001of of of accomplishments that just kept coming and coming and coming and coming and we should all feel very proud of the the kids that we got and the kids that are going and and the success that they're moving towards uh I I want to mention a couple things too then that I had a chance to observe that I just want you to keep your eyes on it and I'm sure you will and that is our uh I I watched our our basketball team play in the uh the sectionals against uh Lawrence North and uh I I was impressed um when I when I when I when I first got here the first athlete that I saw that I knew was going to be uh great was uh Jeff George I went to the first
002football game that I had seen and I saw Jeff Jordan I said that kid is going to be special well I had the same opportunity at the basketball game that we had that we played and saw one kid he's a freshman his name was mccrew I couldn't believe it he came in like last portion of the team and I think it hold him back and I I'm mentioning him because some of some of you guys might know him and I know the coaches would know him but he's a freshman and didn't get a 65 about 225 you know pretty pretty big kid and a freshman that played with talent that I said that I said to myself that's the kid we're going to be seeing for a long time because he really shows some some
003quality uh quality performance and I just I was impressed I had a chance to see uh Mr Clayton was there as well Clayton was there uh Miss Simba was there um Mike was there as well and I'm sure they can test to the fact that we had a really really great basketball team we didn't we didn't come on on the windside but I think we're going to be seeing a lot of noise here in the next in the next years with those guys other than that uh I again the presentations were super and uh I see nothing but more success as we move forward Kim thank you very much you're gonna hear it from everybody I think thank you um I'm going to uh not really say a lot because I'm going to say more
004at the legislative portion and I want to keep this meeting going because already 8:15 so once again I like to Echo what was said about our students and all the success we're having there and we can just continue to help them grow and develop and we got our outstanding uh student counsel there doing doing the the wonderful job she always does and as everybody said without a question Kim is definitely our MVP she she's the one without her we're all kind of wandering around lost and don't know where we going so Kim Kim is definitely the truth I'll say ditto ditto ditto everything for Kim you know we love you I we couldn't do anything without her just honestly um so thank you Dr Hansen even for sharing her with us um I will not
005listen the things that I've done um been active in the community I do just want to take my time to say if you have not gotten your tickets for the black and go Gaya sorry we are sold out yes um but just in case you may want to go I'll call it the adult hour just for the sake of you know the meeting 5 5 to um 5:30 to 7 will be the adult hour 700 p.m. to 8:30 will be dinner and then 8:30 to 11:00 p.m. we'll have an after party this was added a couple years ago because people kind of still just lingering and wanted more to do it was ending to early so it will be at the Marriott North again this year so if you have not gotten a ticket already
006um and want to go you may can email Britney to see if anyone has canceled but as of now we are sold out well I'm I'm glad you said that because you know we're going to have to pour some more water in the in the soup to spread that soup out a little bit because I think this I thought that I thought the suspense day the drop dead day was the 1 of April well it sewed out so we was moving slow but Bor look like I'm gonna break a party Bor you have until the what's today you have until the 25th to secure your complimentary tickets because because we do have a waiting list so if you're not going then let um let us know so we can release those tickets I'm glad I'm
007glad you bring it up because I was the question I had was do do we have a table and I guess I guess we do you have two complimentary tickets until March the 25th and then I'm going to sell your tickets nope you have a link okay and fill out the link I have so much trouble with that internet thing okay well email Britney or I and we'll fix it at April the 25th is the day thank you yes thank you thank you I was writing down the date um Kim as every as everyone said you are definitely the glue that holds our board together and keeps us on track um I know this because I've spent many hours of live trying to arrange flights and meetings and everything else well as everybody else on
008our board but um we sincerely appreciate everything you do um loving seeing all of our students and celebrating Easter EG our Robotics and our high school kids and cosmetology um but one thing runs through with all of those students is that every day they work hard to achieve their goal they put in the practice the hard work and they keep their academics in Focus um thank you thank you to all the adults who work with them and as always we appreciate our student representative bringing us highlights of the high school um I just wanted to say let's see quickly robotic season has finally like really begun begun competition season has um and in the state of Indiana has had two competitions and they've gone really really well and the digital guts were at one of
009them and made the playoffs which is always a great time um National PTA had their federal legislative um conference and Julie and I both attended um and we met with some federal legislators the ones who met with us um of course it was the same day as one of the ways and means hearings on the education budget as far as um the property tax reforms bills are being heard so I had to piece out halfway through and go attend that instead um which is the first time I have ever left one of those so that was definitely very interesting um and I just want to two things first of all this is the sort of meeting I think we all love when we um get to celebrate all of our students over and over again
010um we have amazing students here and we're in Township and that is the reason that I think all of us do what we do is because of the love that we have for our students and the desire to see them succeed um and then I will add on to again saying thank you to Kim because I know she appreciates it so much um you really seriously you're the reason that we're able to run at the level that we're able to run um because there are so many things we don't have to think about because you have thought about them for us so thank you so much and with that we are going to go to board correspondence do we have any Kevin yes we do and actually it's a very nice one it's from the
011feasler family it is a thank you says Dear Warren family we deeply appreciate your grateful kindness compassion and as you extended to our family during time of loss I'm thank you for your love and support from anarie Grant Quinn and Reed that is very nice do we have any blue cards no we do not excellent and with that we are going to go on to the business portion of the meeting um and we've given the internet enough time to be working so that's really convenient for us as well um the first thing on the agenda is the consent agenda which includes the approval of minutes the financial report payroll claims claims register and year-to-date summary of fund balances Human Resources report field trip requests change orders use of school property and conflict of interest forms
012do I have a motion got Julie making the motion I think Kevin like just by like half of a second it was Terry never mind I'm just making stuff up now it's that entire side of the room and Terry with a second is there any discussion hearing and seeing none we will move on to a vote oh there it is okay and the motion carries excellent um next we're going to move on to our reports and Julie French with our legislative report okay um so I'm gonna do the easy ones first cville 146 passed the house education committee um they did add back the paid paternal leave or parental leave um in that as well um and as well as P that passing so did Senate Bill 249 um 287 is waiting for a second
013reading in the house now that's the one that's the partisan bill um they've changed it a bit where it's now um You may put a d or an r or an i or a nonpartisan after your name um but those you can do that usually become will pick the one or the other versus taking off the nonpartisan so we really need to fight that one um we're here for kids we're not here for politics we're here for kids we're here to work for the best interest of our children um okay uh the Senate also the Senate education voted through house uh through bills on math education and the a through F uh grades for schools now I lost my first page oh no there it is okay so I've had some people ask me um
014about comments about you know they're saying well public schools are doing really well financially why do you need money you know um well I'm going to take you on a little journey through history okay um in December of 2009 under Mitch Daniel um that was um I think my first year it was my first year on this board and we had to cut from our budget uh $4 million because the state budget um was going to have a shortfall and that was of 300 million I think and so they said okay schools your half of our budget so you're gonna have to pick it up and we get it we get it um so our portion was $4 million and that's the year we closed um um Morehead and Heather Hills and um we kept
015our teachers it it was a choice between um laying off a lot of teachers and keeping the buildings open or closing the buildings and keeping our teachers and spreading them throughout and our teachers are the heart of our district with our kids so um that was more important to us to keep those teachers and and we I mean we did cut back and we did lose some teachers but that was through attrition that was through people um retiring and such but we did not have to let anyone off or riff anyone because of that um but it was a tough time it was hard um right on the heels of that or around the same time um the state legislator L legislature changed the way they funded schools okay so initially we were funded by
016a mix of State local and property taxes um after that uh we were dependent on sales tax and income tax for our educational fund and then there was a cap on the property tax um which that went towards our uh Transportation building repairs Capital expenses um basically they told us they were going to give us a very basic enough funds to provide a very basic education and then if our communities wanted to have more then uh we would have to take it to them for a referendum okay so we have done referendums in our community thank you very much um you were because of the referendum we currently have we have safety officers we have our police force that are that are in our school districts we have transportation um we have well additional transportation
017we have tutoring for I mean for our extracurricular activities we have counselors and family uh engagement Liaisons um our current um counselor ratio is low lower than most districts because of the referendum so um that's good um another player on the field around the same time is charter schools and vouchers so charter schools have been around since 2001 though in some form or fashion but vouchers were enacted in the legislation in 2011 um so now we're talking about that pot of money for K12 education is not just for public schools anymore or public schools and Charter Schools it is now for public schools charter schools and uh private schools okay so that's being split a bigger way now what you need to understand is that now um this current year um we're funding over 44,7
018more students than we did in 200920 okay when you add in vouchers and Charters and public schools um the per budget uh the per student amount in in uh the 910 school year was $6,193 in the 20 2425 school um the budget allocates $849 per student um now what you need to understand is there is not that does not take into account inflation if you take into account inflation it's going to be $9,99 per student so we are down about $655 million less than what we um per student capita per student okay than what we would have been um so even funding at the nine um we're not even at this time we're not even at the 910 school year when you take in account uh inflation okay so we have a lot less money
019um than than we than we do um in 2015 the state changed the formula regarding the amount of additional dollars uh for low-income students so um we got a drop in the per funding um per pupil funding for lower income students at that time so it just seems to keep going on and on and on in March the legislature adopt a state law that um currently it's a pilot that require counties four counties Maring county is one of them to share their property tax dollars with Charter Schools and then when you talk about Senate bill one and Senate Bill 518 those are both tax uh property tax bills that want to lower um which is when you add all that together it's pretty devastating I mean we don't have we are very lame when you
020think 92% of our um educational fund goes towards paying our staff okay and then when you add in our Charter our um our operational funds uh it's about 82% so um that's that's a lot of money going to our staff which we are a people p people organization so we should expect that to go to our staff but we don't um it's electricity it's insurance it's um it's all going up and we're not getting funded um at the levels of inflation so um that's that's it right there in a nutshell we just need to really remember that even though we are a big part of the budget we are a big part of the budget um but what's going towards it's going towards our future our kids so um anyway I just wanted you to
021think about that and I hope others will hear that message we just need to I know it seems like it's a lot and it is but we're not getting we're not getting funded near what we were that that pot is not just for us anymore it's for us and Charters and and vouchers and so um um just get out there and tell people to vote no for um C Bill one and 518 it's sounding like 518 may be pushed into C Bill one so um we'll keep our eye on that right now there was nothing on there today going on so thank you so much Julie um and next we are going to have our invest in people SL HR report I gonna say there's a whole lot of more names I'm walking up there
022right now come on there we go president Burke Dr Hansen members of the board waren Community uh it's March so that means it's the annual HR report to the board invest in our people uh which is a little twist on invest in people which will be evident in our soon to be published strategic plan um and we that was intentional because we we wanted to have that Focus so uh uh I am joined here with my colleagues uh Pam Griffin our Deputy human resource officer who you know and our newest staff member our uh HR administrator leita Keith she's a Warren resident and uh Sherm certified she started with us on January 6th and so have on Bo yes it's a pleasure to introduce to her to you finally uh since uh she was able
023to start after the holidays um board goals uh you know the school board is committed to fostering a culture of belonging and continuous growth by investing in our greatest asset our people we couldn't agree more and just as Julia got done saying you know the significant bulk of our budget goes towards people and so that's where we come in um as you guys know HR and payroll covers quite a lot of ground and so tonight um we're going to focus on a couple of key key initiatives that we want to share with you um we are um uh one of the largest employers on the far East Side I'm proud of it so without further Ado uh Pam oh well we'll just share our staff uh this this is the team uh small But Mighty
024team um yeah we have H HR and payroll together um Melle Bard is our payroll administrator and overseas two payroll Specialists as well so and we have um Kathy Cobbs our benefits administrator and there we are the the most adorable group of uh Department in the okay never mind now we'll we'll switch over the pan today I'm going to be sharing with you um pathway to teaching um it's not a secret that our universities and colleges are not turning out the number of teachers that our schools need today in order to make sure that we can deliver the best education we can to all of our students therefore to address this um for the last two years um we have been working very diligently to create a solution that would allow us to um support
025the need for teachers in our classrooms while um taking a look at um the current staff that we have and really finding out which of our staff members um are interested in teaching and that led us to our instructional assistance and so we've been able to create um starting last year under Dr Anderson's leadership a partnership with Indiana Wesley un University and we've continued that and since then we uh are in the midst of iterating that even more and so what I wanted to share with you today um I mean it's obvious we've heard about this how much it costs every every time we um a teacher retires or moves to another district and what that impact is um on our students and so today um specifically I'm going to talk about three things um
026one um I'd like to mention that we still get our students from traditional um programs I.E student teaching we've had six uh 17 student teachers this year we have six who are actively finishing this semester um we partner with all of our universities Dr Hansen we did have a student teacher from Ball State this year um we've had them from IU Bloomington IUI downtown U Indi um WGU Mercy Hurst Maran here in Indianapolis Marian in Wisconsin um we are really going out and looking um to create Partnerships with universities and colleges to make sure that we are available for their um preservice teachers to begin their practicums and after they um have their practicums then we are ready to support them um with their student teaching needs so traditionally like I said we still have
027a growing um when we have those opportunities we get them in and um you know it was nice when the teachers are still here it was nice to see some of our former student teachers like Miss McKuen who are graduates and then they student teach with us and then they come back there are um a lot of instructional assistants who um did not have the option of going to uh college first and so for them it was career readiness and so that is one of the pathways I'm going to be talking to you about today and um next our little I put a little like a little Warren over their little graphic that they gave me because when they talk about high school students I'll specifically be talking about our Warren Central graduates um we
028hire teachers with bachelor's degrees and with those teachers um they usually are emergency permitted they still have to go through a transition to teaching program which typically is a 24hour um course package that they have to um complete through a a program that's been approved by I the idoe or they can continue their to get those courses by getting their actual master's degrees but what I'd like to talk to you about today are our par Educators that's what they have them listed there we call them instructional assistants um here in Warren Township and um we have um something called the associate teacher program and that is a program that is supported um by Indiana Wesleyan University and what that program allows um our principles to do is to invest in in high performing instructional assistants
029some of which have been in the district 10 years or more and to really take a look at why they have not um gone to college if they really want to be a teacher and as you can imagine there is a lot of reasons for why people haven't done that and so um we have currently 21 um associate teachers we started the year with 25 and that number has um decreased due to people getting into college and and figuring out that college being a teacher and managing a family is not um uh in their best interest right now because going to college and teaching those are um insurmountable responsibilities and so you really have to be ready to do that work um and balance your life and so we do have some people that decide
030that is not the pathway to take for them but typically our instructional assistance what makes this program so successful with the 21 that are currently serving is they've been sitting in our classrooms for two or more years watching some of the best teachers in Maran County do their thing every day they know our curriculum they know our children they know um they know how to run small group they participated in professional learning therefore when they are ready to make those decisions they're already in a really great place especially if they're a Warren Central graduate who graduated with dual credits and in some cases we've had candidates that have had their Associates degrees or very close to having their Associates degre Dees and so it's been a really easy uh pathway for them currently um 35%
031of our associate teachers live right here in Warren Township um our demographics are 81% women um 19% men 48% black 28% white um 30 I missed I missed one of my demographics uh one of my um or excuse me 48% black 28% um Hispanic 19% white and 5% Asian and so the demographics of our associate teachers also reflect the demographics of our community we support our instructional assistance um by helping them move into associate teacher positions once they're ready our principles interview them and if there is a spot for them they can move into one of those roles we pay them um a salary of 40,500 that is divided into 26 pays so that they're still support staff members they're not certified because they aren't on a teacher's contract but while they are going to
032school they're making that salary and we are supporting um their tuition costs a majority of our associate teachers qualify for pel Grants and so whatever isn't covered by their pel Grant we are able to come in and help support with covering the cost of that the average um course bundle or um cohort package is $785 and a majority of our associate teachers um qualify for pel Grants if they're a veteran they're getting additional resources that way um it's just been amazing to watch um IW support our staff members who are going through this process so that we can help them once they're in that program they start to earn those bachelor's degrees and then once they earn their bachelor's degrees depending on what they're going into they may move directly into a transition to teaching
033program um because they'll need to do that um if you want to be an ml teacher you have to get your degree in secondary education for example or Elementary and then you have to continue your course for to get the additional um certification to have that added to your license um lastly our students right there right now I'm working with math tracks we're very excited um we're working on a special job description that allows K through um for principles who are interested in hiring um a Warren Central student who may not be um enlisting or enrolling into a college right away by employing them and through this program with math TRS we'll be able to support our Warren Central students by preparing them for a career and once they get their feet wet and they
034learn the ins and outs of being an instructional assistant then supporting them with a very affordable Pathway to earning college credits so that as they are thinking about their next steps not only are they serving in the classrooms within the communities in which they have grown up in um they're earning um a s a salary but most importantly they are starting to take their bachelor's courses that they need to begin in um their journey to earning that degree so that they too can move into um a classroom to have their own children so once our instructional assistants begin that process and they begin to earn their college credits they'll move into a pre-apprenticeship program and our goal for them is to then move into our associate teacher program so that they can begin earning a
035salary while also teaching and implementing the schools they're learning through apprenticeship and then they'll be able to transition into fully certificated educator any questions thank you I just wanted to say I think that is such a great opportunity and um how can we um um advertise this you know to try to get maybe some people that are not aware of it because it's such a great opportunity so um math tracks ironically I had to touch base with Lamar they sent us what they thought was like oh the the kids at Warren Cent are going to love this no Lamar probably saw it like no this doesn't you know we don't do flashy in Warren like we like our things to look a certain way and um so for example one of the things that I'm
036doing right now is I'm creating a job description that not only outlines what the career of an instructional assistant looks like but also what their educational pathway is going to look like and what that timeline is going to look like that's important because their parents are going to want to know know what can I expect if my student doesn't do this traditional College pathway for example um and so um as we think about um advertising this our best advertisers are our actual teachers oh let me push this really quick and so my hope is is that in the next few months we're going to be able to um take some of our graduates um we actually have our first fully blown graduate who's moving into um her residency Miss Tucker um at waoa she's also
037my son's teacher um she's incredible and we are excited about her uh natural Baptist just is just graduated and sent Brian um the teaching license and also um Paris is about to move into um the pre-residency program and so I think that once we are able to like look in the eyeballs of our success stories I think that is going to be the best advertising because people are going to be able to see themselves in our group graduates and our teachers and from that I think that's just going to create incredible amounts of Interest I just wanted to ask one other question um when you say your graduates now we're talking about the um IAS that are in the program and then they become they graduate is so we have two programs kind of going
038simultaneously so we have our associate teachers program and then we also have our partnership with math track that's been helping um our teachers who did not have teaching licenses when they came to us earn their cert certifications and so that will be our first um batch of graduates from that program Miss Tucker actually had a degree from her home country um unfortunately when she moved to the United States and they did the comparison it did not translate so although she had two Bachelors neither of them trans translated into one and so she will be our first IW uu graduate they took all of the hours that did translate into um a course toour matching for um a degree in the United States and then she took the additional courses that she needed to have a
039fully fledged bachelor recognized by the United States and so she will be our very first IW graduate Mrs Tucker right there from waa good all right one last question um I was just sitting here uh brainstorming um our seniors that graduate is there an opportunity for them to uh follow a pathway of once they graduate maybe becom an instructional assistants and then from there those that are interested in teaching so we're talking about growing you know our teachers because I remember when I graduated from high school I went to college to become a teacher so can can um we have our seniors that graduate that are really interested in teaching to follow some kind of pathway where they would get out be instructional assistance to see how they like and and and learn the ropes
040yes and then move on from there into your program so is that available for our high school students yes unfortunately we can't hire all of them um I've already like I've spoken with Lindsay nean the assistant director at um our early childhood Learning Center and talk to them about the teachers that are in their programs and um her best guest estimate is that a majority of them are choosing to enroll in a college University to pursue their passion for teaching but in when we look at this place right here with the IAS that were able to hire at for the 25 26 school year if any of them are War Central graduates then we will onard them and prepare them to move into the ear college credits we wouldn't want an 18-year-old to be in
041charge of a classroom like right away but what we would want is to prepare them to be successful in their career so that as they're starting school they're not feeling as overwhelmed as our veteran IAS who started school while they're also trying to run a classroom we've learned a lot we've learned a lot from really smart people who've been doing these jobs for a long time um they were so ready to be a teacher some of them are like incredible teachers but they don't know college because college readiness wasn't a focus for like it is now and so we've really had to work with them like and I'm going to have to tap into Laura's team like what is the fasta you know when you're sitting down with somebody who is 37 years old and
042they started their families and their trajectory has been a little bit different they their kids haven't gone to college they didn't go to college they've had to learn all of those things so we're hoping to avoid some of those mistakes by making sure that we prepare our high school school students for the career of being an instructional assistant the skills they need to be successful in the classroom and then once they have that semester under their belt then beginning their cohort class for them um in that January of that second semester so they can start learning about college okay I'm going to talk about Frontline Central um Frontline Central is a um paperless um onboarding process that I've been tasked with and as being the new person I was able to experience the paper process
043of hiring so um I have basically taken the the step one um so with Frontline Central you probably want to know what really is it it's a platform that goes through the employee life cycle from beginning to end um so what happens is the candidate applies for the job through hiring and recruiting and then we hire them through Frontline Central once they're hired we'll send them a HR package of forms that we would normally get as paper um that will take a lot of time away from paperwork and more of the candidate experience um usually what I've learned in my experience is most employees remember the very first day um they they take that in that sets the tone and they remember the last day so um I will kind of explain how this will
044go um so even with the new hire package being sent um there's still communication and we don't take away from the orientation process so that will still take place but we'll spend more time with that experience and making sure that they understand that they're valued in the district that they'll be working at and this is now their new home so we'll hone in more to that and then as time goes through we will also use this system to push out contract renewal so moving everything to a paperless situation where we don't have to worry about getting those contracts back from each building they'll go through Frontline Central they'll be signed and they'll automatically go into their personnel documents so this is also a a software that their personnel documents will start building and we can
045get away from paper files as well uh offboarding will look like basically the same for onboarding there's a form that will be sent um for a resignation they'll attach their resignation letter and then technology will be notified via Frontline that that information is there for them to offboard the employee which is impactful because we just had a meeting with them and they were asking can this be done and they had a form already in Frontline Central built for offboarding and Technology Turnin so I have been and my team have been working with Frontline Central to get all those forms and everything tested um we're also o going to be doing way with the yellow sheet and making those electronic as well so that is a recommendation to higher form um that's already been built so
046we're going to start testing those um they're um already in Frontline Central so a lot of you will um see um and get invitations to Frontline Central so you can go in there and kind of take a look around if you have the appropriate roles um that's basically what I've been working on since I been here and it's just being tasked with making this a paperless District yes I do have an so um it's kind of also tells you in a more simplified way of what this the process will be uh Frontline Central also is a employee demographic maintenance um software as well so they'll be able to do like things like change their name change the address with the appropriate role so that it doesn't go unseen that the name has been changed uh
047so and then HR processes like I said onboarding contracts certifications we look to making maybe the FMLA process through that so that everything will filter um and they have a medical documents area where that'll be mass and then our our business which is we already use um absence management now um from Frontline um when the hiring recruiting so it's just bringing it all together full circle do you guys have any questions for me thank you thank you Lita yeah she's um she's being somewhat modest because uh uh she is uh in in short order already making us better um we we really she has really uh taken upon herself to help um just overhaul our onboarding experience certainly um and so yeah this will be this will be connected to absence management as well as
048Recruitment and hiring recruitment and hiring is our applicant portal where we post jobs um so we'll be able to um activate hires from Recruitment and hiring also from recruitment hiring use the digital yellow sheet that um I know people out there know what I'm talking about um and uh so it all connects together and so we're very excited we're getting close to going live and we're getting ready to test drive this thing um so uh it's been a long time coming but it's an exciting development um here you have a few uh a few pictures of some of our things um um most importantly our our annual teacher hiring fair that we do in late February so um oftentimes we have um um folks who student top for us that come to that we have
049folks who are career Changers who have a bachelor's degree but did major in education that we helped also go through uh get an emergency permit and go that route uh but as was explained this evening we are finding that with with these kinds of targeted communication pieces we can we can um get to the people in our own backyard we're finding that there are a lot of people who are interested in teaching it's just they need that they need an on the- job pipeline or an apprenticeship program that they can see clearly uh how they could get there that's also flexible and affordable so that's really what we're trying to build here and um we're very excited about some of those developments so um with that uh uh do you have any other further uh
050questions or very good thank you you guys are doing an awesome job thought we did have a question Pam did Pam did we hire um the candidate that Senator Jackson okay okay okay next up is our construction report maybe maybe not depends on if Brian gives up the computer there we go all right we're almost home president Burke Dr Hansen members of the board i' like to present to you our March construction update there is nothing like basketball in the state of Indiana and Final Four fever it's alive and well [Music] here Warren Township welcome to downtown Indianapolis here in the heart of the Circle City and I stand here in front of the NCAA headquarters which means it must be that time of year yes it's time for March Madness better yet waren Madness
051president Burke Dr Hansen and members of the board welcome to the March edition of inside War our goal continues to be to invest in safety and operational excellence while at the same time invested in efficiencies again it is March here spring is upon us and we are so excited not only are we excited as a city to host a lot of basketball including the Big 10 men's and women's tournament which are coming up this month but also we'll be a host site for the NCA tournament so as downtown starts to transform itself for basketball tournament time we and Warren Township will continue to transform our school Community one building at a time and today we're going to take a look of the much talked about but for the first time seeing the new locker room
052at Warriors Stadium we're also going to head back to the high school and check in with principal Taylor as well as Dr Rogers to take a look at the new G hallway renovation as well as the new renovation in the career center and the new print shop I am so excited about that day prevots you definitely deserve this opportunity so we're going to get ready for some basketball and we're going to come back later and talk a little bit about Warren Madness so sit back relax and come inside Warren I am so excited to bring you into our learning space as I mentioned before one of our goals was to ensure that our students and staff have a safe but beautiful efficient place to learn so as you look into our new space here you'll
053notice that again we've brightened the wall somewhat we've additionally um taking care of just some of those housekeeping things that for years um needed to happen so if you take a look up you'll notice the clean lines of our tiles you'll notice that we have lots and lots of board spaces in most of our classrooms one of the best parts here is if you are a teacher that teaches multiple preps so I'm teaching I'm talking and preaching to my teachers it's horrible when you have to keep erasing things but we did install in some of our classrooms the sliding board so if I'm teaching algebra one one period and then I get over here and we got to get ready for the SAT or we got to make sure we have our agenda this allows
054us to be able to slide and go slide and go we got something interesting here slide and go though so it allows for student access as well as teacher access um if you look around too we've got new desks these desks allow for our students to be more mobile um this is set up more in a collaboration model where students can work together so welcome to Warren hey everybody welcome back to Walker Career Center we're here at a little update today on our construction project uh we're in the graphic design Design Lab our digital design pathway this room is almost done we're excited about it we got the new cabinets going in the new countertop set up and getting ready for our uh our new computer lines computer desks here got the dark room almost
055finished and uh the office space is getting ready so we're we're excited about the progress in this room and other rooms here at the career center and now we're in our print shop most of you may know that you know we do all of our Township printing in here and it got a facelift as well we got some new new ceiling new lighting new paint obviously that uh matches the rest of the career center as well and then in the uh old classroom space we've expanded uh give ourselves more lab space in here for the print shop we also took out a bank of Windows here so that a lot of the Industrial Equipment can roll into this space and and uh use that for the print shop so that's really where we're at an
056update for the construction of the career center all right we are here inside section 127 the headquarters this is where all that magic happens all those beautiful images and branding that you see on the international level it all starts right here and we have our special guest today Mr Kevin Glo and Kevin if you could share with us your position here executive director of experiential design all right so tell us a little bit about section 127 not only just the company but some of the partnership that you have yeah so section 127 is a strategic branding agency um born from sport Graphics 40-year-old company that was a signage and print production company located on the far East side right there in Warren Township located on the far East Side started by Frank hanock that's right
05740 years ago um section 127 now president Angela Hill also worn AUM um so obviously the pride of the East Side runs runs deep in the house absolutely Kevin so we have seen a growth just in the importance of branding just as a whole however there's also been a growth just at the in the K 12 space um locally and I would imagine just nationally so what have you seen in terms of the growth of the importance of branding and marketing in the k through2 space growth is the word for sure uh it's an arms race right just like in universities it's they want the coolest things it's a part of their brand but it's building the passion almost from the ground up right it's building that that passion that connection to your communities um
058all the way through and it's no different from Collegiate levels and in that's that amateur sport level so starting from the ground up is really now getting more and more important just like in any Youth Sports um it's just starting earlier and earlier and it's it's an arms race um we know here inside War we know a little something about branding ourselves um again you're an expert in this area um again you've worked with people from around the world what do you think about our branding if you look at the customized inside One Construction head as well as the Warren operations um branded Polo here what are just your thoughts as an expert well uniquely enough we did that logo you did this logo we did that t logo for you guys so I'm obviously
059partial into knowing what that is and and understanding but the way that you guys are executing it is to a te it's all about the delivery right exactly okay exactly let's talk a little bit about the process Okay Kevin we are now in a room that you guys refer to as the barn and just from the look of it um there's a lot of collaboration and um just some of that creativity that's involved with design um around branding so um we have a print here if you could talk to us a little bit about what does that process look like for you when you're going into create creativity design mode yeah so kicking off this new project working with CSO the familiarity with our materials how we want to execute things we're going to roll
060right into this we get to start designing the cool stuff right the moments that are going to get on Instagram that are going to get all those moments and all those hot takes so we're excited about that we've already got some cool Concepts ready to present to you guys so we're looking forward to it we want to thank our friends again from section 127 for that fabulous tour and just giving us a little insight of what that process looks like on the design phase but now we are here on site at Warren Central High School we are right outside of the new Larry Willen locker room and the reason why our board our superintendent we're so blessed that they named this locker room after the Legend Larry Willen coach Willen was a business teacher football
061coach and track coach here at Warren Central High School for over 50 years so this dedication to coach Larry Willen and his family is just a small token of our appreciation but we get the opportunity to hook up with our partners from powers and Suns and take a look at the construction phase of this new facility Well Marcus we just walked in the main entrance and to your right is the electrical room that's where all the it and electrical come in dispers throughout the building and over back behind me will be the uh meeting rooms 102 103 104 105 they have operation operable partitions to divide the rooms into different meeting areas that we have the motors the bulkheads in it's ready to be drywalled now and then back behind you or directly to the
062South is the uh athletic training so let's take a walk that way okay this is the location of the new athletic training room yes there's a uh wall that goes across here that closes it off it'll be the last wall we put in because we're going through here with the forklift for the block work and we're sitting right where the uh therapeutical tubs would be okay I'll be I'll be spending a lot of time in the th yeah there's four of them that sit right in here this area then you have the washer and dryer room behind us you have the service area and the coaches offices over here if I remember correctly this is where students our student athletes um because obviously our athletic training room is coed they'll be able to enter here
063and go right directly to the the training room that is correct yeah this has to be the locker room this is the Freshman locker room area Okay uh the benches were poured this week for the locker room the bench is set on top of these and it has this little seating area which the uh varsity and junior varsity do not have Okay so this they're do we wreck the fors off today we poured last Friday wrecking the fors off today and do a little bit cleaner yeah so again this will be for the freshman football team as well as our our three levels of baseball they'll they'll be able to use this this area here this part of the locker room that that is correct and right behind us here behind this window wall is
064the coaches offices coaches area co there's a coach's office over here this is a big coach's area and on the other side is the varsity junior varsity locker room so the coaches can look through the windows and observe yeah I know we have a we added a a larger equipment room that I know that was important just because um in the previous facility some of the equipment actually had to be um secured in some let's just say some non storage areas just because we had so much and both entrance doors do have security card readers on them so it has to be uh the person has to be granted access to get back in this area we want to thank you for this fabulous tour there's been a lot of talk about this facility and
065um obviously our our students um our community see see the the construction going on but this is the first time we had a chance to take a look in it and we're making a tremendous amount of progress um I know right now we are anticipating July being the the completion um of this project so um again we just want to thank you and um thank you for coming inside warrant with with us thank you very much all right any questions well thank you we always like your updates so very entertaining so thank you and with that we're going to move on to yellow cards do we have any Madame President no we do not okay and we have one action item this evening um Brian Russell and Julie Wakeman excuse me good evening president Burke
066Dr Hansen members of the board let me okay um tonight uh uh ultimately we're going to be asking for Action um for the elementary school student day um but I'm going to take you through um just a synopsis of some of the conversation I know we started last Wednesday in discussion um as we get up to that point so just wanted to highlight the goals and I um just added some specific or um specificity to these it's obviously invest in academic excellence and student achievement and invest in our people um but really to narrow that down just to explicitly list the board goals that I know you guys adopted that align most directly to this increasing the achievement in all areas and then um one of the components that I I really wanted to make
067sure that I highlighted tonight was just um how ultimately we see the restructuring of the professional development as uh investment in our people and then um specifically your uh board goal of providing access to engaging in collaborative professional learning opportunities for all staff um as mentioned immediately after bargaining we took the opportunity to reconvene the teg committee teg is uh one of those acronyms I know we continue to use but it's teacher employment guidelines and those were established or that document was established uh immediately after uh um the Indiana legislative session took out a lot of the components um uh bargainable components that historically were um that can no longer be bargain workday um a lot of things um it kind of reminded me that Julie when you were talking about tonight just going back
068through some of the years I think you could add some of those changes in as well obviously they're not necessarily Financial related um but ultimately the purpose of the tag committee the teacher employment guidelines committee um was to specifically look at professional velopment and that structure uh but ultimately when we did that we made we wanted to make sure that we were ultimately focusing on the goal of increasing stud of achievement um but then as a subset of those um one thing that was really important through our collaboration was increasing common planning opportunities for teachers the opportunities for differentiated professional development increasing the consistency the depth and the effectiveness of our data meetings um and then limiting the occurrences of teacher preparation periods being used for meetings um under the old structure which uh I'll
069give you a comparison um unfortunately that had to happen a lot of times to be able to accomplish some of those things so uh we started meeting immediately after bargaining um this was a collaborative effort amongst uh District administration uh most specifically Brian Simkins myself and wa leadership Julie Wakeman wa president and the Missy gole as well um identified a committee um we started the meet to really just identify what were the components of the tag um it's not as if tag isn't a Bible right we don't have it on our nightstands every night and review it every night before well maybe you do I don't know but um but just really wanted to familiar familiarize ourselves with what was included within the document um sometimes um just so I guess I would say we
070were on a Level Playing Field to see specifically what was in there how it spoke to professional development how it spoke to other expectations um uh around professionalism and just anything related to that and then really we got um I'll call it a blessing we got the idea to create ideas around how do we work within uh the structure of our school day to ensure that we were providing consistent differentiated high quality professional development opportunities to staff that we were able to accomplish those things and I would say just as important that we were honoring teacher time and ensuring that they were able to um realistically be able to accomplish the task that were on their plates um and the things that we were meeting or requir requiring teachers to meet for um were uh
071value added on on all fronts um so we went through that process and it took several iterations months of meetings um we had some pretty cruddy first drafts when we started to think about how that would work when got feed back uh came back to the drawing board ultimately through that process we started to narrow in on a particular model uh really around the end of January as we started to get even more um specific to see what that would look like which really leads us up to this point today so ultimately um as I explained last week but ultimately our current model allows us 25 1hour sessions uh um for professional development of school year um this is a typical breakdown of what those sessions look like there's really 18 school or department-based professional
072learning sessions um three teacher selected professional learning sessions we call those teacher Pathways where teachers get the opportunity to select something more specific um based on their um professional goals and desires and then we allocate some of those times uh before grading Windows those additional hour days for them the postgrad to make sure that those things are um tidied up and um just to take care of those professional needs um the other thing that I would highlight within that because of the limited 251 hour sessions um a lot of the Team Planning and data meetings that would require uh take place would take place during teacher preparation periods um which I know was something as I alluded to before was one of the goals that we wanted to address um under the propos model um
073through strategically uh looking at school start times and school end times um and making sure that non-student contact time wasn't divided equally in the morning and the afternoon um we were able to create 104 sessions at an average of 50 minutes a session uh without adding a single minute to the teachers um contractual hours um so through some creative problem solving we were able to really enhance um quadruple the opportunities that teachers would have to engage in those tasks and I will say just as important again um figure out a realistic way for the vast majority of those meetings that were traditionally taking place during planning time would be able to take place outside of planning time um to give teachers the opportunity to do that with that when I said creative scheduling uh all
074ultimately this is um this lists two things in reference so the student day in um 8 815 9915 715 starts or I should say 7115 8815 9:15 uh but that's in grade band order you can see the way we Leverage The minutes is a teacher would work a 7 hour and 50 minute day Monday through Thursday and a 7h hour and 15minute day on Friday so in K4 and 58 teachers would report a little later to school obviously before students arrive on those days and those minutes in calculation through the 184 Day contract um along with um the unique opportunity of looking at the weeks before intercessions um in a little different way that was a that was the way we were able to accomplish no change in the contractual hours um as as I
075know and again I I referenced this before but last September um the board approved um a policy for our for us to have the ability to report our um school calendar by instructional minutes rather than actual instructional days Indiana requires 180 instructional days or 54,000 instructional minutes for students in grades 1 through six or 64,800 minutes in students in grades 7 through 12 so this is um a a official calculation of what that looks like if you approve that K4 student day to be in 8:15 to 300 p.m. I will note and just reemphasize that we're not seeking any change to the school day for students in 5'8 or 9912 um so with that you can count everything in an instructional day minus lunch in recess if you take a look at um those times
076it's based on a six 6 hour and 45 minute student day at all levels we're taking 60 minutes from K4 for lunch and recess and 30 minutes from 58 for lunch um that gives you the actual instructional minutes or hours five um five hours and 45 minutes in K4 and then six hours um in um 6 hours and 15 minutes in 512 uh we have a 176 regular school days calendared for the 2526 school year we have three planned asynchronous e-learning days the state of Indiana requires that asynchronous e-learning days are reported at 300 minutes a piece uh you can't report any more than 300 minutes U for those days so that equates to under the old calculation 179 school days but because we plan on reporting uh by instructional minutes if you take those
077you get 61,62 instructional minutes for K4 which still significantly exceeds the required instructional minutes um and then obviously with under that calculation for 58 it still exceeds as well at 66,9 um so ultimately what the proposal is and what the action is that we're asking for is that the K4 four student day be from 8:15 to 3:00 p.m. uh that is a 10minute later start in 5 minute earlier dismissal and then no change for the 5'8 and 912 schedule ultimately um this proposed adjustment uh we believe does many things but we would like to highlight these four things it enhances our teachers ability to meet the academic needs of our students which will enhance student achievement it's the primary focus of this effort it increases the effectiveness of our professional learning and it increases the
078opportunities for Teacher collaboration and planning um and last but not least but I will certainly say that it demonstrates the power of Effective Teacher and administration collaboration um which um unfortunately when we look at certain levels of bureaucracy right now that's not always taking place um with that I do want to invite Julie to say a few words about the process in um from her point of view oh man you guys are giv me a microphone it's okay I'll be kind um thank you everyone um I would like to speak about the collaboration efforts here um this has been I'll speak for myself um a labor of love um this is obviously my first year as wa president and um I jokingly said things in my very first meeting with Dr Hansen and Ryan and
079Brian and it's in some ways come to fruition um because I like to be an agent of change to make things better for our students and our staff um and T is one of those places where I think we have that um we know that things are changing very quickly in our lives and in our profession but this is a place where we can warn really is at the Forefront um I work really closely with members at isca and they want to know what we're doing right now with our employment guidelines because they want to do it in their districts as well like they want to know how I'm working so closely with our Administration to make this be successful so they can do it in their District um and I don't know how I
080mean I just said we we I don't know I just um so I'm appreciative of this um because there have been times where it has been rough um but we're working through it and I think this is what's going to make us better and continue to grow and see our students grow and also retain staff um because it's rough and we need we need work time and we need to see that for our students so I just wanted to say that and thank you [Applause] guys so with that um happy to answer any questions but we are seeking action tonight to approve the K4 day for the 2526 school year to officially be 8:15 to 300M I do have goad oh okay um thank you for being here um can you tell us like the
081feedback from the teachers with the change because I know sometimes change is not um always received even though it's for the um good so can you just give us a little yeah um so right now um the biggest concern that was on teachers minds and the other iterations of our calendar um was they were concerned because there was an additional time being added to the day to their contract day um I think it was upwards of 15 hours and that was a that was a massive like Breaking Point um so that's really why I mean I think we're on draft I mean if I could go another day without hearing minutes I'd really like that um I think like we're on calendar version I don't know 10 um to get it so that we were
082neutral so the the committee which I really want to focus on that like the committee was like if we can get this to be just neutral and also make it that the calendar is consistent on work hours so there's no longer that extended Wednesday that will help people feel more comfortable with things um and like we have talked and I I don't know any time that we have worked like Association and District that we have set up things and said okay so we're going to set up meetings with teachers when we come back in April to answer questions so we're having three of those meetings in April so people are going to have time to think and then come to us with questions like it's going to be you know setting us up we're going
083to do middle school high school and an elementary meeting um so we can answer questions Les you weren't able to be at the meeting when we talked about that were you were you at that meeting when we okay okay Ryan could you talk about the committee so because I don't think Lan knows about the committee either yeah so and I apologize so the when I referred to the tech committee we had the opportunity uh Julie um Julie and I Brian and then Missy uh so wa leadership and District leadership formally went into this process by selecting committee members so we identified both wa members and NWA members represent uh to provide repres representation from K4 buildings 58 buildings and high school buildings for that um and that was a committee I believe of I forget
084what the exact number was of top of my head I think around 15 um and um so through those series Ser of meetings in October November December January February and now March we met this week we met Monday again um through that we have been getting ongoing feedback and when I um I don't want to put words in Julie's mouth but when she said it had been rough um I created a really cool first draft in December that I thought was amazing um and um I found out pretty much everyone else in the township didn't think it was amazing um with that but we joke about it now because you know first drafts stink a lot of times and we had to get some thought out on paper to start to get more feedback um
085so I know Julie has um surveyed wa membership um and it was really because of that feedback that really got us to this final uh iteration of where we were but even as short as a few weeks ago uh the contractual minutes uh still were exceeding what they currently were so it was just a matter of a process of us continuing to collaborate to identify those those points so where from My Lens where I felt comfortable is we got we got to the point where we we really saw from both an admin and a teacher view the value and the model it was the minute conversation the contractual hour conversation that we were really stuck with so just through our commitment and collaboration we're able to address that in a way way where and I
086don't feel this way with a lot of things that we do um because it sometimes it feels when you're bargaining or whatever it's like there's there's a win or a loss or whatever but this truly feels like a win-win win a win for teachers a win for students and then ultimately a win for everyone uh involved in this process so as Julie mentioned we know that upon your approval um there's going to be questions about more details we have identified three dates to hold question and answer sessions for teachers to get more details to them in April and um the reason why we were really working on the timeline of March is with an earlier start time for teachers we wanted to give them plenty enough time um for next school year if they had
087to make any other child care adjustments or anything for that that it would give them uh a significant runway in order to plan for that um so I'm someone who works with isda a lot on a different level um and I just you spending a lot of time working with union leaders um trying to have conversations with other people I'm just really happy that we here and Warren were able to come up with a way to have meaningful conversations with each other um and that's just that's a great thing um there there have been a lot of there's a lot of words we don't use now um but meaningful conversation I think is really important and the fact that we're able to do that and compromise and take Ryan's rough draft and move it on
088to something a little less rough and then a little less rough and a little less rough um is just absolutely wonderful and I know that it's been more than just this um and so I just wanted to thank both sides administrative and our Union for their hard work um not really much of a question either more of a comment but um much less as a student representative more as a student I think that I am very proud and happy to see that we aren't just focusing only on our students but that we're also focusing on making our school a little bit of a better place for also our teachers because often times especially as I was growing up I was told a lot um by my parents and even whenever you know you had those
089uh meetings about how behavior is going in the school it was always saying that um it starts at home and although I do like to believe that I also feel like a part of who you are is shaped by um your teachers because you know teachers aren't just teachers but sometimes they're also coaches and they're sponsors and sometimes even I know for myself they've been even though not really my friends um they felt like people that I could confide in so hearing a lot about how we're not only trying to to shape our Township because Warren has always been um how I feel anyways more of an opportunist Township so seeing that we have actually gone to the length of making um our Township not just a better place for students but also for teachers
090and for all of us overall as a community um I'm very proud of your guys's work very good from the mouth of from the mouth of one of our students yes I have to say I want to meet your parents because they have done an amazing job yes and and I mean kudos to you because it's not just parent it's the kids too but you have amazing parents so as usual we let Miss Brown give the last comment because we all know better than to go after that um can I have a motion to accept the action moved okay Julie made a motion do we have a second I will second and Terry seconded is there any further discussion hearing and seeing none we'll take a vote we we're not going to change the screen
091but it did pass unanimously question mark yes excellent it passed unanimously so thank both of you so much your hard work as well as the work of the committee okay so Mr Parkinson you are batting clean up okay enjoy I don't want to name names but I did just get a question about whether I can wrap this up in the next 27 minutes I thought about cracking a joke to all you guys saying in the spirit of March Madness I appreciate everybody getting us to halftime of the meeting and I'm going to take us through the second half now I'm just going to say that the the really bad weather isn't supposed to hurt hit now until after midnight so we're good okay well we do have seven policies that we're going to um talk
092about either revising or in two cases implementing new ones they're all important I'm going to call out two in particular and just ask the board to you know particularly take a look at those but we're going to cover just in summary all of them they're technical I'm going to look at notes and we're going to talk our way through them um board policy 6110 is Grant funds the purpose of this revision is essentially modifying language in our primary Grant policy it has a number of Provisions in it it says that federal funds won't be used on construction renovation or repairs nor for transportation except where authorized under the federal award uh the policy revision makes various updates to board's financial management language largely rewarding existing um language that was previously in the policy um but
093also stating importantly and something that we already do we have to compare actual expenditures under Grant funds to budgeted amounts at the end of the grant period the policy revision adds a section pertaining to audit requirements saying that we must uh we must begin an audit or we must initiate an audit for any Federal grant that's above $1 million um which we already do through the State Board of accounts uh and the policy revision adds mandatory disclosure and whistleblower protection language to that Grant policy president Brook if it's okay with you I'm just going to roll right through the yeah no please you just go by all means when somebody wants to stop me we certainly can I I said there were two policies I going to call out for special attention 6111 the the
094first one that we're adding is new policy is one that I do think um I'd encourage the board to take some extra look at um so this is a new policy to us the board policy is going to be internal control standards and procedures we have references to internal controls um in board policy and certainly in a lot of our action we don't have a standalone internal controls policy so um internal controls in an accounting sense is essentially the way that we commit ourselves to um safeguarding our assets and our cash um so this policy requires a school district to establish document and maintain effective internal control standards and procedures it's a critical part of every Financial audit that we go through and this policy establishes our formal position a few things it does specifically
095um inter internal it states that internal controls uh should provide reasonable Assurance of the Effectiveness and efficiency of operations reliability of reporting and compliance with laws and regulations reasonable assurance that funds property and assets are safeguarded against loss damage theft fraud unauthorized use and unauthorized disposition uh we add language saying that losses must be reported immediately to the State Board of accounts and to the prosecutor's office we're required by State Statute to do that if a loss is material we're putting $1,000 threshold in the policy so if we recognize that $1,000 and some form or another has gone missing we're required to take those steps or an asset of that value and then reasonable cyber security me measures Beyond this for the board's awareness for the community's awareness we require every employee in the school
096district to go through internal controls training already that's outside of this policy we've done that for the last couple of years and that's just recognizing that um we have an awful lot of folks in the school district that in one form or another hold field trip money or hold money that students are paying for you know participating in activity or who have check writing Authority um so internal controls is something that we're routinely audited on by the State Board of accounts and this new policy formalizes that within the the board's framework um the third policy is um the other new policy it's the other new policy for the evening cash management of Grants it really does two primary things it establishes that for Grants where we're uh where we receive reimbursement electronically which is basically
097every Grant I'm not sure I can think of one where that's not the case we're authorized to request that on a regular basis as opposed to just a monthly basis if reimbursed by check we're allowed to request it up to a month or up to once per month um this policy also adds language that almost certainly is not going to end up applying to our school district it speaks about Federal advances on Grant funds we have no Federal grant funds like that today but if we do um the policy states that we can't request that advance from the awarding agency until as close as possible to when school district expects to spend the money fourth policy and the second one that we're revising is cost principles 6114 um it's a lot of language cleanup uh
098it leans heavily on two important terms um so reasonable and necessary which are terms that are common in government accounting School accounting um so essentially what the policy says is that costs must be both reasonable and necessary to be valid under a Federal grant award there's a definition of reasonable that I think um kind of spot on a cost is reasonable if it does not exceed an amount that a prudent person would incur under the circumstances prevailing when the decision was made to incur the cost cost um the policy also covers direct and indirect costs we do have indirect costs that will pull out of several of our grant funds to help reimburse the operations fund for things like like utility costs um and it speaks to to other Provisions around allowability of costs the
099fifth one this evening is another language cleanup one required ADM counts this one is really just largely changing wording from Department of Education to State Board of Education as it pertains to to descriptors of who setting count days and there's also places where it's it stops referring to a September count day and instead refers to a fall count day and then a spring count day which occurs around February 1st each year six policy so Bard I said there were two that we're going to ask you to to um you know really kind of give your most attention to um 6325 is an important policy for the school district it speaks to procurement as it pertains to Grant funds um so we're subject to different thresholds on um Grant funds and we are under local funds
100so board you'll recall that um our quote threshold is $50,000 on um property tax and state state funded items $300,000 um before we have to go out to bids and that's consistent with state law the two most important things that this particular policy revision does is it creates a way for the school district to um self self authorize a higher threshold for quotes up to $50,000 per year so we'd have consistency between State purchasing and federal purchasing on that quotes threshold um so after we ask the board to adopt this in February excuse me in April we're going to come back and ask the board to self-certify um that we're eligible for that $50,000 threshold and we'll have to go through that process each year most likely at the annual Board of Finance meeting um
101the other piece that it does it moves the simplified acquisition threshold to $250,000 it's $150,000 today that's the point at which we'd have to go out to bids on federal projects um bidding is an important thing to do from a u you know a competition perspective it's also time intensive um and so having a wider range that we can go to quotes um is certainly efficient for the school district final policy for the evening is 6550 travel payment and reimbursement the changes in this one are really minor it adds language specifying that travel costs may include Transportation lodging sub uh sub substance and related items incurred by employees who are in travel status and then clarification that commercial airfare costs in excess of the basic um least expensive class travel is unallowable we're already operating
102that way today it just puts that language into board policy be happy to answer any questions thank thank you so much for your hard work we appreciate it you and with that my friends we are moving on to closing comments Kevin we'll start with you well thank you for everyone that came out and enjoyed our much needed joy and celebration of our students we I'm sure we all feel refreshed and enlightened and uplifted through the celebration we had and our display of our future over there who keeps who keeps um keep us all encouraged and definitely the thing we need because there's so much negativity going on and then we can come here and balance that negativity with the positive things that's going on here in Warren so I'm definitely proud to be in this
103district and being a part of it and with that I will turn it on to miss l okay again um totally enjoyed all of the highlights um our students are amazing our parents are amazing and we truly love them appreciative of all the staff and everything that they done Miss Brown just continues to shine so don't forget about us when you make it in the boardroom running and those Fortune 5 00 companies or something like that but um good night everyone we appreciate everything that you um guys have allowed us to be able to support you with and I hope you know by now we are a board that cares and we want to make sure that our district continues to thrive and we can only do that with you being your best self so
104um what that being said good night and Terry thank you um appreciate his towards it's nice to see how the construction's coming along um because we can't always walk around and see that um I really appreciate the um collaboration between our teachers and our district leadership to make appro or make um changes that are going to be impactful and help our teachers it's been a long night and I know spring break is right around the corner so so um with that I wish you all a good night and a wonderful spring break I'd like to say thank all of you for coming out tonight safe travels home and safe travels if you decide to go somewhere for spring break and just God be with you until we meet again good night great presentations everything was
105really fine guys be careful doing your spring break and well we're starting our spring breakoff going to Tippy Canoe for a robotics event yay goats um everybody have a safe and wonderful spring break and uh we will see you next month um so I really quickly I promise we will get out of here on time it'll be fine um Julie when she was discussing legislative update said how legislators like to always talk about how education is a big part of the budget it's over 50% of the state budget etc etc just a reminder they made the choice to have it be that way they did yes that was the and so there's a lot of you know sell congratulating back um patting themselves on the back they made the shift to sales tax that it
106would be part of the budget um this was a legislative choice so they don't get to congratulate themselves for something they did to themselves so anyway just wanted to say that um and then my my I jokingly refer to it as my annual pre-spring Break um message to everyone it's almost here you all deserve a break take the time off turn off your phones pretend we don't exist don't answer our emails do all of those things so that you are ready and refreshed to come back for the last quarter of the year because we all know it's the hardest quarter of the Year we love it and it ends with the best day of the year but man does that last quarter seem to last a couple of them so forget we exist do all
107the things you need to do to come back refreshed we really appreciate all of your efforts thank you so much and with that the meeting is adjourned e