Littleton Elementary School District - Board Meeting 09May2023

001Pledge of Allegiance at this time we'll take a moment of silence and ask that you please silence your cell phones as well thank you at this time is there any board statements on current events I've had the opportunities to attend most recently Lake in Preparatory Academy yesterday we were here and it was just an amazing turnout we were um just really pleasantly surprised by the number of residents and just the number of parents who were so excited about the opening of this school so that was amazing additionally we had the opportunity to attend Country Place leadership day and that was absolutely amazing the students of that school blew everyone's mind with the talents that they had and just the level of professionalism they exuded um last month we had the opportunity to attend the art

002show and I um I would say everyone is just completely floored by the depth of the art that the students of Littleton were able to produce it was absolutely I mean just breathtaking like just just so I've never seen anything like it um likewise um call your financial literacy had a family day or financial literacy a day and that was just wonderful for the students it gave the children the opportunities to really see the importance of budgeting and being able to make plans for the future and it really um just honed in on their entrepreneurial spirit so it was a great opportunity I'm just so so proud of the students of of Collier yes sir well thank you um first of all I want to thank Amy for the birthday cupcakes as anyone knows it

003is my 19th birthday today so um yes thank you um first off I before I give my update I want to acknowledge that may is mental health awareness month as you all know I've had my fair struggles with my mental health and still continue to this day it is something that needs to be normalized when it comes to talking about our mental health and and I wanted to add that it warmers my health it warms my heart that we are proclaiming this month as mental health awareness month today is also a National Children's Mental Health Awareness Day mental health is something not only my generation continues to tackle with but every generation continues to tackle and when it and when we need a break or need help just know that there are resources out there

004for you and now for my update um I just came back from the Arizona State Legislature and participated in a press conference with say of our schools Arizona calling on the Arizona State Legislature to pass a budget that is in the interest of public education excuse me I also received a tour from the students at countryplace Leadership Academy and exhibited the amazing leadership skills that the students have and that they are building over there and honestly I can say that I picked up a few leadership skills even myself um the Highlight for me was seeing the garden outside and the vegetables that they were growing and the Beautiful five pillar mural that is in the hallway near the library it is truly beautiful to see all the amazing artwork being painted on the walls uh

005two weeks ago I joined my colleagues executive team for our annual Leadership Retreat it truly was a time to reflect on what our vision and values are as a board and what we want to do moving forward I must say the top priority for at least me is continuing to maintain transparency with our community and building on strengthening relationships with all stakeholders and our community and the people that we serve I also participated in the Littleton art show and man was I really in for a treat the beautiful pieces of art displayed throughout the Avondale City Hall library was incredible and breathtaking I would say that my favorite piece of art was I believe from a middle school where that goes to Quentin it was a cityscape that had a downtown area and each building

006displayed different TV shows and movies or characters and it was truly amazing to see the level of creativity that our students have in our district it's it's just was breathtaking I also participated in our Littleton Education Foundation fundraiser and it was an amazing evening of bowling and raising funds for the foundation which provides crucial scholarships for our signature field trips and for our middle schoolers gift cards for educators and so much more um I was I attended the bowling night and the art shows well and those were both great events like my the other people have mentioned um I also attended the fine arts academy dance concert this past week and it was amazing to see all those dancers dance and the creativity and how much the students have invested into dance um and just

007the Joy on their faces when they got the standing ovation at the end thank you and I also attended the art show on the foundation and you can't say enough about how much work and time and effort goes into it from students and from teachers so we appreciate all that you do I also had the opportunity this morning to attend the Teacher of the Year Awards at Grand Canyon University and truly their faces their talents and just when they're sitting there and they're beaming you can tell that they have a passion for what they do so we truly appreciate those and we're going to make sure your names when they're announced here in a little bit are up on our Marquee and our big Marquee as well so that you get the recognition you certainly

008deserve along with everyone else so thank you with that your turn Dr Freeman where'd you go I've been around when it started to told us and good evening everybody I love me because um as it's been mentioned it's the month we get to recognize employees and the accomplishments of our students um so um happy belated teacher and staff appreciation day it's teacher appreciation week and we scheduled the day on Tuesday uh for the first full week of May and it was originally championed by Lady Eleanor Roosevelt back in 1953 to honor teachers our teachers and staff deserve our gratitude and respect as they guide our instructional day ignite critical thinking and still love a learning and Inspire hope in our students um this is why we've designated the week of Staff appreciation week and all

009of our staff members receive tokens of appreciation and thanks to the generous donations of business partners we're sharing uh those with members at the DS or board members are important contributors to our mission as well earlier today we recognized our 2023 West Side impact principal and teachers of the Year during the ceremony at Grand Canyon that President Reyes mentioned I'd like to congratulate our deserving honorees and thank president Reyes for being there as well I'm excited that they're also here tonight to join us so we can all recognize their dedicated service to the district a little later in the meeting at our sites our ptsas Administration and staff themselves have been working hard to ensure everybody knows how much they are valued excuse me at Collier Miss Monday's family um who's a second grade teacher

010hosted surprise lunch for teachers from the Angry Crab and then the PTA plan surprises during the week Littleton STEM Academy had taco and ice cream truck visits I'm assuming that's two separate trucks um from Community Partners and the PTA served a nacho bar daily treats straya Vista is celebrating with a creative theme each day yesterday was PTSA treat bags today uh you're all that and a bag of chips tomorrow will be don't stress eat ice cream sundae bar and Thursday PTSA is going to sponsor lunch with Jersey Mike's and then freda's theme is nacho ordinary teachers nacho bar with all the fixings and at Fine Arts teachers received handmade individual keepsakes staff were treated to a nacho bar um one day in sub-sam which is another to end the week they'll have cake and ice

011cream best way to finish any celebration for many of us including volunteer staff members of the board had a blast at the foundation annual bowling fundraiser event the foundation board and its sponsors worked really hard to take care of everything from planning to execution attendees enjoyed friendly bowling competition as well as Raffles and as usual generated lots of excitement we want to thank our board members who came administrators teachers and staff who attended to bowl or just to show support the funds collected are used by the foundation to support teachers and students through different programs in our district and I'd like to express our appreciation to the foundation board to our generous sponsors which include one GPA Ace ADM group Professional Plumbing Canyon State Electric Chase Building team kalante landscape and irrigation Cactus pipe LR

012Cohen norcon Progressive Roofing public mechanical reitan construction Stone Cold um masonry I think Sunland Valley Schools Verity Mid-State W and W structural those were the ones with all the matching bowling outfits they were fun and wholesale floors and others if I may have missed any I apologize so my understanding is LEF collected the most funds ever at any of their events this year so we're really grateful and excited about that the annual district-wide art show which has already been mentioned was celebrated last month at the Avondale civic center opening night was packed Southwest Food Service gave out 300 cookies and ran out I think they could have done 500. um it was great to see so many families come out to appreciate our students amazing artworks and it took a while for the show to

013recover from the effects of the pandemic but we're definitely back this time for the 15th time we had first and second place winners for each school and first and second place grade level winners district-wide for the district and some of those pieces are selected to receive an offer of purchase those are out and we haven't heard back yet but have accepted the artwork joins the permanent collection to be displayed in District facilities this year some of the pieces are also receiving purchase offers from City of Avondale the employees were walking around down there and wanted to know if they could do purchases as well so we'll extend those to parents and it's completely optional but it's kind of cool if somebody wants to buy your kids artwork save space on your fridge um we're grateful

014to our teachers who show students how to express themselves through ART and provide them supportive environment to succeed over at the Littleton STEM Academy our student council and PTSA hosted Spring Fest 23 towards the end of last month and they had food trucks community business visitors wonderful games a spring egg hunt dinner dancing races prizes and it was an awesome event that benefited the school and the community student council members who plan organized and ran raised over a thousand dollars in yard games and did a wonderful job we're really proud of them and their go get them attitude in celebrating their peers and their community Estrella Vista students received an award from Avondale city council last month their National Junior Honor Society students coordinated a school-wide food drive they collected 627 pounds which works out

015to over 500 meals the foods donated to St Mary's via the Avondale food bank for the holiday school spirit food drive and that service to the community took third place students received a trophy from the city of Avondale City Council third graders at Country Place have been learning about recycling women of Gambia they read the book one plastic bag and then they were challenged to create something useful out of plastic shopping bags and their creative designs included friendship bracelets kites parachutes and even a jump rope they can use on their own playground I also want to take a minute to respond to comments made last month about Country Place staff district and school leaders met again with the family as promised apologized for not responding to issues to the standards set by the board superintendent

016and principal there's a variety of reasons but none of those which impacted any racial group of families rather they've impacted the whole school Community regardless of anyone's race they're being addressed in that fashion and we we really are finding that being short staffed makes everything harder to respond to and they're working at it the staff were a little frustrated because um they're having difficulty addressing their concerns but we're all saddened that we let anybody down it became a racial issue for any part of our community and as we've said repeatedly to our entire Community we're human and imperfect but the way we work is to make thing things right it requires us to listen in the way we move forward requires the community to listen as well having said that last week we reported the

017threat Fine Arts didn't include a weapon of many people from the school were aware that the student who made the threat had a pocket knife it was shown to other students and we're moving very quickly to keep our community informed the statement was based on information from police the police confiscated a pocket knife but the school administration didn't interviews done by the police didn't find that the students were threatened with the pocket knife and it was considered small so it was classified as a dangerous object because we're told it wasn't legally large enough to be considered a weapon to be clear there's no need for students to have a pocket knife at school we do our best to be fair and transparent so I hope that clears up any misunderstanding at the end of April

018the U.S Surgeon General um said that the decline in youth mental health is defining Public Health crisis of our time in his remarks he identified social media as the key driver for mental health challenges and called on platforms to do more to curb these issues last week he released an advisory addressing an epidemic of loneliness and isolation affecting our country and substance abuse is at an all-time high in the U.S last year it was a tenth a percent higher than the previous High Mark from the early 1970s so last month we held an event to help inform our community about the dangers of Fentanyl and counterfeit pills we partnered with Matt Force an organization design to help building healthier communities Awareness on the topic could be life-saving for our families and we're disappointed that it

019wasn't better attended or attended as well as we hope finally I'm happy to share the results of the new Leaf Vita program offered this season for taxes at our family Welcome Center we had 233 returns we assisted with free of charge um took 381 volunteer hours and saved our community an estimate of nearly 82 thousand dollars in tax preparation fees so we'd also like to show our appreciation The Welcome Center staff who flexed their work hours on Thursdays to help support that effort and everything else they do to provide support to our community each year it seems that the ending of the school year comes faster and faster our 8th grade promotion ceremonies will be held Monday May 22nd the last day of school is the 24th and those those ceremonies started either 8 9

020or 10 o'clock depending on the school start time each of those times for the schools can be found in our newsletters or on school websites and calendars or posted in social media tonight we're revising the current year budget to match enrollment and next month we'll propose a budget for fiscal year 2024. we're hopeful the legislature might finish their budget setting work soon because yesterday they introduced a state budget package and they were scheduled to hear those this morning and this afternoon in Appropriations um I haven't heard if everything passed out you were down there did you know um so um if it if things go as planned they hope to proceed to a floor vote soon um we understand that aside from 16 budget bills they're also moving mirror concurrent resolutions to authorize an AEL

021override for fiscal year 2024 which should avoid the March 1st Showdown we've experienced the last couple years wrap things up I'd like to express our appreciation to loving library for their 1200 donation for materials and use in the Care Room at Country Place and that's everything I have Madam president thank you president Reyes members of the governing board Dr Freeman and Community tonight I will be sharing our program showcase outlining our Athletic program for our season ones for the spring for sixth seventh and 8th grade students as well as highlighting the winning season teams and our athletes of the season the Littleton Elementary School District believes that Athletics is an essential component of a sound educational program our Athletic program offers unique opportunities outside of the classroom to promote self-discipline improve self-image and encourage a

022healthy sense of competition our program strives to embody high standards of sportsmanship while allowing our student athletes to develop leadership cooperation and other vital life skills in a safe healthy and fun environment the Littleton Elementary School District is able to provide the following programs we have flag football volleyball basketball soccer baseball and softball it is our goal to foster and encourage positive open communication between parents Guardians and coaches the Health and Welfare of our student athletes is our highest priority we make every effort to ensure a healthy environment and safe training conditions for our athletes prior to participation in any aspect of the athletic program the information is available for parents and Guardians and we explain the following things our tryout procedures our eligibility requirements any fees Associated the season game and practice schedule as

023well as any insurance requirements and we do this with the following stakeholders you see on the screen we have one athletic coordinator five site coordinators a season all of our assistant principals assist our Deans we typically have 22 coaches two per site and one or two per sport tonight we are here to celebrate the spring season one boys soccer and girls softball athletes coaches and teams we are so proud to announce littleton's spring season one championship winner for boys soccer the Estrella Vista Hawks and they were coached by rigoberto Gamez and Jeremiah Gallegos we'd love to have both of you come up if you have any athletes here tonight we'd like you to come up as well and stand by the Littleton screen so we can take your photo and celebrate you [Applause] Dr Freeman

024president Reyes do you guys want to come to the front we have a banner there for the team the soccer one all right perfectly everybody smile perfect one more smile congratulations you might want to stay there because we have another we are so proud to announce littleton's spring season one championship winner for our girls softball team and that is our Fine Arts Falcons and they were coached by Nora Espino come on up Nora and any athletes that you might have brought with you tonight please join your coach here in the front excellent congratulations and uh [Applause] each season our coaches select an athlete of the Season based on leadership qualities that include encouragement respect motivation initiative dedication response to feedback as well as overall attitude coaches utilize a rubric summarizing how the athlete embodies and

025exemplifies the leadership qualities that I just mentioned and how these characteristics positively impact individual and team success we are so very proud to recognize our spring season one athletes for our boys soccer team we are recognizing Efren Martinez thank you come on up and efren's coach said that Ephraim was moved around to a few positions early in the season and he didn't complain one single time he stepped up he did everything that was asked of him on the field off the field he was also a leader and a fantastic teammate teammate he was always willing to offer Health academically as well as on the field his attitude was always positive and he did everything he could to make sure that we functioned well as a team we are so proud of Ephraim [Applause] and for

026our girls softball athlete of the Season we are recognizing Arlene Ibarra come on up Arlene oh Flores Arlene Ibarra Flores sorry sweetheart this season was her first time pitching and she's beca she became the starting pitcher she decided to try um one practice and she was just a natural um just like so many other things she's involved in she's a natural leader she has incredible sportsmanship and she has the kindest heart she is someone who never stops herself from trying new things and perseveres when learning a new skill or a new sport like softball we are so proud of you Arlene congratulations [Applause] thank you we are so proud of our all of our athletes and our coaches and two of our athletes share their experience of the athletic season and you can see um

027their quotes here on the screen it's hard to beat us when we never give up we are champions for a reason we had fun we supported each other and when we started we were just learning and we didn't think that we would get this far so we're very proud of our athletes of the Season as well as our coaches for all their support to our students thank you very much and congratulations to all the athletes out there and parents because it takes a lot taking children back and forth so we appreciate you as well I skipped over reading of proclamation so I'm going to go back to that if I could in my apologies um Marcus do you want to read one of the proclamations okay I'm reading the mental health awareness a month Proclamation

028whereas good mental health is crucial to the well-being of our families schools and communities and whereas there is a proven connection between good mental health and overall personal health and whereas many people experience times and difficulties and stress in their lives and should feel comfortable in seeking help and support to manage those times and whereas with effective treatment individuals with mental illness can make progress towards recovery and Lead full productive lives and each businesses School government agency health care provider organization and citizen has a responsibility to promote mental health and well-being for all now therefore be it resolved that the governing board of Littleton Elementary School District proclaims May mental health awareness mental health month and urges others to recommit to increasing awareness and understanding of mental illnesses reducing stigma and discrimination and proclaiming appropriate

029and accessible services for all people with mental illnesses thank you Amy would you like to read teacher appreciation week of course thank you whereas the impact and value that Littleton Elementary School District Educators provide to our students and their families is immeasurable and whereas teachers wear many hats including but not limited to role models mentors motivators coaches listeners and treasure hunters and whereas teachers Embrace students of widely differing backgrounds and often face a myriad of daily challenges and whereas the almost 60 000 active teachers in Arizona Workforce worked tirelessly during some of the most challenging times we have ever faced and whereas we are reminded every year during Teacher Appreciation Week to show thanks to our teachers for all that they do as they educate the children of our community now therefore be it resolved

030that the governing board of Littleton Elementary School District celebrates the second week in May as teacher appreciation week and calls Upon Our Community to share their appreciation to educators thank you both for reading those appreciated and they're both very valuable proclamations so with that we're going to jump right into the West Side impact principle and teachers of the year and we would like to have those individuals recognized and we'll do that now yep thank you president Reyes members of the governing board Dr Freeman and Community I am honored to present to you this evening the West Side impact teachers and principal of the year this year has been filled with amazing stories of teacher Excellence as they work to support their students schools and our community it is our honor to recognize their hard work

031as this year's West Side impact teachers of the Year each year one teacher from each School within the Littleton Elementary School District is voted by their peers to be the West Side impact teacher of the year when I call your name I'm going to read some statements about you so please also join us up here by the screen Collier Business Academy for financial literacy has proudly selected gifted teacher Miss Michelle young hands [Applause] as someone we all look up to as a mentor and role model Michelle exemplifies the district values of dedication collaboration and professionalism on top of being our gifted teacher she participates on the leadership team the PTA yearbook advisor Mesa Club Robotics and read better be better as a colleague who is easy to approach and quick to help in any way

032she can Michelle has been an invaluable resource to new teachers on the Collier campus her organizational skills are on display daily as Michelle manages and facilitates the morning announcements which are done in a timely manner with pertinent information as a teacher it's easy to see the positive impact she has on her students she is always polite and professional with her students and colleagues overall Michelle younghans does it all for mentoring teachers be an effective team player to setting high expectations for students Miss Young hands is definitely one of the leaders of the pack and we are so excited to have her as our West Side impact teacher of the year [Applause] that's right here so cute Country Place Leadership Academy has proudly selected third grade teacher Miss Lynette Hill foreign within the classroom and across

033the campus Miss Hill always strives to be an amazing teacher co-worker and parent many co-workers recognize her for her patient personality which has allowed her to work with the most challenging students and completely turn them around Miss Hill's positive and friendly attitude creates her to be a pleasure to talk to in passing and at meetings she brings joy and happiness to any rumor situation by just being herself in the classroom students say she makes every subject fun and goes out of her way to ensure that her students are reaching their full potential and giving them opportunities opportunities to grow outside of her teaching duties Miss Hill is also actively engaged in after-school events from our winter drive through to our read Across America event and everything in between you can always count on Miss Hill

034to be there for the students and Community also she keeps our community informed using our school Facebook page and encourages staff to share the wonderful things they are doing in their classrooms so that she can share it with the world you can always see her snapping some pictures to share to you last but certainly not least Miss Hill has helped start up our school garden to make Country Place even more beautiful and we appreciate her extending out the invitation for our classes to learn more about taking tours of the garden we are excited to have Miss Lynette Hill as our Mustang teacher of the year foreign Academy for engineering has proudly selected 7th grade ELA teacher Miss Madison Miller Miss Miller exemplifies our district values as a positive and professional person in every interaction her

035co-workers notice that she cares about every single student and staff member every day Miss Miller inspires us to keep learning and growing as a person and leader from leading PDS on trauma-informed practices to seeing her Implement new strategies to best support our students she is an absolute Superstar on top of her other duties Ms Miller has taken the lead for our social media this year and has done a tremendous job showcasing all of the great things happening at EV our Hawk family is so excited to have Miss Madison Miller as our teacher of the year the Fine Arts Academy has proudly chosen our dance teacher Mrs Devon Gonzalez as our teacher of the year in three short Years miss Gonzalez has built an award-winning Dance Program her teaching through movement has resulted in multiple performances

036that include students of all ages along with teaching dance Miss Gonzalez is also the Fine Arts cheer coach in this role her cheerleaders have performed at charity events as well as a recent Phoenix Suns game arriving before school every morning for cheer practice then staying late every day for dance practice Miss Gonzalez is the epitome of hard work and her and dedication her talents do not only lie in the teaching of dance but also in the craftsmanship and creation of the costumes and uniforms her students wear when performing cheer we are so excited to call Miss Gonzalez our Falcon teacher of the year [Applause] the Littleton STEM Academy for computer science has proudly selected fifth or 8th grade resource teacher Dr Marie Bernadette diate foreign does she support our campus but missed it but Dr

037dayate embodies the district values and Norms of what it means to be a leader and a learner she completed her doctoral program this year and still managed to support not only her caseload but our speech program and campus with her breath and depth of knowledge Dr dayate is a compassionate dedicated educator who works diligently to support all of our staff and students alike her flexibility dedication compassion and collaborative Spirit make her the perfect candidate to represent the Epic standards set as Littleton Firebirds our Firebird family is so excelibate excited to celebrate Dr Marie Bernadette dayate as our teacher of the year the Littleton Online Academy has proudly chosen 6th grade teacher Miss Lindsay bacon as their teacher of the year Miss Bacon exemplifies collaborative leadership through her words and actions as an educator she is

038an innovator of virtual instruction and shares engagement techniques and strategies with her colleagues Miss Bacon shares her excitement for lifelong learning with all of our students inspiring their curiosity and hunger to learn at high levels not only does she support her own students but she supports the entire School Miss Bacon recently invited lesd Online Academy students to learn animation skills as well as supported them in presenting their final Creations to parents and our community she is truly a passionate educator who builds trusting Partnerships with her students and families with intention and optimal Learning and Development and we are honored to recognize her Quentin STEM Academy for health science has proudly chosen our reading interventionist Miss Jesus Alicia madril Jimenez as our teacher of the year Miss madril is a true leader and exemplifies the district's

039values she is an incredible support to all staff and students as the problem-solving team lead Ms madril Works to ensure that all students are receiving The Talented targeted support needed to be successful she assists teachers in completing required documentation and refining their instructional practices in Reading as a co-worker Miss Madrid is a team player and participates in all collaborative team meetings professional Learning Community meetings and Leadership meetings her expertise is on display when she provides professional development and trainings to staff on instruction related to reading phonics and phonemic awareness she has a can-do attitude and is always willing to assist when needed shark nation is so excited to have Mrs Jesus Alicia madril Jimenez as our teacher of the year [Applause] there you go to school it's so cute Tres Rios service Academy has proudly

040chosen second grade teacher Miss Giovanna Guzman Miss Guzman exemplifies the district values as a shining example of collaboration as a leader she works with multiple teams to make improvements in her classroom and our school as a whole on our guiding Coalition these teams require Miss Guzman to give her feedback opinions ask questions and relate information to her team in the classroom she goes above and beyond what is expected she has started the flag program with students before school and has reached out to military personnel to train students and teach the importance of respecting our American flag Miss Guzman is loved by all students she treats them fairly and respectfully and looks for the positives in everybody and models what it means to be a treasure hunter by searching for the talents skills and intelligence that

041exist in all students our Puma family is so excited to have Miss Giovanna Guzman as our teacher of the year [Applause] president Reyes members of the governing board Dr Freeman and Community I am also honored to present to you this evening our West Side impact principal of the year West Side impact principal of the Year Estrella Vista STEM Academy for engineering Dr Nicole derazo if I consider leaders who have inspired others Dr Nicole durazo comes to mind Dr durazo is an outstanding leader deserving of this award because she models humility and courage authenticity and vulnerability empathy and performance Dr durazo is committed to the school and District Mission Vision and values our values are dosed not words on paper to Dr durazo she strives to embody the values and firmly believe she must smile these

042behaviors first and foremost she works to build culture with students staff and community members and first and foremost she emphasizes celebrating personal and professional wins she recognizes the commitments staff members have to our school and district and she is constantly trying to show them appreciation Dr durazo we congratulate you [Applause] and again thank you all I know we have many many people that we could appreciate unfortunately this is just you know a handful a handful of the great people that work here so thank you very much and look for your names upon the big billboard because we'll be flashing to magico down mc85 so look for those as well wait there's more oh but there's more foreign oh retirees oh that's the that's the good sad part so now we're going to turn it back

043over to you right Miss Garrison is going to recognize our retirees perfect Madam president governing board tonight I get to recognize our dedicated retirees we are so thankful for the years of service and we want to take a few moments tonight to honor their contributions to the Littleton Community First up from EV I have Mr Alfonso almanza are you in the room he is not in the room he retired early today I do want to tell you that he was the lead custodian at EV and he is a hard-working man he started working at the age of 15 and hasn't stopped he worked in construction and restaurants in both Fields he would start at entry level positions and would soon work his way up the same is true when he started working in schools in

0442003. he began his career as a custodian and soon became lead custodian in 2007 he opened Estrella Vista and has kept the school in Tip-Top shape ever since anyone who walks the Evie Halls always comments that it looks so new and sparkling clean this is all because of Alfonso he is not only the best custodian keeping our facility clean and running smoothly he also cares deeply for students staff and Community he has often made suggestions on how to improve instruction and best meet students needs he looks forward to retiring in Mexico with his family and not using an alarm clock he will be greatly missed and we wish him the best [Applause] next up I also from Evie I see coop in the house Mr David Cooper 7th grade science teacher at EV became a

045teacher in 2012. this was after a successful first career in an industry where he trained and supervised company employees and trained company clients he shared that his first career was good but that his teaching career was much better Mr Cooper is the type of teacher that holds eye expectations for all students it's not uncommon to see him enforcing dress code in the hallways our Hawks know to tuck in before word is said when they see him he has been very involved with all aspects of our school attending sports games family events and serving on numerous committees he we also can see it consistently see him here in the audience at board meetings month after month he has built ensuring relationships with families and stays in contacts with former students by attending games and graduations Mr

046Cooper can you come up the EV hauls won't be the same without him he looks forward to spending time with his grandkids and Mr Cooper we hear you will be subbing and you will still make sure that kids are meeting the dress codes expectations we wish you well in your retirement [Applause] our next retiree also from Evie Miss Julie whelihan art teacher at EV she had a long career in teaching during her time in the classroom she has taught art PE drama and kindergarten of all the subjects she has taught she reports that art is her passion she was one of the founding members of the Alternative Learning Center later renamed Central City Academy and worked for the Leona Group Charter Schools after teaching many years in the charter world she left to open an

047antique shop that dream came to an end but as one door closed another opened she received a call from Antonio Bryant to join the EV staff in 2013. she earned her certification during her first two years at Evie and has been a phenomenal art teacher for the EV Community the halls of EV come to life every year with beautiful student artwork this creates such a happy warm inviting environment for all of Evie to enjoy she is passionate about teaching art and sharing her love a famous artists and techniques with her students we know she will continue to share this love as she enjoys retirement by taking care of her grandchildren until they start school best of luck to you in the years ahead Julie Gary Nunes I are you in the house Terry has worked

048in district office transportation and he is certainly no man of mystery except where he might be tonight is a mystery in fact he's proud to tell you of his military service in the U.S army for six years as a military policeman give him a few more minutes and you will learn about motorcycles motor scooters fast cars and Volkswagens for adventure Terry enjoys outside activities such as climbing hiking trails and riding his bicycle on Marathon excursions with his friends Terry is a Maywood Chicago Illinois native who moved to Arizona in 2003. Terry is kept in check by his wife Deirdre of 40 years and their two daughters Terry's Mantra is family is everything Terry is easily distinguished by his Morgan Freeman baritone voice and his smooth Denzel Washington walk Terry's past employment includes 23 years at

049Walmart among other trades and positions utilizing his mechanical skills Terry joined lesd in 2017 bringing additional help to the garage team while driving a special education School Bus Terry has shared that he and his wife intend to travel to the United States or travel throughout the United States during his retirement particularly they want to go return to Chicago no one can out give Terry because of his generosity and willingness and we wish Terry and his wife happy trails during his retirement [Applause] our next retiree is in the house Miss Barbara Maddox call your kindergarten teacher she is Barbara has been a dead pillar of our Learning Community for 27 years she is respected loved and cherished by Collier students staff and Community she graduated from Towson Union High School and then went off to Texas

050to attend University of Mary hardin-baylor and earned her bachelor's degree she signed her first contract here at Littleton for the 1996-97 school year interestingly her contract for the 97-98 school year was signed by our current governing board president Mrs Kathy Reyes she survived no less than eight principals and I'm sure Terry Pearl Scott Richard pett Joya Brian and Regan and any other supervisor she may have had have wonderful things to say about Mrs Maddox and the magic she made happen in her classroom for almost three decades we are very excited for her as she retires from teaching to take the well-deserved time to enjoy her beautiful family and her many grandchildren who also call Collier her home Barbara our community is honored to have worked and served alongside of you we are extremely grateful for

051you sharing your extensive Professional Knowledge and Skills with us for so many years our hearts are happy for you we'll miss you dearly see you in Disney [Applause] when she came up I told Dr Freeman I feel very old her mother was my son's teacher and I know her mother very well so small world but all the teaching is in circular right so with that we're moving on there is a one call to the public and at this time um Hillary McKillip to come up to the podium thank you sorry if I butchered the name I just couldn't quite make it out so I'll read a quick disclaimer if I may in order to allow time for everyone to participate comments should be limited to three minutes please no name calling personal attacks upon board

052members staff Personnel other persons in attendance or absent will be permitted by the individuals who address the board in addition questions or comments on matters that are currently under legal review will not be accepted citizens are directed to other governing board policies or disposition of legitimate complaints including those involving Personnel so thank you look for a green button at the base of your microphone it's on okay yes okay my name is Academy for financial literacy I've been to a couple of board meetings and all of you seem to be a caring and compassionate group of individuals who strive to make decisions based on what is best for our students staff and community I am here because of the letter you sent out to parents regarding band next year I have a seventh grader who is

053in band this year and the choice to wait and see what happens or move to Fine Arts is unacceptable for those of us with more than one student are we supposed to try and move all of our students into Fine Arts Academy or have different students at different schools with different end times is fine arts prepared to accept all the band students at all the schools along with their siblings and are you asking middle grade students whose lives were already disrupted for two years during the pandemic to make the decision to leave friends and the school they've grown up in just so they can attend band in my opinion that is unfair and what happens long term to these kids when they reach high school if they lose a year of band they may lose

054interest and not want to be in high school band or they Heist they start high school band behind their peers and as you've mentioned with mental health being an issue lack of community band provides that community that friendship I know for myself the friendships I made in band and Junior High I still have today I understand that it's difficult to find any teachers at this time but I am asking that you do some outside the box problem solving and brainstorming maybe meet with parents to get our ideas can we reach out to cats Artistry School of Rock the high school band teachers or Estrella Mountain Community College to partner with them in some way while also looking for band teachers for these schools and please consider how to retain the band teachers that you do

055hire when three out of four band teachers quit in the same year that is indicative to me that this has been an unpleasant experience for them and let me be clear we love Miss Wilt and we do not blame her at all for making the decision to move on and I'm assuming that the other two band teachers who have quit are just as wonderful and loved by their students and this brings me to my last point which is more specific to Collier I'm concerned about the numbers excuse me I am concerned about the number of staff and teachers turnovers this year and last this lack of consistency is unsettling and not good for students can someone please look into what is happening at Collier and again I'd like to be clear we love Collier and

056we're not blaming the teachers what needs to happen so that we can start retaining staff and teachers that are hired for next school year thank you board members and superintendent Freeman for allowing me to speak thank you very much for bringing those issues forward we appreciate it we'll ask Dr Freeman to respond to whatever it may be appropriate in writing thank you and thank you madam president of course getting losing band teachers was not in our master plan and it is unusual to have that amount of turnover in the same year we are usually looking for one or sometimes two and um Dr hayde has looked into that quite a bit and what we'll do is gather some of her work and findings and put them in our report to the board thank you I

057appreciate that next we're moving on to the consent agenda is there any item the board wishes to be pulled from the consent agenda hearing none then I'll ask for a motion on the consent agenda I move that we have perfect consent agenda as posted I'll sick of that thank you all in favor aye aye any opposed hearing non-emotional past thank you next we're going to go to item 10 it is an informational item only and the governing board is going to hear information on best practices and common pitfalls in open meeting law compliance thank you madam president we'd like to introduce um from Gus Rosenfeld Jennifer McLean who's served as counsel to the board for gosh I don't know a few years now I've lost count and so um based on newness of members and

058making sure that we stay in good standing with attorney general and everybody else we've asked her to come and go over I think some key points some of the same stuff that you might hear at the school board's law conference but then some application to our district thank you for being here Chris Dr Freeman thank you members of the governing board so again I'm Jennifer McLennan I work in this area and have for over 25 years and so it's my pleasure and my honor to be able to come out to you and provide you with a little guidance on the open meeting law so it's always a little bit tricky and a lot of different rules that apply so feel free to Pepper me with questions while we go through this next slide please so

059first I wanted to talk about what our goals for today are one goal is just to give you some guidance on the requirements of the open meeting law this isn't going to be a long presentation but I want to just give you an overview of it and the second is to kind of discuss some frequently encountered situations problems and issues that might arise next slide please and the open main law doesn't stand alone and it applies with a lot of different other laws that are unique to school districts and that are within the body of governance that you all are responsible for so let's kind of go through that very quickly if we could next slide so uh the open media law interacts with Arizona's public records act as well as foia interacts with election

060laws for override and bond elections with attorney-client privilege which is not statutory but which is governed by the rules of Ethics applicable to attorneys it oversees and interacts with student discipline and employment hearings conflict of interest laws and with your overarching responsibilities which is board governance so what do I mean by that how does all of how odd wall of these things interact well let's just take an example of let's say that you have a pertinent issue that arises in one of your communities one of your school districts and it relates to a teacher and it's allegations of unprofessional conduct or concern about how a teacher interacted with the child let's just say that scenario and un's board members will likely receive communication because you're involved in your communities and you know the people that

061are in them so you may receive communication from an interested parent or somebody who observed the incident maybe it's on social media maybe you learn about it that way so there are a few overarching rules that apply to both your board governance and to the requirements the open meeting law with respect to that allegation one is you get the email regarding this incident you cannot forward that email to the remainder your board members and have a communication that would exist that would begin a discussion about that matter right that would be a communication outside the bounds of an open meeting that interacts directly with public records law because that communication if you created it would be a public record so that's one of the ways in which that that applies let's say you are very

062concerned about this matter and so you begin to talk with teachers and staff members about what they saw what they learned you want to report this information to Dr Freeman's team well that kind of governs your role as board members and whether you're kind of getting too down into the weeds of what this interaction was without letting the admin Administration do their due diligence and do their investigation why is that important that affects the conflict of interest laws if you as a board member gain information about a matter that might come to you in your role as a board that could potentially preclude you from ruling on it so let's say this information was serious enough to require the district to pursue this teacher's termination if you as a board member got involved in the

063investigation part of it then you wouldn't be able to sit as the governing board member to to hear it out so that's how the conflict of interest law would apply and then finally with respect to the open meeting law we talked a little bit about how this overarching requirements are that you would have to complete all of the review of this instance the teacher termination potential the other items you would have to complete that within the boundaries of the open meeting law and so that would be how all of these things might apply together next slide please so Quorum of the governing board is prohibited from taking legal action that means with respect to you it's three board members because you're a five-member board in my client Fowler Elementary there are three member boards so

064two of them cannot speak because that's a quorum of the board Phoenix Union has a seven member board so they have a quorum of five so um depends on how many board members you have as to what your Quorum is and discussion is prohibited along all venues social media email or in person next slide please the requirement is that all board meetings be held in public so you're required to attend and listen and deliberate in the public eye and any legal action has to occur in the public as well it's a it's a part of the sunshine laws along with the Arizona public records act next slide a meeting is defined as the Gathering either in person or through technological devices of a quorum of the board where they would discuss propose or take legal

065action so it doesn't matter if you're actually in a room you're meeting by Zoom one of one exception to this is sometimes I get asked the question well what if I as a board member want to State my position on the record what if I'm talking to someone from the media and I want to go out on a limb and say let's just say something easy I'm adverse to not raising the AEL limit you know and you want to speak about that well you're definitely telegraphing your position and you may have an occasion to Telegraph that position when you're as a member of the board but there's a specific opinions that find that that is not a violation of the open meeting law so you don't give up your first amendment rights when you're become

066a board member and have to comply with the open meeting law but you do have to be very careful about the association and the discussion part next slide um let's besides your governing board what uh what other requirements might the open meeting law have with respect to your school district one is if you as a board established advisory committees so I'm not specifically aware of any Littleton advisory committees but other school districts that I and Dr Freeman shaking has said that you do not have any other school districts do so for instance I do some work with Scottsdale unified their boards set up an audit committee and so they they have a specific committee that reports to the board that they set up that committee has to comply with the open meeting law there is

067an exception and asba published a policy advisory this week that states specifically that if you have any committee that is considering textbook adoption that committee by Statute has to comply with the open meeting law and superintendent committees do not in my opinion next slide agendas how specific do you have to be well you don't have to if you have an executive session and we'll kind of go through the requirements for that you don't have to give away um the intent behind the executive session privilege so I'll go through that with some other examples but you do have to give enough so that the public can tell what you're talking about so for instance you have to make sure that you aren't discussing items on the agenda that aren't listed broadly enough I'll give you an

068example uh one that surprised me during the covid-19 pandemic one of our clients had an item on their agenda to reconsider the delivery of Education models they were in a hybrid model and they were going to reconsider it and when they got to that and that was how the agenda item was listed when they got to that agenda item the board voted to close the schools so that all instruction was online my mind that was one of the instruction delivery methodologies they got an open meeting lock complaint about that in the Attorney General's office cited with the complainant on that and said nope that wasn't specific enough to tell the public that you intended to potentially close schools so had they had the word School closure delivery model and school closure they would have been

069fine but that's one example again that might have been a very extreme sort of political hotbed of a topic so I don't know that that's how it's going to be seen in All Eyes by the Attorney General's office but that's one example Next Step um agendas so you all had the brief summary of current events that I heard and that's exactly what it's supposed to be only the board members in question and Dr Freeman are permitted under the open meeting law to give a brief summary of current events so for instance you couldn't have a standing item that would allow Dr Hade to give a current event summary can only be under the open meeting law board members and the presiding administrative officer of the district you also have to be cautious during your current

070event summaries that you aren't proposing or taking legal action on anything that you are discussing and you're also not supposed to initiate a discussion of the items next slide so this is what the Attorney General's office says in the agency handbook which is uh or a publication that the Attorney General's office is responsible for keeping so it has a lot of information regarding the open meeting law if you ever have questions as board members and you want to do some light reading before your bedtime uh this would be an area to do it um but they the Attorney General's office has specifically said that again the you have to be listing the topics that are going to be presented that you might take action on so you can only use the current events summary to

071a list appropriate situations you have to strive to provide as much information to the public in advance and so that's what the current event summary is supposed to be about what you did what you went to what you saw that sort of thing next slide please um text messages emails so in this age of Technology communication by email or text messages among a quorum of the board is a violation of the open meeting law certainly boards have been held to um be found in violation of the open meeting law with respect to email Communications you could also not misuse any type of social media site so if you all in some type of chat group on a Facebook or Instagram or what all that would be the same so what is okay with respect to

072this it's okay for the superintendent to email the five of you that does not violate the open meeting law the five of you shouldn't reply back and you have language to that effect likely at the bottom of your emails and maybe Dr Freeman uses some techniques like blind copying you so you can't reply back hopefully so things like that um it's it's even a one-way communication is is could be a violation of the open meeting law so there was a case out of I think Yavapai Community College where a board member proposed a specific change to board policy by email to the members of the board none of the other board members responded back that one-way communication because it proposed legal action was found to be a violation of the open meeting law so again

073you have to be really careful recognize that both your text messages and your email Communications even from your personal phones are subject to public records requests and be cautious about that type of communication um outside of a duly noticed meeting next slide again we talked a little bit about the statements to the press and the Twitter and the Facebook feeds you can certainly if you have an active uh social media presence with respect to your role as a board member you can use that to convey your positions on various issues even if you are friends or other members of the board see what you are posting but you couldn't use the chat feature to communicate in between so again that in my mind is no different than the example I gave about if you go

074to the press and state I'm in favor of raising the AE element I'm in favor of passing the state budget at this point in time that's telegraphing to your board members but that's not a violation but commenting between Quorum would be next slide uh call to the public so the board can create Regional time place and manners restrictions you all have a very reasonable community and board so you haven't had trouble with this knockwood and so but if you do in the future um you know you can always take a recess if you have concerns about things getting out of hand you can give the opportunity for everyone to register their support or their opposition um you all your job when it's called to the public is to be good listeners right so to listen

075to not interrupt the call to the public language in the open meeting law permits members of the board or the superintendent to respond to direct criticism any of you can ask that Dr Freeman put a matter on a future agenda any of you can ask that the administration look into an issue but you can't get into a dialogue or discussion among yourselves or with the public about what was said so the open me less very specific about that I've had at least three instances in the last 16 18 18 months where board members have been taken to task for interrupting during call to the public and for for commenting not at the end of the meeting so commenting in the midst of call to the public you are supposed to according to the Attorney General's

076office allowed the entirety of the speakers to present and then if you want to make a comment along the lines Allowed by the open meeting law such as responding to criticism or directing Dr Freeman to ask for an item to be brought back then you can do it so next slide these are the matters in which you can call for an executive session Personnel confidential records so that would include Student Records to get legal advice to instruct your attorney to negotiate regarding um with your meeting confer teams or IBN teams if you have international or Interstate negotiations if you are instructing your representatives regarding property for safe School operations and to discuss security plans so those are the open meeting law exceptions if you will in which you can have a closed section let me

077kind of give you an example of what we talked about a little bit about the agenda and not you know you not you have to give enough information the public knows what you're going to talk about but not enough to provide what you know what would preclude the the executive session privilege so for example let's say that you are going to be addressing the resolution of a lawsuit you would definitely need to state in your executive session privilege that you're going to get legal advice and because the lawsuit is a public document you would need to probably name the parties name the case number right but you wouldn't have to necessarily say that you are going into executive session to consider settlement you could be more vague about exactly what you were doing ultimately any

078settlement is going to have to be approved by the board and once approved it's a public document but you would you would say that you would be going into to get legal advice regarding potentially resolution or whatever you'd like another example might be real estate you are going in to discuss the potential purchase of a piece of property for the district you don't need to Telegraph in advance what your range is going to be for payment right you can keep that behind closed doors so that you can bargain in good faith with the seller and that wouldn't defeat the executive session privilege but you would have to give enough notification nation that you were going to be meeting with your real estate agent to discuss potential purchases of property you might not have to list

079exactly which property that you're looking at but you would have to give enough that the public would need to know what you were doing so it's it's nuanced I always advise that you all get legal advice when you're looking at drafting executive session language Let me kind of give you another example on the Personnel item the Personnel item isn't as broad it requires that if you're going to discuss any person that in executive session that that individual employee or applicant be given 24 hours notice prior that they were going to be discussed in executive sessions so they have the opportunity to hold this discussion and open so for instance I've often asked well unfortunately our school district's experiencing extreme downturn and we want to go with the board in executive session with you and discuss

080reduction in force that's a hard call right because the general discussion of a reduction in force and the money was that client might or that school district might be experiencing in general is going to have to be discussed in an open session there's not going to be a specific privilege to discuss who's going to be selected how they're going to do the reduction in force behind closed doors so these are you know Again difficult difficult nuanced variables when you're setting executive sessions in particular next slide who can attend an executive session anyone who according to the governing board whose presence is reasonably necessary for you to carry out your executive responsibilities next slide the employee doesn't necessarily have the right to attend they have the right to have the discussion out in public most school

081districts governing boards allow the employee if they're being discussed to attend the executive session but if they are discussed in an executive session they do have the right to the minutes and we talked specifically about a reorganization or reduction in force you're talking about General employment actions those might not be able to be discussed behind closed doors and the 24-hour notice provision does apply to applicants as well next slide and then legal advice you cannot use the executive impression uh executive session privilege for legal advice to carry on a conversation about the subject matter that is the legal advice so let me give you an example of that let's go back to the beginning part of our story you have a teacher the teacher acted unprofessionally um you know we gave you some I gave

082you some scenarios about how those laws interact let's say that it does come to the board's attention that you're going to be adopting a statement of charges against that teacher and you call for an executive session to get legal advice about that statement of charges statement of charges is the document that you would use to fire a certificated staff member so you want to go behind closed doors to discuss that you you can do that to get legal advice but if you if the conversation naturally evolved into discussing what you want to do with that staff member whether you think that the administration proved its case whether you think it's right or wrong that discussion that deliberation can't be done behind closed doors because then you've been broadened Beyond getting legal advice according to the

083Attorney General's office the legal advice privileges should be the legal advice is given and you all ask questions that you have so it's not supposed to be more evolved discussion next slide that's it so quick and dirty so but I'm happy to answer any questions that you all have about any of my examples or any of the information that I gave you today any questions hearing none thank you for coming uh also I just wanted to recognize you were the asba lawyer of the Year thank you as I understand it in 2022 so congratulations thank you very much um well deserved so thank you for coming I appreciate that it's been my honor and my privilege to to be your all's attorney for many years so thank you very much moving on to item 11.

084and this is a public hearing correct so at this point uh I'll State the meeting is being recessed for the purposes of public hearing on revision number one of the expenditure budget for 22.23 and I don't know if there's any comments or questions Madam president I think comments and questions we can do at the end of the presentation for board or Community all right so there is no public that wishes to I know I'm just saying I'm giving him another chance if there's no public willing to come forth and at this point it looks like I will um be convened oh okay okay so you're gonna do this is the action okay yeah Madam president thank you um members of the governing board Dr Freeman Littleton Community this evening we will be reviewing the fiscal

085year 2223 budget revision number one um all districts May revise their budget up to May 15th the 15th is the last day in statute that allows for a revision each fiscal year this revision allows the districts to capture any additional funds from growth over the course of the year or revise down to match the department of education's calculations the district did not have any changes to the mno general budget limit from when we adopted in July while there were some adjustments made inside the budget the district was able to keep the full imminento budget brought before the board in July one of the adjustments made included an increase in ADM when the district adopted the 23 budget in July the district estimated average daily membership of 5480. this was an increase of 157 from the

086prior year or a three percent growth this revision captures an additional 6.68 ADM bringing the FY 23 budget your ADM to 5486.68 the district did also see a positive adjustment in the group b weight add-on this is additional funds the district receives for student classifications like ell gifted or special education designations we did have um other adjustments based on Department of Education calculations the district adjusted to carry forward in this budget based on the annual financial report presented in October as well as small adjustments to the prop123 add-on funding and an ADM audit conducted by Ade during the fiscal year as always the revised budget has been aligned with expenses and distributed budgets in each category as well as appropriate function although we are revising the daa budget down during this revision the ability of

087the district to use Esser funds has contributed to this fund growing quickly for example last year the district revised the same daa budget from 5.9 million to 7.3 million because we were able to do this so quickly the district has moved a small portion of this budget into mno this year resulting in reducing this year's daa budget by 378 thousand dollars at this point I'd be happy to answer any questions from the board or the community hearing none I guess at this point we'll move the governing board reconvene the May 9th regular meeting of the Littleton Elementary School District governing board at 7 20. all in favor aye any opposed we're now back in regular session thank you and it looks like you're still up thank you madam president item 12 is the action item

088for approving the expenditure budget so at this point I would recommend the board adopt the revision as presented I move that the governing board adopt the revised expenditure budget for fiscal year 2022 2023 as presented and the authorization of expenditures in the m o section in excess of any subsection provided all expenditures do not exceed the total budget I'll second that all in favor aye aye any opposed hearing none emotional pass thank you Madam president members of the governing board Dr Freeman Littleton community at our last regular governing board meeting the board heard a presentation from Randy Stein from Stiefel the district's financial advisor about the history and possible implications of Colleen for a 15 mno override election uh this November this election would be a reauthorization to the existing override and would allow the

089district to continue providing for all-day kindergarten lower class sizes special programs such as art music and PE after school programs like Athletics and clubs and funds to attract and retain staff if the governing board adopts this resolution the deadline for submitting arguments with respect to it is August 11th of 23 at 5 PM this deadline as part of the calendar provided in the details of this item which also includes a July 12th uh date the last day to submit a signed election resolution to the Maricopa County or to Maricopa County October 3rd which is a deadline to mail the pamphlet in October 11th for the beginning of early voting and election day on November 7th the district also worked on a pro statement for the board this is attached to the resolution under exhibit e

090I would be happy to answer any questions otherwise the district would like to recommend the board adopt the resolution and call for the election in November resolution is drafted by attorneys right is there questions on the item this is an action item so I would need a motion I moved the governing board adopt a resolution ordering and calling a special election for the 15 percent maintenance and operations budget override to be held in and for the Littleton Elementary School District number 65 of Maricopa County Arizona on November 7th 2023. I second thank you all in favor aye aye any opposed hearing none emotional past thank you and just for the record the resolution is prepared by the attorney Madam president um this item is a combination of two prior meetings where we discuss potential compensation

091for staff next year since our April 11th meeting um I had prepared remarks about what the legislature had or had not done but it seems like they've they've been quick at work I think Dr Freeman um mentioned that briefly in his comments so I would like to um kind of divert from what I was going to say but and and read kind of what the proposed budget is looking like it's going to be um a major part of the budget plan provides an override for the aggregate expenditure limit for next year which would prevent over a billion dollars in cuts to school districts this is like Dr Freeman had mentioned this is that March battle that has happened the last couple of years in the legislature the proposed budget also includes 300 million dollars of

092one-time funds for districts and Charters that can be used for mno and or capital and a 2.92 increase in the base with next year's base level increasing to 49 a hundred fourteen dollars and seventy one cents what we're hearing is the budget could be adopted as early as this week um you know and that's I think there's a lot going on there it could be adopted it could not be adopted so um what you know based on the conversations at prior board meetings the demonstration is recommending providing returning staff with a two percent increase for next year with a 0.75 percent raise for every one percent over the two percent of continuing funds provided from the legislature um so in our example the legislature would provide 2.92 increase we would provide the two and then

093prorate that 0.92 um to provide that to all returning staff if the legislature provides additional one-time monies which it sounds like it would uh the district would like to bring back a possible longevity proposal to the board um if the allocation from the legislature allows for the funds to be used in that manner so I'd be happy to answer any questions that you have for me at this time questions regarding compensation hearing none I'll ask for a motion I moved the government board approve a salary increase of two percent return and staff for fiscal year 2020 to 2023-4 and provide staff for the 0.75 increase for every one percent above the expected two percent in continued funding thank you I'll second thank you all in favor I I any opposed hearing none emotional pass thank

094you Mr French Madam president my last item this evening is um potentially awarding an RFP for photography services for the district the governing board approved the release of an RFP for photography services at the April 11th board meeting the district received five responses from photography vendors the evaluation committee consisted of four District employees two school secretaries and I believe two District secretaries that dealt with in with the photography vendor um on a regular basis the evaluation committee scored United portraits with a total of 964 points out of a possible one thousand and the evaluation committee recommends awarding this rfp2 United portraits it would be a one year RFP with an additional four-year annual renewal options so I'm happy to answer any questions that the board has at this point questions on the photography services hearing

095now I'll need a motion I move the governing board approve a multi-term contract for student and employee professional photography services for the fiscal year 23 24 school year with the option of four annual renewals thank you do I have a second a second thank you all in favor aye aye any opposed hearing none emotional pass and uh this looks like it goes to Dr hade thank you madam president members of the County Board this evening I would like to give you an update on our International recruiting efforts we talked to you last year or oh sorry the previously this year about us going out and looking for other places to find teachers so we've learned a lot over the last few months and we've attended informational sessions at conferences spoken with other districts and have

096been using international teachers that have been using international teachers and we've asked a lot of questions to the companies that we are using to fill positions so right now we're using the embassy of Spain to fill our positions for our dual language program and using the International Alliance Group iag for other positions across the district both sources work with International candidates utilizing the J-1 Visa program this program allows teachers to stay here for up to five years there are minimum set of requirements for candidates to meet before they're even allowed to interview with us and that includes they must have an equivalent of a bachelor's degree and be a licensed teacher they must have a minimum of two years of teaching experience a high level of English proficiency multiple letters of recommendation a background check

097and they must show financial means for settling in the United States and attend a visa interview at a U.S consulate then they get to interview with us I mentioned that we've learned a lot both of our partners are extremely supportive however when we asked our Spanish Embassy partner for six candidates to launch a dual language program at two of our academies they confidently fulfilled our request but only two of them were Elementary certified this created a small issue for us as we promise programs at two of our schools but we felt it would be best to make offers only to the elementary teachers and pass on the secondary folks after reviewing the current enrollment and taking this small Staffing challenge into consideration we've determined that we will still be able to accommodate all of our

098families in both Kinder and first grade and there are only a handful of families showing interest in second grade at this point and we will be communicating with them about their other options we're still accepting enrollment for our newest program to anyone out there telling people so we encourage families to sign up now when we began to consider using international teachers we wanted to ensure that our incoming teachers would be supported by more than just Littleton staff as they will be faced with different challenges than we're used to with our out-of-state teachers both iag and the Spanish Embassy will be will be providing wrap-around services for our incoming teachers and in some cases their families our partners will guide candidates through the application process help with travel plans housing Transportation certification and other necessary things

099iag is asking for our employees anyone that's interested certified classified Administration to be paid ambassadors for these new teachers that's a cost to the it is not a cost to us iag is covering the cost and after candidates arrive though they will continue to be supported with professional development and support from both us and our partners so over the last couple months site administrators screened dozens of candidates narrowed the list to offer interviews and then collaborated with current staff to interview candidates we currently have made 24 offers of which 21 of those offers have been accepted and the exciting news is we have 15 countries represented including Cameroon Columbia the Dominican Republic El Salvador Ghana India Jamaica Kenya Mexico Nicaragua Nigeria Panama Philippines Spain and the UK we'll keep you posted on this exciting new

100opportunity to put quality teachers in front of our students and I'd be happy to answer any questions that you might have this evening so Dr hey just for clarification purposes um you stated that they had offered some options for Spanish Embassy but only two of them met the requirements for elementary so primarily the focus would be that kindergarten and first grade is that to mean that the second graders are not going to be able to participate in that program or are we still looking to fill those positions member Barnett we we do have a couple of people that have shown interests that have bilingual certification and so we'll balance that with the need to see what that will look like but however right now with our Spanish Embassy candidates it is only K1 because of

101the need for them to learn early literacy and math skills we felt that that would be the best option for our students but next year we know more specifically what to ask for so just so I I think it clears so we're only offering the Spanish option to option to learn Spanish just to our kindergartners and first graders at Lincoln and Trace just at Lakin at this oh and so we it will actually be two teachers and they will share Spanish and English teaching so we have more than enough spaces to accommodate all of the people who have requested the program in Kinder and first at this time okay thank you I just have a question in terms of pay rate so um I mean obviously is that been discussed does that seem to be

102initial and benefits I mean for these people coming here this will be a new Health Care system this will be a new retirement system and will they be in the retirement system are they allowed to enter into Arizona State Retirement so president Reyes members of the board when we place the teachers we will place them just like any other person with their experience the deductions and things that they qualify for are different in different years they're they're different in year one year two they start contributing at different rates and different times and so that is part of uh the different things that we're looking at and so the compensation rate will be different sort of like if I I have different deductions than another person with my same salary our take-home pays will be different

103and so there are years where they will not be able to contribute to the Arizona retirement system but then they're after they're here for a couple years they are able to contribute um health care we will not be offering Health Care to them we do not have the plan that is required and so our partners take care of that for us that's all I had I mean I have a lot it's a lot it's exciting it would be it's just a lot to I can't imagine how but they must have right they're right questions and will you assign teachers with them to just kind of be their Mentor during the day I mean just to get around and go to lunch and things that are so basic I think would be different maybe even scary

104to them like where they live and stuff like that probably so um our our sighted Ministries do a really good job of like the Buddy uh program at their sites but then also we are working on dedicated staff to help our International students um particularly we have the pipeline program through NAU and Tolleson Elementary also has International students and so one of the staff members actually helps the Tolleson ones so that we're going to continue that on in our district because of the the same person is able to do that are they they are all of them are required iag requires two years of teaching experience and they have to currently be teaching in order for them to come but the Spanish Embassy requires three they have the Spanish Embassy has more stringent requirements um

105the nice thing about the iag partnership is the uh the gentleman that owns the company was the Human Resources Director at Phoenix Elementary School District and he employs um the former Superintendent at Phoenix Elementary to help with the benefits and the pay in helping districts align everything that they need to also there's a former director of certification that works for iag um and so there are some people that we already know and they're Arizona people so we feel confident in their abilities question how do they get how did how do they make that I mean what's in it for them to send us you know help us find 21 teach how do they get paid to survive as a company to be able to provide this service member Madam president and other members we actually

106pay a fee for that and what happens is some of the things that we don't have to match for them because they're not charged like FICA in their first year and things we will be able to recoup that fee over year one and two to make it cost neutral what kind of fee I'm just curious what what fee do we pay iag is it depends on the area that they teach 20 to 25 percent of the salary per year yes and then the Spanish Embassy is a flat rate because they use a third party company called Amity and I want to say it's five thousand dollars but I can put that in the board update thank you thank you Clarity thanks this is an info item as well so we will looks like um we

107are going back to Dr Hayford classroom site fund information searching that thank you madam president members of the board as is typical we bring to you changes for the classroom site fund this is for information only as it is not a voter protected act anymore I would briefly like to um thank the members of the committee the leap committee who work on these changes and work all throughout the year on working conditions and and work to solve problems and look at um salaries and benefits and calendars and all of those things and if I could just name them there are a few people in the audience one we're really sorry to lose because he's retiring but he says he's going to come back and visit us Miss Bertha Plaza Cody chairland Cynthia Landis Danielle van

108dalen David Cooper Don Robinson Eileen Lieberman Lonnie Fife Marissa short Mary message Mike Cagle Nancy Morgan Robbie and musil and Sue Garrison so the classroom site fund plan was modified this year for the purpose of aligning the student achievement goals to the site and District integrated action plans which you see those every fall and then you get a recap of those right after we look at mid-year data so this work began last year when it was suggested that alignment would provide an opportunity to develop and monitor goals that focus more specifically on the needs of students at each site so the slide that you have in front of you shows the changes and this is what the leap committee members are sharing with their staff so the bullet points are lined up there last year

109their base pay compensation was 54. twenty five thousand four hundred twenty dollars and the base pay compensation amount for twenty three twenty four will be six thousand six hundred dollars this was something I mentioned when we did the stipend and addenda schedule at the last meeting this current year student achievement compensation was determined on math and reading student growth on the pre and post grade level assessment and they could earn up to thirty eight hundred dollars next year student achievement compensation will be determined on three goals from the site integrated action plan it is up to thirty six hundred dollars you'll notice we changed some of the money allocation so they would take home more and then decreased the student achievement goal slightly each goal is worth up to twelve hundred dollars this year we

110had additional responsibilities where teachers were required to choose an a responsibility two B's or three C's or a combination of B's and C's together next year additional responsibility levels will be A's only and they will be selected based on specified committee criteria So the plan is simplified but we feel like it's um much more focused to the work that's going on at the school and actually the superintendent schools have been aligned to that same work and so we feel like um we can State a specified Target goal and see how that works for us and if there are any questions I'd be happy to answer it the the full plan is attached but this is the overview questions on the site fund thank you we'll turn it over to miss vanderwater for information on the

111parent student handbook president Reyes members of the governing board Dr Freeman and Community tonight I will be presenting to you a few updates and highlights to our parent student handbook for the FY 2324 school year please note that the handbook will be published to our community prior to the start of the school year and is still under construction for publication purposes we are currently formatting and editing the structure not the content the content changes I present to you tonight have already been approved and aligned to practice as well as policy your PDF attachment is not the final publication but for information purposes this evening our District 3 for the fya 2324 school year is better together inspired by lyrics from a song by Alex Boye that sends a message of acceptance Alex Boye will be

112joining our district at the opening event in July we can't wait to hear his message to Littleton leaders in learning caring and growing updating the handbook each year we utilize a collaborative review process we began the review process by asking for input from many stakeholder groups including site secretaries Deans assistant principals principals students directors executive team members coordinators and supervisors each stakeholder group was provided with sections that directly relate to their roles and responsibilities to provide feedback and necessary changes for the upcoming school year additionally our parents on the parent advisory committee were provided with sections regarding dress code school safety parental involvement and general guidelines to provide their feedback the outcome of the review process this year allowed for the district to make a few small changes to the handbook that mostly resulted resulted

113in procedural change that we made throughout the school year minor statute alignments and positive enhanced enhancements that we are confident will provide our students and families with a user-friendly guide I know this is small but it is our table of contents I wanted to fit it all there on the screen a school's parent student handbook is one of the first and most important resources that new and returning parents and students receive when questions arrived arise this is a guide to which parents students and administrators turn so a quality handbook like ours is essential our handbook includes elements such as an introduction to the school district a directory of Staff members information about educational programs attendance information and a calendar of events however in Littleton we make the most of our parent student handbook with additional

114components and more detailed materials listed on your screen is a list of our Littleton handbook sections to make the handbook more user-friendly and this was a recommendation in receiving feedback in this area the table of contents will now be hyperlinked so when you click on a topic or a section it will take you right to that page if you are just looking for information let's say on Food Services you would just have to click that topic in the table of contents and it would go straight to that section this content update can be found on page 2 under Littleton Elementary School District number 65 section we are fortunate after surveying our community and with governing board and staff support that we will have two start and end times instead of three beginning in the FY

11523-24 school year this will allow for transportation to safely and timely pick up and drop off students and for staff to have additional collaboration time with colleagues during professional learning time these starred in end times that have been decided are updated in the handbook and reflected in this section as well as throughout the handbook were ever noted this Conte update can be found on page 19 under lesd Online Academy with everything we learned as a school district and Community with our lesd Online Academy for the second official year in its practice it was collaboratively decided that the lesd Online Academy will have their parent student handbook embedded within the main handbook not separate currently in this handbook it references lesd online for school choice location contact information and hours of operation a committee of key

116stakeholders will come together to embed the parent student handbook with components outlined in this handbook but aligned to the online school this content can be found under page 22 under parent involvement in Littleton parent view offers a single sign-on to view school and classroom information for all children in their family parentview allows parents to stay on top of upcoming school events classroom happenings assignments tests attendance discipline and academic performance language has been added to the handbook letting parents know that it is an expectation that they log into the system throughout the course of the school year along with monitoring assignments grades and attendance parents should use parentvue to acknowledge the handbook and select the Academy of their school choice we ask that families maintain and monitor contact information updates to phone numbers email addresses emergency

117contacts and over-the-counter medications can all be done through the online parent view portal this resource continues to be expanded for our family's convenience once an account has been activated parents and Guardians can gain access from any internet connection including mobile devices for additional assistance parents can email parentview littletonaz.org or they can utilize the QR code to go directly to parent view from the parent handbook this content update can be found on page 32 under student enrollment once enrolled in the Littleton District students have choices when registering for our schools the Littleton district has a single attendance area which allows for families to request programs which may or may not be the neighborhood school and families may choose to send siblings to different schools based on the interest and unique qualities of each child our schools

118and their programs have been updated to reflect their signature school focus engagement this section now proudly includes Lincoln Prep Academy our ninth signature school focus Academy this information includes details on the school's Mission the vision the Partnerships career destinations and student engagement in learning this content update can be found on page 36 under student technology section our student device protection plan program still continues to be successful and we will continue to offer it to all of our families there were 1291 student device protection plans purchased this school year the collected funds are utilized to cover the costs of parts and repairs for insured and uninsured student laptop damages our safety alert program works in tandem with our internet content filter which we call light speed looking for keywords and phrases that students type or search

119on their device alerts for students using language that indicates anything related to self-harm or violence are sent to a human review team at Lightspeed to weed out any false positives like work assignments high risk alerts are sent to the school and District administration for further investigation this safety feature allows for immediate intervention when alerted safety is our School District's number one priority this content update can be found on page 36 under student transportation bus conduct expectations are implemented to ensure the safety of all of our students riding the bus is certainly a privilege we celebrate students to ride the bus following our District's expectations this section outlines expected behaviors on the bus and the progressive approach to holding students accountable in collaborating with bus drivers as well as school leaders we have modified the consequences

120for ridership when students do not follow the expectations this will ensure all students and staff get to and from their intended locations safely this content update can be found on page 37 under student transportation as well with careful review from our transportation department of bus ridership it was decided that we would Implement a register to ride procedure for our families beginning this current school year we have had great success so we are continuing with this community procedure we encourage All Families to register to ride based upon the home address on file families can request bus ridership through the parent view portal system messaging has already gone out to our families and information in the handbook will be a reminder to families of the steps in the process and the reason behind this to control bus

121capacity and work efficiency all eligible students must request Transportation each year this content update can be found on page all parents and Guardians must sign and acknowledge that they have been informed of the Littleton Elementary School District selected student policies and regulations handbook parents have the opportunity to read the handbook and review it with their children parents and Guardians understand that they may contact their principal if there are any questions about the information contained within the handbook each year we ask that students acknowledge that they have received the handbook and that they have access to read the content anytime through their student view account it is essential that we have a hundred percent parent acknowledgment through each parent view account each year please partner with Littleton by logging into your parentview account and acknowledge the

122handbook I'd like to thank Dan budsman and my assistant Rosa Martinez for their efforts and partnership in formatting and translating the handbook as well as the many stakeholder groups that have provided Rich input and engaged in the overall review process and at this time I would be happy to answer any questions about the updates and changes to our handbook for the next year does not like the oh yes sir um so just to confirm this is just a discussion item right will we be voting on the approval of it the next meeting or this is just this is an information item not a voting item it's for input yes okay um so for General guidelines for the uniforms um is there a specific reason why we require students to only have two options when it

123comes to wearing jackets and sweaters I know it states that um that students aren't allowed to wear any jackets with locals or or any anything else that's not black or the colors that are listed with the Pacific School do you have a specific recommendation that you're making or are you asking why it was decided Well I mean I would like to see that gone I wouldn't I don't think we should require students to wear just only two options when it comes to wearing a sweater or a jacket I mean I don't think it's I don't think it upsets any people I mean obviously as long as it's appropriate I just don't think that families should only have three options or two options when it comes to just a sweater did you have a comment maybe

124um and please correct me if I'm wrong from what I understand and from my experience with my own children they can have other colored jackets it's just they'd have to take their jacket or their sweater off before they go into the classroom before they go into the school because if I'm wrong then my kids have been out of dress code like all winter long no that I think that goes by school because I know there are some schools are much tougher on it um I think it depends on what the principal puts in place so um I I will tell you the reason it originally started is because and it may not the issue may not be present anymore but there was a potential gang I know that sounds odd but there was potential colorings

125that were being worn that according to the police department represented potential gang symbols or gang colors so at that time it was decided that rather than trying to sort through all the various gang colors that there was there would be more of the the dark blue the the black without the logos or the certain faces that sometimes they wear on them and it may be something that needs to be Revisited it's been a while and that was predominant more in sixth seventh and eighth you saw that and that may not be an issue anymore I haven't actually even thought about it so much Madam president members of the board so I mean we also run these past the parent advisory committee and so there is a long history and they actually have been relaxed in

126our tenure and um uh not only do certain colors and certain emblems indicate uh affiliation with other groups kids have been bullied and beat up for wearing the wrong one and not understanding the implications um there is uh the idea to have a simplification of you know what can be worn in the classroom and not in the classroom the intent originally was your outerwear comes off when you entered the school but because it's a challenge at different times of the day and when it's cool in the morning and warm in the afternoon and the building is um settling in temperature and responding to how many people are in the room some kids are cold and some kids are hot in the same room or sometimes the room's cold in the morning hot in the afternoon

127so we've tried to be flexible in letting kids continue to wear outerwear in the classroom um and of course one of the other issues was always having anything in layers or baggy which is one of the issues that showed up at Fine Arts last Wednesday with baggy and layered clothes that created a lot of other concerns for safety so I think safety is the main reason historically and um if I think if we I mean we've already relaxed that if we were going to relax it more it might be incrementally because what you don't want to see is a return to the problems you eliminated because you had a dress code might I also add um the outerwear colors for sweaters and sweatshirts they actually have all four uniform colors so gray hunter green navy

128blue burgundy as well as Black or White in addition if you look I believe it's on page 16 for outerwear each principal designs an outerwear sweatshirt aligned to their school colors potentially their logo and if it's approved by the principal students can also choose to purchase and wear that sweatshirt so they have um potentially seven options I mean that's my input I just just adamant on that I don't think we should be acquiring a list of certain colors for what children should wear for sure so that that's just my input just on a very um basic level I know that it's problematic at times to find those type of jackets sometimes you know to find something that's solid color so I um to you know piggyback off of Marcus is saying I can see just

129it being you know an issue for parents because even I have four children at a school and it took me until I think March of this year to be able to find like some solid color jackets I was able to you know get the gray get the black get the blue um but because we're all kind of competing for those you really have to get them as soon as they come out you know so that becomes problematic I definitely see um the the purpose behind it initially um so I but I can also see what Marx is saying with regards to limiting those colors because sometimes it's just really really hard to find those jackets because we all need them appreciate the input Sarah did you have I just for me I can see both

130I can see everybody's side of it um I know that parents that I have spoken to within the community they're I've not heard like many complaints about because about the colors um I know sometimes it does get kind of difficult to find them at the stores but I think that also encourages parents or parents to purchase through the PTA the the school sweaters I know that I mean for me personally I purchased those for my for my kids so um you know if you're not able to find it at the store there's also that opportunity to purchase one from the school itself and contribute to the school so so is there a way and our PJs are amazing but is there a way to make sure that that QR code with that Spirit where it

131goes out to all parents because I can tell you I don't think I got the QR code for spirit wear until about March no go ahead I'm just thinking like to get I think that would probably be a good day because they I mean I know for I can speak for you know when I go to Quentin they you know their ptas out there but to have that QR code sent like just like other communication is sent I think that might help as well we appreciate that all of the QR codes are in the handbook for the spirit wear um and they're there regularly updated we can check them verify um but we will absolutely send them out more often frequently through social media pages and make sure that gets out to our community but

132they do live within the handbook and their live QR codes we had about thousand families that resisted finding for the handbook this year that we had to pursue with Vigor no but they would have had the QR codes if they were there no I was just wondering if there was something in the handbook that they were so yeah I had no one yeah I had no idea that such was the option that would have um saved me a lot of trouble if I would have known that that was an option um with you know being able to purchase them I wouldn't had to look out I do have one question with regards to that um are they reasonably priced so I know that you know a lot of our students come from homes where you

133know that's a you know you know money is yeah so how much are they I can't speak exactly to how much they are but in my review I would say they were somewhere between 25 and 35 dollars I would say but we can take a look at making sure they're economical for our families I think they're just a little less I think I paid 20 22 22 yeah yeah when I went to buy I also totally agree finding them is hard but the sweatshirt that was just navy blue plain zip up I paid to a new Forefront I paid less at Tres Rios for a zip up jacket looked just like it but it had to trace you know whatever the the logos are so they were pretty I mean I'm not saying that's cheap

134but it was reasonable we'll make sure we speak to our leaders about that and the ptas I will say regarding the signing of the handbook I think I signed my kids handbook four times because the kids kept coming home with the flyer with that paper to have me sign so maybe it was parents thinking they've already signed or is there a confirmation that when we sign electronically because I don't recall getting that confirmation we appreciate your question we really would love all of our families to acknowledge the form through parent view because then we do have confirmation of that we were really trying to get a hundred percent um and those families that maybe didn't acknowledge in parent view we sent the paper copy home so it's possible that we did that multiple times but

135parent view is the best method for acknowledgment and I know that I did sign it in parent view but my you know rule following children kept coming home with this confirmation form saying they I had to sign it so I I love them too but they drive me crazy too thank you very much and thank you we appreciate all the work went into it thank you um it looks like the next item is it's the asba 2024 a political agenda um and this is the Arizona School Board political delegate assembly that Amy always graciously seems like she's attended here quite a bit in the last few years so we appreciate that Sarah went last year I was her backup oh thank you Sarah cheerleader in the background good so if you want to kind of

136talk about it for newer board members what it's like that probably would be helpful what was definitely a learning experience I know I had sent many messages to Amy but it was uh you know you got to interact with board members from across the state and you actually got to discuss and uh you know give your input on the different items so it was it for me it was a it was a new experience it was it was I learned a lot just listening to everybody else's input every other every you know board has maybe different perspectives on the items that were that are being discussed but it was um it was a really um it was a good it was a good experience so so on our board there's legislative issues for the 2023

137uh and Dr Freeman were these presented by uh were these the ones given to us by asba Madam president and members of the board there is on your attachments you see one that says asba and one that says lesd 65. so that is um uh if you look at that one I want to make sure I got the right one that's the one we completed okay in May of 2022 so it has um I think some issues that are still relevant but for comparison's sake if you go back to the same item and open up the school boards one what you're going to see is the interests from board members all across the state and what I would say is um funding school districts is that very first tab it's the longest it's probably the

138one that relates most of the things you've written in the past right so um you know if I were to look at what you wrote before the very first bullet lines up with competitive salaries and those kind of things I you know we could if you wanted to just grab that language and and paste it in to show that you support that item I think there's a bullet at the bottom [Music] um funding uh funding space um I know that kind of goes with our item for the sfb one I think also in that there is full day kindergarten that's about two-thirds of the way down the First Column um we have to essentially borrow money from other programs to extend the school day and I think that's run about 23 teachers for the past

139couple years I'm looking at Dr hayde to see if that's 22 or 24 or so so to get um those full day programs let's say it's 24 teachers it's 12 extra positions to get from half to full day and we're fortunate that that we're able to fund that out of the over right now if we lost our override we'd have to dip into some other programs to be able to do that and I think full day kindergarten is pretty much the norm you know around Arizona uh you know while they're why they're not funding it I mean it would that would add a lot to our budget if they were going to do that you might want to add that and then the current year funding which I think is over on the other side

140that we are now in Statute in a combination of Prior year and current year funding that makes no sense um the that was changed when the legislature believed there were ghost students running around being counted that weren't being served and um that's another one local control um which uh you have there's there's about three bullets there that are um relevant to things that are happening now that's in the second tab down there is um opposing legislation that intrudes on School site budgeting decisions supporting local authority of boards for student discipline suspensions and open enrollment and opposing legislation that it attends to lessen or curtail the authority of school boards to approve curriculum that is you know everybody you know Banning books and everybody telling you uh what you can and can't say I think those

141uh those bullets are pretty relevant to what you've written in the past um and once again I think what you have there is fine unless you want to pull some things out of the school boards work to show your support for any one for another specific bullet and then um uh the fourth item require public accountability I think um this is I'm looking um down in Tab four where it says require public accountability um the very first one establish financial and academic transparency for all institutions and individuals accepting public funds so the reporting for esas and the reporting for Charters and reporting for districts are on completely to different standards and so you know I would say like that's the number one public accountability bullet yes so correct me if I'm wrong because I think

142this this is where we are in this process we are making our list of our five priorities and why we want it we submitted to asba the governmental Committee of ASB is going to create the agenda they're going to pull I think pull them all together to create something like this right and it goes before the delegate assembly which is where we either vote for it debate it try to change it however that works I think the committee does exercise some discretion on what they take from school districts input under the document so there may be four different ways to say the same thing and they choose one it's not your wording but it's another or and then other people who want their wording debate about it on the floor of the delegate assembly yeah

143then sometimes you can't find yours so yeah and and um you know in the past what we've done is kind of listened to uh the feedback of the board and then um uh Aiden and I have tried to fill in in Wordsmith that and and check it with the board president um but we're happy to stay late tonight and help you word Smith if you want to make changes to or add bullets too I think if we look at the tabs I mean what we've said is different but it has some adequate there's a lot of a lot of things haven't changed unfortunately so if you look at you know the adequate funding could we just take key bullets and just say take and cut and paste from one because we already have that as

144our primary right and just there's no reason for us to rewrite it unless there's a concern about it is that acceptable I think it's acceptable I also think that we have to find out if there's another priority on the board that someone would like to go before I can say in my experience when I went I would take this document to be like this is what Littleton as a board wants and so I would make sure that I would try to separate my personal feelings about something and vote as a member of this board um and so if there is something else that as a board we want to put on here then I think that's a great idea I just want to make sure it's a group discussion and it's not someone with their

145own personal beliefs but I think um there's not a lot under Rural and remote schools that applies to us but I think School Safety and Security is an area that we have an address that probably is important given the given the times and so there's a couple bullets there that I think the board might agree with or find valuable and I don't think we're limited to four it says top five but I don't think we get in trouble for combining a couple bullets into one item and like feels extremely strongly about that you would want as a top priority or something um I would like to see improved outcomes for all students at it and then think the one that caught my eye in there was support policy the last one that supports policy that

146protects School District employees and students from discrimination including on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity and that's under that improve outcomes for all students the last bowl that point green tab yeah that's just fine I speaking um because I was at the delegate assembly where this was passed most everything here I felt like Littleton was in an alignment with um one thing I would say is if their current event topics that we feel passionately about as a board making sure that that delegate is aware of that as they go agreed so is there any particular topic that you really say it's got to be up there as number one or is there some kind of agreement just word smithing perhaps cutting and pasting from these five or six that we seem to really

147strike on anyway just worded differently is there any opposition to just doing that no Amy okay so I'm just trying to make sure that I'm giving you all the information I need to give so I agree with Dr Freeman that I would like to see something about School Safety and Security um and in that I agree I feel like I mean I would be okay with any of the bullet points underneath Safety and Security but I do think that asba asks for our top five and we only have four listed here so if we're not going to add something else I would like to see a fifth be there about School Safety and Security no no disagreement I would agree as well and I like those two bullet points about the funding and supporting policy

148that promotes social social emotional Wellness I think those are two critical I mean for me what about gun violence the last bullet in ours or theirs or where the school safety the fourth bullet the very last balloon it's like I think mental health and well-being is in the first bullet I was kind of looking at the first and the fourth and I'll I'll tell you another concern we have is we've been working with law enforcement Consultants is our buildings are designed to be open to the public for Community use not to be hardened to deter you know assaults and so um hardening a school campus without making it look like a prison costs money and the school facility board has never I mean they've been behind in all the standards and in the costs were

149paying 350 a square foot which is almost double what the cost per square foot standard is and things that they don't pay for um I think the state and their facility standards really needs to step up to school safety issues and deterrence to you know people who would do violence I don't see that on here very well except the first one that provide funding and then it has health and wellness but I'm kind of thinking I mean we have basically we have something in every tab except rural schools so that's five things and then if there's a couple bullets from each of them that members think are um really important like outcomes the last bullet um you know that gives us five things and then I think in the details or the rationale we just

150tie in those bullets and then whoever becomes the delegate has that as a framework to I think there needs to be a huge emphasis on this the you know with regards to social emotional Wellness a lot of our students the only accessibility they have with mental health and Behavioral Health Services are in the school setting um even outside of school those um services are not readily available um and there's like a six-month waiting list I think um for even students to receive those services and there's a huge huge deficit for everybody you know but even on a cultural component with that um you know a lot of students are not able to access those services in a culturally appropriate manner so I think that needs to be a huge priority because that ties into gun

151violence and safety of our schools if those supports are in place then that will decrease those other issues I think I mean we need funding and it has to be bigger than just the school district so well and Amy if you recall sorry if you recall this was a huge debate on the floor um no not opposed I think there was a lot of focus on the verbiage and the wording because they wanted to make sure correct me if I'm wrong because I'm now it's like kind of coming back they wanted to make sure that the social social emotional Wellness was like was a focal point but then also um in that first bullet point I kind of feel like they separated it out like it was one whole bullet point and then they separated

152it into those two bullet points yeah so um so but I would agree I think that I mean all of that is should continue to be a priority they're going to do what they're going to do but as long as we include the things that are important to all of you I think then our inputs there yeah Madam President we I mean we can definitely share it back and I don't do they need to vote on this tonight no so we're putting so we're putting together the input I have um two bullets from tab six the safety tab I have from accountability the first bullet which is transparency from outcomes I have the last bullet which is uh non-discrimination and some of these um I think for instance we had Federal protections against discrimination but

153then we've seen State legislatures go after limiting things and so um uh you know there's a there's a battle afoot not of our making but I think you probably do want to take a stand on that I it just amazes me that we even have to continue to fight about that in um in number in Tab 2 preserving local control I had um I had picked three things that our board authority and so there's two bullets um second from the last in the First Column which is oppose intrusion and the second from the last and the second column which is oppose legislation that lessens the authority of the board and then at the top of that support local board authority for curriculum adoption and suspense oh that's open enrollment capacity and suspension yeah their idea

154was we we wanted to they wanted to be able to put the students they didn't want in other programs in your school district and luckily the feds have saved us from that because our first obligation in federal programs is our local kids so if you want to expand beyond your local kids the legislature has to fund it and that has saved us from the legislature basically mandating services for people that aren't part of our tax base and then I think bullet number one inadequate funding which is being able to um rise to a level of competitive salaries one of the pieces of information I put in your update a week or two ago from Nea was there's almost a ten thousand dollar annual earnings difference between teachers that are in organized States versus what are

155we called again right to work state and um and of course there's probably that legislative and political demeanor full day kindergarten I had circled and um uh I think um there is a thing on current year funding but probably full day kindergarten and their first bullet would fill up our rationale thing and I think give you pretty good input that's what I have is there if there anything else people want to have added I I think there's some redundancy in here so and there and like you've explained they're gonna the committee is going to do and the delegate assembly is going to do so I don't know that we want to put a long evening into something someone else is going to rework yeah they're going to so um the board secretary and I can

156do that unless you want to add to it that's five priorities with you know maybe 10 bullets the objective of the board and we'll share it back with you in your update that finished document yeah a motion of adjournment I move that we adjourn at 8 23. I'll second that is foreign