001to know people is it centered just want okay this meeting of the board is called to order please stand and join us in the pledge of allegiance the flag in front of us I pledge algiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands. One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Like to welcome everyone to our meeting tonight. Uh Trustee Roar uh sends her regrets. We'll get started by approving our agenda. There's a motion to do so on page two. Are there any changes to the agenda as printed? Not for me. No. President Van Antwerp. I move that the board of education approve the agenda as printed. Thank you. Is there a second? Second. Thank you, Emily. All in favor, please say I.
002I. Opposed. Motion passes. We'll get started where we always do with the superintendent report. Mark, our first report uh this evening is uh from Paula Johnson uh to give us our financial report. Paula, good evening. Board of Ed and Superintendent Belang included in your bar packet this time was the financial report reflective. It's the end of April. That's 10 months through our fiscal year already. It has just flown by. The first page of the report, which is my function code. I just want to bring it to the board's attention that federal revenue is running slightly lower than last year, and that has to do with our Skyward cumulative migration that happened over spring break. We were slightly delayed in requesting money through MDE. We have an internal controls process that we follow to confirm all
003expenditures before drawing down on funds and that is almost complete. So we will be drawing down on funds in May hopefully. So there's just a timing issue there. Moving down into the expenditure area, um they actually the business area, my area is uh trending slightly higher than last year. salary costs are up from last year in comparison. Moving down to operations and maintenance, um those salary costs are also up from last year and so are the corresponding fringe costs and insurance costs from set are came in higher than last year for the district. the 31A grant funding costs and the school resource office off officer costs also roll up in this area and uh the SRO cost is up slightly from last year. And then finally moving down to transportation um those costs are up
004compared to last year also due to salary and corresponding French benefit costs and we did purchase the three vans um directly from this area. So that's also uh a big change in why there's a difference and increase overall. Uh looking at page two by object code, I just want to bring it to the board again. Capital outlay looks skewed right now. uh we will fix that with our budget amendment that we'll bring to the board in June and it is up over last year also because of uh the section 97 and 31A funding that we are using for the secure entry-way projects throughout the district. Just a quick brief update on uh what's going on in Lancing. Friday, the consensus revenue estimating conference was held and Michigan's uh general fund general purpose revenue targets uh
005will need to be adjusted down by $221 million. However, the state school aid fund saw a positive adjustment overall compared to the January projections. So, they will be bumping those up by $85.6 million. Uh the big takeaway from the consensus revenue estimating conference is there is economic uncertainty on the horizon at this time. Um Wall Street Journal surveyed a bunch of economists and they they feel that there's a 45% possibility that we will see a recession within the next 12 months. So people are proceeding with caution. Um we also have the federal policy and the potential tariff issue looming um around us as contributing factors. Job growth for the state of Michigan is slowing and our unemployment rate is up. Um the state of Michigan overall is planning for a decrease in enrollment of approximately
0066,300 students for the 2526 budget year. Um each each the governor, the house, and the senate have each released their budgets, but we do not have the detailed house budget at this time. We are still waiting to receive that. The governor presented her increase back in February at $392 a pupil. The House budget has released a $417 increase per pupil, just a summary budget, no detail. and the Senate has released a $400 um increase per pupil. I would like to bring it to the board's attention that technically whatever increase we do receive for the 2526 school year, we did not receive an increase for the 2425 school year. So, whatever we receive this year makes up for what we didn't get last year. We received a categorical funding and that categorical is scheduled to sunset.
007So really, it's not much of an increase at all when you stop and then you look at the numbers overall. So hopefully um Lancing can come up with a budget that is going to be fair um for us as a school district. I do have reservations that we will not have accurate numbers by the time we adopt our budget at the budget hearing on June 30th. It's going to be a best guess situation. So that's my report at this time. Thank you. Any questions? Thanks, Paula. Thanks for the update, Paul. The next two items on the update are will both be presented by Johnny Edwards. The first is our monthly bond project update, and the second is uh uh some information that uh regarding the completion of the 2021 bond project. So, Johnny, I'll let
008you do both of those. Thank you. Thank you, Superintendent Be Lang, as well as the board of education. Before I get into this uh update related to bond, I have one nonbundre related item I just want to bring up. Uh just due to our timing and sequence of meetings in our summer schedule. Uh at Lake Center Elementary School, we're working on a lighting project. Um and this lighting project is one um that will come to the board next month in June. This is a project that would be related to our lighting control systems that are faulting at Lake Center specifically. As you know, the building is now approximately 15 years of age. And the lighting structure that we have in place is now uh getting to the point where we have to keep a large
009amount of light on 24 hours a day, seven days a week without the ability to turn them on. So, we're working with Tower Pinkster. We've worked with them since September. uh to design a new lighting system and we learned that the fluorescent light bulbs will be obsolete in late 2028. So all of the fixtures at Lake Centers are fluorescent lamp lamps and we wanted to uh look at an upgrade to this. This upgrade would be similar to what we're putting in our new elementary schools. Essentially the same uh same components. With that being said, these will be LED and they'll also be cheaper to uh to operate over time. The new system will also offer the ability for our teachers to be able to dim the lights in the classrooms as well as the corridors
010and large spaces. If you've ventured across classrooms in our district, you may sometimes see something over the lights to take a little bit of the shine off of the lights. And so with this upgrade system at Lake Center, this would allow teachers to have more control over lighting in the classrooms that would mirror what we're in the new elementary schools. Uh with that being said, this could be paid for out of our building and site syncing fund budget, which would not impact our general fund. and I will send the recommendation to the board. But I'll talk more in detail about this recommendation at our June meeting just so that the board can be aware that that that it is coming. Now, moving over to our um our construction um at Central L, our site work
011is fully underway. Uh the concrete is being poured around the building and as the slabs of concrete are being poured and the exterior doors are being installed. Um now also we have equipment coming in and being installed on both playgrounds. Uh we have a larger playground for the older students and then we have a small playground near the front of the school for our younger students. Uh you can see those things actually from the street inside the building. The elevator project is ongoing. We have additional furniture arriving. Uh same at Haver Hill. furniture arrive in stages as the building portions start to become more complete then a portion of the furniture delivers uh kind of at a scheduled time. Then also at the current CEL we have uh a third party moving company that have
012already come to the library to help the librarians box up their books that will be transported to the new location. So, we have a lot of moving parts going and by the time we meet again uh in um in June, uh all the students will be gone and all the staff will be gone. But just know that we have a plan in place now for boxing up materials and getting those things transported to the new sites for Central L Herill and Woodland. And over at Woodland, since our last meeting, uh we had our staff walk through which was a couple days after our last meeting. Similar to CEL, the teachers at Haver Hill were extremely impressed uh with the school as they witnessed it. Even though portions of their building is more complete than Central
013L and others are less complete, they still were able to walk through and get a good sense and idea of what they'll be running into or walking into uh in the fall. In terms of projects that are ongoing, again, furniture has begun to arrive. It is arriving in stages. Elevator projects is going, flooring is still going in. And it's amazing the amount of work that's being done on the inside of the building. Uh, and I'm in the building more frequently than others, but even when I walk in, I'm able to see the massive improvements that occur just in one week's time. So, we're really proud of the progress uh, at both schools. So, that concludes my bond project update. Before I move into my next presentation, are there any questions about uh, either the Lake
014Center project or Central or Habit? All right. Great. All right. So, here's the um third portion or the second portion of my uh my presentation. And you should have a copy of this presentation uh at your at your uh leisure. So, want to talk about four things real quick. First, want to talk about our PPS construction history, talk about our phase three progress, what has changed, and some proposed next steps. Just a construction history. Just want to remind the board phase one was our high school work. Uh we passed the bond in 2007 which included a new central high school, a renovated northern high, two new elementary schools which came out to be 12th Street and Lake Center. uh and we address buses and technology and here is aformational flyer from 2007 2015 we call
015that phase two uh we did two new middle schools we replaced the old central middle with the new central middle the same with north middle school we renovated west middle school our plans were to address PCEC uh new athletic spaces buses technology moving over to phase three. Uh our elementary work, uh five new elementary schools, and that's one of the uh advertisements there. Five plus one plus zero equals a bright future. Great tag. Uh five new elementary schools, one renovated elementary school addressing the PCE. And that's on there again because um in phase two, some dollars were shifted around prior to my arrival with West Middle School. And so things with PCE just kind of continue to go down the road. Um and buses technology and addressing solutions overall for curious kids community high. So
016phase three progress what's underway? Uh Central Elementary School will open in the fall of 2025. Habill Elementary School will open fall of 2025 as well. Exciting news for us as well. What is also underway is a Woodland Elementary School that's fully designed. Construction will begin this summer and this will open in the fall of 2007. So roughly it takes two academic schools years uh to complete a total building project. Remaining projects relates to Angland Road Elementary School, Amberly Elementary School. Morris Bridge Elementary is a renovation. So in fairness to Angland Road and Amberly as I went through those last two slides, those are replacements of those buildings as new on their existing sites. Morris Bridge would be a renovation project and ideally a renovation project that we can do over the course of maybe multiple
017summers. And then again the goal is to address PCE which houses two programs curious kids and community high. So, what has changed over time? And here's one thing that's changed. Uh, February 24th, the director of Curious Kids or Early Childhood, Lindseay French, uh, did a nice presentation to the board just to kind of talk about uh, the program, how it currently exists. She also mentioned about some of the shifts that are occurring related to curious kids. and she introduced a term called early childhood education which is a term that we are starting to you use more widely. There has been a statewide emphasis on pre kindergarten for all students and also with early childhood education there's an opportunity for more collaboration with the great start readiness program. It is our understanding that there is a
018high demand in our community for um early education opportunities. What also has changed, PCEC as a building continues to get older. Built in 1951, it's currently 7 74 years old. Uh the building is beyond its expected usage. We've had count countless repairs over the past 10 to 15 years. This summer, we're putting in a new boiler and a roof repair, both of which the board has approved, and we're hoping to get an additional six to seven years at most out of the building. What also has changed, March of 20 was the start of the pandemic. Over the course of the last five years, you'll see instruction cost in K12 education has risen approximately 30%. Also, nice chart here. The first column is the year from 2018 to 2025. The next column is what a 77
019passenger bus has cost over the past seven years. The next column says 3% inflation, which says, hey, if we only had a 3% rate of inflation over the past seven years, what should a 77 passenger bus cost? We're paying $137,000 for a bus and approximately $103,000 if we were to assume what normal rate of inflation would have been. For a lift bus, those are obviously more expensive, $101,000 2018. That cost $160,000 today. But the normal rate of 3% inflation approximately a lift bus should cost us $124,000. All things being equal, this is how that graphic looks. Uh the orange line is the 77 passenger uh line. The uh dotted line or the dash is what inflation would have looked like at 3%. And the solid line is the actual you move to the blue chart
020or the blue line, it is what the dotted line is what an estimated 3% inflation would have costed us versus the actual. So in both cases, there's a gap between what normal inflation would have been versus our actual cost. With all those being said, a 77 passenger bus is 70 64% higher 64% higher over the last seven years. A lift bus is a 59% increase over the past seven years. So here's some proposed next steps. uh look at a continuation in 2025 without raising taxes at all. We could pursue approximately a 132.4 million bond. This would allow us to complete all of our remaining uh projects combined with our remaining 2021 bond funds. This would permit us to address solutions for early childhood education community high potentially the admin building if we need to do
021some renovations or remodeling of any of these other spaces. This would also give us the opportunity to continue to purchase buses as as well as technology. In terms of a timeline, we have been proactive. We have met with the staff at Amberly Elementary School on several occasions just to understand what their school should look and feel like and we've we've we believe that that has been very helpful. Uh on Wednesday we will meet with the Angling Road staff as well as the Morris Bridge staff. When I say we, we're working with Tower Pink and Fielding International, the same group that has um done our first few buildings. We're also partnering with OAK. O helps us with estimations in terms of cost inflation over time. Today is a board presentation. It would be my hope or
022desire that we consider a board resolution. A board resolution is what authorizes us as a school district to put a uh ballot together for the voters. Uh November 4th, uh which would be an opportunity to do a bond vote. And obviously we can talk about absentee ballots and all that stuff. And then this would give us the ability to proceed to wrap together all of the completion of what we said in phase phase three, identify our needs under uh early childhood community high as well and then finally be able to uh continue to purchase buses as well as technology. So that concludes my presentation and I want to pause and give the board an opportunity to ask questions on on this presentation. very clear, Johnny, on what's been done and what still needs to be
023done and how we're going to get there. So, thank you very much for that update. Appreciate it. Right. And I mean, we've been kind of talking about this, right, a little bit for a number of years after that inflation, right, spike hit and and you all needed some time to work a plan together um to try to give us some more predictability on on the costs and the um so whenever we've talked about this, the the trustes eyes always light up with getting all of our staff and kids in air conditioning in air conditioned envir environment. Okay. Um, and so I mean, so that's that's one piece that has appealed to us and it's and it was always a little awkward that the PCE had not been included. Um, that I mean that still would
024have been a of an old environment. So I'm glad to see that we're thinking about those folks, too. I mean that's a that facility that's an old chestnut, but that's it's just hanging on. It's Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. And speaking of air conditioning, as we have not fully defined the full scope of Morris Bridge, uh, one of the number one requirements is whenever we renovate that building has to be fully air conditioned. Yeah, that's within our scope intentions. We've been very fortunate that, you know, our tax base has continued to grow and that we can, you know, complete all the projects that we wanted to that we identified back in 2018 uh without raising the tax rate. So, that's a really uh good position to be in for any district. Thank you, sir. Thank you. That's
025it for my section. We'll move to our comments and communication section and bario will read our guidelines for public comment. Public comment at board meetings. Board of education meetings are held for the purpose of conducting the business of the school district. The board recognizes the importance of letting the public express themselves on district matters and welcome community input at our board meetings. To pit permit fair and orderly public expression, please conform to these guidelines when addressing the board. Attendees must register their intention to speak during the public participation portion of the meeting by completing the speaker registration form at the beginning of the meeting. Individuals may not register others to speak. Speakers will be recognized by the presiding officer and may not be called in the order in which they have signed up to speak.
026Speakers are requested to state their name, address, and group affiliation if applicable. Limit comments to three minutes. Direct all comments to the board and not to staff or other participants. Speakers may not yield any of their speaking time to others. Provide a written copy of your comments and supporting documentation to the board secretary if available. Present your comments in a respectful and courteous manner to model the behavior expected of portage students. Refrain from mentioning any student or individual by name. Contact the superintendent directly regarding personnel matters. The board has a legal obligation to protect the due process rights of students and employees. Typically, concerns raised by speakers during public comment are best addressed through the established chain of command. Board policy delegates resolution of operational concerns to the superintendent for further action. Thank you, Terry.
027And we welcome our first speaker tonight, Sarah. Great. Welcome. Thank you. Hi, guys. I am here uh as Cat Frank tonight. So, I'm your representative from the Portage Education Association here to present some good stories from our students all around the district. A little something uplifting for you guys. Um, first, this is entirely self- serving because I'm wildly excited about it, but 10 art teachers at all different teaching levels throughout the district have collectively received thousands of dollars for a group grant from Education for the Arts to be able to attend the National Art Education Association conference in 2026. because for once it's not on the west coast, it's in Chicago. So, lowest possible cost. We're going to get over there while we can. And then I have I think I'll probably um share this
028with with Atkinson here. Um a really wonderful document from our speech language pathologist head who's um our one of our speech path workers, Heather Hudson, who's out of Haver Hill, and she assembled just some really wonderful things tonight. I'm going to abbreviate a little bit so I don't keep you here all evening but some of the anecdotes that she shared are from uh these are from the perspective of our SLPs our speech and language pathologists. Um and this is no you know no names no buildings even. So this is cross cross district at all levels. Um first she shares a once completely unintelligible third grade student is now completely understood by his teachers and peers. A kindergarten student has uttered her peers names for the first time, the names of children around her. A kindergartener
029who was previously difficult to understand achieved all of her articulation goals by first grade and is now back reading at benchmark. A student who once relied on a handful of hand signs has now embraced an electronic communication device and has far surpassed his goal of 25 words. He now uses over a hundred words on this electronic communication device. And a second grader who is new to the school um who needed this says handholding to travel the school with fears that she might um elope. Uh it's the formal term for when a student you know does a runner um wasn't uh she was um now walking independently in the hall using two to three words to communicate and can be trusted to get from point A to point B with no concern on administration's part. and
030a third grade student who also uses an electronic device to communicate for the first time in his life volunteered to share with his peers during a show and tell using this electronic communication device. And last, she asked me to share this is a note straight from a parent. Um, you have done so much for me and my child. For me, it means the world to me. I felt so lost after I lost my parents and here comes this school. Insert school names here. You guys have changed my future. So, who do I ask so I can explain how amazing you are? It's me. Here we go. I needed a person like you guys in my life. I think you deserve an award and to be recognized for how well you work with students and how
031you go above and beyond to support your students and their parents. Um, and she also breaks this down into some really wonderful um, not statistics necessarily, but growth areas specifically. So, I'll be sure to share that with you guys so that you can um, appreciate it. And just she deserves a raise. I'm going to have her rewrite my resume. This is gorgeous. Um, and then last time I shared anecdotal story from my high school and I thought I'd do the same again. Um, and a little bit of levity or um, positivity. Um, I have a student who we always the art teachers end up with students who just accumulate. We'll be down there and we'll be like, it's it's this is my planning period. Why are you here? And where did your shoes go? Like,
032you know, they just end up down there. And one of my favorite students this year was just down there. And it happened to be my lunch period. She was down there and she wasn't even eating. She was just like down there working on something while I had my lunch. And as I watch it was taco salad Tuesday, right? Um, an underassman, the gal I'm hanging out with as an upper classman, walks past in the hallway carrying her beautiful bowl of taco salad and trips and the taco salad becomes her clothing. Like she is like, it's bad. It's really, really bad. And I watch this upper level student in my class who does not know this underassman go out in the hallway, clean her up, clean my floor up, give her her sweater so she can
033wear a clean top, and then find $5 so the gal can go back to the cafeteria and buy herself a new taco. No connection between these two kids. I just watched this kid walk out to this hallway stranger and do that. And I was I'm sitting there eating my lunch like America like it's all going to be fine. So I thought I would share that with you guys. Just a little positive slice from inside as well. And on a personal note as I finish here um I'm going to sit back down. I just want to say uh thank you to all the work the board has done to continue the three-year teacher contract that the ported education association teachers have with you. I know I've been teaching for 13 years and I know what my
034paychecks are going to be in September. I cannot tell you how wonderful a feeling that is and I just really want to say thank you. I know that um those negotiations are often fraught or fractious and um I know it's a lot of work on the part of administration and it feels it feels really really good as someone who's had summers that have been through to October with no contract and as someone who's had summers with contract I just want to say thank you from the bottom of my heart. So all right appreciate it. I'm out. Sir, is that the handout for us? This is actually um I have it only in digital. This is the minutes. Okay. But we'll get it with is that email to me and then I'll forward. Okay, perfect. Yeah.
035Okay. That's great. Thank you for coming tonight. Appreciate it. Thank you guys. Share. Uh our next speaker tonight is Matt Stury. Welcome. Good evening. Sec uh good evening uh Superintendent Belang, members of the board. Um I thank you for the opportunity to speak to you. Uh, my name is Matt Stury. I reside at 4633 Bicklton Woods Drive in Portage. I'm a parent to six children, five who have graduated from Portage Central High School. I've been married for 40 years to Denell Sturdy herself, a graduate of Portage Central High School and a teacher within the district. Dell would be here this evening. Uh but she is has a choir concert where literally 100 voices will speak for Portage Public Schools in our community. Right now I have a concern that the community does not appear to
036be represented by the actions of the board in not moving Eric Albertus' candidacy forward in the interview process. We the stakeholders, parents, teachers, and community members would like to know if the board has reviewed the hundreds of online comments and support for Eric. Um, and what has has and and the paperwork that was turned in following the interview the interview process. Um, no disrespect to Secretary Belang, but in the 35 years that I've lived in Portage, I can't remember the enthusiasm about a a prospective superintendent candidacy. Um, people were downright excited and optimistic about Eric bringing the same dedication and passion uh to the entire district to lead us forward that he's brought to Borage Central High School. Eric has a long history with the district and I believe it's unparalleled in comparison to other
037candidates. I believe that he knows this district better than even many of you. I think he showed real courage in the interview process in speaking about the dark times of Port Schools in 2008 when Port Central High School was known as Heroin High. I lived that I had children here and this is not a part of our past that I want to see us return to and I know and I know none of you do either. Um, I think that, um, I think that I I think that in in not dealing just with the with the pretty facade of Portage Schools, um, Eric has shown that he is connected with our past. He knows our present and he knows where we need to go in our future. Normally, I would be sitting at Portage at
038Portage Northern High School tonight uh listening to my wife's concert, but having these words shared with you, I thought was much more important in celebrating her students and their achievements. In the spring of this year, my wife casted the musical at West Middle School. She was two weeks into into the rehearsal process and she reconsidered the casting of that event. It took courage for her to question the decision she had already made. I'm asking you tonight to think about Eric's interview process. If there was any portion of his comments that were omitted, anything that was neglected in his consideration, I'm urging you to have that same courage and thought process. It's not my my comments tonight are not based on my affinity for Eric. My comments tonight are based upon decades of watching his his
039managerial and his administrative skills and his and his passion for the children of the of of Portage Community Schools. I thank all of you respectfully for the opportunity to address the board tonight. Thank you. Thank you. Thanks for dropping your comments and thanks for speaking, Mr. Thank you very much. Thank you. And thank and thank you for and thank you for your service to our community. Thank you. Our next speaker this evening is Bethany Mezer. Welcome. Thank you. I'm here tonight to address some serious concerns with the eighth grade horror unit or twisting expectations since the unit is receiving a different name to hide behind. This unit was requested to be reviewed, a review that was put off until long after the unit had ended. After being denied access to the review, a foyer request
040had to be filed for us to even see it. Where is the transparency here? Beyond that, there are so many problems and concerns with this review, this unit, and its stories that this will only scratch the surface. Number one, meeting standards. This is a constant referral to how these texts meet standards, making it sound as if this is a difficult thing to do. And that is an that it is an amazing thing that these texts can meet them. I can tell you with certainty that that is not even remotely true. Anyone could type a standard into Google and it would generate books with lesson plans that meet any one of these standards. Given how many texts can meet these, it's not about standards, but rather about whether forcing eighth graders to spend weeks on fearinducing
041and morally reprehensible unit is in the best interest of the students. Two, a review member said if a student is uncomfortable with a moment in a text, they have the power to shut the book instead of a movie or other type of exposure where you may not be as safe. If they were reading this on their own time, they could choose to close the book if it made them feel uncomfortable or if they didn't like it. However, these texts are classroom assignments and they cannot just walk away from them. These readings are being forced on the eighth grade students regardless of whether they are comfortable with them or not. Also, do we honestly expect a teen, excuse me, a teen to share that they are uncomfortable in a classroom full of peers? Teens don't want
042to admit that something makes them uncomfortable or that they don't want to continue with something when their friends are sitting with them acting perfectly at ease. They don't want to be teased or bullied for feeling differently. How is this even a response to something that is required and not set aside as an elective course? Yes, some people choose to read those things on their own because they enjoy them. But there are many others who would much rather avoid these types of stories altogether. Three, a review member said these stories are not intended to promote or glorify characters actions, but rather to prompt critical thinking and discussion about authoral choices, societal issues, and human behavior. Talking about intent without looking at impact is an egregious error. While the supposed intent of the story may be academic,
043that is not what the students will focus on. The impact of these stories instead is normalizing murder. Almost every story includes murder. How are we comfortable teaching this to teens? But at the same time, we are worried about school shootings and increased instances of violence in our schools. Violence breeds more violence and this unit contributes to that by normalizing the heinous act of murder. There is also the favorite phrase of windows, mirrors, and sliding glass doors. Are these really are there really people out there that are completely unfased with children seeing themselves in the eyes of a murderer? Or even worse, that they would be okay with those same kids stepping into the shoes of a murderer. That is a horrifying thought. I wouldn't want any of the hundreds of children and teens that I
044have worked with to ever be put in the position of having to stone their own mother, become demonpossessed, or be so enraged over something so minor that that they thought that poisoning someone was the answer. I would hate to think that teachers are asking students to empathize with murderers. Please consider what is truly in the best interest of these students because this isn't it. Thank you. Thank you, Bethany. Do we have your comments? Yes, I'll share them with you tomorrow. Okay. Okay, good. Uh, our next speaker is Lindsay Zerver. Welcome. Thank you. Thank you. I am here this evening to voice my concerns regarding the eighth grade horror fiction unit. My son will be an eighth grader in the fall. He is extremely advanced in both math and ELA, yet he will not be taking
045part in this grossly inappropriate unit. Included as the unit introduction material for students is a YouTube video titled, "Why is it so fun to be scared?" It states, "Experiencing horror through movies and books can leave you quote feeling pain-free and energized while not getting caught up in worrisome thought. This response is similar to what we experience in high arousal states like excitement and during sex." End quote. Knowing that middle schoolers are more prone to making reckless decisions, we are essentially telling them that exposing themselves to literature that contains violence and murder can make them feel good. This is irresponsible and could lead to far-reaching consequences in the future for these impressionable kids. Is it fitting with PPS mission statement to teach students that violence and murder can bring enjoyment? In the reconsideration paperwork for this
046unit, the meeting notes state that PPS admin wanted to change the name of the unit and have since reached out to fish tank to have them do just that. Is this the transparency that PPS officials claim to have? Now that parents know about the concerns in this unit, we will hide it under a different name. For a district that claims to be open to discussion, every time a concern has been raised, it has been met with more restrictive policies and a change in procedure to further hide their actions from the community. Finally, most of the stories included in this unit contain violence, murder, and graphic descriptions that as an adult I would not choose to read. The students, however, do not have a choice. They cannot simply walk out of the room if they find
047the material disturbing material such as the following from behind Colin's eyes. The body is ripped in half with its endrails completely scooped out. Its neck is sliced with stringy muscle and cartilage pulled out through the slit. The mouth gapes. Both eyeballs are missing and all four hooves have been ripped off. Or the following. I giggle under my breath. I'm 10 and three4s old, but I got two real guns myself. I can't hold in my laughter after I read a panel where a white cowboy yells, "Great Scott Indians." before an arrow ruptures his organs. Or the selection from Click Clack the Rattle Bag that states, "Click Clacks drink you. First they bite you and then you go allshy inside and all your meat and all your brains and your skin turns into a wel a wet
048milkshaky stuff. Then it sucks it out through the holes where your eyes used to be. Once you're just bones and skin, they hang you up on a hook and you rattle in the wind. As a teacher, I have had several students that have experienced the trauma of a loved one being violently murdered, including siblings and parents. children that were witnesses to every shout, violent abuse, and gunshot. At a young age, they have had their lives forever marked by violence and pain most of us have never seen. It is heartbreaking to think they will sit in one of these classrooms and be forced to relive that trauma by a school system that claims to do what is best for them. Why is this district fighting so hard to protect ink and paper over the well-being of
049the children? It's time to put the children first. Thank you. Thank you. Do I have your comments as well? Okay, very good. Thank you. Thank you. Um, we now move to comments from board trustees, graduations this week and next week and look forward to all of that. sinks, complete a major milestone and have a fun evening and see parents and bees. So, the fruits of many people's labors for sure. Thank you, Terry. Seems like we're seeing a lot of each other in typical month of May with some extra meetings for for various reasons and graduations and uh my thanks for the extra time today in the retreat. Um, good stuff. Sometimes quiling over a word um in a policy, but um important stuff. Thanks both. Anyone else? Okay. Um we'll move to our consent agenda
050on page seven. Uh we have some minutes to approve the May 5th, 2025 committee of the whole work session. The May 7, 2025 special meeting and close session. the May 14th, 2025 special meeting, the May 15, 2025 special meeting. Um, we also have the Chartwell contract renewal. Um, we've been asked to approve the contract with Chartwell School Dining for Food Service Management through June 30, 2030 and authorize the director of finance to execute all necessary agreement. We've been asked to approve the purchase of durable bound classroom sets for ELA elementary early adapter classrooms from bound to state bound not not to exceed the total amount of 94,725.30 the funds for which will come from the 30 section 35J professional development curriculum and supports grant. And finally that we approve as presented the revisions to operational
051policies 5320 immunizations 5330.01 epinephrine auto injectors and finally policy 55 5350 student health well-being and suicide prevention and all those items were reviewed with us at our last meeting. Are there any exceptions to the consent agenda as presented? Hearing none, the consent agenda is approved. And uh now we're moving over to page 24, which is approval of monitoring report 1.1. This was presented to us uh earlier in the year and uh it's here to be uh approved this evening. Is there a motion, please, on page 24? Mr. President, I move that the board of education accept monitoring report 1.1 global lands as a reasonable interpretation and evidence of compliance with policy. Thanks, Mark. Is there a second? Second. Thank you, Terry. Any discussion? Randy, I would just say quickly um I was I think I
052was probably the one who said let's pull it off and take some more time with it. And we spent a lot of time with it. So, um Mark, thank you for your your patience with that. And to my colleagues on the board, thank you. And I um appreciated the discussions. Thanks for those comments, Bo. Anyone else? I appreciate the discussion we had on it this evening especially more so I mean all the discussions that we've had but this evening where we talked about acknowledging the um impeccable uh production of the report while acknowledging that we don't necessarily need to like the results in the report um knowing that it was put together with such quality uh is excellent. Thank you. Thanks, Kimberly. Anyone else? You know, if I could have a second bite at the
053apple. So, right. So, you're you're being more specific here. And so um it's so I mean just a quick recap a lot of that discussion is you know what's the right role for us as a board to try to set the expectations higher when things are already good and how do we do that appropriately and express um support uh you know for the superintendent but try to articulate a fair but higher bar for future performance for the district and and that's tricky to do and it's a balance. There's a balance to that. Um and it just it takes a lot of dialogue and I think we're we're largely there but you know we'll have more conversations but for me it's exciting. Um I I mean I think you know we should be advocating for higher
054performance but things are this is a good school district so it is. So we have to balance we have to balance how we do that. And I I agree. Um we're we're pushing for very very high standards here because we value our children. Thank you. Anyone else? Okay. Then all those in favor of approving monetary report 1.1, please say I. I. Opposed. Uh the motion passes and we'll now remove to go to page 25, excuse me, required action item to approve the K reset 202526 general education fund budget. Uh if you recall, it was presented to us our last meeting. Is there a motion, please? On page 25. Mr. President, I move that the board of education approve the resolation resolution. Wrong one. I apologize. Page 25. 25. We'll get here. Thank you. I move
055that the board of education adopt the resolution provided indicating support of the Kresa general education fund budget for the 2025 2026 school year. Second the motion. Thank you. Is there any discussion? All those in favor, please say I. I. Opposed. The motion passes. The budget is approved. And now we have another action item, the K rate bianial election resolution on page um 32. U Mary Lou Roar has um agreed to be our delegate and cast that vote for us on June 2nd and we are looking for an alternate this evening so we can pass this motion. June 2nd at 55 5:30 something like that there for one second right I can be an alternate very good both thank you with that said is there a motion please I can do it In Mr. President, I
056move that the board of education approve the resolution designated the district's electoral representative as Mary Lou Rur and alternate as Bose Snider and direct set of individuals to cast a vote on at least the first ballot on behalf of this board for candidates David Webster and James Devers at Kelu Reese's June 725 bianial election. Thank you Kimberly. Is there a second? Second. Thank you Terry. Any discussion? All those in favor, please say I. I. Opposed. The motion passes. And we'll move to our first discussion item, which is the custodial services contract extension. Welcome back, Johnny. Thank you, Randy. It is my recommendation that the board of education approve a two-year extension of the custodial services contract with GRVS or Grand Rapids building services in the amount of [Music] $2,334,900 per year for the next two
057academic school years which would be 2526 then also 2627. Uh GRBS is a third-party provider that provides uh services for cleaning in different uh indust industries including education. We've partnered with them over the past 15 years. We have a hybrid staffing model which means we have PPS custodians that work directly for PPS and then we also have uh GRBS custodians who primarily work our second shift and some element of our third. this increase in our cost uh with our current rate it's approximately $2.2 million a year now. So this increase in cost is within a typical range given the rate of inflation. There is uh an increase in base wage and an increase due to the earned sick time act which went into into effect February 21st Michigan. Uh the third and final increase is
058related to uh is increased square footage of cleaning attributed to our new central elementary school which is approximately 21,000 square ft more than the current uh building. So those are kind of like the three reasons why uh our cost for the contract is more than what it was that we signed uh two years ago. And um copy of the addendum is below. You can see that for yourself there and I'll be happy to answer any questions of the board. Any questions for Danny? Thank you. You did too good a job. Thank you very much. Uh our next discussion item is the student Chromebook purchase. Ryan, evening, Superintendent Feling, trustees. Last but not least, right? So, tonight I recommend that the board of education approve the purchase of 1,000 student Chromebooks and licensing from Zigh Computer
059Products uh in the amount not to exceed $290,460. The funds for the Chromebooks, the actual devices, uh, which would be the amount of $260,460 would come from the 2023 bond fund, while the licensing, uh, $30,000 will come from the 2526 general fund budget. This recommendation is represents the annual purchase or refresh uh that we go through each year to sustain our onetoone device program in in the district. Typically what we do is we look at the numbers of rising uh freshmen. So, our current eighth grade class, we look at that group and we forecast right around one device per student there plus a little bit more. As we get more students, as they come and go, as enrollment changes, the remaining of the devices go down to the elementary school. So, we're still seeing about
060a five-year life cycle on Chromebooks. And a lot of that has to do with availability of the parts that we have because accidents happen and the devices aren't forever devices. As we know, the other limiting factor has been state the state the requirements, the minimum device requirements for state testing. And so that will eventually get a device that's otherwise useful and still has life left and renders that basically useless for the for the purposes of state testing. And so we find other uses for those devices. They could be backups. They could be, you know, a borrow. they can go down into certain classrooms, but they can't be used for state testing. So, we do share our Chromebooks with other schools as best we can. Uh, the other issues or the other things I wanted to
061highlight is that we're sticking with the HPG series Chromebooks. Those have been the best for parts. They've been the most reliable device. They're not the cheapest one on the list. They're not the most expensive. They're kind of the workhorse that have worked for us for several years in a And because we have those in stock, often we can borrow and beg and steal from different parts of different things and you end up with a Frankenstein Chromebook that works just fine for state testing, but all good. Uh, so the these Chromebooks are available on the REMC bids save process, so we didn't have to go out to formal bid. I might have uh forgot to mention that Seh High Computer Products is the vendor for a specific device this time around. uh would be appreciated if
062we could approve those tonight to get the ordering and get those devices on the way if you're comfortable with that. Uh if you did not see the pricing information, I think I included that, but I have that in case you need that. Any questions that you might have, be happy to answer that. I just find it frustrating as I assume so do you that state testing requirements um it means it doesn't matter how what good of care students take with it they become obsolete despite our best efforts and the the way that that works the vendors also understand that they need to make sure that their devices are competitive that way and so it it ends up working against us a little bit in that aspect. Thank you, Ryan. Um, is uh there interest on
063the part of the board moving this forward tonight? Great. Then we need a a motion to bring this item to action. President, I move that we move the student Chromebook purchase discussion into action. Thank you, Emily. Second. Thank you, Terry. Any discussion? All those in favor, please say I. I. And now we need a motion to do it. President Vanamperp, I move to approve the purchase of a thousand student Chromebooks and licensing from Seigh Computer Products in an amount not to exceed $290,460. The funds for which will come from the 2023 bond funds in the amount of $260,460 for the Chromebooks and from the general fund budget in the amount of $30,000 for the licensing. Thank you, Terry. Is there a second? Second. Thanks, Mark. Any discussion? All in favor, please say I. I. The
064motion passes, sir. Thank you very much. Thanks, everyone. Um, trustees, please remember to get your uh board self assessments into me. And with that, we've completed our agenda. Thank you.