001[Music] good evening the regular meeting of the Richmond Board of education will come to order please stand for the Pledge of [Applause] Allegiance the pledge of allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one nation under God indivisible liy and justice for all C you please read our mission statement and take role at Rich commun schools we provide a quality education to empower students to be successful in the BL Community uh board member tto here board member Cunningham here board member Styer here uh I'm board member Fortuna I'm here board member Gillis here and board member Sutton said she would be late so she late with notice and then um Joseph our student representative Joseph PTO isn't here with us tonight but we have Elizabeth
002schaer here we have we have a forum thank you you didn't ask I didn't ask you I'm sorry sorry that's okay okay I'm looking for a motion to approve the agenda um I'd like to make a motion to approve the agenda with an amendment um moving item 11 student board rep report up and make it a new number seven and then just re numbering from there so we're okay with the motion with the amended motion motion to approve the agenda with Amendment and Candace you second it SAR thank you all those in favor I opposed motion carries okay I'm looking for a motion to appr approve the consent [Music] agenda do I have support thank you um we are going to move out the meeting minutes from uh 22425 um we had some things that
003were missing from that meeting so Mr wsy is going to review the video and we will bring it to our next meeting so that we have it all corrected then my motion will be to approve the amendment moving those AMS okay any questions all those in favor I I opposed motion carries okay next item on our agenda is our proposed overnight extended trip for the mock trial Dr Lad oh I am very sorry Mr lad let's do our student report I made a note um theol we have multiple students artwork on display at the Anton Art Center in Mount Su there are five seniors who whose portfolios are on display and seven under class students with pieces that were select as well you can stop by and see the artwork Tuesday through Saturday from 10:00
004a.m. to 5:00 p.m. until April 12 um they had a very successful 8th grade information night this past Thursday the parents/guardians and students heard about the scheduling process credits required for graduation and also the various ways to get involved in extracurriculars and athletic program um if any parents are un able to 10 they are encouraged to reach out to misso or Mr osor um the annual op stay presentation is scheduled for March 20th in the morning all students will participate in the virtual presentation in their second hour classes um the National Honor Society induction ceremony is this Wednesday at 7:00 p.m. in the auditorium um come out and celebrate the students uh a gr orientation and Carousel courses took place on Wednesday February 26th students receive the scheduled presentation and forms which are due no
005later than March Friday March 7th there's a parent informational meeting on Thursday that's from last um the regional CTE Advisory board meetings are held on the evening of March 18th we are always looking for business part Partners to participate so if someone if you know someone is interested or if you're interested in participating um and representing the industry you do or work in please contact misso and she can get you more information on how to register and participate and then rhs DEA students are going to be competing this Friday at hunting place and then middle school um they had a very successful parent teacher conference with many families attending we also picked off March's reading month and are excited for our students participate in the Fantastic activities they plann while they enjoy their books middle
006school students are currently choosing their courses for next year which is always very exciting preschool Roundup had an amazing turnout this year we had many new current new and current families come through the building for that evening 70 preschoolers came through and all of them left with some great richment gear and smiles on their faces Le Elementary had an awesome circus kickoff assembly for re students have read over 8,000 minutes at home um they have a school carnival plan for the 14th um they are really excited to see what more fun they could have um bring much month um we have a lot of extracurriculars uh Varsity tring took third in the state behind two very strong teams wrestling had two All State athletes Jacob B finished a state runner up and paulen Chapman placed
007fourth clire milr finished in the top 30 at the bowling single state competition girls basketball districts are being hosted were hosted at rhs on Monday Wednesday and Friday our girls played at Marysville last week too um rhs hosted the girls best the powerlifting team wrapped up their winter season with their state championship um the girls team played second overall uh Leo SRO right and then Bry Mayer um play individual state championships and Logan Evans played second in his individual in his respective way class um the high school band earned a division one rating at the MSB Festival past week the high school choir will be competing this upcoming week at their festival and then today was the start of spring TS anyone have any questions for Elizabeth thank you okay next item on our agenda
008is Dr Lad this time is our proposed overnight extended trip request thanks so to move along with all that other good stuff last week the trial team went down and competed they won the regional tournament and so we' invited to go up to lanene for a two-day tournament after the state Mark trial and the winner that gets to go to the National Tournament in Arizona this year so need commission head on up anyone have any questions for Dr Lad how many kids are going you we have [Music] 13 and I know that you did have a question um and Brian again we going to the states there's the criteria for the hotel and all that you would get that information he was asking about that we would send that out um consistent with the other
009groups that go to state that's so we comp beat on Friday afternoon then again twice on Saturday with the championship on Saturday night so and anybody's interested Thursday during third and fourth hour be practicing down here see right right this is the first Regional Title you know oh pretty excited yeah well you guys have went to States before but this is the first first first time yeah we went to States as an additional qualifier yeah very cool first championship Regal champ Prett excited they are what time is that oh God you think I know that 9 was it 10:30 come on list time start this is okay Dr L we will be Ving on it later um you're welcome to stay if you're not Mr W will give us of you thank you very much
010good luck good luck hey next item on our agenda is March's reading month we go will I will share a little blurb from the high school and then we'll hear from the middle school and then Elementary School about what they're doing um as it gets more exciting the lower grades that you get um so the high school group had a chance to actually kind of help support at the elementary school they went over and did some of the decorating for their Circus theme for this month so some of the U High School artists went down and decorated windows and kind of help them get ready to celebrate and then what they're doing at the high school is um students have a chance to turn in Reading respons kind of like a book review of books
011that they've read and um they submit those and have a chance to win prizes every week and teachers are encouraged to participate in that too so that you know students are hearing what books great books that their teachers are reading and then they're going to be putting together a full bulletin board of all the different books that they've heard about um throughout the month of March so that's kind of the high school overview but let me pull up middle school and I will invite Miss Mel over and I don't know if anyone is joining her but um we'll have her presentation good evening so um we also celebrate March's read month at the middle school I'll be a little bit of a a different scale than what you're going to see at the elementary school
012um however our kids still have a lot of fun celebrating reading um one of our greatest challenges as teachers is trying to help students Foster a love of reading and um when we can do great things um outside of what we would normally do during a regular school day um is a it's just a great opportunity to get our students to read um we have some tricks of the trade by offering some incentives and um other fun activities that I'm going to explain to you in just a minute and then of course we know that reading is everywhere and I don't know why that little e is randomly on at the bottom like that but um we know that reading is everywhere and if we continue to celebrate reading again we hope to Foster that
013love of reading um this year's theme is tell your story um while students read throughout the month they're going to be encouraged to tell their story through activities and a series of spirit days um their their beginning activity was doing a mini bio graphy of themselves and um we're going to see those displayed very soon around the middle school which is pretty fun um the kids will put them on their lockers and then we'll be able to celebrate each students's um uniqueness which is always fun to see and then we have um our reading month calendar and so today was hats off to reading and uh we encouraged our students to wear their favorite hats today um some of our staff had some pretty fancy schmancy hats on today too which was a lot of
014fun um we started off with read Across America with Dr Seuss day um where we were all encouraged to wear our Dr Seuss clothes or dress like a Dr Seuss character um and then of course just you can read all of the great things that um we're going to be doing and um tomorrow is pretty exciting it's career day so it's to address as what you want to be when you grow up so I can't wait to see what some of our students are aspiring to be so um a really fun thing too is the very last day on the 31st we do a a schoolwide drop everything and read um and it's really fun we line the hallways we bring blankets and towels or whatever we want to sit on in the hallway and
015um we all read um for a sustained amount of time last year we did 20 minutes um but I think we actually extended it a little bit longer because the kids were having such a great time just reading and it was P pin drop throughout our school was fantastic so and they really enjoyed it um another thing that our students are doing is book bingo so if they get a book Bingo they'll win a prize um and of course we know our goal is always to get kids reading and so what they'll do is as they read different books throughout the month they can write the title of the book down on um the different things so like right up in the corner is a book that is a mystery so they would write the
016title of that book down and just like regular Bingo if they get five in a row anywhere then they win a prize so um this was fun we kind of did something similar last year and the kids really had a great time um so this is that school wide drop everything in read that I just told you about these are last year's pictures we had a lot of fun um it was really really cool they really enjoyed it and everybody was reading and then this was just our very first Spirit day this was Dr SE day so um a lot of our kids are really enjoying themselves the middle picture is our most recent duck days that we had um I'm not sure if everybody knows what duck days are but duck days are tied
017with our accelerator reader program and if the students when uh the students reach their Accelerated Reader goal they I walk around or Mr Knight or Mrs sh whober or Mrs Rutman walk around with a wagon full of little rubber ducks and they get to each choose their own little rubber duck and it is quite fun to watch them choose so those are some of our bigger kids um enjoying upct dates so but that is how we celebrate reading month and a big thank you to Mrs schay Huber who is our March's reading month coordinator um she put all of this together and um we're always happy to have her um and her very creative mind so thank you so much unless you have any questions thank you thank you thank you very much and next
018I will invite miss m up to talk to us about all Theo is doing for March reading month thank you all right so this year for March's reading month if you haven't seen it's been a circus at the elementary we're part of the circus Squad many of you are going to be invited to be in an act next year so I want you to be prepared for that we want to expand our circus so we did a circus thing this year the kids have loved it we've never done a kickoff assembly but we're asking ourselves how can we get kids more excited to attach it to reading you know reading minutes and all of that is great but we really wanted them to know that it mattered for the month so we did our kickoff
019assembly um we can't do that alone so a lot of our staff even some of our more introverted staff was willing to really do some acts that we were surprised about and you know it's takes a village and they really stepped up because when you do something like this you don't know what you're going to get back and um so I'll explain to you some of the acts we had for students and um all of that we had the book fair tied in Mrs uh Nichols is here tonight she's our media center specialist she brings the book fair to incorporate during conferences so they can go in by themselves with their teacher but then also with parents so we're trying to really focus on the family aspect you know we can find reading important seven
020days or I'm sorry 7 hours but we're trying to really incorp that more at home too so parents can see you know how can I make this fun for my students so we'll talk a little more about that we have guest readers come in so thank you to those of you who have signed up to R to our kids um I know Mr wisley um board members um Miss spiac and lots of folks are coming in to read um so that's been really exciting a really fun thing to do is to let the kids ask you questions cuz they really want to know you and what you do and who you are so if you get the chance to read a book but also let them ask you something um but don't be offended because
021this year I got asked how many grandkids I had by a first grer and so that hurt a little but that's okay cuz they you know there's over 600 kids at Le now and you don't get to have FaceTime with all of them so it was a good time for me to share that I didn't have grandkids um so we also have a daily calendar same as the middle school so that's a lot of fun something something for them to look forward to um we keep a little extra also in our social work office so if kids want to participate that are able to um we try to provide opportunities for everybody we have lots of competitions we're competitive I'll talk more about that and prizes all right so this was our kickoff assembly at
022Lee um so I just want to thank the board and Mr wisley for letting us T take risks like this having 600 kids in an assembly is a big deal it's an overhaul you know you're opening the wall you're getting custodial staff you're taking a lot of resources from the district not from but you know for this event so I think that that's really an honor um some of the acts that we had I'm going to if you don't mind shout out our teachers that um participated Mrs retic um did back flips and she did the splits and then read if you saw the picture um she did reading while doing the splits um Mrs Joan Ali and Miss Sizzlin were dancing clowns we had a showcase dog um Lion Charlie manguni who jumped through
023fire which was a hula Hoopa streamers we got creative we had the strongest man Mr Gibson so that was a fan favorite um we had tight Walkers Mrs uh McCoy and Miss Mansfield I was the ring master um I want to thank Jason Robbins and his um but not just Jason he's done a fabulous job in incorporating now his students show up like on their own they sign in they are there to do their job um for TV production and so they really run it now on their own same with our music performances so a student did that all on his own so I thought that was excellent and then um miss anacher and miss cook were our organizers and Mr Petri was our chairperson for March's R month so um and Mr Wellsley I
024did read a book um called The Circus at Lee and you're in there a lot so if you want to watch the Richmond TV we you know so just just for the warning um also something we Tred different this year like um we said we try to incorporate families so you have to put action to your vision and so what we did is instead of just guest readers we did an invitation to families in jammies this year or special person in jammies so that's an invitation to everybody because what we didn't want is for all the slots filled up somebody doesn't get to have that person there and they get to miss out on what it's like to really read with your child and they're in a room where everybody's reading and they get to
025find out their kids interest pick out a book with them bring one from home it was cute you saw all these people bringing in the other Child's favorite book or maybe theirs so that was super fun parents showed up in like Pokemon jammies and they really got a kick so we've only done um kindergarten so far so that's new this year um and then our calendars on display there but that's that's what we're doing um so far and then Mr Gibson's going to explain the rest okay all right um so we did uh obviously with all the fun stuff we're doing we wanted to put some incentives behind it to get our kids excited um so our reading month goals and incentives um classroom competitions are taking place across each grade level so the winning
026class from each grade level is going to receive a pizza party and then the top reader in each grade level that month will get to be principal for the day um so the kids are super excited about that we're also giving out Small Things students are going to be reward of circus keychains snap bracelets activity books drawing pads we've set our school I go at 200,000 minutes um that was something we announced right at the end of our circus um so it was they were really excited they were screaming they were hollering um one other thing we're doing is uh Jimmy John's field um students um have posters in their classroom so they bring in a reading slip and they mark it every day when they come in and if they reach their goal on
027the poster and then we reach our school goal they're all going to get a free ticket to a Jimmy John's game um on Jimmy John's field so uh they're super excited about that as know they're coming to the office ask any questions about the baseball game so you're really excited uh we also uh partnered up with some local businesses in our community U Richmond Dairy Queen offered free cone coupons for students um Richmond BP is giving free pizzas away and then um Richmond Mason so books for bikes is coming up again so they give away 14 plus new bikes every year to students it's amazing boys and girls um they because they read tons of chapter books um so the students that do the best job with that and read all their chapter books are
028going to get a free bike um so that is a big assembly that we've put out there and they're excited about that um we're really um thankful for Rich amaz for doing that every year for us and then Texas Roadhouse also um is giving free coupons uh for kids meals so free kid meals they're giving those away um so lots of different incentives um for our students and lots of uh reward from our local businesses too so it's great to see one other thing that we introduced this year since we're you know we're big obviously in the reading not just in March but you know overall so early literacy is very important obviously at Le school um we do a lot of things with our preschool program um and now our K through three students
029but we introduced something new this year so I'm going to bring them up right now it's our PTO um they introduced something new to our main entrance area and it's the book vending machine so want to invite them up to talk about that hi so I just want to give a little bit of background on how we came to purchasing the book vending machine um it was a few years in the making for us at with the PTO um we had seen it advertise on one of our PTO magazines and it kind of got me thinking we do a lot of stuff for the students the staff the school in general but we don't really do anything that is long term for the building um after discussing with the PTO and we decided that it
030was something that we were really interested in bringing to Lee uh the following school year we started preparing and seeing if it was something that the school would be interested in and making sure that we'd be able to get it approved we began with getting a quote we worked hand in hand with Miss nickel on um those different slots for the size different Siz books so the bigger picture books would need the bigger slots so we worked with her to figure out what size slots we would need for the books that would Poss be for our students um I want to give a huge shout out to our PTO board from last year especially Laura fry she helped me tremendously in getting this we had to budget for a whole year um we had to
031figure out all the logistics for it but we made it work everything that we did for the school and for the students we kind of went around what our budget was for this machine uh we decided to use our annual Color Run as a fundraiser towards this machine machine last year uh the Color Run is something we do every may but there's never really anything that the money goes toward that we're being raised um we with the money that we raised from the Color Run the money we budgeted and then we reached out to a couple of people that we thought might be interested in helping sponsor this machine so the Richmond Lions Club and Northstar Bank in town both donated $500 towards the machine which was a huge help uh we put the order
032in and then we got to design the machine so the machine is custom to the elementary and the Richmond blue doubles um we really wanted to Captivate something that was Richmond uh so on the one side it has like the Richmond blue doble logo and it says well the Elementary on it it's really cool if you get a chance to go check it out uh the machine was finally delivered in October just before conferences of this year but we really wanted this machine to be not only something that was long lasting for Le but we wanted to be something that got students excited about reading uh we bounced a lot of ideas around on how to implement this machine into what we do um we came up with the idea of focusing on extra true
033blue Behavior at Lee the idea is very similar to the blue tickets at lead that the students get for their true blue Behavior so that's being respectful live responsibly use caution and everyone belongs um when students go above and beyond demonstrating these qualities teachers are able to give students a golden blue ticket so it's very similar to the little blue ones that they get for their uh good behavior but in their big like certificates that are gold and they say EXT Behavior so every student is going to get one throughout the year kindergarten through third grade um when they get their certificate they're able to go down to the office they get to exchange it for a coin that they get to put in the machine and our office staff and Mr Gibson m m
034have been amazing is it's a lot they come down all hours of the day from what I'm told so um they've been really awesome at getting the students really excited like oh my God yes you guys got a gold ticket and giving them their coin and the students have been really excited about it um we hope that this not only gets students excited about reading more but students who may not get the chance to get a book throughout the year now they will get a chance to get one um also with them demonstrating these qualities we're hoping that it kind of amplifies and makes them want to have these qualities more frequently the way that we fill the book vending machine is really cool too so I'm going to let Miss nickel explain how we
035do that one hello okay so what of the great things about hosting the book fair twice a year is that we earn Scholastic dollars um every time we host one so this past Fair we just did a little over $122,000 so we're going to earn about $6,000 in Scholastic dollars they call them and I'm able to go to like the catalog and Order books through the website so it's really convenient and I get to pick and choose um which books are going in the machine so that's really nice too so yeah that's any questions does anyone have any questions for our elementary school no questions but just comments that it sounds like everything that you guys are doing is awesome it's like above and beyond especially coordinating with the local businesses and and just getting
036the sponsorships it looks really awesome thank you great job signing up for the circus next year I right I right Bo me down we'll find a spot today they were all wearing these red noses during the day so it was really cute they gave one to every student in the building and the teachers were wearing them too with clown hats on and stuff it was very yeah that's really excellent job for sure okay next item on our agenda is our closed session so I'm looking for a motion to go into Clos session CL 15268 section 8h of the Michigan open meetings act I moved at the Board of Education will the close session for the purpose of considering material exempt from discussion or Disclosure by state or federal statute I have support support thank you
037uh any discussion this will be a roll call vote Margaret hi Candace hi Sandy I Raymond I Sarah hi Danielle I vote I motion carries uh we will be turned uh when we're done with our close session to finish our meeting okay we're going to go back in Open session at 8:08 our next item on our agenda is our presentation on board policies Mr okay tonight there's uh several policies for a first read we you go for board approval on April 14th um they're kind of in groups so I want to start with the title nine policy amendments so here tonight I have Jennifer Starland our attorney for TR to talk about the policies I wasn't intending going they kind of give you the broad uh changes for those policies all right thanks for having
038me tonight everybody um we have the 3115 series of the policies and then 3118 so kind of the really cliffnotes version of what happened in 2020 we had new title 9 regs that set forth a really specific process for handling sexual harassment complaints that came forth in schools there were really detailed training and procedural requirements as well as policy requirements so you had at that time a title 9 sexual harassment policy that laid that all out in 2024 we got new title 9 regulations that changed that process um so at that time what we did was we edited the 3115 series to Encompass any type of harassment complaint so sex based harassment uh race based harassment disability based harassment and we said great we can have it all in one policy this is so helpful
039in January a federal court um vacated the 2024 title line regulations which means they are effectively off the books and we are back to the 2020 process so what we had to do in this policy update is revise the 3115 series which will Now cover any type of harassment except sexual harassment and then 3118 is now the title 9 sexual harassment policy so you were down to two procedures as opposed to we had several before 2020 um but it's still more than the one which was our preference so that's why those are all changing um it's just cleaning up some language then 4101 4104 uh 5202 uh and I believe 5206 there's small tweaks in all of those that just address um that that that track those changes so now some of those say things
040like for title n sexual harassment complaint C policy 3118 for all the types of harassment complaint C policy 3115 so that's why all of those changes are there so it seems like a lot of changes um a lot of it though is really technical just to comply with those legal changes so any questions on that all right so when you look at the series of policies there's a couple uh policies that deal with the um Michigan earn sick time uh act which was passed on February 21st or took effect February 21st and then uh it was passed by the legislation sign by the government and kind of retro Act is so what this policy is that aligns our practices to be in compliance with the time earned by individuals the majority of our contracts exceed
041the require minimum requirements in this policy there are some uh nonunion members in our group that we were going to have to provide additional uh lead time available to them based on the hours work and so forth so Angel Blake and I went to TR last Thursday um so between Tammy Angela and I will'll be sitting down this week uh to kind of look at what areas or what groups will need to adjust but basically it's earning an hour for every so many hours that you work um and then being able to if we frontload them um there's not a carryover if we allow them to acrew it then there would be a carryover so there's some policy uh or uh administrative Logistics that we still have to work out and a review of each
042of our contracts um it does get some broader definition misss to um the Le time that can be taken um so we'll have to work through those but that's what policy that you have before you are questions okay so these will come back to on April 14th which is our next Bo meeting for uh form TR thank St right there do the absolutely to the fer should be four on to okay uh last meeting I talked to you about a bond uh consideration a future Mel consideration and what the scope of that Bond work might look like um since that meeting we had scheduled a parent meeting on the 7 18th excuse me um but it was canceled primarily due to the the weather and not being sure we're going to get everybody to come
043out so tonight's focus is I'm going to Briefly summarize the past and I'm going to focus on the high school where the last one was on the Middle School um and then the April 14th Bo meeting will focus on the elementary school we do have a couple meetings coming up for the community to uh listen to and participate so these are some of the things that we've done or have plan to do we have several meetings that that are coming up um series our goal or my goal of this whole process as well as the team is to make sure the information is out there so that members of the community uh if the board chooses to put this on the ballot in November that they've have the information about what this entails so just
044summary um we have two types of enrollment we have head count and we have FTE FTE count is what we have uh is what our funding is based on often times we have students who might be only a partial partial uh time or they're shared between schools so we don't get a full ft for them when you look at our current and past enrollments the general trend is we are on the upswing the the unknown is the future it's that area and so often times school districts will use an enrollment projection company in this case we have contractor with Michigan Alliance for student opportunity to project that enrollment and when you start looking at their projections and they use various models and methods and the fifth model being average in the next 5 years they
045anticipate our enrollment to continue to increase when they extrapolate that data out 10 years and again various methods that they use and these are by grade level over the next 10 years they expect a 21% increase in enrollment in in our in our community part of this is they're looking at birth rates they're looking at death rates they're looking at housing market they're looking at migration Trends in the county they're looking at economic factors and when you compile all those in a statistical model this is what they um what they achieve so when you look at our current capacity as I shareed with you in the 2019 Bond we added 10 classrooms on the elementary school at this point we're really down to just three classrooms left that are not being utilized as everyday instructional
046areas they are being utilized whether it's a sensory room or literacy Library room um at some point that we have to have those um those those rooms and those resources somewhere in the building but we have some room to grow Middle School we are completely out of room every room in the middle school is being utilized the stage is actually being utilized for one of the classes and the gymnas as I shared with you last time is split in the middle of the curtain drout and we have two classrooms in there at one time when we look at high school we added in the 2013 Bond the science ring we add in the 19 the auxiliary gym and and weight room um we have about three classrooms left in the high school that could be
047utilized for classroom as I said our community has supported Bonds in 7 13 and 19 some of them have taken multiple times um so in the 2019 was our last Bond um for 38.7 million so what this positions the district is a no increased millage over the previous year I want make sure I phrase that because what our current rate is would be what we can continue to to to uh Levy in order to collect the the mill what does that what does that mean we could issue with a no increase millage starting in July of 26 we vot in 25 for July of 26 51.5 Mills million excuse me when you take count of that what the estimated capitalized interest would be which would be about another 400,000 it would total about 51.78 million
048you might be asking how how can this be possible so when you look at this mate this is the levy of our village that we um produce every year summer tax collection that we we issue in the tax bills um the last couple years in July of 23 in July of 24 we reduced the rate if your house went up in value you might not have seen that but if you actually look at the rate the school was leving on the Mills we reduced it in July of 26 you're going to see a large green box that's the drop and so if we were to go to the the community and say in November of 25 would you be willing to continue continue the millage rate that we're leving that would generate $5 51.8 million
049so you might be asking what would we use those funds for um this is a little different than the previous Bond if this is about space and capacity and I know that's not very fancy and so forth but when the bottom line looks at it these enrollment projections are even 90% 50% correct we do not have the capacity uh without making major changes of how we operate in terms of teachers not having a classroom for their C period we be putting classrooms in putting teachers on cart this is this allows us to create that space for that future enrollment so some of the things that we've done as you I said last time we've met with our construction company and our archit to look at what wasn't on the bond and it wasn't on the
050bond because it wasn't a need at that time but like for instance we have a roof that's set to expire around 2028 when we did the 13 and 19 Bond it wasn't a need to repl that rope we're now getting to that need um looking at areas that identified as we've now have evolved in in the district in ways we can improve uh we are currently in the process of gathering stakeholder input from staff and and uh parents which would be with some of those parent Community conversations so the middle school last time I talked to you about an addition we' be looking at doing a four five Wing a new addition visually that's where that the old JV softball field Feld behind the Middle School uh we will be looking at possibly doing some
051multi-purpose rooms at the end of the fifth uh fourth grade hallway in the end of the sixth grade hallway to allow for more flexible uh instructional areas in addition all of the restroom which is kind of hard to see on this picture but all the community restrooms those are the original restrooms yeah we've replaced a toilet here and there or a sink because they broke in or some some of the pipes because kids will be kids and they they break um but they're they're 50 years old and so all of the restrooms would be completely renovated that's the primary focus of the Middle School from the parking lot area you can see here the existing parking lot that's behind the middle school would double um and you kind of see the projection of where the
052the addition will be placed on the on the middle school now let's talk about high school this is where we spent a little more time on because last month was the middle school high school is our next need um when we look at the space available High School is the next one that has the least amount of space so off the science Edition going forward will start there we'll be looking at adding roughly a 10 classroom addition just extending that science Wing out on this addition will be some type of offices and some type of restroom again no drawings have been done these are conceptual square footage uh building the cost per square footage for an addition is how we've been building the budget again if there's any questions anything just raise your hand and
053ask know um you see kind of the space there that's Green Ohio that would be more like an office area might be a counselor might be a social worker some support as enrollment grows in a school so too are the support staffs that we will need then the other area would be designated to a u a restroom or Community bathroom area like we simply have in other areas of the building this particular one one of the concepts on this would be exterior bathrooms that would be attached to this that you couldn't get into but it allows for those groups that are using the field behind the high school to have restroom access uh Hometown Football League often does it some of the soccer leagues use it um so we provide a resource for the community
054rather than using a a porter chop this is the old gym kind of cafeteria so the area first area in green there is currently the a storage room and then right above it used to be the old boys locker room for basketball that area would be en llarge to enlarge the cafeteria with increased enrollment we need space to put kids to so that cafeteria would actually a third of it would be increased by probably about a third the you can see now that whole green area would be now be the new cafeteria area where students would be able to eat the top area in yellow is currently the old girls locker room from the original building so we would reconfigure that area it's it's the original from 1950s the tiles is pain um it's it's
055not used on a consistent basis other than probably for sports program and after school is not something from the structural end that we use but renovating that to be more of a uh upgrade the facility so we can use use that area um in whether it's for the the wrestling or the baseball or some other area in thatp that space this is the office of the high school you kind of see the main vestibule on the right there um what we will be looking at is um this is next to the school store there's kind of two manyi offices reconfiguring that space for support staff offices um like for instance there's not a space in our building if our theas and officers here there's no space for that we're literally out of room this could
056be maybe moving the couns makes better sense said in the in the main office and me the counselor that was the counselor area at one point um but it also could be for social work the space across that is the old chemical storage from those used to be the old science rooms and so when we did the last two bonds it's really it's a storage room we could reconfigure that to be a a support staff office again looking for that future the area in blue is currently um Mr Gore's classroom for a visual you know Mr Gore is in the room and then that's the high school conference room so looking at this space redesigning that because we do not have a bathroom for students who are in the clinic area who sick there's no
057bathroom up there so putting in a bathroom uh expanding the conference room a little because it is the smallest conference room out of all three buildings and when you have groups in there it's very tight especially for I meetings CU we've been trying to keep them in the secure area of the of the office um part of that room would also become an expanded possibly for records room which would leviate another room that we have in the building for a support staff office I'm going to reconfiguring that you'll see on here all of these yellow areas are the community bathrooms um oops so there are four main ones in in the building if you envision it's basically redone the bathrooms um a lot of these bathrooms other than the gymnasium bathrooms and the auditorium bathroom
058but the other gy are the original bathrooms from the 1950s when the school um open again there's been some cosmetic stuff done we' had some dividers put in um replacing some dividers play some sings but generally it's the original Plumbing the two in the auditorium and the U gymnasium we're put in the 96 box again imagine we have about 500 students in our building every day with all the activities the amount that these bathrooms get utilized and they've been here since ' 96 you're talking 30 years is um a lot of wear and Care on the bathrooms uh this kind of gives you the overview of the the the grounds so what for the high school the parking lot behind the auditorium we would look at extending that parking lot to increase the parking capacity
059um currently not every that's generally a staff parking um we can't put all the staff in there just because of the numbers um just to give you a perspective 11 years AG 10 years ago we were about 78 teachers in our district we at 90 almost 95 96 almost 96 but we're at um so we have grown any questions on the high school at this point I got a question um throughout you've been mentioning a lot of different you mentioned bathroom a lot and the different upgrades and and and Community bathrooms was one word you said so what in regards to the bathrooms and the bathrooms you're talking about what type of upgrades specifically do you need part of it is getting down and replacing the puming cuz we've had Plumbing issues underground so basically
060these bathrooms when you look at them in any of the building basically gutting the entire bathroom um putting new fixtures in new Plumbing in new flooring in new walls some some of the bathroom tiles um particularly when you look at the community bathrooms at the elementary school when I say community I mean there's three or four or five stalls in a bathroom um little kids don't always hit the toilet so that gets into the ground stains and that sent is there but we're constantly using uh chemicals to get that out of it um the high school when you look at these bathrooms here they're the original I when you look at the the flooring and all that it's it's it we've used everything we had to try to keep it clean so tiles in the
061elementary school in the9 or 13 Bond we tried to do a surface that went over the tiles like a texture almost like you would put in your garage floor to fill that in um and it comes with little glass beads that are in that FL to create the texture um but what we found is that material tracks dirt and it keeps it it doesn't clean up very easily so we're constantly uh spending a lot of Manpower trying to keep them up so when I'm talking about these bathrooms it's a complete G taking out the toilets the sinks the walls redoing some of the plumbing that we've had issues with or that we've had fixed over the years it just needs to be fixed correctly bandaid if you own in some of the bathrooms bathrooms are
062are costly renovation um just because you're doing a lot of pling trads and so forth that that are there but there's no design I couldn't tell you what it looks like uh other than if there's 9 sareet of bathrooms approximate cost that we budgeted for but these bathrooms in particular like I said the ones on high school here if you go and look at them they're they're not the best so so when you're seeing the walls are you talking about just the standard metal dividers you know kind of I guess it could be it could be the kind of partitions um it could be tiles on the walls and the new bathrooms that we put in in all the additions in the 19 Bond we did a a a larger tile that has less routs
063in it um better ventilation in the bathrooms a lot of our ventilation that's in these bathroom is from the original design of the building back in in the ' 50s so we have upgraded the newer bathrooms um these are kind of L on the list to do but at this point we don't have a design of what no basically what what I've worked with the architect and and uh construction manager is is beginning building cost which that will come to you as we go through each of these projects okay what is it going to cost for the Middle School given this much square footage for an addition and basic these bathroom um they use the industry standard over the years it cost when you renovate a school bathroom b ,000 square F feet is going
064to cost you X number dollars per square feet um and what I've been very pleased with a and frenches is often times they are very they're more conservative which is good because I hate for we have to get to a point where we got to cut projects out after we' committed them to the community um and we have the ability to make sure what we said we're going to do can actually happen right yeah because there was uh I think in previous conversation we we talked about how there's a um depending on the Styles how many bathrooms would fit in in the room there are there are state regulations how many what the quantity of the building is and so they'll look at the number of rooms how many kids are in those room and
065there's actually a calculation that says how many how many toilets and urinals and S have to have so all that goes into that calculation um but in the initial part renovating there there's no opposition from the architect for the construction that we wouldn't be able to meet those qualifications thank you there are some other things on the high school um that as we start prioritizing one and two which means if there's dollars of the end once like we did in this last F that we can do some project that are still within the um some of the things like the high school bleachers have always been a concern the last couple years we've had a lot of issues um with them opening and closing um we have to it's it's it's a manual install of
066the the handrails um it's done possible to do we've been able now to do it um it just is a cost on the flip side on the man or the labor side um but looking at bleachers Sim to the element or excuse me the middle school where the the the handrails automatically Clos with them um those bleachers are almost 30 years old they're they're they've had a lot of we and care of and then the next one I'll spend more time focusing on the elementary school on the April 14th meeting but just to give you a general the big thing at the Le is the kitchen that kitchen was not designed uh to Comedy as you heard tonight from Mr M Looney 600 students Plus in that building um this year in the kindergarten Wing
067which is located there um we were borderl adding that sixth section of kindergarten um which is great and the numbers are there um right now finding where they would be if if we had to add it they would probably be in a different section of the building and not with the other C so we're trying to put them put them all together again a big thing is communication we sent out the community newsletter in January that kind of outlined this to the community uh it is on the website if anybody didn't receive it uh we sent out a letter in February asking people to come there will be another uh message that blast that goes on to our parents later this week to remind them about next Tuesday uh which will be here in the
068high school um Media Center uh some of the things that are different I highlighted in yellow on this from our last meeting um part of the state of the district will address the future of Richmond this this is a piece of it in May these are some of the dates that we uh kind of the checkpoints you have to do uh in order to get to a position that the board can say yes we want to do this or no we're we're not so on May 14th uh the bond application which would be everything that we've talked about costing it out would be submitted to the Department of Treasury by the law firm um on May 19th we have a meeting sched with the Department of Treasury basically what they're looking at is is this
069reasonable and how it be gathered or at least communicated to your your community how if we come up with these costs um if this is based on Need for space they're going to look at our enrollment projections Etc um on May 20th and I sent this email out to you guys earlier um we have to have 30 days between the time the board approves the application and the time the board approves the language that would go on the board so in order to do the approval of language that goes on the board which is what we did in the remember on June on the 19th Bond we did that in June um the back up 30 days so we'd have to do a special meeting specifically to talk about the application uh if there's anything
070that the missig Department of Treasury ask us to change we would have to put it into that application U but basically on the 20th you would be approving the bond applicated this is what we're going to do with the 51.7 million um on June 23rd um the board would officially approve and basically give the go ahead to say yes we're going to put it on the November 4th p and at that point really becomes the the um continued communication to our community we have until August 12th to actually submit the ballot language to the county clerk in order for them to get on the ballot so you might be asking why do you need so much time between the 23rd and the 12th um the board could approve the bond application on June 23rd which
071would mean our next board meeting would be August 11 which at that point you would authorize the language which means if there's any glitches we have literally the next day till 4:00 to give it processed it it's not in by 4:00 we're not putting this on the so to give us a little more time that's why I'm asking the board to have the special meeting look at the bond application uh because we are dealing with two counties our primary contact is the home county clerk but we also CC the St cler County because we have obviously constituents or residents excuse me in both District or both counties kind of gives you the timeline the big in depth last month was because a big chunk of the lond is the middle school that is our priority
072for our uh allocation uh High School becomes next with physical classroom space and then Elementary you're going to see next month there is some classroom in the kitchen space is the primary reason and if you haven't been in the elementary kitchen if you're out in March's reading month stop down and just take a look at it um talk to Miss Michelle the head cook or any of the assistant CS over just talk about the space it's very tight in there for the amount of meals especially serving breakfast and lunch for all students um our numbers have gone up in terms of what we're producing out of there um all of our preschool programs eat some por portion of breakfast or watch out so you have that so we're nearing about 4 425 meals out of
073their day any questions okay we're going to move on next item on our agenda is our Blue Devil raids so we're going to start with Sarah okay Margaret um yeah I came up to the um District Championship girls basketball game Friday night and our sad kids from the high school were doing a fundraiser a bake sale and um I guess they had done it Monday Wednesday Friday game but that night they made they told me a little over $200 and they were raising it for sy's kids and to put together Easter baskets for the famili so I just shout out to them that they did a really good job thank you Raymond yeah I just want to go over what uh the Kudos that I gave to miss Muni Mr Gibson their staff and the
074PTO uh what they're doing for the reading I think that was a lot of great stuff there so just want to reiterate that thank you um Daniel I just want to congratulate the um High School Band program because they got the division one rating which I feel like they always do so well under um Mrs sha so just congratulations to all those students and her for that amazing program that she offers over there thank you yes um just to kind of follow sandies on that um I was able to sh both of the seventh and eth grade Festival as well as the high school festival for the um band and the kids are were just amazing um this Chef was amazing and congratulations to them for their division one um both both times in one
075week um and then also I did want to um give a shout out to M Miss rby is um our nth grade colge teacher um I met with her conferences this weekend just I wanted a shout out for her because she she takes the extra time with the students and she makes time for them to um retake tests extending um the submissions for the their work um and just she really caters to each individual student and I believe that she needs a AOS in so thank you thank you um I have two uh first I read today at Lee school and the middle school and I just want to thank Mrs Mela uh Mrs Vanoni Mrs M Nicole they did all the scheduling and putting it together I went from building the building so they
076worked with me on that um the kids were great I had some really good discussions who said someone said talk to the kids and ask them questions you'll be amazed at what you hear and they were good we had some really good discussions so I just want to thank both buildings for what they're doing uh the other part is and this is from Mrs Morales so I'm just going to read this this is about um our essay winners um on behalf of Richmond Middle School administration m brown Ela teacher and Miss jar social studies teacher we would like to announce the local winners of the 56th annual American and the essay contest sponsored by the Farm Bureau Insurance this essay began in 1968 and was open to all Michigan 8th grade students and was written
077at the beginning of the school year by all eighth grade um middle school students this essay allows Michigan youngsters to explore the greatness of America and its people with the focus on their Michigan hero the essay is a yearly cross-curricular writing assignment between both the language arts and social studies departments several thousand 8th grade students from nearly 200 Michigan schools participated in this essay contest this year our three winners are in first place we have John kinora in second place Ava Vance and in third place Bella papian I probably massacred that and I apologize what is it okay too all three students will be receiving a certificate and that John's essay will now advance to the state level um from which the top 10 essays in Michigan will be selected uh let's see the top
07810 winners will be announced in April we will receive a plaque whoever they are they will receive a plaque of Medallion and a cash ward of $1,000 um Farm Bureau insurance will also be presenting each top 10 Statewide school with a $1,000 check uh the annual American and me essay contest Awards day is scheduled for Wednesday May 14th in Lancing and the top 10 students and their teachers from across the state uh will participate in the dayong group recognition so just congratulations to our middle 8th grade middle school students and that's all that I have next item is our superintendent and legislative update Mr Wesley have service some District update um today in the middle school we had uh kids in the kitchen uh 501c3 organization um held a a session for 20 of our
079families they basically taught fifth graders how to handle food safely and make families low low cost healthy meals um families receiv low cookers and uh even got a meal that night so I was there at the beginning when they set up and so um looking forward to Future Partnerships uh the spring parent teacher conferences was held last week uh and they were a success um generally spring conferences are a lighter turnout than the fall um but the the meaningful conversation between our staff and the parents um really working together um for our students successfully to showc everything that's good about Richmond just a reminder of the board of the community next uh Tuesday as I said in my presentation March 18th here in the media center is the conversation with the superintendent regarding the no
080increased Village um that you saw tonight focusing on the middle school and high school V because of the middle school cancellation in February on the second state of the the second annual state of the district will be held next Wednesday March 19th at 7:00 in the auditorium at Richmond High School letters are mailed home to family as well as many community members inviting them to the event uh just reminder the parents in the community spring break is March 24th through March 28th it's a week from Monday spring break is uh safe travels to our group of students who will be traveling abroad to Scotland England and France during this year's spring break uh legislative update we got quite a few that I want to talk about uh one is last week we heard uh president
081Trump's uh address to the Joint session of Congress for his first address of the second term um you heard a lot of things that he was talking about and what he's accomplished today uh one of the things that we're paying close attention to is his uh what his position is going to be on the Department of Education and the funding that goes along with that department from a general fund Source we receive a over $680,000 in general fund that's not to include the food service accounts for which be food service which is a lot so we're just watching how that uh plays out at the uh Federal level um on March 7th last uh week on Friday I received an email from our representative green um basically last Thursday the House Representatives uh introduced a
082budget bill um and basically 30 minutes later they voted on it and the current budget bill um for the FY 2526 school aid fund uh shows uh reduction of $5 billion allocated to schools um in her letter to me and then I'll read it to you so you have um the context of of the the House of Representatives U measures as you may have heard the house yesterday passed two appropriation bills the bills includes the closing of the books for fiscal year 25 and the fiscal year 26 government shutdown prevention method I want to highlight some of the shutdown prevention methods that were included in the K12 budget under the bill schools would have the assurance that they would receive the resources needed to keep students safe provide mental health support and continuing delivering quality
083uh educational programs included in the shutdown prevention is fully funding for school safety and mental health programs if you recall $300 per pupil it was reduced to $150 per pupil um special education services and teacher retirement payments don't you remember that cuz I'm going to come back to that a minute in addition under this prevention we increased the per pupil allowance to $10,250 in the governor's budget it was $10,000 um so they increase in $25 more per pupil uh Which is higher than the government's recommendation I want to stress that the budget process here in laning will continue as normal the measures were um this measure was was to protect you in case of the government shutdown which is a talk at the federal level as well as the the budget process going on in
084in in the state level so you can be assured of your funding so I mentioned about that retirement service if you call last year we received a one-time payment with a a retirement reduction that would go down um almost 6% this year so I ask uh Tammy and um Angel they spent a lot of time today writing the numbers our current payroll for this year is $1,200,000 of that we pay 3.5 million or 31.25% in retirement expenses so our net um retirement after all the money they gave us and so forth brought it down to Our obligation to be 2.3 million remember that number if we do nothing and everybody stays the same in the payroll for next year which we know is not true because we have contracts in place but if we do
085nothing and keep that payroll at 11.2 million our retirement cost um will go down to 3.1 million or 28.2% that's a 3% reduction remember last year they told us it was a 6% reduction so when they look at the money in and out that's in the current Governor's budget our retirement costs go up almost $200,000 next year so of that $400 per increase that the government have promised 60 bucks is already gone for retirement cost if we assume a 5% increase in The District in various contracts remember teacher contract that the percent increase and then the steps which so can be plus or minus 5% and all the other contracts are retirement cost will go up to 2.3 million so that equates to about $110 of that $400 is already gone because we now have
086to pay for retirement cost so the savings that was promised in last year's budget does not shake out in this year's budget and that doesn't even assume any contract increases summarize it correctly so when we look at the statements like we're going to give you your assurance and we're going to reduce it we're very skeptical of school Community because we've been burned many times so um now is more than ever important for the community to contact the legislature because we are in a the budget process the House and Senate will introduce their bills house did and they approved it literally they had 30 minutes to review it and they took a vote on um not a lot of open discussion that happens when you do things like that um but those are things that we're
087watching um the other things in the legislation um I talked about the governor's budget um it didn't uh the house budget increases our per pupil funding from uh $10,000 over the governor to$ 10,25 um cyber schools would receive the same as per Public Schools they don't have a lot of the expenses that we do they don't have transportation costs they have a lot of stuff but they receive it per pupil 31a mental health and school safety in the the house bill uh increases to uh by 50 million so it's basically uh 350 million it goes to it it's about $175 per child which you currently get 150 a little bit more there is a special ed increase in 2.7 or EXC 127 million and the myth reduction that combination um they're investing some of it
088so that has yet to be shaped out just continue watching because we enter negotiations with the teachers union and the par professionals these are going to be affected by these costs the Senate the bill now moves on to the senate for their consideration and then ultim if they approve it it goes on to the governor uh a couple of the bills that were um from committees that have occurred uh the house uh senate committee on education held its first meeting there was a couple bills that were stalled in the last that they're kind of they're looking at one of them is Michigan future educator teach student teacher stien if you're Rec calling this year's budget student teachers get a stien um while they're student teaching to help offset their cost um some of that is
089looking at continuing that um the house education and Workforce committee uh looked at several bills looking at the impact of teacher certification endorsement um eliminating fees on teacher certification applications permits um some of the other things um there is a decline in the number of people going into teaching education which is hasn't been a new thing I've been saying here [Music] um and then there's some bills that um just kind of came out of the blue that we didn't really suspect but we're watching because the impact is number one Senate Bill 119 which modifies the biology content standards and subject area content expectation for graduation to require uh instruction on human developments we're kind of re watching that one and House Bill 4175 which modifies the Michigan Merit curriculum that's the graduation requirements that we
090have I don't have a whole lot any more details on that but um we are watching and then finally of this report uh the last meeting the board voted on their masb membership um Rod brick means from Westwood One the region that's it thank you next item on our agenda is items of interest from the board Margaret um Candace no I just um I did attend to the kids and kitens here tonight and I wanted to say um thank you to State jie green and the kids in the kitchen back work and hopefully was Sandy uh no mind nothing today um forgive me if I missed it since I um but Brian did you tell us the process for HR and Along on that I've seen the poting on the person how the process is
091we interviewed SE I interviewed seever candids last last week uh and then we're bring back second Monday and Wednesday got a lot on your plate you're all second now yeah Sarah no R nothing thank you I don't have anything next item on our agenda is public comments uh since the last board meeting uh board did not receive any uh emails and there were no public comments that needed addressing from the last board meeting this time if anyone would like to address the board you have three minutes please step up to the podium state your name and uh share your comments guys want to come thank you my name is Ursa Schneider I with the newly formed R High School theater booster club U please do bear with me as I do have a question to
092ask of the board when I'm finished but I would like to give a quick snapis of the theater program first as you know our theater program was dismantled during Co when Brian Brun our director came to rhs in the fall of 2022 he faced the challenge of starting a new he began the after school program with 12 students they successfully studied for and enacted two plays one during the school year more students joined Brian and the new assistant director Caitlyn sins in 2023 and they produced two more successful shows last fall we saw the theater improv grow to over 35 students we can't deny that this fledgling program is quite popular a attendance at the shows has all has been steadily increasing as well our fall performance the S sat Sunday mat n had the
093biggest attendance to date we have also just initiated a theater booster club to help our program become even more successful Carly adults present behind me and the kids are part of the new booster board so last summer a decision was made by this board to scale back the upcoming musical from three performances to to two we are here tonight to ask if the board would reconsider adding back the third sh which for this one would be the Sunday that may this is the performance that most of the students grandparents attend as well as those people that work nights the Sunday show brings in about a third of our income we were told that if the board were to reconsider this decision we would have time to pay the necessary fees to make this happen so
094we do humbly ask you to reconsider your decision thank you did you br your name so I can follow pleas sorry well just Carly Roa just want to Echo just the same thing these kids work very very hard rehearsals Monday Wednesday Friday Saturday um so we think they should be afforded the opportunity to have to shows as they did in the past which is Friday Saturday and Sunday so thank you appreciate your consideration yeah and I'm just here to third that I guess um you know these some of these kids um can only find a passion and create Arts to reduce that opportunity to showcase that passion like I we humbly ask you to Recons your consideration thank you thank you pretty much thank you boths excellent so are you in the musical here yes
095what's your parts what was that what are you playing um I'm playing Brook wind for the we're doing legally right we know we're up on the drama here I play uh Vivan Kensington nice yeah we already like even though we just started we worked very hard and it's taken a lot of dedication and everything so for this one to be the show that this has been full has been a little difficult but I mean we're going to try to do what we can that so okay well thank you for coming forward andk you sorry any other public comments okay we'll move on our next em on our agenda is our action item I'm looking for a motion for the approval of the fiscal 2025 general fund budget amendment one I move to accept the recommendation
096of the superintendent and approve fiscal year 2025 general fund budget amendment number one as presented at the February 24th 2025 Board of Education meeting and outlin in the attached resolution do I have support support thank you any discussion all those in favor I oppose motion carries looking for a motion for the approval of the a proposed overnight extended trip request to Lancing I motion to accept the recommendation of the superintendent approve the overnight extended student trip to Lancing Michigan as presented at the March 10th 2025 Board of Education meeting is outlined in the attached documentation do I have support Candace um any discussion all those in favor I oppose motion carries I'm looking for a motion for the approval to resend board policy 5106 transgender students go ahead I motion to accept the recommendation of
097the superintendent and descended board policy 5106 transgender students is outlined on the attached acation supp okay Sarah any [Music] discussion all those in favor I'm sorry I'm sorry um I I thought that this might be an individual so I apologize but I just want to um quickly state that um this is one of those times where your personal beliefs uh might not align with resending this policy but um being that you know um our attorneys are recommending this particular change uh you know that's I'm obviously not going to go against that I mean that's there a Prof [Music] so Y and I I agree with you on that and I also know that um I have full faith that Richmond schools will continue the procedures that we follow in the inclusivity in which we are
098any other discussion okay all those in favor I oppos motion carries being no further business the board will adjourn at 901 thank you everyone [Music]