2 24 25 CAS Board Meeting

001February Monday february4 2025 board Education meeting here not here [Applause] I I of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands One Nation God indivisible withy andice for [Applause] all agenda first I would remove motion for also move [Applause] yes yes yes yes I also would like a motion to am the the agenda to add the UPG ceras at the high school next we have the agenda approval of minutes I would I'd like a motion to approve the minutes of January 27 2025 meeting as presented it was uh by Sor yes now good evening everybody it's an honor to be able to do uh this tonight because the girls basketball team has other things going on so Macy's our lady that usually gets this honor but I get it tonight

002so tonight we are going to honor four of our best and wrest and we're going to start off with our freshman class Miss Macy Morris wrote it has been a unique privilege for me to be able to have DM in class this year she has the epit of a young lady who is mature Beyond her years one of my most favorite things about DM is that you will not often find her complaining she will instead find a way this quality transcends your athletic and academic Excellence as it will serve her well in all of her life Endeavors not only is she an aid Problem Solver she is also the glue among her peers need someone to spearhead a project yeah need someone to make things happen on the court yeah need someone step fast and

003levelheaded you guess it yeah she approaches is every challenge with a fresh perspective always sinking outside the box it's her creativity that makes her stand out and excuse me makes her stand out in group projects where she has unique ability to bring ideas together in sports her quick thinking and adaptability are keys to her success she handles challenges with wisdom and confidence and absorbs any constructive criticism throwing her way with a nod and a will to improve Beyond academics and Athletics she is a Beau she is beautiful on the inside and she is on the outside she carries herself carries herself with poise and it's not boastful despite her very large amount of talent it will be a great joy for me to watch her grow and evolve over the next four years and I

004know that she's going to fill it with whatever she does congrats girl next we have our sophomore students dear Shan area school board and community members it is my honor to introduce Carly hubby as your Shan Area High School 10th grade January 2025 student the month I was in February Carly has been enrolled in my fifth hour dat class this year as a career in tech technical education class bat demands technical skills clear understanding of Industry computer soft software and sound attention to detail throughout the year she has continuously strived to turn in quality assignments and continues to challenge herself to excel in this field Carly is a very thoughtful and caring individual she has a natural gift of being warm and inviting to her peers and is always willing to help others in class

005with their daily tasks as she takes her academics very seriously she is always willing to advocate for herself and seek assistance from me when needed these traits will benit from Carly within the first couple weeks of the school year and continue to grower which is why I believe she is so deserving of this recognition it is always rewarding and inspiring as an educator to see the personal and academic growth of a student through their time at schan Area High School Carly is exceedingly gr empathetic and a very driven student it has been a pleasure to get to know Carly as a student and as a person I wish her continued success through the rest of her time here at Shan high school and Beyond that's from Mr K [Applause] next we have our J Studio

006lanaa diamond is in 11th grade and it is my honor and privilege to have nominated her for the student of the month for January of 2025 I've had the privilege of teaching l in a number of classes over the past few years including US History world history and AP government and politics the main reason that I nominated her is because of her growth and her work and her work ethic when I first met her two years ago she was a very shy girl who often second guess herself and was quite timid especially during class discussions this year though I witnessed her come into her own just in our AP government's class alone I have watched her stand up and dominate the BS run for class president and put in an extra effort to know and

007understand the wide range of topics we cover for example I think she made roughly 500 flashcards for our first semester uh final exam in AP Government she's also a perfectionist while she Excuse me while she is sometimes too hard on herself in my opinion she always wants to know what she can do to do better whether it is immediately asking her the questions she got wrong on a test for a quiz getting feedback multiple times on a paper or simply asking for ification on an assignment Lana's drive to succeed is unmatched overall it has been a pleasure to watch lanaa grow from a girl who doubted her abilities and skills to one who is now confident passionate and ready to Take On The World when it came time to nominate a junior for student of

008the month she was an obvious choice for me and I'm looking forward to seeing her continued growth over the next year in whatever path she chooses for her future that was for Mr and now our senior big dog blowing up your joh funny story obviously I moved to the district Sean is one of the first kids I met here and made an immediate impact I mean from day one so this is really cool to be able to do this for anybody so Sean Pula is uh without a doubt um a very easy uh person to nominate and it with great pleasure that I had nominated him for the student month for January he's a senior in my dual moment English composition course and I've had the privilege of witnessing his cons tongue witnessing his consistent

009dedication in growth throughout the year he is a wild mannered I'm sorry mild mannered student he is a man student who brings a calm solid presence to the classroom he works well in group settings contributing thoughtfully to discussions and projects his ability to collaborate with his peers is admirable as he listens actively and shares insightful perspectives that elevate the group's work what stands out the most about Sean is his strong work ethic he is a diligent student who is always striving to improve his skills and understanding while he may not always seek the spotlight his commitment to putting forth his best effort is evident in the quality of his assignments and his continuous engagement in class activities Sean's hard work and quiet determination make him a deserving candidate for this recog nition he may not

010always seek praise but I want to take this opportunity to acknowledge his persistence and growth throughout the course he is truly deserving of all of these honors congratulations Sean keep up the great work and that was from Mrs said if you are here in support of one of these students i' like you to and recog next then we have one more after that I just don't want any of those students to go anywhere until after with all of it so i' like those people here in support for those students that we just stand and do have a this Academy we need to make sure that anyone was here unfortunately both of our uh the are recipiant uh this month could not be with us but that is okay uh we'll go ahead anyways uh so

011we typically only do one uh student Spotlight um because we have a few kids in our building however uh we had a really hard time picking this month between two very deserving students so we decided to go with uh both of them so our student spotlights this month are Emily Ronald and keny Martin both students have been with us uh since last year I'll start with Emily Emily is uh very kind very uh you know Waring presence in the classroom she's also a very hardworking student she greatly balances of you know both going to school and also working a job as she works towards completing uh her high school education which hopefully she will do this year uh Emily does uh have plans to go into Child Care profession once she finishes with us here

012at inord MES uh then there's also McKenzie Martin uh who as I mentioned started with us last year also going to be finishing up this year uh she is actually coming to us from range she uh to us in the morning um you know it's quite it's quite a far distance uh to come for school you know about that's probably about 20 30 minutes so it's really great that she's come out to get complete her education of which she will actually be one of the first in her family to actually complete High School which is a huge accomplishment uh for her she's very hardwork student very kind we have another warming presence which you can obviously tell is one of the reasons why it was so hard to pick between just two of these students

013of McKenzie plans on going into the mental health profession after completing her education so those are our student spotlights this month and unfortunately we can't recognize them physically because they're not here but it is uh great that they're recognize [Applause] I you just hold ONN after and then after I would [Music] after I'm Ry Clin represent the Career Technical education I'm here with L Wim and his parents here in the back of the room um who have much much dedicated to his life his education I've only know I've known him for the last few years but I've only had him in class for approximately 6 months so I went out and reached out excuse to our welding instructor who has had planing here for four years here so between him and I this little uh

014Lan has been involved in our welding program for the past four years even from a young age his passion for welding was evident he's always had a strong Drive particularly in shielded metal art welding or referred to as the stick process Lane was dedicated has dedicated countless hours of developing his welding skills in class he consistently puts in more practice time and is and is never satisfied with his current level he's always striving to improve over the past years or four years Lane made an point to come down to welding shop whenever he had a free moment even if it was just 15 minutes he would have his hood down in be C and his commitment goes beyond the classroom he works on his skills both at home and on the job and working with

015his dad in his junior year Lane went out bought his own welder from our puberty distributor and to just get extra practice at home that's the level of dedication he brings to the crap not only is Lan an exceptional welder but he's also a hard worker his efforts have paid off this year when he plays first in a welding competition that him and his family took on to take or go to themselves at the Missouri Welling Institute in Nevada uh Missouri Lane chose to Contin is choosing his continue sorry is choosing to continue his education in pipe welding and enrolled in MWI because there was an excellent pipe welding program after enrolling he learned about this competition and the chance of winning that scholarship with 300 um contestants laye place first earning a full ride

016scholarship to MWI valued at approximately [Applause] $22,900 in addition he also won a custom Lincoln WRA Ranger 225 engine Drive welder I'm not sure what the cost on that one is I know it's pretty ni um so this opportunity is not to set Lane up this goes from Mr fing Binger on his part in the future but has also inspired other welding students um Mr F bringer has seen a positive energy that lane has brought to the shop and is sharing with fellow colleagues classmates um the work hard work and dedication that he has delivered so we'd like to thank Lan I know this has been on the radio know I've seen it on TV but this is the first boarding board meeting we've had to say congratulations Lan we're proud to have you as

017a student and your parents parents keep just to finish I've uh emailed each of the board members but I would also like to personally invite you Thursday to our career Expo our Career College Expo and have in now all the students you would like to leave also after thank you okay the next thing on our agenda is the [Applause] start e e there we go thank you okay good evening um I have uh been tked by the bo excuse my got a frog in my here so I'll try to talk as best I can um but I'm going to task uh doing try to get a report together uh from the incident that occurred this past Monday and subsequently all the work that has happened since and what are some of the corrective action and

018what are some of the plans moving forward so hopefully I can do that uh we're going to have a couple people that know a lot more about facilities um present along with me um instead of just me so I'm going to talk here at the beginning a little bit by about a couple different topics then we also have uh Pete uh bush from site Logic for those of you who have attended board meetings in the past uh We've entered into an agreement with site logic a year and a half ago and uh they are leading the charge on our uh architectural designs and facility upgrades um for the entire District he's still being a big part of that I think think you guys know that $22.5 million was approved back in November um through the

019bond election and 10.5 million of dollars of that is uh dedicated directly to uh East Elementary Renovations so before we get too deep into that also I would like Steve to come up here uh I think most of you know Steve clemi he is our director of building and grounds he's essentially in charge of Heating and Cooling and all all of that that falls underneath that uh been diligently working all week long um and a lot of the work that most of you I'm assuming are unaware of so we want to make sure to get you up to date with uh the work that's been going on and the work that's still yet to go on and then lastly uh Deanna dufton who is the principal of East uh Elementary is going to talk a

020little bit about how this impacts um students teachers learning and everything that falls under a building administrators uh you know concerns so she'll she'll speak as well about that so hope this works so first of all I want to thank everybody for the feedback uh we've been getting a lot of information uh via email via phone but ideally we set up a couple of meetings this past week that I thought uh the board um and I um thought were very good uh we got a lot of information and now our job is to filter through that information and create that plan for improvement but uh a couple of the meetings that we had last week is uh faculty and staff meeting um on Thursday after school um to discuss uh concerns and issues and so

021on I know um Deana has surveyed the staff on a couple of occasions and then also we were thankfully uh in a position to return to school on Friday and I in Diana uh and Steve met with the faculty and staff directly after school on Friday too to see how everything went luckily I mean thankfully um everything seemed to go well on Friday I didn't hear of any uh negative reports concerns of weird or odors or smells so Friday uh went pretty well um and then the feedback we got from the teachers and staff after school that day confirmed that uh Friday night uh I see some similar faces here we had a community meeting Friday night um and uh that is when you have a very sensitive situation as as we did on Monday

022because we knew there was a lot of people and it was over the community members not just parents so I think we had close to 40 people there Friday night and uh I think the meeting went from 5:30 to almost 7:30 so there was a lot of feedback a lot of give and take I know uh uh Mrs Lila our school board president was there she took a lot of diligent notes and um a lot of that stuff is going to be uh pass down to me and to Steve and to Deana and to our security committee and make sure that some of our good ideas that have been presented to us actually come to fruition so thank you for the input um and it continues um and we will continue to grow take it

023and learn from it as far as from Friday night you know there was a lot of stuff about we talked about a lot of things that that they gone wrong uh this past Monday there's a lot of finger pointing going on and just uh for the sake of moving forward and in the improvement process I'm I'm I'm the superintendent right and on Sunday I sent out a hopefully you got an opportunity I sent out my Sunday suit um and in there I also made some comments about you know I don't want to waste a lot of time on pointing fingers at different folks um you can point the finger at me I'm ultimately in charge I talked a little bit about that on uh my Sunday suit and I just like to read a little

024section of that to you um so that we can all be on the same page but you know it is my responsibility to lead not only good times but also when we Face challenges I fully acknowledge that Monday was a very difficult day and I deeply regret the things that did not go as plan my priority is and always has been to ensure Safety and Security of our students I recognize that we did not meet that standard on Monday and for that I sincerely apologize you entrust us with the care of your children each day and we must earn that trust every day please know that this situ situation will remain mine our top priority and we will be committed to working tirelessly day and night to ensure your children safety moving forward personally anything

025less is unacceptable and I think I Echo uh that little sentiments for the board as well um I don't think anybody is taking this likly uh with that being said a couple more things before I turn it over to people that know a lot more uh than I do um but I'm going to have Pete Bush come up here in a minute because a lot of this stuff Monday I think really uh shined the light on East Elementary but I think most of you who have grown up here and been a part of this community we all know that East Elementary was built in 1959 and it's had a lot of issues for a long period of time uh that's nothing new I got here last year one of the first things that I recognized

026was we got to do something right and and there was conversations for those of you I see your faces here that was here in the fall of 2023 we talked about shutting East down that was a real conversation a year ago due to all the situations many of them um um circling around air qu right but the decision was made um to uh ask for a tax extension and we were able to acquire as I mentioned earlier $22 million which almost half of that is dedicated to East Elementary to deal with those issues heating and cooling electrical pluging those are all a main focus and i' like Peete to to talk about that now because he's the one that uh kind of is the expert in that roow knows a lot more than me um

027but it was real talk and that that that facil assessment that occurred years ago that that um assessed all of our facilities it is public information um we can get it to you if you can't find it yourself but we can get that you so I'd like to introduce Pete Bush at this time and me set up your so click drag to right well again I just want to introduce myself quickly my name is P bush I'm a senior consultant with site logic um we are a facility provider for K12 schools throughout the entire Midwest and I wanted to just quickly kind of give uh a little bit of a background on on some of the work we've done with Spencer and Steve and the Board of Education um this is actually a title slide

028I'll step back here that you know was when we actually gave the inial facility assessments review for the board back on February 23rd of 2023 you know and there is just kind of a quick Milestone I know it may be hard to see but as Spencer mentioned we started talking in August I think about a month after Spencer started back in the summer of 2023 and through September and October we did a lot of the initial assessment work in the district we had our development engineers and our development Architects go through every inch of the building work with Steve and his staff to really identify the current condition of all of the systems within the district and as I mentioned in October we did that initial facility assessment review throughout the fall into October November

029we also did some Community sessions we had a couple evenings where we invited the community and to learn a little bit about that work and gather some feedback from the community on some of the things that they might like see not only at East but throughout the entire District we also did some surveys and went through some workshops with the board on some ideas and some opportunities and as Spencer mentioned one of those things that we talked about was the potential of a new elementary school and and what the realities of that and the cost of that could look like but ultimately we went into the fall in November we did a more comprehensive report to the board at that time and then in December we entered what we call the workshopping phase there was

030really about a 3 or 4 months period we had a couple days we had bad weather and had to cancel a couple workshops and reschedule but it took us about 4 months to get to the point where the board was able to identify their highest priorities the highest needs in the district meeting with the financial advisers to make sure that any type of a future referendum could meet those needs but also be as fiscally responsible for the taxpayers within the community as well the board ultimately approved uh the PQ application that first of all State Treasury we went with them on April 5th of 2024 um the board approved that application and also did a resolution calling for election on May 9th of 2024 and then election day of course was August 5th of 2024

031once the uh vote was passed and successful um the next thing that the district's financial advisor to is they have to sell the bond to generate the resources in the fund that Bond sale took place in November of 2024 so that was at the point when the district could actually secure some of the resources to move forward with the design and work and then we met with the district for a design kickoff on December 5th of 2024 which is just couple of months ago I just want to kind of go through a couple things quickly as Spencer mentioned eastry is a 1959 building there was an addition of four class put on the building in 1964 and then there was also some additions put on in 1999 when there was a bond issue during that

032time frame as well then there was one small addition in in 2001 as I mentioned we go through all of the the the buildings within the district and our engineers and Architects give a grade on all of the assets within the building so flooring U ceilings all the HVAC equipment the windows everything that's included gets a grade and so we look at the age of an item and also the condition that it's in so we can kind of an age adjusted grade and identify for the district what their highest priorities should be now for East Elementary this is a slide that really speaks to of the age of the building um that you know the things that are blue that is the average life expectancy of the systems within each elev entry the orange would

033be the things that still have some life left so if you see a blue bar next to an orange bar it means that system still has some life expectancy and some condition left the things that are in read were the things that were really what we'd say Beyond useful life it doesn't mean that they're not still working many times districts have have systems that are have been kept in very good condition and will work much longer than what's expected and that's really a compliment to Steve and his staff in the district that they're able to maintain systems and keep them functioning much longer than what they would originally be expected to but at least the red gives the district an IDE IDE of these are the things that you really have to prioritize because at

034any time these systems may not continue to function the way that and so what we did is created kind of a a chart for the board and the staff at East Elementary and really looked at a couple things that were priorities the 1959 unit ventilators they were original to the building they're 65 years old they have a useful life of usually 20 to 30 years so they've really lived a good life in the district and are still functioning the way that they were intended to function back in 1959 they still work well um and in a minute I'm going to talk about why maybe some of the challenges the district has had with some of the air in the classroom but function like a 1959 unit ventilator is supposed to function the other thing is

035the controls that help Steve and his staff control they are the old pneumatic controls a lot of those are original as well um so by updating the controls it it gives a lot more digital output and information so it allows the district to better maintain um the equipment if they're upgraded to digital controls in the future um we also with the district we what we call HVAC map so it helps the district identify what they have how it functions what areas of the building that it serves for instance you know the air hand we needed in the cafeteria is also original the 1959 and that is one of the things that have been identified for replacement whereas the air hand in the gym was installed in 1999 because that was an addition during that time

036so we make sure that the district understands the current condition in the age of all of those things so that their HVAC system can function as well as possible I also wanted to show some of the challenges and this isn't just true to Shaban this is really for all schools especially in northern Michigan um and many of them were built in the 50s the 60s and the 70s so we have these older unit ventilators that you see in a lot of classrooms around and sometimes they become shelves and people tend to put equipment or store things on top of the unit ventilator and obviously if it's supposed to take out the bad air and bring in the good air those vents need to be open and available to so that doesn't always happen it's not

037anyone's it's just kids throw stuff on top maybe teachers so that is something that does happen from time to time the other thing is when schools were designed you would think times the design may have been better 50 years ago but the ventilation that brings in the outside air as many times near the ground and we all know in northern Michigan especially snow tends to pile up so what happens in a lot of places is that snow Drifter thinks pile will cover that vent it's not able to bring in the outside air that it's supposed to bring in and that can cause it to be a little bit more stuffy in the class so I know that Steve and his staff again they try to keep those open when they get a lot of snow

038but this has been where there's been a lot of Swing Miss to side quickly just about indoor air quality and CO2 obviously carbon dioxide is normal in our society it's everywhere we breathe in oxygen we breathe out carbon dioxide so when you are Outdoors the normal PPM for carbon dioxide Outdoors is usually around 400 parts per million when you talk about going in indoor environments because you're breathing out that carbon dioxide the parts per million are going to be a little bit higher typically in doors it's between 400 and a th000 in most environments and so when you talk about installing equipment to keep that air at a high quality you try to get equipment that can take out the bad and bring in the good and continue to exchange that air to keep it

039in that range what does happen from time to time is especially when you put a lot of people in a small space there's a lot of carbon dioxide that gets that tailed and that causes the parts per million to increase when you get into that th and 2,000 range it certainly isn't Dangerous by any means but what it does is it creates stuffiness within the environment it just makes people feel a little more lethargic a little more tired um and I think we've all probably been in environment like man it just feels really stuffy in here right now and it's because if you get a lot of people in a tight space maybe even in this room this evening the CO2 levels may be a little bit higher than what you would typically like obviously

040as the CO2 levels get much much higher we're talking you know in that 5,000 30,000 $50,000 range it really or 50,000 per million it really doesn't become a health concern until it gets extremely high and there's not enough oxygen in the room but as I mentioned before if you look at some of the American government standards over here 5,000 PPM is what is really recommended for an 8 hour workday no one should work in an environment above 5,000 PPM if they're working for an 8 hour day and it should not exceed 30,000 for a 10 minute period otherwise it will get hard to breathe and people that may have health challenges might have even additional quick question on that yeah we got a lot of input on Friday night there's been a lot of debate

041on what should be our goal because Steve has the ability to control the intake of fresh air in all those rooms right so um the goal has been historically 1,500 but there's been some discussion debate about it should be a thousand do you have any thoughts on what you know what what is recommended and again like we look at ashray and a lot of different standards you know that 600 to a th000 range is is typically a good range to shoot for um I'll show another chart in a second that really kind of speaks with it because there are challenges especially in schools when you put 30 or more children and staff in a classroom for ant period of time the CO2 levels are going to go up during that period where there's a lot

042of people in that room they go to lunch they go to recess they go to other times and then allow the systems to kind of catch up at that point um but it is sometimes challenging for these older systems to maintain it at a high at the level that you want to maintain when you've got a lot of people in that classroom for an extended period of time um you know certainly we try to encourage schools you know if you can get in that 600 to 1,000 that's great 1,500 it's not terrible it's just going to start to feel a little bit more stuffy and it may not be the ideal learning environment for children if they don't really feel like they can concentrate it this chart really shows the difference I know it might

043be hard to see but in white is 600 parts per million of CO2 and you'll see that in terms of cognitive performance again this isn't really safety so much it's just your ability to concentrate and think clearly and in in a school environment we want kids to be able to concentrate and to think clear so the white kind of shows when you're at 600 parts per million everything all of these functions are pretty much in that very good and Superior range when you get into that thousand parts per million you'll see that some of these things begin to decrease a little bit it's not substantial yet but again you're starting to create an that it is a little bit harder maybe to concentrate and not as comfortable as it is when you've got that that

044better air exchange when you get 2500 and beyond that is the black where you really start to see people feel lethargic tired not being able to concentrate much um again it isn't like it's hard to breathe it's just hard to learn and so really we try to encourage schools you know if if you're getting to that 2500 range you really need to look at some potential Solutions it might be just setting it to bring in more fresh air especially during the periods of the day where there's a lot of kids in the room for an extended period of time but if you've got newer systems and newer digital controls it is a lot easier to do that than if you have older systems and these old domatic controls where you really can't get a quick

045read out of what is the current CO2 levels in the classroom keep my it's going to work just not um the other thing I wanted to just this is a a typical classroom and you know when when you come in a classroom in the morning the air system has been working and and typically the parts per million of CO2 is at a pretty low rate it may be at that four five 600 rate but as kids come into school and staff comes into school it usually tends to peek and Valley a little bit throughout the day depending not again our kids in the room has a system had a chance to catch up but normally after lunch and I think we all probably can attest to this as former students you've had lunch you're back

046in the classroom everybody's you know they've had their recess you're back there the hardest time to concentrate is in the afternoon after lunch it always seems to be the other you know thing is that's when you typically have more um maybe behavior problems in classrooms in the afternoon and a little bit of that is because CO2 levels tend to rise as kids get back from lunch and sit in that classroom for a few consecutive hours that and again it isn't that this is getting into a dangerous level it is up in that 1500 range but then obviously as the school day ends the systems are able to recover and get that CO2 level back to the level that you like it to be but again that's that's just a kind of a typical classroom and

047that is an actual reading sometimes we put these monitors in the classroom for the entire day so we can get a good read of of what's happening in that space one other thing to consider is just you know the standards for indoor air quality and how they have changed over the years back in I'm going to put all these arrows up here quickly back in this is this is 1960 and the outdoor air per person rate that ashray who was one that kind of set these standards recommend is that it was at a 10 and in time as we got into the 80s and into the 9s actually real time where the standards went down and then they started to go up again and they've continued to go up over the years so now in

048the 2020s the indoor air quality standards are about 2 and a half times what they were back in the 1960s so that when we go into buildings and we make recommendations we need to make recommendations based on today's as standards but for example the equipment at East was put in at a time when that was the standard that you were trying to meet that's why that equipment was probably put in at that time CU it was going to help you maintain that level but now over time as you upgrade you're going to look to put in equipment that's going to get to this level and try to keep things you know it's going to be much easier for the equipment to keep up than the equipment from 19 Pete I got have a question um

049during Co postco a lot of school districts uh purchased air purifying machines I know that the school district here did the same if you walk throughout in all of our classrooms there's a lot of those air purifier machines does that does that have any impact on this information or is it just well I mean a lot of what happened during Co was making schools more aware of changing their filters in their systems as well and those air purifiers they just kind of send air through those filter systems and they try to filter out some of the things in the air especially things that can cause you know sickness there a lot of flu in your room it helps kind of reduce the levels the infection rates um it isn't necessarily something that's going to change

050the CO2 levels too much um but it certainly is going to from a CO perspective would maybe help reduce the transmission of one other thing is that what we have found and again this is through many many studies that have been done is as schools increase the outdoor air ventilation in the classroom you also typically see improve student performance over time this is probably for our company one of the big selling points when it comes to improving your systems is that if you want to improve student learning you really want to improve the environment in which they learn in so it really creates that environment that allows kids to pay attention to concentrate to learn and to not be distracted because the room might not beeve um the best that I can feel so and

051then asally just mentioned you know the higher ventilation rates also will reduce the spread of transmission you know of infectious dis like the flu and the commic cold and things that we see in schools all the time especially in the winter months this is the actual CO2 act that we shared with Spencer and the board uh back in October of 2023 and what we do when we come into a building in a district is we go in and we want it to be on a day where it's not super warm outside because we do want the school's heating systems to be working as they normally would we don't want windows open we want say in a normal environment on a day when it's you know 40 degrees or 50 degrees outside your boilers are working

052the Heat's working the air exchange is working and you have kids in the room we want to give you an idea of what the levels are and again these are just snapshots and one of the things I will point out there was one room at that time that did have their C2 level over that 2500 range at that moment but the at the bottom number here is also the number of students and staff in the classroom and it is very telling that in that space at that time we did that reading there were 35 kids and adults excuse me sir can you tell how much is in each room or the building we we we put our co2's in no no right now oh in I'm sorry right now like today as the teachers are

053in the room the kids are in the room can you tell each room how much is in that room I mean there's a way that it can be done yes is it done is it done now so so a hallway they always end and they have a lot of in one room but Kindergarten area has enough of can you tell that that room has something bad in can we can we tell if there's a higher CO2 level in the classroom in that one room there is a with as long as we're doing the reading yes no right now not while you're doing the reading as each teacher or teacher can you tell today can you tell me tomorrow if if I said sir can you tell me how much is in room 206 if if

054the system is set up with CO2 readers to do that yes but is it no the current system is not the current system one of our proposed changes is that we put a system in uh that will have a constant measure of CO2 it will connect directly Steve will talk about this in a minute uh that will connect directly Steve's computer so he can adjust airf flow from sitting at his at his desk but currently there is no constant CO2 mechanism reader now I will tell you that also um the teachers um we are purchasing a portable they're they're not real expensive they're also not necessarily real reliable but portable CO2 reader so that every teacher can have one in their room so that they can feel confident to walk over and look at it

055if the suspected numbers are but those are those have been ordered I believe de's going to talk about that that we have ordered them right and Steve is working on a a a constant um assessment tool for CO2 but right now no we can't there's nothing we we can't I can't look at my computer and say you know classroom blah blah blah the this were supped would like comment to wait until there's public comment right now we need to hear the presentation and we need to information because some of these questions will be answered as we go through thank you yeah I would to say you know the value again of updating the systems and and going to digital controls will allow the district to know at a moment on their computer on a phone

056let's say what the CE levels might be but the current system doesn't have that capability and I know you can't read this at all but this is just an example of as spener mentioned there's over 10 between 10 And1 million of improvements that are going to be made to each elementary school starting in you either late fall 25 summer 26 is when most of the work is going to be done you kind of see over here project year was we were doing all the planning 2026 was the year that we really felt was going to be that the right time to be able to get into the design process get designed complete get out to bids we can get competitive bids for the district and as you know schools do the majority of their work

057in the summertime when students are not in class and so I know it would have been very nice um to maybe do some of this work in the summer of 2025 with an August bond issue with a November Bond sale with a December design kickoff there really wasn't enough time between December of 24 and let's say June of 25 when school got out to get through all the design process to get everything out to competitively bided and and line up contractors to do the work many contractors line up their work six to n months ahead of time and we want to get competitive price from the district so that the summer of 26 was really the first viable option to do the level of work that needed to be done um at these and that's

058it for me are there any questions from yes yeah they'll be installed and they'll be able Steve controls will have the ability to make adjustments but they'll be designed to meet today's asy standards when it comes to that that air exchange and that El all right thank you Pete uh was trying to talk a little bit uh more about uh what what is actually happening what's what's what's been investigated uh and what has yet to be investigated so I have a couple of slides I think let's see um I know uh St has his own notes as well yeah this is this is you so take over Steve it's all yours all right first of all um like to apologize I was out of District Monday when this happened and I was unreachable Monday um

059till evening when I found out about this um incident I immedately returned to District Tuesday and uh been investigating and taking action since the first thing we did Tuesday was a city fire Chief arrived with DTE Energy because there was false reports stating that there was carbon monoxide in the building so there's only two places in the building where carbon monoxide would be present that is the boiler room and the gther nowhere else those two areas have uh alarms to alarm as if there there was presence but we didn't call DT Energy and fire we expect those there was Zero evidence of carbon monoxide ever being in building um once that was done um I called Michigan mechanical they do all the maintenance on our hbac system they did a feral inspection um of all

060the equipment and measured the air intakes they gave me a recommendation to uh improve open the air intakes on the unit ventilators when there's bad air quality so this week I've been messing with that increasing air flow certain rooms that have high CO2 it's been working I still I'm looking at the results today I still have couple room I need to work on uh to increase air flow so my goal is going to be a th um there's a couple rooms we did get down by increasing the air air flow so I will continue to do that um I also called our environmental consultant NOA environmental uh they did a uh air quality test for CO2 in each room before students were there when students were there and in the afternoon I believe uh we

061have the copies of that available for anybody uh they will be in the building tomorrow doing uh testing the air for mole uh in the building so it'll be their firsts thing tomorrow morning be doing that can I ask a question why mold has not come up in all right not have been an issue since why are we testing for mold tomorrow we're trying to roll out everything possible okay um I actually I called the building inspect the county building inspector the electrical inspector and a uh a local electric Vol contractor to also do an inspection of the building before we let students back in and they all gave the thumbs up to do so um during the building inspection I did find a custodial closet where we store cleaning chemicals didn't have the proper

062exhaust ventilation so I immediately called a local contractor and they installed it within hours so grateful for their rapid response on that um and during uh during all the investigations of this um we had another person absent on Monday we had our our cust out so we didn't have a a sub custodian in there the night custodian doesn't usually work mornings and he didn't know to clear the snow in front of the univent so he did that with the tracker once kids were in the the building and that will never happen again because I spoke to him about that um we didn't have a recommendation to improve air quality so each univent will be installed with a CO2 reader um so I will be able to see the CO2 readings from my computer I'm going

063have it set up so when the CO2 uh reaches a certain level I'll get a text message and an alert on my email the Billy principal will also and the unived will automatically open to uh to the proper level to increase air flow uh to get it below the certain level then they'll go back to the normal state so that is an improvement we're going to do ASAP um I had a contractor working on this over the weekend and we uh provided a more the quote today and we're going to try to get this installed as soon as possible when I say in the next couple weeks right yeah what you got to order this it has to be installed correctly they can do it uh they going to try to do it in so

064we don't we don't interrupt any classroom Behavior or we're going to do it evenings so we're going to work on the evenings and weekend to get this done so I I anticipate happen in the next few weeks um all right so continue this we're going to continue uh to investigate and monitor U today we had a uh we had a teacher report a a smell a burning smell so we M I was actually in the building when that was reported um we went into the UN called ourain te we pull off the uh cover to unet we found that the unet motor was had a lot of vibration to it um the fire chief was there also we uh we noticed that the motor was abnormally warm soing went has so immedately changed out the

065motor and the vibration went away and it was back to normal operating conditions I believe that's all I have lse we have d uh is our fire chief I know he came here tonight we've been working with Don all week long I know you and Steve have work worked hand in hand is there anything Don you want to add to what Steve has talked about what we've done and what we continue to do this week no I think he pretty much covered all okay thank you for being here by the way I appreciate all your help does the board have any questions for Steve no this week so the custodian is on there in the morning he uh he clears that at 4: a.m. so he know he takes the tractor and clears all the

066events got back up people train nowly correct yeah he the cust on for sub custodian didn't know to do it and then he was notified at around events now you just mentioned that the the CO2 sensors that you just got approved in order today are not going to be installed in working and working order for a couple of weeks correct correct so what are you and de going to do every day to ensure to to test to make sure I think we talked about right this morning you and I met at 6:30 and you went around and and U tested every room yes I I provided Deana a CO2 uh here um pretty nice piece of equipment I also have one so every morning I do a reading before students are in the building and

067then I do a reading with students are in the building in the afternoon we also do a reading and we've been logging this information too so what Kinder so the original uh piece of appointment was made this guy look at his truck and he leave these things in the cold environment that he recalibrated so um he didn't he wasn't properly trained on how to use it he used it mostly for temperature readings because it actually displays humidity and temperature in a room so that's pretty much why he he had good measure you know when we have a room that's really hot we go there and say well thermostat system use it to verify temperature so you left in the truck so you never leave those things in the cold so when I came back to

068District on Tuesday I noticed the a was 900 PPM and that's unless you're in Los Angeles you're not going to get a 900 air PPM reading so I immediately pulled the manual out had a recalibrated then I verified with Nova's uh equipment and it was spot on with NOA so is calibrated it should be calibrated yearly according to unless so correctly if I'm wrong the best way to calibrate your machine is to walk outside because outside should be somewhere between 400 and well there's a there's a procedure on that's how you verify ver outside but you you do when you start the calibration process you do it outside at the meeting on th with the staff I remember a comment that was brought up um I remember with it this morning um someone mentioned identifying

069the smell um have we looked at sewer GES yes so so the a fire actually Four gas meter measures hyrogen sulfide the meter does and that's sewer gas his readings are zero I remember you spoke something about there's a dra somewhere if it gets dry oh that's a there's a so there's a teacher that has a room used to be an art room so it has a trap in sink and when a trap dries a gas yes I gas analy test for gas corre just another question um so I'm corly by um monitoring the uh CO2 levels and your ability to adjust the air flow into the buildings our goal is now 1,000 right correct you could be a difficult goal like he pointed out at 2:00 but still that's our goal so our our

070air fresheners our systems can be calibrated to bring in the proper amount of fresh air to try to accomplish that goal right yes I can increase the can you talk a little bit about the how you do that seed right okay so they're set they're originally set for 10% which is a recommended U error so so what it does it brings in 10% outside until uh recently so recently i i u increased up the 15% in certain rooms and then 20% in certain rooms and then today I moved a couple up above 20% when I did move up above 20% the levels Dro significantly so I think I'm have to do that to all the rooms what might happen though is when we're um in extreme cold days like we're below zero the heater may

071have issues catching up um I won't know until that happens but right now today was a perfect day everything the heater was uh kept the room the proper temperature and everything working any other questions all right thanks Steve de I know I see heror somewhere part our [Applause] presentation all right um we still have some work to do um to uh make sure that the events from last Monday um don't happen again we have a plan in place um if indeed anything like that does happen again um so what are we doing now um we are consistently monitoring for uh the CO2 levels in each room as Steve mentioned um we do have ordered some portable CO2 for each room in the building um we should get those any day we were initially going to

072use the Ben Q system because there is a CO2 monitor on those uh but the couple of the teachers have gotten the plugin portable ones and they were more accurate with the uh tool that we were using um to measure initially so use those to monitor that daily that consistent reading here um mold testing will take place tomorrow tomorrow in the morning prior to students coming to school we will be developing a Building Safety Committee at East it will focus on specifically on our needs um and then that team will report to the district Safety Committee as well in order to whenever that's appropriate um that will include going through the current emergency response plan and addressing the lack of protocol for adverse a quality as well as anything else that this committee finds we

073need to add or modify as we look into that um another thing that I am committed to communication to all families and staff so using the voice message um the say that I use on my Sunday messages where I can record my voice um that way it doesn't matter the length of the message I could talk for an hour on there if I wanted to I won't but I could um and using the text option if it's a short message I can send a text but it will go to everyone um um I understand that some are not able to get into the rooms um anything so important communication that needs to get to every family will go on the voice message or via a text if it is an individual um something I need

074to talk with with an individual family about it will be a phone call directly to them um rooms will still keep an eye on room still for General announcements if we sign out a fire or you know um something the teachers have planned in the classroom may need use that room app still so don't forget that that is there um consistent plan and communication to staff when I am out of the District staff will always be informed who's taking my place while I'm gone emergency plans will be readily available physical to be ready readily available to all staff um or any individual who might be expected to make decisions in my absence this will include a well thought out chain of command with specific people to call and those phone numbers um in case of

075an emergency um the next slide you should just hit theace for the future um we are um within the next month as Steve mentioned we are going to be installing CO2 monitors on the HX systems that will automatically introduce that fresh air once the CO2 level gets a certain point so as of right now this minute we take readings and if the reading is higher than we want it we aler opens up the air to allow more fresh air and they um we will be getting that system um that will automatically um send thater so that you can do that that'll make a lot easier U we are planning to upgrade the HVAC system as part of our Remodel and addition plans and as a district we will be exploring and updating school policy emergency

076plans um at the any questions from the board next coule days anybody else have questions I I have one question for you I know um you had a scar today right this morning very similar to the same scar you had last Monday but today um with a much different result right I think a lot of things went better today than they did last month why is it well um number one it was fresh in our minds and we knew exactly you know what what needed to happen who we needed to have present um to check on the situation um and you know I'm thankful that they found um something that needed to be addressed and addressed it immediately um we had two um smells um brought to us today the second I mean both of

077them were very mild very mild smells that to be honest I had a hard time smelling myself but um you know having um the fire chief come in just to check everything out and make sure that everything was okay gave us all of mind and gave us to go ahead that school was safe students to be there um so I mean everything checked out fine thankfully but I did alert the families today and hopefully everyone got that and if for some reason you're you're not getting please know reach out to me so that we can figure out why um or know if that communication needed to be different also I also like [Music] from you is that link going out to all that possible that link went out in a text message um after school

078today um there is there's a change that I was asked to do and I will um add the teachers names instead of the room number so it's easier to read the location so I will make that change yes so those go that is a link that they can reuse um and I will continue to add to that sheet okay week at the bottom there's a tab for each week so um just click on the week of um okay any other questions for I wanted Marty to show you guys just I know there's a couple questions this is the CO2 reader this the problem with some of the of I talked to Jordan this morning he's got a call in to take a look do a deeper dive we have really old B cues and we

079got a bunch of brand new B cues what we're finding is that the old B cues are not giving us a bid CO2 reading but what Marty just did and as quick as he just did it he can pull out a CO2 reading in this Vue the sitting in this room is 478 we're not we're not we don't have 100% confidence in this because we don't know who has old Ben qes and who has new Ben Q um so we're we're we're investigating that and until we know we're going with the CO2 sensors and we are going with the Portables in every classroom and until those happen I know Steve is going to do a a pre student reading and then Dan's going to do a post reading every day until we get those CO2

080sensors here okay any questions about thank you reading um this is last call for board questions um if the board doesn't have any other questions what we'd like to do is we've added a public comment specific to this situation that we're dealing with so if you don't have any Julie it's it's all yours in regards to uh public comment I will say based on um I believe our policy each person who would like to make a public comment has uh five minutes to do so um and um it's a it's a comment not a discussion and if there is a response that's needed it will be up to the board president to assign who and how to get you that response if there was a response from the comment is there anything else uh I

081think you cover about everything down here that's all right and I just want to say that the board takes your concerns seriously and although we will not respond to your concerns I will make sure you have an opportunity to meet with the staff member who you can who can best answer your questions so um I will I am going to write that on these Pap that have to be turned in in order for you to speak so if you have not given me one ready when you um come up please hand it to me so I can so umna you are ready so would you like to go first so tonight I'm not here to say anything new these concerns have already been raised at the parent meeting but we're here again because we care

082about the safety of our children and the well-being of the staff in the district what happened on February 17th was not just an unfortunate event it was a failure of process and accountability this was a near Miss we are incredibly lucky that the outcome was not far worse as parents we trust this District to provide a safe learning environment for our children that trust has been shaken the handling of this incident has been defined by a lack of clear consistent communication on the day of the event parents were left in the dark and critical information was not effectively shared among staff conflicting messages persist with school app updates focusing solely on co2 while media statements claim CO2 was not the issue these contradictions fuel frustration and a road trust I do want to thank and

083Comm commend di for how she has taken on ownership in moving forward with this her compassion is one of the reasons that I am personally able to put some Faith back into this District we are still searching for Clear answers parents attended the Friday Town Hall expecting some explanations instead we were met with somewhat of a lack of preparedness and some shifting explanations and timelines that was not just diso it was kind of disrespectful transparency should not be a battle the district should have come to that meeting ready to account for the decisions in the events of that day we deserve better and we still do one of the most alarming questions remains why wasn't the fire department and gas company the first call when an unidentified Ed symptoms Emergency Management best practices dictate that

084trained fire and gas utility professionals assess the situation immediately the fact that this did not happen raises serious concerns about decision making and preparedness since then we've been given a rotating list of explanations diesel trackers dust now we know that at least one unit required rep years after an odor was detected again yet none of these explanations fully account for what happened on 54 17 due to a lack of proper emergency response that day we are left with speculation instead of definitive answers the ventilation issues in this building were already well documented we thought it again today in 2023 by Logics air quality assessment found that nearly all classrooms exceeded the ashra recommended CO2 limits for schools this means the district knew there was a problem long before February 17th the issue that day was

085an unidentified order meaning CO2 was unlikely to have been the direct cause however CO2 level serve as an indicator of the overall air quality and ventilation Effectiveness the fact that the school consistently tested above recommended limits means the risk was already present to make matters worse we've learned that the district's handheld gas feeder was not working properly at the time failing to maintain and properly trained staff on safety equipment is unacceptable the negligence directly impacted the ability to assess and address this situation data provided on Friday and again today underscore that ventilation continues to be an issue in this building ventilation deficiencies must be addressed immediately this is not just about what happened on one day this is ensuring long-term air quality and safety for students and staff the district has convened a Safety Committee

086which includes First Responders that is a necessary First Step but at the parent meeting we learned that the committee did not specifically discuss Feast Elementary nor does it include staff from that building additionally healthc Care Professionals should be engaged in developing an environmental safety plan and as part of the Safety Committee the district already has a partnership with thunderbay Community Health that partnership should be leveraged to analyze whether students and staff at this school have higher rates of chronic respiratory conditions than the general population the data is critical in assessing the long-term impact of air quality issues not just on February 17th but every day leadership is not just about making decisions it's about owning the outcomes of those decisions the decisions to reopen the building should have been based on verified air quality data

087not a stamp vote parents deserve to know why teachers were asked to vote on reopening instead of relying on objective safety assessments why was this treated as a matter of opinion rather than one of safety and data I do not expect that anyone will stand up and say it's my fault legal council would like to advise against admitting to minimize liability but parents in this District expect accountability and honesty protecting the district from liability must not take precedence over transparency we need a full independent incident audit that outlines when and how this issue was first identified who was informed and at what time what actions were taken and whether they not whether or not they followed safety protocols reasonable judgment in their absence this audit cannot be conducted internally the district cannot investigate itself and

088expect public trust parents will not accept an internal report that amounts to we investigated ourselves and found we did nothing wrong at the end of the day we may never get a perfect answer about what happened but one thing is certain something happened this was not Masseria this was not shared hallucination it was a failure of processed communication and accountability our children were kept in cold crowded classrooms the response was disorganized the explanations provided do not fully account for what occurred and parents were left in the dark this isn't about a signing blame this is about ensuring that the right measures are in place to prevent this from ever happening again I ask leadership to spend their work days in the environment alongside our children the children in Sam if you don't feel comfortable spending

089your days there how can you expect the same from them and know that as parents in a community we're not going away we will keep pushing because our children and the staff in that building deserve nothing less we deserve transparency we are owed accountability and we will not stop asking questions until we get it thank you [Applause] one thing that I ofos to also got two kids in that building one in another and hopefully we're going to be inchol next year adri3 here today because I have a son who suffers breathing issues due to triups of ration left in that building with high heart rates as is normal one of the signs of CO2 is a high heart rate when children were taken to the ER they were reported as carbon monoxide poisoning which led

090to the lack of them even testing for what what the concern was which was the carbon dioxide which means multiple kids could have been um in there with high levels and we wouldn't know it as shown here today the qualties since 2023 has been a concern yet our top priority is to transform the East Elementary into a preschool versus fixing the issues at hand the cost of going into let's attach these CO2 detectors to the agback system that we know has failed us the system that is 40 years past its life expectancy so how much money are we going to put into this CO2 and that it will perform to a better level versus just replacing it um the risk that every child and staff member there that day experience is worth more than let's

091think about additional money and opening a preschool instead of thinking about the kids that we have there today not to mention with opening the preschool we're going to open two classrooms that were previously we were me to open prior to any of this discussion of well when they open then second grade has to go to the Middle School Seven Grade has to go to the high school we're now increasing the levels of bodies in our buildings that we are proving canot support the amount of people we have in them now so I think more time needs to be spent and versus just pushing I don't know if anybody else watch the board meeting on the we need to vote on the preschool today right now or it's not going to happen we're not getting that

092same expression on today at all on the concerns of the CO2 it's just well let's do this let's do that as a superintendent you hold responsibility to all of your employees you stood here today and questioned every single one of them without accepting accountability for your failed actions on the day of that event as well it's proven after several discussions the responsibility isn't going to be taken however we also raise our children that every decision they make has a consequence and there needs to be consequences for the actions that took place on that day and the failed communication and things like that um I think this is more serious than most people know um I don't think many of the board members today have kids in that building nor are they working in that building

093to take it as seriously as it needs to be and as a board we're just thinking of the Mone that can from the preschool and other things versus the needed Renovations that must take place the vots need to happen before 20126 before this could happen again before we hope that the CO2 meters magically make the H work better that's buas three more years on something that we've gotten an extra 40 years on already thank you [Applause] just like your mom I'm Jesse currently 6773 north m33 um there's a lot to say there's a lot of data there's a lot of decision makers um a lot of fingers pointing most importantly there's a lot of children the care of all of us in your leadership in your leadership all of your leadership as a parent I

094failed I failed to trust this leadership I grew up in this District I attended Eide I graduated from Shan class of one I chose to come back here with my young family my daughter is 5 years old she's a Mrs Fry's kindergarten she loves it but I failed her I sent her into an environment that I believe was safe in my wildest imaginations I'm also a certified firefighter an EMT I also hold PhD in education that I ever believe that I would be putting her in an environment not conducive to her health wellbeing and education think about what you're telling parents with this data this level per dioxide is impacting their ability to learn it's impacting their ability to behave what does that do to a young learner what do you think they're left with

095I'm I'm a bad kid I can't pay attention we' failed our students by opening East Elementary that's not an environment conducive to learning that's an environment that's setting children up to not believe in themselves can you imagine because these levels of carbon dioxide make you feel sleepy make you act up there's discipline the teacher calls you out pay attention maybe it escalates into consequences how does that set you up for first grade do you believe in yourself as a Lear how does that set you up as an educator how much harder is your day trying to teach students in this environment it's absolutely unacceptable and I've looked through the data I've met oneon-one with Spencer Steve and I appreciate that and we can all look at the data bottom line is each shouldn't be open

096Spencer you open this meeting by saying your priority is the Safety and Security of our students that was true wouldn't be open we're now in this game of trying to retroactively be proactive in a building we know isn't safe what can we possibly do in the short term that's going to give me the confidence to send my daughter back into that room what can we possibly do for our Educators to make them feel confident in their already busy days overpopulated classrooms with children who are documented to have impacts from these carbon dioxide levels What can we possibly do to rebuild that we are retroactively trying to be proactive here it's inappropriate it's unacceptable it's setting up a generation of students to fail second of all there was a breakdown of leadership there was no emergency

097plan there was very little communication there are no maintenance protocols in a building we know is sick a building we know is inadequate that's unacceptable what are we possibly going to do about that that's why you're all being here to additionally Spencer you said to Steve why are be testing for that and Steve wholeheartedly said because we're testing for everything possible have we tested the theory that eite should be closed should we be exploring contingency plans to relocate our students into an environment that sets them up for success I think so furthermore the lack of Staff being properly trained so unacceptable blaming a substitute custodian who didn't know that they should remove snow absolutely unacceptable you know where the ventilation is what are the consequences for that you talk to them what about something in

098writing what about a protocol that should you no longer be in your position is handed off to your successors that doesn't sound right does it maybe what sounds right is that we're not using e Elementary as a safe place for students to learn again we are retroactively trying to be proactive it's too late the data speaks for itself you know that this problem has existed finally Spencer just now when di was up here you said Dan didn't you have a scare today and that really struck me because no didn't have a scar today you have scar today all of you have scar today I have a scar today this entire room had escap today we are all responsible for this and I would like to see have of the board to put together not only

099emergency plans for indoor air quality emergencies but contingency plans should e El evry no longer be fit for students and staff because it's very clear by the de by the students by the parents and by staff that this learning environment is not setting anyone up to succeed I want to thank you all for Comming tonight this is an incredibly important issue that we're certainly not going to let go of my trust is broken with this District um um when I came into the district I had no idea maybe shame on me for not doing my homework but if you knew this building was inadequate why wouldn't you educate new families entering your District why was there no transparency again our job as parents and Learners is to set them up to succeed and it's very

100clear that this Elementary is not that [Applause] my name is Roger CR 550 46 SCH Road um I was on the board forever and three three times tonight I've heard the word policy talking about this piece of paper right here this piece of paper is not policy it's a recommendation do not use the word policy does anyone on the school board know what number policy goes to public comment thank you and you don't want you know that TR because you've taken the classes and you know does anyone else do that that was 254 anywhere in that policy say this is a requirement no so if you tell us to fill this out please say it's recommended so we can get back to you okay also these questions there's a spot on our website for the

101questions that these people who vote for you people ask if one person out in this crowd asks a question that 10,000 people in this town want to know it should be on that website with the answer when is the last time question and answer was put on our [Applause] website March 2023 as no public people ask a question since March of [Music] 2023 please work on that we there's so many people that have their question answered and not come here and bother you [Applause] um MSP class 101 one of the first thing they tell you is when the public is speaking the people that voted you on and the people that can vote you off do not get on your cell phone and text if you don't have time to give Us 2 hours of

102your time a night without getting on your phone and not listening to us get off the board okay you don't have time to be on the board if you don't have time to be on your cell phone why this lady right here was probably one of the best speakers I've ever seen in my career a lot of people come here just complain that woman had so many good ideas and she articulated it great I'm hoping that you put that on the website and put the answers so all these people can hear this please keep our children safe keep our teachers safe and all of our employees safe don't just think East Elementary you guys have got to think the middle school Intermediate School and the high school internet School don't just fix East and wait

103for a disaster to happen in another school because you are informed if half disaster happens at another school you're informed thank you [Applause] on Monday the 17th um I was my best friend usually picks up my daughter from school I work all my Happ pick up and I found out my kid was being exposed to something un safe not just one thing but M will think that that moment um I my big concern right now is why was the school left unlocked doors left open with multiple children you how easy an intruder could have came in there these days these things happen daily how are these kindergarteners first graders second grad are supposed to know what to do like on Friday night at the meeting C said that there was two teachers per kid we

104heard classroom that's not enough with the safy concern for concerned mother also my kid came home that day telling me she didn't get to wear coat in her room classroom she was freezing it was below temperatur that day she could have came home got the pH through that then you didn't let the teachers inform their students they were scared that they would lose their job for that part they shouldn't have to feel that way they should be able to feel that they were able to prot class [Applause] students I'm Robert from 760 Garfield in I was in the first Elementary kindergarten class at Westside School um school was very near dear to me um I guess my biggest problem with the air quality at East Side is the fact that the superintendent had a third

105party mechanical inspection of all the school properties done each side was found found to have air quality Equipment updated and not function properly so the problem was not addressed as a need but more of inconvenience you know this is a problem money was used for lots of unessential things science bleachers weight equipment playground equipment uh our superintendent was out of line for spending on frivolous things money should have been allocated or reallocated to more essential things like preserving the health of our children when this current problem developed the superintendent should have taken air quality seriously instead he came to the school with a volunteer firefighter should have take an action maybe call 91 to get all the most qualified air quality specialist on St many teachers and students were affected they actually medical treatment many

106many went to the emergency room our superintendent has a history of Inc confence it's proven it is it incapable of handling the duties of the job there are therefore our superintendent should resign or be removed thank you [Applause] [Music] I'll I'm Jamie Clinic I was left 13 days before my wedding with baby and I had to move back home there were no teaching jobs so I was a at East Elementary then I got a teaching job finally then I moved to the intermediate school and then I came back to East Elementary as a coaching position um I think the a quality has been a concern for been there for 17 years for a very long time I just want to say that yes we have places that we can improve but nobody was looking at

107this before spener came into the district so I mean we've made progress and we've we're going to make improvements but I just wanted to say that that um it's been a problem for two decades at least so [Applause] um comment be AV also I I did make and um someone will get back to you if you feel that you have a question you can reach out at any time to any administrator District I appreciate the concern of the community I appreciate your time this and as we move forward in this I hope as a district that we are able to regain your trust because we truly do care about your students and we truly do care about the staff and um I guess it will be in our actions that we gain the trust back

108and I'm just asking for not patience because we're going to do it as quickly as possible so that's probably not the right word but I'm asking for your grace as we go through this process that has already been started was started immediately and as we continue the next thing on our agenda I decided I decided that I thought that that would be an important thing to do for our board isend so I thought it would be a good to start go through this list quickly start committees and what I want everyone to remember that there's a maximum of three board members in any at time can have the room and the RO of commit keep the board informed to maintain budget the policy of our district should guide our decisions and we do a very

109good job of this within our committees having commit formed as a board members and also that we are gos that are in our strategic plan which safety is the other thing is um also when you reply to an email I had some confusion myself about this I did um actually both of these things and I did contact the nas lawyer and get some clarification over this so can send out an email to all board members but board members may not reply except for to just reply not reply all we cannot have a conversation more than board members even in email uh the next thing and um and the best way to reply is to never use the reply all function and in a good habit of just doing reply uh also uh coming up is

110a spring Institute any board members that wish to go to that um you're welcome to check that out and sign up for it in person it is May 25th May through May 4 and you can find the details on that at [Music] n search ins ask all right the next thing I had on the superintendent evaluation back in October we did we did pass a motion to go with the schedule of October March May and July asch meeting we will have evaluation a update at each of our of your superent report add next agenda on the back of this I just put um all the committee members if you are not able all theit team and which board members are on each team to clarify that and then you yes yes so we will [Applause]

111at thing on the agenda is retirement resignation and it is maret a science teacher and will my children grandchildren had her science experience motion to accept with reget the for the purch of retirement of Margaret Paul grade science teacher effective at the end of the 2024 25 school year motion made by Matt supported by BR discussion yes yes the next thing on our agenda is the hiring of Jason Raymond and special education teacher at the high school I a motion to approve of Jason a special ucation teer at school Jason are you here can we can we Marty you want to introduce him real quick absolutely it's an honor to bring someone like Jason into thean area District he is um top notch with special education mathematics computer information systems the guy's Real Deal getting

112J out of and he's going to be doing special education for us which is like trying to find a unicorn right is we found our unicorn for sure he's he's amazing so it's a huge honor to be aost well welcome to the school district put you on the spot tell tell us a little bit about yourself um well I taught in I taught in classroom for a few years and in mlci classroom which is where I met Marty and some other fine folks and then the past five years I've taught middle school man and now I'm trying to make my way North to be with my family my wife teaches High School science here all my kids will be here so now next year the family gets to head which will be great to have

113everyone together better Dad hband teer awesome I still need that motion [Applause] yes yes report [Applause] right where it belongs okay uh we had a per committee meeting on February 18th and the first thing on our agenda was uh CTE um report from Ryan autic and all and all the programs must be State Certified and approved and the key questions that they have to address when they are adding new programs is liability facilities and Equipment student interest in enrollment funding budget and impact on our programs uh the current the current um programs have 300 of our CT programs are male students taking in at 22 female students included in our CTE CTE courses four out of the eight programs have more girls enrolled in them than boys uh committee we have to check our we

114just making sure that we are servicing students equally [Music] committees uh and funding efforts Ryan is participating in a steering committe to guide decision a possible Mage vote in November led by Jen Huber could generate approximately $500,000 for the district specifically for CTE currently our CTE programs are funded through General funds and some grants future programs that are being thought of are uh James L A current teacher and certified instructor it's also a local fire fire so they are uh the initial VI EMS class they would like to they're starting to they're in the planning stages for the 26 27 school year we like to bring back construction trade if we can find an instructor who would teach Woods an hour or two of construction in the future um we haven't had that in several

115years because the teacher we had had retired uh we are looking into a cosmetology as fut pram we are we have a meeting next week I know change this okay so next week one day we are having a meeting with a um potential program where person has a cosmetology license to teach and try to see if that program would be something that we can however all of the things that have to go through manys by the state in order to make that happen they take a year or two um next we had a a union presentation by Michelle Chase they are requesting some thank requesting some compensation to Mo um right now it is just a proposal and it has to uh complete negotiations to the board uh there was a curriculum update uh we

116talked about resources that are needed elas in 12 supplies for steam 28 we are going to BU a K2 at and 29 we have to at oura we make sure that the fing are there for those things talking and some grade levels um then plans to expand standards based gr to second and third grade next year this approach work ensuring instruction is responsive standards and student learning by focusing on what students know and can do we can better address individual needs and improve and improve student achievement uh ccul resources and 712a current textbooks and novels are deteriorating that's why we looking at those right now in waiting to come up to our cycle uh materials are being order to support teachers inning instruction with standards Steam and science additional funding is needed for consumable supplies

117talked about uh different ways to get those that they need to teach and science uh future resource Replacements next we talked about the April PD uh TI is a grant that funds professional learning opportunities for certified staff attending conferences often cost thousands of dollars and one of the grant requirements that and share what they learn this district and learn come back and share with the district what they've learned um some stuff feel uncomfortable doing that we do not want to stop that from going to the conferences so of way ways to have them present teen com monly you ever have any concerns about curriculum feel free to contact me jamiec all right so the next thing on the agenda is myv thing is data uh I'm the cul director state director here at the district

118a little data so uh tonight we're going to talk about NWA NWA is a national Norm assessment that students take three times a year also formative and subita assessments happening within the classroom State assessments that tells us how we're doing compared to other districts in our uh State and uh our whole goal for all of this is to get students College a career ready tonight we're going to talk about NWA data we're going to start with math I did some highlight in here and I'll explain that so um here's our fall column here's our winter column and our spring column uh the First Column is the Norm so in 2015 Andre with a national norming study and that is the average of Norm of the entire nation so we can look at how Shan area

119schools compares to um the national Norm if the number is green it means that we are at or above the national Norm if it's yellow it means that we're just under by a point or less and if it's white me under more than a point but in a lot of cases we're still very very close so that's a great thing to see in the winter some really exciting things happened our first grade moved from being just um below to above our second grade went from being a few more points below to above the norm our third grade did the same thing and so did our seventh grade now this year of exams we did not test our eth through 12th grades so you'll see that we don't have test scores there uh the thing I'm

120most excited about is I like to study our growth so the norm growth for kindergarten is 10 and 5700s um we exceeded that by quite a bit and so as you can see we exceeded the norm grow so we're growing um more than the national Norm growth there will be new Norms coming out hopefully pretty soon 25 or 26 couple 26 at this point um because remember too these are pre pandemic Norms so that's also very exciting that we got through the pandemic and we're still making such great growth now to give you a little backgrounds in mathematics right now we're doing curriculum development we're building guaranteed curriculum so I wasn't exactly expecting all this green because usually when you're bunking around with your curriculum you tend to go back a little bit but this

121is extremely promising and um it's exciting because I know our teachers are working super super super hard and they're amazing talking faster than breathing so exciting to give AA um they're working really well and so now with our guarante of bable curriculum we just want to C it and we meet every month to calibrate and to continuously respond to the data to increase student achievement so it looks like um our work is working which is super exciting and then we have Ela still doing really good here you can see our hurs above the norm are first and second grade or just a little bit below the norm um nothing to to Earth shattering um we have third just um below the norm and now they're above the norm we were consistent with being above the

122norm in fourth grade fifth grade and sixth grade and um seventh grade we're just a tiny bit below the north here but I'm confident that we'll come back up and you can see our Norm increases um are right there does the board have and then there are graphics on this all to you if you want to see it in picture form exciting and we'll be here forever so um if you I'll you you have any questions for me thank you for [Applause] your that's the first time I've been any my [Applause] our agenda contains Blue Links if you want to see that colors that all right so the next our next session is stable finance and uh we have finance and building and ground upate okay so uh first thing we talked about was the

123financial software update that the district Mark for and more stuff they used um they're currently working to uh get that set up and scheduled the previous current we're using is getting Sunset and so it's no longer going to be a viable option um and so this is the one that they thought best so that's what we're going with um we talked about just some of the Personnel posting we build one of them tonight um some of the other ones uh I think we'll hopefully get build here a little bit for some of the coaching positions and I know think on that there uh we had the in showers that are being um put in here with all the design Works done so going down toid pretty soon for those I believe um next we had

124a gentleman from Prime painting come uh he's going to painting the uh Intermediate Middle School over straight he going to the cafeteria to eliminate the whatever you want to call it and kind ref our school colors and then going try um possibly during the school year like at nights when you do that won't take him a super long time so he just kind of to do the those two uh track update um that should hopefully get put in in the fall I know I think they've got to do a few things once some Els as far as surveying a few samples um soil samples but I think that is the plan tennis cour out part of B that we pass so those are couple things that hope made fall um couple of the other things

125um from from Steve I know they're working on having to do some stuff with the filters and order some of the other items kind of smaller things so and then we had a about hour design call f up primarily about that I think they're just working on I think they have to change the proposed design for the addition part of it a little bit the the other folks had a little concern about how students would leave the building bus kind of main things work out and get back to us um those so those plans are in progress and been pretty well along having a final design at some and that was it yes um the agenda is um to accept the bid upgrade cameras at the high school I need a motion to accept the

126bids to upgrade cameras at the high school in am of9 money for the cameras okay I I didn't hear the question the doing the update to the cameras so um why why are you doing this so I I have't B and I but [Music] I 100% saf the current camera system has issues correct so I think I think that's why and I don't think it's we're we're not getting a brand new camera system we're keeping some we're losing some we're adding some right so swapping some out right Steve because the cameras we're going to displace the cameras in high school to other places in the district like this building and some other dead spots that we have okay I know Mar you've had concern about the camera since you started you don't perfect example be

127like somebody comes through the working lot you zo init on the driveway still be a to pick up can help some and and actually there are a few more into the building to so it's going to make some wi SP any question yes all right we got a bunch of stuff from thetic comme got a couple new hires Jordan Barrett is former JB coach is now going to be the head rity volleyball coach and Le M CLE is a fouryear All State athlete she runs a 26 plon uh group and she's the daughter of a teacher here she's going to be the new girls head Varsity track coach we're excited about that as well Larry McCay who's been involved with Athletics and specifically track for several years is now going to be the head boys

128coach uh we talked about aeds we are limited on where we have placement of those in athletic fa facilities specifically where the track is where the baseball and softball fields are so we went through different details about how we can an a out there uh we need one outside rather than in the concession stand thought being at this practice or something going on we can't get to it so we got through some details about how we're going to do that we think we can use maybe 31 AA funds uh to cover it enrollment wise we're still decreasing we went from 462 to 441 uh we're going down pretty much every year for the for the past 15 years increasing enrollment has been a big concern of our specifically in the athletic department athletic committee and

129our thoughts have been facility upgrades Personnel upgrades get great people they want to play for and and be taught by get great places to be do things and that great people in the community working for that for sure the memc program uh a newly proposed prek program should increase our enrollment by 60 just with that so that should bring us up as well and that's uh you know around $10,000 so $600,000 money come in as well student access the games a guy Nam Matt Orton suggested providing all students with a pass to attend all games for the season this would require a sign up at the beginning of the school year looking into that still there's consideration of maybe just doing it as we would reduce what it cost the student to get in so

130it cost less you have not made that determination yet in either case we can't really put anything in place until the beginning of next school year so we've got a little time to figure out what we want to do there uh we're also talking about how students in season should shouldn't be paying go anywhere like it when a kid goes to practice and goes and watches another team play obviously that's something uh the junior Chiefs confirmed that we are permitted to use Gordon Turner Park but we will be responsible for maintaining facilities that's perfectly reasonable we got the personel to do that sta Etc parents home as well we would also need to use their Nets which would be our responsibility to manage so we should be able to get that done Timing System as

131we're redoing the track there's a clock there it doesn't really F fill our our current needs uh Jason BR suggested uh a new Timing System that would make it easier for us to host tracking we also help soccer games system we're looking at that decide exactly what we want to do but Jason will be involved design meeting uh when the discussions begin when the changes that happening in Spring uh we have a zoom call with the is schedule with a company that is going to bid for the new basketball floor it's pretty cool design that Jason picked out and uh the latex based product actually cost less of it's easier to maintain than standard stained wood it's going to be a pretty cool design you guys will like it uh let's see design for the

132conference logos and Team Championship banners is still under under way once that's complet we have them up on the gym wall football schedule we do have a week eight schedule now um that's a game against spille they're now by Lancing pretty good match up for us excited about seeing what they can do what we can do with them we're also talking about having that game in a neutral site be looking into Elma college or perhaps is it dit what's the school that high school also a very nice facility so we're looking for something kind of in the middle pretty practice hoop install if you guys aren't aware the way that the gym is set up now the game baskets are here and then the practice baskets are on the same side standard is that they

133go across the court just for air for space and able to put two courts on the two games on the floor at the same time so we have uh finalized that they're going to be installed Thursday or Friday course break move them around new basket setups with a far better controller system have to use a key or anything C is just a touch pad very very necessary upgrade so looking into putting field Turf on the softball and baseball fields we met with a ref uh from actual asro Turf that's actually a company they still exists they're the original uh people who were doing that they start the as in Houston we're looking at the dollers for that the reason why we're looking into it is strictly maintenance I me where the baseball and softball fields

134are a lot of water a lot of trage issues especially being as it's a Spring sport I mean you can't be shoveling snow in the morning play in the afternoon whereas if we had TF we could do that um strictly for maintenance the cost looking at like 1.6 million for the baseball field and about 600,000 to the softball field not sure if we can swing that but U again we're just looking best G might be a good move for us also looking to find sponsors to offset that so we were talking about py who big construction company that's working on paper mill area their multi use facility um retails some shopping and things like that we're thinking if we get a hold of them they might be avable to given us half or we'll call

135ity field everybody seems pretty that again we get somebody else to pay for it why not also looking at the same thing for basball field potentially looking at what's his name against company EMD chel I was looking for some positive PR here in the community with their uh gas lines thought maybe they might be able to help out not sure our concern is of course that's a substantial investment and spring season is short um it would take some time to get back on maintenance but we might not be able to maintain maintenance that we have and there's no other schools up here who have that which is also it's a positive and a negative we're the only ones who have a baseball and a softball field now we're hosting all the clinics now we're hosting

136all the camps now we got lots more students coming in and seeing our facilities and want to so that helps us to like I mentioned 0,000 K uh last item the armory in town is for sale they're asking 1.25 million as a gym classes kitchen Etc it'd be beneficial to look into that and see if we could maybe do something there what would give us at Le is a an auxiliary gym some classroom space a highle kitchen facility we thought maybe we could offet some of the cost by being a to rent that out at night as a facility for banquets wedding receptions things like that because it is pretty impressive we also talked about turfing that gym so have removable pieces of turf that we can put in there and basically have an indoor

137turf facility we use for All Sports which facilities wise would help us a lot uh let's see at 1.25 million it doesn't sound like a good deal but to build that building today would probably be 10 million minimum so if we could do something like that even for looking down field again just investigated not trying to spend everybody's money we want to look into it it's going to help us do the time to jum uh we have not scheduled a meeting we were going to go see it last week but down Elementary School for wen't able to get there CD ins side very much at the beginning of that process we'll see how it goes but they questions foris I a motion to approve the Hing asach track coach Larry m as voice track coach

138support [Music] by okay we are com CI so I like add the I so believe this young lady here because she said about safy and Trust I so behind her because on February 4th my grandson fell at school never got notified he called his mother he then within 2 hours was a lifted to divos and your if anybody realizes what that is been put under he said the bra Sur from here to here we got tons of text messages while we were down there the whole time from the community from other mothers and other parents um I said to my daughter and my sonla we're not going to listen to all this wait till we get home let's go to the school give them out and find out what really happened because our neurologist Dr

139down there saying this just was not a simple fall and hit the back of his head so since we've been home we've heard multiple stories from the school I want to clear up one thing right now to this board this did not happen at high it happened in the school on a recess it is not hereditary it isn't the hockey team boys that did this which we were told we from the school have heard so many different stores and now we're trying to pursue getting him the care he needs but the neurologist needs to know what truly happened so when we try to see the tapes we're told we we're not allowed to see so I'm asking you as a board to help my grandson do I have to hire a la to see the

140tapes to give the neurologist what they need for information and how this accident happened we're not all seeing nothing from anybody and I'm so for teachers I'm the only nurse my whole family granddaughters and grandchildren and nieces and nephews and sisters they're all teachers all of this in public school so I'm not out to get anybody I'm out to help Grand and if by any chance it's a case of then that need but my most important point today is my grandson in the honesty at the school I we want to know what happened would you not want to know that from your children if it was your child or your grandchild what do I need to do so that we as a family can see these CES if it's truly truly like we're told he's

141involved it was case of Rock was allowed to continue R playing then okay show us the tapes we're okay with that but this not being honest I'm not okay with so I'm addressing you as a board as a parent as a grandparent I would hope I treat one of my patients like that I hope I tell the truth not other Reas us I'm and then we talked to Ron and he wasn't even told about it wait a minute your school check on things for the school your police officer or whoever follows this why is he not he was a coached at a hockey game by a hockey because one of kids got his recess taken away so we're told kids up here are losing their recess but then here nothing happen everything's fine why these

142boys lose their recess I apprciate it as as and CH tra I was just taking notes on um what Travis was saying about the athletic in the update and about the AST for bothof okay and then the 1.25 mil the armory okay so they're looking we're looking at potentially raising some funds or using some funds to pay for that correct okay well I'm just wondering if what it would look like if we asur these things B Armory but didn't update the hab back system before that happened so I just think it's important that we got to look at Optics here I don't want a beautiful field I'd rather have a healthy Hab system so I just want to make sure that it's clarified yes you are correct right now there is not any talk about

143funding this project or just people looking into what it cost for this project right now there is no money be Mark in this project so as Travis mentioned what what some folks that been talking with the athletic committee and on the athletic committee a lot of this is talking about fundraising money for that but you are definitely correct that this is a bold priority and Mark are allocated for this idea right now it is strictly an idea so it's not from the bond at all it's this is just uh just I talking about the future like future future um but right we can't do anything without money there is no money uh buy money or anything else in your mark today sorry just want to make sure I just one more point back up to

144the podium um Travis your comments on Athletics were exciting um you know you're animated engaged obviously uh superintendent bird is a big sports fan we had Chad about that when we met I'm also a big Sports person play college hockey my kids play various Sports um interesting Association I just made here we're looking to grow the district we want to pump up Athletics we want to improve our facilities make it look attractive that's awesome I could get behind that that would you want to stick around but it's also interconnected you have elementary schools you want to make a preschool nothing makes a kid more excited to play a Varsity Sport and come up do that District so I'm glad you pointed it out because everybody in the audience was wondering we're talking about the py

145fields well how about a p the elementary school kidding I don't think that would be necessary but let's look at our investments and let's look at the interconnectedness because the health of our youngest students ultimately leads to the health of our district as they so I appreciate your enthusiasm and hopefully you can connect the dots that the he and well being of our most vulnerable student populations kind of agates to health ofers SOC to watch that come I would during the report on the CTE um I noticed that it was still lacking and not that it isn't great because those are amazing programs like those are the wonderful things that this District does but I would love to see if we could look into with the district some health profession programs um is to exist

146here and those are um some really Great Courses that can prepare people for students for Meaningful careers and steps that they could take at our local community colleges to pursue meaningful next steps I was able to pursue a degree in nursing at our community college and a health focused CTE program could help set up students to pursue those things um faster and Peak their interest sooner um we need more healthare professionals so I just wanted to rally for that for a moment and I did forget to mention that in researching I did find that well Michigan lacks regulation on school air quality um it does in fact have funding available in programs for air quality improvement I know that publicly our representative cam Kat has spoke out about how the district had yet at that

147point at least engaged him um for any funding needs but I hope to see that our legislators are worked with in this matter to maximize the available funds to put into this and I really think that Jesse brought a great point that maybe in py field we need a py elementary school or we need a py hbag system I don't know how you put that but maybe they're willing to fund something that has a real impact like that thank you com many [Music]