001doctors. Doctors, >> if you're done, may we? >> I guess. >> All right. like to welcome everybody to our board meeting tonight. It's Tuesday, November 18th. This is our regular board meeting. I'd like to welcome everybody that's here in person and the millions of people that are uh watching online right now. We're going to start our meeting with a call to order. Uh that's what I just did. I just called this meeting to order. We're going to have a moment of silence and a pledge of allegiance led by Jill Humphre. If everyone would please rise. for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Thank you, Miss Humphre. And now we'll ask Miss Wilson if she would please do roll call. >> Mr. Chad Thompson, >> here. >> Miss
002Shaina Murray >> here. >> Dr. Blake Robersonson >> here. >> Miss Jill Humphre >> here. >> Mr. Jesse Brainard >> here. >> Mr. President, all board members are present. You have a quorum. >> Thank you, Miss Wilson. Uh, our agenda item number two, approval of our agenda. Is there a motion to approve tonight's agenda as written? >> So moved. >> Thank you, Miss Humphre. Is there a second? >> Second. >> Thank you, Mr. Brainer. All those in favor of approving tonight's agenda as outlined, please say I. >> I. >> Any opposed? And that passes. Thank you very much. Moving right into our superintendence report. Dr. McCord. >> Thank you, Mr. President, governing board members. Uh there are no recognitions tonight, but uh because we're waiting for some fall events to wrap up, we'll uh congratulate
003everybody on all their accomplishments at the December 9th board meeting. But with that in mind, we still have a couple of teams playing. Uh we have two schools in the running for the state championship in flag football tomorrow evening. The 5A number one ranked Campo Verie Coyotes take on ACP from Chandler at 6 p.m. at Campo. And again tomorrow evening at 6 p.m. the 6A number one ranked team Highland High will take on number four ranked Red Mountain at Highland High. So good luck to both of our teams. Uh as a reminder, this Saturday is the annual Gilbert Days parade. Once again, all of our schools will be represented in this parade and we are looking forward to it. Our float is being constructed by the students from Desert Ridge High School and this year's
004theme is out of this world. So, Miss Taylor saw a little sneak peek of it. Says it looks wonderful. So, we can't wait to see that. The parade starts at Juniper Street in Gilbert Road and it begins at 8:30 and ends right here at the district office and we look forward to seeing you all there. And uh another great accomplishment happened yesterday. We had Mr. Ryan defend his dissertation and is now Dr. Ryan. So, please give him a hand. Congratulations. [applause] We're very happy for you and proud of you. Well done. And last but not least, next week is Thanksgiving and always an excellent time to reflect on the family and friends who make our lives complete. Uh we're blessed to live, work, and learn in a community like Gilbert and East Mesa. We have
005the very best students, teachers, support staff, administrators, and families any district has to offer. So, please enjoy spending time with your family and your friends this Thanksgiving. And please be safe. Mr. Thompson, that concludes my report for this evening. Oh, wait. Kid, sorry. Psych. Uh, I'd like to recognize a few people in the audience real quick. So, we have two students from our student senate, superintendent student senate, Mary Maguire and Carter Carmichael. Stand up. 11th to 12th grade. They're from GCA. [applause] And we have S Cindy Wagner from MHS from our Aspire program. There you go. [applause] I'd like to tell you they volunteered to be here, but it's a little bit of requirement, but we appreciate you showing up. Thank you guys for being here. And that concludes my report for this evening. Thank
006you. >> Thank you, Dr. McCord. We're going to move on to our request to speak to the governing board. We'll have the admonition read by Dr. Robersonson. Request to speak to the governing board pursuant to ARS 38-431.02.8. The governing board may make an open call to the public during a public meeting subject to reasonable time, place, and manner restrictions to allow individuals to address the public body on any issue within the jurisdiction of the public body. After an opening call to the public, individual board members may respond to criticism made by those who have addressed the governing board, may ask staff to review a matter, or may ask that a matter be put on a future agenda. However, a member of the governing board shall not discuss or take legal action on the issues raised
007during an open call to the public if the matters are properly noticed for discussion and legal action. During an open call, the governing board requests that speakers refrain from voicing complaints against school personnel or anyone connected to the district as it may impact due process rights. Please contact the Office of Talent Management if you have specific concerns about any individual employee. Thank you, Dr. Robersonson. We have one request to speak to the governing board tonight. Miss Susie Jackson, if you'll come up to the podium. Do you want me to move that turn that towards you or you got it? >> Got it. >> Okay. All right. Um, while you're while you're getting set, I do just want to make mention uh that we had a number of individuals uh submit um submit their request uh
008>> their online comments and I wanted to thank them for doing that. That's important for us to hear and we appreciate them taking the time to do that. Miss Jackson, you'll have a timer on the screen. As soon as your mic starts working, we'll >> Hello. Oh, yes. Okay. >> Hey, don't yell at us. >> Get it. Okay. Thank you. Well, I have uh had conversations with most of you regarding the district honoring my son's DNR. I would still love to see the district have an open discussion or forum about this topic rather than people making decisions based on personal philosophies. But those are the choices you make, the ones who deny a child the opportunity to attend school. I am here to tonight to discuss a few things and it all all boils down
009to character. I have been told numerous times that the district has never honored a DNR. This is a proven lie. I received my foyer request and the emails regarding the parents wishes from last year, a request for a meeting and a follow-up about the meeting which included director level staff and administrators. The email highlights what to do if he stops breathing and with his DNR procedures as well as the DNR directives attached to the uh attached to the email for staff to reference. Can I ask publicly why a DNR was honored for a different student but is refused for my son? The inconsistencies are a challenge. We requested onetoone nursing so he could return to school. This meeting was attended by your attorney for the district. I have attended over 100 IEP meetings with GPS
010and never has an attorney been present. She was seated directly across from me which felt like it was a failed intimidation tactic. This was a meeting requesting nursing. There was no need for legal counsel. Yet there they were. Nursing was denied. Of course, I know they met prior to our IEP meeting, a fact that they denied. Again, a lie. My daughter received onetoone nursing last year. The topic was raised prior to anyone meeting or seeing her. Her nursing was approved without anyone meeting or seeing her. No meeting, no attorneys, just approval of her services so she could attend school safely. Rio's nursing decision was denied by a room full of people who have zero nursing or medical experience. Despite the discussion of his daily medical needs with se several that were deemed nursing duties only.
011My daughter had zero nursing duties while at school. Zero. Yet she was approved. That's weird. A little bit weird. two instances where last year the exact same services were given to other students but denied for my son. People with disabilities are treated inconsistent inconsistently within the district and I am asking and begging for change. Recently I learned about two GPS directors who dressed as a disabled character from Saturday Night Live. District directors thought it was funny to dress up as a person with disabilities. Even worse, they wore it to work. And even more disgusting, not one person sent them home. Silence is compliance. I am asking that the district create mandatory disability awareness and sensitivity training for all staff. I ask that you create a position within the district that includes a person to coordinate
012social and emotional activities and sports for our students with disabilities. If we have athletic directors for gened, we better have them for special ed. Again, I am asking for you to advocate for our children who don't have a voice. Recognize that their needs may be different from your experience or comfort zone, but they deserve dignity, compassion, and respect. I am asking that you demand better character counts. Thank you guys. >> Thank you, Miss Jackson. All right, moving on to agenda item 5.01, monthly financial report for month ended October 31st, 2025. Dr. McCord. >> Thank you, Mr. President, governing board members. I'll turn this over to Miss Betts for our monthly financial report. >> Good evening, governing board members. Uh Dr. Accord. President Thompson. Uh, this will be a a short monthly presentation. Um, let's see.
013We hope I get it to work. So, as usual, the district operating funds will be shared, the federal funds, and a couple of notes about some enterprise funds. So, district operating funds, as you can see, the maintenance operations fund is highlighted as well as unrestricted capital. very minimal change occurred on M but this is normal um activity uh through the end of October. Uh note that in unrestricted capital outlay that the incumbrance has increased by um just about a million dollars reflective of um some work on some parking lots as well as additional security fencing. Normal activity occurred through the uh occurring through the the fall rain due to the fall rain. Um, again a reminder that uh we've budgeted about um 30 $36 million to be spent in unrestricted capital. So not all of
014it obviously at almost 20 million has been encumbered to date. So we'll see that change throughout the school year. So looking at the next um grid, the federal grants just um a note that indicates that we're aware that the ESA title 2 grant is negative at this point in time. This is normal. We adopt a budget always in our federal grants that reflect what we've been awarded thus far. So, as we go through the year, we complete we um submit all the completion reports associated with our federal grants. At that point in time, the Department of Ed makes the decision about what our carryover amounts are. So, we have received that those uh those approvals for our carryover amounts. So, we're allowed to spend um even though we're showing a negative $23,000. But when we
015revise the budget in February, we of course will account for the carryover funds and we'll correct that negative. So you'll see that for a couple of months. And then finally, IDA part B. The biggest change there was the year-to- date expended encumbered. It increased by about a million dollars. note that due to um to not knowing the quantification of the tuition outpayments we we make for our um I our highest need special education students. We have all of those purchase orders opened up out of maintenance and operations. Um, but every month we have an accounting specialist within the special education department who submits journal entries to us to move expenditures based upon the availability of um, idea into the idea fund to make sure that we're spending down those federal grants as appropriate. And then
016uh, finally the enterprise funds. Just wanted to share nutrition services. Note that we are um we are projecting an available balance at the end of the school year of just over $6 million. We had about $7.6 million in fund balance at the end of 25. So we are anticipating drawing down fund balance by about a million and a half. So that is why when you see the action item at the end of the meeting this evening that nutrition services is asking for um a 10 cent a 10 cent uh increase to all the lunch prices only keeping the breakfast prices the same but increasing the lunch prices um by 10 cents. So that uh and we we can revisit some of the reasons behind that when we get to that action item at the end
017of the meeting. And with that I have nothing else to share. Does the board have any questions? >> Does the projected balance in include the 10% or sorry the 10-centent increase or or not? >> It does not because the 10-centent increase would be reflective of next year. So, we're still in the current year, right? Yeah. Yep. >> Okay. Thank you. >> You bet. >> Anything else? Okay. Thank you, Miss Betts, for that report. Uh moving on to agenda item 5.02, teaching and learning academic spotlight. Dr. McCord. >> Thank you, Mr. President. Governing board members. Uh turn this over to Dr. Ryan. Uh we'll be talking a little bit about um IB and Patterson, but uh he'll have some guests come up and speak. Dr. Ryan. >> Thank you, Dr. McChord, President Thompson, governing board members.
018Um, you're about to hear from a couple of the most passionate and I will say three that are in attendance with Miss Gray in the back row there. Um, but Paula Dunnit and Principal Chip Pettit have just done an incredible job of building uh what I'd say is one of the top primary year programs within the IB world that you can find in the state. Um, a few years ago, Dr. McCord and I had a chance to talk um around 2020 2021 about the future of international balorate within Gilbert public schools uh and it only took a few minutes to sit down with Miss Dunnit and have a conversation and at the time Mr. Blackburn and hear the vision and Mr. Pettit has absolutely taken it to a whole new level and they're here to
019to share with you this evening and and I'm proud to turn it over to them at this time. It's on. Okay. Thank you, Dr. Ryan. Uh, and governing board superintendency. It's an honor to be here tonight to represent the two of us represent Patterson Elementary. Um, and explain a little bit about what goes on over there on a daily basis through some slides. Um, it's a little easier to see in person most days. U, we're going to do our best in this short time to explain why um, what the PYP and primaries program looks like at Paris Elementary. Um, like Dr. Ryan said I'm Chip Pettit the principal if I haven't met you yet. Uh second year at Patterson but my 24th year in Gilbert. Um and then Mrs. Dunn Paula Dunn is our IB
020coordinator. So she will um introduce herself a little bit when she gets to her part here too. So hopefully it's the right button. So just a little bit about our journey like Dr. Ryan started there with um Patterson kind of had a history of uh being project- based learning um STEM uh engineering design process actually um which is more districtwide now even um so they kind of met and talked about how to um take this to the next level and maybe build a continuum in Gilbert and that's where IB came about. The candidacy began in 2021. Um the candidacy process is uh in-depth and lengthy and a lot of hard work. Um, our teachers have to do the Gilbert trainings like just like all the other teachers in Gilbert, but also go uh above and
021beyond have to do all the IB accreditation trainings. Um, many of them continue their training, go with us in the summer to different trainings um to get to keep uh continuing their education currently. Uh then we have a different math program. So IB is not a curriculum. It's a um just a philosophy. So um we use all the Gilbert school's curriculum um except for our math is illustrative math. Um the reason that we use they chose that one was because it was very student centered um super in-depth questioning um just a lot it aligned better with the IB philosophy. The district's now kind of gone with another math program that kind of is close to that but um is is pretty in-depth and rigorous for the for our kids. Um and then of course we
022have to always constantly look at the state standards and align them into the units which Miss Dunn will go to in a little bit here. Um there are six units in every grade level. And so the teachers spent years um putting all knowing learning all the state standards and getting those all into the correct unit they aligned with. Um so they know their standards probably more than any other teacher. So I always tell them they're the hardest working teachers and they are the most knowledgeable about their standards in Gilbert. Um, authorization was last year which I got to be the guy who got on third base and got to uh score the winning run there at the end when we got our authorization. Uh, what that was was we submitted a action plan which was
023a lot of hard work. Um, big write up and got that submitted. It got approved and then we got a site visit. Um, our site visit was with a couple judges from around the country, Colorado and Florida. They were pretty impressed. Um, and they told us without saying it that we looked good. And then we a few a few few weeks later we got a letter an email that said we were approved um and authorized to be a IB >> Mr. Pettit extremely impressed. I was I was listening to the conversation. Don't be don't be bashful. It was very impressive that >> they Yes. It was one of the best they'd seen. There you go. [laughter] It was all because of the hard work they did leading up to it. Um our post authorization is
024what we're in now. Um Mr. Mr. Bircher actually joined us there today for our we have a uh we meet with um Iris who's our um global rep and she meets with us quarterly and we kind of go through our program development plan now. So um we are in that for the next 5 years and then hopefully reauthorization in 2030. Wow. All right. Um, the IB mission, I'm not going to read these to you, but they kind the the big picture is that the Patterson mission, the IB mission, and the Gil Gilbert schools mission all kind of align because we want to create great human beings that are productive in society. Um, it kind of goes along with everything that you see up there. Um, we think it fits in nice, the IB continuum. So,
025that the we are the primarers program and you'll see some funky spellings because it's um worldwide. It's European. Um, so we have some words in there that you may think look look different than they are and they're spelled the European way. So, uh, primary program is what we are. That is a K through six. We are one of 10 authorized one schools in Arizona. Um, we are the most southeastern, which is kind of nice. We can pull from people that are looking for IB programs down um, Queen Creek, Higgley, those kind of areas can come check us out. Um, it includes all the students that are in Olden Patterson. That's what's kind of unique as we get to the rest of of the U programs here. But the the PYP is wallto-wall, so every student
026gets the same education. Um the GAMS program at Gilbert High School is in candidacy for the my um at Gilbert High School, they have the diploma program and the career program which are authorized. So we whenever GAMS gets their um accreditation will be a K12 continum, which is only a handful now in the state um that are left. So, it's it's pretty exciting to be part of that. They um some of the stuff we'll talk about later, but Gilbert High was just there last last Friday with some of their students. Um working as mentors with some of our students on a world um IB Day of Service Day. Um we Paula and Megan, the IB coordinator, Gilbert High are constantly working together, um planning together. So, we we're a great continuum working all together. And
027then I'll turn over to Mrs. Dunn to give you a little bit of the meat of the program here. Okay, good evening. Uh, like Mr. Pettit said, I have been at Patterson, this is my 11th year, and I have served in various roles at Patterson, from a classroom teacher to the instructional coach and to um, most recently IB coordinator full-time for the past three years. So, it's exciting to be able to see it at every level, to know um, exactly where our teachers are and what they need. Um the primary years program is um really a framework and a philosophy that's built around the best teaching and learning practices globally. Um it is formed from six key elements that are listed up there on the slide. We will go through each of these elements as
028we continue through the presentation. This one. Okay. The learner profile attributes are valued by the IB world schools. They consist of 10 attributes that are shown there up on the top right hand side of the slide. They are found within each of the four programs of the continuum. They are core to the IB mission to create a more peaceful and knowledgeable world through education. They help students develop a holistic set of skills necessary for lifelong learning to be a compassionate individual and a globally responsible citizen. The goal of IB is to create internationalmindedness. And so we say if a student graduates with being able to embody the 10 learner profile profiles, then they do go on to make this a better, more peaceful world. And as you can see in the picture there, as Mr.
029Pettis spoke of, that top lefthand picture shows some of the IB students who came over because the learner profile attributes are woven through all four programs. They came over to help our students kind of p paint a picture of what each of those attributes looks like in real life. And then Miss Gray took those back to uh Gilbert High and they hang in the IB lounge over there, which is kind of neat. The picture on the right of the um bulletin board there is to show you that like Mr. Pettit said, every learner at Patterson is an IB student. So that bulletin board right there was done from our schools who or students who are in the life skills. So even preschools, preschool and specialty programs are connected through the learner profile attributes. So we
030find a way for everybody to connect to the framework at Patterson. Okay. The transdisciplinary themes, the PYP is guided by six transdisciplinary themes of global significance. They are applicable to any learner anywhere in the world, which makes it kind of neat to be able to study concepts that can apply across the globe. Um, at Patterson, our students in kindergarten inquire into four global themes, two of which being who we are and how we express ourselves. Students in grades 1 through six inquire into all six of the themes. Um, most of them run roughly six weeks. They are built around a conceptually rich central idea and those were taken from the Arizona state academic standards for social studies, science and English language arts. If the opportunity arises organically, other subjects across the disciplines are also woven
031into that for a mo more conceptual picture of learning as it's joined together and applied in the real world. Okay. Oh, there we go. I don't know what's happening. >> There we go. It's a It's a user error. Under the transdisciplinary themes, we have our units of inquiry. And like I said, each grade level connects to a transdisciplinary theme at some point in the school year. The unit of inquiry is a 6 to 10 week in-depth exploration of that central idea. Under the central idea are lines of inquiry, typically three, and those are framed by what we call the key concepts, which we will discuss a little bit later in the slideshow. Um, our teachers spend about two weeks per line of inquiry. And in addition to the lines of inquiry, they also are intentionally
032working on the learner profile attributes as well as what we refer to as the ATL skills, the approaches to learning skills, both of which continue through all four levels of the IB continuum. Um, additionally, our units of inquiry are housed in the total learning management system, which is what the rest of the continuum uses as well. And it's a great way for the rest of our staff to be able to connect to the units of inquiry. One of the philosophies and beliefs in IB is that teachers at all levels and specialties connect to what students in their classrooms are learning about. So for example, if they're they are studying patterns per se in math, they might be studying patterns in music, patterns in art, patterns in PE, etc. So that allows our special areas to
033really dive deeper into those conceptual understandings that are being taught in the home room classroom. Okay. The approaches to teaching and learning. The approaches to teaching are really a pedagogical approach to inquiry and conceptual understanding. They're student centered and they're built on building collaborative skills with the goal of students to have the ability to self-manage and self adjust in their learning. So that student autonomy is really at the heart of that when the student graduates from an IB program. The approaches to learning are a set of skills that are really necessary for lifelong learning post K12 education. We're finding or research shows that students leave high school oftent times ill equipped to be successful at the next level. And so this is something that is also woven through all four levels. It's something that Mrs.
034Gray and I work on too. What are you seeing with your students? Which approaches to learning there? Are your students struggling with so that we can help support that and start building that even as young as kindergarten? And in the middle are really just um the top 10 skills of 2025 according to that report. And so one way to be able to produce these learners that can think critically and communicate and think is really through the development of the ATLs. The key concepts, as I mentioned earlier, help really frame the direction and the meaning of a unit of inquiry. So, our academic state standards, if you've looked at those, they really are very close in alignment from grade level to grade level, often nuanced, very, very minimally, but the key concept that we attach to
035each line of inquiry helps to take that knowledge deeper. So, for example, that picture there on the left is a group of first graders who are inquiring into energy as a life process. So they may be looking at that through one of those key concepts such as form. What is energy like? Function. How does it work in the real world? Responsibility. What do I do as a person? How am I responsible for the use of energy? Now our students in second grade to take that deeper may be looking at more causation and change. So really it allows us to move beyond just that knowledge piece to that understanding and application in the real world assessment in the PYP. That is something that is at the heart of our professional development um plan this year. It
036also aligns with the Gilbert district's um focus on formative assessment. In the IB the philosophy is that we are focused more on the process over the product. We believe that assessment shouldn't be something that is done to students, but rather with students. And so the PYP really encourages students to get involved with their learning. So students know exactly what they need to learn, where they are in their learning journey and what they're going to do to be able to to self-monitor and adjust. They work on giving and receiving feedback to peers as well as with their teachers. uh they keep learning logs of their process and their journey. They also help to co-construct and co- um write a lot of their rubrics and success criteria. So really when we think of learning with our students,
037we want anybody to walk into a classroom and say, "Hey, what are you learning? Why are you learning it? How will your teacher know when you've learned it? And what are you going to do with that learning?" So by making that thinking and that process visible and embedding them into it, they they take on that ownership and know exactly where they're going and what they need to get there. Student agency and action. Agency is defined in the PYP as voice, choice, and ownership. It nurtures student voice by bringing their questions and their wonderings into the units of inquiry and letting them help define the path that those inquiries take. And those may look different from year to year based on the questions and the background knowledge and the wonderings that the students are bringing that
038year. Students have choice in their learning by how they want to display what they've learned and what artifacts go into their portfolio. They have ownership in their learning because they're expected to have those accountability skills. That is something that those students need to own in order to move forward with that. [clears throat] Action is really um connected to what they're learning in the program and it's what we want students to to do when they leave Patterson. Action is self-driven in the PYP. So we we model that of course with our students, but we want to say, okay, so now what are you going to do with that learning? How does that apply in the real world? So we're very intentional about pointing out those moments to students. And for example, that picture at the top
039is one of our second grade students who learned about the Dia de los Muertos and went home and made her own aphrenda to her to honor her um family members that have passed on. the picture of the two girls. Um they saw I need around campus for picking up garbage and that our garden needed to be tended and so they started a garden club. Um part of IB also as we spoke about earlier is committing or not committing um contributing to service. So we've had we have our service projects that we run as a school but we also encourage our students to come up with ways to offer service. So last year our first graders thought, well, there's kids out there who probably don't have books. Let's start a book drive. And we've had, you
040know, oh, we had somebody from the district come about speak about the need for um items for our unhoused people and they started a drive for that. So really, we want to encourage these people at any age, these kids, that you can make a difference and and action can be big or small. So I'm going to turn it over now back to Mr. Pettit to wrap up with our Spanish. She's always a tough act to follow there. [snorts] Uh Spanish uh language is a uh key component and a required component of the PYP. And so um we selected Spanish as our language uh for obvious reasons close to the Mexican border here, but also our community. It's very prominent in the high schools as a language of choice as well. Um so we went uh
041our curriculum is through uh Calico Spanish. Um what the students do is they go to Spanish class 30 to 40 minutes a week. Um it's hard to teach an entire language in that. So it's a lot of focus on culture um basic understanding of the language. Our goal it's it was new last year. So our goal is to have some kind of um promise to the parents of like this is what your student will get if they come here K through six. Um that's our next steps. um we don't think they'll be fluent when they leave there, but we do want them to have an understanding of the language and be ready to go into junior high and keep going if they wanted to. So, nowhere near um what Justin has at Gilbert with the
042dual language, but it's it's fun. It's exciting to go see them um learning about the different cultures um hearing kids using Spanish terms around campus. We on our daily video announcements have um Spanish words sometimes in there to keep them um you know, learning new vocabulary as well. So, that kind of wraps it up. That's us on our celebration last year. Thank you to Mr. Brainer and Dr. Ryan and Dr. Martin for coming out and Dr. McCord. Um it was an exciting day. Our students being being an IB campus. We want to make sure our students were a big part of it and so they did the speeches and um it was a fun day to to recognize all their all the staff and students hard work over the last four to five years that
043um paid off with being authorized. So, if you have any questions, that would be now. But also, I wanted to make sure everybody knew about February 27th is our first exhibition, which is a um kind of the wrapping up the PYP program. Um it's the sixth graders do put on a u well an exhibition of their learning. Um and so they do those in the morning on February 27th. I can get uh Mrs. Wilson the information for the exact times and stuff. So, thank you for having us. Thank you very much. Are there any questions or comments from the board? >> I just wanted to say um you know I've come out twice to Patterson uh when with Mr. Blackburn to talk about the IB program as well as with Mr. Pettit recently and I
044just want to say it's amazing work what you guys have done. I've talked to many staff members at Patterson and you know that task you know to get that authorization is not easy and I know it's taken hours of outside work as well. So I just truly appreciate all the work that you and your staff have done. Um yeah, of course. And um my question is um I did have a question. Um what impacts have you seen on students not only academically but how they feel about learning because I know in IB they have a lot more I guess agency in it and what have you seen? >> I can we had our uh we had a book study this afternoon so we were actually just discussing this on how we have seen um students
045are um more comfortable taking risks. We've noticed um we had some fifth grade teachers sharing about um students that normally wouldn't share an answer or be uncomfortable um you know thinking they're wrong. Everybody shares there's no judgment or anything like that. And I've seen that in kindergarten first grade where they they're training them and teaching them these ways of like it's a safe place. Everybody learns differently. It's okay to fail. Um we're all going to learn this together is is the culture. Um we've seen a lot of growth with discussions. Um, I was in a math class today and they were having like they were doing um, you know, disagreeing but nicely about it and learning and teaching discourse. There we go. Uh, and u talking with and sharing what they're learning and they were
046like, "Oh, I guess that is the right answer. That is correct. I see how you did that there." Um, the level of questioning um is the we've been working on that too with teachers. um how they question students and allowing not giving them answ if if they don't know the answer or you don't make a um you don't lead them towards an answer. You're trying to you're trying to hear what they say and how they go along and how they discuss things. The level of discussion is I noticed it right away when I got there. So, anything else in there? >> No. >> Anything else? >> Oh, Dr. Yeah, a wonderful presentation. Thanks for all the work that's that's gone in the presentation and and all the the work before that into the program. Um,
047I have just a quick question. Can we go back a couple slides? Is that possible to the moving away from moving toward >> and I'm I'm trying to put my thoughts together here. So, I hope it it comes across uh the way I intend. Is is the is the philosophy that um kind of moving away from a big sumitive and feedback at the end towards um the learning journey and process focus is I I can understand how that may be more healthy um for for many students and um maybe a better way to learn. Is the is the thought behind the philosophy that that it's going to end up with better results or that the results don't matter? >> Uh we hope that the results are there because they are learning at a higher level
048and and more involved with their learning and they have more buyin in their learning. Um we don't we would never say results don't matter but we want to produce >> that's yeah that's that's a little extra blunt. Um, but are we deemphasizing the result and focusing on the the process or is it or is it hey this is a better journey to improve results at the end? >> I I had a I had a similar question. Are we are we grading on on the on the journey slasheffort or are we grading on the on the result? That was a question I had. >> I can tell you that we're not waiting till the end where it's an autopsy. My win is too late. So really having students focusing on the process is more about being
049able to be responsive in your teaching and learning practices. So really correcting and allowing for that journey to navigate in a different way. If students need reteing, if students have already mastered that, it allows for differentiation. So it is the process meaning that um we are watching that and learning like what did I learn during this journey? What misconceptions did I have? What do I know now? How has my thinking changed? So, at the end, it's too late if we just say, "Hey, you got a B on this test or you you did however you did on this test." We want to capture that prior to that. So, students have a solid understanding of where they are and where they need to go in their steps towards the that success criteria, towards that learning target.
050They um do that through reflective practices, through really self- assessing themselves. What do I already know? What do I need to know? Where am I strong? Where am I weak? What's working? What's not working? So, we take all that into account and it's very fluid from day to day. We're not just saying, "Well, we hope they learned it." We are looking at that evidence along the way and and having them show that in their visible thinking daily. >> Yeah. >> That helps. >> Yeah. And we still there's still tests. There's still assignments that are graded. So that's where the there's still an end product and there's still grades. Um so that's what like the report cards based off of or but we also like we mentioned earlier they're doing weekly um goals and they know
051we're trying to get them where they know what they're learning, what they're working on, what they can they can communicate with their with their parents. Um these are my strengths and my weaknesses. That's what we're we're not going for like the nineweek grade as much as probably as we used to. It's more of along the way that's the process part. There's still projects with grades. there's still tests and yeah >> is your anticipation and and we don't need to get into a discussion of you know high stakes tests or or state testing and and and whether that's valuable or not but but just is your anticipation that this this way of teaching and this process focus will lead to improved scores on t state testing or no change or or maybe uh not as good
052as scores. We're hope we're through the um specific there would be any dip or anything from the philosophy being changing because we've been through it for a few years now. We're hoping we're now on like the upward trajectory. We we do outperform our demographic. So our kids are already doing pretty well. We'd love for them to do better of course, but we hope that gets them. Yeah. >> If I may share a couple statistical points. Uh Dr. Martin, Miss Hansen, Mr. Burcher, myself constantly reviewing data as you know. Uh what we've seen since 2022 when really this journey was was kicked off in high gear. um from a state reporting mechanism, from an A rating piece, we were a B on campus at that point in time, 82 points in in total. Um they've now
053gone as high as 96 points over the last two years, 94 points this year. Um their growth numbers are through the roof. So they earned over 48 of the 50 possible growth points in their students this year. Um, I think that really the the conversation is if we do things the right way and we do it with fidelity at a high level, the results will come. As Mr. Pettit said, there are assessments throughout as well. And so, we're gauging those all the time. I would say one of our highest level campuses in terms of being able to predict what the outcome is going to be prior to any state assessment occurring. I think they have a really good handle on uh where the students are at, probably even more so than than some of our
054other campuses at this point in time because of this this unique work. So, um same same conversation actually going back a handful of years with Dr. McCord. What are the results going to look like? And that's a promise we make always when we implement. >> Thank you, >> Mr. Thompson. >> Miss Humphre. Um, I don't have a question, but I want to thank you for the hard work. And my question was about the Spanish, and you answered it just as I was thinking it in my head. So, thank you. Um, and I'm very impressed with um the quality of what you're doing and helping the kids to take ownership and to have that um that thought process of how they're going to learn and grow and solve a problem. I think that's really really important
055in in the way work is done in today's world that uh we need I'm sorry I don't think AI is going to take over. I think we need very thoughtful people doing very difficult work to solve our problems and um seeing these kids learning that at this young age it just gives me a great deal of hope. So thank you. >> Thanks. >> I just want to say thank you you guys and Gilbert High. This is a heavy lift, I know, from behind the scenes. And I know it's hard sometimes getting everybody on the same page and and and pointed in the right direction. And I remember when we started IB over at Gilbert High and uh it was co time and not the best time to start anything. And uh it's really gone, you
056know, to another level. And you guys are going to have students coming from Patterson, going to GAMS, going through Gilbert High with just this this ability to understand. And I I look at it when some of these questions were asked, I think it's we're just teaching kids to own their learning a little bit more than than what we do on a on a daily basis. And I think at the end, um they're going to understand the why 10 times more than uh maybe some other kids will. So, thank you for that. And I appreciate what you guys have been doing. All right. Thanks for having us. >> Thank you very much. [applause] >> All right. Moving on to our consent agenda item. Is there a motion to approve tonight's consent agenda item uh as written?
057>> So moved. >> Thank you, Dr. Robersonson. Is there a second? >> Second. >> Thank you, Miss Murray. All those in favor of approving tonight's consent agenda as outlined, please say I. >> I. >> Any opposed? Thank you very much. That passes. Moving on to our action items. 7.01, increase in nutrition services lunch prices for fiscal year 2027. Is there a motion to approve uh an increase in nutrition services lunch prices for fiscal year 2027? >> I move that we increase nutrition services lunch prices for FY 2027. >> Thank you, Miss Humphre. Is there a second? >> Second. >> Thank you, Dr. Robersonson. Dr. McCord. >> Thank you, Mr. President. governing board members. We have Natalie Tenny, our director of nutrition services here. We also obviously Miss Betts has uh alluded to this in her
058uh monthly budget report. Again, this is due to influ inflationary increases associated with labor and food supplies and we are requesting a 10-cent increase for the school year. Uh Miss Betts or uh Miss Tenny will entertain any questions you may have. So, just to set up the conversation, just wanted to share that we have increased our meal prices um over the last four years um of since since the pandemic and since we were out of the um universal free breakfast and lunch. We increased uh the first year for 2024, which was a 10-cent increase, and then again in 2025, which was another 10-cent increase. And at this point, um, we did not increase for the current year, which is the 20226 school year, but with the $1.5 million expected draw down, and knowing that our
059equipment at many of our kitchens are aging just like our facilities, um, wanted to make sure that we were being thoughtful and increasing our prices slowly. um uh with honoring our families, but but also making sure that at at no point in time we we would be uh negatively impacting our general fund budget. So again, Natalie Tenny is here to ask to answer any specific questions um as well as myself. And so if you have anything that you'd like to you'd like us to clarify, we're um we're ready and willing to answer any questions. So maybe I maybe I missed it. We're asking you're asking the board for approval to for a a 10 cent increase. Is this just at the elementary level or is it It's all levels but only for lunch. So we're
060keeping all the breakfast prices the same. A couple of details. These are for paid lunches. So this will not impact those students that are on free and reduced lunch. they still would be at least for this year the reduced price students will still get free um free breakfast and lunch uh due to the subsidy from the state of Arizona. Um and then also the uh important thing is is that there is a bill um in the House of Representatives to increase the paid reimbursement um by over that 10 cents. And so if that is approved, we will vacate the approval and we will not be increasing our paid our paid prices at all. So that increase, in fact, Natalie, can you help me? Do you know do you know what the projected increase is that
061the the Massachusetts representative is recommending? >> Maybe it's on. Yeah. uh I believe it's 55 cents at lunch and 35 cents at breakfast. So it's a significant increase even further than the emergency increase during CO. So if that were to happen based on labor and food um costs rising, then that would be way more than the 10 cents. Yes. um the expected increase in revenue for nutrition services would be about $125,000 for the year. That would be the expected increase at that 10 cents. And so keep in mind if you have a a f a child that participates in our lunch program every day, so it' be a 50 cent per week increase. And then if they're there every day for the full 180 days, it' be a total increase for the year of about
062$18. So again, trying to be thoughtful about our our recommendations, but um trying to make sure that we um can still provide a high quality uh product and be able to uh to continue to be able to do that. >> So I know I know how it works at the elementary level. The kids kind of get their trays and they go down the line and and get their get their food and there's limited selections. It's kind of like this is what's for lunch today, right? Is it the same at our junior highs and high schools or do kids have more choices? And how does the 10-cent increase? How does it come into play there when they're choosing different items, different diff a different number of items, different types of items and it's not just like
063here's what's for, you know, it's chicken nuggets today. So, how does that work at those levels? >> Great question. Do you want me to fill this one? Okay, that's a great question. So yes, there is limited choices at the elementary, but there still is three to four choices every single day. And then at the junior high and the high school, there are more choices. So there are more hot lunch choices and more cold lunch choices. Also in the meal pattern, junior high and high school students can get more quantity of food. So again, same thing, the 10 cents would go towards that. Don't. >> So, are you asking like per item? Like, are we adding 10 cents per No. >> Or is it just a like you get XX and this consumes a meal and
064that is going to be 10 cents more. Is that what you mean? >> Yeah. >> So, the 10 cents would go towards labor and food cost. So, it's not per item like that. And so, we do have commodities for food. We also offer fresh fruit and vegetables, which is offer versus serve. So some students have unlimited amount of fruits and vegetables they can take and some students say I don't want any. So kind of balances all of that out. >> So Natalie, this is not um this is not all a cart, right? These are meals and so what's generally included in a in a full meal regardless like if they've got two or three choices of a full meal, what would what could those choices be? >> So at breakfast you have to have at
065least three components of a meal and at lunch it has to be four out of the five. So you would have grains, protein, fresh fruit and vegetables, fluid milk if you want, and then any of the side items which would be other vegetables which we break into colors. So you would have to on the week offer at least so much and then they would have to take so much. So when they pass the register with the person working, if it's not a complete meal, we send them back to go get more things. Okay? >> And the complete meal is what you get reimbursed through the government for. So, if if you saw on her chart, $469 was for the full reimbursement. So, even if we were to take the price that a paid student pays
066right now plus what we get from the government, it's still less than what we get as a government reimbursement for the free meal. >> So, I I know in the p I appreciate that explanation that cleared it up for me. [laughter] I know in the past, I think in the past, if I unless I'm not remembering this accurately, when we've raised prices, we've done different amounts at the different levels. It hasn't just been a blanket, you know, increase that's the same at all of our elementary, junior high, and high schools. Is that is that accurate or am I >> So I've been here since 2008 and since I've worked here it's always been the same amount. There hasn't been different amounts. When we did the first amount it was 10 cents. Then in 2019 uh
067it was voted on in the 2018 spring and it was uh enacted in 201920 school year. It was 25 cents because they had gone a long time without doing an increase. And so we thought it is easier for the families to do it more gradually than to all of a sudden oops we should have been watching our budget and doing a little bit here and there and then all of a sudden and and so previously we had to do the 25 cents because we were so behind on it. So, we thought by doing smaller incremental increases, less burden on the families and also less surprise like she said when the fund balance keeps going down. >> I I will say that the board asked for more frequent increases after that uh vote because >> that
068wasn't popular. Yeah. >> Yeah. It was it was just hard for families to um make that jump. And also I think we increased our um our afterchool and preschool prices at the same time. So it was a lot for families to absorb all at once. So we decided that doing it more frequently and being more careful so that it's a smaller increase and easier for the family to absorb >> more gradual and in smaller amounts so that we can still um we are following all the regulations for like the lower added sugars and the not the artificial colors and flavors and things like that to keep it high quality things that the students like and and fuel them for learning and success. us in the classroom so that we can continue to give the high
069quality products that they're used to. Um but at the same time not um like she said if if the other bill passes which it's still in the formation and needs to be voted on and approved and all these things. If if that goes through then we're not going to do it just to do it because then we'd be getting more for the reimbursement already. >> So um Mr. Mr. times. You can see from this grid that the the different that you can see that we've already got a diff differentiation. Yeah. Right. If from by grade level, it's a different. So, we're just increasing by 10 cents across the board. >> So, if we vote to to approve a 10-cent increase tonight and then the state legislature votes to approve >> congressional USDA, so it' be
070national. >> Okay. So, and they approve it. Would we would we rescend our 10-centent increase? >> So, she said we would vacate our request. Okay. Because then we would already be getting more funding from the government for each meal. >> Would that require another board action or is that something that the district can do without approval? >> Uh, good question. We'll find out. >> Just curious. These things usually move quite slowly and so we're we are tracking it. No, not >> we are tracking it so that we are staying up to date but as of right now there hasn't been any movement on it. So we don't want to get our hopes up either way I guess. >> So just my prediction is even if it passes it will take two or three years for
071us to see the outcome. Just >> very you never know. They I think the USDA works pretty quick when it comes to stuff like that because they have to do reimbursements right away after an approval. But to go back to answer your question, we would bring it back for you to rescend it because it'd be great to publicly say, "Hey, we're not going to charge you extra money." >> Good news. Yeah. We'd rather [laughter] instead of a bad surprise, a good surprise because truthfully, um the USDA is uh everything done there is through Congress. And so that's what makes the more delay is all of the approvals. Once you get the approval then yes it goes through the proper channels for the funding and then makes it back to our state. But um we are
072very careful with those resources and want to maximize them to the fullest benefit. So if we don't have to do the 10 cents then uh we will let you know. >> Okay. >> Do we all right you want to go? Sorry, I I just So my question was what percentage of our students are paying for lunch? What percentage are receiving the free and reduced lunch? And what percentage are bringing their own lunch kind of? >> So you might do you have percentage or do you have last year's I saw some percentages fly by. Anyways, uh we're we're right about 30% at this year that are on free and reduced and 70% so rounding a little it might be 30.1 or something like that. Um the vast majority of ours are uh paid if you look
073at her chart for the meal service trends. The orange is the reimbursements and then the blue is the breakfast reimbursements and then okay I don't think this is the chart that tells that this is how many people are buying meals >> is the number of meals number of meals. So uh so the meal amount has stayed about the same except for when we were in universal free meals uh following the COVID pandemic. And then here if you see the orange is federal revenue. So that is our reimbursements. The blue is local revenue. That's what the community is paying the families. And then the gray is the total revenue. So if you notice going back preandemic 19 and 20, we were getting a little more of the blue, people were paying more than we were getting
074from the government in the orange. And then all of a sudden the orange skyrocketed because everything was free. And then in 2324 it's now reversed with the federal Oh, is this too long of an explanation? Sorry, I tried to record. >> I said you're talking in colors. I love it. [laughter] It's my Bonnie always talks numbers. You're talking colors and I like the colors. >> Yeah. [laughter] >> Oh, yeah. So, um the orange in 2023, if you can see, the federal revenue inched up a little and the local revenue went down a little and then same in 2024. So, uh, what we're seeing is that a great amount of people are buying the meals with their own money instead of just the free and reduced kits. That's how I interpret it. Sorry about all the
075colors. >> Yeah. So, so probably more are are buying not the the local the local revenue is actually more students even though it's a lesser amount of of net money because the reimbursement is lower, >> right? And I think uh the other important thing is is that if you look from from 23, the the blue bar in 24 is higher than in 23. There we go. >> So, we've um so we're increasing participation and I wasn't able to update it, but the 25 result is even another um 100,000 meals were were purchased in 2025 as well. So, even with the small incremental increases, we are still driving participation even those even for those that are paying. So, we're competing with our local our local businesses to keep kids at school and eating our lunches, which
076is really exciting. Do you know what the projected? So you said sorry 100 140,000 or the the 10 cent increase would lead to how much >> about $125,000 in revenue. So pretty small you know >> and do you know what the projected federal change would lead to and increased revenue? Um well she she indicated what did you say like 40 cents or something >> 35 and 50. >> So the last three years the reimbursement rate um for the paid students has gone up by 2 cents. So last year it was right now it's 44 cents. It was 42 and it was 40. So it's only going by 1 to 2 cents. So if this bill were to pass in Congress and the USDA were to do a huge jump like that then that would be
077a lot. Yeah. I'm wondering if we know that number. If if we don't, that's >> we can start. Uh so she knows our number. >> We can times it by that. >> Yeah. So it's about I think it we had about $2.2 million worth of paid meals last year if I'm remembering the AFR is right. Is that correct? >> Yes. And Julian just uh gave you the number to times for the 10 cent we could >> So it' be about it'd be about a million. it'd be just under a million dollars. You know, just under 800,000 would be an additional revenue if we received the 35 cents more per meal from the federal government. >> And and we don't have a lot of control over that. I definitely comment on all their bills and I
078comment on all their proposed rules. I comment I ask people to chime in. We we do everything we can to support it, but if they either decide not to vote on the bill or decide to vote no on the bill, then then we don't really have any control of it whether they do that or not. >> Right. So So with a even with a $125,000 increase in revenue, we would still expect a a considerable draw down in the balance the next year. So just kind of projecting out $6 million, it it seems like going with the current trend, we'd exhaust that over the next four to five years. Is how how did we how did we build up to $6 million and and I guess once we don't have that, then we're looking at a
079sizable jump in four to five years, I guess. Is there >> So now I I appreciate the question. We're always monitoring that very closely. So, one of the things that we did not expect is that we would actually gain in fund balance over 2025. So, we actually gained in that position by about $300,000. That was due to the fact that we we did address some major capital needs in 2024 that we didn't need to address in 2025. >> Uh so, this kind of an indicator that we're going to have to take a look closely at our asset planner. All of our nutrition services equipment is in there so we can determine that those costs. Um and also uh we we did not know how to project the impact of the community eligibility program that we
080added two sites in the current year. So now we've got Burke as well as Mosquite Jr. along with Harris. >> So the participation at Harris is amazing. Uh the other a shout out to um to Judy our our caterer at at Gilbert High. Her participation is oh my gosh she's serving 1300 kids. 1300 meals at lunch a day at Gilbert High >> over 250 breakfast. >> So the kids are really they're choosing our our offerings which is also very very exciting. So all those things as we increase participation we have opportunities to increase revenue. Again we're just trying to project as best we can um and just be thoughtful about how we're increasing prices. I think the other thing is is that if you look if you look at this um this the the USDA
081reimbursement for free students, you can see that $4.69. Whether that's enough or not is a is a question mark, but we're proposing $3.20. We receive 44 on top of that from the federal government. So, we're at $364 for lunch elementary versus 469. So, we're still below that USDA um reimbursement and we still feel that we can afford that. So, all of these things are talked about on a regular basis. They're very valid questions. Doing the best we can, I guess, is my best answer. >> Yeah. >> Was your question about the remaining fund balance though? 3 to 5 million. >> Well, yeah. I mean I mean you're addressing it. I guess is it accurate to look at it and think, hey, in 5 to 6 years, we're going to draw down that entire balance because
082it seems like if we continue on the trend from this year, that that's kind of what it would be. And I think there's so many moving parts to answer that question. One of the things that I've been very appreciative about Natalie's team is since universal free lunch has gone away, she's had to rightsize all of her food service operations at each of our schools to make sure she's got the right amount of labor given the participation rates. So, she and her team do that every single day. Um, so as an example, our salary total was about $6 million in 2024 and last year it was 5.8. So that's an indicator that that we're trying to rightsize everything. So we don't want to overreact, I think, without really knowing what we have in front of us.
083So could be that, might not be. It's hard. It's hard to know. So was the the balance built by >> the balance reimbursement we had postco is that it was >> traditionally always around three to four to five tops million traditionally before co >> for fun balance yeah >> for fund balance and then when the universal did we go up to 11 12 >> we were we were up to yeah we were up to over 10 we were over 10 >> yeah so that was what did that then we used it for equipment and continued. So, previously the hourly wage was a lot less. Like when I started with food service, it was $6.99 an hour for the part-time people and now they're starting. >> But you told me $6.88. >> $6.99. I'm kidding. I
084was right [laughter] below seven. I was almost seven. And um so that's the thing is right now they're starting closer to 15 something. So, um, these are the kind of things that we do not want to wait till it gets down to zero. We're trying to keep it about where it should be and where it traditionally was and where the um, USDA says, you know, you need so much in emergency reserve. And so, we're just really trying to, like she said, it is a little bit of a guesswork and a gamble, but we do see the trend of it getting used up. Thank you. >> Any other questions from the board? >> All right. >> Thank you very much. >> Thank you. >> All right. If there's nothing else, uh, I'll call for the vote.
085>> Did we Did anybody want to have discussion about it before we vote? I mean, we've asked questions, but we haven't discussed as a board. Is there any discussion among the board in regard to this increase? >> I actually I'm sorry. I just thought of one more question I'd like to ask. >> That's okay. >> Um, so if we vote to approve the 10 cents tonight and then let's say we happen to get the federal money, do we are we just going to continue to keep that 10 cents in there even though we didn't need it? Like let's say they've been paying it for a year and it's not until next year that they decide to pass this. You know what I'm saying? So, cuz I I was kind of thinking along the same lines
086Blake was. It's like, okay, well, if we were at 3 to 4 million before, now we're at 6 million. We're still higher. So, why charge our families now when this may be going through? you know, why not wait a year and see what happens to the fund balance and then charge our families the extra 10 cents once we may have I know it's all big question marks but may have a better idea of what the the federal government's going to do. >> Um, so my my answer is because our projection right now is by the end of this year we would draw down another $1.5 million. So we're not talking about increasing our prices right now. We're talking about increasing them for the next fiscal year. So that was why we have to do it
087early. Um so um it's a judgment call and a recommendation from us is all. Yeah. >> And again I you don't know what the federal government is actually going to do yet. >> We don't. But we'll bring it back to I mean I think Dr. McCord made the commitment that in the event it comes back, we'll just have you affirm that we're not going to increase it by the 10 cents because we're going to receive additional federal reimbursement. And and there is a chance that maybe you be that legislation would not pass. I mean, who knows? >> Well, sure. I was just looking at it though that we're still higher than what we were originally at with the three to four. >> Oh, that's true. >> So, >> I don't know. I just I think
088about I do think about the families and I want to make sure that, you know, if we make that decision, I understand it's a minimal amount per family, but if we're planning on continually increasing over time, I could see it as families go, "Well, wait a second. They're already up another$1 or2 million. we ask for an extra 10 cents and then down the road in a year or two we have to ask for another 10 cents and I'm just wouldn't want them to pick up on a pattern of like they already still have the extra 2 million why are we why are they keep asking us for money now I think I I think personally it's just really important that we have that reserve so that we don't then have to do what we did
089previously which is you know a 25 c or a 30 cent increase it I think it's better to go more frequently and a little on the side of um having more of a reserve so that we don't have to ask families for 25 30 or even 50 cents because it it was hard um when we had to raise them before >> and and also correct me if I'm wrong but I got the impression that three or four million a three or4 million reserve in the past was fine for all of our maintenance needs and all of our equipment needs, but I thought I heard somebody in there say that we're expecting that need to increase because the age of our equipment. And so whereas >> two or three years ago a three or4 million dollar
090surplus was enough, now it's going to be because the cost of everything has gone up, that three or four million is now requiring a five or $6 million surplus. And so I think you're you're absolutely right, Miss Murray, that three or four millions, you know, is less than the five or six that we have now. So why are we doing this? I think it's because that five or six isn't going as far as it would have two or three or four years ago and that's just that's the new three or four million so to speak. Does that make sense? >> Yeah. No, it does. I just >> anytime I'm going to make a vote on this, I just want to make sure I understand it completely before I say yes or no. >> Glad for
091the questions there questions. >> Is there any other discussion before we vote? >> Okay. All those in favor of increasing uh an a 10- cent increase in nutrition services lunch prices for fiscal year 27 say I. >> I. >> Any opposed? Thank you very much. That passes the 7.02 2026 to 2027 course description books for high schools and junior highs. Dr. McCord. Thank you, Mr. President, governing board members. It's that time of year. And if you're familiar at all with what we do in November, Decemberish, it's course description book time. That's where uh Dr. Cox and her team get together with all of our principles, APs, counselors from our surrounding high schools and junior highs and they make additions or deletions to our course description book. And this is getting uh students ready because we
092start the registration process probably in February and uh we need time to get things put in our system so uh all of our counselors can advise our students appropriately. So I'll turn it over to Dr. Ryan and Dr. Cox and they can fill you in on the rest. >> All right. Good evening Dr. McCord, President Thompson, and members of the board. As Dr. McCory just said, um, I am here this evening to share with you a summary of the changes that are being recommended to the board for both our junior high and high school course books. Before I go into those uh recommendations, I do want to just give a um thank you to the committee. The committee is made up of 40 to 50 people per group. We have different stakeholders that are um
093included in that room from classified employees, counselors, teachers, um administrators at district and site level. And it takes a lot of insight to make sure that the the book is as userfriendly and uh that the course offerings are as robust as our students deserve in our community. So thank thankful to um our community and our committee for all the hard work that they put in over the years with this process. So um we do go through as a committee and each campus just to share with the board what the process entails is every year starting early in the school year every campus has the autonomy to make any recommendation that they would like to see in the course book. So that could be a change in anything that already exists that could be adding to
094the course book that could be removing from the course book. It could be anything from grammatical um to a brand new course recommendation. The process at that time is that the recommendations at the campus level are viewed with their administrative team and they have now been kind of trained and we work together as a team to make sure that the site administration are looking through those recommendations in alignment to our district vision and district improvement um plan and goals and strategic operating plan that we have as a district to make sure that when we get into the committee work that we're really bringing forth the recommendations that are in alignment with those uh pieces that our district believes in. Then at that time, we bring all of those recommendations that have been approved at the
095site level together with the committees that I just shared. And the committee, we work, it's eight hours a day, multiple days um for each level. And we talk through um and make sure that all campuses then agree with that because we believe that these books represent Gilbert public schools. and we try our hardest to make sure that if we're adding and offering um I would say 90% of what you'll see in the book we have worked toward unifying and we are Gilbert public schools um and we want to make sure that if there's an offering that a campus wants that they get to take advantage of those opportunities. The other 10% of the book because of different programs and uh agreements that we have there are some offerings in the book that are representative of
096specific schools which we'll go into in a moment as well. And then when the committee goes through all of that, we have a final meeting that goes before a handful of cabinet members and our building principles um for them to kind of hear what recommendations the committee is recommending to bring to the board and that group then final finalize the recommendations that are going to be shared with all of you this evening. So, the um way that I've organized it, I know each of the board members were given a spreadsheet that kind of just summarizes the changes rather than scroll through hundreds of pages of these booklets. Um I'm going to summarize those, but I know that uh community have a copy of that draft book. And just so for anybody that is watching, um
097we strike out and put anything in red that we're recommending to be removed. Anything that's in blue is just verbiage that we're looking to add. And then there are some organizational changes that I'll talk through, but we won't make in the book until we have the board's approval. So, I'm going to dive in. Um, first I'm going to talk about organizational changes. If when looking at the book, the beginning part of it, it has a lot of general information that our counselors use to drive all of their conversations with our students. So, the counselors have really taken ownership of what the beginning of the book looks like because it just helps make sure that those student meetings and our communication with our parents and our students is adequate. And then in the back of the
098book, we do have a handful of sections that support our programs. Um, and that's the organizational changes and sections that I'm going to reference. And then once I get through that, we'll actually dive into the courses um, and any changes or recommendations that are being made there. So with the organizational recommendations for the junior high and there are some that are consistent junior high and high school. So then instead of going through the junior high list and the high school, I'm just going to lump them all together. If I miss anything that you guys notice, you're going to have plenty of time at the end to ask any questions. Uh but for the sake of time, I thought it'd be easier to condense some of that. So for 7 through 12, you will notice that
099we are revising our summer school information to uh meet the needs of the information that parents like we get a lot of parent calls when it comes to some of these topics, which then is an indicator to us as uh a leadership team to make sure that we are communicating to be more transparent with the questions that we get to hopefully eliminate those questions that our parents andor students have. So, when it comes to summer school, uh we do have a new principal over summer school this past couple of years, and she has um done a lot of work with looking around our state, specifically the East Valley and comparable districts, um and then looking at the needs of our district, and she has spent a lot of time in the last two years um
100honing in on what uh those um pathways should be for our summer school. So, you'll see that the section is reorganized to add some transparency and it's a little bit more in-depth. A lot of the information that's been um adjusted for summer school was always given out separate, but the feedback that we got from our parents is that it would be nice to have it in the same section instead of having to refer to a different document. So, uh that is one organizational change you'll see there. In addition, we have our dual dual language immersion program that is at Gilbert L. And over the last couple of years, we've worked to expand that to our junior high level so that we have a better bridge in keeping our students that are passionate about dual language
101and being a part of an actual immersion immersion program. And so with that, um, it was suggested that we add a section that explains what the DLI program is because at the secondary level, we haven't had that in Gilbert public schools. And so we have some students and parents and faculty that are just not familiar with what that program is. So, we added a section that kind of explains that program. And you'll notice last year and this year, there are some DLI uh classes that are being recommended. So, since we were adding program type classes, we wanted to make sure to have a section that explains those as well. And then in our junior high book, there are math classes and world language classes that count for high school credit. And it was brought to
102our attention to maybe be more transparent and um kind of bold which ones count for high school credit so that families and students are aware going into that uh which ones are for credit. either a they're looking for that and they want to e be able to more easily find them and or some families um kind of voiced that um maybe they it wasn't as transparent and so they maybe got into something and didn't realize until the first couple of weeks of school and uh maybe that wasn't the option that they were looking for. So that was great feedback and we went ahead and adjusted. So now in the junior high book, they are all right at the top of the box. So that it's one of the first things that our our students will
103see. Uh there will be uh notable changes to our gam section and that is with the IB. You heard a great presentation from um Patterson Elementary just a while ago and our middleear's program at GAMS is in their um going for their candidacy as well. And so we are putting this stuff in here because I firmly believe that they are going to be approved for all of that and we don't want to then be stuck waiting a whole another year. We want it to be in our book and ready to go once they receive the the credentials to move forward with that which we should be hearing back um shortly. And then our last section that is for 7 and 12 that you'll notice some revisions to is our Gilbert Classical Academy. There has been
104some revision uh to the scope of coursework that our students are going to be taking there to allow for our GCA students a little bit more um option and um to be able to choose uh a few of their electives as opposed to having such a prescribed schedule. And so with that, there has been a lot of work with uh Dr. Hood and our cabinet team to um look at what would be best for our GCA students. And one of the recommendations that has been made is going from seven academic classes that are prescribed to six academic courses within the day where they do get a little bit of flexibility over their elective choices which are denoted in the charts on those pages. All right. And then um within the high school book a couple
105additional organizational changes. You will see that our CTE section, they at the very end of our CTE section, we used to clump lump all of our internship opportunities together at the end of the CTE uh portion because we were trying to save space if I'm being honest. And the feedback that we got is that when a student or family is maybe looking at the biomed program, they were not then going to the end of the CTE section to look for the internship opportunity. So, they felt like they were missing out on some of those. So, you'll notice that it looks like there's uh several new internship classes. They're not new. We've just decided to add them at the end of each of the CTE programs so that students are very well aware of those internship
106opportunities that exist because we're really excited about those and our students are really excited about them as well. So, we're just trying to advertise them more. And then there are um several denotations that have been added because we are continuously trying to add dual enrollment opportunities within our district and want to make sure that as we gain teachers that have the certification or we get classes approved, we want to add those on to the list. So you'll notice that that list has grown and then we've gone through classes that nothing has changed other than we've been awarded the um acceptance to be able to offer them for dual enrollment. So that is throughout the book. We didn't call them out individually, but you'll be able to notice that phrase wherever it's added is just that
107now students have the opportunity to choose to take that for dual enrollment. And then as a separate attachment that everyone um has received and has been published, we did receive the updated EVIT program guide and that does go at the end of our high school book and we just take what we receive from them as a part of our agreement with them and that gets added in. Uh so the EVIT information is not anything that we edit. It's just what we work with and what we receive. So I I separated that out uh this year um just because of it being more of a program guide. So if you're curious to to learn more about that, it is separate from what GPS has any control over, if that makes sense. Um when looking at the
108EVIT stuff, there haven't been any changes. So if you're familiar with it from years past, um it just it's formatted a little bit differently and uh everything else is consistently the same. All right. So, moving into fees. I'm going to again, this is a section I'm going to just do 712 together. Uh, we we are not uh making many recommendations for fee changes. I know that nutrition services just talked about the 10 cent uh increase. So, we do list all of our course fees in our book for our families. And so, that will be one now that the board has approved that that we would like to add into our book as well. um the summer school after doing a salary study across the east valley uh well across the state um we are making
109the recommendation to increase the summer school and extra course fee from $200 to $250. uh when we have tracked our um our um the money, the revenue that we're receiving from that. Right now, if we continue to charge only $200, we will not be able to continue to offer summer school because we won't have enough funds to be able to uh pay for teachers to be able to run summer school. So, um, when we started to see some of that and look into the trends, um, we really wanted to make sure that we were able to fund it and have enough teachers to be able to run summer school. Uh, because we know so many of our students take advantage of that opportunity um, not only for credit recovery, but for credit advancement. We have
110a lot of students that need release time during their regular day and really rely on that and or are uh very overzealous with the amount of classes that they want to take and just really like to have those extra class opportunities during the summer and again with those extra course fees. In addition to summer school um the class fee, there would be a recommendation to increase the transportation fee from $50 to $75 per session. Uh this is due to inflation and there was a study done um with Mrs. Bett's team on uh that part as well. And the other transportation fee that we would be recommending would be our sports academy at South Valley and that they currently charge $50 um per sport to transport students and the recommendation would be to increase that to
111$75. same thing per sport and it would be um in alignment with the same justification as uh the inflation that we're just after doing those studies recognizing that there's a need um to be able to continue to provide those transportation um to those students underneath technology uh services there are several I lumped them together um in the summary sheet but if you look in the draft you'll see that over time some of the fees are no longer even a part of our device anymore more. So, they have dropped off and then there have been some um updates to some of those fees as well. So, rather than kind of go item by item, um if you refer to that part, it's very minimal and it's really um nothing significant. It's just they're different. They may
112be like I know now the computers have like a touchpad. So, if that breaks that didn't used to exist and so there's different pieces like that with tech services that annually we get that list of um updates. We haven't had to increase anything with our devices I believe in three or four years. So, this is the first time that we've actually had um shifts in those costs in a while. And then that covers all of the 712 fees that are kind of overarching at the high school level. The only class fee that was proposed because we've done quite a bit of work with this to really eliminate adding fees to our families. We work really hard to make sure that it's truly justified before bringing that um to this point. Our performing arts classes a
113few years ago had increased some of their fees and at the time no one was offering beginning or intermediate guitar and so that class got missed. Now we have a couple of campuses that are offering that class and there's been no fee and so teachers have been paying out of pocket to supply some of that. So, we went ahead and asked them to show us um what what they would use the funds for and to kind of give us an itemized list. And they're proposing a $25 fee just for the minimal um strings really is what it comes down to. Um and that would be for uh this semester. So, that is everything in relation to fees um and any organizational parts of the book. The next parts that I'm going to go into are
114the courses. I'm gonna keep going unless if anyone wants to pause for questions on those two sections. Am I good? >> Can I ask now? >> Absolutely. Yeah, it might just be more relevant since there's a few more sections. >> Yeah, that's Yeah. Um, so I guess the first question is is not in relation to anything you've done in in the book or any of the changes, which I think is great. I think emphasizing the classes they take in junior high that are high school classes is great in the course description book. I just wanted to make sure are we like actually in the class during those first few weeks or the teachers emphasizing that? >> Yes. >> In the class room because it seems everyone should read this book. >> Um but for those
115who don't and we just want to make sure that >> I mean kids kids know. >> Yes, >> they absolutely do. And uh the feedback that we got came from immediately the teachers having to kind of do schedule changes within the first couple days. It wouldn't even be really the first couple of weeks. I think if they identify a student that they think they want to encourage to try to try it out, they give them that couple of weeks. Um but it it was really the shift um in that first couple of days of having them denoted this way. >> Okay, terrific. And then for the sports academy, you you say per sport. I I thought are we transporting kids to multiple sports? I thought I thought they were transported from the school. Why why
116is there a per sport fee? What is what does that mean? Are people taking more being transported for more than one sport? >> Yes, they they can be. From my understanding, they can um maybe have a fall sport and then maybe have a spring sport. I know a majority of the students focus on a single sport. Um but when I was speaking with uh Miss Betts this morning, I know that they are able to and there are some students that do then engage in multiple sports with different locations. So, >> I'm not sure. >> But one at a one at a time. >> Correct. It's one at a So if someone does a different sport each quarter >> Mhm. >> they'll pay four times as much as someone who does one sport for the whole
117year. >> No, it's per quarter. It's per quarter. >> The the fee is per quarter. >> Okay. Okay. Perfect. And then my last question was for for the increases. Well, I guess for all the increases, but for summer school, is there is there a discount or something different for students on free and reduced lunch or or is there some other type of I guess discount that students can apply for? Uh yeah, I from what I um am aware of, I know that we do some scholarships and each year we share those opportunities with our counselors to share with our parents and or to kind of nominate some students that they know fit that criteria. Um and any of the students who are on free and reduced um lunch um are the students that we target
118for that. So um I don't know if you want to add to that, Mrs. Taylor. >> Yes, thank you. the last few years any student who's on free and reduced it's automatically waved half price. >> Okay. >> So it was two 100 instead of 200. So we plan to continue that next year as well. >> Okay. >> In addition to that >> we will scholarship certain kids even beyond that if there is a need for the family. >> Great. >> Thank you. And I will share that there are a few t you'll notice that through the course book it represents many different departments that come together. So I'm glad I have a couple people that I can uh phone a friend over here. All right. Any other questions on these sections? All right. So moving
119in. I'm going to focus now on the course changes and recommendations at the junior high level. So for new courses at the junior high level, we are making the recommendation to add um a handful of dual language immersion classes specifically to the social sciences and Spanish. Uh those are a part of the program that are required to be able to offer a program. In addition to that, we are recommending to add an elective for the IB middle years program which I spoke to. Um there are um several other IB classes that we have already kind of denoted, but this one would be a brand new class. So um wanted to put that there. And then the career exploration would be a mini slash a duo class. And what that is is basically a class that
120our junior highs can use and run as a quarter class, a semester class, or even all year long. It allows them to provide multiple opportunities to junior high students. We've done a lot of work with our CTE programs and career exploration, which is a part of the graduation requirement for students as well. And we've kind of been backward designing down into our seventh and eighth grade classrooms. And so this would give them an opportunity to allow students to choose a class that allows them to kind of explore all the different careers instead of just choosing elective that is like one thing. So was really excited to see our junior highs propose that because it's really in alignment with what we're doing as a district with our vision. So that's all of the recommendations for new
121courses. And then in the changes throughout the junior high book, I am going to summarize these kind of in clusters. So you'll notice that there are several descriptions that are being updated to simply just become more robust and current with being in the year 2025. Some of these descriptions haven't been updated in easily 10 or 15 years. And so, um, as we have, um, like for example, you'll see STEM is on there. STEM looks very different today than it did 10 years ago. So, we wanted to make sure that those were reflective and truly that we've worked with the teachers to make sure that what is happening in the classroom is what our students deserve. Um, and we feel like what was happening in the classroom is, and then if that's true, we want to
122update the description to match that. Uh you'll also notice that last year we did a lot of updating our titles to be uh consistent from program to program. So if they're a a mini or a smaller class, it's an introduction. And if it's a program where there's multiple levels, it goes introduction, level one, level two. That way, if you're looking at maybe a performing arts or a fine arts or um um STEM, whatever it is, they all have consistent titles. So, you'll notice that there were a a few on here that we uh either missed last year or maybe were a singleton. So, we weren't sure if we wanted to change the title. And after we moved that way last year, the junior high team really took ownership and were like, "Hey, these are the
123last few. Let's just do it." It really worked well with scheduling and um helping people better understand the sequence of the programs. Uh there was a little bit of some incorrect verbiage in some of our classes like choir 1 and two. It references that students won't have to solo perform, but technically um that is a requirement when you look at the standards. And so we didn't want our descriptions going against what the state standards are. So we cleaned up a little bit of that. Our English language learners, you'll notice that underneath the prerec, it used to list out a few assessments that helped with placement, and those are out of date as of now. Um, and now, uh, the state is allowing for, um, showing proficiency on a variety of assessments. So, we just changed
124the verbiage to say that so that it's not, uh, we don't want to not include, um, an assessment that maybe a student brings from another state or another school district. And then, uh, I think that that covers all the changes for junior high. Um, the last thing in the junior high book is that there are only three classes that we're proposing to be removed. One of them is STEM and sports because when you looked at the description and the standards, it's the exact same as STEM 1. So, historically, we would have classes that we'd get a really passionate teacher that wanted to propose a class and we would um approve that and then what happens is if a teacher leaves or whatnot and and then there's not consistency with scope and sequence and curriculum and
125things like that. So, we did work with the campus. There's only one campus that was offering it and when we explained what STEM one was, they're like, "Oh, that's what we do. We can just do it through a sports lens." Absolutely. So, we're going to do that and then that helps us to better monitor the STEM numbers to then know how to support the growth into our high school programs. And then we added a few years ago introduction to French and German at the junior high. Um, they have not gained enrollment in over three years. And one of the things that we've done to really clean up the book over the last several years is if a class isn't showing enrollment in three years, historically those courses just would stay for like decades. And so
126we've worked really hard that if they're not making and there's not enrollment and it's not directly attached to um like a district goal um then we will clean that up. So the recommendation to remove those actually came from the campus. It helps to not make those sections as overwhelming and push the students into the classes that we know we have teachers. we know we are ready to go and um the curriculum and the scope and sequence have already been developed. All right, that concludes the recommendations for the junior high. I'm going to go ahead and switch gears into the high school uh the high school new courses that were requested. I will share that um two of the classes our district is um does a lot with growing our advanced placement program and it is
127our uh vision to have all of the offerings in the book because you can send teachers to get training. Uh that's the credential. They don't have to have a degree or anything like that. So we don't want to ever limit not offering these classes to our students. Uh so it's our our belief that we want to have them in the book and then that way if campuses choose to move forward. So, at this time, we actually have every College Board AP class in our book available to our families. Not that all of them are always making, but we're pretty close to that. So, this last year, um, College Board has been, um, piloting and just finalized the approval of AP business and personal finance, which we already have three campuses that have, uh, teachers going
128to training and have been working on the pilot of that and are really excited to add that to their campuses. and the other one is AP cyber security. So, we're excited to see those and um just to share and I know I'm going to try to keep myself on task, but I get really passionate about this stuff. Those two AP classes are also a part of a career pathway that College Board is now um shifting their belief system to be more career aligned as well. And they are they brought in CTE directors to that conversation and are currently working on mapping those. So within a year's time, our hope is to actually be able to offer those for CTE credit and they will become hopefully uh per everything I've heard and the conversations I've been
129included in with College Board, those will then become uh part of the completers for our CTE pathways. So uh we're really excited because we know that we have a large interest in those two classes. Um and it will be 10fold if they are then CTE credit as well. You'll also see several IB classes that are being recommended to um continue to support the growth of the IB program at Gilbert High School. Uh we are making the proposal to add a capstone class for weighted credit for five of our performing arts programs. So those will include our orchestra, choir, band, theater, and dance. These are classes that historically have not had a weighted class or a opportunity to gain weighted or honors credit. um in the past um we know that these students do a lot
130but when it comes to looking at the additional work if that be a capstone or a project or um different pieces that come from the criteria that we have deemed honors um it hasn't quite met that with the addition of the Arizona um diploma seals that are now um very heavy in those additional pieces the teachers across the district collectively made the proposal um to add these classes which will only be relevant for seniors that have been in those programs all through high school. They have to complete three years before they are eligible for it. And then in their senior year they can choose to still do the regular fourth year and not do the extra assignments and activities and projects or they can choose that option um and then earn weighted credit. So uh
131this is I am excited for our performing arts. they're very excited about this opportunity. Um, and it'll um, help grow those uh, diploma seals as well. That's not the only reason, but it's just an another added incentive that those students will graduate with an additional diploma seal. We are recommending adding a sports leadership class that will be uh for students who um a lot of our campuses have done clubs where they're pulling in athletes that are truly your leaders and kind of like your team captains and go on to pursue coaching as careers and or um maybe refereeing and things like that. And so the sports leadership class will allow them um when you think of like student government and community service hours and things like that, it's combining it through the lens of an
132athlete. And so they can help out with our unified sports program. They can help out with uh volunteering in those sports fields. So a lot of our other leadership classes that are in our book, when you read them, they're very academically driven, which this will be as well, but it's through the lens of that that student athlete. We're specifically looking to target athletes who have been like three sport athletes through their high school careers um that want to continue on with that. The rest of the new classes that we're proposing um is just to make sure that we have um outlined the classes that we brought to the board earlier um specific to the ASU experience with uh Mosquite High School. So they're not they're not new courses. It's just making sure that we are
133able to add a section that shows which classes students are able to get that ASU credit because they the students that are doing those opportunities when they don't have the opportunity here specifically we have to add an additional course code and so this was our way of adding that section. You'll notice that this is in a separate section in um that part of the book and we recognize that it will be fluid. Some may come off, some may not, but we wanted to be transparent and just share that list that had come up in a previous presentation. And so, um, honestly, that that one was to be more responsive to some feedback we got from the board. >> I I did have a question about that. So, I want to, um, so the when I
134looked at it, it just said that you're going to add 65 courses, but it didn't list the courses. So, I was going to ask if those could be emailed to us or something so that we can see those courses. And I saw that after I PDFed. It's not 65 courses. That was a typo on there. [laughter] >> I thought that was a lot of classes. >> Yeah. No, if you No, that would be like a whole book in itself. But if you look on the summary sheet for the high school new courses >> was that that link and then that tab, right, that you emailed to them last week. >> Okay. So, it's in there >> and it is lines 10 through 20. So, it's >> okay. >> I'll go back and look. >> I
135think that was a page break right at the end. I It did look like that, but I apologize for that. >> Okay. I I will go back and look at that tab then because I I tried to cover everything but it was a lot to cover this time. >> It is. It is. And I don't mind the questions. I want everybody to be on the same page. >> Okay. >> Uh the next um section is high school course credit change which is changing the type of credit and there were only two for this. One is the creative writing and the other is foundations of film. Uh simply these are the only two classes left in the high school book that were a semester class. and then they could repeat for credit. Everything else in our
136book over the last decade has gone to year-long classes. So when you're scheduling really it came down to why don't we just make them all year long. So all we're doing is changing this to say they are now year-long classes. Nothing else is changing. >> The next section, >> Dr. Cox, I have a >> I want to before we get too too far away from this, I've got a question about the waiting waiting of classes. the fine arts classes. >> Okay. >> So, the question in my mind is how is waiting fine arts classes going to impact or affect students that have a weighted GPA from more traditional classes that that allowed a weighted GPA like your math and your science. And I just I [clears throat] guess I guess my concern is are we
137going to have are and and I [clears throat] I want to say this as as diplomatically as possible, but is it will a student who [laughter] has a way a GPA and a class rank because they took honors science or honors math. Is that rank is that class rank and status at Jeopardy because there's a student who took an honors drama class >> or something like that. >> I and we've had a lot of conversations around this. So, I'll just share kind of the conversation and if I don't fully um answer your question, just let me know. So, I will I will share with you that historically our performing arts teachers have actually felt the opposite of what you're describing. They feel like um they have a lot of students that are in the top
1383 to 5% of the graduating class that are in performing arts. And those students stay in the performing arts all four years. And sometimes they feel, and it's not just a feeling, there is evidence to back this, that our performing arts students um feel like they're they have been penalized because they are wanting to be in their performing art and they don't get to compete in some of those other weighted classes. If it were up to our performing arts teachers, we would weight every single class that they offer across um our district. Um however, that would not be fair. And so what what we um landed on is that if we did this for only seniors who have shown that commitment through all four of their years and are willing to do these additional pieces
139that honors rigor level that they're that they do deserve that honors credit. Now I will share with you that we do have weighted classes in all of our other departments on a high school campus. So we have honors in our world languages. we have honors or weighted I should say not but weighted credit in our some of our CTE programs um in our fine arts and so really our performing arts is the one area where we haven't seen weighted credit so um again when we look at our population and statistically the students who um are in there and it's I'm not saying all uh but on average you do see a larger percent of students that are in that top percent um that this this may give them a boost in their GPA, but not
140any more than a CTE student who's already able to take. And one of the things that I have personally seen running a high school is that um we have some amazing performing arts students that when they get to like their junior and senior year, they have some really tough decisions to make. And unfortunately, some have had to make the hard choice to step away from it or maybe do it outside of school or take it as an additional class because they feel like they want to compete with the GPA val scholarship opportunities and they want more weighted classes. And so, um, this conversation is not new. I think, um, these conversations, they come up in course book every single year. And it's our job to kind of make sure that, um, it it isn't it
141isn't a game to to to support the val. Um, it's to make sure that we are truly saying that these classes are at an honors and weighted level class. And if they are, then those students deserve that credit. And so again, we've kind of looked through all of those pieces. Um the other part that I think is important is that this last senior's uh cohort, so 2025, if you recall, we actually changed our val to flat GPA. So when you look at that, we were at a point where historically students got to choose which credits they could use. So even in these same situations, if they didn't want to choose those classes, they could choose their top weighted classes. Now, going to a flat rate GPA, if we have one department that doesn't have any
142of those opportunities, you're going to naturally see kids go the other way, and we don't want that. We don't want our students to feel like they have to pick and choose and not be a part of our performing arts. >> That makes sense. Thank you. >> You're welcome. >> Just just to answer your question a little further because I do have >> Oh, I thought she answered it. She did answer it. Great. But I'm just I have two daughters who have music degrees from one from ASU, one from NAU. And I will tell you that those degrees are as hard as any engineering degree or science degree. There is a lot of work that those students have to put in. And it's not a four-year degree. It's actually a 4 and a halfyear degree because
143it they can't compact everything they need to do into four years. So it is music is a very hard difficult um area of study and it does take a lot of work. >> Yeah. Can I speak to that really quickly as well? I appreciate the long answer because I I think there's so much there to to discuss kind of all all the topics you hit on I think um are are important to consider um in situations like this. And and I I appreciate the question from from President Thompson because because I agree you don't want to I don't want to say devalue or take away from AP calculus and and AP physics and um but but I'll tell you is anecdotally and I don't know if if we have like the numbers to actually back
144this up is is that these these students aren't taking their performing arts classes instead of AP calculus. All these students are doing AP calculus. All these students are doing AP physics. And these are the students that are taking a hour to be able to do that extra class, that are doing summer school to be able to do that extra class. And so I I don't think I don't think them doing orchestra is is taking away from their academic. I I think it's additive. And I I do agree. I think um that to to take four years of of a performing art and to have to consider, oh man, I'm my GPA is above 4.0. this is actually going to lower my GPA by participating I think puts students in a hard a hard spot and
145I don't want to put students in that spot and I think that our performing arts are are amazing and they and they put amazing work but I I agree that it shouldn't just be >> given that it's an honors class. So, I I appreciate kind of the measured approach to this and and I would actually I think that this is a great starting point, but I I think maybe even if if they are adding more substance or or whatever the requirement is to push that down even to lower levels um to to make some of those other honors classes so students have to don't have to make that decision of of hurting their GPA versus participating in performing arts. So I don't know I don't know what the balance is and with the you know
146valadictorian saludiatoran discussion and all of that but I I think that I think this is a step in the right direction >> and and I will share I know you referenced it possibly being anecdotal. Um I'm sitting here nodding away because I can tell you that the numbers absolutely support what you're saying and it is quantified. Um, I also think it's important I I know I talked about the course book committee, but Miss Taylor um has the last few years put together uh with a few of us. We've run a performing arts meeting where we've invited a liaison from each campus to come and give us their um input and feedback. And so this conversation started long before course book even. Uh and we had some really robust conversations and they're willing to put in
147the work and everything you just said. That's what they want for our students. We have some incredible performing arts teachers here. Uh and truly they're these students are going above and beyond. And so now our next step is to create uh some documents to make sure that that consistency is across our district and not uh we don't want inadvertently some of our campuses to increase the rigor and make it more robust and then some to not do that. I don't think that that's what would happen, but that's where my team gets to create those next steps. So thank you. All right, moving on to the high school change in course description. There were a few uh that fall under CTE that are just being updated per CTE verbiage that we get each year uh from
148programs and then in addition to that our online curriculum which is flex point each year they also give us their descriptions um and we use that curriculum but then we modify it and um because that curriculum comes out of Florida we then have to modify it to make sure all the Arizona state standards are there and make some adjustments to make sure it aligns to Gilbert. And so, uh, we have to revise a few of those and those are the ones that you'll see that have an OA any of and they're all in the global section. So, um, that justifies the online, uh, class changes. And then the course description for our ROC programs, Camp Overty High School is no longer, uh, running ROC off of their campus. So, uh, Gilbert High has that program
149and all students are able to go there if they're interested in ROC. And I mentioned the English language learner prerec change. That is true at the high school level as well. So you'll see that in both books. And then for the course removal requests at the high school level. Um I'm just going to kind of go down a few of these. Uh the first one is we have a uh regular government econ. Those are two semester classes and a few years ago we had proposed putting them together and ultimately trying to have teachers work together. Because of the work that we've done with our masterers and with our grading and with our uh common unit assessments and curriculum apps, it's made um uh this class a little bit more difficult to manage in this in
150the scheduling aspect of having it coded and set up this way. So the campuses um a few had tried it out and then last year we had two campuses and this year there's one campus and they they came to me they're like hey because of the systems and supports we have in place now it doesn't make sense to have it set up that way and um we asked if anyone plans to go that way and they had said no. So we're we're looking to remove it. So it just will be the regular government and econ sections. uh forensic science. We had this in our general uh part of the book, but also in our global. And we've worked really hard that if we have a class that's offered within our brickandmortar setting, that all of
151our teachers, even online, will use that course description and curriculum. If there's an online class that is only for online students, that's the only time we separate it out. And so, this was one that we must have missed when we uh cleaned those up. And so our principal at the global academy had pointed that out and so we're just removing it from the online section, but technically the course is still in the general part of the book. Driver's education is no longer uh being offered in our district. We were down for several years where it was only at Desert Ridge High School and they just like the rest of our high schools, they now um have recommendations to programs and opportunities that they share with them, but it's not something that they're offering on campus
152anymore. So, we just wanted to remove it from the book since it's not an opportunity. And then you'll see the next three are honors classes that were competing with an equivalent AP class. So, this includes honors economics, French 4, and AP English 4. Those all were competing with AP economics, AP French, and AP Literature. And we from watching the growth we've had and monitoring the student data, our students are capable and proving to us that they are successfully um scoring well on their AP exams. And so we don't need a similar class that's the same level that's not encouraging them to take the AP exam. And so with all the work that we've done with AP um over the last several years, we're to a point where we we felt this way a few years
153ago, but we wanted to make sure that our teachers uh didn't feel like we were pulling the rug out from underneath them. And also our students sometimes when those opportunities were both at a campus, they might have felt uh more insecure to try the AP. And and we've come a long way. And so at this point, um those students, these three classes, each of them is only offered at one campus. And so it really was the campus is saying, "Hey, you know, we're finally to a point where we feel like we're ready to to push our students into those AP classes." And we're I absolutely love to hear that. So, um those would be the recommendations um for the course removals. And that concludes all of the summary of changes from the committee at this
154time for both our junior high and high school books. >> That's it. >> I know. [laughter] I actually think that is the shortest list we've had. [laughter] >> All right. Uh we remind me we made a a motion and it was seconded for this item. Right. >> Yes. I I made the motion I believe. >> Okay. Thank you. >> Um discussion. I I don't have any more questions. I just want to say thank you for all the work that you poured into this and and everyone on the committee. >> I I made the motion for nutrition. I don't think we have a motion for this yet. That's what I was wondering. Do you know, Gabby? >> I'll still thank you without a motion. But [laughter] I I I really do appreciate it. And it is
155super long. Um, but it has an incredible amount of information. It's actually very efficient and very effective in conveying the information and appreciate everyone who who put the work into it. Thank you. >> Thank you very much. >> Thank you. >> Miss Wilson, can you confirm? Did we >> Okay, let's let's do that. Uh, is there a motion to approve the 2026? I thought we did this. >> No, I did the nutrition services increase and that was the last >> I don't think there's any harm in doing it twice if we did, but >> is there a motion to approve the 2026 2027 course description books for high schools and junior highs? >> So moved. >> Thank you, Mr. Brainer. Is there a second? >> Second. >> Thank you, Miss Murray. Okay, if you could
156just go through that again. [laughter] >> Not a chance. >> I think we'll be good. >> We don't have to have a motion before a presentation. Just before a vote. [clears throat] >> Okay. Uh any disc I echo what Dr. Robersonson has said. The amount of work that goes into this, I don't know how y'all do it. Amazing. Amazing work. Just I mean it seems like a a juggling act that you'd need 50 hands to be able to keep everything up in the air. So, thank you for doing this. What What other discussion or questions do we have? >> I I don't have any more questions because I already took a great deal of um Dr. Cox's time this afternoon in asking her all kinds of questions. But I I think that every parent and
157every student should have find things in this course book that will be interesting to them, helpful to them. And I think it's that they should look they should dig into this course book if their student is saying, "Oh, that's boring." or whatever, they will find something interesting. And I personally wish I could come back and take some of these classes, but no homework. I don't want to do homework. >> Thank you. >> Anything? >> I mean, yeah, same. It was great. It was really great. You guys did a really good job. So, thank you very much for all your effort. >> All right. If there's nothing else, then I'll call for the vote. All those in favor of approving the 2026 2027 course description books for high schools and junior highs as presented tonight, say
158I. >> I. >> Any opposed? Thank you. And that passes. Thank you, Dr. Cox. Uh, agenda item number eight, items for future agenda. Is there anything that anybody would like to add to a future agenda? >> Okay. Can I actually I just want to note this. I'm not sure the best timing to do this, but can we sometime in the spring get feedback on the the ASU experience on that? Can we kind of put that on the calendar so we can >> Yep. Great. Perfect. Thank you. >> You guys talked about that in that >> work study at that time that we looked at that approval. Correct. >> You had kind of requested that back then. >> Yep. >> We got it. >> Perfect. Thank you. >> We're requesting it again. >> All right. >>
159It's okay. We'll have Dr. Cox come back up, too. >> Oh, wait a minute. Wait a minute. Let's I want to request. We don't request. Just kidding. >> Request. Okay. Anything else that anybody wants to add to an agenda? Okay. As always, if there's anything that comes up, please please reach out to me or Dr. McCord, and we'll uh make sure that we get it on there if it's appropriate. Um, all right. Moving on to board reports. Town of Gilbert Liaison, Dr. Blake Roberson. >> Uh, nothing to report. Thank you. >> Thank you. Uh I don't have anything to report from the audit committee. We have a meeting this week. Um but I do I did attend a couple of events. Uh one was a Veterans Day event that I thought was fantastic and I
160applaud and praise all of those schools that uh that take time out of their schedule to honor our veterans. I thought that was amazing. Um, yeah, and that's all I have for tonight. Thank you. Uh, Gilbert Education Foundation, Mr. Jesse Brainer. >> Nothing to report. >> Thank you very much. City of Mesa leazison, Miss Shaina Murray. >> Nothing to report. >> Thank you. And our legislative representative and employee benefit Trust, Miss Jill Humphre. >> Uh, couple things. Uh, excuse me. the the employee benefit trust committee meeting will be later this week. So, next month I'll have something to report. And then um I just wanted to share a couple things that um I've been to. So, I I did miss I was on the phone last month um because I was with my daughter and
161her family while they had a new baby and they're doing very well. Um, I also wanted to share that uh last month in o in September I received an award from ASBA for 600 hours of professional development. I received their gold star award which is their highest level. Um, and I really appreciate that. That was u I feel those conferences have been a great blessing to me in my role as a board member. And then I wanted to share that I went to Augusta Ranch for grandparents day. Really great turnout. Um lots of grandparents there. I got to sit with two little kindergarteners. I got to eat one of our nutrition services lunches and it was delicious. And these two little kindergarteners were just so cute. I work out. I can lift 10 lbs. I
162can lift 20 lb. I can lift 200 lb. So, we had the strongest kindergarteners in the whole world. So, it was adorable and it was a wonderful um event and it was just one fun to see the community coming together and how many grandparents came to be with their grandkids that day. >> Thank you, Miss Humphre. I think there's a Seinfeld episode that about that. >> I don't know. >> Bomb. Mendlebomb. [laughter] All right. Uh thank you for those reports. Uh meeting dates, Dr. McCord. >> Thank you, Mr. President. Governing board members, we have one more meeting for the 2025 year, and that's December 9th. It's a board business meeting. January 6th, 2026, governing board special organizational meeting and brief board business meeting. That's where you will elect presidents as well as um clerks and
163do committee assignments. And then January 12th is a board policy committee meeting at 4:30 and January 27th is a board business meeting. >> Did I hear that right? So we have January 12th is the policy meeting. January 26th is the organizational meeting and January 27th. >> January 6th is the >> January 6th. >> 6th and then 27th is the board visiting. >> That's where I was confused. Okay. Thank you very much. All right. And last but not least, adjournment. Is there a motion to adjourn tonight's meeting? >> So moved. >> Thank you, Miss Humphre. Is there a second? Second. >> Thank you, Miss Murray. All those in favor of adjournment say I. I. >> Any opposed? >> And we are adjourned. Thank you very much. Sounds good.