001e e e all right excellent um okay welcome to the monthly business meeting of the Blue Valley Board of Education the time when the board publicly conducts its business of governing the school district although these monthly meetings are open to everyone it's important to note that they are not interactive sessions with the public comments from the audience are reserved for individuals who have signed up to speak during open Forum we kindly ask that all attendees to contribute to a positive Atmosphere by conducting themselves with decorum please engage in civil and polite Behavior towards one another it's crucial that everyone present extends courtesy to both the Schoolboard members and the speakers by listening attentively please refrain from making comments or sounds While others are sharing their thoughts fostering an environment of respect thank you for your
002understanding and cooperation making this a productive meeting for all so okay so we're going to uh ask I'm going to ask for reports from board advisory committees so I will begin that with the diversity equity and inclusion committee the diversity equity and inclusion committee met on April 4th here in this room uh the topic of that committee was esol programs and the welcoming of new families to the district uh Jackie dir who is the Blue Valley Schools K through2 esol coordinator um presented to the group uh talked about um the different programs that we have we have a center based approach so that every single one of our schools has that program um but we have 989 students currently in Blue Valley who are con classified in this program 4.5% of the population uh she
003she also talked um about our newcomer program which are um would be students who are new to uh the United States and um have more needs uh we also had a panel of teachers uh who came in and spoke as well as some administrators who spoke about the program uh this was the last meeting of the school year for the Dei committee and the next meeting will be in September uh next up committee wise I'm going to have uh Jeremy mcfaden come up and he has two the Student Activity committee as well as the finance and operations at the Student Activities Committee met on April 4th the meeting began with a report on the status of current Blue Valley projects including building projects Matt Ortman shared a rough draft of the activities on Athletics five-year
004strategic plan based on the work of this committee activity and athletic updates were provided by Blue Valley Recreation Blue Valley high schools and middle schools the finance and operations committee met on May 9th in the Board of Education room Deputy superintendent Kyle Hayden welcomed committee members and then reviewed the meeting agenda items Matt Ortman presented the Strategic plan of the Student Activities Committee Jake sodnik presented the activities and Athletics Capital Improvements underway as part of the 2023 Bond initiative Jeremy mcfaden reviewed the 20 Bond 2020 and bond 2023 quarterly progress reports and the investment summary report as of March 31st 2024 Jason Gillum and Jake sodnik presented the bids and contracts on the agenda for board approval this evening the next meeting is scheduled for June 6th uh next up was uh Katie Coler who's
005going to do curriculum and instruction I have two meetings to report on this evening uh the cni board advisory committee met on April um 10th Matt Ortman director of student services um and District director for Avid shared her presentation on um this program he shared the mission statement and the purpose for Avid um currently since uh 20072 2008 over 1100 students have participated in a and the committee uh offered suggestions for how to get the word out to Avid um to assist students um in their uh potential Choice selection uh for that program additionally Jackie dir was present and she provided an update regarding the our K12 esol program and she um shared that of um over a 100 languages are spoken in the district and about 15% of our students receive support through this
006program finally fin at this meeting Jennifer lazinski shared the process for reviewing courses uh draft curriculum uh documents uh that you have been provided and uh the committee had uh members had opportunity to provide feedback on those at the next meeting which happened to be on May 1st at that meeting uh Dr hinau and Dr punswick were were present and provided an update on Trends related to Staffing teacher ret retention National local Trends um through the uh throughout the um area and here within the district um the committee was able to provide feedback on the data that was shared Dr Mindy Wells was present that evening to provide an update on the district's mtss work in particular she uh took some time to gather feedback from the committee members about our the district's desire to
007provide parents education on the Neuroscience of behavior and understanding the three main brain states that INF influence all human behavior this is training that been provided to staff will continue to be provided to staff and uh the district feels that that education for parents is important so we're appreciative of the fact that Mindy was able to get feedback that evening as well finally Jennifer lazinski and Kelly June presented draft curriculum documents and again provided all committee members the opportunity to provide feedback on those and you have um those documents before you this evening the committee will meet again when school commences at the start of next school year and we appre appreciate all of the dedicated committee that work uh to help us with our important cni work next up uh Dr Schmid will present
008on health and wellbeing the health and well-being board advisory committee met for the final time on April 24th uh in this room Christy Dixon uh who's a school counselor with blue valley and she's also on a committee uh that works on drug and alcohol prevention efforts uh she shared that the committee that her Committee of drug and alcohol prevention had had two community outre outreach sessions this year connect to prevent which is focused on how to connect with your child to have critical conversations related to prevention and Off Script uh which was focusing on the trends of substance use and abuse uh following the P pandemic she also reviewed the drug and alcohol prevention curriculum grades 5 through 12 and discussed various cost-free and confidential drug and alcohol assessment opportunities that are offered through Johnson
009County Mental Health adolescence Center for treatment we finished the meeting by soliciting topics for next year uh the next meeting will be September 11th 2024 and the final committee report uh will be christe mcnarland regarding the communications committee good evening the communications committee met on May 7th of 2024 um we kicked it off with District updates um we ran the superintendent accolades that shared at Board of Education meetings also uh Jan kessinger was an attendance and was excited to share um about the graduations coming and how much you as board members enjoy that time together um Casey brudo our director of communication shared a summary of communication plans the team is working on as we finish up this school year and move into to Summer but the majority of our time spent was we spent
010the time talking about web-based opinion platforms so the committee discussed the experience and options they prefer when taking surveys the discussion will help inform decisions around tools used by the district when seeking the thoughts and opinions of staff students families and community members the committee shared ideas around surveys to consider running during various times of the year examples mentioned include surveying new Educators asking why they chose Blue Valley employe exit surveys student surveys um for the transitional years senior exit surveys family entrance and exit surveys they had just some great ideas as we had some really healthy discussion around that um and then Shar the process for reapplying for the communications board advisory committee or applying for a new board advisory committee applications um you know are located online for those that we continue to
011have those open we're also promoting that um as part of a communication plan as well meeting was Jed at 8:30 a.m. we look look forward to regrouping next September thank you fantastic thank you um we're going to go uh next to reports from board members and the superintendent on items not included on the agenda but if my board cohorts can bear with me a little bit I asked them this afternoon if they wouldn't mind um sharing um uh in recognition um of uh natural teacher appreciation week last week um I've asked our our fellow cohorts um to um just make a mention um about maybe a teacher that impacted them or an experience and I'd like to do that first if you don't mind Jan would you like to start sure uh you know I'm
012old so I can't remember teacher's name but my kindergarten teacher was amazing uh just because well I had had a severe accident burn on my mouth and had speech problems and but she was always so caring and made me feel included and was very patient with me which as you guys can understand the need to have patience with me um but then also my speech pathologist for three years in in grade school in uh second third fourth grade uh it taught me the love of reading because as part of our speech therapy you were to read and read out loud and it just it made all the difference in the world to me and I have a book problem I'm addicted to books so but I I give my speech pathologist that credit for that
013and I can go on about it too because that was in special ed uh which taught me great love and compassion for uh children who were different from me so and I can go on I I love teachers thank you Jan I appreciate that Jim would you like to go next uh sure um my favorite teacher was Mr Stout who wore a tuxedo on the day that we did um the Pythagorean theorem and geometry in nth grade but I asked my um that was that was good stuff um I asked my kids who've all graduated um who their favorite Blue Valley teachers were um my uh son Daniel uh called out coach Parks over at Valley Southwest who now like seven of those wrestlers all work together at my son's company um uh my daughter's
014yearbook teacher whose name was reers at um at Blue Valley Southwest she was awesome she was a grammar Nazi um she was great and um my son Andrew's teacher writing teacher or English teacher at Blue Valley West uh Zach G who's I think he's leaving but um he's writing in novel so good luck to him on that and then I did not I cannot remember the name of my son's uh algebra teacher of buali Academy but my son David was struggling at the time and that guy was me just you know changed his life so I'd recognize those teachers thanks Jim I appreciate it Gina so I'd say my personal favorite teacher was my fifth grade teacher Miss Foreman Vivian Foreman um and I don't remember exactly why just the warm feeling that her classroom
015had but I will say as far as my kids go so I asked my kids so my um freshman at KU said um Angie Sanders was his special ed teacher um most of the years that he was at blue valley Northwest before she moved on to uh the Middle School um she was awesome she's an amazing special ed teacher and she's doing a lot at Pleasant I think believe it's Pleasant Rich um to make change and she's just an awesome stud teacher so um Amelia my sophomore loved EK she's a honors Ela teacher at Northwest um and also miss Sutton the eighth grade English teacher at Harmony Middle School um I'm sure Patrick would agree on on Miss Sutton um the kids all think she's really strict and they learn a lot from her and
016so it's interesting because they hate how strict she is but they love how strict she is and they learn more from her than any other teacher um and then fan favorite at Harmony Middle School my son said eth he's an eighth grade so Mr Sanders is the fan favorite at Harmony Middle School right now so y thank you Gan I appreciate it Tanya um I would say I I have a lot of teachers that I could talk about but the one that really always comes to mind right away from me is Mrs Bell Mrs Bell was my second grade teacher uh when I was in elementary school I struggled a lot and I would come home crying almost every day U my mom used to talk about U when she would go to conferences if
017they would say that I didn't cry that day um it was a big thing but she recognized in me um that I was smart and that I could do things and so she encouraged me and she had me help kindergarteners and that just that little bit is what really kind of drove me to really love school and so I I distinctly remember changing from hating going to school in second grade to just loving it thank you clay all right well I did not go through and ask my kids because we'd be here for a long time going through all of their favorite teachers um but thinking back my favorite teacher of all time was probably Miss Williams Jan Williams way back in the day she was the music teacher at our elementary school and I
018was extremely shy in elementary school school and throughout school and she is she got me involved in music and theater and drama and it was a a game Cher a life Cher for me um at one point we were doing the kids version of Alice in Wonderland and I played the White Rabbit and the makeup the little whiskers on my face got smeared before I went on stage and I was crying and and it was just making it worse and she just turned me around and pushed me out on stage but that was the best thing ever because I managed through it I was able to get out there and survive and do well so I think back to uh Miss Williams and maybe I'd still be in a little shell if it wasn't for
019her so you can blame her or thank her either way but Jan Williams thanks Clay Patrick thank you jny um you know we all I think had probably great teachers mine was Miss Coulter um third grade teacher um taught everything obviously but really um um gave me the uh green light to just go as fast as far as I could in math um it was a good experience and you know rarely do you have teachers that have that kind of confidence or trust and can manage their class to let that happen but more specifically um certainly my my kids at Northwest have some some great teachers I think all the teachers there are I think all of our schools have great teachers but the AVID program I think is an amazing program and and the
020team in blue valley Northwest has done a really great job um Mike aruchi and um Valerie golden both very good at what they do but they uh take that extra mile to reach out to the kids uh make sure that um there's a substantive relationship there um and I think that really is is important um in whatever class or whatever uh program you're in that really engages the kids and helping them Find meaning as opposed to just going home doing homework taking a test and coming back um so um all our teachers um deserve great credit for the things they do every day how to teach a child to learn is complicated um takes time some go really fast some take more time and then some do great later but the bottom line is all
021of our teachers are helping our kids be successful at whatever phase of Life they choose to pursue thank you thanks Patrick Sonia well for me I had uh two teachers third grade I was extremely shy too and people will forget that I would be in the classroom cuz I was so shy oh you're in here oh I didn't even know you're still here so uh Elementary School teacher third grade Miss moraca she would just I would never raise my hand for anything so she would just pick me out okay you're going to be my helper today Sonia because the other kids would raise their hand they get picked and I figure they're not going to pick me anyway but she would you're going to be my helper you clean off the board so she kind
022of just made me feel important and made me feel like I was valued and that she actually saw me cuz I was one of the kids just kind of melted in the the wall and she saw me and she pulled that out of pulled that whatever that was holding me back she pulled it out of me and then when I was in high school ninth grade my history teacher I remember her uh because she was an equestrian and she made the class so interesting and exciting she was animated and she came to school one time just beat up I mean she had scratches and scars and dried up blood and I'm you know I'm staring at her and she said she was in the horse show and she got thrown by her horse and I
023was like wow so that was another teacher that influenced me as far as history is concerned and so um then I asked my uh youngest son I remember him talking about at Blue Valley High School back in the day about uh his counselor Andy ticki he really really liked him and I think he was kind of right kind of like very energetic with the kids or whatever he liked him and for myself I can see when my grandson came back um Prairie Star El uh Middle School uh principal he's not a teacher but he's a principal Eric rebold and uh Shelly tempton the kids didn't like her cuz she was strict she was real stct and so I knew that and I'm kind of like that myself so that summer I had her two to
024my grandson he said why did you pick her I said because I know that you're going to learn something and she came to my house twice a week to tutor him and at the end of the tutoring the summer session I was cuz I try not to be down there and be hovering like a helicopter type of person so I was kind of standing on the L landing and his last day I remember he stuck out his hand he said you know I really appreciate you coming to my home to tutor me and I was shocked and uh so I really like those two individuals at Prairie Star middle school thank you Sonia um I would have to say um many teachers throughout my uh career of K through 12 but um the one that
025stands out the most um would be Mr deach um up in Lincoln Nebraska um leer uh Junior High um he was absolutely a fantastic social studies history teacher um we would just Pine to to spend time with him because of the great dialogue we would have he really listened to us um and it was just just a very very special person and he's still around and um I love to see the things that he's doing he's a he B not a motorcycle but he bikes so um I I appreciate you all sharing because I think you know um all of our teachers create such an impact and you don't always know what happens after you know they graduate and you know most of us have been graduated for a number of years and um that
026we still have such fond memories and that their their Devotion to their their Craft um really made an impact on us so thank you so much for sharing I appreciate that um okay so on to uh reports from board members and the super superintendent on items not included on the agenda so let's start with Clay this time all right um it was a busy month there's a lot going on um Student Activities Committee curriculum and instruction committee very had our reports on that attended the nsba conference which was very educational informative still involved with f father's Club over at Blue Valley West wrapping up my final year after there and holy smoke met with the school counselors to find out ways that we can support them plan some events with them did the Jaguar Grill
027we grilled out for the kids for lunchtime um grilled out for the teachers at a sports event where we had four or five sporting events on the campus all in one night so we treated them for uh to dinner and all their kids that they wanted to bring um had 120 some show up had a uh coffee camper for teachers this week parked out side Blue Valley West 120 teachers came out to get drinks and their the morale was high things were good they were happy it was awesome um and I also told them that if they took a coffee drink they were committed to coming back next year so we got them locked in um of course we handed out Donuts to the kids and had a lot of other stuff going on there
028uh Johnson County Suicide Prevention Coalition went to those meetings very informative learned about um uh the 988 system uh learned a lot about that state of the county program of course there was prom I did not go but I did help cheron um Blue Valley Ed Foundation we had a celebration last month um to celebrate our big donors over at DLR with Tom Mitchell um hosting which was fantastic um and caps Network held their annual inperson meeting brought bringing in the folks that are um sitting in the board from across the country which was very very exciting and I continue the school tours and hit six more schools so I think we're I'm well over half the schools now in the district Patrick I'm good how anything Sonia on April the 2nd um I attended
029a Blue Valley High School assembly they had invited Kevin Hines He's A Mental Wellness Advocate and a bestelling author and an Amal awardwinning filmmaker to speak with the students and that was sponsored by the Blue Valley Education Foundation and that was just mental health awareness and actually sharing his life stories with the students and telling them to love their life and I really uh enjoyed that matter of fact several of the high school students uh that I spoke with they they said that it really impacted them and that they really enjoyed the uh the assembly with what he shared with them I mean you could hear a pin drop I mean it was so quiet and he knew how to manipulate the students too because if they start going off in the direction sometime how
030he drew them back in again it was just awesome and of of course I attended the nsba annual conference um and on April the 9th I attended the PTO PTA president's Council end of the year meeting and I also on April 10th attended the 2024 combined retirement celebration at the Iron Horse events room and on 17th with um April 17th with clay and the rest of the board members we attended uh the awards reception at the DLR group offices recognizing the big donor Community uh supporters and then on April the 18th I attended the husband and wife team Ken Selzer and Deb Grimes Innovative educator awards at Overland Trail Elementary in Overland Trail Middle School and then on April 25th I attended um with other board members the Community Connection town hall meeting at Blue
031Valley Middle School and then on May the 4th I attended the parents as teachers 35th year anniversary Touch a Truck celebration at Hilltop Learning Center that was a high day to see 400 plus children um get on all these trucks all types of trucks I mean people I was just amazed at the people that supported this that brought their trucks there to the facility and just seeing the kids dragging their parents because they want to get inside the truck and pretend like they were driving or whatever and I that was really a high day so that's what I did yeah Jan um every Friday I would get on to to a zoom call with the Kansas advocacy Network a part of the Kansas Association of school boards uh work on legislative issues and one of
032the things we're especially happy about is the uh uh special ed funding that the budget uh that was passed injected several million dollars I think 72 million uh National Association of school board down in New Orleans several of us were down there had some great workshops uh Jody and I went to the state of the county luncheon where we learned what we already knew that Johnson County is soaring and it's great and I tell you that education uh Blue Valley schools and our sister school districts all help make that happen uh attended to seven days of kindness breakfast that's something that Mindy corpin formed after Blue Valley High School student re Underwood was murdered I also went to a rally with them uh later in the week uh Blue Valley School District we had a
033retirement party out at uh Iron Horse and that was uh really great and on one hand and sad what the best part was there weren't that many uh retiring teachers um Community Connection that Sonia talked about uh we heard a lot of concerns about computer Paras and whether it should be teacher certified the touch of truck as Sonia again mentioned uh is a real highlight uh a lot of fun they were supposed to get a helicopter but something caused them not to not to get it landed uh and I would have gotten on that and tried to fly it uh Communications committee as chrisy talked about we talked about how to do all those how to do surveys and gather more information so we can do a better job uh the Blue Valley Ed foundation
034on the committee they uh passed funding for 50 teachers to receive scholarships for uh English uh how say that anyway esol um uh licensure and they're committed to increasing that um Jim and I were at the education influencer luncheon at leetta felter uh out at mid- America Nazarene College had put together uh we received a $1,000 scholarship for Blue Valley student who goes to Mid America Nazarene and studies education uh also in a small group at the tables uh during the lunch and we did a lot of brainstorming of how to retain teachers so a lot of good things coming out of that thanks Jen Jim um I'll just uh report on the BL valy wreck meeting the staff gave an update um on memberships to the to the rec center up at the hilltop
035um in 2019 there were 11,800 members Co cut the number of members almost in half so back in 2021 there were 6,300 members as of now uh it's just under 10,000 members so it's almost recovered um the loss in membership and I think on a revenue basis it's actually up Clay May clay might know this because he came from chairing that board but I so the the Blue Valley wreck has done a good job at at rebuilding the business that they lost um because of the Pand mic so thanks Jim Gina uh the ability showcase which is put on by the special ed advisory Council was a couple of weeks ago it was amazing um as always I think Maggie's daughter was participated in it also um so that was a lot of fun and
036they also have an art fair outside of the um show room so really enjoyed that um I'm on the ca board and um they give out this true blue scholarship every year to 34 students throughout the state of Kansas Blue Valley won six students won six of those which was by far the most out of any school district in the state so that was very exciting and then I was elected or maybe talked into joining their executive board as a local Board of Education member so um we'll be trying to follow in Tom's footsteps I guess on the activities and Athletics participation stuff um lastly we've done a lot of school visits this year um recently but the one thing that stood out in this last round was the nest um day I guess every
037Thursday um at Harmony Middle School um all the kids get together in their nest flex and um they're in that same group all three years they're in middle school so have this real family environment and um it was really neat to see so yeah thank you Dr marrian you bet if you guys will pull up the presentation U we've had a lot go on uh since the last time we met so we want to highlight some of those things here uh first of all the University of Kansas uh recently honored some Blue Valley teachers and administrators who have 25 or more years of service in the teaching profession this year they hit the 25 or more so you can see that list there um Blue Valley West student won the Kansas State science and engineering
038Fair um you can see her research project there um so that's we congratulate her um so this is a a true honor for Blue Valley this is the first year that the state of Kansas has had a Civics B and so we had the local uh Civics be and we there were eight finalists who made it in Johnson County all eight of the students were from Blue Valley Schools um these three students were the local winner um in that order I believe and so they went to the state competition there were four regions uh three winners from each region um so there were 12 students there and here are your winners from the state um rashan in first place from Oxford is the student in the middle he will now go on uh to compete
039uh for Kansas in the fall uh to Washington DC and those students um won money just FYI uh it it wasn't just but and they were very very impressive so we are thanks to special thanks to Kelly and Jennifer over there because they coordinated that and the the chamber who coordinated this would say that we were very easy to work with and thank you too very much um here is a Blue Valley High student who uh won a National Merit Scholarship um scholarship so what happens is once you're named a National Merit finalist you uh can win certain scholarships so here is one that a student won um we had two Blue Valley High students who were presidential scholar semifinalists so congratulations to Kevin and somma um some caps medicine students uh who won at
040a future health professionals conference so we want to congratulate those students uh we honored Jim earlier this evening uh for his induction into the kspa Hall of Fame uh the blue valley Northwest yearbook The Horizon was one of 27 to win the yearbook pacemaker award so we congratulate those editors as well as their advisers Jim mccrosson and Kim white um we honored Rachel earlier this evening as well she is a journalism um adviser at Blue Valley Southwest for winning the Jackie Engel award uh Arts Council of Johnson County um we honored some of those students this evening as well so we want to congratulate them um Anne Fritz uh coached the West team in the girls McDonald high school All-American Game in April um her husband Ed had coached the men's team several years ago
041so I think this is the first time that we believe that a husband and wife combo has coached for the McDonald's teams um Governor scholar uh this they were honored these students were honored in toeka a couple of weeks ago so we want to congratulate them this is the top 1% of each of our schools um May celebrations it was national school nurses's day it was Teacher Appreciation Week school lunch hero Day School principal Day speech pathologist day lots of days and recognitions in May and and we want to thank all of those individuals and congratulate them uh 2024 rankings are in for the US News and World Report all five Blue Valley High Schools were ranked in the top 10 in Kansas and in the top 10% nationally so congratulations and that that starts
042in early childhood or actually in parents as teachers all the way through it isn't just a high school uh celebration it's for all of our schools um here are some staff Awards uh we had champ last week Champions uh for student award the Blue Valley Ed Foundation helps us uh to award that that is funded by the sharmas and then the Innovative educator that Sonia talked about um that has been going around a while and that is from Ken seler and Deb Grim so we uh thank those people for funding that and for the ability for us to recognize these individuals uh we SE celebrated several retirees in April uh we have nearly 60 uh who have a combined 1,214 years of service in Blue Valley and I agree with I think Jan said the
043the good news is there wasn't as many as in the past Blue Valley parents' teacher celebrated its 35th Anniversary that was the touch of truck event oops and then late breaking can you go back sorry I messed this up late breaking news was that um Blue Valley West is the 6A State CH Tennis champion um and there were some individual Awards as well Blue Valley Southwest uh right here is the singles Champion so we want to congratulate Sanjay in that as well and actually blue valley Southwest got second place by one point so St James beat them by one point so congratulations to them and then this weekend is graduations uh we are very excited to celebrate um all of our graduates uh this Saturday and Sunday great thanks Dr Morgan um I think most
044of my cohorts here had mentioned many things uh 7even days rally was fantastic um seven days of kindness um I know Jan attended also um retirements were great also uh attend the can Network um uh state of the county address was phenomenal um the touch of truck was fantastic rain held off thank heavens it was it was a great event lots of excitement um Blue Valley aded Foundation event at LR um clay and I were he had mentioned the Caps Network it was the um annual meeting that we had um and so we were able to all meet in person usually we don't because we're from all over the country um and uh really excited about the upcoming summer huddle so that's pretty neat oh and also I've been a judge at Shark Tank um
045at Blue Valley Southwest this last week and I will be doing that again this next next week and if you haven't had a chance to do that it is so much fun it is Jim would love it Jim would love it so so um before I move on to I think we have some students in the crowd yeah so where are you guys from nice and are you do you have to be here you just worked that right in didn't you nice well thank you for coming we appreciate it all right so we're going to uh need to approve the agenda for the May 13th 2024 regular Board of Education meeting as published have a motion I move that the Board of Education approved the agenda for the May 13th 2024 regular Board of Education
046meeting as published we have a second okay motion by Gina second by Clay any discussion all in favor raise your hand or say I I any oppos same sign motion passes 70 all right on to the consent agenda um do we have a motion do you want a motion before I think you're pulling something off right yeah um I'd like one item to be pulled from the consent agenda and then just added as new business item 4f great National School Board Association membership for 2024 okay sounds good so do we uh was that a motion it was just pull it off done okay move it down new business okay so now we can go ahead and approve the consent agenda so I'll need a motion for that I move the Board of Education approve the
047amended consent agenda for May 13 2024 regular Board of Education meeting okay wait a second second okay we're gonna give that one to Sonia sorry all right uh any discussion um all in favor raise your hand or say I I any opposed same sign motion passes 70 do we need to give the captioner a break at 701 are we good let's go one more okay um so first off this evening uh Kelly June is coming up to present uh the curriculum this is a yearly occurrence uh she is here to present the curriculum that has been written throughout the school year I will turn it to Kelly good evening my name is Kelly June and I'm the executive director of academic services for Blue Valley and I'm here tonight to share draft documents for your
048consideration for the 2425 school year um no action is requested tonight um they will be an agenda item for Action in June see so I'd like to take just one moment quickly and share with you the process by which these documents were created on the screen you see the graphic that depicts the process through which state standards become um lessons for students in classroom Kansas College and Career Readiness standards are created by KSD improved by the Kansas board of education for all students in Kansas and then these standards outline are learning outcomes for the various subject areas in all schools all districts in Kansas then take those standards and develop local curriculum our district curriculum in Blue Valley is comprised of units of study organized in a manner that makes sense for the students and
049learners in Blue Valley uh the process of developing our local curriculum allows for our educational professionals to tailor the standards for the Learners of our district it is with these documents essentially scope and sequences uh for a course uh that teachers collaboratively design instruction for individual Learners in our district and it's at this point where State Standards come alive for students each year we have curriculum revisions and creation it's a year-long process led by lead teachers and our instructional design team uh the process begins in August where teacher writing teams are assembled and the work of creating draft documents begins uh throughout the process teacher authorship teams use feedback and processes to engage all students of the course or class and then these documents were first presented to our board of education curriculum instruction committee
050advisory committee on April 10th and then again on May 1st I've also provided you with an access to the working drafts in April ahead of this formal present ation tonight as you can see on the screen we're nearing the end of the process tonight and I'm happy to provide you with 57 pages of easy reading for your consideration um our teachers have been very hard at work uh diving deep into resource-based practices deepening their content knowledge and creating these curricular documents for the benefit of students I want to thank all the teachers uh and who have been involved in the process uh there there are literally hundreds each person who wrote or gave feedback or assisted with the verbal articul vertical articulation uh was certainly a valuable contributor I will now go Department by department
051and just highlight um some specific courses up for your consideration um for Career and Technical education there are three courses business software applications emerging Technologies and financial literacy all three are uh part of the business and computer science pathway and teachers um really focus on Real World Learning in these courses of particular not is the financial literacy course which is a new graduation requirement uh there's six units uh involved in that curriculum earning income spending saving investing managing credit and managing risk and these uh units are tightly aligned to the requirements for the new graduation requirement in science you will see uh physical science and zoology the updates to zoology focused on lining that a course with prerequisite course in honors and biology and biology while the physical science course was designed with a focus
052on improving the alignment between chemistry and uh physics social studies big big gear for social studies there were several classes that were re were Rewritten um social studies six and eight at Middle School along with several High School courses you can see there uh the F the focus of these authorship groups include Improvement improving the alignment between onlevel courses and AP courses so that more students will have the uh skills needed to take Advanced courses uh they also Dove deep into the our country's uh founding documents and increase the relevancy within the units in the area of math a single class was uh written this year it is a new class we're really excited to offer uh next fall will be the first year we're offering AP pre-calculus for students it will replace honors pre-calculus
053and open up the possibility of college credit uh because of its AP status so we're excited for that opportunity for students in the area of Performing Arts are Elementary music teachers are hard at work this year writing all six levels of the elementary music curriculum and Performing Arts uh these curriculum documents organized into the three categories found in their standards creating performing and responding and they focus their work on the six year experience for students uh and making sure they acquired the uh use the skills of descriptive language creativity performance and Analysis next is World Language and you'll see four Chinese courses uh Chinese steam 7 Chinese language arts8 Chinese Humanities 8 and Chinese steam eight uh these four courses finish the complement of Chinese program for students coming uh or matriculating from the Chinese
054emersion program at elementary school the biggest uh group is caps um I'm not going to read all of those for you but they they are all caps courses uh these courses are developed by caps instructors using our district protocol and you'll see the do in the documents their focus as you would expect on the authentic experience and work pay skills and so just to recap I am here formerly presenting the documents for your consideration um as you read through them and have any questions feel free to reach out uh we're happy to answer any questions um documents and curriculum that are approved in June will go go into effect in August and the at which point teachers will have professional learning around um those updated documents and courses so that's what I have for you
055tonight anything for me to right now all right any questions be sure to send in my way thank thank you okay so up next we have the 2024 2025 calendar so Dr CER um will um come forward for the next two uh 202 2425 calendar and then 2526 calendar um some possible revisions so the uh calendars before you this evening have both previously been approved and tonight we're seeking um revision to approval of revision of both of these calendars um this is related to our ongoing conversation around teacher plan time and collaboration at the elementary level the dates before you this evening on the 2425 calendar are the same dates presented to you at last month's Workshop those are highlighted in a light yellow uh shading on the calendar those dates for next year are
056uh for each semester August 30th September 27th November 1st December 6th January 31st February 28th April 11th and May 2nd as a reminder we still meet the state requirements for hours required at the elementary level in um in presenting this calendar to you this evening I'm happy to answer any questions that you might have um given that I've presented a couple times to you I just want to give you the opportunity to ask any questions that you might have but those are the revisions to the previously approved 2425 calendar so I can see you made the changes but what were what were the changes I mean you added days took days away CH moved the days around these are the days requested for elementary plan time and it's they are the non student attendance days
057four scattered AC uh across each semester for a total of eight throughout the school year okay thank you question I was going to make great a motion I move the Board of Education approve the amended 2425 calendar to include designated days for elementary plan time and collaboration time do we have second second second by Clay any discussion okay all in favor say I or raise your hand any opposed same sign motion passes sorry go ahead thank you the 2526 calendar um in front of you again has previously been approved um highlighted on this calendar again are the elementary days those are August 29th September 26th November 7th December 5th January 30th February 27th April 10th and May 1st and I would make a note as well um I failed to say this on the 2425
058calendar we do have a communication plan set and we'll begin communication on these calendars as early as tomorrow I'm happy to entertain any questions you might have on the 2526 calendar any questions right do we have a motion I move the Board of Education to approve the 2024 25 no this is 255 26 down there move the amended 2526 calendar to include designated days for elementary plan time and collaboration time do we have a second second okay motion by Jan second by Sonia any discussion all right all in favor raise your hand or say I any oppos same sign motion passes 70 I would like to thank the Board of Education for your action this evening and all of the uh the depth of questions that you've asked the last couple months to understand uh
059this particular topic so thank you thank you very much all right so Dr margan is going to give us a legislative update pull that up okay so this is just a brief legislative update now that um the legislative session has ended so as a reminder this is the legislative calendar um they adjourned uh they call it sign die right sign die um on April 30th and so the legislature has adjourned for the year there'll be a special session Well for now they've adjourned um the Board of Education had adopted uh six priority positions they're they're listed up there and those are the ones that we really focused on um and worked with our legislators on um I want to highlight just some bills and actually thank our legislative delegation uh for the work that they
060did the uh K through2 education Bill uh is Senate Bill 387 uh it includes all of these other bills um that are listed below it that I'll highlight just really briefly uh this where this is it's past the house 115-2 it pass the Senate 35-2 and it is with the governor um I don't believe she signed it yet I checked earlier today and it had not been signed yet but we anticipate that she will sign this um this is our legislators listen to us uh we advocated for some changes and they made those changes um it's not perfect but it certainly is a a good step in the right direction uh so I'll just go briefly through a couple of them uh the first one uh included with this bill is the disposal of District
061real real property um it limits um so a part of the legislation is is that the legislature has first right of refusal if we were to sell something um they F tune that a little bit uh really talked about uh buildings that were formally used as attendance centers um allows the legislative coordinating Council to wave that option if they're not in session clarifies the timeline um a district May one thing that was included in here though is that you you will you cannot deny to sell or lease a building solely based on the intention that it's used by a non-public school so that would be something to be important um included in this virtual students now participate in Casa activities uh currently they have to be enrolled in one class uh in the brick and
062mortar school in order to to participate in Casa activities what this does is it just uh makes it the same for homeschool because right now A homeschool student can come in and participate that was last year so that helped some auditing requirements changed for adult virtual programs that does not pertain to us so I didn't list much there um the Open Enrollment Bill uh prioritized that Kansas residents um would be prioritized over out of-state residents um provides for continued enrollment of non-resident students who attended their school the year before authorizes school districts to deem students as not in good standing before they enrolled they didn't allow that before um parent May appeal the not in good standing to the local board so you would need to know if we as administrative deemed somebody not in
063good standing they could appeal it to you requires publication of those policies and amendments on the school district website uh they articulated that transportation is not provided unless required by other law or regulation which would be special ed um and then virtual schools are exempt from open enrollment Dr Maran yes what does not in good standing mean uh not in good standing would be that if we had a student um with we we can determine that at at as a district level but for us it would be attendance or discipline issues in their home school and correct me if I'm wrong but that was written into what we already approved yes it was um the education task force was developed uh it has 11 voting members you can see who those are some ex official
064U members appointments will be made by November 30th and they are to report to the legislature by January 11th of 2027 that date is important because in 2027 the school Finance formula sunsets um it would also abolish the current special education task force um at risk and high density at risk uh this is one that they listen to us on uh it is a two-year pilot um they will take I think 10 school districts uh to um to kind of fine-tune this uh each School District must establish an atrisk student accountability plan uh including budgets and expenditures academic improvements in certain student cohorts must be identified um there would be a penalty to at risk funding if cohorts do not meet those goals there would be no penalty in this pilot um ksbe is a
065Kansas State Board of Education will have to approve and provide a list of atrisk education programs and evidence-based instruction that already is Char they're charged with that uh the Board of Education also the State Board of Education also will provide a process for provisional programs um or really Above and Beyond in at risk talks about a collateral benefit if no additional cost so for example if we found a program uh and it was a flat fee to be used in a school any student could use that and we could use atrisk funds for that um but if it was per student then you could only use the atrisk funds for the at risk students that's a difference there and the Kansas State Board of Education cannot substantially change the math or Ela standards what basically
066they don't want them to make it easier I think um special education included in again this is all included in that budget bill um Revis a special education state aid um excess cost calculation uh requires the calculation of school district level excess costs requires districts to transfer funding uh attributable to sped from lob to sped um but very importantly uh the state board will develop a formula to distribute the new funding of 73 million so they've added an additional 73 million um and they don't want it funded the same way we've been doing it across the state um the State Board of Education is working with ksde uh we've seen some models of what KSD is proposing and Blue Valley would benefit from that so we we're happy with that can I go back to
067your yep uh real estate the very first one yeah I wasn't tracking so yeah so we have to offer it to the legislature that's ridiculous that's been that was passed last year Jim yeah okay well I'm not in the know of that I'm remember I'm not I guess I'm in the no but I'm constructively in the no but I'm not physically in the no so got it yep um oops now I'm messed up um so then the governor's uh budget recommendations again included in Bud in the budget Bill uh it increased the CPI increase to the base um Consumer Price Index maintains current funding levels for most programs um added some money um to state to sped state aid uh it did restrict the $5 million in safe and secure schools grants to aeds cameras
068and then that artificial intelligence gun detection software um those are the only things that you could use that to apply that grant for so we've used that Grant in the past for cameras right mainly yep yeah locks glass um so this year if we want to apply for it would have to be aeds cameras and I'm guessing Dan probably doesn't want to do the artificial intelligence gun detection software right now yeah um so so that's the that's the uh funding bill and again we want to applaud our legislators for listening to us and and really making that much better for Blue Valley than it was um a month ago um a couple other things that passed uh Senate Bill 73 uh looked at how they fund us and they would use current year enrollment so
069starting in 2425 uh the enrollment for funding will be based on the highest of your current year or your prior year for next year only it would be the current year the prior year or the average of the prior and the second preceding year so that's just a one-year deal uh it passed the house and the Senate uh it's been signed by the governor and so it is being published um Senate Bill 19 it's called the emerg program and cardiac plans uh I put this in here because this is going to affect us the emerg program is not going to affect us but uh this requires the Kansas Department of Health uh and Education Health and environment sorry to develop model emergency cardiac plans for schools and for local school boards to adopt an emergency
070cardiac plan that has passed and been signed by the governor so you can expect this summer sometime uh that we will have some sort of a plan before you um Senate Bill 438 is the blueprint for literacy um we are uh fully in support of the blueprint for literacy it kind of talks in there about some of the work um that they have established with this plan and then there were lots of other nonk through 12 things in there as well but those are what's listed there really is what pertains to us and then just some other topics of interest um parents's teachers uh the bill that would have moved parents as teachers to the office of Early Childhood did not pass so that still is under the Kansas State Department of Education and then
071Senate Bill 37 the new tax plan the residential exemption raised to $100,000 and the mill rate dropped to 19.5 um the school Finance fund is supposed to be backfilled with state general fund and this is just um a QR code to our website so if anybody wanted to learn more that was watching this you can go to this presentation and or you can go right to our website and it would have that information so um as Jan kind of alluded to at the beginning they have adjourned for the year but the rumor is is that the governor will be calling them back um to work on a a tax plan so we will be watching that to make sure nothing else happens fantastic thank you Dr Moran um okay up next Children's Mercy Hospital contract
072do we have a motion I move that the Board of Education approve the contract with Children's Mercy do we have a [Music] second motion by Clay second by Patrick any discussion just want to make a couple comments I ask that we separately consider this um this is about a $2.7 million contract uh it's a similar it's an annual contract we've this been third time this come up for consideration while I've been on the board and um I don't think it's a a an expenditure that you know I it's not an expenditure that I uh support um I really have two fundamental problems with it one I think it expands the the um we've already done it in the school district but we and a lot of school dist districts have done it so I acknowledge
073that um and I acknowledge that there's some support for it but it expands the function role um of the schools uh it's really fundamentally a philosophical perspective on what the role and function of our schools is um the other is we have really unlimited wants but we have limited resources so we have to pick what what we spend money on and if you look at the average large public school system like Blue Valley you know our line item is about 50% instruction 50% everything else and it might be 52% might be 54% might be 47% but that's the range for almost all public school systems at least in in Johnson County that's the case um probably across the state probably across the country if you look at most you know private school systems large school
074systems Catholic dases Etc that instruction expenses upwards of 60% to 65% so you make choices whether you're putting that money into the classroom or or putting it into support services or and I'm not saying the support services aren't aren't um necessary in some circumstances um but we've made a choice so I during this last campaign I wasn't running but I did get asked because it was a prominent issue you know Jim why do you why are you opposed to our social workers I said it's not that I'm opposed to our social workers but um I I might say the same of if someone who supports that are you opposed to what's called additional reading support or additional math support or higher salaries for teachers or um a smaller class SI sizes all of those things
075are also valid expenditures so it's same thing I I said last year and I just uh reiterated okay any other comments All right so um all those in favor raise your hand or say I any oppose same sign motion passes 61 uh finally we've got um uh the uh membership for the National School Board Association for 2024 do we have a motion I move that the Board of Education approve the national school boards Association membership for 2024 may have a second Jan okay motion by Gina second by Jan any discussion I'll just make a quick comment I I voted in the last two years to approve this but um I did it on the hope and expectation that the uh National School Board Association would take a a less ideological bent um and I don't
076I don't think it's the case I you can re review the website and the leadership and the commentary it it's just way out of whack with uh you know my beliefs my beliefs don't really matter but I I do think that uh it doesn't reflect the the Viewpoint or perspective of close to half of the the citizens of Blue Valley and so I pose it on that basis any other comments all right um all those in favor raise your hand or say I any oppose same sign motion passes six zero oh two sorry Patrick so Jim and Patrick 52 all right so if there's nothing else I believe we can go ahead and adjourn um the May 13 2024 regular Board of Education meeting is adjourned thank you