Oxford Schools Board of Education: 3/24/26

001education meeting. If you could all rise for the pledgece 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. >> Thank you. Mike, in the absence of James, would you mind taking attendance? >> Sure. President Mcdana >> here. >> Vice President Whitney here. Secretary Summers absent. Treasurer Gibson >> here. Trustee Aldren >> here. Trustee Aes >> here. >> Trustee Capjourney >> here. Thank you. Any changes to the board agenda? I'd like to uh move to add the approval of Annerson's registration for MASB CBA 370 the live online course to number 7A on the agenda. Support Shane. Thank you. Any discussion? All those in favor? I. >> Any opposed? Thank you. And item three, scheduled public comment. We

002do not have any this evening. Correct. Thank you. And item four, our consent agenda if anyone would like to make that motion. >> I can move to approve the consent agenda as presented. >> Support Shane. Thank you. Any discussion? All those in favor? >> I. Any opposed? One name. All right. Item number five, what we are all here for, our teacher recognition. Thank you. Okay. Good evening, members of the board, Dr. Milligan, families, friends. Thank you so much for being here this evening. Tonight is one of my favorite nights of the year as we take the time to recognize such welldeserved individuals here in front of the board of education. Before we introduce our honores, I want to recognize a vital community partner who helps make this celebration possible each year. We are joined tonight

003by Mr. Matt Beasley of the Beasley Insurance Agency. Matt, thank you for your incredible generosity and for providing special gifts to each of our five award winners tonight. We truly appreciate your ongoing commitment to our staff and schools. If we can give a round of applause for Mr. Beasley. So this evening we celebrate five professionals who haven't just done their jobs, they've gone above and beyond to shape the lives of students. To give you a true sense of their impact, I'll be sharing brief excerpts from each honores application, the very same narratives that have been sent forward for consideration for the county level teacher and staff of the year awards. So at this time I'd like to invite the board of education, Dr. Milligan and Mr. Beasley to the stage all the way up. It's

004official. Yes. Okay. Thank you. So, I will begin this evening at the foundation with Miss Melanie Gans. Melanie lives embrace the mission of our great start readiness program at the Oxford Early Learning Center. Melanie is known as an indispensable teammate, always stepping up in support of her colleagues. In her classroom, Melanie turns highle instruction into joyful hands-on play. By skillfully embedding literacy and math into every daily routine, she creates a space where our youngest learners feel safe and excited to learn. Melanie, the trusting relationships you build set the tone for their entire educational journey. So, please join me in recognizing Melanie Gans as our early childhood teacher of the year. >> Oh, there's some We can go that way. >> Oh, yeah. Did you get one? Okay, moving to the elementary level, we have a

005recipient whose impact is best described by one of her students, Peter, who shared that Miss Wckle is the best because she makes learning an adventure. Whether it's phonics boot camp, where students exercise while mastering their words, or hands-on science experiments, Valerie Wel makes every lesson feel like an event. She fosters independence through book clubs and partner work. And she is her students biggest cheerleader, constantly reminding them that they are the best class in the school. Please join me in recognizing Mrs. Valerie Wckl as our elementary teacher of the year. CONGRATULATIONS. At the middle school level, we recognize an educator who is truly student centered and solutions focused. Laura Wilson doesn't just teach art. She invites her students into a purposeful creative process that celebrates every individual voice. Mrs. Wilson is a master of high expectations

006paired with high support, ensuring every artist feels seen. Beyond her studio, she is a mentor to our elementary art teachers and a vital collaborator, recently co-leading a remarkable cross-curricular unit with our choir department. Laura, thank you for making Oxford a more vibrant place. Please join me in recognizing Mrs. Laura Wilson as our middle school teacher of the year. Okay, moving on to high school. So, as our students prepare for the world beyond our walls, Dana Brewer teaches them how to move through it with confidence and discipline. Mrs. Brewer balances physical rigor with deep emotional empathy. She invests the time to truly know her dancers, their goals, their worries, and their stories. Because they feel safe in her studio, they are willing to take risks and persist through difficult choreography. Dana is a visionary who designs

007pieces that are accessible for beginners yet deeply challenging for advanced dancers. Please join me in honoring Mrs. Dana Brewer, our high school teacher of the year. Congratulations. Okay. Our final recognition this evening goes to the heartbeat of Oxford High School, Mrs. Stephanie Seph Chef Sik. As one of the primary points of contact for the building, Stephanie is the face of OS, ensuring every visitor's first impression is marked by professionalism and genuine warmth. Beyond that grading, Stephanie manages the highstakes details that keep a school running safely. From student attendance to the vital oversight of health records and medications, Steph, your deep-seated care for this community creates an environment that is organized, safe, and supportive for all. Stephanie, please come forward as our support staff person of the year. Congratulations. Let's give it up one more time

008for Stephanie. If I could have all of the honores back for one last group photo with Mr. Beasley and the board of education. All right. Ready? Oh. So, please join me in one final round of applause for these five incredible individuals. Thank you, Ryan. And thank you once again for our teachers and support staff of the year. You are truly the best of Oxford, and we appreciate you so, so very much. I know you're probably all not dying to stay here for the rest of this. So, we'll take a three, four minute break, and anybody who would like to leave, feel free to do so. Thank you. >> All right, it is 6:53 and we will bring this back into session >> and it'll rain it back in and uh start out with our superintendent

009report with Dr. Milligan. >> Here we go. >> All right. Good evening everyone. As usual, I will ground us in our strategic plan. So, our vision empowering learners, building community, and inspiring futures. Our mission provide providing a supportive, safe and opportunity rich educational experience that fosters belonging, builds self-empowerment, and prepares learners to contribute to a connected community. Our core values: empowerment, belonging, innovation, and integrity. In my update this evening, um I have a handful of specific updates I'd like to share. Uh I'll share some school and department highlights. We have Mr. Barless here and his team for the crossroads day school presentation. Um we have Gary Vanstvern with the strategic plan goal one update and uh we have our safety update from Dr. Willleman. So starting with some updates. Uh first thing is um the

010unfortunate situation that happened in West Bloomfield. We of course are deeply saddened by those events that happened at Temple Israel and West Bloomfield. Our thoughts are with those affected, their families, and the broader community. just given an some insight into how we respond in those situations. Once we're informed, we immediately follow our communication protocols to ensure families know that our students are safe and that the school day was proceeding as normal. We also stayed in contact with the Oakland County Sheriff's Office for guidance and updates. While our district maintains strong safety protocols every day, we implemented additional precautionary measures to further support the safety of students and staff. These included increased monitoring of exterior areas via cameras, enhanced external patrols, alerts to our sec security team, and ongoing communication with all principles. We also coordinated

011closely with our OCSO, substation commander, and school resource officers. Safety remains our top priority and we will continue working closely with law enforcement to maintain a secure and supportive learning environment. For community sport support, we have a list of resources available on our OCS website under support and wellness resources. In terms of administrative reorganization, as a part of our ongoing work to strengthen Oxford Community Schools, we have posted a position for curriculum director. This new leadership role is made possible through natural retirements and an internal administrative reorganization. This is a budgetneutral change and does not require additional district funds. The curriculum director will support teachers and enhance classroom instruction insur ensuring our curriculum is aligned, innovative, and responsive to student needs. This role allows educators to focus on teaching and learning while benefiting from added

012instructional guidance and leadership. This is an important step in maintaining a strong, stable leadership team dedicated to student and staff success. An update for the citizen school finance committee. I do want to remind our community about the citizen school finance group uh formed to strengthen communication and transparency around district finances. The group provides a direct line of communication between our finance team and the community offering clear financial information and space for ongoing dialogue about community priorities. We have our first meeting April 15th from 4:30 to 6 p.m. at OEIC and any community members that are interested in participating may still email info@ oxfordschools.org. Finally, an update at the middle school environmental mitigation. Um the um note uh for our community, we have posted two detailed memos from our environmental partner TEC on our website for

013full transparency. They're linked up there because they're a little tricky to get to on our website. You have to go to um documents building um and grounds and then continue digging down. So I just went ahead and put a link there as long as well as a QR code. Um, and it was also in the Monday memo, so our board has it as well. So, first, regarding room 109 at Oxford Middle School, the planned carpet replacement is now scheduled for June 2026. This timeline allows us to safely work around existing cables and classroom technology. Recent environmental testing showed no elevated moisture or visible mold. While very low levels of common airborne fungi were detected, they remain within safe ranges. A HEPA air purifier has been installed in the room and is effectively maintaining safe air

014quality. Staff will continue to monitor and report any concerns. Second, related to air filtration across the district, we have selected MV 13 filters for our school HVAC systems. These filters are highly effective at capturing smaller airborne particles and improving overall air quality. Based on testing, airborne chemical levels in our buildings are already very low. So, carbon filters would not provide meaningful additional benefit. We are also ensuring all filters are properly fitted and that our systems are wellmaintained to operate efficiently and safely. We will continue to keep the board and the community informed. And again, the full memos are available for review on our website at those links or QR codes. Some highlights from our schools at Lakeville. March is reading month. Even in PE, favorite book characters left a coded message for students in PE

015class. All students dribbled across America to unlock letters and decode the secret message, which was, "We love reading so much." Miss Wood's class is giving back to our community. They recently visited Oxford Beehive Care Center to play games and sing songs with the residents. We are so proud of our students for spreading so much joy. At OES, our fifth graders had a very successful capstone night. The capstone project is a culminating experience that allows students to showcase the knowledge and skills they've developed from kindergarten through fifth grade. Through this project, students explore a passion, interest, or issue, applying their learning in meaningful ways. During Capstone night, students present in classrooms across the building, demonstrating their ability to research, think critically, and communicate effectively while informing or persuading their audience about a topic that matters to

016them. Outside of the capstone project, um we had a GA art gallery uh displayed self-portraits made in art class. Capstone night not only demonstrates the skills students acquire in the classroom but also in art, music, and language. These portraits demonstrate their skills in art. On the right hand side, that's St. Patrick's Day. The OES fourth grade students welcome DTE for an interactive lesson on sustainability. Through hands-on activities, students learn practical ways to conserve energy and water while reinforcing key science concepts like resource management and energy transformation. It was a great opportunity to connect classroom learning to real world environmental stewardship. Also at OES, they had held math Olympics. Our students recently took part in a schoolwide measurement math Olympics transforming challenging math standards into a fun high energy competition. As they rotated through events like

017the Javelin slide, long jump, alpine slide, and shopput, students applied their learning by converting units, calculating averages, and graphing real time data. This hands-on experience helped bridge the gap between abstract concepts and real world applications. And congratulations to Miss Horton at OEES for being the support p support staff member of the year. Miss Horton is a dedicated and resilient professional who brings passion and excellence to everything she does. She goes be beyond com completing tasks, consistently moving work forward with focus and determination. No matter the challenges of the day, her perseverance and commitment make a lasting impact on our school community. At the middle school, we are thrilled to announce that Mrs. Kina has been honored as the MS support person of the year. As a dedicated pair professional, Mrs. Kina has consistently demonstrated unwavering

018commitment and support to our students and staff. Thank you, Mrs. Kemina, for your dedication and for making a nurturing and inspiring place for everyone. On the right hand side, Oxford Middle School students recently participated in the Detroit Symphony Orchestra Civic Youth Ensemble's Honor Band Day. Throughout the day, they worked alongside professional DSO musicians building skills in technique, musicianship, and ensemble performance. The experience concluded with a live concert at Orchestra Hall where students showcase their hard work and talent. This memorable opportunity allowed them to grow as musicians while performing in one of Michigan's premier venues. We are celebrating our MS Oakland County wrestling champs Carter Curtis, Jack Margraphth, and Lucas Eldridge. Their leadership fueled an undefeated dual season, the Waterford Ketering team title, and second of 31 at uh 31 teams at in Oakland County. Now

019on to Ova. Our community vendor electives give students the chance to move beyond the digital classroom. Partnering with local experts and community hubs, students earn academic credit through hands-on in-person labs, turning lessons into experiences they can live. They can live from analyzing the physics of a bowling strike to exploring nutrition in a professional kitchen. Students apply classroom concepts in real world settings. This approach transforms screen time into meaningful lifetime, combining mentorship with access to industry standard environments that a traditional classroom can't match. At Collier Lane's team sports, bowling students dive into the mechanics of the game. Coach Chad guides them through engineering, material science, and physic principles that affect a ball's trajectory. Students track their progress, set goals, and apply science to strategy. Learning that success comes from skill, strategy, and self-improvement, not just practice.

020My slides are a little out of order, so I'm going to skip this one and I'll go back to it. The OVA Freedom Kitchen. In our culinary expressions electives at Freedom Kitchen, students learn from expert instructor Lisa Jenza to go beyond recipes while crafting Italian Amaretti Cookies. They're really gaining independence, courage, and critical thinking, learning to move past processed foods and take control of their own nutrition. The curriculum connects the natural world to the modern marketplace. Students explore environmental science through pollinators and local honey. Practice nutritional literacy by identifying additives and tuning into natural hunger cues. And cultivate an entrepreneurial mindset by learning to grow food and explore food-based business opportunities. Through this partnership, OVA students aren't just cooking. They're developing the skills to lead healthy, self-sufficient lives. And congratulations to Mr. Peruse Gee. Um

021he is an irreplaceable treasure at Oxford Community School. Since joining the district in 1995, Neil has served at Daniel Axford Elementary, Lakeville Elementary, Oxford Middle School, and for the past five years as a school improvement and data facilitator at OVA. He will be retiring in June. And while he will be deeply missed, his lasting impact and legacy on our school community will endure. Congratulations, Neil. And that concludes my updates. I now invite uh Mr. Todd Baras up for his Crossroads Day School presentation. >> Good evening. It's good to see you all tonight. So, it's been a while. Um, real quick, it's my honor to present uh an update on Crossroads uh day school tonight uh for all of you. I appreciate my staff that are here this evening. Uh much of our successes uh at

022Crossroads Day School uh are attributed directly to them as you'll see as we kind of go through the slides this evening. So, uh presentation overview that I'd like to just share. Um we want to go over the history of Camp Oakland and our partnership as a district. Uh I want to kind of go over our crossroads staff, uh provide some 2526 updates, as well as uh folks on our students, their academic progress, some of our local data, uh which includes star screening and progress monitoring that we're doing with them. We want to go over some points of pride uh for Oxford Crossroads Day School in the form of pictures. And then uh we're going to focus a little bit on relationships with our students and staff. So, um, with that, uh, did you do that

023for me? Thank you, Dr. Milligan. So, are you going to handle that or Noah? >> Great. Thank you. So, uh, the history of Camp Oakland and our Oxford Community Schools partnership. Uh, Camp Oakland was actually founded in 1951. They're well established in our community. Uh, they are a nonprofit located within the district boundaries uh, of our district and they include over 160 acres on our campus. very large facility. Our students are very fortunate to have access to the lakes and the woods and the nature and everything that goes with it, including the deer and the turkey and everything else we see on any given day uh at our at our school. So, uh Camp Oakland's mission is uh specifically adjudicated youth uh working towards community reintegration as a result of receiving emotional and psychological services

024through a robust residential program. So all of our students actually reside on campus 24 hours a day. They are court-ordered to be there uh to complete a program. Uh Camp Oakland also empowers at risk youth to uh evaluate their own behaviors and actions while they're there. So that is the end goal for those students to be able to look at their futures uh based on their own behaviors and actions. um our partnership specifically in 2000 uh the community solidified its collaboration with the nonprofit with the opening of Oxford Crossroads Day School there on campus. Uh the nearly 8,000 square foot school was constructed so students would have one central facility for traditional classes which we which we currently enjoy to this day. Uh as well as some vocational vocational studies. Uh there are separate school

025buildings for both our males and female residents. And uh we are committed to maintaining a strong partnership under Camp Oakland's president and CEO uh Mark Mark Porter's leadership. So with that, I'd like to introduce my administration and staff. So we have a a picture of a couple of them up here on our slide. And uh so I I am honored to be the principal out at Crossroads. Uh Miss Sudter is our administrative assistant. she is here tonight. Uh, Miss Gene Denver is our science and special ed teacher. Uh, Stacy Trevino is also here this evening. She's our English and language arts teacher. And we've got Miss Mary Schwaggo, uh, our mathematics and social studies teacher. She's here as well. She will be sharing a little bit a little later in our pres presentation. Miss Laura

026Beck is our part-time social worker. Amy Wright is actually assigned as a school psychologist to Oxford Middle School, but she also serves our special ed students. Also, uh Melanie Royster is our English learner teacher and interventionist. So, when we have English learners, uh at our school, she spends a significant amount of time with them. Uh and we'll talk a little bit about her a little later as well. Uh Amy Greenspan does an amazing job as our school counselor. She focuses specifically as a GED facilitator as well as our 504 coordinator with our students. So, um, as our updates, um, for this year, I'd like to really talk about our focus on leadership, climate, and culture. Uh, we are looking at creating a program, uh, really focusing on program stability and alignment with district initiatives. So,

027our commitment to improving school culture and connection with Camp Oakland has been a focus this year, and we've really looked at aligning many of our initiatives with our uh, recently developed school strategic plan. Uh there's an example here of our our district's core values that were developed as part of that plan as well as our school expectations. So we have a PBIS PBIS matrix that really lays out clear expectations for our students and we've aligned those specifically with our core values of our district that are tied to to our strategic plan. So um our second focus is on student academic progress, wellness, and belonging. Uh some of those words probably look familiar to you from the strategic plan. Uh that's intentional. Uh we really focus on student academic progress. Uh it's important that our students

028complete course credits to meet graduation requirements. Many of our students have had large gaps in their educational experience coming to us uh due to various circumstances and uh so we really want to be able to move them forward with with uh completing credits towards graduation. Uh we provide interventions specifically through STAR assessments and Freckle interventions. And uh Freckle is actually a personalized learning program that uses an online platform for our students to help them catch up or get ahead specifically in math and reading. So um it's it's kind of tailor made for each of our students. I had the privilege this afternoon actually of being with some of our students as they were working through their freckle intervention. We try to get them anywhere from from 25 to 30 minutes a week uh up to

029as as much as 50 minutes a week in Freckle. So, they're actually working on personalized learning. It it really um it fills gaps in for them. And I'll talk more about that when we get to our academic data, spec specifically our math data, how Freckle actually supports our students math development. Um, Freckle is kind of like a digital tutor that automatically adjusts uh the difficulty of work based on uh on how our student is performing from day to day. So, as they work in that platform. So, we also provide opportunities to complete GED testing for our students. Last week, we had one of our students complete all four tests and uh he actually has his GED. He'll be leaving uh April 2nd uh while we're on spring break. So he's our first of probably uh

030three or four that will be completing their GED in the next uh 30 to 60 days. So um the third focus is on maintaining behavioral health awareness which we think is very important especially with our students. Um we do utilize the sabers uh which we assess social, academic and emotional behavior risk with our students specifically to gauge barriers to their learning when they come into program. So we really want to look at where do our students need the most support in order to be successful academically. And so the sabers is as it is across the district. It helps us to assess that how are our students going to be most successful? How can we support that success? Um we also utilize all of our available behavioral health supports in program. So our climate survey survey

031results which um you've seen with each of our school presentations and updates. I wanted to touch base on this. It hasn't always been included for Crossroads because we have such a small sample size uh when we do these climate surveys. Um our parents aren't necessarily involved extensively with our students because uh Camp Oakland is actually guardians with our students when they're when they're um ordered to be part of our program. So what I what I have represented here in these slides is actually our staff responses. And so um with these results, we want to look at families are encouraged to attend school sponsored events. Um, in 2324, 50% of our staff uh identified that they either agreed or strongly agreed that our families were encouraged to participate. Uh, 35% said they didn't know. I attribute

032that somewhat to uh the confusion like does that mean Camp Oakland because that's who's actually our students guardians or does that mean their actual families who we don't have a lot of contact with because of the circumstances. Uh in 2425 we we came to 100% all of our staff either agreed or strongly agreed that we encourage our families to participate. Um some of that we'll talk about with student le conferences. So we do have opportunities to invite families out to involve them in their students education, their progress in in um their academics as well as some of their career goals and things of that nature. So I will touch on that a little bit with some of our highlights and our points of pride later. Um I think that was a mitigating action that really

033brought our staff up to 100% with including families. Um the next point is there's teacher, counselor or other staff member to whom student can go for help with a school problem. Um both in 2324 and 2425 our staff either agreed or strongly agreed at 100%. And then the third data point is this school has high expectations for all students. uh in 2324 67% of our staff either agreed or strongly agreed with that statement uh and in 2425 it came to 100%. I think some of that might be attributed to our PBIS behavior matrix and a stronger emphasis on that uh as well as some of the community building weekly academic progress reports that we provide to camp Oakland and the courts. So I think all of that contribute as mitigating factors as far as our

034expectations for students. We're very clear with what we expect from them and we also recognize them when they're meeting those expectations regularly. So um the next uh slide really focuses on a different set of climate uh survey results. As you know we want to the lower percentage of responses on this the better. So we really our goal is to hit zero. Um so the first data point is discipline is enforced fairly in 23 24 and 2425. um we had 0% of our our staff that either disagreed or strongly disagreed with that with that data point. Um which is what we're looking for. Um this school offers students a variety of activities and courses. Uh in 232 24 um and I will say that our our our school does have a very small staff, very few

035programs and because of our size we are limited but we we offer an awful lot to our kids as far as paths uh based on their needs. So 23 24 um we were at zero uh of of our staff disagreed or strongly disagreed um and in 2425 we're at 25%. So some of the mitigating actions that we put in place to address that um was that we've created additional district partnerships um for our students to participate with which included partnerships with bridges with loft and um our Oxford Wildcat pack to mitigate the impact of some of the changes in programming that our staff had seen. So I do think that those are some of the mitigating factors that we put in place in order to address some of those data points. So, uh, next we're

036going to move into some of our photos and our points of pride. I really want to, uh, I referenced earlier that we focused on community building this year. Uh, some of those opportunities are our schoolwide PBIS program. So, what you'll see here is we've got some photos of our green sheet lunch. Our green sheet lunch occurs once a month, usually the last Thursday of the month. Um, our students have to hit 98% of their daily points, which they are assessed points every hour of every day. uh according to our behavior matrix and meeting the school expectations and for them to be at 98% that's nearly perfect and I don't know if I could meet that on any given day. So anyways, yeah, for our students to enjoy a lunch on the final Thursday of every

037month. Um that's kind of how we assess that with our green sheet lunches. We do everything from homemade pizza, which is the picture up here. We've done omelettes with the kids. We've done uh chicken wings with the kids. All kinds of stuff they get to select. Chicken Alfredo was twice. Uh, Miss Kanja Collins came out one day and she helped me serve green sheet lunch with chicken Alfredo. So, she was mixing the noodles and Alfredo sauce. We had a great time. Um, and so we also for community building, we focus on student of the month. So, every month our staff comes to consensus with one male, one female student who's met expectations, uh, gone above and beyond. And, um, we recognize those students not only with a certificate, uh, Miss Sudter's developed stickers for them.

038We've we've obtained an office monitor and so we dep display photos of our students in the office and they absolutely love to see themselves up there with their certificate picture with staff every month. Um it amazes me because they're in the classroom and they will come to me at the end of the day and say, "I just saw my picture up there, Mr. Barlo. It wasn't there this morning." I'm like, "When did you see that picture put on?" You know, but they are glued into it. It's it's motivating for them. I love it. We had a we had a great loft gathering. There's a photo of that down here in the lower right hand corner. So, um I don't know how many of you got to have apple pies from the loft. They they make

039apple pies and sell them every Christmas at at the holidays. And so, um MSO and I we we had the kid we brought the kids out. Um I made some sweet potato pie. They brought their apple pies and some ice cream. And um we were just hanging out and enjoying some dessert together before the holidays. You know, the two programs. Um I I referenced it earlier. It's kind of like a middle school dance. Everyone stood by the wall quietly eating their ice cream, you know, and all a sudden one of the kids put some music up on the Prometheium board and a dance contest broke out and we had, you know, Genie's kids out there just showing off their moves and then we had a couple of our boys up there, you know, challenging them

040with some dance moves. And uh it was so much fun that Camp Oakland, they invited all their staff over. Their staff were over in their offices. They're like, "You got to come over and see this. This is the best thing we've had in years." So they just absolutely loved it. So anyways, our Wildcat pack comes out uh once a month and so um we've never had our our therapy dogs out and with having some of our most vulnerable children in the district um it was so impactful. Um you see some pictures up here um with the therapy dogs up here in the top corner. And today actually was a day for this month and and Caitlyn Malberg, our lead handler, brought two of the dogs out. brought Teddy and Al out or Oscar and and

041Al and those kids just melt. Um you see kids laying on carpet cuddling with dogs and dogs licking their faces and Caitlyn's like, "Don't let them lick your face." And they're like, you know, the kids just absolutely love having those therapy dogs there. Um those kids get therapy all the time. It's part of their program, but there's something that a therapy dog does that just, you know, mental health professionals just can't tap into some of those areas. So, it's amazing to see. It's been a wonderful experience this year. Um, our kids uh in in program Camp Oakland's limited through their license uh as a child care provider residential area that the kids can't be outside when there's certain temperatures out. So when it hits 30° or lower, those kids can't spend extended time outside. And

042so they'd really been contained in either in the school or in their residence um for a good part this winter because it's been so cold out. We were able to coordinate thanks to some of our um principles in the district. Every Tuesday evening from 6:00 to 8, our girls have been going over to Daniel Axford. Absolutely loving it. I mean, when I come in on Wednesday morning, those girls are like, "Mr. Parlor, we played bad mitten and then we played volleyball and they are just so excited to go over there and do that on on Tuesday evenings." And then our boys get to go to Clear Lake on Friday nights. So, it's one of those things where uh some of our kids get weekend passes and those that don't get to look forward to a

043Friday night activity at Clear Lake. they go over play some basketball, maybe they they do some dodgeball, stuff like that. And it really gives them a chance to get off campus, get out into our facilities as a district and really engage in some community building, uh, as students. So, wonderful opportunities, uh, for our kids there. Uh, and then we've developed some district partnerships, uh, district and community partnerships this year. I really want to highlight just a few of them right now. Um, Oxford Orian Fish Food Pantry has been an incredible partner and I I couldn't have planned this better. In fact, I didn't plan it. It just happened. So, today they too made their their spring delivery and they support all of our PBIS store um snacks for our kids and we were purchasing it

044with a fairly small budget trying to reinforce our student expectations and our student behaviors with snacks twice a week. And um it gets financially stressful, right, when you're trying to encourage these kids with that. So Oxford Oran Fish stepped up and they make three donations a year, one one in the fall, one in the winter, and one in the spring. And we've just been incredibly blessed with what they brought to us each time. Uh today, the kids were lined up for lunch when they pulled in. And literally a husband and wife go to Costco three times a year, fill the back of their pickup truck with boxes of snacks for our kids, and they deliver them. and our kids went out, they they got carried them in, you know, put them away, all of that

045stuff. So, just an incredible opportunity to partner with a with with a great community organization. Uh we also had the I am third club from the high school. Uh their students and staff came out. They wanted to volunteer. It's primarily a volunteer club. They were looking for an opportunity and I said, "Well, we've got some gardening to do on campus. That would be great." I said, "We do have a painting project." They're like, "We'd love to paint." And I said, "Do you want to come out and look at the painting project just to assess the size of it?" They're like, "Oh, no. We we'd love to just come out and help you guys out." Our our hallways were supposed to be painted over the summer by volunteers and it never happened over the summer. So,

046when our students came back and our staff were back, they were kind of disappointed because they really anticipated to have fresh paint on the walls and stuff like that. The I am third club came out. They volunteered, I think, three, maybe four evenings with different groups of kids and adults and they got us started on a very large painting project. So, um, by the fourth night, they're like, "Todd, I think we need to volunteer somewhere else." You know, we've got Christmas cards to take to the nursing home and stuff like that. So, I was I we were so thankful. Uh, our staff actually volunteered a couple of evenings. We've got a picture here of our staff uh up painting. That was me on the ladder. And, um, the hallways really came out amazing. So, the

047kids commented actually this week, we were lined up at one point and they said, "What color were the walls before, Mr. Barless?" And I said, "Look in that office down there." They're like, "That looks kind of dirty." I'm like, "Yeah, that's what they look like. They're kind of a dingy yellowish, you know, uh, beige color." So, yeah, the kids actually appreciate it. Um, and then our third community partnership that I want to highlight is Oxford Addison Youth Assistant has been a longtime partner with the district, but this year we had a specific need. Um, we have a number of African-American residents and students. And so when you get to personal hygiene items, sometimes they didn't have what they needed to take care of their hair or their skin products and things like that. And I

048was at a board meeting because I sit on the board for Oxford Addison Youth Assistance. And I just said, "This is a need that we had. They were doing hygiene uh closets for some of our other schools and I said we could benefit from this." And you can see here Ben showed up and there's Jessica. and they just showed up with a ton of product for our students that needed specific hair products and skin products. It was just absolutely amazing. So, wonderful partnership there too that I wanted to highlight. One thing that um that Mr. Mascll started last year was really an emphasis on field trips. So, we continued some of that this year. So, I want to give a shout out to Mr. Mascll. Um we did um brought in early in the fall

049the exotic zoo which was a great experience. Um, I didn't I didn't highlight this. I intended to, but on one of our earlier slides around our partnership with Camp Oakland, we had a picture from 1951 with the Camp Oakland sign and the two boys on horses in front of it. Our exotic zoo brought a horse and the kids got horseback rides and lessons while they were there. And one of our residents actually got to ride that horse down to the sign and recreate that image from 1951. Uh, in addition to that, they had all kinds of exotic animals. Uh, we've got this bunny rabbit in the center and one of our male residents there, students, he just cuddled that bunny for probably 20 minutes. He was sitting in the middle of the pen and just

050cradling it like it was a baby. He absolutely loved it. We've got a sloth down here and one of our girls is just eyeballing that sloth. You I mean, if you zoom in on that picture, you can just see there's so many things going through her mind like what is this animal thinking and doing hanging on this tree? We've got a gator there. Girls are one's a little apprehensive. The other one's like, I got to touch this thing. It's kind of cool. And then um uh I will say that in the fall after our exotic zoo, we actually went to Blake Orchard. Uh and so out at Blakes's, a lot of our kids have never picked apples, picked pumpkins. So we spent an a morning and an afternoon. Um our girls went in the morning,

051our guys went in the afternoon, picked apples. Uh they each got to pick two pumpkins. Um, we ended up they made they made pumpkin pies with one of the pumpkins and they got to decorate the other one for a classroom. So, um, yeah, it was a great experience. In addition to that, you can see they took full advantage. It's nothing like seeing teenage boys on pedal cars and racing uh, you know, out of Blake's Orchard and they just went right back to being little kids. You could see big smiles on their faces and everything else. Uh, they had a great time and they've got the the bouncing pillow there and they are out there doing all kinds of acrobatics and whatnot. So, uh, Miss Schwiggle and I actually took our girls to a local bookstore

052one day for a field trip. Our girls love to read. Our boys love to read. You wouldn't imagine how they use our library. You know, when you don't have electronics, our students, they they rediscover reading. And so, our kids are in that library all the time. We cannot keep up with the books in that library. But, uh, we took the girls to the local bookstore. Miss Schwiggle, you know, if you're going to be at a bookstore, you have to have, you know, a fancy drink. So she she uh actually sprung for some coffee and and special drinks for the girls. Uh we split the cost to buy them each a personal book and they each selected a book for for our library also. So they got to pick out two books. They had a drink

053and we had a wonderful afternoon. You can see the girls up top there just kind of going through uh exploring. I think some of these kids I don't know if they'd ever been to a bookstore at just for pleasure and looking at books like what is there? What are the different um genres and things of that nature. So, wonderful opportunities for our field trips this year. I'd like to get into a little bit of our our local assessment data with our academic update. So, we use the STAR uh reading and math assessment when our students come in and then we progress monitor them with that assessment. Most of our students reside um with Camp Oakland for anywhere from 6 to nine months. So, that means they're enrolled in our school for 6 to9 months. um

054that's a fairly quick turnaround, but we do get an opportunity not only to assess where they're at when they come in, but what how they progress as as they spend some time with us. The one thing that I'd really stress here is that you can see the initial grade equivalency there. Our students range from early elementary all the way to 12th grade, 9th month when they arrive to see us. So we have a full spectrum and for our high school teachers to to place our students into high school curriculum and and actually recover credits and move towards graduation or even a GED. Uh it is a tall order and it takes a special uh educational professional in order to take that on and be successful with it. So hats off to every one of them.

055Um, students are allowed uh to be sequential learners at Crossroads, which we have found has been incredibly effective. Um, you know, our most recent graduate, which I'll touch on in a little bit, he uh he'd struggled in traditional school mightily. He had a 504 plan, still continued to struggle. When he came to us, the ability for him to be a sequential learner and meet him where he's at, where he could focus on one class and complete it or two classes and complete them and then move on to his next one changed the entire way he saw his education and he was able to be successful and actually complete his diploma and graduate uh with a commencement out at Crossroads. So, um, by by being able to meet them where they're at, uh, in in this

056particular student's sake, uh, it built his confidence in their school experience, and that is one of our goals is to build kids confidence because so many times they've lacked that in their educational experiences leading up to us. Um, other students benefit from small class sizes, the studenttoteer ratio, and specifically the relation relationships built in our classrooms. uh most of our students have had limited success in their traditional uh educational settings. Um with this data here, 65% of our students remain at the same level intervention level. So the the red, yellow, green, the various colors are the intervention level that they actually are performing at and that we're providing them while they're in program. And then um we had 29% of our students improve at least one intervention level. two two students tested at a lower

057intervention level uh while they were with us and that could be there could be a number of factors that we could look at with them um given the particular students um there are different circumstances that impacted their testing uh on any given day. So I did want to and I will go back uh FCO like I said that is the intervention tool that we use with our students and that's like that uh virtual tutor that I referenced earlier in the presentation. Uh the one thing that I will say as we go to the next slide with our math data really it's it's very similar to um our reading data. We've got a large spectrum of kids where they come to us uh when they arrive when they leave. Um the growth is amazing to me.

058The one thing that I'll say is um as Miss Schwiggle is teaching high school math curriculum, uh it's based on on this data that um few of our students come to Oxford uh Crossroads Day School uh with the math skills they need to function at a high school level. So a lot of times Miss Schwagle is trying to fill those gaps that they that they've experienced in their learning. And a tool that we also use is that freckle intervention tool because it does fill the gaps where they've got uh deficiencies in certain skills and it allows Miss Schwagle to really move them forward at in that high school curriculum with the appropriate rigor and and meeting uh the mastery that they need. Um 69% of our students uh in in our math data uh remained

059at the same intervention level. 38% of our students actually improved at least one intervention level while they were with us. So um pretty impressive work. Um a lot of um support with our students when it comes to those academics. So pretty impressive. Um our academic progress I want to look specifically at credits completed. So I do want I don't want you to forget about our assessment data because those are the kids that come to us. You know those are kind of the raw numbers that we have. But um this year our students have completed over 108 classes which equals 54 credit hours. So that's amazing. Um currently we've got students enrolled in 88 classes uh 44 credits. Um we've had one graduate with a Oxford Community Schools diploma. Um we've had uh 11 GED tests

060passed. Uh we've got five students testing. Two will receive their GEDs in April. We had one receive their GED just last week, which is amazing. Uh, today he shared with one of our teachers, one one of our teachers happened to be talking to him about it and said, "How many people in your family have graduated or gotten their GEDs before?" He said, "I'm the first one." He is so excited. And this is a young man with a baby at home and he's got plans for his future and first time he's experienced some success that will make a difference in his life going forward. I'll guarantee it. So, um, the other thing I'd like to share is that, uh, Miss Denver, who couldn't be here tonight due to a dentist appointment, um, she's our science teacher,

061but she does incredible things with our students from science labs. She's right now she's got hydroponics and she's growing flowers with our kids, and they're sprouting, and they're going to beautify our campus. Those kids are planning on planting those flowers at our entrances, and they're taking ownership in in the climate and culture of our building uh, when people come and go from us. So, I think it's great. She's she does forensics with the kids. We've got blood spatter experiments on the walls in the hallway. Those kids are all into it. Um, they were making DNA the other day and they had like beers and they were stringing DNA and they're like, "Look, Mr. Barlas." And, uh, she has them doing photosynthesis experiments last week where they had lights and petri dishes and they things were

062turning green. So, I'm thinking it was photosynthesis that was happening. uh the kids are like, "Yeah, this is so cool." You know? Um so anyways, great things happening academically um at Crossroads Day School. Um these are just a few of the things that I'd like to highlight. So next I'd like to move into one of the things that I talked about regarding our survey and parent involvement. Um two times a year, once in the fall, once in the spring, we have studentled conferences. And the one thing I'd like to do is I'd just like to give a quick shout out to Miss Trevino. Miss Trevino does an amazing job with coordinating our student le conferences. She launches that and just takes ownership of it. All of our teachers and staff participate with encouraging the kids,

063but Mr. Dino just does an amazing job with getting those kids interested and engaged. Um we've got posters up here and um the kids really look at what's their academic progress. They summarize that academic progress. They they take and they look at their career goals. they research what are their interests, what what type of earning potential does a certain career have, what type of educational experience do they need in order to access that career? And then they list their goals. They reference their program level um while they're there because it's a leveled program. They earn um different opportunities to increase their program level. And then they referenced who am I? They, you know, when they're in program, they start to look intrinsically a little bit at who am I? What makes me who I am?

064And so they start to identify that on these posters as part of their student led conferences. And then they actually have um who's important in their life. So they start to reflect like who supported me through my most difficult times and through some of the best times that I've experienced. So they start to kind of uh solidify some of some of these important concepts. And what we do is we invite all parents to participate. And it's incredible how many parents come out. So, if you look in the top left here, this is one of our students. His mom and little brother came out and you can just see that that mom's smile. If you can imagine as a parent, I mean, I'm a dad of four kids. And when you go through some hard times

065with your kids, and to see them start to identify some of these things and have a positive experience, parents just glow when they show up. And they wanted to have their pictures taken with their kids uh during student le conferences. We also have uh we have some snacks and beverages for the families to kind of spend time together afterwards and process what the students just presented and what they shared with the parents. So, it isn't just kind of a public display. You get to go in and the kids and families get to spend some time together, break some bread, and really um spend the evening together. Um so, these are just some examples. Um young man up here, that's he's with his mother. He was so proud of his poster. He's one of our newer

066students, his mom and sister. That was the first time she had seen him in program because he was new. She hadn't seen him in some time and so she came out for student le conferences and was just thrilled to death. So anyways, great experience. Um how about we go on? We we had a couple students that were were nearing the end of their program. So um in the fall they did their posters for student le conferences. Here they decided to do um slides. So they did virtual presentations for their student le conferences. Um some of the things that they focused on is they select a quote that kind of relates to their life. very powerful. Um this particular student on the left, uh these slides came from his um presentation. He is actually incredibly incredibly

067smart young man. Um he is completing his GED. Every one of his GED tests that he's taken, he's passed at the college level. As a result of that, last week we received his acceptance letter to Michigan State University. Um so Miss Greenspan, I I referenced her earlier as our school counselor. He uh she has done a tremendous amount of work with this young man in order to work him through that process. He had a provisional acceptance initially. Um they wanted to look at some of his legal issues. Uh he was very concerned because he had to provide sentencing information uh actually what he had been through actual court records. And we probably waited another 6 weeks after M. MSU requested that information. He assumed his chances were gone. Uh and then last week he got

068the letter of acceptance and that young man was so excited. He's like, "Mr. Barlless, can you email that letter to my attorney and to my dad and all these people." So yeah, just incredible experience. And this is some of the things that were part of his studentled conference. Uh he referenced his GED testing and Michigan State. Uh his sobriety being very important to him. Uh some of those things. We've got another young man over here who I will say this is actually the young man at the time that I put this together hadn't received his GED. This is the one I referred to last week got his GED and so some of the things that he references who am I and he talks about family talks about his child. Um he references his grades and

069his grades you know all of our kids they they push hard just because they're working on their GED they're working on their academics as well. We are not a GED program. We are an academic program. So while every one of our kids is enrolled in at least six classes and advisory, they work on their GED in addition to that. So um this young man actually was maintaining his grades here. He put them out there and he completed his GED while he was doing those classes. So important people in his life, you know, he they put those right out there. So um and they they reference exactly who they are. So when they go through their their um student leg conference, those people are oftentimes in the audience or maybe they're online. and we offer them

070to join us virtually if they can't be there in person and I tell tell you what it's a moving opportunity to hear just how uh various people supported them. So next I'd like to really share a teacher perspective from Crossroads. Uh Miss Schwiggle is our math and social studies teacher. She's an educational leader. She provides perspective as a classroom educator with more than 22 years of experience in education. Um she shares student goals that all of our staff share. Um, getting Crossroads students back on track by improving their view of school and themselves as students is very important. Some of the daily objectives and outcomes that that we focus on at Crossroads is that our teachers invest every day to impact student futures after uh after they complete our program. So, it's not only the

071day-to-day, it's not getting them through the class or sitting in that hour. It's what does their future look like. So, I'm anxious to have Miss Schwagle share with all of you her perspective as one of our teachers. Thank you, Todd. As Todd said, my name is Mary Schwiggle. Um, and I've been teaching for 22 years, this is my second at Crossroads. And, um, when I tell people about my job that I haven't talked to since I started at Crossroads, I always tell them how it's the best thing I've ever done. And so, I thought as our board, you should know why I think the place that I work is so special and why I think that our school is a point of pride for our community. Teaching is not an easy job, no matter where,

072who, or what you teach. At Crossroads, though, we have a truly unique set of challenges and objectives. It's no secret that our students have made mistakes. These mistakes, like Todd's reference, have usually been to the detriment of their education. Um, as mentioned, the majority of our students are very, very credit deficient. So, one of our objectives is to try to get them back on track and help them earn as many credits as possible. In addition to that, those that are nearing 18 often choose the GED route. So, like Todd mentioned, while they are fully enrolled in our courses, they're studying for four GED tests at the same time. All of that in and of itself would be enough except our students are only with us for six to nine months. This is a very, very

073short amount of time to achieve a lot. Um, in addition to that, the kids that come to us often come to us with a very unfavorable view of school and of themselves as students. They haven't had much success. This is a really big hurdle that we have to overcome if we're going to help them move forward in their education. Um, unfortunately, that requires them to have trust, right? To build relationships and have trust. Um, many of our students find that difficult because trust isn't something that comes easily when the people in your life that should have your back often have let you down. And um, it takes time, but the awesome staff at Crossroads that I work with are very very good at building relationships with kids. It's one of the things that that we

074really excel at. And not only do our kids become come to trust us, but like they they love us. We had one boy who um I don't remember school wasn't in session but we hear like thmping down the hall and he's coming running to say goodbye because it's his time to leave and even though no one else is in the building other than us teachers he he had to say goodbye before he left. Um what we do at Crossroads though is so much more than than providing an education. Some days I really truly feel like I'm only 20% teacher and I'm 80% therapist, counselor, cheerleader, school mom. Um, we all know that kids today carry a lot of baggage and our kids carry more than most. And so there have been quite a few times

075where emotions run high and you just have to set aside the curriculum and you just have to offer love and support and have real conversations because that's what they need. One very final and crucial part of what we do is to help our students imagine a future for themselves that's different from their past. Um, that's more than just getting your GED or diploma. We help students to plan for how they're going to finish school, for what careers they might want to do, for how you how you even get those careers. Um, it's also about making better choices. Habits are hard to break for anyone, but especially for our kids. Um, and I found that our kids see them, their mistakes take over their identity because when the world sees you for your mistakes, that's how

076you begin to see yourself. And so, I've had many conversations with my kids because they'll they'll talk about themselves in that way. And I stop them right then and we have a whole talk about how we are more than the sum of our mistakes. and that's not how I see them and what my expectations for them are. And um they they know that they can't talk like that in front of me. They they know that I won't allow that. Um and so the whole transformation that they make when they're with us, it's truly it truly is amazing when you see when they from the time when they come in to the time they leave and just how they change and how they grow. Our students needs at Crossroads are many and for some that might

077be really overwhelming, but for me it just means that I see the difference I make every single day. These kids have absolutely stolen my heart and being their teacher is literally the most meaningful thing I've ever done in my life. The hardest part of my job isn't juggle juggling individualized math instruction for numerous students at once. getting kids to believe in their math abilities when they are being asked to solve these complex equations that they never dreamed they could. Trying to comfort a student in need, trying to find the right words for a life experience that I've never lived. Um, or even just trying to talk to a kid who just got to us and would literally rather be anywhere else in the world. It's not that. The hardest thing about my job is saying

078goodbye. The countless goodbyes. It's knowing that. It's hoping that the love and knowledge and encouragement that you've given for six to nine months is going to be enough to help them counter what they face when they leave us. It's knowing that you're building these really strong relationships that are going to break your heart when they leave. What we do at Crossroads isn't easy, but I'm so proud to be a part of our staff and to be a part of this district and for all that we're able to do for our students. Thank you, Mary. Very inspiring. And I will say Mary, she shared that actually at at our staff meeting and all of our staff concurred. I mean, she speaks on behalf of every one of them. Um, so with that, I really want to

079to move to it's all about relationships. We talk about what we do every day, day in and day out. We talk about what we want for our kids when we leave, but it's not just talk. These are pictures of our students after they've left us. And so, I want to share that Miss Schwagel and M. Trevino uh went to this young man's uh football game last fall. So, he's at Dearborn Heights, Annapolis playing football. They went down on a Friday night. Uh sat under the lights, surprised him. Uh he was absolutely thrilled to have them there. uh and a student who who came to us in distress and left uh and is enrolled in in one of our local high schools and completing his courses enjoying some extracurriculars. Um we've got another young lady over

080here who has completed her program with us. Uh Miss Sudter and I went over winter break on our day off and um she's in supervised independent living right now and so we took her out for breakfast one morning. Uh took her to the grocery store, bought her some groceries, some some personal hygiene stuff because she's independent. She's learning how to do all that stuff on her on her own, you know. Uh she's trying to figure out how to pay her phone bill. Uh Mr. D tried to pay her phone bill for her because her phone was shut off, you know. So, learning all of those life skills as a 17 or 18year-old. It's amazing what our kids are asked to do. Uh she has two courses left to finish, two art courses to get her

081diploma. She's still enrolled with us. We've got her in those classes and she is looking to go to Northern Michigan University. Miss Greenspan's working with her. She's working with the admissions department at Northern Michigan and that's where that young lady would like to be next fall. Uh Miss Schwiggle is meeting with her on Friday morning to help her with those art classes. Everyone else is off on Friday, right? I reminded Miss I said, "Do you remember you're off on Friday?" She says, "I know. That's why I'm going to meet her, Mr. Barlas." So anyway, she'll be working with her art classes uh on Friday, trying to get her wrapped up and ready for university. We've got two young men up here who completed program and they were our first young men to move to our

082journeys program through OVA, our dropout recovery program. So, they transitioned directly from Crossroads over to OVA. Um, they had built confidence. We talked tonight about student confidence in their academics, right? They'd learned that they could be successful in our OVA classes because those are classes they work in every day. So, they're like, could we stay in these classes? We said, well, if if we get to enroll at OVA in the Journeys program, you can. So, I got a report actually this morning from Mrs. Greenspan that the young man in the middle just completed his first class in the Journeys program. Actually completed it and moving on to his next one uh yesterday. So, last night she met with him, done with one of his classes already. So, anyhow, and the young man up there has

083been very successful as well. So, um that's just some of the relationships um that we've built and the futures uh that will be impacted with some of our students going forward. So, I thank all of you for your time tonight. As we wrap up, I'd like to take and shift the focus back to our staff that just invest countless hours, energy, and emotion into every one of our kids and their success. So, hats off to every one of you guys. So, thank you. Any questions from the board? >> Questions, comments? Sarah, >> approximately how many what is the the youngest you have as far as age- wise and and how many do you have consistently because you said they're they're only with you for six to nine months. And does that also go through the

084summer, I presume? >> Yeah. So, yeah, students are are there through the summer. They're there year round. Um uh we we are high school, so it's 9th through 12th grade. We don't get as many 9th graders, but on occasion, you know, we've probably had two maybe three nth graders uh this year. um in program. So yeah, and we have anywhere from um it depends on actually Camp Oakland staffing model because there's a student staff ratio that they have to maintain. So that that does often time limit how many students we have. Um so we'll have anywhere from 15 to probably 20 students. Um I believe right now we're probably at 16 I think uh something like that right in that neighborhood. Yeah. Between guys and girls the two units. Mhm. Awesome. >> Thank you. >>

085What a great presentation. What a great story and kudos to the entire staff. I mean that the the details around what you do every day is Oxford, right? And and you guys absolutely emulate that and it's really great to to listen and when watch your enthusiasm. Great job. Thanks, Mike. >> That's awesome. Thank you. >> Yeah, I definitely have to echo that. You clearly have the best staff and your passion when talking about them is so evident. I'd be lying if I didn't say I didn't have a tear during half of that presentation. That was really powerful and I just thank you to the staff for providing such a gift to those students. It's really evident. and Todd, your your passion and care for not only the students but your fellow staff members is was

086really evident. And so, thank you for everything that you've done for Oxford. >> Thanks, Amanda. >> We'll miss you. >> Thank you. >> Sorry. Um Mike pretty much said everything I was going to say. Um so, thanks for that. Um I had probably three questions, but your presentation was like a bangup job. Literally, you answered every one of them. Uh, so I could just cross them out. Um, I did have a question. Uh, it looked like and I I thought I heard you say there was a sloth. >> Yeah. >> Uh, involved. >> Yeah. So, that's uh that's strike three. Um, but uh honestly I I couldn't be more excited to hear about this program and and you know it's in my day job I work with a lot of folks that make mistakes and

087they're paying for those mistakes and I echo your sentiment uh and and yours as well that that doesn't define you. You know, everybody's capable of making mistakes. Uh it's what you do after that, right? That that matters. So, I I couldn't be more proud. Um, I think it is an amazing amazing program that you guys have and uh uh next time you have a sloth, let me know. >> Thank you, Shane. >> Good. >> I I was going to ask um you mentioned the library. How is that stocked? How is it how is the library stocked? You mentioned some books were bought at the bookstore, but is is there a general rotation or >> uh actually last year there were title one dollars that we allocated specifically for uh the library. So a number of

088the books were purchased. Again, um the staff does an amazing job. Mino is actually our our designated librarian these days. So we've we've developed, you know, a check-in checkout process. So the kids can take those books with them back to the unit. They read them, they bring them back, they sign them in. We've been purchasing book series actually. So the kids really once they start a book they're engaged in three or four or five books because they're into a series which has been pretty exciting. Unfortunately that title budget decreased significantly this year. I think it was 40% 60% something like that. Um so we've been we've been using some other funds that we've been able to just kind of reallocate here and there just to sustain that library. But last year is when really a

089lot of the building portion of that came through title dollars. Yeah. in order to build the library out with different genres that interest the kids. >> Okay. >> So, yeah, thanks for asking. >> Yep. >> Anything else? All set. >> Thank you guys. Have a wonderful night. I'm gonna try and look at you at the same time. So, I'm moving this a little bit so that Dr. Milligan doesn't have to fast forward it. >> Okay. Hello. Um, so, uh, yes, I'm sorry, I saw a blank chair there. Um, so Gary Van Stavern tonight, uh, and I am, uh, excited again to be in front of you. And this is the third time. And this time we're reporting on goal one of our strategic plan. And you're going to see here in a few minutes that

090we've got seven metrics that we will be reporting on tonight. And so our goal uh our purpose is to update you specifically on these goal one metrics. And again just a reminder that we do have four goals. Our vision is empowering learners, building community, inspiring futures. And the goal tonight is safe, supportive, and connected schools. So when we get into these metrics, uh there recently was a question about why we're going out of order. So just a reminder about that. Um we did go four back in the fall because of the focus on facilities, the focus on the um technology budget, etc. That's kind of the first thing before the the rest of the year. January was because we had uh HR pulse survey data from the fall. So we reported that on that in

091January. And then tonight is uh we just uh finished up our school quality survey. So reporting on that. And then in June, we're going to have hopefully a lot of our uh culminating end of the school year academic data, attendance data, graduation data, stuff like that. We'll report on that. So that's kind of why this um pattern, okay, is a little bit out of order. So again, seven metrics tonight. So this is the third presentation and this is the most metrics that we've had um to present in one night. So you'll see the seven metrics here. you're going to see four of them are from a survey and that survey is the school quality survey that we just conducted at the end of February. And so when we look at 1.1 sense of belonging and

092safety, the trauma response uh action plan, 1.2, parent communication needs and preferences, and then also 1.2 two, the district responsiveness to feedback. And then 1.3, there's three of those. Again, uh survey question, administrator training on disciplinary documentation. And then we're going to conclude the presentation with restorative practices and using that in place of exclusionary. Exclusionary meaning suspensions, in school and out of school suspensions. Okay. So again, why those seven? So you're going to see here um in that black box again this is the timeline that is also on our website and so in that black box you'll see in 2526 you're going to see those seven gold bars and those signify why those metrics are being um um uh shared tonight. Then you'll see the next year in 2627 what we're doing and going forward.

093Okay. So before I get into these, any questions so far? Okay. All right. So 1.1, you're going to see similar format here where we have the goal, the aligned action, the metric, and then our data, the baseline, the target, and then what we currently are at. So this specific metric is looking at the key performance indicators for the action plan from the TRSIA uh organizational self assessment. And so our baseline was zero because we're starting this year and our target was to get to 30% and I'm going to explain this in a moment in the next slide but to get to 30% by the end of the year and we're currently in March sitting at 20%. And again, just a reminder, we talked about KPIs before. KPIs are those quantifiable metrics. It's it's looking at

094this list of things that we want to accomplish. Okay. So, how did we get to this that 20%, you can see that we didn't quite hit the target, but again, that target is the end of the year and we're currently in March. So, we have 30 KPIs in this particular metric. And so you're going to see we want to hit those 30 KPIs in the first three years out of the five. Okay? And so 14, we're really frontloading a lot in the first year. There's 14 in the first year and then eight and then eight. And so what is the TRSIA? We've we've talked about a little bit the last year or so. And again, that is the trauma response of schools implementation assessment. And so that was conducted in May 24 through January 2025

095and over 600 of our staff participated in that assessment. And so we've got about 860 870 staff. And what key performance indicators are we looking at in that TRSIA self assessment? Things like um connecting with experts in trauma responsiveness. So, for example, Oakland schools, we're really working closely with them and, you know, implementing that trauma assessment in schools. We're also looking at including actions related to trauma responsiveness in our school improvement plans. And so, that is something actually that's not quite done yet and that's why we're at the 20%. So by the end of the year that will be completed and we've got some different KPIs related to our school improvement plans and making sure that's embedded in there. And we actually have a meeting uh coming up actually a couple different days uh towards

096the end of April where we're going to be working on this communication protocols and policies and training. And those are all different KPIs under this specific one. But again um by the end of the year we will we will have met that 30% target. So looking at the next one our student sense of belonging and again this was from a survey. This specific metric is increasing the percent of students responding positively so strongly agree or agree about their sense of belonging and safety. So, two separate questions on the annual school quality survey, which again we just conducted at the end of February. And so, again, you're going to see baseline because we have a baseline because that's data from last year. And so, we want to improve, we want to grow that. So, you're going

097to see that target a little bit higher. And then our current, so you're going to see belonging is very, very close to to what we had last year. And 81% is still uh four out of five students is still very high uh that share that they have a strong sense of belonging. And then safety did go up even higher than our target. And what does that mean? What does that look like? So the question that students actually answered says specifically when I'm at school I feel I belong or I am safe. And so those are those two questions. So here you're going to see right behind me 2025 and 2026. So you can see all four of those that um strongly disagree, disagree, agree, strongly agree and you'll see 25 and 26. Also want you

098to note that um it's pretty reliable data because sometimes you might have a thousand respondents but then the next year you have 200 respondents. Okay? So you're going to see we had 1,600 last year. We had 1,674 this year and last year was the most respondents we had. So uh very pleased with the amount of student participation in this survey and again believe that this is really uh valuable and reliable data. Any questions on this? >> Okay. >> I I do have I do have a question. So, I see the aligned action, right? Increase student psychology or psy psychological safety and well-being by enhancing trauma-informed student support systems and mechanisms that use comprehensive data reviews. So, what does that actually I guess flesh that out a little bit for me as far as because I'm

099seeing like we we did seem to to drop some on the um the one baseline for belonging. >> And so, like what what are we doing to try to tie it to try to improve that? >> Really? Uh I think one key thing and I think you've heard it uh talked about with the school presentations is is PBIS uh those SEAL lessons. Uh I think another one is having it's got some feedback uh is having a trusted adult. So ensuring that every single child has a trusted adult. Uh, so I think those are a couple of very key factors, but touching base with children, um, making sure that you're connected with those students, making sure that they're involved in in maybe it's extracurriculars, maybe it's sports, maybe it's other programs, that they are belonging, they

100have a sense of belonging in the school community. >> So I do want to, if you don't mind, I want to add to this. So, I want to remind everybody that the strategic plan is an ever evolving like it's a live document. Um, and so it'll change as we get data like this and each of our schools get their data in terms of how their students responded and that's where their plan for next year is going to change. So as they see their sense of belonging dropping, maybe they'll evaluate their PBIS. Maybe their PBIS is not aligned with what their students really um what they really want, what what J, you know, jives with them. Um so I think in towards the end of the year our staff will have an opportunity to you know

101Gary will share the whole um survey results and our leaders our school leaders will also have a chance to like dig into their own data and we'd have a better response to that because this is this is just one question but I think a broader data set would be helpful. >> Thank you Dr. Milligan. And looking at the next one, parent communication needs and preferences. This metric, this is our first year on this metric. And so that's why you see baseline, target, and current are all the same. And this is to increase our percentage of parents and guardians who report that school communications meet their needs and preferences as measured by our annual survey. So again, this came out of our school quality survey. And the the exact breakdown of the strongly agree, agree, and

102so on is right there at the bottom for a total of 84%. Looking at the next one, again, this is a new one. Uh, and so that's why again you see the baseline target and current are all the same. Increased percentage of parents and guardians who agree the district is responsive to the feedback as measured by annual survey. again, the school quality survey. Now, you're going to note here, um, and again, you can look at that bar graph across the bottom. You're going to note that 61% and the previous one you saw was 84%. So, I do want to call that out. Uh, when you look at the far right where it says don't know, and you see 29% responded don't know. Naturally, that's going to lower the remainder. So that's why you see 61%

103that strongly agree or agree. Now why do we think 29%? Well, it's possible maybe there are parents that um didn't solicit feedback or didn't expect feedback from the school district and so they might answer don't know in that particular case. Next one we're looking at administrator training on disciplinary documentation. So here our purpose is to increase training or calibration of our administrators for administrators on disciplinary documentation in our SIS in powers school which is where we entered all that data. baseline was one training session and our target was to add another one. though having two and we have met that target and again in that uh we're looking at calibrating so we're looking at making sure administrators are all on the same page making sure that as we go through that disciplinary data are there

104maybe areas that that um uh can be improved areas that um might not uh be make sense um how can we improve that so that's what came out of those two training sessions but Again, the intention behind it is for us all to calibrate and be on the same page as far as schoolwide behavior is and entering that data. So, one of the things that might come out of that and PBIS and a lot of the the work that we are doing that intentional work is this ne next metric which is looking at fair discipline. And so again, this came out of our survey, increased percentage of positive survey responses pertaining to fair discipline. And so we broke this down by staff, by parent, and our students. And so you're going to see again baseline,

105which is from last year's data. Our target is to increase that, and we wanted to increase by 2%. And then current. And so you're going to see a a large gain for our staff. That's a 10% gain from the previous year. our students um we didn't meet the target but it was the same as last year and you know we all kind of joke a little bit you know students and fair discipline do students really believe that discipline is always fair so um and then our parents uh again a 5% gain from the previous year so pretty pretty um pleased with that response. So when we look at this data again, we're thinking about our survey from last year which was back in May. So we did it later in the year. This time it's

106earlier in the year. On the left side uh and the bottom you'll see a breakdown for parent, staff, and student. And you're going to see the N. So you will note that staff and student participation was pretty equal the last couple years. and our parent uh participation number of respondents uh went increased by almost 200. So that's obviously pretty favorable as well. And the question for this one was how strongly do you disagree or agree with the following statements. Discipline is enforced fairly. And getting to I think this is our last one. This metric is to increase the number of incidents utilizing restorative practices to replace those exclusionary practices. So inschool suspension, out of school suspension, and RP is restorative practices. So there's a lot of data here. So we'll try to break it down.

107Across the top again, you're going to see elementary, RP, elementary in school, and out of elementary out of school. And then underneath that you will see secondary for those three as well. Baseline, target and then current. So every one of them is is green because every one of them is positive. What you want to see uh just to explain this um you want to see the restorative practices increase and you want to see the ISS and OSS decrease. Okay. And so we have seen that. I do want to call out the uh elementary restorative practices. It says two. Our baseline was zero. Our target was two and and we did meet that. Um but there is there's more restorative practices happening at the elementary level than just two. Um so again, this kind of gets

108back to uh our administrators and and supporting and calibrating that entry into our our SIS. Um but but definitely that is happening more than than twice uh at the elementary they are doing a phenomenal job with restorative practices. And so again taking a little look at that I I did kind of already explain it but you know what is a restorative practice? What is a restorative circle in schools? These positively impact student behavior and climate. They uncover the root causes of conflict and create a space to facilitate complex conversations might be with an FSL, with a counselor, a social worker to minimize harm, repair relationships, and identify solutions going forward. So again, we're trying to minimize suspensions by using these restorative circles and restorative practices. And according to the revised school code and one of

109the seven factors um restorative practices are required are really required for us to use as part of one of those seven factors. So any questions on this? Again I think it's important to note that this is March data and so you likely will see the restorative practices go up. You you're likely going to see the suspension data go up by June. Um, but right now we're we're very very far ahead of our targets. >> Are are you aware of any are there any like known barriers to being able to submit those restorative practices numbers just to in order to give credit where credit's due so that you know we want to really lift up the work that's being done there? >> That's a great question and I think that's definitely something I'm going to to

110look into. Yes. Going back to um the 1.2 where you had noted that 29% were didn't know and you can you elaborate you said that was a new question this year. >> Correct. Yes. >> Okay. So then looking forward are you planning to keep this question worded as it is or are you planning to revise to to capture better data? >> Again Dr. Milligan mentioned this a little bit, but this is a living document. Um, that is something that we're already looking at is the verbiage. Um, and we're also even working with Oakland schools on this as well. So, yes. >> Okay. Thank you for clarifying. >> Yes. >> And we would probably keep the sentiment aligned. Yes. Right. Because we want to continue measuring this. I I do want to share um it's really

111impressive coming from the secondary background the amount of restorative practices being used. It's a new concept really from a a secondary standpoint. Um secondary has been really heavily exclusionary practices out of school suspensions in school suspensions. And the reason I bring that up is you noticed that that um the sense of belonging did not hit where we want it to. Exclusionary practices impact a student's sense of belonging. Right? Anytime you're ostracized, anytime, you know, you're put out, they see themselves often as I'm bad, I'm not a part of of this group. And so, um, that's one of the reasons we're really pushing this concept, not just because the state requires us to have, um, restorative practices, but, you know, there is a lot of research that tells us about the negative impact of exclusionary practices.

112And so, we're strengthening our skills in the restorative practices to, you know, eventually reduce those as much as possible. Yes. Any other thoughts or questions? Okay. And I do want to spend some time in the data data board. Press escape and now click on it. Okay. Okay. Thank you. And so again, um this is our data dashboard which is on our um website and we're going to go to goal one maybe this enter. Okay, so I got to hit the trackpad. Okay, so goal one and just a reminder also that we have our key resources over on the right side. And so again, that timeline that I showed at the very beginning, our strategic plan, all of that is here as well as the TRSIA, uh those findings are there as well, so that you

113don't have to go back and forth to the website. Now, specifically, uh, all of the metrics that I just shared are also right here in the data dashboard. And again, if you hover your cursor on the dashboard over any one of these bars, you will see the data populate. And then you can also click on it to drill down deeper. And then you will see 2025. You will see the baseline. And then again, hover your cursor over it, and it will populate. You're also going to see current, baseline, and target just like I shared in the presentation. And so if we scroll down a little bit, take a look at some others. Okay, I got it. There we go. This is embarrassing because I am a tech person. This happens every time. All right. Um,

114so 1.2. Um, when we looked at 1.2, again, both of those were new this year. And so we're going to take a look here at 1.3. And so if we look at positive fair discipline practices, you'll see it's broken down by parent and staff and student. And so again, we'll just highlight one of these. We don't need to get into each one. And so again, here, just a reminder that uh when you look up at the top, you look at the um the heading here and you click on this I right next to it, that breaks it out into that from that abbreviation to the full context. And again, you can hover your cursor over that, see the baseline, and then see where we are currently at. And so if we take a look here,

115let's take a look at out of school suspensions. I do want to draw your attention on this one. Um again, just just dramatic um improvement here. But on the far right side, you're going to see a carrot total OSS. So the way that this was built was uh all of the out of school suspension. And then when you click on that, it drops it down to elementary and then secondary. So it'll break it down even more. So if you click on that then that's just looking at elementary and then you break it down again it's going to look just at secondary. Okay. So again big improvement in terms of out of school suspensions specifically on on this metric. Okay. Any questions? Okay. Thank you all. >> Thank you Gary. >> Yes. >> That was excellent.

116All right, good evening for our safety update. Um today we're going to do a follow-up regarding external door checks which will include our expanded procedures with timing and processes concerning our door checks. Um as a reminder for anyone at home and anyone here, we do have our anchor chart on the school safety and security web page that you can reference at any point if you have questions about any of the things that we have. We did spend fall semester reviewing this. So, just want to make sure everyone is aware that that's still there and anything underlined is a link to the product or process listed. So, today um we're going to talk about documentation moving forward. We have entrusted our fordis personnel who are routinely throughout the day, multiple times a day, completing these exterior

117door checks. They are now marking them off on a checklist to note that that was done. And then as I go to the campuses, I will be checking that and initialing it or signing it to show that I checked that. Um, it is not only on foris to do that though. And I want to highlight Miss Murphy at OES who has I I always tell people as they check doors to pull and push, pull and push. Like that just becomes automatic. And if you're ever walking with me anywhere, I'm going to go up to a door and I'm going to push it or I'm going to pull it and we're and so thank you, Miss Murphy, for putting that out to your staff. Um that it's just become part of the culture of the school.

118Um yes, Foris is who's going around and documenting it, but it is everyone's responsibility. Um, and everyone as they come across doors are really good about if there's a door issue, something's not working, especially with the weather changing and salt buildup of putting in work orders. And Tim and his staff are very quick to get to any issues that we have with doors. Um, and so that is all that I have for for this evening. Anyone have any questions? >> Thanks for the update. Um the as you mentioned it's uh it seems like work orders if there's an issue with the door right pull work order people are good at that are we making sure like if I don't know third grade teacher does push the door and it is open right and it goes

119open are we making sure that they're reporting that >> yes or some way anyone who comes across a door that does not seem to be working appropriately should be taking that to the office >> every time. Even if it comes back and latches. >> Yes. >> Fine. Okay. >> I would just to have someone come check it >> because better safe than sorry. And like I said, Tim Llant and his team are excellent about coming to it. I'm listed, Liz and I are both listed as followers on any of the work orders that are put in. So, we're able to see exactly when it happens. >> Thank you. Just a quick question on the the new procedure with the log and it will be your department that is checking it. What's the frequency of of

120those, you know, audits, I guess you could call them, that you're ensuring that it's being done. Do we have that set or not yet? >> It I I can't tell you on Monday, every Monday I'm on this campus. I It depends on how the week is going. Um Tuesdays, for example, are a lot of meetings for me. Um, so that's my designated day to check OEIC. Um, tomorrow I will be on four different campuses. So it depends on what my week looks like and how they're checked. >> Okay. So that was actually more frequent than I was thinking in my head. I didn't know if you had a target of, you know, monthly they would be audited or but at a minimum to it's okay. Okay. Thank you. >> Yeah. Um, quick question regarding you

121take a vacation. Who takes care of this in yourstead? >> My safety and security specialist and I typically am here except for when kids are not here. That's not I'm here all summer though, but I do take like a week at the summertime. But um if kids are here for the majority, I want to knock on wood because I don't want to get sick. Um but my safety and security specialist would then take that on. All right, thank you so much. >> Thank you. >> All right, that concludes our superintendent report. Moving into our board of education matters. First up, we have governance committee. Ann, would you like to update us on that? Yes, we just met uh this past Friday. Went over the workshop preparation. Um the copy of the scenarios were just sent

122out yesterday in the link in Tanya's memo. Uh please take a look at those. So if there's any, you know, requested changes or questions or anything we can judge up and smooth out before we get to the workshop, which is quickly approaching. Um, we also discussed the coffee conversation, um, possible locations, trying to leverage those conversations regarding the upcoming operating millillage. Um, so that's still work in progress with dates and times to be determined, but we would love to have three board members at each of those once those are established. And also a coffee and connect with the superintendent idea coming up. So, those would be like morning opportunities for folks at um maybe at the different coffee shops in our area since we have so many awesome locations um that Tanya could possibly include

123in her leader article so that folks were aware of that. Um just offering as many different ways to connect with our community members as possible. So if there's any anything that anyone anything that comes to mind that anyone wants to suggest, feel free to add it to the list. Uh we also went over the board leadership code, the feedback that we had. So I added red line changes. So this is kind of a working document. It's not perfect, but this is just what was included on that Google got feedback from the board back in January. So, if you want to take this home, take a look at it. If there's um questions, maybe we could do another Google form to do feedback on this. I did a reorganization thanks to AI suggestions with the you'll

124notice the headings. There's five different headings. So, the the same code of conduct numbered items are all included word for word. You'll notice in parentheses afterward what their original um number was on that original list to reference, but they're organized now into categories. So, if that helps that helps me look at it. I don't know if that helps everyone. And then we also thought it would might be helpful whether we want to include the the superintendent and board role chart in this document or something more pertaining to our operating proc the operating procedure document. But just to have that as helpful. So yeah, if you could offer any feedback you have, that would be great because we will have another meeting coming up scheduled on April 10, which is the Friday before our workshop, April

12511. Yeah. >> Oh, April time. >> Oh, okay. Busy meeting day. So that was all that we had. Did I cover everything? Yeah. >> Okay, that was it for governance. Any questions for governance? While we're here, I wanted to lift up because it pertains to governance. This is something that we had been discussing um back and forth between members and the the consensus was that it would be pretty beneficial to meet in small groups. Uh there's there's a few of us that have one-on ones. You know, Tanya and I have a standing one-on-one every other week and um I think it would help facilitate more conversation around our governance models and especially the feedback that governance is going to need for this year. It's a it's a heavy lift year for governance as we are

126looking ahead at the election with potentially four new seats. So, it's important that we all do provide that feedback and and meet. And so I wanted to reiterate there is the sign up document that was in the Monday memo two Mondays ago and we had April 8th is the one I signed up for for lunch and I already called dibs on Victoria. So if that sounds good to anybody, please sign up for that one. And then if that doesn't work, there's the 10th from 8 to 9 and that's going to be at a coffee shop at uh if you sign up you can probably pick. So, hurry, sign up. Uh, and then we have April 28th, another lunch one. And so far, um, Ann is on the lunch and Mike Whitney is on the coffee.

127So pick what works for you, but it would be very helpful and appreciated if you could sign up and join those conversations so that we can further our governance goals and uh you know really make our workshops effective and our work moving forward. So wanted to >> reiterate that if it's helpful Tanya can send out the link again if you don't have it. >> Okay. I'll do a text and email. >> Perfect. >> Mike Whitney already did. >> Thank you. >> Text. >> So >> nice. >> You all have it at the forefront of your phones for when you get out of here. You can sign up. Thank you. And then moving into we had a change in the agenda right here. Ann, do you have the motion ready? >> Yes. Um, I'd like to

128move to approve the registration of Anne Aches for MASB CBA 370 managing a construction project. Support Shane. Thank you. Discussion. >> So, I attended this online live webinar CBA on Saturday morning and I have to say it was awesome. This was presented by Johnny Edwards who is the superintendent of Portage Public Schools. They're in the Kazoo area. They have 8600 students, 14 buildings. They have some amazing amazing things going on. So, it was it was just so helpful to hear his process having been through quite a few building projects. Um they've they're undergoing replacing five elementary schools full demo new builds and then all because they were all built in the 1960s and then their one elementary school that they are keeping was built in the '9s. So they're renovating that. So I I know

129I can see the expression on your faces. They're they're doing some huge projects. Um, but just just hearing that conversation alone in his presentation of what to consider, what to, you know, um, things to to not micromanage and overstep, things to to step back and make sure you're listening to and asking questions about was was absolutely so valuable. So, I highly recommend um, if it comes up again, I think it is on the spring list. So, if you're planning to do the spring MASB session, it's it was great. Um, I can't say enough good things and everyone that attended and introduced themselves and what type of projects that they're looking to do in their district. So, the different bonds that they that they have or what their their bond projects that they're going for. So,

130it was it was so valuable. I can't speak highly enough, but one of my biggest takeaways was how their relationship with their community over there in Portage is just so so tight-knit and supporting that they have a $1.6 million annual sinking fund that they have renewed for about 50 years ongoing. So they're able to take care of so much of their upkeep and maintenance for their infrastructure because of that ongoing syncing fund which allows them to not have to dip into their operating fund every year for anything else that comes up. It was just it was amazing. but also the community involvement and the community feedback that they get for any any upcoming project was just very very helpful to have that reminder and how impactful that is and how needed we need the community's

131input. We want it but we need we need them to give it to us. So whether we can meet them at these coffee chats, whether it's these online um surveys that we've been sending out, like all of that feedback is so helpful. So yeah, that was all. Any questions? No. Any further discussion? Thank you for that, Ann. >> Sure. >> Okay. All those in favor? >> I. >> Any opposed? >> Motion carries. >> All right. Thank you for attending that an and bringing back a bit of uh feedback. All right, moving into item B. We have our first reading for the OS field trip and then we have our approval from last meetings field trip. Mike, thank you. >> Move to approve the OS fifth grade camp field trip as presented. >> Support Shane. Thank

132you. Any discussion? All those in favor? >> I. Any opposed? Motion carries. Great. All right. And as you remember, last time Anita presented on the technology course if anybody would like to make that. Mike, thanks. >> Move to approve adding the technology course to the district course catalog. >> Support. Shane. Thank you. Any discussion? All those in favor? >> I. Any opposed? Motion carries. And as you noticed, one of our technology bids fell off. Uh we were not able to secure that pricing and it sounded like they sold out pretty quickly, but we do still have the second one. So would anybody like to make that motion? Shane, thank you. >> U move to approve the OA share time student device technology bid as presented. support and thank you. Discussion. All those in favor? >>

133I. Any opposed? Motion carries. Item B, we have our boiler. Shane, thank you. >> Move to approve the Leonard boiler bid as presented. >> Support and thank you. Discussion. All those in favor? I. >> Any opposed? Motion carries. And item C. John, are you making your way up there to discuss this? Is that >> Yes, ma'am. >> All right. I'll hand it over to you then. >> Chris, we know I got to save the best for last, right? >> So, >> depends on how long it is. >> I'm thinking maybe two hours tops. Um, as you know, been going we've been as a district going through the process of establishing a center program and part of that process is creating an a contractor agreement between the ISD and um, Oxford surrounding the use of P18

134funds, which are specialed levy funds that the ISD does, um, to use those funds to fund construction related to center programmings. So, just as a quick um perspective setter, so to speak, there's really two two things driving the whole the whole contract piece and the whole project piece itself too. So, so from a project point of view, it's we're pretty confident for better for worse that um ASD um is going to be with us for a while. So that's going to be an extens you know number of feeding into the number of years that the contract speaks to and then the underlying administrative rules from the state and the underlying laws that authorize the MDE to create the underlying rules none of them from the laws on up are very very well written. Um the

135ISD themselves have been caught in the middle for literally the last 20 plus years. They've been this is probably the over the last 25 years maybe the 20th project sizable project that they've done like this. They've done smaller stuff but and they have been trying to get the MDE to actually clarify things and for whatever reason they get crickets. So that leaves it on them to come up with a working agreement that everybody relative to the information in it can understand and um get the rules of the road so to speak around the money and how to use it. And really that's what this does. So in the in the board the board book is a memo that's got um it's roughly I want to say it's maybe 30 pages with the background and the

136attachment a information attached to it. Um and from a contract point of view, it's um really as as you know identify in the memo here, it's really primary purpose is to show the financial commitments. Section one is really all about financial commitments. Sections two and three get to construction and compliance. Section four is around the uses of the funds that's quasi related to the once the facility is in place its current use and its future if there's a future change in practice things like that. Forest the mo is the area that shows up most in the wordings of the contract that's mo relative to the underlying administrative rules and laws is the most unclear um wording. Now, they've had their contract, this is based on their standard contract for decades, but it's been evolving as

137they go. Um, and really from the perspective of where we're at and how we came about with the wording of the current contract and where it sits now, um, we from a process point of view have been working with the ISD from a draft starting with their draft basic standard contract. We reviewed it, they reviewed it, we're back and forth. Um, I've had some side conversations with one law firm, but not a formal review, not I shouldn't say formal, not an actual review of it. Did some more feedback and working with with Sherry. Sherry McMillan is the in-house counsel over at the ISD. I've known her a long time. Um, she's good at her job, but she's she's also um I don't want to sound like I'm picking on lawyers. She's a lawyer, so she's

138got certain, no offense, Ann. So, but I mean, so going back and forth, we um we did end up having once we thought we were near final draft, we had um our district, one of our district lawyers take a look at it and gave us some feedback in terms of um literally it was from everything literally from a from a a correction of a a typo error all the way through up. Um by the way, you might want to think about adding a summary paragraph that speaks to some of the Elliot Larson stuff. So all of it is informational and clarifying. None of it really gets to or impacts any of the material controlling language of the contract. So I took out some of the the more pieces that kind of really do a good

139job and particularly the pieces that's that she pointed out in section 45 through four 5.56 some of the wording there that helps clarify. So what you have in front of you now does not have that. And then I'm not talking about paragraphs. There's like four words here, maybe a sentence there. One of the paragraphs actually has just a blatant a sentence added right at the end saying all of this information only applies to the center. So, I mean, it's that kind of clarifying language. So, I talked with I sent it over to Sherry. I talked to her again today about it. She's going to try to get get it finished up tomorrow and get us back a final agreement to sign off. So, from a practical operating point of view, what you have is 99%

140done. There's some some of these things that were I was just mentioning about some of the clarifying language. So based upon the wording of the motion um assuming we approve tonight that we'll be able to move forward with it before the 27th. They the ISD themselves have a timeline to get it to their board kind of thing. So with all that said, I'll do a quick overview. And in terms of when we originally started the the project, we estimated from a raw starting point, it was just under four million in terms of project that we'd be looking to borrow from from not we're not really borrowing it. they're going to fund from the ISD after going through the different working with architecture and the construction managers and getting some solid bidding in going through what's

141known as the design schematic phase and actually frankly we got some cont confirmation they're actually contributions of have you thought about this from the IST they actually they actually wanted us to add it was a $100,000 cost ad relating to the flooring in the in the facility so it's a it's a higher quality better flooring from their experience with it. So they're fine with those things. It was a very cooperative, very interactive piece to where we get to where so right now the agreement before you 5 point just under 5.6 million. So I and in the memo the big picture of what's really changed from first day one to completion. Um so that's what gets us to the contract piece of the it's a it's really a contract goes up to 5.65. In those numbers

142there's contingency funding we may not use. So we may end up just using P18 funding to 5.1 million whatever whatever we till we get everything done up and running kind of thing. So, from that perspective, I've got a um I'm going to guess that the um the best use of this piece here is probably just a conversation and questions that the board may have in terms of the actual contract and in terms of, you know, moving forward in terms of the um a couple of edits hanging out there. So, do you have some specific questions that I can address with it or you want me to make a few points in terms of what I know they're looking at in terms of um making the language clearer? >> So, the way I'm understanding is the

143contract is not complete that you said it's about 99% done. Yeah, they're actually um going to put a um one, two, three, four, four sentences worth of inserts. And for example, in section 4.2 um second sentence will have a word the words the ISD shall not unreasonably withhold approval. I'm sure Ann as a lawyer you've seen that as >> that's put in a lot of things and that that's actually protecting us. >> Okay. Um, so do we have that what you just said accessible to us? Is that a change from what you gave us? >> So what you have right now does not have that sentence in it. >> Okay. >> But it's an add-on to what you already have. >> Okay. >> And and by way of example, it's not changing anything materially in

144terms of the controlling and responsibilities of the contract. >> Okay. >> But it helps clarify things. >> Okay. Thank you. What's that? Thank you. So, I I just want to in case there are concerns about the fact that we don't have the the contract in front of us, I I'm comfortable moving forward with that. But if anybody is not that wants to state that and try to schedule a special meeting instead or something to that nature, you can go ahead and voice that. But I personally am comfortable with where this agreement is at, where it has been going. And as always, we will be given the final copy once executed. So just wanted to put that out there. And if anybody would like to make that motion. Shane, thank you. I move to approve authorizing

145Oxford Community Schools District Administration to execute the center program agreement with Oakland schools. >> Support and thank you. Discussion. All those in favor? I. Any opposed? >> Okay, that carries. Thank you, John. Do we have any unscheduled comment this evening? >> Nope. Excellent. And we have a list of scheduled activities coming up. Of course, our spring break everybody's very excited for and lot of board business coming up in April and May. Any administrative clarification, Dr. Milligan? No. Okay. How about final board comments this evening? and >> um I attended the Oakland schools dinner meeting on last Wednesday um with Dr. Milligan and I won a book at the raffle. Um this is on their AI presentation. They now for Oakland schools they have an AI department. They were very proud to announce that and I

146don't know if they confirmed that they are one of the only ISDs in the state to have one but they seemed confident that that they are one of the only ISDs with an AI department. So if there's any way we could utilize them more um the the guy that presented has presented at several MASB and Oakland schools events. so very knowledgeable and just found that very enlightening and and valuable to hear from him again and and kudos to the ISD for being at the top of the AI game. So, thank you. Oh, yes. We also um they do a random drawing for the what is it behind the scenes Lancing upcoming visit. What is that? May 20th. Um, and so Oxford is one of the top ones. So, we will get a scholarship. So, anyone

147interested in attending, it'll be I don't did they announced the amount of it. Yeah. But anyway, >> yeah. >> So, we are one of the recipients. We landed at the top of the list. So, awesome. >> Winners. >> Excellent. All right, Mike. I I just can't stop thinking about your presentation, Todd. I mean, I I think I don't even know how to word it. I'm just so fired up about the success of your program. What you and your staff, the team that has to be things like that have to be echoed outside of this. Like I feel like it needs to be in the leader. Like it should be on channel 7. Like I feel like that type of stuff in Oxford, that success, the leadership that you have, the team that you've built, the

148the motivation, the enthusiasm in that presentation made my day, man. I mean, I I just that type of stuff has to be echoed and we I got to find a way to push it out after a board meeting. Like that type of stuff is cool and it's great for the kids and I think it would be awesome to have your student body here at a meeting. I think it would be great. That's my opinion. >> Thank you. Any additional? I have a a few this evening then. Um, first I wanted to thank Miss Yulan for inviting me to the Wax Museum this morning at OES and of course Miss Murphy for having me. Uh, it was so fun and the event itself was impressive. It was my first experience with the wax museum. So, I

149really enjoyed seeing the students uh bring their history and literature through their um you know readings to life and then they went after they read the books and they researched their person and they were able to embody that individual while sharing what they learned and it was just a really cool experience. And so I wanted to thank all of the OES staff who helped make that possible and uh really gave the students a creative and meaningful way of learning. So, thank you for that. Uh, I wanted to piggyback off of Freedom Kitchen. I'm glad that you lifted that up this week because it's my favorite. Um, and I just wanted to go over a little thing with Lisa who runs it. She brings this unique background. She was an educator and health coach and her

150class goes beyond the cooking to help students really understand the science behind the nutrition and that includes the physiology of things like trauma or stress which she's trained in. And so it gives students an ability to connect that healthier mind with a healthier diet. And there's of course a ton of research on that. Um and then I really wanted to show everybody that she has created a new Freedom Kitchen magazine. This is her first edition and it's gorgeous. It turned out really lovely. And it has recipes, helpful information. You can order that, learn more on the website if you're so inclined. And just, you know, we have so many amazing electives through OVA. And this one I'm I'm so impressed with. My my own kids have been in it for a couple of years. And

151it's not uncommon that at 9 and 11 they'll they'll make meals for the family now and they they know exactly what they're doing and they know why and the the process behind it. So, thank you for highlighting that and I wanted to echo my support because I just love that one. And again, back to OAS. Um, I wanted to thank Shannon Schaefer for the incredible work that she put into this year's first Lego League Explorer Expo. I know that's a mouthful, but that event was so cool. This was the fifth one that she's organized and it brought in 163 DK through third grade students across 29 teams from all five elementary schools plus two teams from St. Joseph. So, that one was a it was really a joy to attend and and just see the

152excitement of the kids and the pride in what they built. The whole gym was filled with all of their creations and they were just beaming and to see that all of their work for those past weeks come to fruition on that was was really fun to see. Um, of course I need to thank the parent volunteer coaches because that is also a lot of work and the student leaders who some of them were definitely future teachers. Those kids were awesome in there. Um, but it it just really was a great example of the opportunities created for our students and the staff and community that makes it possible. So, thank you for that. And Shannon, if you're still watching, I hope you really got some good sleep this weekend because that was so much but so

153cool. So, those were my updates for the week. Marie, I'll stay out of your building this week now. All right, anyone else? Sarah Beth. Yes, I got a chance to attend the Leonard's uh fifth grade capstone and it was so exciting to see these kids. Um, one girl brought in an engine because she competes with her ATV. Um, and it was we had gluten-free desserts from some of the bakers as well as some homemade bread. um and uh a young man who um puts together Legos that actually have the engine. He puts the engine together. They I didn't know they made Legos that way. Um but it was just exciting to see the kids and and talk with some of the staff. It was just really enjoyable. I love that age. So, >> thank you.

154All right. Anything else come to mind? Okay. Well, it is 8:57 and this meeting is adjourned. Thank you everyone.