001into order may we stand for the pl 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 may we have roll calls confirm we have a legal meeting withum Mr SS Dr Woods Dr moud Mr Johnson and I am pres all pres with a meeting with all five members present we have a forum and IL legal meeting let's move on to it number two on our agenda that would be approval of tonight's agenda I entertain a motion please have a second moved inly second is there any discussion on tonight's agenda hearing none all in favor say I I any oppos agenda has approved let's move to item number three Chelsea Gary ready
002snap shots please good evening good evening school board members Dr STS and this amazing Community both in person and virtually for those of you who are attending your very first school board meeting I'd like to share with you that we have a special part of the program each month called Gary snapshots this is the time where we're able to share good news updates and all types of positive things that are happening in the district so shall we begin the first thing we want to talk about is the launch of the literacy initiative our first lady Crystal Melton came over to the district and assisted with the training of our first Cadre of volunteers as we know literacy is the foundation by which our children learn everything else and so we are ramping up a partnership
003with the first lady and she is actively seeking volunteers to read to our young people on a consistent basis throughout the district later in the Schoolboard meeting Dr Cynthia Treadwell our chief academic officer will elaborate further on this initiative what the outcomes are going to be and how individuals can get involved in this newly launched initiative the first lady has not joined us but should she join us we certainly want to acknowledge her and we can give her a round of applause at this time just for partnership that we are so looking forward to moving on Miss witon see if we have any of the other members are are present there are there any other participants of the literacy initiative here so would you please stand oh thank you we give you all a round
004of applause as well we can have him come up if they want to say a word yes I'd love to invite them up because we well know their impact in the community Mrs Kelly I am not familiar with one of the young ladies so we'll ask that you introduce yourself and then we have Mrs Joselyn Kelly owner proprietor and Visionary of Jay's Breakfast Club good evening we we re I received a call and I said yes I think it is very important for our students to see what they could potentially grow to be being a proud product of the Gary Community School Corporation graduate L Wes High School it is my responsib Duty and privilege to participate in such a program like this and I would encourage others to take time to come and participate
005as well thank you hello and good evening for those of you that do know me hi again and for those that don't my name is Latrice farmer I am a longtime Gary resident I've done a lot of work in digital marketing branding and uh pretty much work for myself I am uh always interested in literacy a lot of times we think really big on how we need to fix things but sometimes you just need to read a book to somebody and I think that looking at it that way we'll tackle a bigger problem I think that uh we'll be able to solve a lot of these issues with the scores just by starting out seeing where some of the gaps are and i' like to be I'm so happy that um I was able to
006be a part of supporting that thank thank you I stand corrected I do remember you now miss farmer so great to see you and there are many others who have been and will be participating so we look forward to Dr treswell presentation with more details but there's more great news to share please mark your calendars for Monday March 17th we are having our third installment of listen and learn but with a Twist this time we have implemented both an enrollment and career fair so so there's a dual purpose in that you can enroll your child in the Gary Community School Corporation and you can also explore opportunities to join our amazing team as an employee we have more than 60 opportunities listed at Gary schools.org and so on Monday from 3:15 to 5:15 we are
007inviting our community to come out and apply for these positions as well as make your intent known for your child to return to the next school year and or enroll your child newly with all of our representatives from every school in the district that will be there and then there's the good part at the conclusion of the enrollment and career fair we will recess for light Refreshments over into the cafeteria where you will get the opportunity to meet our entire leadership team led by our superintendent Dr yon Stokes we will make presentations about updates that are taking place in our individual departments and then we will have a question answer period as well as a meet and greet so it's a robust agenda but with purpose again bringing the community in as a side note
008I am just getting off the highway from Lafayette Indiana where I attended a teacher recruitment fair and we have a lot of young people who are coming out of the schools who are ready to be teachers and we let them know that only the best and brightest will be welcome into our district and so this is an off shoot of those types of initiatives that we are doing so we ask the community to please share this information we have flyers on the table upon your departure to let people know that we are hiring we are enrolling and we are growing and thriving listen and learn next up who doesn't love a nice repeat the students of Westside Leadership Academy have retained their title as champions of the still City knowledge bow I was there along
009with my good colleague Mr Jeffrey Smith who hosted The Still City knowledge Bowl which is held at Indiana University Northwest and our students came prepared and represented the district well there's a traveling trophy involved but as you know the trophy need not travel it stays right at Westside Leadership Academy so I'd like to congratulate Carl Scott all the sponsors and the young people who are part of that team many of them were freshman last year they're sophomores now so we're just going to claim a three repeat for next February but definitely do a Google Search and also check our social media Platforms in that there was an abundance of media coverage around this event and even one National hit as our children were featured in Rolling Out magazine can we give them another round of
010applause West Side Leadership Academy travel back if you will for us band members one of the highlights of our high school careers are professional competitions where we get the opportunity to interface with other high schools from across the state and showcase our talents well Westside Leadership Academy students participated in the isma competition which is the Indiana State Music Association competition and they brought back the gold in certain categories and I'd like to invite you the podium my colleague Mr DeAndre teer senior who is our band instructor plays all every instrument in the band he is an HBCU graduate and he is a member of the musical fraternity and so much more I had a chance to talk to him and we reminisced on our show a day in the district where he talked about how
011passionate he is about leading these young young people down state and showcasing their talents and then I think we have a special presentation from our young people thereafter please welcome Mr DeAndre teer senior uh greetings everyone uh to the board Dr Stokes uh I just want to first thank you all for this opportunity uh secondly uh it's been a pleasure being here in Gary back home born and raised uh giving back to the community uh been at Westside since 2019 uh and it's been it's been a journey uh got a lot of kids scholarships to universities of course historically black colleges and universities as well as the predominantly white institutions um my goal is to just build the program here um bring B back to Gary I'm pretty sure if you are Gary native you
012you were under Dr Carter Miss Dylan Mr streets Mr Ray Phillips uh so many different legends that are still with us in those transition um it is my pleasure to present to you all a flute Trio um that uh three of my students have performed at isma they brought back a gold medal each of them also have their own individual gold medal for their solo that they did as well um so I hope you all enjoy it and again thank you all for the opportunity excuse me for just one moment I want to make an announcement there is a gray Dodge pickup that is parked in a No Parking Zone it's um possibility it will be told if you have a gr Dodge pick up please move it at this time thank you I would
013love for you all to come in just introduce you all names and grade and you know tell them just a little bit about your experience in hello my name is Natalie Packer and I'm in 11th grade and um I really like B I'm and I'm in 10th Grade um I really like being to it's been an awesome experience hi my name is Alicia Thomas I'm a 10th grader uh and I could definitely say my experience in band has been fun I want to play more instruments and I think I'm going to another round of applause as a former first chair West Side band member class of 19 I applaud you all that see that this Legacy is still going we are so proud of you Mr sugs I'm all done it's back over to the
014board thank you thank you item number four on our agenda is item for public comments Mr Johnson would you read the comment information statement pursuant to I indm code 5-14-16 the gar Community School Corporation Board of Trustees welcomes comments from the community as a result the agenda for each regular meeting provides time for public expression this period of public expression is going of 3 minutes per individual and 30 minutes total discussion of items on the agenda or to express concerns relative to the operation of school City School Board actions and other items of General educational interest if there are many people wishing to address the board we may limit the amount of time person may speak comments shall be directed to the board not to individual board members statements shall not be abusive or argumented
015persons making comments should not debate statements made by other persons I shall not be permissible to orally present or discuss complaints against individual employees of gear Community School Corporation at any border School trustees meetings issues relating Personnel individual circumstances or an individual school will be referred to the building principal or an appropriate administrator in an attempt to resolve the issue prior to an appeal before the board speaker cannot transfer their remaining time to another person board president will enforce these rules and may take actions necessary to maintain order at the meeting such actions may include but are not Lim to interrupting the speaker if the statement is too LLY unduly repetitive or otherwise violates the rules the president May terminate the address of any speaker who violates these rules limit the total amount of time
016devoted to public comments if there's a large number of people wishing to address the board or if there's a large agenda of other business before the thank you sir I apologize in advance if I mispronounced the nameera Jones close thank you hi everyone I am Piana Jones um parent of Lark Academy recent parent of a West graduate who's now at Howard University to get him there I was a very involved parent um went out on Thursday nights and fed the football team came back on Friday made sandwiches made them at home fed them it took parent involvement we do not have that at glimp I have spoke with principles teachers the parent Le sign and everybody sends me to somebody else I just want a PTA started that's all I'm asking for I need help
017get Lake SW good evening B Dr Stokes uh my name is Blake sart I work with Indiana landmarks um a historic preservation nonprofit I work with Miss un Miss trod um the black her preservation program and we involved in the Gary Roosevelt uh development um and property um inventory at the school I'm just here to uh lend my support for the um approval of six item 6.2 on the agenda tonight for the um air quality assessment that we requesting done at the property this would greatly um assist our efforts in having Volunteers in the building safely and also uh when and if we get to the point to bring potential developers in it would be um really administrational to know that the a um is clean and safe to walk around and if it's not
018um how to mitigate exposure to any harmful um mold or anything else in in the property so I'm just here to um blend my support uh thank the board and school district for all their help so far and um any questions or anything please send them uh to back to landmarks Robert bugs good evening boy Dr Stokes Rob bugs uh I have two or three things I want to talk about one is there's a teacher that her name was LE Lei Eda Smith that talk to the G Community School Corporation for 60 years and I suggested that they give us some kind of recognition and I was told that other people have had that much time also but I was asking for her since I got a s to Meer and I think it's a
019disgrace to say but we have others too what all of them anybody that teach for the G Community School Corporation for over 50 years should be acknowledged the other thing is uh I've been getting 4 requests for public records since 2018 this is the first time that I've been charged for to get copies it's not like I get hundreds and hundreds of copies and I was advised that only here it says uh 10 cent per copy but it says the ATC Al call the back commission charge 10 cent for copy so it just doesn't look good that I'm asking for copies and all of a sudden after all of this time I have to pay I don't mind pay but it's just a thought of it why now is it because I'm asking for something
020that the school don't want to give me and this is a way of punishing me or something I don't like that the other thing is one of my PR request this board has voted not to hear expulsion cases what you are doing board is denying due process to a student that's being expelled your handbook said that there's a process that you may go through and part of that process is you go through the chain of command and the last one being the board now if you all have voted not to hear an expulsion then you denying the process of a student that's been and I know two students that have been illegally expelled so you all are condoning that and I brought it to your attention before this is wrong every student has a right
021to do process if he's going to be expelled now we talk about what the white people do to the black people but look what the board is doing you denying a young man a woman a right to have new process that is wrong and I'm here to tell officially to you that that is wrong and also the charging for the 10 cents for you you you you also look like you try to run the public away discourage them from being a part of the process thank you Bruce Curry first of all thank you I like to say to the public GL to see everybody here parents teachers um security and the board and uh Miss St uh first of all I just want to let you know there has been excellent cooperation with the community
022uh I've talked to my members uh constantly at our NAACP meetings and we have been strongly supporting each other right now it's uh it's a time that uh educ ation is under attack and I think you see it you seen in the news everywhere we have to be together we got to work the issues that are about the students students first that's what we got to do I lived through a time where there was no school board it was done by the state but it was in the 50s again Nine Girls integrated to school in Aransas right now we are under attack so we can't be fighting each other we have to work together we did that on Bill 1136 I want to compliment Miss juet Juan Stokes Dr Stokes for her note and for
023the collaboration meetings we had with the community to say that with Jerry now can come keep going with his public school we can talk to the community about increasing in the enrollment we brought all the students in Gary to go to Gary's big school whatever that is which is Westside now and all we want that you got to put the word at because it's enough Economic Development coming back to Gary that we need these students in the future I was at nesby 15,000 student run convention in Chicago they had pre-ol initiatives and other things going on and our students of Gary they they know about Gary Strong and stem I think belly stem and all that so we have to keep on keep that going because right now there's a project the mayor had the
024other day called building a Convention Center building hotels who you think is going to be doing that it's our kids in three categories one being kids going to college kids getting skill trade could be Military Support so and that gets us into the security area so all I'm encouraging we must support each other I know uh Dr U Vanessa McLoud has a list everybody in this room needs to sign that list because we got to get these quick wins in G as far as economic development seeing buildings go up it's about our students so all the little nonsense I heard that I was just sitting back about a pencil a pen I let him use my cop he's gone now but I'm going let you know we can't be talking about that kind of stuff
025we need to I'm sorry my time is at thank you we will move oh my name is Bruce Curry uh NAACP re me from Johnson Johnson and Caron thank you we will move on to item number five on our agenda consent agenda um Mr chair I'd like to make a motion to approve items 5.1 through 5.5 I'll second a motion on the floor and properly second to approve consent agenda items 5.1 through 5.5 any discussion on this motion hearing no discussion may I have roll call for approval Please Mr SS yes Dr Woods yes Dr MCL yes Mr Johnson yes can I say yes V is 5 to Z with a vote of 5 to Z the motion carries we will move on to the introduction of director curriculum and assessment Mrs willon good evening
026once again members of the board Dr Stokes and the community this is also another great part of the school board meetings when we're able to introduce another great member of our so please allow me to welcome our director of curriculum and assessment Dr reita Craig Dr Craig is a seasoned educational leader with 27 years of experience in various leadership roles including a Junior High Principal an elementary principal an assistant principal special education director and high school special education teacher she's a recognized transformational leader and she has successfully driven culture and climate improvements in multiple schools she specializes in staff development schoolwide behavior management team building and fostering strong connections with parents and the community at large her expertise also extends to curriculum development and instructional leadership ensuring high quality inclusive learning learning experiences that meet
027the diverse needs of our students I could go on but I'd like to add that she holds a doctorate in educational leadership from the University of St Francis a master's in educational leadership from Concordia University in Chicago and a bachelor's degree in special education from Eastern Illinois University and Beyond her professional Endeavors she enjoys singing Fitness walking and running and she's the proud mother mother of two daughters imman and Jordan as well as a devoted grandm grandmother to her grandson Cameron please join me and welcoming my new colleague our new team member director of curriculum and assessment Dr Vita good evening Dr s good evening School Board of Education thank you so much for this opportunity to work for Gary Community School Corporation I want to thank Dr Trent will it's been a pleasure getting
028to know you so far and I am very much so looking forward to working under meet your leadership and your toage I am very excited um to uh fulfill the position and the role of director of curriculum and assessment I am so excited to use my skills my strengths and my abilities to be able to um work alongside Dr Treadwell to create a curriculum that is very strong for our district to increase our student achievement and also something that our students will be able to enjoy as well so thank you very much item six on our agenda action items um item 6.1 Mr Richards good evening board members Dr stoes and to the community members that are here today um I would like to call your attention to uh the ukg HR Service delivery application
029and platform which we are um asking for approval for the contract approval of the signing of the contract to upgrade our Workforce and time management system for um from Nova time to UK CH So currently uh we're using Nova time which is going to the software Nova time is going to expire in June 30th uh of this year and that will in fact that will um that will uh it will uh it will stop the uh tracking of employee work hours attendance and payroll and also in 2018 we started using Nova time so now um ukg has bought out no time and it will now become obol and incompatible so in that case we will face uh extreme pain points and the incompatibility will affect uh the hr's ability to track ATT and definitely affect
030the approval information of both finance and payroll this will not only affect the uh portions of finance and payroll but it will also uh trickle down to manual processes between uh the attendance of payroll uh one person will have to do manual processing and and put in 645 records per pay period and not only that but the teachers will have to um either sign in Via clock via laptop or via um just a regular piece of paper Okay so the district looked at three platforms to uh resolve this problem la which is one but uh La quoted just a little bit too much out of the budget on top of that it had integration issues and thirdly it was not cloud-based uh front line came along and gave a better solution but it did not
031have the full payroll management uh levels that we needed and so it also was not budget friendly and then we would have had to have a third party to integrate the uh Frontline application with all the applications in the district ukg on the other hand uh gave us brought us to what we need which is the company that brought out uh brought out no time so number one it gives us a 30% employee monthly cost savings secondly it collaborates with the gcss uh finance software allow and the time clocks align with industry standards and it includes finger print and verification okay so we're requesting that the board approve the ukg contract for GC uh gcc's Workforce and timekeeping system thank you thank you any questions board members see no questions I'll entertain a motion I'll
032make a motion to approve contract motional form I have second second it's been moved in property second any discussion on this matter he no discussion may we have roll call for approval Please Mr Suggs yes Dr Woods yes Dr ml yes Mr Johnson yes and I say yes as well with a vote of 5 to zero motion carries thank you sir thank you item 6.2 on our agenda uh Miss troter got a little h of myself apologize uh m trer is not able to be here tonight so I'm speaking on her behalf um we not Happ to answer any questions about the the contract or any sorry I know that you shared during um the time when we had when you were able to give public comments can you just share a little bit for
033sake of record keeping sure about this proposal that you're asking for people uh so we are requesting again um for Environmental study a basic environmental study of here Roosevelt High School uh to better understand if there are any needs uh for air quality mitigation throughout the building as many of you probably know there's a lot of material paper material fabric um and the building's been closed for a long time without any hbac um or or air quality checking um since the building was closed so I've been in there several times and uh in the cold and in the warm weather and it's definitely probably mold in some places definitely in the lower levels um and then if we're going to be moving a lot of material around it's very important that any of our volunteers
034or uh potential developers you know understand uh if we need uh PPE or any other um protections to make sure people are kept safe and I understand based on the proposed contract that there is no charge to G commity schools Corporation that's my understanding as well what process will you utilize to do this uh environmental assess uh that's a good question I don't know the absolute details of the type of testing that will be done uh from what I've been told it is a very high level air quality uh testing they're not going to be taking cores or samples or anything like that just to see if it's safe to make sure it's safe to be in there breathing the air since it's not being actively circulated board members any other questions I entertain a
035motion on this item so move we have a second second been moved and properly second uh any discussion on the motion hearing no discussion may we have roll call for approval please yes Mr s yes Dr Woods yes Dr McLoud yes Mr Johnson yes I say yes as well with a vote of five in favor and zero against motion carries thank you sir thank you very much item 6.3 Mr cwell good evening board Dr ston Community um before you this evening on the agenda we have uh two contracts uh one for fire service monitoring and one for Burglar Alarm Monitoring and uh how these came about where we were notified by dgf which is the Department of local government finance that a new requirement came about starting in January 2025 that requires us to upload
036our Burglar Alarm contract and our fire service monitoring contract into the gateway system um with that we sat down with our current um vendor for fire service and Burg larm which is American Eagle we um got some new contracts drafted and signed by them um and the dgf did give us an extension to get this uploaded into the gateway system um so this time I would request for approval for the two contracts for so Mo second yes I'm sorry I wanted to interject he is actually covering 6.3 and 6.4 yes motion on the floor to approve the burglar burglar and fire alarms is there a second second it's been moved in properly second any discussion on this motion the contract the length of time of the contract the three-year contracts and there is no increase
037to the uh the fee the fees remain the same for all the buildings thank you any additional discussion on this matter may we have roll call for approval Please Mr sus yes Dr Wood yes Dr M yes Mr Johnson yes I say yes as well with a vote of five in favor and zero against the motion carries to approve the fire alarm for the burglar system the alarm system for the burglar and Fire Systems thank you item 6.5 field conference experience so basically we are asking the board if they will approve experiences that we believe are important so that our staff are able to develop their skill sets to better service our students you have a document in the back of your page the very last page that lists some of the field experiences that
038we are proposing thank you like to ask the board members do you have any questions on the experiences listed hearing no questions may we have a motion please Mo there's a motion on the floor may I have a second second it's been moved in properly second to accept the field experience and approve those experiences any discussion on this motion hearing no discussion may we have roll call for approval Please Mr s yes Dr Woods yes Dr McLoud yes Mr Johnson yes can I say yes as well with a vote of five in favor and zero against the fielded experience has been approved thank you item 6.6 Dr Stokes please yes thank you all right as you know um we bring what we call the administration templates the 1,000 series deals with administrative information it is
039s in many Fashions to some of the information that we brought you that dealt with our teachers however we have to do by law a first reading and a second reading um this is our second reading and might I add this is our last policy series that we need to bring and in the future we will just bring revisions of which one I actually have to date we will bring revisions according to Indiana kod it is being revised and um we will then start working on administrative guidelines with that being said um we listed again the administrative policies and if there is any particular policy that you see on the screen that you would like me to explain or expand upon I'd be glad to do that at this time if not I want to
040go ahead and move to the next policy and then ask you to approve 6.6 and 6.7 with one vote or if you choose Cho to separate out 6.7 this policy actually is a modification request of our finance policy 6325 which deals with Federal grant funds and what we call Micro purchases during an audit of which many of our board members were present for the findings in that particular audit finding they asked that we increase what we call the micro purchases from 10,000 which is with the board had approved to 50 ,000 so we're asking at this time to modify an already approved board policy to the threshold up to $50,000 with that being said um I give back to the board for approval thank you Dr Stokes I'd like to ask the board members if
041they have any questions on item 6.6 or 6.7 I will entertain a motion for approval of those two policies thousand series and the finance policy please make a motion to approve 6.6 6.7 a motion on the I have a second second it's been moved in properly second any discussion on the motion may we may we have roll call to approve uh the two the motion on the floor to approve 6.6 and 6.7 yes Mr SS yes Dr Woods yes Dr ml yes Mr Johnson yes can I say yes as well with a vote of five yes and zero against administrative policy and Finance policies have been approved thank you item seven on our agenda information items I'd like to call Mr Richard back up please thank you again uh board and Dr Stokes and community
042members um today I would like to recall your attention to the last board meeting that we had where we discussed the uh tcsc wi area network project we talked about um having a cost savings for the uh internet and after being in the uh uh district for a while here now for well for a while but for about 3 weeks seems like a while H but um I got a chance to understand the internet a little bit better than I uh did when I first came so we go to the next slide we could build a more secure and more reliable Network by retaining uh two internet connections as opposed to one and so if you look at where our egress points are one is at Williams one is at glint park and if you
043look at the lines the two lines are coming into the manag land if one uh Network Internet line is compromised by storm or by um a vendor pulling cables or wires we can still reroute the internet package over to um uh to a different location this will allow uh students to continue to use their Chromebooks it will avoid uh downtime uh in the district also it will um is is better for redundancy and fail safe protection the Voiceover IP the phones will continue to work as well as the cameras and things like that um also it would increase bandwidth and so if you look at those two lines that's like a traffic lane and so we if we only have one that means that all traffic goes to this one lane but as we retain
044two traffic is divided up into these two lanes which I call Freeway Lanes which will allow processes to flow even quicker okay and then for uh cyber security protection if one um line is uh hit by mwidth it can reroute to an alternate route and therefore we won't be down we'll see be working while we um restore the other line and then also expansion for uh technology if we have to go to hybrid learning you never know when uh we may have another covid season or something like that we can still use both internets for um you know for e-learning and also uh it's uh compatible with um compliant with ER for funding for grant funding and also that is compliant with the state and federal regulations also SE for children's internet and protection act
045next one please so the request for approval given these critical factors I respectfully request board approval to retain both internet service connections to maintain educational and operational efficiency at gcsc and as Dr Stoke said is we are in the business of educating children and we need two internet lines to continue to educate them well thank you Mr Richard any questions for Mr Richards yes sir I do have a question I appreciate the visual so my question is this is two new internet lines or there were not was only one line before no uh the goal was to um for C savings to combine the two lines but we have two internet lines now so the request is to retain can I interject real quick um this isn't really a request it's more of information um
046because we already have the ability to do it we actually had it it's just that uh we had a previous leader who and he he was writing his vision but you have a different Vision so we want to be able to honor your vision and let the board know we want to retain the two thank you thank you has automatic fail yes any additional questions I don't have a question have a comment we we are not plan don't have another experience I agree with you you know I just sit on edge with these things I I think it's a good I would do the same thank you thank you Mr Richards um we'll move on to item 7.2 now miss Wright good evening good evening board superintendent and the community I'm here to provide you
047all with an overview of our 1065 as you all may know in 2015 the general assembly provided the Gary School Corporation with an interest free loan from the common School fund so from October 15 to October 28 uh we had nine common School uh loans and those loans were used primarily for our vendor payments payrolls and insurance payments in 2020 the principal balance was approximately $25 million at that time house um uh H 1065 allowed the Gary Comm Community School Corporation to use those redirected payments for our capital projects each payment we were scheduled to pay would have come out of our state tuition or our tax uh revenue and that amount was uh $454,000 and I believe it was 62 so they allow that those monthly payments to be redirected to uh be allowed
048for our Capital project some capital projects U which were broken down into seven phases uh were pretty much hbag Plumbing um air conditions so Capital uh projects so as of July 1st 2024 the 1065 balance was 5.1 billion so we had spent $20 million from 2024 to 2020 to 2024 for so with the remaining $2.2 million we still have some uh projects in place as you all know uh on October 8th I talked about the uh Westside bathrooms uh those bathrooms are in progress they're being renovated as we speak now I was in the building the other day and uh those bathrooms are coming along pretty well so we have about $1 billion still allocated for those bathrooms um as I talked about before LED lighting we're almost complete with uh LED lighting inside and
049outside of all the buildings so we pretty much have a balance of $109,000 uh we have $50,000 allocated to the west side doors we have some doors that were compromised and we're going to use $50,000 to make sure that you know our doors at Westside um High School are uh secure um we have approximately a million doll left U we're going to use $350,000 to renovate the baby bathrooms this should take place this summer so now we're in the process of getting quotes to make sure that that takes place also other daily Renovations we're going to paint the lockers we're going to paint the hallways we're going to try to uh beautify a baby middle school and lastly we have the Gary Middle School Windows uh this winter we had some issues with uh cold
050air coming into Gary middle school so we have allocated um $100,000 for those windows and then we have $500,000 left for our contingencies I just want to let you all know that anytime we spend money out of this fund it has to be approved we do not we're not allowed to just take the money and spend it as we see those um projects have to be approved can you please share who has to approve those projects um do act and Pete M yes so that's it if I would like to entertain any questions if you all have any thank you you're welcome item eight on our agenda administrative important uh Legacy TX Force initiative Dr Treadwell good evening members of the board Dr Stokes and our community members it is a pleasure to uh speak
051about the literacy task force initiative um I had an opportunity to meet with first lady Melton probably in January um where she shared her vision for wanting to connect with uh the Gary Community School Corporation um to really begin to uh Drive the passion that she has for improving literacy outcomes for our students um and wanting to bring Volunteers in to really support our students and improving their literacy um abilities and so as you know and I just want to read it because I think it's important to always situate ourselves in our own mission and vision um and as a district we are dedicated to advance in top tier education within a safe and organized setting guaranteeing that our learners entainment knowledge skills and values vital to their development and to industrious responsible Global Citizens
052and a technologically advanced Society we need that inter that right and so in order to do that we have to improve our literacy scores um for our students across all of our grade levels we know that prior to um the pandemic or right during the pandemic many of our students um in kindergarten did not enroll in school so the pandemic happened in 2012 and no we don't want another pandemic um I just reiterate that but in 2122 kindergarten students did not return to school which is a critical um level for them to enter in to ensure that they are prepared for school beyond that 5year um age and so that year over a million students that were eligible did not enroll in 2022 only 32% of fourth grade public students were performing at proficient levels
053only 32% we also know that over 130 million adults in the US read only at the sixth grade level and so last but not least in Gary only 49.2% of our third grade students demonstrate reading proficiency significant significantly below the state level of 82% and so first lady Melton coming to really partner with this with us was great timing because as you know um having the need for people to read with students in individually in class sizes of 25 and Beyond can be quite challenging and so she had Able Body volunteers who signed up and literally today she sent me another list of about 15 more people that are going through the background process um I like are they ready she's like no they're they're just going through the process but nonetheless I'm excited about
054that because our goal is to close the literacy divide right and in order to do that we need this participation and it's not just about improving test scores we want students to be ready to perform their civic duty as an adult whatever work they're looking to do really acquiring those four EAS that Dr Stokes likes to talk about often right enlistment enrollment um entrepreneurship and employment right that's a part of our goals that we're really working towards and so our program goals that you'll see on the screen is one we want to enhance their literacy skills we know that when students have a love for reading and they can read they're more confident in school right we see them wanting to come to school I said that the second one is fostering the love for
055reading um most importantly is encouraging Community engagement um we want community members to be a part of the work that we're doing here at Gary Community School Corporation and of course if we're doing all of these things we're going to see the academic success you keep going and so we invited these folks out initially I want to say it was about four weeks ago to an orientation and as I led the orientation we outlined it in a way no matter what your background is you should be able to come into this space and work with our students we wanted you to know exactly what to do and so each school is identifying a set number of students from anywhere from grades K to five um this pilot this year we're only going to focus on
056our Elementary grades while we know we have students in middle school and high school that can definitely benefit from this we're going to take what we learned from this year to really expand going into the next year from there each um volunteer will have a schedule they have identified the time that they are available some are like I can come every day at any time others are like I only have a two-hour window schools are selecting students based on that once they're there they're going to meet with individual students for 20 to 25 minutes and read to the students and why is that important we want students to hear fluent reading and what that should look like and sound like additionally those students will select books that they're interested in and then read those books
057to those volunteers as well practicing those fluency now we don't want to leave them just reading to and with you can go to the next slide we have provided all of the volunteers with some foundational literacy information right my background is in education I have a M's in reading and so this is my background but if you come to this work I want you to know if you're engaging with a kindergartener what should it look like for what type of book should they be reading we don't want kids to come and read with you in their meeting frustration um what does it look like for a student that's in the developing phase and then um also our fluent phase we also provided our volunteers with activities that they can do with before during an after
058reading so if I'm reading a book with Cynthia I can say tell me who was the main character why is this important many of our standardized tests ask students to recall um information that's that comprehension and so we wanted to give them um strategies that they can use I'm not looking for them to come in with a lesson plan or any of that read with and read to our students and ask these simple questions so our students can really develop that love for reading all while improving their ability to read you keep going and so keep going we have a light call to action so yes we have we're up to about 25 volunteers we're asking for more if you are interested please email Miss Adams at J Adams at Gary CSC K12 i i
059n us um and we would love to host you um for the the remainder of the school year I'll entertain any questions from the board should you have thank you what is the time commitment uh is it re of school year throughout summer through May 16th will be the end we're looking to start right after Spring Break um and we will go through May 16th um again any Vol some volunteers are two days a week some are five days a week it really just depends on the volunteer schedule wonderful thank you thank you item 8.2 on our agenda Dr St you uh give us a financial update Mr wow I hope I can only do as good as Miss Salas and thank you to my Chiefs by the way we have two of our great
060leaders out so my team has done a great job PIV to support so um Miss zarowski wanted me to share at such a time as this um information about taxes so these first few slides will be about how we have taxes that have been levied Andor collected and I say Levy Andor collected because if you look at the bottom where we have a one final tax collected through 2024 is the information that we're going to show you in this column here which is what I really want you to look at so if you look at 2020 through 2024 this is the amount column that's been levied but what we actually collected is here somebody asked me why is that important well why is that important Dr stes because we don't always get 100% of the
061tax money that's been levied we don't collect 100% it's always contingent on what our taxpayers actually pay so while this money is important and we're happy to receive it do know when you look here at what the net Levy is and the gross Levy we're not receiving 100% % of our funds so with that being said um we often like to make a call out to our community about how important the money is to support our school system and we ask that our um community support us and we can only be supported through the tax collection next slide please so this is information that Mrs zosi wanted you to see you know we have several funds debt Services operations referendum and I do want you to know that the operating referendum was passed by our
062voters in November and we started levying the money in 2021 but these are the different rates and if you ask or wonder why the rate has gone down ever so slightly typically when debt falls off for us why we always try to keep pretty much a steady rate and if you look at these rates here the total rates they're pretty much steady there's not major change but as we started dropping some debt off then the rate starts to drop down just a little bit which means over we we do collect a little bit less money but then we really don't because if the assessed value of our property goes up it kind of Keeps Us in line with what we're used to collecting next slide please so this is just a historical review of our
063assessed value and as I just shared if you look here you see that over the years from 2021 to 2025 you see that our assess value is actually increasing so if anyone ever says that in Gary things are not growing or getting better that's not true this is actually evidence that we're growing in Gary our assess value is growing and that is a great indication for a community so I do want you to see the change here next slide please so I'm going to switch a little bit and give you some information and just for clarity I'm going to be calling out if it is what we call calendar month-to month or what we call Academic Year our academic school year goes from July of every year through June of every year so if I
064say academic or fysical school year that's what I mean July through June if I say calendar year we all know calendar years go from January through December so the information that you're looking at now we wanted you to be able to see how money was spent for the calendar year of 2024 from December through I mean I'm sorry from January 2024 through this past December and if you look as would be expected most of our money is actually being spent here in the blue on salaries and benefits human capital um so you see we've spent just about just under 50 million to take care of our staff you see other things like supplies services and charges so on and so forth I do need you to understand that when you see transfers right here Indiana
065law allows us to transfer up to 15% % from our education fund to what we call our operations fund and the reason is because education typically plays for our teachers and things that are directly impacting the classroom more academic related whereas operation is that oversight and yes we do have to have oversight it would be like your CFO or things that deal um our maintenance department things of that nature I want to be transparent and tell you while 15% is usually the cap that's allowed um Gary has been transferring a little bit more like 18% we're going to try to balance that out here in the near future so that we are averaging out at the 15% but we have been transferring a little bit more because our operations fund as you've noted from Dalton
066and Dalton they've been sharing this with you our operations fund has been kind of trending really low and so they wanted to make sure that we were able to keep things afloat next slide please I do want to share um a historical review of the average daily membership ABM stands for average daily me membership we call that our basic Grant that's the money that the state gives to US based on our student enrollment and I want you to look and I do need you to remember that even though for example you see a student enrollment with certain numbers do understand that this particular number for example February's enrollment count does not include over 300 and some OD students that we have in our preschool program so I don't want anybody to think that oh we
067thought we were closer to 4500 and it's saying something different no we don't include our preschool students because the state does not include them in the money that they give us for ADM the only money we get for our preschool students is on the way preschool money and that is contingent on information that our parents would need to provide about um jobs or enrollment in college or things of that nature where they live and we get maybe I think it's $400 or something if parents are willing to do that so with that being said what I do want you to notice is that we did put a red box around our October versus February but I don't want any Community member or anyone to be confused about these numbers we're not saying we got 39
068million plus an additional 40 what we're saying is what we were projected to get the 39 million increased to 40 because our enrollment increased in February so I want to make that clear so that people understand this particular chart next slide please so then I'm going to go back to something that Mr sus asked us for at the last board meeting um he asked Miss zaroski if he could get um some information that she looked from how duab was doing it and what they showed was some of the major fund balances all listed together so you see these fund balances and she tried to give you a 5-year historical view so you see from 2020 she did want you to know that the operating referendum was passed again as I shared by the voters in
0692020 but not let until 2021 so that's why you see this little one here and that's why you see nothing here and then you start seeing money so with this information where we are or were in 2024 was this was the total amount from our historical view next slide please this is similar this is what you just saw on the previous slide but what she's wanting you to see here she wants to give you a month by month with our new calendar year so January of 2025 and now February of 2025 this is where we are in terms of the money that we have so at February we are at 37 just under $38 million in our reserves there next slide please and while I could go through all these slides um there are the
070standard slides that you see that really talk to you about a calendar year from January through December projected operational fund spending we've not spend this money as you see from March moving forward but this is the money that we have to make a projection of what we believe we're going to do with money and so we do that for every fund so this is just a projection for the operations fund next slide please she gave you a breakdown even though the budget was projected at 20 just under 22 mil we still have 87% of that budget remaining for operations next slide please and she's showing you here where most of that money is going and as you see there are no transfers out of the operation fund our next slide please and I'll go quickly
071this again is the education fond there again the projections for the calendar year January through December the projections of money next slide please of that 32 million we've got 80% of that money left next slide please and you will see that we did transfer money from education fund to our operations fund our next slide please and our last cash flow projection for 2025 from January through December is projected for the referendum fund next slide please and you see here's something I do want to share about this as you see it says that we have 99% of that budget remaining what um Miss zaroski is Joiner that she's considering and she did a one month test to see if she wants to do something differently in the past our former leadership would actually take money from
072the referendum and they would deposit it into the education fund or the operations fund and then they would pay those things that our referendum dictated that we wanted to support like teacher raises or um things of that nature she did a test to see if it would be more feasible to just pay the money directly on a referendum or if she wanted to continue the practice that has already been occurring she hasn't decided which way is best T just yet I just reminded her make sure our board and our community can understand that we are using referenda money for what it was targeted to be used for so I can't tell you which direction she's going to go right now but I do want you to know that's why you see that it looks like
073we are we only spent 1% and as you see here again she's trying to show you that salaries and benefits is what's been spent so far so with that being said next slide that completes my report I'm happy to entertain any questions or we can save those for Miss zosi how would you like thank you thank you Dr all right you're welcome item nine on our agenda board reports and Communications like to open up the floor for board members to share Mr SS yes please just thank Miss Jones for coming out and volunteering her time to participate in a PTA program we definitely want parent involvement there's a lot of opportunities to volunteer with the literacy program I just I hope we got the information if not you got it all right okay we definitely
074and I thank you cuz sometimes parents say that they want to do something but for you to come out to a board meeting and say I'm here I would like to do this I I thank you for for that um thank you Miss Kelly and Miss uh Farmer for what you've already done and grab a hold of Miss Jones you know she's a willing worker so so I'm just volunteering your time right but thank you for that um the school district is doing very well and I just want to acknowledge the library has a lot of programs and activities that's going on for our children especially doing um spring break so I have a flyer I passed out some of the Flyers and I'm sure Mrs Treadwell has that we're talking about reading and literacy
075um let's just take our children to the library it is open and it's beautiful down there so thank you for sharing this information and last but not least I welcome Dr Craig to the family of the gear Community School Corporation and um we thank you for just coming to our district said Mr oh one other thing Urban Le scholarship deadline I forgot urb legs I had to Swit hat the deadline for scholarships for graduating seniors is March 16th so I will send out another flyer to you Dr Sto thank so that you you know I'm following protocol send it to Dr St first um just to remind students to finish their applications in the system sometimes they stop at that essay they'll upload everything else but that essay sometimes um prohibits them from having a
076complete application thank you Mr SS thank you Dr MCL any other comments board members Mr s uh but first of all I would like to say welcome to uh I'm sorry cor sorry about that um and then uh also thank you for all the presentations and things like that but it's just one one thing that just kind of said uneasy with me and I just kind of wanted to address it publicly uh and and that is I I don't want any misinformation being in the community that the school district is illegally expelling students as as that is definitely not true um I also don't want to any misinformation out there that we're the only School District that doesn't appear uh have expulsion ER because that's not true and we also are not the only District
077that charges for for your request that copy Fe of only 10 per page um and again that's that's not true at all and so I I just didn't want any misinformation floating around in the community and I just felt the need to address those things thank you thank you sir additional comments I would like to say how much I appreciate the youth coming from Westside and I've not been this close to gold medalist so it's always guys to be a part of the work the young men is doing with them as well I was very happy with the presentations from everyone on the team as a whole and I appreciate all that you were doing to continue to make this District um what it is and last but not least although you are not mras
078you did an excellent job with the numbers I'm just happy to be a part of this team I'm really help at what we're trying to do with literacy I appreciate the U PowerPoint that was there and the statistics so we can those numbers in terms of it's not just our children it's children across the United States that have struggled with this something that we all can do to help make a difference thank you I'll just make one quick comment I do want to welcome our new staff member uh we look forward to seeing all great things you can do and I'm just so thrilled to say that we are done with all the policies and uh but it's it's been a learning experience for me so I'm really grateful for that thank you thank you
079board members I want to take a quick moment uh document that I have shared with each of you electronically so you should be receiving this but I received a a notice um celebrating our state senator and our uh colleague um Mr Mark Spencer and the herit Heritage committee has asked for the board to review an opportunity for a naming right of the auditorium at Westside High School and so I'd like for board members to take a look at this and um be prepared to make a decision on this but it was just a great thing that brought a smile to my face the opportunity to uh honor someone who's given so much to this community and I just want to take this time to share that this has been presented to us and uh we
080will take it in item 10 on our agenda superintendent report Dr Stokes thank you president sus I want to share what I always call matters of Corporation interest so the first thing I wanted to share with you is join our team we are hiring as we've shared um Miss Crystal has put for you um a little just video and I'll just speak while it's kind of going through to show you how you would actually go on to our website it's just showing you how you would go on to the website and how you would actually um make application to some of the various career opportunities that we have on the right side of the screen we've listed just a few of those career opportunities and we welcome we truly welcome you to go on and
081to apply if you believe that first of all you love children children because we're in the children business we're in the children business that you love children but more than that that you believe that you have the gift of supporting them and transitioning their lives to be better we're not always concerned about where you've been but where you're going so we want to make sure that um how our children show up is important to us and if you believe you can help us move them from where they are to a better place we welcome you to apply the next thing that I wanted to show you is or rather show you is to remind you of has to do with testing updates as many of you know we are very much in the assessment SL
082testing season we have I learn as you see which is our um third grade through 8th grade test that is the state's ability to understand how our students are performing on what we call standardized assessments we also have the ASAP which will be occurring which deals with militaries their assessment vocational assessment for the military we also have what we call I read which is the Readiness assessment to help us determine if our third graders are reading at the level that they should be and comprehending what they are reading I do want to make it clear that there is new legislation that basically says that when third graders are not reading where they should be there is the potential that they might have to repeat third grade so this is very important to us and with
083this call out parents please please I implore you to make sure that your children have rest that their brains are clear and free of anything that would inhibit their ability to show up and show their best on the assessment this is very important the next thing that I wanted to talk about is Friday March 21st parent teacher conference as the young lady shared with us earlier it is very important that our parents be involved and be knowledgeable about what is going on with their child or as we like to say their particular scholar our children please know that we have parent teacher conf says if you are not able to attend face to face please reach out to your teacher and or the building administrator about an opportunity to perhaps get a 5 to 10
084minute slot must be on time to get a 5 to 10 minute slot where you can either join by teams or zoom and hear information you'd be surprised how much information you can get in 5 minutes or 10 minutes but you have to be on time if you take us slide with that being said it's Spring Break Time Coming up March 24th through the 28th we encourage our students our Scholars our staff and our community to know that there are lots of things that are going on over spring break but we do want you to take the opportunity to relax to take a mental health break and to just take care of yourself and your family so that you can come back invigorated and refreshed after the spring break with that being said I just
085want to move on as always and give you a draft agenda for our next ail 10th 2025 meeting there are a couple things that I do want to draw your attention to under information items we will be having some information about our library board update so um our board members will be sharing some information about the library board we also have information about professional development and so that will be a um administrative report that we will share about what we're doing to to support professional development for our staff um and District leaders and that that's what I have I will give it back to you Mr s thank you Dr Stokes I appreciate the attendance and the engagement in the room on tonight's board meeting and I'll entertain a motion to adjourn so is there
086a second second all in favor say I thank you again