about childhood trauma, how it affects the brain and how just some of the behavior impacts. And so we are going to start providing some professional development to to the teachers on a monthly basis about and a lot of it's how you're just interacting with kids old school ways. You know when I was in school and Mr. Pots was in school not Jacqueline because she's a lot younger than us but those those methods just don't necessarily work anymore. Kids kids have a lot more um that they're dealing with on a personal level. And so that kind of is geared towards like retraining our brains as professionals on how
109to how to work with kids. And this summer I was able to attend this national uh school to watch conference in DC. Met with the state director. We've completed a rubric um for our uh our staff completed a survey rubric um and we've got some really good numbers. So we're going to be applying to be a national school to watch. Um so we're kind of excited about that. So, um, the process will start well we the application is due in October and then they'll do a site visit and so we should hopefully know something early 2026 if we receive that honor. So, >> we're about out of time questions or comments for Tom. >> Can you dig down a little bit more on the pacing issue? >> Sure. >> How that happened and what was
110done about? So um the previous year they had gone through and they had been looking at standards and so what they were looking at was is they were looking at the checkpoints. So the checkpoints we have three checkpoints I learn checkpoints. >> Can you tell me who they is? >> The math teachers. >> Okay. >> Yeah. So there's three checkpoints. Um I learn checkpoints. It's a formative assessment that they give. They'll give one in October. And they basically said, "Hey, here's what's going to be assessed." And so as they worked on that checkpoint, unfortunately what was on the checkpoint, I mean, I'll just be honest with you, it was we dropped the ball. Um I'm not going to, you know, um hold back, you know, where we did it, but we they were working on
111the checkpoints under last school year. So this would have been the 23 24 school year. Yeah. And then um when we came this year and they were looking at standards and aligning the stuff up, it just didn't get aligned up with when we taught it or they spent too much time on a on a specific topic because they're trying to get kids to mastery and then when we get to this point it's like because our checkpoint improve once we figured it out, we improved it. We got to checkpoint two, then we didn't that that issue didn't exist anymore. That answer your question, Jack? we kind of >> so a pacing guide is basically like a road map for the teachers that they say here are the topics that we're going to teach and here's about
112how long that we think it's going to take and so and they they had built in some buffers and um when they when they aligned that pacing guide with what when they when they set the pacing guide they were following the pacing guide with what they they needed to be teaching when the checkpoint came out it was a oh we we didn't we didn't like we just didn't teach the material I mean, it did get taught, don't get me wrong. Like, they did some catchup and they it did get caught taught. Um, and and the pacing guide got corrected. So, this year when those kids take that checkpoint, they'll be on pace to to cover that. >> And the other the other uh point that I would make was our district actually piloted the checkpoints
113this year. It wasn't required by all schools. this year it will be but we participated in the pilot because we wanted to um correct you know issues that might happen. So what Mr. Arthur is describing and what the math teachers are are talking about we intentionally wanted to participate in the pilot so that we could um check and you know it would be a double check for ourselves to see that. So last year was a pilot year for those formative assessments leading up to the I learn summitive assessment. This year every school corporation has to participate in >> so if we found a hole which we did that we could get it fixed before the one the before it goes live. >> So because you did the pilot you had input to the people giving
114the test as far as >> they did. Yeah. So, so the state um sent out a a survey um asking for our input on the test and on the assessment and so that was sent out to the teachers to to provide that feedback. >> Y >> I got a question. >> Yeah. >> On your your your J your goal thing. I think it's pretty neat. Um >> it it's I've not thought of it that way before, >> but that So we're at the bottom of the J. I'm hoping we're at the bottom of the J. >> Say we are. >> Yeah. >> Um that would be last year's seventh and eighth graders. >> Correct. >> So next year we hope we climb u at the middle school. Last year's seventh graders, this incoming eighth graders,
115I mean they'll be part of this improvement, climbing up that J. What about last year's eighth graders? Do you think there's any concern for them going into the the high school uh affecting their goals? And is there any I mean is there any collaboration between you guys and Robert to kind of help prep those eighth graders that may have been somewhat left behind? >> Yeah, I guess Robert and I talk a lot about incoming eighth graders. Um I know Mr. Steinmets talks about like the discipline side of things. He actually um emailed me I want to say March and said, "Hey, what data do you have on the eighth graders coming in?" Um and he got all of our checkpoint data which breaks it down by each student. I had it broken down by each
116student. So they had the results of checkpoint one, checkpoint two, checkpoint three for math and language arts. And then he got the summit of data information that he could kind of assess to see like what supports he needs to put in place for his for the incoming freshman. >> Okay. Yeah, that's good. I I knew there was something in place. I figured I just was curious. >> Y >> and I'll I'll add clarity to that or additional information with with what Mr. Bolting House would have in pos in place with multi-tered systems of support. So, he's got that individual that they'll be focusing in on those kids that are per se most at risk and it's going to be another person over their shoulder working with them during a class period to make sure assignments
117are done or make sure items are turned in. And what Tom also alluded to um and Mrs. Harington does this now uh with Patriot Hour, the scheduling and the juggling at the high school level, they are scheduling kids in for academic support uh as frequently as they need it. When the if a kid's going along doing great at the high school with Patriot Hour and they want to go attend the Spanish club meeting during that time, they're going to go to that Spanish club meeting. But if they're flagged for for a lack of a better way of saying it, that there's a deficiency in English or math, let's say, that they need to make up a quiz or they're they're struggling, then their their math teachers putting a little flag by their name and saying,
118"No, you're coming to my patriot hour to helping to get some extra help." So we they have built in and it's becoming a bridge and tell me if I'm incorrect Tom it's becoming a bridge from the middle school into the high school especially eighth grade going into ninth grade and one thing that we we've also done is um we looked at our preparing for college and careers and we only looked at that number we looked at our class sizes we were able to eliminate one of our classes um into that I think it had a class of 10 so those 10 kids were distributed throughout the other periods and we've added a a reading resource period. Basically, it's not it's not a um the goal is for them to read the content they're reading in
119language arts, but maybe it's in a smaller setting. It's with an individual teacher. Um she actually has training in reading. Um and our language arts and our math teach or not language language arts and social oh my goodness our language arts and special education teachers have been um doing a book study um by Kylen Beers who who is it's it's entitled when kids can't read. I read the old version, they're reading the new version right now, but it basically goes through and it talks about traditional strategies and then it talks about, okay, let's try it this way and then like gives them a model of what it looks like and then and then she kind of paints a picture in the book of what it looks like. And so we're we're trying to work in
120some some remedi like remedi reading remediation and then we've also got some math remediation period that's built into the schedule also. Uh, any other questions or comments for again Tom and his team? >> I think great job see the last several years. >> Thanks. Thanks. I have I gota I got to say I have probably um I've been in four schools in my career and I have probably one of the best teams that I've ever worked for. They're really dedicated to the kids. Um they want to see the kids succeed. Middle school is not always the easiest group to work with sometimes. Um, but it's the most crucial age we feel like. Um, they they they need the most love. They kind of they have that elementary vibe, but they want to be kind of
121mature like high school kids. It's just a but it's a it's a fun age. Um, and we all love them. But yeah. All right. Thank you very much. We'll uh I'll ask Chris if you would mute the system. We'll take a brief recess so the uh individuals at the table can stretch their legs or use the restroom and then that'll give Dr. Robinson time to pull his PowerPoint up and then we'll jump right into that one. >> Thank you, coach. >> All right. How you doing? >> I am >> good. Like you know >> I think I need as much as working hard to Virginia. sort of >> cross [Music] green. that way. So, great to see you. >> You too. Take care. I found out question. >> Yeah, you did. Yeah, initial round interview
122for a job on Tuesday. unfortunately moving slower than I'd like found but it's a ROI counties to figure out how to increase the quality and number of seats in early That was the round. They're not going to do the next round until Okay. >> Another job of academic affairs. But it's a good job. >> I normally would be like, I can't >> that might be unemployment direct. ass. >> Oh, I saw the twin fies. >> Oh, yeah. >> There's lots of little running around and you know my parents try not to stress >> it's still a stressful get that call >> but also kind of like vacation one still have that. Well, I gota go back on vacation. >> Yeah. Yeah. My sister is now mother of five. Well, I am. Yeah, I do want
123to go over I really have a really nephew. I'm sure they probably >> haven't been able to hold a new baby, but she's kind of in that phase where she's eating. It's hard to hard to get the baby's hungry. And I can't provide >> you. >> Well, she did. >> Yeah. Yeah. But probably no dishes did not matter and then turn on the vacuum. >> Really? >> You must have had it must have been a very noisy pool. Yes. Yes. Actually, >> how busy. >> Yeah. Chris. >> Yes. >> I'm gonna turn my mic on and we're start. >> All right. Welcome back. We'll go ahead and start here with Dr. Robinson and his presentation for Patrick'sburg Elementary. >> Well, good morning. >> Morning. >> So, what we're going to talk initially about is data
124and then we're going to move into some other fields that I feel are important to know. >> So, closer. >> Okay. Supposed to be green, right? >> Okay. So, our 25 ELA passing rate proficient and above was 28.8. Uh that is actually a slight increase from last year which was 28.2. Our mathing math pass rate was 32.9 which was a decrease from last year which was 42.3. Um, when we look at state averages, there's many things I want to get into within this data set that I think is going to help clarify some things because there are elements of the way that I learn data is calculated, the way that specifically with free and reduced rates and with sped rates, it's not not always an equal comparison. Even when you're looking at the data, it's
125kind of hard to draw that out. Um, I had sent uh Mr. Klene a report for all of you. Uh, it took me a while while draft so I I couldn't get it directly uh before the meeting, but he does have it now. And I'll talk about a little bit about that study today, but it it's it shows a lot I think that maybe we wouldn't be able to see otherwise. So some considerations regarding our data. each student in our data data set counts as 1.37% of the total tested population. So again the state average for ELA for 25 would have been 41%. So in our case that means we were short in fact nine students. And I I feel that sometimes when we look at that deviation and specifically with smaller schools we could
126think that that is a much wider gap than it in fact is. Um one thing that I'm going to amend because I noticed an error in my calculation. So students approaching proficiency is actually 26% it was 19 students. So that was that was an error in my part on calculation for ELA. So again when we are looking at a data set as a whole we're not very far off from where I want to be which my my goal is always to be at state average or above. that's always where I would like our performance to be. Um, and in some ways that is uh it's a actually a very high bar to set which again I'll I'll get into kind of as we get through this portion here. So, challenges. Um, PS had a total
127of 49 students identified with an IEP, speechonly IEP 504 ELELLL in grades preK through six. Our e-learn uh or iLearn e-learn, our iLearn data doesn't accurately depict that. It's only showing, of course, you know, our testing grades. So, it's not going to show that high of a percent for what we actually have. Nor is it going to show the actual percent of free and reduced students we have, which is also higher. So, we're looking at the school as a total. There's quite a difference there. Uh, so that creates a total for our again IEP, speech only, 504, and ELLL rates of 33.3% which is a third of our building. It's it's a huge need. Um Indiana has a rate of 15% meaning that pees is twice the state average. Uh PES again is a school
128so not as our would would show because that's a slight difference there. Uh we have 75% free and reduced rate approximately which puts us in the top 12% of the state with free and reduced and with sped it puts us in the top eight or top nine% rather when it's sorted and that is actually sorted by by the ILR data. So, some present and future things that we've got going on that I'm very very proud of is we're planning our fourth uh Hunter Ed uh training which has always been very wellreceived, well attended. Um, I feel that especially for Patrick'sburg and I know this is something now we're doing at the middle school too, which I'm extremely proud of for our for our kids that, you know, hunting is for many of them, it's a
129part of their life. Uh we go over things like being cautious with weather, being prepared, which out where we are really. I mean it it can be a life and death situation sadly at times. So we really want to make sure that kids understand how safe they need to be and the c the cautions they need to take precautions. So archery program uh last year it was approved. We have instructors trained. The students love it. Absolutely love the program. This year, we're going to start looking at developing a team so the kids can compete. Uh so again, with our kids, not all of our kids have the ability to compete in an activity. That's a rather rare thing. So, I'm very excited about that. Uh we have our upcoming facility agreement with Boys and Girls
130Club to expand afterare opportunities uh which would also be at a rate for most of our families. It's going to be at a rate that's substantially less than what they would pay for regular use of latch. So I'm I'm very proud of that and happy about that. We have a student council that remains active. Uh we have sustained engagement with 4, Girl Scouts and WRE. One thing I I didn't actually include here and I should have is as well as Head Start. So we have we don't have an active center in Owen County anymore, but I served on the council for Head Start for three years. Um all of which as an officer. Um, we do have a homebased Head Start uh facilitator that at times actually works out of the school to try to
131reach families, especially with younger kids that could qualify for the program. So, again, just something I'm very proud that we're able to do to try to expand services that are far outside of I think what you would probably normally consider what a school does. So this is a a uh a personal topic for me that I I love that we do. So we offer a career exploration program to our kids specifically uh students in third through sixth grade. And what we do is we bring in career speakers. We try once every couple weeks generally to do this, but they come in for an hour and they talk about their careers with the students. And I mean it truly ranges. We have anybody from policemen, firemen. Uh Jack has talked about emergency management. Um we've had
132foresters. I've talked to the kids about it being, you know, a principal, a teacher. Chris talks to them about kind of the emerging world of um social media management meet and media relations. Uh again I I can't even we've had so many people do this nurses foresters and it's all based on what the kids want to do. So at the beginning we ask the kids what are their career interest and they do it. Um I teach a Personally, I I teach something before we begin this every year where we go over what it is to really live in Owen County. So we go over things like average home prices, we talk about saving, we talk about budgeting, we talk about investing, we talk about how even though certain degrees might have uh an appeal that
133often times, say you compare a doctorate with an associates in a heavy sped field, the associates in the heavy sped field may in fact highly outearn the doctorate. degree in many cases. So, it's something I want our kids to really have an understanding of even before they leave elementary school of what their options are because I don't think that necessarily every one of our kids understands from a young age what opportunities are available for them. And just as importantly, I want them to understand that maybe a certain opportunity that they've been thinking about after they hear a speaker, they might be like, "Hey, this is not for me." And that's okay, too. So, I think I think that is equally as powerful of a thing. So, with the investing, I always I use Mike as
134an example with the kids. So um I'll calculate at my age a certain rate of investing and then I'll calculate at their age certain investment investment and of course you know the the finding is essentially I could never catch up with what they would eventually earn investment even in highly smaller amounts if they would start earlier. And that does open the their eyes to, hey, this is something that maybe I should be talking to mom and dad about about opening an account early for me to be doing this. So academic and instructional growth. So our IAS um and I I could say this about every single person at Patrickburg, so I'm just going to kind of deviate real quick and just say it. Every one of our staff members is highly dedicated not not just
135to the profession but to the students themselves. Um our IAS they are a special class of people. Our teachers are a special class of people. Our bus drivers are a special class of people because all of them go way out of their way to do things for kids that it is it far exceeds their their job descriptions. So, RAAS have completed um OG training to support literacy. That's a training that I would say I mean certainly within a couple years ago, three years ago, it would be very very rare to have had NIA trained in OG. So, that's again an area I'm proud of. Mr. Taylor and Mr. Klein have helped me do that. So, it's something I'm I'm thankful to them for. We're awaiting a decision on a greenhouse grant to boost STEM and
136launch a community garden. Right now, we do have a gardening club. The kids are active in it. They love it. I personally love it. It's something that I I personally get involved with. We uh used the um oh the the I wanted to say the community foundation. it's not correct extension office to seek out assistance with getting writing a grant for that and they have been a lovely partner truly. So I've got my fingers crossed on this that it's something that'll work out for us. Uh last year we partnered with McCormix Creek and IU uh in a universityled tutoring program where IU students specifically to uh had to come to for for PES we had to McCormix Creek and more but they would actually work with kids during the school day on ELA and math.
137Uh it was a blessing for me as well because actually I got to mentor these IU students which was very it it was very rewarding for me as a leader. Um initially they had very little interest in rural education and by the time we were at the end they were very much interested in rural education. So it's something I'm I'm proud of there too. So continued support of classroom and schoolwide behavior and attendance initiatives. So we have uh literal classroom initiatives. We have um schoolwide initiatives. We do monthly attendance awards. uh the teachers are aware that well not all staff again not just teachers but anytime that they see a kid doing something that's positive uh they could actually send the kid to my office to meet with me and I'll congratulate them and do
138those kinds of things because it matters to me. I never want to be viewed as a principal that's only handling the the negative aspects of things like with discipline. Uh, I don't want kids to ever view my office as a negative place to be. I want them to view as as a positive environment. So, uh, again, I do have a continued collaboration with Head Start Homebased Services. I am I'm a bit concerned with the state fundings uh state funding with Head Start that they're going to be able to continue to do um what they are or have in the past been able to do. I had a brief conversation with Crystal, our homebased facilitator, and she feels optimistic that at least at her level they're they're going to be able to. But as we all
139know, that's an everchanging role. Um, we have our upcoming partnership with School Smiles Dental Program, which again, I think for our population is a great thing. Uh, considering that it is the the family's choice to, you know, if they want to be involved or not, I I'm thrilled with this and if it opens up additional opportunities for our kids to to seek out treatment, it makes me thrilled. So, we have a very strong PTO that is very engaged. So, things like fundraisers, events, and support for schoolwide. Um, we last year was kind of our centennial because we've celebrated two things. The beginning of the actual building of the structure, but also then operations of the structure of the school. So, again, ongoing guest speaker series, which has been kind of my my baby. uh virtual
140reality which is in huge part due to the work that Miss Samk had put in is something that we were able to put into place in our STEM lab that kids can uh engage with. the the the mission that I always try to look at Patrick'sburg with is I want to support this concept that we are a rural building that I want to focus on how special that makes Patrick'sburg because there are not many schools that operate within the the paradigm that we do anymore. However, at the same time, I do want our kids to understand that there's more out there than Patrick'sburg. In fact, there's more out there than Spencer Owen. There's more out there than Indiana. And virtual reality does give us a way of uh putting the kids in locations that they
141otherwise would never be able to go into to view. Uh the kids love it. It makes me very dizzy, but we'll take what we can get. um hands-on learning through robotics, STEM toolkits, um STEM usage. Okay. So, now I'm going to talk a little bit about this study that I had performed that you'll get a report on later. One thing that throughout my tenure with Patrick'sburg that I I've heard over and over and over again and it's true that you cannot compare um apples and oranges that when you're dealing with a population that we are dealing with, it is not the same thing as dealing with um a school that is uh that has an quote unquote and I and I really don't like saying this ideal demographic. Because to me, Patrickburg is the ideal
142demographic. Our kids are wonderful. The staff's wonderful. Uh the staff is engaged. The kids are engaged. Um and I I can say truly that the staff at Patricksburg Elementary, we we it's not just that we care about our kids, we love our kids. We treat our kids like they're our own. Um, so I decided that I would start a study where, and I laugh because this quickly got out of hand, quicker than I had imagined that it would, that I would look at the free and reduced rates for ELA and math for every school that took iLearn last year. Um, I used a standard deviation of 2%. So I took our 72.6% 6% free and reduced um went down 2% went up 2% searched out schools that had fall that would fall into that range.
143I did the same with our sped rate which was 28.76. So I went down to up to searched out all the schools that I could pull from that range. Well again I thought yeah we're getting closer to apples to apples but we're really not there yet. So what I my my next decision was was I was going to take both of those, look for a common data set, common schools on both list and then combine them and then look at their data. And what I found was extremely telling. Um, I had found a total of six schools that fell into both sets of these categories. So again, to think about how insane this is, you know, we started or 1850 schools. I'm using a deviation of 2% up and down for free and reduced and
144for sped rate and it comes back with six schools is the data set. Uh so already we're in an extremely rare demographic in terms of the the barriers that we have. Um, of that six schools, one of them had data that was confidential, which is they have too few students to publicly show a lot of the the more identifiable information that we would need to to conduct this. So what I did after that is I actually used a methodology to find a zcore which a zcore is a general way that you can average out performance levels and to see if where you are performing is above or below that average. So, uh, the formula for a zcore is the school score minus the average divided by the standard deviation. If ever in your lives you
145need to know that, now you do. So, uh, schoolwide ELA, we were plus 1.06. So the way this works is anytime that you're if you're above uh zero, you're you're doing well. If you hit one, that's saying that you're actually an entire standard deviation above that average set, which is very good. Um if you're negative, of course, not so good. Um schoolwide math, we were plus.6. 6 ELA free and reduced we were 1.01 01 free and reduced we were 61 for math for sped ELA we were 39 and for math sped we were.17 so still above that standard deviation so when we actually finally compare apples to apples we're not underperforming um to to say that I say with a very strong caveat, we're not performing where I feel it's acceptable to perform. Um I
146I don't think that my goal is has been always will be and it's going to continue to be that we perform at the state average is where I want Patrick'sburg to perform. Um, I do not ever want our students or my staff or our community to feel that just because of free and reduced rates or because of high um sped 504 rates that it's okay that we're under that state average. I don't feel that it is and my staff don't feel that it is. But you know for the first time when we actually really do compare what the truth of the data set is it it is much more eyeopening to look at. And by the way one of those schools that was considered in that data set to make this even more rare was
147actually a middle school but of course we have sixth grade so it was comparing our sixth grade data. So when we start out with the that many and we narrow it down to so few, we truly are in a very very unique population. >> Uh we're about out of time. What questions or comments from board or administr or Brady or Matt do you have for Mike? >> You mentioned expansion of the uh Boys and Girls Club. Are you talking numbers? You talking programs or >> what do you mean by that? >> Well, it would actually just be to open up a site at PA a I guess a a satellite site at Patricksburg. So, in our evening, it would replace our latch key program would be the the ideal operation. >> Did they have an
148opportunity to go to the the club itself um before this or is this is this a whole new door that's being open to This is a new door. Uh during the summer, we do have several students go to their their camps and summer events, but no, it's not something that we've bust to or that we've done >> before. They're coming to us. >> And to add to that, this is last school year they uh started with an afterchool program at Gossport, which was very successful. And then their outgoing director, Mr. Baldwin, excuse me, was concerned about their funding sources and would not could not commit to trying to do both Patrick'sburg and Gossport. Uh so now they again came back to the table this spring and uh last well last Thursday evening's meeting is when
149we approved the the lease agreement uh for this program to go forward. So they'll be using they'll be using the building just the same as they would be using Gasport from what approximately 3:00 to 5:00 5:30 each day >> for for Patrick'sburg because of our parent schedules it'll be six so >> just because extra time for parents to commute back from work to the building Y >> you're most welcome. >> Any other questions I can answer? >> Oh, we have Rick. >> Have you been aware of your high ability students and what you've done to to engage them? So Emily Voy is our high ability coordinator. Uh she works a a great deal with those kids, but a lot of the engagement for the high ability students, it's going to be very similar to the
150engagement that that our kids that would be above proficient are going to receive in the classroom. So instead of working on say our during our RTI or our wind time on remediation or skills gathering um they're working on advanced topics. Now uh I am going to have some additional conversations with Emily to see what else we can maybe do that's going to maybe push those kids even further. Um, we don't have a a lot sadly. Um, but I either way when our kids are performing above their expected level, regardless of their high ability or not, I I want to make sure that they have a world of opportunities open to them. >> You're welcome. Thank you, Mike. >> Thank you. >> You will uh exit out of that and we'll have Mrs. Watson come in
151and >> it's good to see you all. She can be done. >> Oh, I can be done in about two minutes. >> Oh, I get to go before lunch. >> 12. >> Okay. Well, if I stand here long enough, I won't have to say anything, will I? >> I better move that so I don't drink it. What am I supposed to hit? >> Oh, I see. >> Right in the middle of the screen. >> This one. Okay. Hello. How is everybody? How is everybody? That's good. How are you? Um, first of all, I got to tell you about our theme this year because you always ask me about that. Our theme for the year is um in our and then I'm going to say blank era. Um, some of you are familiar with Taylor Swift,
152I'm sure. Um, so it kind of goes along that. So each month we'll change what our era is. So for the first month it's in our back to school era. So um we'll have the school decorated in back to school things of course and then each month will change like um and it'll be it'll go along with the lifeline. So it'll be in our respect era and our friendship era and our determination era kind of go along with the lifeline and we'll talk about those kind of things with the kids and try to get them fired up along with the lifeline. Um, so that's what our theme is this year. That's kind of how we get the kids fired up with the school. And we've already had a few kids come in here and there
153and say, "What's the theme going to be? What's going to be?" So that's always the big thing there. Um, our successes this year or this past year, um, our iid scores for grade three were 100%. Which we're very proud of that. We had um a couple of students have to go to um summer school, but they both passed it and we're at 100%. The last three years we've been at we had 100% 95% and then 100% again. So um we have a very strong third grade teacher and we had a very strong primary getting them there. So that's something to be proud of. Um grade two, this past year we had 80% um which is also very um good. I believe that was three kids that we have that still need to pass the I
154learn or not I learn I read. Sorry. Um our well I spelled that wrong so sorry about that. Our iLearn math scores overall were 45% which was above the state average of 42% and above the corporation average of 38%. So that was something to be proud of. Um I think I had something jotted down here to add on to that. Sorry. And um I also wanted to add on there we had 67% in our English language arts in fifth grade. I wanted to add that. Um another success that we were proud of was we implemented a new ambassador program which you saw parts of that when you came and visited um at your last schoolboard meeting at Gosport. It's the same ambassador program, but we just added a new part to that um to enhance
155the already successful program that we have in place and that'll continue this year. Our resource plus room was designed and implementmented with great success. That's where our um special needs students are. We had a very high population of younger students without going into great detail, but um that were a lot of challenges this year, but we had a tremendous success with them. And when I sat down to write down the successes, that was the number one thing that came to my mind. Um even well, it outrank the test scores by a long shot. But um when I thought what was my greatest success this year, I remembered our kindergarten graduation. And when I saw three of our four kindergarten students come across the stage to get their kindergarten diplomas, I would have never imagined that
156the first of the year those students would have made it as far as they did. And that that is a measure of success to me is where those students started and where they ended up. And I can't wait for this year to see where those kids can how far they can make it. Um being in education, this is my 35th year, so a long time. So I've seen a lot of changes. I've seen inclusion. I've seen self-contained. I've seen inclusion. I've seen self-contained and now we're back to inclusion. I've been on both ends of the p uh pendulum. I've seen I've I myself personally I've thought, you know, I don't know if those kids, you know, I they should be here or not, but I've had a strong strong change of heart in the last
157um year, and those kids are definitely where they need to be now. Um, and they they have changed my outlook on how we educate kids. Um, and I can say that with a lot of took a lot of a lot of soulsearching, I guess you could say. Um, Brady knows that, Andy knows that, um, to get there. But they they have really changed my outlook. Um, I've been following a person on I know this kind of going off track, but um following a person on Facebook that um can't think of his name right now, but he's a principal and he talks about finding your passion again. And I mean, this is my 22nd year and I sometimes think, oh, you know, how much longer am I going to do this? And he talks about, you
158know, if it if it's causing stress, it's not it's not what you what you want to do. And and he talks about, you know, you got to find your passion. And I really thought about that this summer and I came back and thought, nope, I this is what I want to do. I'm still here and I'm going to do it with a lot of passion. And it was kind of those kids that was causing a lot of stress there or a lot of times last year, but then I and it's also those kids that make me keep coming back because those are the ones that make me be there every day. So that I know that I went completely off rail there, but that kind of makes me want to be there and makes me
159feel successful and makes me know that I'm in the right place every day. So more successes for Gossport Elementary. Um, our playground was upgraded with new equipment last year. Um the Gaga pit was installed through a community grant through Casey's and RMC. Um our Marine Corps League program was implemented into the school and continues to be um included with students from all grade levels and in surrounding counties. >> Oh, sorry. >> Sorry, sorry, sorry. Um in surrounding counties, that was Morgan County and uh Owen County kids. and that they had kids as young as third grade in that. I think Dale told me there was a student that was eight, so she might have been second grade from Morgan County. Um, we continue to be the hub for the community with our um carnival, our
160parade. The alumni banquet was back at Gosport this year. You might have saw that. Um, some other things I thought of that I should have added onto this was our boys and girls club. Our afterchool uh club served 50 plus students throughout the year. That was very successful. Um we had a lot of students use that and we're going to have that again this year. And of course our class program will continue with that. And of course as good as we are we can always get better. our iLearn scores. Oh, our English language language art scores. Um, what is happening? We only had 31% overall, which this is not acceptable. And we own this. We know we we have to take a long hard look when the teachers get back at what our English language
161arts instruction and figure out what is happening. Um, what's going on in that tier one instruction that's causing that? We did um do the I learn checkpoints. We piloted that this year and we looked at those throughout and I know that all of those teachers in the um third through sixth grade took those very seriously and they were going back and using those checkpoints and giving those over and over because you were allowed to give those again. Um, and we were giving those over and working and something happened. I don't we don't know what. Um, but we are working to try to make that better. Looking at that instruction, looking at the kids that did not pass and trying to figure out why. We're not giving up. We've been in that boat before when I
162first got there. Those that's about where the test scores were. And we're not giving up. and we're gonna keep plugging along trying to make that better. Attendance continues to be an issue across the board and across the state of Indiana. We do all kinds of attendance incentives. We're doing everything we can to try to figure that out. Um we're open to any suggestions anybody has. We give out gift cards. We give out pizza parties. you know, that's, you know, trying to find ways to get the kids to school. But when you're a 9-year-old and mom and dad say you're not going to school for this reason, that's not a whole lot that a 9-year-old can do. So, >> Carol, let me interject real quick because >> looking at your data sheet, I mean, your attendance
163percentages were still 93, 94, 94%. >> So, and some of the other principles hit on this. It's we're not talking about a schoolwide epidemic. Let me say it that way. If you had to put a number on it, how many kiddos are you working with that are really the challenge or the opportunity to work on making their attendance better? A dozen? Five? >> I'd say a dozen. Yeah. Off the top of my head, I can think of probably a dozen. >> I I mean, put it in context. It's not >> It's not a >> We're not running a muk. >> No. But But the ones that are run a muck are a muck and it's the same ones year after year. So it feels like you're beating your head against the wall because you really
164don't get anywhere. But you know, you try and that's about all you can do and it, you know, I sent out the letters about the prosecutor and all of that and it didn't seem to phase them at all. They just whatever. So, um, we have four brand new teachers again this year. Um, we have three in primary, so we need to work closely with those teachers to ensure that they're getting what they need. Our class coach is coming on Monday, next Monday, to work with them already before school even starts um to get them up to par on what what is expected of them at Gosport. Um, so we're running right off the top to get them started. And they, all four of them seem to be extremely excited. I'm hoping that um, it's going
165to be a great year with all of them. Trying to think if there's anything else I need to add. Oh, um I did want to add as of this morning, Andy doesn't even know this yet, we are up to 27 kindergarteners. So, our primary is growing. Yeah, I just got that information on the way here. Sorry, Andy. Um, which is a good problem to have for Gossport because our when you looked at my class sizes, we have a one-two split this year. We haven't had splits in a long, long time, but um we're going to have a one two split and um my primary numbers seem to be larger. We do have a sixth grade that only has 12 in it, but once that sixth grade leaves us, then the numbers seem to be relatively
166larger. The primary numbers seem to be going up, which would be a great problem to keep having out there. Um, but that kindergarten number is really big right now. Um, and that was a confirmed number as of this morning, unless some of them don't end up showing up. So, uh, what could we do? And this went along with what I just said. We have more kids. Um, seek out ways to attract new kids to our corporation or keep the students that we have. And these were just some ideas that I saw other surrounding corporations doing. I'm not sure how they're doing it or what we need to do. I just saw a couple of the surrounding corporations offering free lunches for all of their kids um online schools and I did see this one and
167I don't know how they're doing this but offering free prek and I think we just need to think of some ideas outside of the box especially for our smaller schools. I'm trying everything I can do to keep the kids that I have there. I don't know why they're leaving. And when I do have a child that leaves, I have reached out to the parents and asking them why. I do know two students that are leaving to go to the project school in Bloomington. And I did reach out to that parent and ask her, you know, was it something I did? Was it something one of my teachers did? Why are you leaving? And she said, "No, it is nothing." She had had her students on this list for four years. child's the fourth grader and
168she said that um they finally just got drawled from the lottery at that school and got their students there. So she said it wasn't anything nothing her child is a theater child and they wanted to go to this school and that was the only reason the child is leaving. I was like, okay, you know, it's things like that. And I think we're going to see that with the more of the choice things coming around. But when I do have a student that leaves like that, I do reach out to try to find out what's going on. And every time I do, I don't get any negative. It's just that they wanted to go for work or they wanted to go for some other reason like that. So, you know, but I think we need to
169look at different options. I don't I don't know what the clue what the magic thing is, but if I did, I would sure do it. Um, one thing I would like for us to consider, and I know this isn't the ideal time, but to hire a full-time C counselor for the two small buildings, we have a halftime person that we share between Gosport and Patrick'sburg, and our needs are plentiful. Um, and they're getting worse by the day. Um, we had a lot of serious issues go on last year at Gossport that we needed somebody there and they were either at Patrick'sburg or, you know, wasn't wasn't their day to be there. Um, so I think that's something that we need to really consider, especially when you hear of all the mental health issues going on
170in the world right now and just continue to work with this new staff to ensure that they want to stay at SOCS for more than one year. Um, that's on me. I mean, I own that that I have to make them stay there. Um, I had three new staff members with me this past year and they left. Why did they leave? I asked them why. one wanted to go to another building which was fine. I didn't really expect her to stay at Gosport because she wanted to be at McCormy's Creek from the get-go. So, she went I mean she didn't leave SOCS, she went to McCormack Creek which was fine. Uh the other one went because of personal reasons for her family and you know the other one left because she's sort of asked to
171leave. But um you know it's that's on the principle of the leader of the building to get people to stay. And so I'm working hard to try to make it a positive environment which I think I do. Um, but you know, got to try to get them to stay when we have good people. So, >> any questions? >> Yep. last year. Does that represent last year's third grade? >> Uh, those were last year's. >> Yes. Well, wait a minute. Let me make sure that's correct on both. >> Yes, that's last year's. They have the fewest inclusion. >> Oh yeah. >> Self-contained, but we don't have self-contained anymore. Looks like that's affects it >> for fourth grade. >> Yeah. Highest number. >> Right. >> Correlation between that Well, a 504 also is some of that is
172medical could be. >> Well, I guess I'm asking >> and well and Chad, sorry if I can't. Some of those um IEPs also include speech. So I didn't break it down like if they're speech that was included in that number of IEPs. So I would have to look at and see how many of those kids are actually just only speech kids. >> Oh, I just I mean you said that >> Yeah, it goes back and forth. Back and forth. [Music] I have a child. >> It's a disruption as a always equated to understand that it's the highest >> well I'm not sure where you say what's the highest number >> so like there may be something medical there but you can't equate just this 504 to the disruption in the classroom, not getting support. We
173have special education teachers, right? We have inclusion teachers. They get additional support. We even put in a resource plus teacher that works more with students that need the skills um to be able to function in a classroom before they go into a classroom. And that's the successes that she said she's seen. So again, I this may be it's not necessarily and so that has that can't really correlate that to not getting high ability um because of there's just too many factors that could be involved and what's going on with this group of kids I couldn't just because there's three speech kids or three kids with an IEP I can tell you that a majority of the students with IES are lower grades The majority of students that have significant needs are at the lower grade
174levels. They're not in fourth, fifth, sixth. Occasionally, you'll get one. We had one previous year, not these last year. So, so I can't I that's why I'm loosely trying to answer your question here. There's too many factors that could go into saying that the reason for there not being high ability. And I would not blame Are we in the right place with special? Absolutely. Because if we were to go against the law, I wouldn't be here. >> I wouldn't want >> But it's right for kids, too. >> That's right. I can say research is more prolific now than it was whenever we were doing that 5, 10, 15 years ago. I mean, how how more readily available is the data that we utilize than we did five years ago than we did 10 years ago.
175We had to look stuff up when I started. We didn't have the internet to where it's all in front of our face. We didn't have dashboard to where there it all is. this is what we're held accountable for. Um, so we have all that for us now to where we can look at, okay, what are the real things that are helping these students as we have swung through from 1980 to 2020? Has segregating kids based on ability been a good thing? No, never has. Has it in the short term worked out for some kids? Probably, you know, but that's why we don't have um centers anymore that are I can't even remember what they're called where we would just like asylum or or things like that. Just places where we ship kids because it's better
176to ensure we're providing support. We teach those skills at a young age than to just say we're keeping you away from everybody and let everybody else go. And again, we're legally responsible and obligated to provide the maximum education we can. >> Let me ask a question. Step back a little bit. Remind me, Carol, because um when we we are identifying or assessing the potential of high ability at what grade? >> At third. Okay. >> I'm sorry. No, at second and fifth. >> At second and fifth. Okay. And at kindergarten we start to screen them. >> Okay. >> So I just want those numbers in my mind as well because it's >> and I have >> the adolescent development as kids grow and change. >> So when >> these well this year when I can't say
177your kids I can't say your daughter's name because we're live streaming but when your daughter's a fifth grader. So, we should be assessing that group of fifth graders again to see if they've developed and would meet the criteria to be encouraged to join a high ability program. Right. >> Right. That that group will be assessed again coming here. >> I need to clarify. I'm not saying >> no I'm not saying what I am getting at I guess I'm asking do you need more Yeah, I can see what that's [Music] >> I see it when I hear stories. walk. I hear that. I see it. And do we need to be more support? >> And if there are and I would I would also look at that as as again we're not talking about all behaviors
178or special kids. So how do we go how do we go about teaching behaviors and then teaching maybe that to families who need that? because that's real where it really goes down to got all different types of families, different types of outlook and political views and how they want to raise their kids. At the end of the day, they go home to them. So, we can always try to support as much as we can, but the biggest influence is going to be that kids. So, we have to involve family more um just adding adding more people. It's not going to change. It's going to put more people in what? >> So, if we're talking, >> so if we're talking about, you know, lower teacher to student ratios at all times for disruption or anything like
179that whether it's a counselor or something else then that is always the ideal. Uh if we can do that then you're getting into um fiscal issues at looking is that feasible is that possible or is it more of a environmental culture not just of the school of the community that we need to look to see how we can address this. >> I want to ask is that ongoing year like it wasn't just isolated in fourth grade. I feel like it was >> and a lot of it I think is teacher experience. We're going to get into that more this year as far as >> we talked about that the other night. You can know your subject matter, but if you don't have the classroom management, >> right? And I think that's where we're working closely
180with the class coach right from the get-go to establish those procedures and what's expected of those new teachers. And hopefully, you know, we're gonna >> and as a teacher, I can I can verify I can say >> when you lose control of the class or when there's a constant disruption and you've got to you've got to management that and get it back under control, you've lost your other kids because then they're talking and they're and you've got to bring everybody back. So, you do lose, you know, you do lose instruction time because of disruptions. Can it be? You know, we don't live in a perfect world, so we don't have one-on-one instruction for every student, but it is a concern >> that is overutilization of that particular class of the teacher. Is she at 100%
181utilized and needs more help >> in that particular class? I think it's what he's asking. >> Yeah. And that's that's right. And you you answered the question as far as these are not the same. These being 504s and I understand that but there are more >> right >> yeah what's so are you saying that maybe this cohort >> itself that third grade fourth grade fourth grade fifth grade would need to be looked at to see if they need more support just on a school level >> that yes accurate Yeah. >> Right. And that it's hard to answer that right now, but that's something I can look at. >> I think she's I think Carol's right in that when you don't have >> when when you're constantly getting turnover and getting new teachers in there and
182you're teaching them the culture of the school and how to interact, that's difficult for kids to relearn that. >> Year to year always having a new teacher, not They will have a well seasoned teacher. >> Yeah, I can say that this next year that that group will have a more experienced teacher. It will be a male teacher. So, we'll see if that makes any difference. And I can also say that group of students has been a difficult group all the way through. So, >> it's about all I can say >> systemically. I wonder if uh that's the case across the corporation as that would be the class that the 201920 school year was their prek year or >> you know that those years were their formative years in school. U we hate to blame everything
183on co >> but when you look at their very formative years of elementary school that class that >> that they missed >> that was their first few years >> and um and so there may be supports that we are identifying now that we realize oh there are some things that they might have missed >> and some socialization and different things >> and that can go into your first grade kindergarten now too because they're developing years they were isolated in their first year of their life or first and second. So we're seeing that more also within those grade levels. >> The kids that are in kindergarten this year and prek this year were our COVID babies. So it'll be interesting to see what what we see now. >> Uh any other questions for Carol comments? >>
184Thank you. >> Thanks very much. Thank you. >> You You were less nervous this year, Carol. >> I don't know why I get nervous around. >> I don't know either. I'm just saying. >> All right. Uh we will >> I do have the high ability breakdown by schools this year. If anybody wants this, like you guys can keep it, make a copy of it if you want. >> For live streaming purposes, just so this is recorded, we will take a recess for lunch until about 12:30 and then we will turn this back on. Okay, I'm green. Thank you. >> I am green and my mic is green. >> We've had some battery issues. All right, we're gonna reconvene our uh work session for the data retreat for the board. It is 12:35 and we'll start
185the afternoon session with Spencer Elementary. >> All right. as well. Um, so yeah, I'm just going to kind of start off by saying, you know, you listened to me talk last year. You're going to hear some similarities. Um, some of the things that we're working on aren't a one-year deal. So, you know, we're going to we're going to continue to to work on some of the processes in our building. Do you see me scroll down? Is this kind of how I um So, okay. So, last year's highlights, some things that we did within the building. Um, if you remember from last year, uh, I talked to you about, um, following the Marzano's high reliability schools model. So, level one in that is your school culture. I think that's something we're always working on, but we've
186got a pretty good school culture going. One of the things that I really wanted to work on at Spencer Elementary was our effective teaching, which is that next level, level two. Level three is that u reliable and viable curriculum, which is something I working in in tandem with Mr. Taylor on. So I can really affect that effect of teaching in the building. And so there's some different things that we can do. We sent a survey out to the staff and uh one of the low points on that was getting in and watching each other teach and collaborating in that way. And so a couple of things that we did last year that I think went really well for us. One was we opted into the literacy cadre uh that the state has offered and we've
187got our literacy coach. She's always been in a um an RTI, a response to intervention kind of role, but never really sitting down and coaching teachers one-on-one. So, we really dove into that last year. And I think you'll see in your hot sheet. She met with all 15 K to3 teachers multiple times, multiple cycles last year. And she really dug in with their data. What what's a problem group that you've got? What's uh you taught this lesson, it didn't go so well. What can we change? So really digging down the boots on the ground level. Um and and that was a real success for us last year. Another thing I'm going to talk to you a little bit more about today, our instructional rounds. We jumped in as an administrator. It's something I've wanted to
188do for several years giving that survey. I felt like we were at a great spot last year, put together a leadership team and we got into each other's classrooms and watched each other teach. We watched effective teaching happening and brought it back to other rooms. We're spreading it throughout the building. So that was great. Um, I read we increased our passing percentage. That was a goal for us. That was a target being a part of that literacy cadre. I think we did do that. Our dibbles were also continuing to increase that growth. I'll talk to you a little bit more about that. And our iLearn, we did meet some grade level goals. So, I was I was happy with that. Um, the success in coaching, this one, I just kind of want to throw that
189out there. I sent a survey out to staff at the end of the year was just like how how did it go for you this year coaching with our literacy coach. Um and of the 15 that I sent out by the end of the year I got eight responses in time for for a presentation that I had and 88% of them said extremely helpful changed the way I do things. The one person that didn't say that she said it takes a lot of time. So to me I'm kind of like you know what we're at 100% here because it does take time. So I wasn't kind of counting that one. Um, so again, teachers loved working with our our literacy coach and and we want to continue that even beyond this year in the cadre.
190I think it's been a great thing for Spencer Elementary. Um, I know I've mentioned it before, in the last five years, I've hired most of my staff and so over 75% of them are my hires and that's been in the last, you know, five to 10 years. So, um, people who are new to Spencer Owen, new to Spencer Elementary, we're still fairly young, still still learning some things. And, um, so we've got to keep building that effective teaching in the building. Another thing with the instructional rounds, um, what we did was I I put together a leadership team, a primary teacher, an intermediate teacher, and my literacy coach, myself. Uh, we sent out some surveys to the staff. What are some things you feel like you need help with? What are some things you want
191to see? Would you be willing to let people come into your classroom and watch you teach? And then we put together um those rounds. Groups of teachers went into various classrooms in November and April. Um again we pulled the teachers on on how well they thought it worked at the end of the year. One of the things I wanted to know from them was you know what strategies did you see that you you brought back to your classroom that you felt helped you? And because my again my goal is to spread that effective teaching throughout the building and um you know a lot of the teachers small group differentiated instruction, whole group instruction engagement and classroom management were like three biggies that the teachers took back. Uh and that was some of the things that
192I wanted them to see based on the things that I see. And so I was happy that they did that. We're going to do that again this year. Uh but we're going to refine it a little bit more. Um I read again we had 3% increase from the year previous went from 88% to 91%. We tested 83 students and by the end of the summer only seven um did not pass and so we're we're working with with those seven but um felt like that was a good spot to be in. Uh our spring administration also saw an 6% increase in March when we gave it last year before last we were at 80% and this year we were at 86 with that cohort. So, um, that was great. Second grade, we had a 20 cent
193a 20% increase from the year previous. U, now, this year was a little different with second grade. We were allowed to give it in March and May. So, in March, we were still sitting at 50/50, which was comparable to the year previous, but when we retested in May, that jumped us up to 70%. So, 70% of our second graders going into third grade this year have passed I read. Um, which puts us in a really good spot to target the that 30% that didn't. So, um, I'm excited about that. second grade teachers were proud of themselves. So, uh, Dibbles. So, Dibbles is our early reading assessment that we give and you know, paying attention to the state, right? Science of reading and reading is huge at the at the elementary level. And, um, so I've
194got majority of my K to2 staff have participated in the 80 hours of additional reading instruction. Myself included. I did that this summer. Got three staff members who have added it to their lensure already. So our our building is taking that reading that science of reading initiative seriously and I think it shows in our early reading skills. Um so I mean we've all of this data here to the lefth hand side. I mean you've got it in front of you, you can read it. But I mean bottom line is is our students start out with a high percentage of well below at the beginning of the year and we're moving them out of that well below category. And um and not just moving them one level, we're moving them into that above benchmark. So into
195the blue, like well above where they should be. My first grade, if you look at first grade, I mean they are killing it. Um they went they're my above benchmark kids, we started out with 26% of our kids last year were sitting above benchmark and by the end of the year we're 50 56% of our first graders. So over half of our six our first graders, sorry, were above benchmark by the end of the year. So going into second grade in a great spot for that summer slide, you know, we'll we'll catch some of them up. Um second grade, we didn't see as much growth with second grade and I will tell you and you'll see it probably in March and May. Uh this is an interesting group of kids. It's a interesting cohort of
196kids. There's 57 of them which is small for me. Normally I'm sitting between the 65 75 in a grade level. So it's a small group of kids and of that 57 about 20% of them are special education which is high and and of that 20% there's some high need in that special education resource plus students going into that resource classroom. So um in order to to meet that 90% that we're at this year we're talking six kids and I can think of six right now that are high need special education students. So, we're again, we're going to strive for it, but it's going to be an uphill battle this year with with that group of of of students um to get them where we want them at the end of of their third grade year
197with iAre. Um but again, I feel like overall K to2, you know, we're showing more and more growth in these smaller areas every year. We're chipping away at it. So, I'm feeling good about that and feeling great about what we're doing in our primary. Um, flipping the script to iLearn, there's a disconnect for sure. Um, iLearn, our goal every year has been to increase those individual grade levels by 5%. So, we did have some small successes as a school. Our English language arts went from 30% to 32% proficient. A little bit of growth. Um, nothing that I'm I'm writing home about, but um, fourth grade did had a huge increase in their ELA from 29 to 43%. So, that was great. sixth grade didn't meet their goal but did have a 3% increase. Um with
198math as a school again we increased 3% from 39 to 42. Um fourth grade increased from 46 to 58 a huge increase. And sixth grade also had um an 8% increase which was more than what that goal was. Looking at our I learn scores, our ELA, we are about 9% as a school below the state average. So, I'm not real happy with that. Um, we've got some work to do uh to figure out where that where that disconnect is in in our our i readad preparation, what we're doing there versus iLearn and they're different assessments and they they require different things. Uh, with math, we're we're right around the 40% state average. So, I mean, again, 40% isn't anything to write home about, but we're hanging in there with the state. So, um, we're going
199to keep working working on that. Um, what's the plan for next year? Next year, again, we're going to continue striving for that 5%. I thought it was interesting looking at our checkpoint data. So, with our English language arts checkpoint data, we were between 60 and 70% or higher on those checkpoints. Um but then at our end of year summitive assessment we were in like 30% as a grade school was like what where's the disconnect? Why can we achieve in English language arts on these checkpoints but for some reason that end of year summit of assessment we just plummeted. Math was pretty comparable. Math was pretty was telling like I mean we were we were right around 50% um in most of those checkpoints and then we were as a school about 42%. So, we were
200closer. It wasn't such a a discrepancy. So, we're going to take a look at that and see why we think that is. And then I think just we want to continue to implement refine our curriculum maps in our local assessments. Uh I think our addition of this year is going to be a great addition um to the classrooms for that that strategic help um for those skills. I read and dibbles. Again, we're going to continue with the cadre. We're going to continue coaching. Uh we're going to continue tracking early reading skills. And then with our effective teaching, we're going to continue to target that. Um I I talked about those instructional rounds. I want us this year to create an instructional model. So within um the high reliability schools model, there are 43 elements of
201effective teaching. They're researchbased. So I want to sit down with the teachers and take a look at those and identify as a school what are we what are we doing? What should we be doing? What do we want to focus on? um and then target those as a school. And then when we go in to do those instructional rounds, last year the instructional rounds we were just kind of dipping our toe in. We're just going to get in each other's classrooms. We're going to check things out. We're going to see what we can see and hopefully pull out some good stuff to take back. This year, what I want to do is target specific things. I want us as a school to be working on something specific in all of our classrooms. That's going to
202take us up a level, and then we're going to go in and watch each other do it and then go back to our classrooms and practice it. and so and and monitor that that progress. So, we're just going to take we're going to kick it up a notch really um to target that effective teaching even better and and track our progress. So, um that's it. Short and sweet. What questions do you have for me? I mean, I can tell you another thing that we um talked about at the end of last year, Erin and I, we looked at discipline um and as a school, we had a committee kind of come together and we talked about what we were going to do with um just in terms of tracking behavior and and refining that throughout
203the building. Uh, I think that's probably something my guess is you've heard in some other meetings today. Kids are coming in with more and more behaviors and how do we target those and how do we help those? Um, so we we met last year and and and kind of came up with a system for for doing that, for tracking that. Um, >> yeah, I think I think we we spend we spend a lot of time academics and we should teaching teachers how to how to teach. We don't spend as much time on things like classroom management, behavioral modification, things like that. And and that's not something that that you've that's not a new thing. Um and so we are trying to as as we look at discipline and as we look at kids that have
204repeated offenses, what are we doing? Trying in almost more of a more of a model like we do with academics because we have a lot of tiers of academic support. And so we're trying to bring that same mindset into a child that has repeated behaviors. What are we doing when we recognize that and what are we doing differently in the classroom with our staff uh to try to help that child be successful and the teacher? And so that's some those are conversations that we're trying to shift a little bit um instead of continuing well we're getting you again we're getting you again. What are we doing differently? How are we trying to approach that to be able to to help that success? >> Yeah. So that'll be another thing that we share out on that
205first teacher day and we work to to refine throughout the year. Um you may or may not have have heard or seen but we did I'm cracking down on attendance. um with some of our kids. And so I've in my 10 years of being a principal, I do not believe that I have denied very many children admittance to Spencer Elementary, but I did this year um before attendance. If you're missing more than 10 days and you're a transfer student into Spencer Elementary and it's not your home school, we're taking a hard look at you and we're we're sending you notifications and and reminders of, hey, you need to you need to fix this. Um, so if you do hear some conversation about that, um, we did have some some students who were well over those
206days and, um, and did not get to come. Kind of makes me fily because I love the children. It's not their fault. Um, but I also have to hold a standard to my building and um, that was it. So >> there were some of those. >> There were handful. >> Yes. Yes. I had one outside the corporation and u we're we're gonna maybe reexamine that one, but um other than that, no, they're all within the corporation. So, it's basically just go to McCormix Creek, go to Gosport, go to Patrick'sburg, get on the bus, get to school on time. >> The bus thing is it's kind of interesting because when you do have those and you have the ability to have someone ride a bus, you It's It's interesting how sometimes reluctant they might be. It's
207like sometimes it's just kind of force. Look, you you can't get your kid to school. >> Yeah. >> We're offering a bus to you to do that. >> Yeah. Yeah. I mean, our attendance rate, I mean, we're sitting around, we're comparable to others, 93% 94% as a school and you can see it in your sheet. Um, but again, we want to get that we want to get that up >> and we want kids to be at school. So, >> when you and and I do think attendance wise, you overall it's it's it's fairly solid. There's an interesting dynamic as as you watch. And it's and it's not it makes sense to me when you look at your kindergarten percentage. It's lower than your upper grade percentage because it's kind of the the first moment that
208a parent is entering into accountability with their kid coming to school. And so that's it's still in the 90s, but it's lower. When you look at the upper grade levels, it's it's consistently higher because then they've been conditioned to to be there. And so, um, but, uh, but yeah, there is a little bit of a a learning curve for a parent as they're coming in because they've had the ability to when your child is very young, go do whatever we want to do. And and then it's becoming more like, oh, this is your job. It's your job. Be there every day. And so, you'll see a couple of percentages difference between between those lower and higher grade levels. Have you found any ways to um have kids use the STEM room a little bit more
209in a scheduled way? >> Um so right now our our STEM coordinator uh he puts together a a signup sheet and the expectation is the teachers are going to utilize that room at the very least one week out of the school year. And whether that's you know I'm adding up my days or I use it for a solid week. Um that is something I would like us to increase a little bit more. We've brought him into staff meetings to share what all things are available in that STEM lab and what kinds of things you can do with them. Um teachers have shared with each other in those meetings too, like here's how I used it. Um we we see use of that lab I think more in our intermediate grades. One, it's on that side
210of the building. Um, and two, it's just when when you look at the way we do our curriculum, we're very math and reading heavy in the primary and then more science and social studies comes into play in a in a blocked way, a blocked out scheduled time in their day um, as they go into the intermediate. Whereas in the primary, they got to integrate it a little more. So, it's in that reading block, it's integrated into the math block, that kind of thing. So, >> no, that's definitely something we should do. >> One thing that's relatively new to is we're trying to have some trying to open up some conversations. Um I just talked with uh Stefan Welsh who is uh has a new position with ROI with ready initiatives and his part of his
211role is with kind of career awareness within ready initiatives and he um he's going to try to pull in our STEM rep with some conversations for them to have a little bit more threaded like how does this work on an elementary level and then where are we trying to go as kids get older and so which which makes sense uh and so that was just last week that we talked about that. So some things like that I think are happening too that will help maybe make that make that line maybe a little more effective. So when you talk about your STEM coordinator, is that a teacher in the building? >> Okay. >> Yeah, it's just a stipen position. >> I would ask about the um the staff that was injured that eight. Was that primarily
212at the beginning of the year? Is that all special ed? Um, I'd have to look to double check, but I'd say it was probably more threaded throughout the year. And yes, more special education. I'd say going back if I looked at that, that was a majority of those eight were probably in our resource room. >> But it wasn't people. >> No, eight reports. Sorry, maybe I shouldn't have said number of stat well reported. Yeah, wasn't eight different people. >> Any of those that turned into comp cases? Maybe one or two time or two. >> And if it was, it was a day. >> Yeah. Wasn't time off really. More uh just going and getting it checked out and then kind of getting cleared to come back in a day or so later. >> I think
213there was I think there was one that she there was a child sitting with her. She went like that bumped her nose. I think she may have been out for a day. as a precaution. >> So, >> any other any other questions or comments for Britney or Aaron? >> Yeah. >> Doing great. >> All right. I guess no news is good news. >> Thank you very much. >> I know. I got the after lunch crowd is what I got. The bellies are full. >> We're saving them for >> Gazelle. >> Yeah. Get it. >> Yeah. >> Great idea. There's still people. >> Oh, yeah. We don't have This is Exactly. 1995. I graduated. >> Yeah. Yep. I just bought it two years ago. I see. >> Yeah. So, >> I'm like I'm like, you know,
21430 miles per gallon, have we really progressed that much? Because I mean the new ones probably get 42, but 30 years ago we were still getting 30. >> So >> we took Beach and >> that's impressive. >> That's really impressive. >> That's a lot of miles. It didn't have a big tank on it. >> Yeah, >> I was impressed with that diesel box truck we used yesterday to go get the textbooks. 10 and a half gallons in and back to Bloomington. 10 and a half gallons. That was it. >> A 30 foot box truck. That's pretty good. And probably, you know, 5,000 pounds of books in it or more. >> It was 8,500 lb. >> 8,500 lb. We only used 10 and a half gallons >> of diesel. That was it to get there and
215get back well back to >> Bloomington. >> We have those coordinators at building and they're doing those types of things at every elementary school. Uh Matt, thank you for coming in. We'll go ahead and begin and uh we've got to 1:30ish and we'll uh let you present and then ask questions along the way or at the end. So, >> very good. Um you know, this time we sat around this table last year, we were talking about our ELA scores being up and being good. So, then we focused on math and now it's flip-flopped. It's a one of those balancing acts, you know, um trying to figure out how much to push this area and then not neglect another. So, our ELA scores um were not exactly where we wanted to be. Um we were above
216the state in um all categories in except one in ELA. Um so, we were happy with being above the state, especially with the test that's developmentally inappropriate. It's very difficult to get a passing score on these assessments and especially when they're having to do them on a Chromebook. I know as an older individual I would not want to compare and contrast multiple articles on a on a screen, but that's the reality that we're faced with. So, um I was not super excited about our ELA scores, but I was glad to see that we at least were above state average in all but one grade level. Our math, we had some very good strong math scores. Um, one particular grade was over 71%. That's pretty much unheard of to be in the 70s. So, we were
217very excited about that. Um, all but one grade level exceeded or greatly exceeded the state average and that particular grade level had 16 students with an IEP and 504s. So I think that was a challenge because it's hard for a student with uh you know general abilities just a gened student it's hard for them to pass it and then if you have a learning disability it just makes that all much harder. And the reason why this grade level and you can look at your sheet why it has 16 um special ed kids is because at one point we housed all the special ed severe profound moderate students in our building. That's no longer the case. Mr. Tragasser, as you know, has worked on very hard on getting each school to have their own resource plus
218room. And so, we grandfathered those kids in. So, we have that grade level took a hit for that. And and that's okay because we we love our all of our kids and we want them to be as successful as they can. And and a lot of them did show growth, but and not every kid, as Mr. Traguser could attest to would take the um iLearn assessment, but we are pushing them as much as we can because we want in the elementary level, you don't want to say a kid's not on a graduation pathway. We don't want to make that determination. I mean, you can undo it, but we want to try and and you know, push them towards a diploma. So, um that's our scores in a nutshell. We were very very happy with our
219math and I I think that's partially due to some math interventions that took place. Um I think it's due to some uh strategic looking at the curriculum maps, looking at the power standards and focusing on those and pushing the kids to think beyond just rope memorization because they're going to have to be able to explain their answers on these tests. They're going to have to do multiple steps. And so I feel like our teachers have done a great job on that. And I think with the new curriculum on the ELA that we just adopted and and purchased, I think we it's going to increase the assessments that, you know, the rigor and maybe help us a little bit with the iLearn scores in that regard. So, um, I kind of covered all my slides in
220one, those two slides together, but we definitely feel like we have a lot to celebrate, even though there was a little dip in the ELA. Um, our I read scores were phenomenal. Um, third grade and second grade. I think I only have five students in next year, this year, this school year, excuse me, that will need to take it as a third grader. So we had um and you can see that there in the on my hot sheet. Um we had u 92% of our kids in second grade pass I read. So the state average I'm struggling with that. If anybody remembers in this room I want to say it's in second grade it's probably 47 50ish 48%. So for us to have 92 that attests to what our primary teachers are doing. So, I
221know the state is always talking about early literacy. We've been doing early literacy appropriately for years at McCormix Creek OG stuff. We've been doing that for years. So, our kids have always gotten phonics instruction. So, I'm very happy with that. And the third grade, too. Um, we were at 98% state average was 82.5. So, and those don't correlate to iLearn. It's a complete different animal. We I talked about that last year when I was here. Um, I read is more of a an appropriate test. It's it's doable. It's not reading three different stories and comparing them and and you know it doesn't have the writing component on there. It's solely test reading. So, um, I'm happy with those scores. My one big concern that I have and and we probably all have it uh, principles
222across the state and mo most of us across the state is student attendance. and we've we narrowed it down. I think I've got there. We improved it by almost 2%. And that's it. So, I did not come anywhere near meeting my goal of reducing chronic absenteeism. We put a little dent in it. But I mean, how you've got how do you how do you combat that? You know, I mean, we've I've we've purchased alarm clocks. We've had parent meetings. We've called parents. um it's just a struggle to get kids to school on time and in the classroom. So, that's something that we're just going to continue to plug away at and and keep working on it. And if we get 2% every year before I retire, it's going to look good. So, but at least
223it was grow growth. I will say our staff attendance is above the state average. Um you can look this up if you want. The average teacher attendance in the state of Indiana is 94%. So, we're 2.7% better than that. So, even with all the illnesses and winter flu and bugs and stuff, we have we have a great attendance rate on our our teaching staff, I feel. So, um I don't want them there if they're sick because then our student attendance goes down. So, I feel like our teachers do not take advantage of that and they work really hard to be there each and every day. I think I had two teachers that almost had nearly perfect attendance for multiple years if they didn't have it. So and and it does correlate to the success in
224the classroom having a qualified teacher in there. You can see that in their you know their checkpoints and their uh summit of I learn scores. So our next step is to try to work on that stamina for th that test try to build that. We're going to work on some professional development with Jim McMillan our class coach. You may have heard of him. We're going to focus on that and say, can you help us dissect the issue here? Why what am I missing on the ELA? Why are we not even doing better like we were with the math? So, he's going to help me with that this year. And then we're going to really use those I learn and I read data to kind of continue to focus our instruction and and dig at those
225uh high impact standards and make sure that we're covering those and make sure that the kids have enough exposure. It's kind of like the the Goldilocks and the three bears. Not too much, you know, uh but just enough to make sure that they, you know, feel comfortable, but they don't have test apathy. uh they need the endurance but they don't you know if I don't want kids to just test you know a test only tests what a test I think Dr. Nef we all know Dr. He always said that he goes a test only test what a test test and so it gives us one data point. So I think we need to teach kids you know if you have a a cancer if you have cancer and you just keep going to the doctor
226and you just keep testing it and testing it it's still coming back cancer. So I don't like the fact that we have to test test test and spend days on it. Um but I do like the fact that we have the the checkpoints has kind of reduced some of the testing upper grades because we don't have to have NWA anymore. So I feel like we're not testing quite as badly in that realm. It's always nice when you get to remove something. So to be able to remove that program, I just hope that the state does take action on reducing the iLearn summitive like they keep saying they're going to do. So that would be my hope. So we're not spending hours and days and weeks on an assessment. You can't get better if all you're
227doing is testing it. Um we're going to continue to work on that. I I misspoke earlier. Our attendance was up 1.14% from last year. So, it's even worse than what I just stated. So, I apologize for that, but it's it's a little better, but not not what we want it to be. This one was a good question, and I don't have the answers to it. What could we be doing differently? Andy asked us that. And so, I'm trying to think outside the box because doing the status quo is not necessarily working in all areas. So, I'm like, what can we do? And as a public school, we've never been one to brag about ourselves. I think that's something that and and Chris does a great job with that, but I'm not always great about informing
228maybe her of some of the success stories. You know, if we could get some parent permission to share how their child has had success at our school. I mean, I think I have around 80 transfers into our building. So, we have a lot of parents that love McCormix Creek, but I think we could even have more. I would my goal would be to have three sections of every grade level and just keep getting our building and that would be pretty much capacity. Right now we only have two grade levels with three three sections and we're we're knocking on the door of three in kindergarten and three in fifth grade right now. So it's it's a good problem to have. I think that's due to the um housing additions. I think what do we have Dina?
229We have one across the school. We have one to the to the west with the Bolts subdivision going in. And then we have um um Cook, but that would be SCES. But we have um >> Cooper's construction over there by the golf course, and we're getting a lot of kids from there. So that's a good problem to have because we all know our budget is based on enrollment. So, and we can provide our kids with more supports if we have that enrollment up. Um, so I'd like to think and this is just a discussion that we can have and the teachers and I and the parents. How can we brand our school? How can we this school is known for historically and many of you probably heard this McCorm Creek is known for our SPE
230special education. I've had parents drive many miles to come to our school out of Monroe County because of our special education offerings and the success we've had with those kids. But that's not enough. We need to brand for the general education student as well. So I would like to think of that and you know is that projectbased learning that we focus on that in my building or is it a STEM building or outdoor education? What is it? And that doesn't mean you focus solely on it but you're known for that. So, I would like to think think about that some this year and have some tough conversation, well, not tough conversations, but just have some open conversations with people about what do we want our school to look like and how can we appeal to
231kids that may not even be in this county. Um, I would like to look at some type of recovery system for our students that are absent without the use of retention. I think retention has its place in the very early earliest ages in the you know of our population but there's definitely a time and place for it but not just based on uh attendance and so I would like it looking at that somehow that we could do some you know in missed instruction and I don't know how that would play a part. We're kind of doing a little bit with that with our uh collaboration with IU. We're doing that through the tutoring program that we have. Uh Daryl White has been instrumental in that getting that set up and that's going to expand to
232all four elementaryaries this year. They're going to be sending us and that's done during the school day. So, as long as the students there, they're getting the instruction, but they like to be there on those days because it's all about relationships. So, they get used to this IU tutor coming in. And it's pretty cool to see a sixth grade boy or girl say, "My tutor's not going to make it today. They're absent. I was really hoping to work with them. So, we do that during our library time because the kids go to library twice a week. So, it's embedded in there. So, just little things like that. Maybe, you know, if we can look at replicating that in some form or fashion to help with the absenteeism. Um, and then I would like kind of
233like the middle school Tom Arthur did create some type of jump start because you know a lot of people gripe about that we start so early in August which I'm not a big fan of starting early in August either but when your assessments come quickly your checkpoints and that it's nice to frontload that calendar and get as many instructional hours in as you can. So I could see a benefit to what Mr. Arthur's doing at the middle school and I would like to kind of look at that. The question would be how are you going to get the kids there if they're the kids, you know, the kids that need it the most may not be the ones that attend. So then now you're looking at a host of issues with transportation, you know, buy
234in from from the families and those kind of things, but I would like to look at something in that model. It's 15 minutes. I had 20. So questions or I've got a question. >> Yes. >> Where are you on building utilization? How much >> building utilization? That's a great question. Um, if you look at some of the doc old documentation when the school was built, it says we can hold 750. There's no way Mrs. Stickles could attest to that. You can't get 750 kids in my building. Um, but we definitely could get three of every grade level and and be comfortable with that. So out of the the rooms that you have in the building, how many of them are >> um all but one is being utilized in some form or fashion. One's a
235storage uh room which we have to have. We had them in locker rooms and stuff everywhere. And so we consolidated to one's a storage room. Some of the extras are used for an inclusion teacher. And when we say inclusion, we all know that I'm talking about special ed. Um, so those teachers will pull kids in there and work in their room. Um, some of those are have two sped teachers in it and so they'll pull kids in. Um, one's latch key, one's a STEM room. Um, they're utilized, but are they utilized if we needed them to be for classrooms? No. We could we could pull some of those programs out of there. >> You could free up two or three rooms. Yeah, we could free up easily probably six or seven rooms if we needed
236to. So, we have the capacity and and I it's the enrollment's changing. The secretaries were on the phone when I left and so it's it's changing. I feel like we're going to be pretty similar as of now to what we were last year around 392. I think we're going to be pretty close with that. So, I worry a little bit about prek because I know prek uh reimbursement has been dropped from the on my way prek programming. A little worried to see what that's going to do to our families that were benefiting from that. But hopefully our enrollment it won't change and that the families can find a way to make that payment without all that assistant. I hate that for them. But um we're definitely not at capacity. But when you see us in
237the gym, the gym, we can't pull the bleachers all the way. It was a faux paw in the in the building. You can't pull the bleachers all the way out. It crosses the if you're having a ball game or anything. You can't it. So you look at the bleachers when we're in it, it's pretty full. But that's not a true representative. But if we ever had a basketball game, if we ever get back to the old athletic days, we wouldn't be able to have the whole student body and staff and guest in there because it you can't pull the bleachers all the way out. So the architect screwed up or something on the court. >> Yep. It impedes on the court. Absolutely. which is weird how that got missed, but I would think a little
238mathematic calculation would have worked. But >> So, have you noticed an improvement in staff attendance in the last couple years? >> It went up drastically. The year before we were in the 60s, but Mrs. Stickles retired. No, >> no, that's a good one, Jack. >> No, I was >> She was there. >> I was there. It's too hard to do and I do sub plans and then they not have a sub for me. So, Yep. >> She showed up. >> I think the the problems you shared, everybody shared them right before you got here. >> I figured you were probably hearing this four times or five already. One thing that keeps coming up that I I really want to look at is uh how do we get the word out >> of what we've got
239going on here >> because I know we put up some billboards and some social media stuff but it doesn't seem like the message >> right >> catching the traction. >> I know and I think that's part of the branding and thinking not like a businessman. I mean you know we don't think of like that like that as principles. We weren't trained that way. We didn't get into this to make tons of money or any of that. So, we have to start marketing ourselves a little better at the elementary. I think the high school does a pretty good job of getting the word out about the many different things they're doing at the high school. And I I I look at some other schools neighboring us, and I'm very very impressed with how our high school
240is portrayed and the offerings that it has for our small community. Just in general, I think there's there's just a feeling of inferiority >> around >> outside of this county. >> Do you think that's due to size or >> I I don't know what it is. It's it's not Monroe County. Yeah. >> It's not as good, right? You know, and I I think we need to share the word pro. >> I would 100% agree with that. I'm very impressed with our school system, the family feel, um our values, um how kids are respected, how the staff comes together, and it's I always I don't say team in my building. I know a lot of people love to say team, I call it a family. Dina can attest to that. We are a family, and we
241have come through some really, really terrible sad things last year. But it just proved that our hearts are in the right place when we come together and help each other whether it be personal life, you know, professional life. Our building is is is pro, you know, I like to say it's unique, but I think a lot of our buildings in this corporation would do the same and they're in it for the right reason. And I think people need to see how much the staff cares about its community and about its constituents, it students. >> I think that's part of the work is our uh ability provide a wholesome education. >> Yes. >> And >> yeah, >> you can't get that everywhere. >> No, you can't. We work really hard at balancing things. You know, some
242people say, well, we have one to one computers. Yes, we do. And we have long discussions about how much screen time should a child have. But yet, we are in 2025. They need to be able to use some of this programming. So, again, it's the it's the balancing act. But I think we do a great job of balancing all of that and and you know caring about the the needs of our students. >> We were going to tell you when you come in that to save the best for last done you go ahead and go home. >> We decide not to teach the library. >> That's funny. We like to have a good time. That's what makes our district, I think, unique is we have most of us have a good sense of humor and
243we just really enjoy coming to work every day. It's it's a fun place to be. >> You don't joke with people you don't like. You just >> Yeah, that's true. That's true. >> Trying to prove to me that >> Very good. >> Everybody gets along. We can joke around a little bit. >> You've got a little bit of time. I'll ask this here because got me thinking when you said not as you said, basketball teams, >> right? >> And what could we be doing different? This is just a thought out loud, I guess. But what would you think about an opportunity to each school having their teams? >> I would love that, but I also don't want to step on the toes of the Junior Patriot basketball league because we have a great relationship with
244them. And I'm not super into athletics as most of you might know, but at the same time, I would love it because you got that community feel, your kids playing together, going to the same school, but again, like I said, the Junior Patriot basketball league has been great to our school and they've supported us through I so I wouldn't want to step on their toes and maybe they could still co maybe we could coexist. I don't know how that would >> maybe but taking that off the table, the junior basketball, >> right? I mean things like our capacity to be able to absorb it teachers would be volunteer sponsorship but but not only basketball I'm thinking what made me think of this is the baseball complex >> is underwater for so long has been about
245>> 30 or 40 however long it's place >> um Patrick'sburg we have I don't know if we still do but there was a back stop there go there was until we redid the the playground. Um, where I'm going is just is there any do you see any opportunity to take some of that stuff over? >> I think we do. Um, but again, I'm not super into the runningings of athletic. I know Mr. Klein used to coach and do things. I don't know what that and I never I mean, I taught when that was going on, you know, when that building opened. I think Mr. Shopmire was a coach. I think we had some coaching going on during those days and we all had our own teams, but I don't know what that looked like administratively.
246I don't know what that what kind of headache it was because I didn't live it. >> Well, and that only lasted a couple years and then it became a financial burden. >> Okay. Yeah. So, that's why >> then it was because they were paying stipens and >> um you know, they bought uniforms and and then it >> went away. >> It went away. But even to that thought, because we've batted around in my first few years here, I brought up we've we discussed it briefly as elementary principles, the notion of do we have a field day at the end of the year where all four elementaryaries are coming to the high school track and you've got a representative from Patrick'sburg and the other three schools running the hundred and you've got a group of kids
247from McCormix Creek and all the other schools doing a medley relay. Um, you know, I so that's been >> do that when we were doing the fitness award for our sixth grades were going to come and go to the high school and do that and something happened. I can't remember the weather got us because of the many thunderstorms it seems like we get now. >> As big as that is, you can have a a kickball game in the middle of, you know, >> Yeah. >> Lots of different activities to expose those kids. Well, >> we need a a principal's team as well. >> Well, as I said earlier, I can play my radio. That's about it. But I can't play any sports. I, you know, I was Mrs. East was taught me out here. Soccer.
248I think we had a two two week unit on it maybe or something. Soccer wasn't a big thing in the United States then and that was the only thing I was good at and no one played soccer then. It was just a two-eek unit in PE, you know. But I was good at that. >> Everybody plays soccer so they don't have to watch it. >> Yeah. >> But on what Chad said, that's a really good idea. but to work with the youth basketball league >> and still have that competitiveness between the schools maybe at the conclusion of their >> uh season right while everybody's still in basketball mode >> maybe uh you know Patrickburg can >> out of out of that group or if even if they're not in that group if they're of that
249age uh put together a team and then just have a tournament >> right and we talked about doing that with and then COVID hit we were had we had it all set up a robotic 16 where the elementaryaries were going to compete against each other unless I just dreamt that and I'm pretty sure we had all that ready to go and then COVID hit and something all that got shut down and we never revisited but I think something even like that for the kids that aren't athletic that could do you know because we've got the equipment. I mean if you guys remember when Brock was big on getting our Brock Beaman was big on getting our uh STEM labs created and we got all that grant money and I mean I think we each had
250almost $100,000 worth of equipment and added to our buildings and we still have a lot of that now. Some of it's getting outdated because you know Brock's been back in the music classroom for a while, but um we're looking at ways with Mr. Taylor on how we can update some of that stuff. And u but I would like to go back to the robotics club or maybe some type of academic competition too in addition to sports or something. athletes. >> I know we have I think with >> Junior League basketball if you'd mention that see if they they have any appetite to to do something like that. So we like to have a you know competitive >> and even if it starts small and it's just one game you know >> or something I don't
251know like I said I'm not an expert on sports. That was always neat for me to, you know, we'd go to back when I was a kid, >> right? >> We would go to Dport and play. We'd go to Patrickburg and play and it was a, you know, >> kind of a best of the county type thing. >> County tournament. >> Yeah. >> Well, you definitely had a community feel that way. >> Sure. >> But I will tell you, Patrick'sburg might be a little bit harder than the rest of the schools. Number one, transportation, >> lower income, >> cost gas money. No one has practices out there, fewer kids. That would be >> A concern if you wanted to be inclusive schools. >> Well, we're in >> I got many I can drive some word
252out. See who's interested. We can at least check. >> Good idea, Chad. >> Very good. >> Well, I'd like to commend you. Um, Mr. Klein told us that you had perfect attendance last year. >> Well, thank you. I didn't have perfect board attendance. I don't attend all board meetings sometimes, but um, yeah, I strive to be there. I can't stand not being in the building. I don't know. It just amps my anxiety up, not knowing what's going on. So, I I but I I never wake up dreading going into that place. It's just it's a part of me. I don't have hobbies. The school is my life and I don't care to say it because I'm proud of our school. I love it and I I I am blessed beyond imagination with a great staff.
253I have been totally >> and that's you know with the number of kids that you that you have in being just you and you do have that family support otherwise >> absolutely >> I would think it would be very difficult for you to >> for them to do as well as they do and to not I mean your >> discipline numbers were >> yeah we don't have >> exceptional and >> it just doesn't happen the teachers take care of most of the discipline concerns. And that's not to say I'm not there to support them, but they have such a good rapport with the students that we don't have people sitting in the office. I mean, a lot of you walk in and out of my office, you'll see there very rarely are their kids sitting
254in the carols because they can't get educated if they're sitting there. And so, but when they need to be, we we take action and deal with it. But our parents also are pretty supportive. I mean, I've been blessed with that. When we have a discipline concern, I call a parent, they're usually backing us. and that doesn't always happen. So, I consider that a blessing as well. But, thank you for that compliment. I appreciate it. >> Matt, you mentioned parent consent to share positive >> stories. Is that something that we could uh offer out there or part of the package to to sign up school? So it's it's already >> you know as I said that Jack I was thinking the way it's worded now we kind of already have consent to a certain level unless
255the parent writes I do not want my child photographed I still think it would be in our best interest to say hey would you mind your child being a feature to reach out but yes >> but we already do kind of have a cart blanch you know >> unless you write to us saying you don't want your kids picture to be posted you know due to and there's some very good reasons why you don't want your kid on social media. I completely understand that. We always try to value that. It's just hard with so many people with cameras, you know, camera phones and stuff. Um but yeah, uh definitely definitely um something that I think we should reach out and just inform the parent. >> I mean, we kind of did that for a while
256with a student spotlight, >> but it it was under a different, you know, umbrella, I guess. It wasn't so much to sell the school and the great things we're doing. It was more just focused on that student. But it would be neat to hear what the students have to say. I know Mr. Klein asks in our buildings, "What do you think about the school?" And so it'd be neat to capture some of their thoughts and have permission to share those. >> Yeah. I mean, the consent you're speaking of, Jack, is already there in as much as what Matt Mr. Cazelle already described that uh in final forms with all the signoffs on handbooks and transportation all those things but if they don't want their picture in there but maybe we should just flip it to
257the opposite. Can we have your permission to promote positively because uh the pre the principles aren't aware of this yet but this is happen at a principal meeting. So I'm just going to tell it you tell you right now one of the things I'm going to ask the principles to do is to write at least two stories that we can send to the Owen news this year on top of the stories that Mrs. Samic has written or the other pieces that we have provided because we've tried to provide a positive news piece to the the the startup paper every month since its inception and I it's been positive for us and it's been a good thing for us as well. Uh but it's just going to be another means to expand that uh broadcast of
258the things we're doing well because it's uh and it goes back to branding again with uh how do we brand ourselves even even further because you know during during the meeting I mean Chris had sent this information out that our most in most recent metrics on Facebook we had 328,000 views news. This past month or most recent we had almost 88,000 reaches reaching out to different people who were looking at our our social media feed and then uh of those there were about 5,300 interactions with posts and then we picked up 62 new followers. So, you know, we're doing those things and we've we've talked about we put our some advertising on the front end of the movies at the Tivoli. Uh, so we were catching people that are doing that. Uh, the billboarding that
259we've done, the advertising we've done in newspapers, but I we just need to ask the question and you've asked it. What do we keep doing more of? You know, how do we keep how do we let know how do we let everybody know what's really here and what's really good about it other than just everybody who already knows about it. So >> maybe maybe look at a company that specializes in that, you know, digital marketing. How do how do you put a 10-second blurb on Pandora or, you know, I know nobody likes commercials when they listen to Pandora, but they're effective because, you know, you don't get up and change the channel. >> No, you just let it play. Yeah. >> Yeah. >> And you need maybe 10 seconds to just put in somebody's mind
260how positive this place is. They need to check it out. You got a kid this age, check it out. >> Yep. >> Don't cost money, but >> sometimes you have to spend money to make them. >> Yeah, I really think >> Yeah. And we >> something we need to look at. >> We've uh we've exhausted 90% of our uh promotion funds that's allowed in the the yearly budget right now. So, it's uh we're allowed a proportion or a maximum, and our maximum is $3,000 of a budget cycle. So, we've we've spent about every dime of that at this point. So, whether it be on the billboards or on making other things to promote uh to to promote the school system, >> it'll replenish itself. >> Be ready when it does. >> Yeah. >> Any other
261questions or comments for Matt? >> Great job. >> All right. >> Thank you. I would like to thank the board for allowing me to stay in this position in my for my contract which I need to s see April. She sent me an email. I better sign that. But I it's an it's a privilege to work in Spencer Owen schools. I mean it's just I love it and I'm feel very blessed to have been here 276 26 years whatever. And I felt like I got a great education here as a student. Proud to be an alumni from Owen Valley. So, I thank you guys for that privilege and I hope you guys have a great rest of your day and maybe your ears will get some rest tonight. >> All right. Thank you. >> Hopefully
262the weather will cool down. >> Thanks for that. >> Uh we will take a brief break and then reconvene at 145 uh for our last session. So Chris, if you'd mute for us. There's It's going >> to get all this crazy weather out school starts. >> The train drivers. >> Okay. Uh we're going to uh start our final session and uh this is just an opportunity for our directors of technology and our transportation director and our maintenance director to speak with the board and talk with the board about uh their challenges and opportunities. uh it's a little different than the principal presentations where again last year it seemed to work very well with just an open conversation of uh uh what you what's in front of you and what what challenges are there and what
263uh what things are there to celebrate already as well. So uh I'll uh I'll let the veteran statesman Mr. Warner start or or Mr. M if if you two want to flip a coin. So, >> normal >> and please turn your mic on and you need to speak into the mic as we're talking. So, well, technology is actually in pretty good shape. Uh, the last couple of years we've been able to bring in some uh young kids to help us considerably with uh all the things. The other thing that we're doing a lot of is um automating tasks um pulling in data that we would have done manually three four years ago are now tied to Power School and Clever and all the little programs that we used to have to pull those databases in
264manually by hand and then every time you touch a database there's a chance for an error we're pulling directly out of our student uh information system. So that's helped a lot. Um, as far as uh hardware out in the buildings, uh, we've we've done a pretty good job over the last few years with -ate money of replacing switches, servers, backups. I don't know if you guys knew, but we do backup to Cloverdale now, our main servers. That way, if anything ever did happen, we could run off of that while we were getting these back up to speed. Uh, in fact, I talked to um the IT folks at the county yesterday, Jack. This you'll find this interesting. And they're looking at the same firewall that we've been using for 10 years probably. Um, just because
265it's an industry standard and it's also pretty pretty beefy and does the job well. We don't want to be sitting in here trying to discuss what we do with encrypted data that someone else owns and we have to pay to get it back. So, um there's uh if I if I was going to say things that we need to address soon, um I have not addressed the switches at Gosport, Patrickburg, or McCormix Creek just because the funding hasn't been there, but I did get notification from the state that the rate has been um re-uped for another fiveyear cycle. So, uh we will file for that uh money. It's a 8020 U matching grant, which we've been doing that for a long time. That'll help take care of our internet and then it'll also uh supply
266me some cash to buy hardware. So, the intent for my part would be to then go ahead and upgrade the other buildings to comparable switches to what we have in place at the high school, middle school, and Spencer Elementary. um and then get everybody up to that level before we start looking at servers and uh backups again because then that cycle will be around to where that'll be on the on the on the board to be done. Um I don't know how much you've talked about Chromebooks. We are going to try to extend the Chromebooks. We've been doing a four-year rotation for the last ever since we went down the one to one road. We're going to try to go five, possibly six, uh, depending on the the structural integrity of the Chromebooks. Once we
267get them back each year, we'll take a look at them. If we can get another year out of them, then we may be able to balance the uh purchase and do more of like four grade levels per year. Instead of having a six grade level year where we do high school, middle school all together, which is roughly 1100 machines and then the following year we're doing four grade levels. We'd like to do four four. That way it's easier to budget for. Um and it gives it takes a little load off of you. That's a lot of machines to get ready over a summer. Uh we don't know if that'll work or not. The licensing works out now because they've extended the licensing on Chromebooks where they last longer. Uh and I think the reason they're
268doing that because schools, especially in the current environment with financing, are going to have to stretch their dollars further and that'll give us the opportunity to do that as long as they will physically last long enough to be viable for us to use. Um, beyond that, uh, really we don't have any major expenditures, at least from technology standpoint. We'll just have the ongoing licensing and things that we've always had. Uh, and then, like I said, the switch upgrade and then I keep everything on a rotation. So, you know, we'll be sitting here next year talking about we're a year out from updating the servers and the backup systems. And, um, I just it's kind of lined out. I don't know that I have it written down. so you could see it, but it is in
269my head. So, as long as I don't have a a traumatic head injury, we'll be good to go. >> Yeah. Um, you guys got any questions for me or anything specific I could address? >> You have that written down? No traumatic head injury? >> Uh, I don't have the no head injury written down, but I I I'm doing better at getting, you know, passwords. I've got passwords down in a in a keep a file uh in case anything would happen. But I do need to start getting some of this rotation stuff down and I know that, you know, I'm I can't see retirement, but I hear it's just over the hill from me. So, I'm I'm hoping the lights will come on eventually. So, uh, as that as that point gets nearer to me, then
270I will, uh, I'll make sure that the transition's easy and maybe a couple years from now, depending on, you know, how things are looking for me personally, then we might we probably need to talk about some sort of transition between me and the next person. Maybe even u a mirroring thing. But it's it's a few years out. It's it's not going to happen tomorrow. So >> tech technology infrastructure I know a lot of work went into replacing lines in the buildings and um are we in a good spot infrastructure wise? Yeah. Um every building has cat six except for and this will floor you guys. McCormix Creek is our oldest wiring now. They have cat five which is 100 meg not a gig. Um, so if we were going to do an upgrade for wiring
271purposes, it would be at McCormix Creek and we would go to Cat 6 there. Or I was hoping it was Cat 5e, but I actually looked into it this year. It's Cat 5, so it's not even E, which would give us the one gig speed throughput. Are they going to notice that at the end user? Probably not. Now, I will tell you that the middle school end users are probably going to be able to tell a difference because they were Cat 3. That's a 10meg connection. Now we're at Cat 6 all over that building. That's a gig. So it's 10 times faster. Uh they should be able to see a difference there. Um I know when we first started and I was out there trying to watch the access points as we were bringing them
272online and make sure they came on before and after I could tell a difference in how fast it checked into the cloud. You know, you would click and just kind of sit there and wait on it. So, that's going to that's going to pay us dividends across the board with the kids engagement and everything because they're hitting those same access points on their Chromebooks. They're they're going to see I hope anyway they'll see a difference. Um, that was a major undertaking to consolidate those upstairs closets into the one new one. That took us a big part of the summer, but luckily I had the help and I'm not as young as he used to be, so pulling wire is rough on me now. So, uh, but those guys did a lot of that work and,
273um, I think it's going to work out really well. All the other buildings, as far as wiring goes and fiber, everything's fibered together, all buildings have their own firewall. I don't know if you guys knew that, but they do. They're all sitting behind their own firewall that then talks to the main firewall here at Spencer. And then that profile is cast to all of them over our WAN connection, which is our fiber interconnects between the buildings. We still lease the main lines coming in at the high school and here u and that won't go away because somebody else owns that. We just we get to lease it from them. But we do that through our rate. So we get a 8020 split on that as well. I was a little nervous when they started talking
274about the rate going away altogether. um because that would increase our cost significantly um per month for our internet connections and we would probably have to look at dropping one of the connections or possibly even backing the other one off a little bit. We just don't want to go there if we don't have to. But u beyond that, if if u if our legislators take care of us, uh we should be we should be good. Like I said, we'll we'll keep upgrading things and uh if we were going to do a major wiring issue job, it would be at McCormack Street. That'd be the next one to do wiring. And I I've already told you they they have switches are same age as the wiring. That'd probably be the next building because of the size
275and the student population that I would address with switches. Uh if I can get a decent bid that's not crazy expensive, we may look at doing the wiring as long as I can hire it done where it can get done over a summer. I I don't have the manpower to do it myself, but I can knock out chunks at a time, but I'd rather just have somebody come in and do it all at once, if at all possible. We still have a a small wiring project to do down there between it and the transportation building as soon as that gets to a point where we can get that done. That'll be a fiber connection going over there. Uh the transportation building, just so you guys know, um the phones the phones will have their own
276extension, but they will go back to McCormack Creek for their server. Same way with the cameras. All the cameras will be backed up at McCormix Creek. There won't be a a video server or a phone server in that building. I already have them a copier that we've uh accessed at McCormic Creek that will be going over there. So they will have a copier in building >> uh with the same um >> the same um usage the same follow me and everything as all the other buildings have. So >> thank you. >> Yeah. And um the key system the key Bob reader system will go back to McCorm Creek as well. >> But with that being a a g a fiber connection that's at least it can go as fast as the switches can go. They
277won't even know it won't even be a blip on the map out there. Norm, I would ask you just to update the board just a little bit because you brought it up in our leadership meeting earlier in the week, the fact that our copper lines are going away. Oh, yes. Telephones. So, uh, currently all of our elevator phones, uh, fire alarm, and our fax lines are on a a copper line except for the middle school, which has already been upgraded to the digital side. And I did that one first mainly because we were in remodeling anyway and I knew this was coming. So I got a notification from AT&T this week that by December the 1st or 31st, one of the other may have been 31st. All copper lines in Owen County will be non-existent.
278So we will set those other five buildings up just like the middle school has set up. I do that through NEC, which is our phone vendor for all of our phones that we currently have. And basically what you have there is a box that does a dial tone that hooks to the internet. And then there's a phone number that it calls through the internet to make the call instead of out through a copper line. Um, that'll be happening pretty rapidly here because >> was that you said >> this year uh last day of the year I believe is is when it is. so I can get those in. Luckily, I've done a building now, so I know the pitfalls and all the little problems we'll run into with there seems to be a lot of
279communication back and forth about, well, here's the phone number, does it work? And then you got to ping it and it's it's it's pretty involved, but it's not insurmountable between now and December. So, that's going to be happening. uh that cost is roughly between $50 and $60 a month as opposed to what we're paying for telephone lines. And I meant to look it up today before the meeting and I just haven't done it um to tell you. I think we'll actually drop our cost because copper lines are expensive and there's three of them at every building right now. So, if we take those out and put these $50 uh internet uh connections in, I think we'll actually lower our cost and then everything will be digital and we won't have to worry about the copper
280lines anymore when they go away. So, that's that's going to happen within the next month. >> How will that work? When uh someone makes a call from the high school to a like my cell phone, what what number will show up? We we do it on the back end where it shows up as our phone number. >> Okay. The original. >> Yeah. If you'll remember when we were doing the middle school, we had a problem with that. When it was dialing 911, it was saying it was in Arkansas or somewhere because that's where their head in is. And we had to mask that number with our >> 2249 number. Yeah. Um we we had SRO's, you know, tell them that we were going to be calling them several times. And uh that one's a hit
281a push button. you don't really make a phone call. You just push a button, it automatically dials 911. So, we had to work with the company a little bit on that's kind of the calls that are going back and forth. It's like, hey, it says it's from Arkansas, but it's in town. And then we have to mask that with our number. It's a little bit involved, but it's like I said, it's not insurmountable. We can get that done. I'll get the equipment here and we'll get started hooking things up. Most all of our phone uh landing spots in the buildings are already a demark extended, which means they have category six cabling running there already. We just hook the stuff up, run it back to the wiring closet, plug it in, and then the hard
282part is just getting that kind of stuff squared away, make sure when you hit the button in the elevator, the phone actually rings somewhere and it gives them the right number. And same thing with caller ID. if your um if your fire alarm checks in with the course and we want to make sure it says Spencer Community Schools or Valley High School, not Little Rock, Arkansas, which is what it was doing. So, >> and what about the transportation building? What's the state of the art that you're I know you're putting in the latest and greatest there probably as far as wiring and stuff. >> Um they'll be getting the Cat 6A which is the top of the line. I mean, it's the it's the best thing we can get our hands on reasonable. Uh, and
283they're doing all that work as part of the u the u the SRO or S so um you know scalable work. Um I've ordered switches comparable to the switches I just replaced at these buildings. There'll be two of those in there. Um they'll have a rack in there um in the little um there's a little IT room in there. uh they'll be getting the same phones we have here. Um the only difference will be they running off of a server at the other building, but we I have talked with the um the NEC rep and he's assured me that they'll have their own prefix like all the other buildings have because that was one thing we wanted to really make sure we had transportation had their own prefix so they're not just hanging off of
284McCormack's Creek and he said that would be no problem whatsoever with the programming. So, if we run into an issue where their phones are slow because they're hanging off of that building or it slows the other building down, then we'll address it if we need to. Um, >> we should only have like three in there. >> I know. I don't think it'll be a problem. The other thing to keep in mind, and I I should have told you guys this, uh, we've already taken the video storage to the cloud at the high school and middle school. They don't have a they don't have a server setting. They have a server, an NVR, but it's not all the recordings going on in the cloud. Um, I have a proposal that uh Mr. Klein had set money
285aside and gave me a number and I've got the proposal that came in under that number to take the elementary schools to that same setup where we're all looking through one pane of glass and then it's just a matter of your user and what rights you have as to what cameras you do or don't see. And this also gives us the ability to do it, you know, on a phone, sitting at home, get the SRO's in. The sheriff's department, we talked about giving them access. We could we can do that now. Um, but I'd like to get all six of the buildings done. With the money he set aside, the proposal will get us there in this next school year. So, by the end of this year, everybody will be on par with the high
286school, middle school as far as video recordings and access and that kind of thing. So the camera data on the buses uh is like downloaded or recorded in real time. It's not like at the end of the day at 7 o'clock at night it downloads to the >> Yeah, the bus video is a separate monster. It's it actually has a hard drive setting in the bus itself that it's recording to. >> But it is real time >> as far as I know. Right. >> Yeah. I mean, it records as it records and then you can go. >> How does it store? >> Uh, we bought buses, handicap buses in 2020, I think, and I pulled it and it's all the way back. I think it depends on the obviously the newer hard drives have more
287storage, >> but as far as I know, what I've seen is from like I've actually seen footage of them installing the cameras. I see. Okay. >> And that's not stored anywhere else. >> Not to my knowledge. >> No. No. No. The only time we we uh store that data is if we have to pull it for some reason and we store it on a hard drive here so we can show it to parents or >> just capture that. >> Yeah. We capture that video. Um on that same note, the high school is our biggest building. Obviously, it has the most cameras in it. Uh I found uh now that we went to the cloud three-month old video, it it's about three months and that'll get shorter as time goes by obviously because we only have
288a limited amount of space. And what happens there is it just it's like a VCR back in the day. It records over the beginning. So as this as this recording happens, it goes back to the oldest one once it runs out of space and records forward so that you've always got a sliding window of roughly three months. So, uh, normally, especially in those buildings, we're on it way before then. Um, we might be two weeks out. Usually when someone says, "Hey, can you pull video?" You know, so I think we're in a good spot. Uh, if we do ever do run into a position where we're not storing enough video for my liking, then we'll just buy more storage or, you know, rent more storage, I guess. But yeah, the video off the buses does
289not write to the same place as our video for the cameras in the buildings. >> And we actually just there were some buses that just had like a microchip card in some of them. Some of them actually had the DVR drives. And that was a purchase that we made just three or four months ago, early early 2025 to get all of those converted to an actual hard drive because we were having issues with we've got three different models of the DVR and everything has to be basically you have what you take out of it to do video, you have to make sure you're putting the same drive the same ship back in and nobody had ever told me that. So, we did lose some footage because if there was some incident that I had to
290keep keep out, I would just put something else back in there, not knowing that exact same. So, we did lose some stuff there. But, we spent some money several months ago to just make sure that across the board. We've got some backups now to fit each model of the DVR. >> Are you um do you have a way to keep like if there any written incidences like the video footage of that from ever being re recorded. Does it go like a permanent file >> for the buses? >> You just have to pull that drive mark what it is out. >> Okay. I just wondering if you just kept a copy of those, but you have to take out the whole drive and buy a whole new drive. That's what >> does for us. If we
291if we need a if we have a video that we think we'll need in the future, we store it either in the in the cloud or on a hard drive here for the cameras in the buildings. We've had a few things that I just will not get rid of because, you know, the situation surrounding it or something. Um, >> well, there may be a way for us to give you that. Yeah, we could definitely dump that data. We just never really talked about person, so I don't >> That's what I was wondering if you could just take it out, make your copy, put it on a permanent >> I'm sure. >> Yeah. Um, the thing you have to be careful about with all video is you got to have your time stamps and your all
292that or they're worthless, you know. Um, because then did you alter it comes into play and all that. So, as long as you can transfer your uh your pertinent information that the you know a lawyer would need, then uh then they're usable. Otherwise, you make them pretty much not worth their what they're recorded on. Most things nowadays do that. There was a time back in the day where if you didn't purposely move that information, it didn't come over. >> But, uh they everyone knows it now. So, I would assume we can make copies of it. We've just never really been down that road. >> What? >> I'm here. I don't Okay. I'm sorry. >> I got a question for Nor. >> Is that your phone? >> No. >> Will you hand that to me? >>
293Thank you. >> Y >> My biggest challenge this year has been weather. >> This spring has been a killer. Uh we dealt with the fire marshal before what March. We got everything resolved with him. He pretty easy to work with. Um my elevator inspector that just out of the blue from the Department of Homeland Security showed up yesterday at Gosport. So everything passed there. So no issues there. So they can show up at any time. They don't have to ask, you know, they just walk in. But uh I've got a young man helping me this year. He's done a really good job. Uh I I see a challenge coming ahead and that's going to be taking care of that transportation building. I really don't have the manpower to be plowing that. So we've got to
294look at that. Me and Andy's talked about it a little bit. So we're going to have to come up with what we're going to do there because what we do now takes everything. >> Sure. >> I can get him one. >> I'll be on a bus. >> So that's going to be a challenge coming ahead. Uh we just purchased a brand new mower for uh Gosport Ele or for McCormix Creek Elementary. So they've got a new mower out there. So everybody's got a pretty new piece of equipment right now. The oldest would be maintenance. But uh the mower we took from McCormix is still running. It's just going to be a spare. One goes down, we have that to fall back on. And I really don't have a mower to mow and I mow a
295lot. So there'll be times we can just pick it up and help out because we are really behind. Uh, we've been in the front ditch at the high school two times this year. I'd like to do it one more time before school starts, but that's a challenge. 18 hours last time. The weed eat that thing out. So, I mean, that's a that's a big job and I had every guy out there. >> Sonia tried to hook him. She tried many times to get something done that ditch couldn't get it done. >> If any of you want to join me with the weed eater, just let me know. I got a spare. But, uh, I I see some challenges ahead, but we're just gonna take them one day at a time. So, that's how I I
296I put fires out one day at a time. That's what I do. So, our equipment's held up fairly decent for the weather we've had. I mean, we've got a few units down. We've had this one down for four or five days. Knock on wood, we think we've got it. We got one more little piece to put on it, and hopefully it runs. So, Um, got the gym unit of Gossport. We're having some issues with that. We're going to have Andy's aware we're going to have to think about replacing that. It's 26 years old. >> What is it? >> Gym unit. The air conditioning. >> Oh, okay. >> For the gym. We temporarily got it up and running again. Uh, a lot of the issues is is when you need equipment, it's 26 weeks out. I
297got these compressors for this. That's the last ones I could find. Otherwise, I was seven, eight weeks out. So, we I jumped pretty quick. So, but um I've got some glass. I've got a couple windows broken. I got a couple cracked at Patrick'sburg, a couple at SCES eight weeks, 8 to 12 weeks out. You know, I ordered that before school was out. So, things are really slow to get on stuff. But, uh I think the equipment's holding up well for the heat. you know. So, what do you guys got for me? >> Um, quick question on um just overall infrastructure. I mean, biggest fire that you think might start round the bend. >> You got some units over SCS is 40 years old. We've nickel and dimed them back together. >> How old? 40. They're
298they're over they're over 40. So, most of that building's got brand new units around it, but the library doesn't. The nurses station doesn't. The cafeteria doesn't. And the kitchen itself doesn't have air conditioning. So, those are some units. They're pretty old. So, we just kind of keep going. They keep telling me there's a new refrigerant getting ready to come out and they're going to force it on us. So, that could be an obstacle down the road that we're going to have to convert some stuff over. We actually converted this one over here. So, we got rid of the 22 and went with a 401 or something because it's cheaper in the long run. So, but when we took those old units out of the high school, middle school, we saved all that refrigerant >> and
299we've been using it since then, but we're almost out. So, we bought like a thousand dollar tank to store it in. >> Yeah. >> But we had about $40,000 worth of refrigerant saved. So, I mean, we've done our best to do that, but we're almost out of that. One of these days, we have to start buying again. >> Is that how they phase you out? They just price it so high. >> They price it so high. >> You have to. >> Yeah. >> Okay. >> It's just you've got to you got to make a move. So, >> Jeff, I I'll ask or put you on the spot a little bit because we've talked about it. elevator replacement. I think >> middle school really needs to think about that. That's the original elevator in it. If
300you ever ride her, she's a ding ding clink clink clunk clunk and she leaks oil. >> So the oil is pumped out by our elevator repairman probably every six months and he adds some to it. So that's something that really needs to be looked at down the road. And I think the one at Gosport is almost obsolete where you can't get parts for them. Now, the last one we put used parts on the one at uh the middle school. We put used parts on it because we couldn't find any new ones. So, they're getting to be obsolete. So, >> how old are they? >> I'm not sure about the one at Gosport. I know the one at the middle school is original. >> Uh 1984, right? >> 84. I think >> I went to I
301went to middle school there in eighth grade first year. So >> 81 82 be my guess. I graduated 86. >> 99 add- on. >> That's what Yeah. before that they didn't have. >> Yeah. So the middle school is definitely the oldest other maybe SCS. It may be older. I don't know. But I really don't my elevator guy don't complain about that. It's that one at the middle school is one he complains about. So, we are going to have to think about that in the near future, though. I don't know what that would cost. >> So, there's a unit just specific for the gym. Is that is that what you're saying? >> An air conditioning unit. Yep. SCS. Every classroom's got their own unit. >> So, there's quite a few that way. The high school runs
302off of one. It's got the multistack and two Yorks that are tandem. They're tied together. That does the whole high school. And then the middle school's got a just a three. Well, the middle school's actually got an outside unit, too, that does the new media center. And then we just added the front office and stuff. That's a new unit in there, too. Then the multistack is upstairs, and that was put in 2022. So, it's it runs pretty good. So, but the high school is almost all brand new because we burn up one of the other compressors on them. Have to replace it, too. So, they seem to be running all right. It's just you got to clean the strainers on them quite often. So, John Wheeler's really good at that. That's how we >> That's
303not HFI, though. >> Well, now it could be, but we opted not to. We bought an impact gun and we went and we bought a power washer for we don't have to pay for that service. >> Okay. >> So, I'd say it paid for itself in the first week. So, so that's how we do that. Now, we can't get to it, then they'll service it for us real quick. But we got the back to school expo this weekend. So, tomorrow we'll be sure the strainers are changed for they clog up, they'll shut the unit down. So, and a lot of what we're picking up is just bugs. I mean, just stranded full of bugs. What else we got? Andy, >> are there any other questions or comments from the board or anyone for Jeff? And
304Matt, we'll turn to you and kind of give us your overview of where we're at with transportation here. Um there's some things that are going really well right now. Um as far as like we're replacing our our fleet um gradually. I think we've gotten two rounds of new buses. Uh I have a lift bus which is the last one of the second round that should be delivered next Thursday. I think the 31st. Um the uh me and Andy have started the conversations for the next round. Um the uh pricing for those the I don't know if it's a state bid or federal bid or what from each of the manufacturers. They come out they change in the spring they change in the fall. They will be going up drastically from what I understand probably 10%
305come September. So, our last round were for our big buses, we paid 157, 158, somewhere in that range. Ordered a lift bus. Um, which that's a challenge right now because our lift buses are 2020s, 2018s. They're not that old age- wise. However, they were allowed to take them on their field trips in the past. Those buses um are generally about 20 grand higher than a regular bus. So we have really high mileage on a four or five year old bus that isn't good. Um so when I took over as the director, that's one thing I did put a stop to was the wheelchair buses could not be taken on athletic trips. The drivers like to take them because they have air conditioning. Um however, they have to take a fullsize bus now to try to
306offset that mileage and the increased cost for replacing the bus. Um, so part of the increase is they are throwing in tariff charges. So that can come or go depending on what happens with the with the economy right now. Um, but we're looking at I'm hoping to get as many as I can versus fewer buses before the big increase goes into effect. Um, as far as preventative maintenance on the buses, um, I think we've had more frequent tire replacements, but the overall bills have been less because I've got our, um, tire guy coming and we just set up a time and he knows that basically each quarter of the year. I usually try to plan it around spring break, summer break, fall break, Christmas break for him to come assess each of our vehicles. Um,
307we had a lot of mixed and match, so we weren't getting the full wear, the full lifetime out of our tires as what we could have been. So, I've tried to get those as evened out as possible. And we're having fewer repairs now that we're probably in our third or fourth rotation where he's came and looked and tried to even things out. Um, so with his eyes on him more frequently and more reg more regularly, we are able to not have to do like we did last February where I think we spent what 18 grand or something like that just in one round. Um, so I think that's helping us not only for cost but also the safety of the of the students. Uh, as far as getting me some help in the office, um,
308I had an interview this morning and I have an interview at 3:15 today. Um, one of them is already licensed. They are from a neighboring school corporation. I'm hoping that it goes well. um so that I can start focusing on rather than putting out day-to-day fires, being in a bus every day. Um basically just been on the run putting out fires that come up as the day goes on. Hopefully I can start focusing on potentially getting these routes. We have two more years on we just extended our contract routes for another two years. So hopefully I'll have time within the next two years to look at the routes, get them to where we can run them more efficiently. Um, and some of the routes haven't changed in 40 plus years. Um, so hopefully I can
309get some help so I can start focusing on that, let them kind of take care of some of the day-to-day stuff. Um, one of the biggest challenges right now, and I don't foresee it changing because we don't have any control over it, is the the roads just beating the crap out of our buses. And I try to stress to my drivers every chance that I get like you got to take it easy. And we need to baby the buses just and then I get the response, well it's bumpy whether I go 35 or whether I go 10. Yes, you're not wrong, but what it's doing to our equipment. We have an 8-year-old bus that can't be ran anymore. It has too many cracks in it in the body. >> Yeah. >> I want to say
310Yeah, I didn't look at him. >> Yeah, turn turn turn turn turn turn turn turn turn turn turn turn turn turn turn turn turn turn turn turn turn turn to your left d d d d d d d d d d d d d d d d d d d d d those comments. >> Oh, we've we've talked, >> Mr. Warner. >> We've we've talked. Um but yes, I'm trying to get that through their heads that yeah, it's bumpy no matter what, but what it's doing to our vehicles 10 or 15 miles an hour makes a difference. >> And you have an employee that doesn't understand that? that hitting a hole at 10 mph is a lot better than hitting it at 30 m, >> not just one. >> So anyway, yeah, we have a
3112017 2018 that will not be used as a school bus any longer because it's irre it's it's we can't repair it. So that's one of my frustrations and biggest concerns right now. And we have no control over we have control over what we can do. We have some control over what our employees can do. But the external factors we have zero control over. So but that is one of the biggest challenges right now. learn. >> Yep. >> Many conversations have been had. >> Um, as far as driver shortage, right now I'm down two. Um, which could be a lot worse. So, I'm stressing over it, but I'm also grateful that it's only two. Um, Andy and I have been in several conversations this summer, and I think that what we have came up with um
312will help. I don't think it's going to be perfect, but I think it will hopefully help. Um, one thing that I think would also help is I've been contacted by three or four drivers from a neighboring corporation that would be willing to come work for me um as a driver, but it would just be too much of a of a pay cut for them. And I get that. We know our cost of living and things are a little bit lower over here. Tax brackets are lower. So, we're not going to be able to match. But one thing that I would like for you guys to take in consideration, Andy and I have talked about it as well, is allowing years of service from another corporation to carry over um so that we can get them
313into we now have a pay bracket for years of service. Um we have our starting pay and then so many years of service it goes up and it continues to do that up to the 10 year point. Um, if we could allow not their full doesn't have to be their full years of service at another corporation, but if we can allow something to try to get them closer to what they were making elsewhere to get them over here because they're licensed. We don't have to train them. You know, they can come in, jump in the seat as soon as they get that background check passed and the drug test passed. Um, I'm just asking you to consider that. um routing. We've kind of talked about um back to our um preventative maintenance. Um our mechanic
314who is doing a great job. He's only focusing on school buses right now. He's doing um two neighboring corporations as well as us. And we keep him the busiest to say the least. But he's got some software that he's looking to purchase depending on if we are able to do this. We've talked about it in the past about basically paying $15 a month for each unit and that would allow him to basically he's going to check our he's going to keep a better eye on our mileages to keep up on oil changes. I'm trying to do that um monthly. I'm also asking drivers to help me send me a picture of what your odometer is on a certain date and time, your oil change sticker, and that's working. It's working somewhat, but things are getting
315missed. Um, but if we could consider paying him this monthly subscription, he's going to be able to track everything. This new software allows me to enter work tickets in directly to that. So, and he gets an alert on his phone rather than me sending him a text or hey, there's something in your tray that you I have a tray over there for the manual work tickets for the non-urgent stuff. But if we could pay pay this subscription, it's going to get I think it's going to help things from falling through the cracks. And Andy, you could verify this or not, but it's my understanding that our maintenance bills have dropped by us having his eyes on the buses more often. our maintenance bills have dropped. His his hourly rate was less than his predecessor, but
316also because of the frequency that he has begun to look at our buses in a preventative manner, it it's cut down on our problems. So, it's it's been a a positive thing for us to to move to um to move to this provider and the the process he has in place. But right now we currently are not paying that monthly subscription for this part. And um one thing to think about whenever he called me yesterday because he was out in Oklahoma which is where the IC factory is where they build the buses and he was out there for a week for for training at the factory. Um, I don't know if IC covered that or if one of our other corporations that he works for kind of foot footed the bill, which I don't foresee
317that happening, but I don't know who paid for it, but it's a great asset for us to have. And right now, he while he was out there, this new software, they're cutting a heck of a deal, but that deal ends on July 31st, I think. So for him to offer us to even consider going to this this particular software which has a lot more advantages and we can go in and see you know when what work has been done and everything um at that $15 a month the decision would have to be made before that that sale ends otherwise he won't even be able to consider considering it >> July >> 31st >> in that case you would need I need I made a quote in. >> Okay. And he's supposed to be sending you
318and I an email with >> that information. So, um, my main thing right now I've already kind of talked about is getting me some help and we're trying and so that I can start working on more preventative stuff and things to make things better in the future rather than putting out daily fires. So, we could be a lot worse. And also, um, we could be a little bit better. Then, one last thing is I don't want to be selfish, but one thing, um, my salary wise, which me and H Andy have talked about, I'm covering a district that has 10 townships in our corporation. I've got a fleet of about 45 routes, give or take, and I've got neighboring directors that are making quite a bit more than I am. And they're two townships with
319half the vehicles and half the drivers. So, I'm just asking for you guys been great. I'm just asking for some consideration of that. That's all I've got. >> Um, transportation facility. Um, ready for that move. And >> I was starting to pack some things and get things ready and then I've kind of halt halted that >> until we get closer. >> Y, but anticipating >> uh because I'm sure that'll happen quick. Yeah. Um, what? Like right now, what? Fall break is probably the earliest. >> I had a construction meeting yesterday. Uh that was a a firm and productive meeting with the owner of the contractor that won our bid and uh things will be progressing along much quicker at this point. So you should be seeing seven days a week people working uh at that
320site. So um and again I'm not I won't make excuses for that company but they have faced the woes of the weather and I compared it to uh being an athletic director in the spring when a baseball game gets canceled or a track meet gets canceled and you got to reschedu everything and then you got to reschedule the umpires and everybody else and uh they have had the fight against the weather and uh they have had two subcontractors who were part of their bid that went belly up and as the owner of that contracting company said this is the first time in 25 years I've ever had this happen and I said I hope it never happens again. So, uh, but they they have a plan in place, uh, sitting through a two and a
321half hour meeting with them yesterday, uh, to ramp up what they're doing and get this done as quickly as possible. So, Derek, in respect to your question, I am hoping that we are in there before. So I I >> I just don't want to move in. >> I'll believe it when I see it, but I I think the message was conveyed pretty bluntly yesterday with I can't say much in a public meeting right now. So uh uh it was con the way it needed to be conveyed. So I'll I'll leave it at that. So, >> and one more thing because you're in here and with one of your relatives, I'd had an interview, really liked her, wanted her to come on board. Um, she decided to drive for a contractor, which is fine. One of
322the things that I found out was she was frustrated that during the training, because they had to go to a three-day class, stay class, that she was the only one in there out of 30 people not getting compensated. So Andy and I have also discussed doing something for some type of a train sign on or something to help cover some of the upfront expenses that bus drivers have. They usually have about 300 350 bucks upfront before they get a paycheck through training and physicals and testing and all of that. So that's just something to consider to kind of help with this with the shortage. And just >> I don't know who you're talking about. So >> Oh, well >> I don't think >> Okay, we can talk with off off the record. >> Any other
323items for Matt or Norm or Jeff? >> So So we don't train uh somebody interested in driving a bus. It seems like we used to. I train them, but they get zero compensation for it. >> But then they still have to go take a test. And so what what part does Spencer own play and what part do they have to do on their own? Because I I thought Tom kind of walked people through that do have a license. >> We do like I train them from start to finish, but before I could even start my training, they have to pay for their permit. They have to pay for their driving record, which is that part's nothing. They have to have a DOT physical which is anywhere from 100 to 150 depending on if they have
324insurance or not. They have to pay for their skills test which is 105 if they don't pay the first if they don't pass the first time which knock on wood my track record has been pretty good getting them through the first time. Um so it's 105 bucks a pop each time you know they have to go through >> take the test. >> Yep. Um drug testing is our expense altogether. whether it's between three and 350 bucks that they have to expend out of their pocket before they get on our payroll. >> Because I thought we thought we trained. So that's the fear and that's what we've talked about is is that potential, >> right? And we I've had no previous knowledge of what you just asked of reimbursing. So um one thing to keep in
325mind the training that Matt has done if that was done by an outside vendor $1,000 >> when I trained for contractors previously I >> so >> I did well. >> So we're saving the expense. We're saving the thousand dollar expense for the for the driver, potential driver. But u I and I will have to ask the secretaries or the treasur. I don't I don't recall Tom ever having talking to me about reimbursing for let's say 350 if we brought a driver on. And we haven't we haven't done it since you and I have been here as well. I think as a board we were told that uh schools provide training. We just didn't get the Paul Harvey version. The rest of the story there's another component to that that is the certification process and he
326never Tom can't provide that. It's got to be done by the state of Indiana. Right. >> Right. The three-day class has to be done through the department of education and that is >> forward. We understood the the rest of the story >> and that is a free class. However, this area of the state is kind of the redheaded stepchild and there aren't classes like I had a driver who started the process last May, had medical issues, could not finish the process within her one-year time period. Therefore, she was scheduled to test this week. And I got a call a couple days before her test from the test site saying that that three-day theory class had expired. So, she had to go through that again in person. Couldn't do it online because it had been one
327year and no classes in the area. So, she had to go to Hammond, Indiana. She's probably driving back right now. at her expense, which it's she's driving for a contractor, so that's here and we're there, but um that was an expense that had to be paid by the by the driver. >> Could we reimburse with the stipulation of your employment with us or something? That's >> that's the dis that's the discussion Matt and I have started >> because it that makes sense to me with a commitment of we're going to reimburse and you're going to give us x amount of time. >> Yep. and even if it's reimbursed in stages, you know, but that was a frustrating that was some feedback that I had recently got just like within the last month or so that
328that was the only driver in that class out of 30 people, the only one. Now, whether that was exaggerated or not, it could have been, but I do know that other corporations are paying for training. >> There's a component that I don't understand. I thought you said that that class they went to was free. >> Correct. The class is free. She's talking about being reimbured for her time in the class. >> I don't know how we could do that when they're not employees yet, >> right? That's why we're discussing the >> reimbursement. That's yes, that's that's where I think we're going to head is we'll give you a sign on bonus which is reimbursing you for that cost. But then also the commitment to you're going to give us a year to drive or you're
329going to give us a year year and a half to drive, whatever it may be before you would look elsewhere or look to be a contract driver or look to go to another school corporation or uh something else. So, do they um are the contractors paying more than what we're paying? >> Matt can answer this probably better than I. We're we're right in the ballpark, but I think they're just >> they're step above. >> I don't know what each individual contractor is paying, but I do know that it is higher than corporation. However, they're not offering the sick days and things like that, which we're not offering for all of our drivers, but we are now. But >> do our drivers just drive in the morning and then back in the afternoon or do they
330have duties all day long? >> No, they're they're an AM PM route driver. So, roughly two and a half hours in the morning and roughly two hours in the afternoon. And correct me if I'm >> Yeah. vice versa, but yes. >> Yeah. Um with the exception of our special needs, they we do have special needs that need the midday. >> What about the uh vocational school? >> Okay. So, >> hold that. >> We do. It's a trip. Leave Owen Valley at 1:30, go to Hooser Hills, come back and Did I say 1:30? They leave at 11:30. They leave at 11:30 and then we pull out of there roughly 2:00. >> So that'd be an all day employee, right? >> Um yes, but we are treating that as a shuttle type thing. So we have a
331I don't know if you call it a It's not really a stipen. It's just they get they get an extra hour pay. >> Yeah. There you go. I feel like I'm in the weeds too much. I'm just asking questions because I don't understand. >> Transportation's a tricky. There's a lot of layers that unless you are involved in it, you you don't think about >> and I'll circle back to what Matt has said at the beginning and it Tom faced it, Mrs. Sorenson faced it, he's facing it. It's the big worry of where do we find the drivers because it's I hate to say it. It's, you know, I I can think of my drivers at my previous school. Half a dozen of them were farm guys. They'd come in and drive. Then they go back
332home and take care of what they needed to. And then they come back in in the afternoon and drive. and that that group up there, they're down to one and he's he's 10 years older than I am and he's probably not going to do it much longer and it's and you know he Matt alluded to the down two drivers my previous district right now they're looking for five and it's I don't know what the magic answer is to to do that. So, >> need more farms. >> There you go. >> Well, that that group of people are kind of >> gone. Okay. So, >> and the the fear that I have is why we need to work on making it more appear more enticing to get people in here is because not only the the
333farmers who worked great with their schedule, they're phasing out. And drivers that we have now in all corporations, they're quickly reaching the retirement age. whether they're having health issues and have to retire early or they're just at that age where they're they're done. There's no new ones coming in. Like there's no younger generation drivers coming in. We're still I've had phone calls from retire from people that are retiring from their careers after 30, 40 years and they're interested, but what are we going to get out of them? Three, four, five years. So >> yeah, you're right. You know, it should be good fit for somebody though, somebody cuts hair or something, you know. >> And we have two mutitionians that that drive for us. >> Make that part of the cosmetology class. >> There you
334go. And let them train them. >> All right. Uh, any other questions for either any of the three? All right. Appreciate you coming in, gentlemen. >> Thank you, folks. >> Thank you. >> Appreciate it. >> Thank you guys. >> He's the guy in charge. The other two are out of town. Well, I appreciate everybody coming in and uh taking time today to listen to each of the schools and each of the departments. And we got just a little bit of time if uh we want to talk about just kind of debriefing and points that you saw or points of emphasis that may be uh you want to talk about in another work session or uh items to think about pushing towards uh goal setting or other items. So I know I I we got to
335we got to get Mr. Roger's home so he can get ready to go on vacation, too. So, but >> any any anything that stuck out that uh green button for the first time? Um the only thing that stuck out I mean there were a lot of issues discussed, but this telling our story seems to be the challenge we have. Um, you mentioned I think I think our community has a bit of an inferiority complex. We've always been >> Riverrats or whatever. Um, but this is no easy task. I mean, you're competing against Amazon and CocaCola and huge corporations spending millions and millions of dollars to tell their story. So, uh, yeah, we got to get a a grassroots way to do that. But I think that's our biggest challenge. So, I think we have a
336fantastic school system and I truly believe that. But >> to do to do it in house as far as putting it on on digital stuff. I don't know what Chris knows, but I bet she can learn what she's learned. And we've got all the video and the and the stuff going on where people could could make a digital recording or a digital video and we're figuring out how to get them ads that we make on it's it have to be cheaper than marketing. >> So you're saying we need a digital rebrand? Is that what you just Yeah. I think I think we need to look at getting our message out digitally. We've tried everything else. Tried the highway signs. We've tried the you know the T league is a is a great way because you
337got they're focused on that what's in front of them but it's a very limited number of people every month. you know, u I don't know how many people you would hit with a Pandora or I don't even know what the other listening type >> Well, you're buying tiny slices. >> An example, uh Chad made the example of reels and it's like I will I'm guilty because I'll sit down when I'm checking social media and I'll flip through reels and stop and watch Indiana basketball and or whatever it is and there's always an ad in front of it. So, I don't know. We can certainly look and see what that would be and what that would cost. And uh and I made the comment. >> Could you try again? >> Your phone thinks I'm you. Uh
338>> uh I made a comment at lunch that uh >> Oh, I just lost it. >> My mind's my mind's full. So, >> it's only three hours ago, Andy. I know >> it's not a good sign. >> Uh oh, it'll come back to me. Sorry. I just It just came and went. >> I know I keep mentioning Pandora because that's my that's what I listen to, but I know I heard an ad for Karen Red Ball. >> Oh, >> on there. And so they can get that focused. What's that called? Digital fencing. >> Geo fencing. >> What? Geo fencing. >> Yeah. Okay. >> Oh, now you Well, I was now I remember I mean I made the comment at lunch, you know, we have we are allowed an appropriation of approximately $3,000 for promotions at
339the corporation level based on our budget and it may it may be a time for me to step in out and ask the whether some organization will you give me $5,000 for marketing purpose? I mean, you know, that that may be a discussion with the chamber or maybe with the foundation or it may be uh Smithville with uh with uh grant opportunities just to get those monies because it's I know I don't know how I don't know how other districts do it because they're not that much bigger than us and they're still under the thumb the thumb so to speak of you have a limited amount that you can set aside, right? That you can set aside and budget for under the law. You can't you're not really supposed to spend any more than that.
340So, >> as far as making that thing that would then be approved >> really when it comes to this stuff, but I know it's being done because I hear it. I want to respect your time. I just anything else that sticks out that because I'm going to go back through my notes and Matt and Brady and I are all going to go back through our notes and condense this and summarize it. But I want to hear from you if there was something else that really stuck out that it's like, "Yeah, I want to know more. Maybe we need to move on this or whatever it may be. because we're going to be talking about projects coming up. Yep. Pretty soon. Um Jeff said 18 hours. 18 man hours. Let's round up to 20. Let's call
341it $50 an hour. It's $1,000. Let's say we weed eat six months out of the year. Just one time a month. $6,000. 50 years is 300,000. That project was 1.5 million. We could do that for 150 years before we spent 1.5 million to make that ditch look pretty. >> Yeah. So, I mean, it's a I know it's a lot of work to weed eat that, but the point is is I don't think it's a feasible project to do >> it >> to enclose it or to put in the sewer that I because I think when I >> I think when I got Oh, come on. I think when I got here, if I remember right, I think the Stephanogle group was talking about an enclosed concrete sewer, but then the concerns were with the waterways
342of the Americas and the natural flow of water. But then I did my research and talked to the conservation offices or a contact at conservation and it's like we can trim it all the way down so long as we do not disturb the soil. And I I still have my email from the conservation officer who told me that because it's like if I ever get in trouble. It's like here it is. This is this came from Indianapolis and came from the number one guy's office. So yeah, >> I'm just I'm kind of being facicious about it, but I just mean that um that's that's the figure. 18 hours in the middle of the summertime would be the most amount of hours. So, it's it's pretty reasonable to weed eat it is what I mean. >>
343I don't think it's just a money thing. I think it looks like crap. >> Even when it's weed eated, >> they've got trees there and everything. >> Mhm. >> Yeah. And that's that's the face, you know, that's the face of that complex right there. You got to look at that before you can see anything else. >> I don't know. I I I just think we could do something cheaper that would be >> probably >> be better for the maintenance part of it. and much better looking. >> It does look better, but I Chad just alluded to it. I I I think it needs to be a discussion or part of the discussion looking at your future projects. Um because we've got your information from what you've given me about trying to prioritize some things that
344are in front of us right now. We're going to talk about that come into the August board meetings because we are going to wind down the bond projects for Spencer Elementary and for Owen Valley Middle School. And we have some funds remaining that we have the opportunity to spend on some immediate impact projects such as painting, such as some of the things you have asked about and kind of pointed out and uh correlated amongst yourself individually and then putting it together. So, but then looking into the future when significant debt will drop off of our bond capacity or our current debt and then we talk you're going to have to have the discussion about how much do you want to put back on for G bond capacity and what does it want what do you
345want it to look like? you know, and it's again, we started the morning with uh the discussion of our facilities not being quote unquote up to snuff to host a baseball or a softball sectional. Is that going to be something you want to look at down the road? Or facilities that need to be up added on or upgraded or, you know, it's that those will tie into it and everything. The other big piece that will tie into all of this is the new the new way that property taxes are going to be calculated and the flow of tax dollars to help pay for our our debt services and all of our rates. Those are going to those are going to be changing and it's uh it will be opposite of what we have grown accustomed
346to the last several years where assessed value of property has gone up up up. This new model in place, it's going to drive the assessed value of property down down with different deductions and credits and all that. But um that's not it's going to it's going to take some real thought about what kind of projects do you really want to add and how much bond how much do we want to take on for future bond capacity. So, >> well, what Jeff was talking about, you know, two potential elevators. >> Yeah. >> And multiple air conditioning units. you have to do. I'm assuming it would that would fall under something like that or is that I'm assuming we don't just have money laying around for those projects like those um in particular the the elevator project.
347I had him pull a quote earlier in the spring just to see what it's going to cost and I have that number. It's a six-f figureure number, but I that's something I will build into the 2026 capital projects recommendation to you as a board that we will set money aside, per se, in order to plan to fix that with the intent of fixing it going into the next year. And and if not, if you tell me no, then I'm going to say, well, then let's push it to 2027 or push it to 2028. But as he alluded to, we I don't know that we can wait too much longer since it's >> Is that one elevator or two? >> One one. So the 1981 I mean the original equipment from 1981 and it's uh >>
348is it the only one that >> I believe so because he only got a quote for a single elevator >> and it's it's the one right there that's comes right out into the cafeteria and uh the bathrooms downstairs. So, you know, and those things and uh I've already got a quote for the air the air unit at Gport that uh it'll be put into capital projects 2026 and as soon as if you approve it, when it's approved, then we're going to order it so it's here for next spring or next summer and we get it installed because it's it's 40 years old and and I you've heard me say this. I I I came into a c set of circumstances where we've had just taken care of things and again it goes back to I
349think community values. We've taken care taken care of it. We've taken care of it in order to get the most life out of it and watch the dollars as we've progressed through time in history and now we're at a point where you can't get you can't get 43 years out of it. It's you know and I'm guilty of that as anyone as a you you all hear me joke. My car has 328,000 miles on it. So, I'm going to see how much longer I can push before it dies on the roadside and I got to get something. But, it's it's good thing and a bad stewards who have been here have taken care of things or tried to take care of things and it's just now we've run out of time, you know. And the
350other big example, and we've talked about this early in the late in the winter and early in the spring, was the building management system to control air conditioning and heating levels in all the buildings, replacing the compact computer that had Windows 98 running part of the school system air heating and air across the district because we had to go we had to go to eBay and find the exact same model to replace it in order to keep it running until we could update it. And knock on wood, we're almost done updating it. But that system, it's probably it was probably 1990 without me looking at the computer and you know, we got our money's worth. So we it's just uh we we just ran out we're we're running out of time on some of the
351shelf life of some of our stuff. So >> I've got a question about that. Why was that not identified as uh needing to be replaced by HFI? >> That was from from what from what I was told it was identified and then superintendent came and went and said let the next guy take care of it. Superintendent came and went and said let the next guy take care of it and then Mr. Klein showed up and I got to take care of it. So >> So who told you that? >> It was We were still live. Yeah. But it was when it broke down. When it broke down and we had to go to eBay and find a computer to replace it, it's like, oh my gosh. >> Who said they reported super >> that? Well,
352that was just a historical recall from folks in this office. So, >> super I can't see that anyway. >> Yeah. But I >> I know when I was on the board and and we approved the church project. I felt very good about that because we had just done all the buildings corporation that see all of our buildings were great shape and we weren't putting turf over windows or >> HBAC really that's coming and it sounds like it's more necessary now it was when we done football it was almost a luxury then but now it almost is required host sectionals it's the expectation pretty much >> and it wasn't we felt good about it because we had done everything else before put turf down baseball softball field in a few years. We need to get in
353>> right and we're in that process and I I think as you sit and look at projects with this remaining bond money because it can be spent on the general improvements of all facilities. uh you'll be able to take care of some things that were on the priority list that I or on the list that I asked you to prioritize and then uh then be prepared to start making those next steps and make those decisions on what's going to be next and what's going to be most important. So >> the administrators give us those priorities >> there. They will. I just they've been so they didn't come back into the office until Monday and uh they've they've been working on other things. So >> I really think they can give you much better answers. >>
354Yeah. But >> they really >> Well, yes, but then also keep in mind that those working priority lists, those were lists made from Stephan walking around and talking to them or me walking around and talking to them. So they gave input as we kind of went through each of the buildings over the last year and a half, two years >> priority and some of those things already, >> right? Yeah. So some Yeah. All right. Anything else? I had a move. I had a I I had a motion to adjurnn and I had a second. I'll let this president ask for a >> Well, no, it's a work session. We don't have to. >> Oh, that's right. >> Uh but uh we've reached the the end of our effectiveness today. Uh so uh >> Yep. >>
355Thank you very much, everybody.