001All right, welcome to our April board meeting. We're going to go ahead and get started with our pledge and our prayer 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. Father, we thank you for this evening. Um, thank you for all those who are here with us tonight. Please be with those who are not here with us and I just pray that you will guide and direct us and help us to make good decisions for uh the community, the students and the staff. In your name we pray. Amen. All right. First on the is the approval of the agenda. We do have an addition um to the agenda under finance board action items. Letter F number
002two has been added um about the donation of gift cards. So with that addition made, we will need a motion to approve the agenda. I'll make a motion. All in favor? Opposed? Okay. Motion carries. Uh next we have approval of the minutes that you had uh emailed out to you. Uh we have the March 5th executive session, March 11th executive session, the regular board meeting um on March 11th, and the March 17th executive minutes. Um in looking through those, did anyone have any additions or corrections that needed to be made on those? Okay. If not, we'll need a motion to approve the minutes. I'll make that motion. I'll second. All in favor? I opposed. Okay, motion carries. Um, next we have public comments. And, um, I do have Mrs. Karen Colchen that would like to
003speak. And just as a reminder, I don't know if you've done it before, but we have five minutes that are allotted for people to speak. So, feel free right now. Yeah, right now. You can. This is your time. Well, as you said, I'm Karen. I've been a bus driver for approximately 34 years. The first 14 were with special needs and the last 20 on regular route. um beginning in 2005 when my regular route um became available and until the current elementary administration took over and especially started PBIS. I rarely if ever have had to consult or call upon a principal for help for any behavioral issues. The students knew the rules and were more easily reject redirected and most had a healthy fear aka respect for the principal's office. Now I could use assistance frequently
004and usually for the same students most of the time who know the rules and choose not to follow them because I believe they have no fear of any consequences ever being administered. After several reminders to these students of the rules they are to follow, I have to resort to my front seat as the only real consequence I can give. The front seats on my bus are supposed to be for the kindergarten students who are just learning the rules and proper bus behavior. It's hard to teach kindergarteners proper behavior when their seats are constantly being filled with older elementary students who choose not to behave. We have to do better. PBIS is not working. Not just on the bus, but I'm hearing from others in other positions in the school that is not working in classrooms
005either. When there used to be immediate action taken for misbehaviors, the problems were more likely to be resolved. These students who choose not to follow the rules also to refuse also refuse to accept any responsibility for their actions. Students must be given responsibilities. The choice to accept them is totally up to them. Codling is not the way to get them to accept responsibilities. Rewarding them for doing things that they should be doing anyways doesn't make sense. I'm all for giving thank yous and praise to help build self-esteem, but rewarding a student for one minute of so-called good behavior when they haven't followed any rules or direction for 34 minutes is insane to me. I have a great bunch of students, most of who are responsible and follow the rules. The other handful of students just
006don't seem to learn or take responsibility for their choices. I ask you, the school board, to look into how all this is being handled. My job and the job of the other bus drivers is to keep these students safe. This is becoming more difficult when we are constantly dealing with misbehavior. I can't imagine trying to teach in a classroom if these are the same students with the same misbehavior problems, which I can only assume they are. Elementary administration needs to address this and not believe in doing better. If students aren't learning to follow the rules or directions, how can they or others be learning anything in the classroom with all the disruption? Coming forward and speaking to you tonight, I feel not going to be in my favor if someone has to step forward. I'm
007not the only driver who feels that we're not doing well with PBIS. Please help us gain back the great status we used to have at the elementary level. And part two, this is my main concern. Do you, the board, know what the jet room is? Do you know what this room is used for? Is this room for all students? I don't really know the answer, but I do know what this room has been used for this school year. It's been used for a 12-year-old autistic child. Not just for minutes, but for long extended periods of time, often daily. I know this because this child was my great nephew. I can only imagine the terror he has felt in this barren room that has nothing in it at all. He doesn't have the cognitive ability to
008understand what's going on when someone, usually the special needs teacher, is holding the door securely shut with him inside alone pleading to be let out with the two words he put together. Pet out. pet out. These actions by the teacher have been observed numerous times by others in the hall, both students and adults. The elementary administration, I believe, is fully aware of these incidents and the following actions taken by the special needs teacher. Going through the proper chain of command has gotten the results. To parents, no results. Only when these concerns and issues were brought to the attention of our superintendent did any action for his child take place. Within days, our superintendent and the co-op had made the proper changes to protect this child. Until this school year started, this child has not had
009any behavior issues. I feel that he has been targeted because of unexplained injuries upon him last year. There was an inquiry by the elementary administration into how these injuries occurred with no answers given. I am concerned as well as the parents as to how a child with adult supervision at all times could get this kind of injury sustained and nobody knew how. I hope you the board will take immediate action in finding out what is going on in our intensive intervention program and its teacher and any other individuals who may be participants in any or which are heartbreaking. I believe this is abuse. We don't know how this has affected him emotionally. I don't know if this so-called behavior management has happened to any other students, past or present. As a parent, grandparent, aunt, uncle,
010or just being a human, I don't know how anyone could not find this kind of treatment to a child appalling and heartbreaking. I hope and pray that you, the board, will take action and do whatever investigation is needed to protect this child and all children in our school system. Seems to me that some changes need to be made. We are secluding special needs children for things they can't cognitively understand while we cuddle children who are capable of understanding and choosing not to follow expect expectations. Thank you for your time and consideration in these matters. Thanks for shing. Um, I can assure you that everybody up here does care about what happens to every child and and we will be asking some questions and and trying to get to the bottom of some things. So, thanks
011for for sharing those things with us. Okay, next we're going to move on to our um finance board action items. Uh first we have the approve approval of our payment vouchers and our fund reports that um Don has sent to us ahead of time to take a look at. Um I know you know there were some questions asked. We got some things answered. Um I don't know if anybody else um had you know any other questions or clarifications about anything that was in the vouchers this this month. Okay. If not, then we'll need a motion to approve the vouchers in the fund reports that we received. I'll make the motion. Second. All in favor? Opposed? Motion carries. Uh, next we have the approval of the 2026 budget calendar. And um Don provided us that last
012month I believe in the August and September and October dates are all dates that are uh regular board meeting um nights. And I don't know if anyone had any issues with any of those at this point in time. That's where they're going to stand, but if we need to change them closer to time, um sometimes we've changed in the past the August one because it's like our back to school night or something that that conflicts with scheduling. So, we'll just wait until we get a little closer if that's the case on that night. Um, but at this point in time, are those dates okay with everyone that are listed? Okay. Then we need a motion to approve the 2026 budget calendar. I'll make a motion. Second. All in favor? Opposed? Okay. Motion carries. Um, next
013we have our approval of our wage recommendation and this is just concerning Candy Stzman and the athletic office. Um, this is a temporary thing from March 26th right now until June 2nd. Um, this is just uh an increase that we have done in the past. Um, whenever she has picked up extra duties, increased workloads, responsibility just for a temporary time, um, we have in increased that hourly wage. So, we think it's only fair to do that again as we have done in the past for her for doing those extra things and we thank her for um stepping up and being able I know she's she's very capable of taking care of that office and and um managing things. So, um is there are there any questions about that? Um what that increase was or anything
014regarding that? All right. Then we need a motion to approve that wage um increase for her. I'll make a motion. Second. All in favor? Opposed? Motion carries. All right. Next, we have approval of contract. And this is one that I'm going to let Mrs. Accord speak about. It's called class intercom. And Debbie, you can just take it away there and explain. Um, so, uh, class intercom, um, we started looking at this because they have an archiving service. Um part of public records is you have to have um maintain records of all social media um and online activity. And so we currently use Civics Plus which archives anything on our official Adam Central page and our athletics. Um we went with this company. It was one of the only ones that we we uh knew about
015at the time. But as um time has changed, we've learned about a few other companies. And Cath Intercom is one that stood out to us. Number one, the price is significantly cheaper, but it also has a bunch of other services that are more friendly for schools that have to do with managing social media. So, um we all know that I do that um for our district along with other things. And one of the components of this, it allows people to um put an app on their phone so they can send stuff to me. So right now I get it through email, text message, people stop at an air droplet. And so it's a way to not only consolidate how um we more efficiently get posts made, but it's also um going to um meet our
016archival needs. Um we're asking to start that um now even Our other service does not end um until December for two reasons. Number one, that way we can have a good kickoff of being able to use that app, especially when teachers go on field trips and things for the upcoming year. But the other piece is just to make sure that archival um piece is in place before we should end our next contract. Um and uh it is a significant price difference. So, we thought taking a risk to start it now um to to make sure everything is what we need will save us so much money in the long run um that it's worth that chance. So, okay, that answers my question because that's what I was going to ask is why so much overlap.
017So, okay. So, I know we have um pages that we were sent that we looked at ahead of time. Um, did anybody have any questions for Debbie about what this new service will provide us or I mean the cost difference was yeah significant much yeah much savings. So it's hard to test any archival service until you have data to test it. So, um the risk of switching to something without having an overlap and then realizing it's not doing what we need um is a risk that um has been advised by many other PR professionals to avoid. Okay. Is this like a locked in price or is this going to like go up every year? Do you do you have information on that? Um at this point it's at least a fiveyear locked in price. Um
018uh the other thing I think it's important to point out is um this is unlimited posts and comments. Um Civics Plus is a tiered one. So anytime we post and the number of comments that people post we have no control of but that counts towards our usage statistics and this year because we have been posting more and um especially around um going to state this year um has really brought our numbers up. So, we're actually on the cusp of getting moved up to a higher tier, which is another thing that kind of motivated us to look at some other options. So, makes sense. Anyone else have any any uh questions or concerns? Okay. Thank you, Debbie. If not, then we'll need a motion to approve the class intercom contract and that will start uh immediately.
019Debbie is that or I mean like May May. Okay. I'll make that motion. I'll second. All in favor? Opposed? Great. Motion carries. Um, next we have the approval of grants and the first one um is the Perkins Education Readiness Grant and Mr. Mallister, do you want to speak about that? Yeah, so the Commission for Higher Education working with Kexus Indiana um on the education manufacturing readiness grant um they had x x millions of dollars and we're offering plenty of money out for um projects. So, we applied to expand our um robotic arms in the advanced manufacturing room. There's been interest in those and that specific set of robotic arms is a certified um a recognized indust industrial certificate through the state of Indiana. Um, so we got more so we can get more kids on
020that because um once they go through the coursework for that, they can sit for the national certification test and become level one operators in that um specific arm which um that has specific local interest because both Micromatic and Bird and Star Engineering use that brand. Um and the programming u the programming controller is universal. So the same controller they learn on goes to all the different types of arms throughout um the brand's catalog. Um so it's just a great opportunity for our advanced manufacturing kids to get one more piece of certification through that program. Um and we have local community members that or sorry community members local um community partners that are very excited about that um potential um and kids are getting excited about it because they've gone and visited and seen the yellow
021arm in other places. So, um, that's huge for Adam. We're excited for that. And you you took part in writing this, correct? Am I correct on that? We wrote Yeah, we wrote the great Thank you for doing that because what it wasund was 115,000,000. Yeah. So, that's great that we can give that opportunity to our kids. Yeah. Because right now, you can only get up to two on it at a time really to be functional like for kids to look over each other's shoulder to program. So, having more gets more kids in practice. Yeah. Okay. Um, and that I know that that kind of was the same the Don Wood Foundation, a separate grant. Um, I believe Mr. Jones submitted that one and that's one was I believe $25,000 for advanced manufacturing um equipment as
022well. I don't know if there's anything else that you would like to add about that. I'm not sure. Uh, those are going to be tabletop trainers. So, they're smaller versions of machines that South Adams has for their machine trade program. And so, um, that's just to help, um, build interest in other areas of, um, the trades. Um, with our partnership with area 18 and local schools, we try to protect each other's, um, programming, but also help each other out. So, um, as part of that, um, the teacher from South Adams has agreed to a couple times a week or a couple times a month zoom in and and give some instruction on those trainers to help just get more experience, um, to our kids in the advancement program. Okay. Um, do you know about how
023many kids we typically have in those classes? Just an idea. I'm just curious how many students. Yeah, we have about 20 in in right now. That's in the introductory level in the capstone, which is it's a two-year, but we have about 20 to Okay. All right. Sounds good. Um, for the grants then, um, we do have to to go ahead and and vote to approve those. So, oh, I'm sorry. Did anybody have any questions about those grants? All right, then we will need a motion to approve those and I we'll just do those two together. I'll make a motion. I'll second. All in favor? Opposed? Okay, motion carries. Um, next we have uh two donations. Um, the first one is sock donations from Shoe Sensation. And I don't know if anyone has any further information
024on that one or or got any further information on that one. So, it's not something that has started yet, but it is something that Shoe Sensation is wanting to run um where they will have donations brought in to the store and then they would want to bring them into the school so that we can distribute them to the kids that need them. and whatever surplus we have from them then we can donate to whatever other organizations. Okay. So I just All right there. So thank you to Shoes Shoe Sensation for um thinking of us as part of that. So um we'll go ahead and do that donation and then we'll work on the second one. So we need a motion to approve this the sock donations when they do come. I'll make that motion. I'll
025second. All in favor? I opposed. Okay, motion carries. Um, next we had um a situation where we had some contractors um I think it was W MII Morris sheet metal, Votal Electric and Wan that we need to thank for their generosity. Um Todd, would you like to speak on that? I know that you you gave us an email about that. Yeah, the the guys especially the plumbers felt bad. Abby all in the special needs went without drain lines for like six weeks while we replaced that drain line and they all felt bad for her. So showing some appreciation that Abby was a trooper through it all. They just collected all the scrap debris that they recycled and whatever money they got out of that they they bought gift cards and give to Abby to use
026in her room. So it's pretty cool. That's very kind of them to think of of her in that. And I know that that probably was an inconvenience, but I'm sure she handled it well. She never complained one day. So, okay. All right. Well, maybe one day. All right. So, we do need to um have a motion to approve the donation of gift cards that were given to um Mrs. OG's room. I'll make a motion. Did you do it? I'll second. All in favor? I opposed. Okay, motion carries. Um, next we have the approval to dispose and these are some cafeteria surplus miscellaneous items and I don't know if you guys would like to speak about anything that's on that list. I know we got pictures and and listed everything for us. So, thank you. Um,
027uh, no, they're just things that are old that we don't use anymore. like we sent you napkin dispensers and stuff. We have new napkin dispensers. Uh there are some pumps and stuff um and some tables that go with the pumps. Uh we don't use those anymore because the government wants us to have everything in certain sizes. Uh usually one oz sizes. So technically we can't really use those anymore. Um the reason why we're doing it is because GFS has uh asked us to um order during the summer to help them. So in August and September it's not such a big load for them and uh they're asking us to order so much product and then in return everything else that we buy from August until June. Uh we get 1% back as credit. So we're
028trying to clean up and get rid of stuff so we can have enough room to put all this extra stuff that we're going to order. It's mostly going to be cans and like plastic silverware and stuff like that, but um just non-p perishable food items and stuff that we're trying to figure out where we can put it all. So, um and we're just asking if we can get rid of it. Yeah. Well, thanks for doing all the work, ladies and cleaning out, too, and having the staff do that because that will help us in the long run to be saving. So, we appreciate that. All right, we need a motion. Well, I just want Are they like Luan King's auctions? Is that where they're going to take that stuff? Uh, yeah, some of it maybe.
029We'll see. It's not really anything of much value. So, all right. We'll need a motion to um approve disposing of the cafeteria surplus items. I'll make the motion. We'll second. All in favor? Opposed? Okay, motion carries. Um, next we have the uh the policy board action items and we have the approval of the calendar. Um, we have already approved the 2526 calendar. This is just adding the graduation date as June 7th. Um, that is just the soonest with the last day of the way the last day of school falls. That's the quickest we could actually have graduation um for that year. So um any are there any questions about that or anything else on the calendar that I know we have approved it but if anything else has come up. All right then we will
030need a motion to approve that graduation date being added on that calendar second. All in favor? Opposed? Okay, motion carries. All right, we have several overnight and out of state trips here. Um, and I'm just going to go ahead and list those off and if anyone wants to mention anything about them, that's great. We do we did get quite a bit of information about each trip um is sent in to us. Um, but we have a varsity baseball going to Easter and High School in Greentown on April 11th and 12th. We have an FFA leadership center trfoger, Indiana, April 25th and 26th that the FFA will be going to. AP statistics and physics is going to Cedar Point on May 9th. Uh the FFA again is this going to the state livestock con contest in
031Lebanon, Indiana on May 2nd and 3rd. BPA, we have some students that made it to nationals again. I think was it six students or I was trying to six or seven. Okay. Yeah. So, we have they're going to Orlando, Florida, May 6th through through 11th. And then we have a couple field trips here. 7th grade Ohio Caverns in Liberty, Ohio on May 16th. And then the the annual eighth grade Cedar Point trip for um those eighth graders on May 29th. And then the FFA state convention is in West Lafayette um June 15th through 19th. So, busy organizations, busy end of the school year. Um, did anyone in looking over those requests that we received have any questions about any of the specific trips or um field trips or contests that the students are going to?
032I think we'd probably all like to go to Orlando with the BPA group and see them perform. That would be fun. All right. If there are no questions, then um we do need a motion to approve those those trips. I'll make the motion. Second. All in favor? Opposed? Okay. Motion carries. Um personnel board action items. We have approval to hire. Um the first one we have is Mrs. Cara Dot. Warner, who I know is is currently teaching for us. And this is for middle school, high school facts and art for 2526. And um Mrs. Ish, do you want to add anything to that? Or I'm really excited um to ask for parents to be approved. Um this allows two of our teachers to be able to work part time, stay home with their young children.
033And um Cara is very experienced. They've been doing it this school year this semester. So we were able to try it out to make sure it's seen the most for the students and it's just worked really well. Okay. All right. Um, anybody on the board have any questions for Mrs. Wish about that? The students seem to do okay with it this semester, like having a teacher, a different teacher. I have not had any student come to me with any concerns about it. The teachers, they seem like it's going pretty smoothly as well. They plan really well together. Um, so I've not heard of any concerns. All right. Is there a motion to approve the hiring of Mrs. Warner? I'll make a motion. I'll second. Okay. All in favor? I opposed. Okay. Motion carries. Um, next
034we'll move to Mrs. Miss Carly Black and she is being recommended as a grade three long-term sub. She'll be coming in for Mrs. Christy Beer who will be on a leave of absence for a while. So we look forward to having Harley that position your approval. Okay. Is there a motion to approve Miss Black for that position? I like the motion. Second. All in favor? Opposed? All right. Motion carries. Next, we have Miss Alyssa Feer and um she would like to be our elementary girls on the run volunteer coach. And I think we've got that recommendation from you, Miss Paula. She um would just be leading a group of elementary girls. They I think they spent four Mondays after school running. They actually ran um they'll run a a 5K at the end just talk
035a lot about confidence and self-confidence um as they they're running. encouraging and empowering girls those girls just to be the best they can be. So Melissa would like to volunteer to lead that for our students. Okay, sounds like a good program and I think we've done that for quite a few years now, right? We've had that. Can I also add Maddie Gerber and Madison are high school students who would like to help just come along and track girls and cross country girls that would like to run with the young ladies. Okay. All right. Is there a motion um to approve Miss Alyssa Feer for that position? Make a motion. Second. All in favor? Opposed? Okay. Motion carries. Um lastly, we have Mr. Greg Puit and this would be for a volunteer baseball coach position that
036we have. There any questions or discussion on that? If not, we'll need a motion. I'll make a motion. I'll second. All in favor? Opposed? Okay, motion carries. Um, next we have our administrator reports and we'll start with Mrs. McCulla. Um, first of all, I just want to thank our title staff tonight. We had a STEM night for grades three through five. um sponsored by our title staff. Uh worked hard getting that ready, but science central came in. The students got to put together circuits, um experiment with lots of different things. So, there was a lot of enjoyment down in the cafeteria tonight. Um I want to thank all of our subs first of all. It's not easy to these days to get subs in our building. Um but we are so appreciative of the ones
037we have. I also want to thank our staff. Um because when we don't have subs, they are willing to make changes to their schedules. They things so that we can cover our student classes and carry on as as needed. So, we've had a lot of great cooperation and teamwork from our staff. So, I appreciate that. Um, and then just we are gearing up for I learn of our summitive test here for grades three to five beginning next week. So, ready to show off the hard work that they've done all year both staff and students. Okay. Thank you. All right. Middle and high school. Well, as you see on the field trips and activities coming up. It's that time of year. We also have a lot of testing um in between these field trips. So, middle
038school will be starting learn as well and then our AP test almost as soon as um we're done with high school, we'll start with some of our AP tests. So, um lots of testing from here until the end of the year. Um we want to congratulate the musical students and Mrs. Johnson, those of you who went to see the musical, it was very well done. Um so, and I know it takes a tremendous amount of work. I want to recognize all of their hard work as well. The band Chicken Barbecue is on Saturday from 4:00 to 7:00 with the student performance from 4:30 to 6:30. So, we want to make sure that everybody is aware of that as well. Um, and then a lot of planning um this year still looking at graduation, getting everything
039ready for that and looking at next year. I think probably twothirds of my conversations right now are still on this year. About onethird of them are starting to look at what's going on next year with scheduling and um different changes that will be made. So, um it's obviously a very busy time of year for everyone. Um but people are doing great staying in business mode, getting, you know, a lot of learning. Everyone just is going with it. So, we appreciate that. Okay. Thank you, Todd. Well, the day-to-day operations, everything's going good. Um end of year stuff already. I can't believe that. Um it's really starting all the programs and all that. Um we're getting our summer crews set, everything ready to go for summer cleaning. Um we got the one big elementary project. We had
040a meeting today um on that. The HBAC stuff upgrades. So um that's all go. Um the weather has been kind of a pain last couple weeks trying to do anything outside. it looks like next week um is finally going to change for us. Um the 400 wing is really winding down. I mean, we're in the finishing stages now. We're actually to the point where we're waiting on stuff to get done. Um cabinets are all hung. Um some of the tops come in today for yesterday. All the HBAC heat pumps have all been started up. Um they're not running yet. We're waiting till the dirt and stuff gets down a little bit to start those to get them online. Whiteboards are up. The electricians are pretty much done other than the low voltage stuff and they'll
041be the last ones in there right before it's turned over to us. Um, it looks like we're going to get it by end of May turned over to us. So, it's about a month ahead of schedule. So, that'll give us June and July for me and the IT team to get in there and get things ready to go. Um, I think Katie and us, we got a furniture thing going. Um, so yeah, the 400 wings really coming together. Um, the pool we run into some issues with the paint peeling underneath. Um, and they don't want to put the new epoxy on until we get that problem figured out. So, they did some tests this week. Um, I have not got the total results back. It's just starting to come in, but we'll talk about that
042at the job meeting Thursday if anybody's interested. When you say pool, do you mean the actual pool itself or? No, the in in the uh auditorium, the walls. That's what um structural steel. Um I told Joel they'd be done this week. I was mistaken. It's going to be probably next week. They're working up in the gutters to beef that up for the new rooftop unit cuz it's a lot bigger. Um they should be done next week. Uh HVAC is as far as they can go as well as electrical. Um, the pool guys, pool equipment guys are here starting to install the pool equipment. Um, it's all very technical, so I hope Jason understands that stuff. All the concrete work inside finished. The old rooftop's been removed, so it's progressing along good. That's all I got.
043Thank you for staying on top of it for us. It's a lot to take care of. Yep. Okay. All right. Um, we do not have a superintendence report tonight. Um, any other matters from the board that you would like to speak about or circle back to? We do have PTO donuts with dad in the morning. We do starts at 7:15 and goes through 8:00. So, yes, all all dads and special gentlemen with their students. Okay. Okay. Um, yeah, we've gone over lots of things tonight. Hopefully we can get these spring sports like really actually started outside with this weather. Um, but I just want to say good luck to the VPA students. That's a big trip to take and an honor to go. And then I know the FFA has their banquet Friday night this
044week. Um, so awards and different things will happen there. So, um, we're proud of them, too. They have lots of contests going on. Um, anything else from the board? If not, we'll need a motion to adjourn the meeting. I'll make that motion. It's okay. All in favor? I opposed. All right. Our next meeting is scheduled for Tuesday, May 13th, 7 o'clock. Thanks for coming tonight.