March 2026 School Board Meeting

001Ready? >> All right. It is 6:30 on March 16th and I called our regular meeting of our board of education here in Rockford to order. Please stand for the pledge. I pledge algiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands. One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. >> Madame clerk, can you please take forward roll call? >> Jamie Hilstrom here. Chris Morgan >> here. >> Eric Gordy here. >> Jessica Johnson here. >> Beth Frasa >> here. Kevin Shine >> here. >> Everyone's here. >> All right. I will note that Beth Presca is attending this meeting uh virtually. >> All right. Next item on the agenda, approval of the agenda. Uh Dr. Ryver, are there any changes to our agenda? >> Yes. Um,

002Director Keenan, I'm sorry, Director Keenan mentioned that um that he would um be agreeable to to moving his tech report his tech report um down um and swapping with the launch your future presentation um so that um our folks >> Yes. so that our our high school folks can get out of here um at a little earlier an hour. >> Sounds great. We will change eight and nine. So with those changes, no other changes, just those two ch that change there. Um I will uh take a motion to accept the agenda. >> Gordy make a motion to approve tonight's agenda with the stated changes. >> All right. Motion by Gordy. >> I'll second. >> Second by Hilstrom. Being that we have a member attending virtually, all votes tonight will be roll call. So, Madame Clerk,

003>> Eric Gordy, >> I. >> Jamie Hilstrom, I Chris Morgan, >> hi. >> Jessica Johnson, >> I bet Prasa, >> hi. >> Kevin Shad, >> I. >> That passes unanimously. All right. Next item on the agenda, public comment. Do we have any public comment? All right. At this time, we will close public comment. Uh item number four, consent items. Dr. Ryder Hoover, any notes on any of that or we're good to go? >> All right. >> Um at this time, I'll take a accept a motion to approve the consent items. >> I'll make that motion. >> Motion by Hilstrom. >> Eric Gordy. Second. >> Second by Eric Gordy. Any other questions or comments? >> All right, madame clerk. >> Jamie Hilstrom. I Eric Gordy. >> Hi. >> Chris Morgan. >> Hi. >> Jessica Johnson. >>

004Hi. Beth Bras. >> Hi, >> Kevin Shadine. >> Hi. >> That passes unanimously. All right. Item number five, superintendence report. Dr. Ry Hooper. >> Thank you, Chair Johnson. Um, as we've come to expect, the month of March has brought us unpredictable weather conditions with some days in the high 50s and then days like this weekend, we're reminded that we live in the tundra. Tonight, uh, we are blessed to have Rockford High School principal Paul Manard, Rockford High School CIC Jill Gordy with us. And in a few moments, they will share some information related to our launch your future early college and career prep program as well as some other recent happenings. Jill here, she may be not here. Um, she was I thought she might be coming. Um, other recent we also have Rockford High

005School activities director Dan Pratt and a group of amazing students as we celebrate our winter activity season. But before we get to those fine high school representatives, I would like to share a little bit about the happenings at both Reams and Rockford Middle School. At the elementary school, third and fourth grade students took the second round of My Sabers the week of March 2nd through the 6th. They also hosted teachers uh from Howard Lake Waverly Winstead District on March 4th. Um they wanted to come and see the implementation of our CKLA reading curriculum in action. and we are very proud of how our teachers and students demonstrated engagement and collaboration um and we showed well um to our colleagues from Howard Lake Waverly Winstead. Uh the fourth grade concert on March 5th included several arts

006troops performances as well as a large group ensemble. Uh parent teacher conferences occurred on the 12th. Um, Reams will also be recording their all school song, We Are the People of the 21st Century, on Wednesday, March 18th. That will be released to families after spring break. Uh, there will be a terrific Thursday performance on the 26th, which will include many student performances, and Miss Na will be egged by the Heartalthy Top fundraiser. You don't want to miss that. Um Kathy Matson and Brennanos have been busy meeting with all of the teams uh to gain feedback um as they restructure the intervention time known as win. Uh kindergarten will spend time with dance artist Aaron Lehard uh the week of March 16th through the 20th. So this week working on uh creative movement in a connected

007space at the middle school. thrilled to continue uh as they move closer to a math curriculum adoption after the math department has been meeting. Um they reviewed standards on March 11th aligning practices and exploring that curricular resource. They'd like to express kudos to Miss Kathy Matson for leading the work. Uh round two of the data retreat for ELA and math teams has occurred uh with our focus now shifting to the MCA assessments. uh on the 17th. Excited to be hosting the Northwest Suburban uh for the three-year reflection and review process. Excited to show off our program offerings and gain feedback as we move forward. DARE graduation for our fifth grade students will happen on the 26th in the media center. Um end of third quarter that are working diligently to help students improve in their

008learning and academic standing. On April 30th is the STEM showcase. So, I'll mention that again next month, but that's from 4:00 to 7:00. Great night to highlight the great work happening at the middle school and it also serves as a nice recruitment event to families who might be interested in attending our schools. This one's big. They're excited to have their buildingwide rock paper scissors event on Monday the 23rd. It promotes connectedness through shared experiences. Uh the bolt team has been making arrangements uh for their fourth quarter pilot of the hall pass system uh through infinite campus. High school's been using that this year and that's been going well. Uh middle school is looking into having a common organizational tool for students to use for the 2627 school year. And finally, and this is a big

009event on April the 9th, um we'll be hosting Can't Look Away, which includes a video and a panel discussion related to the dangers of social media. This will be open to folks within and outside of our school district. Um, in district news, operationally, we continue with preparations for the 2627 school year, which includes enrollment, staffing, and budgeting. Uh, we've also contracted with former state demographer Hazel Reinhardt to assist us with a comprehensive demographic study um for enrollment to help us proactively plan for future needs through growth and development. district is also in preliminary discussions with the city of Corkran reli regarding their anticipated anticipated residential growth uh which may result somewhere down the line in a school being built in the eastern portion of our district. Uh these discussions are very preliminary uh but the

010board and the administration have found corporate city leadership to be incredibly knowledgeable and thoughtful and collaborative. Also related to operations, um Rockford CFO Bridget Peterson has been working with the local land appraiser to assist us in gauging the land value of land uh currently unutilized back behind the tennis courts near Reams and Rockford High School. No plans are in place, but gaining an understanding about the value will best position the board administration with any potential options. uh Rockford Area Schools through a partnership with local uh digital public relations firm continues our marketing campaign to highlight all of our amazing work in Advantage Rockford. On the human resources side, round one interviews have been conducted uh for high school activities director and assistant principal positions with the final round two interviews scheduled for later this week.

011Um, in visiting with Principal Manard and also cruising the applicant pool myself, it's evident um that Rockford Area Schools is a highly desirable destination um for a very qualified candidate pool. The 2026 legislative session is now in full swing and while many bills have been introduced for consideration, the likelihood of funding any new significant uh items is not anticipated. As we have discussed previously, bills to watch include the potential repeal of the $250 million to be cut from special ed at the state level, scholarship voucher program for K12, the compensatory uh task force work, and ballot language related to school funding requests. Again, with this considered a non-budget year at the capital and every leadership position up for um for vote on the ballot in November, the overarching sentiment is that not much of anything

012will occur this year. Um I also personally attended the MSBA MASA day at the capital uh where I engaged with some of our local legislator legislators and I've had conversation with them on the telephone as well. On the instructional front, uh, lots going on in the department of learning innovation. Uh, to begin, targeted services have been up and running at our middle school with students taking advantage of additional instruction in the areas of math and literacy after school two days a week. Um, also connected to our middle school, our math teachers again have been busy vetting and narrowing down choices for new math curriculum with a final decision set to be made in the coming weeks. Uh also on the instructional side, planning continues for summer programming in ESY and general education and high school

013credit recovery. Uh we're really blessed uh in this district that we have teachers willing to teach summer school. Um we believe we already have enough um to do that. Um and we're still sitting here in March. I also want to thank the support staff um which has become a much more tricky thing to do to get support staff to come in in the summer. We also have folks interested in helping in that regard. Um, our 2728 achievement integration plan was officially submitted to MD ahead of the March 15th due date. Uh, we anticipate the continued use of those funds to support our magnet programs and intervention work. Our APAC recently welcomed the Northland Schools drum and dance troop to Rockford High School. That was last week. Um, we also invited other local school districts to

014participate along with our student body in the gymnasium. Um, it was a wonderful event and I'd also like to thank Chef Harlon and his staff from Tower for the amazing Native American cuisine provided prior to the event. As planned and as a means to build instructional capacity throughout our system, we have members rotating off our sitebased instructional teams and new members rotating on. uh applications and interviews occurred over the past several weeks and we're thrilled with both the process as well as the teacher leaders who have led with intentionality who are rolling off as well as those who are joining us with our built work this summer. Uh finally in other news um I've attended meetings of AMSD, MASA, MSO, Northwest Suburban and the Superintendent Institute. Also prior to our work session today, our policy

015committee convened where we discussed policies um with respect to um our rotation and we also discussed the policy brought forth by MSA MASA to I'm sorry, MSBA to review on AI of which we will be tableabling for the moment. Um, I also had the good fortune, this is my favorite thing last couple weeks, I got to speak with our AVID students uh last week uh to share my personal journey in the world of education. That concludes my March superintendent report. Does anybody have any questions for Dr. Thank you so much. All right, we'll move on to our next item, the RHS rocket spotlight. All right. You're up next, Dan. >> Okay, >> Mr. Man. >> Good evening, everyone. I want to highlight our Rockford High School Rocket Spotlight Award winner this year. She was not

016able to be present this evening, so we'll have a little ceremony for her in our building uh in the near future. But um the recipient that was chosen by our building operational leadership team um came pretty quickly and unanimously when we reviewed the the applications and uh this year's recipient is Miss Paulie Trandle for all of the wonderful work that she does um helping with math and reading intervention at the high school. As you can imagine, um, high schoolers are a unique population. Um, but especially, uh, a road that many of them have struggled on for 10, 11 years, um, because they need that additional reading and math support. So, she's able to tap in, uh, maybe give them a little motherly push every once in a while, um, and get their confidence up so

017that their ability then rises as well. So, a lot of success to her, not only in her ads classes, but also pushing in and um being able to help teachers realize some successful interventions that they're making and some minor tweaks that they can make to really uh make a difference in the students lives within the classroom as well. So, congratulations and very welld deserved to Polly Trenle. AWESOME. >> Very well deserved. All right, our next item on the agenda um under student achievement and growth activities celebration. >> First off, I want to uh thank you for having us. I want to welcome the uh student athletes and activity participants behind me that'll be representing eight different uh activities. We have uh one activity that was scheduled to come tonight. We're going have to push him

018to the June choir. is at a big competition at DC tonight. So, uh they'll have the report in June. So, without further ado, I'll have them start here on my right. And if you just introduce yourself, tell us what activity you represent and a little bit about your season. >> I'm Cody Miller. I'm representing boys basketball. Uh right before our season, our coach, he had surgery, so he missed like the first week. So, it was a little rough start for that. But, uh we started the season out strong going five and two. And then throughout the season, we had a lot of close, tough games. And we ended up winning the last two of their last three games. And then going into the playoffs, we knew Providence was going to be a tough matchup because

019early in the year, we only beat them by two. So, we knew it was going to be right there. And during the game, we went back and forth. It was a really good game, but they ended up winning by six. But, uh, overall, I thought our season was a great >> My name is Max L. I'm a junior. I'm also representing boys basketball. I've been with the program ever since middle school. Came all the way up. Um last year we had a very strong class of senior boys. So there was shoes to fill for sure. Uh I feel like as a team we did individually we all grew a lot through um we focus a lot on uh the like the non-tangible things hustle um confidence talking with your coaches talking with your teammates those

020kind of things and using those skills we uh we were able to compete with some very very good teams this season. Um, obviously, uh, we had some stretches where we struggled, but I feel like we bounced back and ended the season very well. >> My name is Ethan Rober. I'm also a junior. I'm also representing boys basketball. Um, at the start of the season, there's a lot of shoes that need to be filled. So, we had a lot of seniors this year step up who were kind of uh inexperienced but really stepped up, worked their hardest and filled those shoes. Even though we did have a rough year um like numbers wise, we still went out, worked hard, and had a lot of fun. >> Um Noah Forward, I was also a senior. I was

021in basketball and just to go out there and have fun my senior year, we knew we weren't going to be the on the floor every time, but we still went out, had a good attitude, hustle every play, didn't take any plays off, and still turned out to be a good season. Had fun. >> Hi, I'm Kel. I'm a junior and I'm representing gymnastics. And um this year our record was five and three and that's a lot better than our previous seasons because we normally don't win as true. Um I'm Tessa. I'm also a junior and And um our high score last year was 128. So we went up by a lot and our high score this year was a 131.15. So that's like pretty good improvement in gymnastics. >> Yeah. And then um another like

022one of our bigger accomplishments this year was that we beat New England and Spicer, which hasn't happened in a lot of years. I don't know. >> Or maybe ever. >> Um Oh, okay. We got third sections this year, which is good out of I think six. And we Yeah, it was good. Tough pass. Um, last year we lost nine seniors. So, coming into this year, we only knew like five girls that we would for sure have on the team. So, that was kind of like scary, not we'd have like full teams, but we had five seventh graders join and then four other girls that we didn't like expect to join. So, that was like really good. We got to fill up with her wrest. >> Yes. And then um we had one girl in eighth

023grader Emmy Heg go to state in three events and then she did pretty good there. So that was good. >> And then we had two girls who were all conference which was Emmy Hag and then her older sister Reese. >> Yes. Um and then throughout the season we had a lot of fun. It was a whole new team vibe because everybody graduated. We did um a lot of different fun activities like yoga and pilates and very fun. >> And we also had a new assistant coach this year, >> Grace McCoy. And she was really awesome to have in the gym. She's very supportive and had lots of good new ideas. So that would brought a good vibe to the gym as well. >> I'm Riley Freed. I'm a junior. I'm representing the girls basketball team.

024Um we actually had a really good season this year compared to other years. Last year we won five games and our goal is to win 10 this year and we ended up going 12 and 16 and that's like the best season since like 2019 for us. So that was really good. We had two 80 point games which isn't usual for our team. So that was like really good. And we we had a really like fun season. I felt like our like spirits were really up this year and we just like really connected this year as a team. >> Yeah. We had one um all conference player was Riley. And this I'm Sophie by the way my name. Um this season just really allowed our junior and sophomore heavy team to just bond with not only

025each other and with our newish coach Kurt Thomas. He's been here three years. So when Riley was a freshman, he came and had to start all over. We lost our coach Brian Martin. Um, so this season is just super super big on building relationships between players and between coaches. We also, um, lost our assistant varsity coach, Aaron, but he decided to come back as a volunteer. And we got another assistant coach, Bailey Pollson, who didn't really help a lot with skills on the court, but she helped a lot with team camaraderie and bringing us together, helping with drama, which was very limited this year. and was just a very fun growing season. >> I'mia um and I'm representing the wind ensemble. So some highlights include um hosting section instrumental ensemble contest on Monday, February 9th.

026And in total there are 11 school districts that participated and Rockford led the way with the most entries and we have the most superior ratings. >> My name is McKenna Evans. I'm also representing band. Olympia Kissner here performed in the All State band on Saturday, February 14th, and this was her second appear appearance at All State Band, which is a very big deal. It's a very limited spots and going for two years is very impressive. >> I'm Thomas Russ. I'm here on behalf of Rockford Speech and uh I'm a junior. Uh it's pretty cool. You know, Speech has grown a lot uh recently. Speech was able to hire an assistant coach this year. They had before which has been able to bring the program up to new heights. Uh what's also pretty cool about speech

027is we have multiple people who consistently place highlight every meet and uh most recently I actually placed first in my category at the most recent meet which is pretty impressive as a first year student. So it's pretty cool to know that even if you're new to speech if you work hard you're able to do well and yeah. >> Okay. I am Ethan Stoultzman here representing one act. Um uh so about the season, I didn't write anything down, by the way, so I'm sorry about that in advance, but um uh so the season went pretty well, I'd say. Um we we made it to like the sections, the first sections thing, and we we got third place out of six schools. Um the other five schools actually had like a big budget and stuff, which I

028think is really good. And technically we tied for second, but they just chose the other one to get second because they liked it more, which I'll never stop being upset about kind of. But um it basically was just a really good environment. Like I felt comfortable just being myself. I met a lot of cool people. And yeah, that's that's about all I can remember right now. These two are describe it better than I could. >> Um I'm excuse me. Uh I'm Olivionic and I'm also representing one act. Um one act is really great because a lot of us already know each other kind of from the fall musical but also since it's such a smaller group compared to the musical you get to interact with everyone else more and become closer. And um Miss Hall

029and Swanson are like amazing coaches and are always like pushing us to be better and to like I learned a lot this year on like how to act and express and like making sure that you background and they're just great with that. And like you said, we got we did really good this year where we were really close to being able to move on, just not well enough. >> Uh I'm Eric Beardsley. I'm also representing one act. Um continuing on from what the other two have said, uh we had a great year. Um this is our second year that we've had one act at the high school and place tying for second in a section that we haven't been a part of prior to two years ago uh is pretty nice. Um again our two

030uh coaches who help us uh you know get our pick a script for us, tell us what to do, you know, help us get into the character roles and stuff are really nice. Um uh the ent the entire spirit of uh one act is so fun. You get to see so many people perform so many roles that they fit so nicely into. Um it's just been a really fun experience to be a part of one act for the last two years. Um again this season we did really good because again this is our second year in one act and tying for second with schools with again these big budgets is pretty nice. The nice part about this year is we also because we had more interest, we got to have students who were in roles

031like costume and a lot more people doing tech and different things where they were getting to try out some background or like what do you call it? Backstage stuff instead. Yeah. >> Uh I'm Roman Morgan. I represent the wrestling team and um what I will say about wrestling at Rockford is that we struggle with numbers. It's definitely a rebuilding program. Uh it's a tough sport, but I think it's the best sport. And uh with the people that we did have, we found a lot of success, but obviously I think the best part about having uh a team in a sport is having like a lot of people. I think that makes it a lot more fun and obviously struggling with numbers makes it a lot less fun. But I think overall we had a really

032good year with the people that we did have. Um, that being said, it'd be great to have a full team and be able to compete as a team instead of just individually. But, uh, yeah, >> my name is Jesse Brown. I'm also representing wrestling and basically just piggy backing off from him. We didn't have very many guys with guys that were there to work every day. We had success at tournament. >> All right. Thank you guys. Thank you everybody for being here. Um we do have I think five or six girls. Is it five? Six. One of five or six girls wrestled. The the wrestling program is is uh is struggling with numbers. They always have. And it's one of those sports where you know as they're talking about there's you know 13 different weight

033classes. You have seven guys are going to wrestle or six. You've already lost before you left the school >> you know. So, uh, it is becomes an individual sport. It's something that they've been working on. I think every program here, the kids worked their tails off. They had success. They had some heart, you know, their hearts broken at sometimes, but I think the biggest thing is that they always competed at a high level and very sportsmanlike, which is I think is super important. Um, programs, they're they kind of es and flows. Some programs are really high one year and then nine seniors are gone and everything gets retoled and you think it's going to be a bad year and it has they have a pretty darn good year. Like gymnastics is a good example of

034that. Um so I I I appreciate you guys coming and talking about your activities and I think it's really pretty neat that at Rockford kids are able to do these things and sometimes do more than one thing. So um thank you for having us tonight and uh in June we'll have choir will be added to that group. Thanks so much for coming in all. >> All right, our next item on the agenda, the principal's report for the high school. Mr. Menard It's not let the kids walk up. >> All right. Good evening everyone. I'm excited to talk to you about some updates from the high school today. Just some general updates right off the bat. Um, we continue our 90-day focuses for the year. We're in quarter three and we have a focus on rigor

035through Costa's levels of inquiry, which is an AVID strategy that we've been diving into a little bit. Um, admittedly, and you'll hear this later in the report, we have kind of changed the schedule for those meetings and that professional learning because we needed to open up some time for staff to continue their curriculum mapping from last year. So at the high school level, you may have teachers teaching three, four, five, even six different classes. So they have to have additional time to map those additional preps. Um, and as an understanding leader, I've created that time for them. Uh, I want to share with you just a little bit about um our connection with the Annunciation Catholic School in Minneapolis. So, um, as we all remember in late August, they endured a tragedy and, um, as

036sort of a call to all the Minnesota IB schools, the director of Minnesota IB simply asked for, um, any IB schools to consider a message of support for Annunciation. And so, of course, Rockford took it to level 11. And we uh, told our art teacher about this opportunity. So, Miss Sherry Weber asked her art one students to recreate um the painting of the enunciation. So, I have something for you. As you look um that was um the day that we brought the painting to Annunciation School. Yeah, you can move that window there. See? And so we've recreated the enunciation and they're going to hang it in their annunciation hall which is right as you enter the school to the right. There's a packet that kind of explains the process that they underwent starting in September

037and working their way to a completed mosaic of this actual annunciation painting. The picture that I wanted to show you um doesn't show the art as well, so I didn't select it. But there was a teacher from the school who uh is a middle school teacher of a different subject, but he's an art enthusiast. And he remembers seeing the monastery where this original painting is painted. And apparently it's huge and it's on the wall and you you come up a bunch of stairs and his jaw dropped significantly when he saw our rendition. He said, "I have the exact same feeling as I did walking up the steps of that monastery." And so, um, it's entitled Care for Annunciation. Um, just letting them know that other ID communities have been and will continue to think of

038them. So, just wanted to share that with you. That's what they've been up to. Later on, we'll talk about our launch your future um, college and career readiness campaign and the video that was recently uh, sent online to educate our families both internally and externally about that program. And as Dr. Raver mentioned, um our raise program uh had the Sugar Moon lunch and the drum circle event at the high school last week. Additionally, we've been kind of out and about talking about our Launch Your Future campaign to other schools. So, we had visitors come to Rockford High School in December and uh January and in March. Um, we've uh talked to three different districts about not only our IB career pathway program, but the way that we packaged it in a way that families and

039community can understand. And you'll learn a little bit more about that later. Uh, we have our personal projects that have been submitted. So, as a reminder, all 10th graders are asked to do kind of a passion project on a topic of their choosing, and they're as unique as those 10th graders, ranging from art to how to make corages, somebody wrote their own poetry, and much much more. So, those will be showcased throughout the spring semester at the high school. Uh, we had a IB teacher who's an admin candidate uh come for a shadow visit. And those are always really nice days for those of us at the school to kind of take a step back and say, you know, what is really unique? What do I really enjoy about um this school, this community, my

040role? Um, and so we were able to do that for that IV teacher. Uh on the 17th, I already mentioned a little bit, we kind of rolled back um uh on our PD day and and drilled extra hard on our student action plans um that engagement continuum and our curricular mapping with many sessions that teachers rotated to for about 20 30 minutes at a time. Okay. And a reminder of our SIP goals and then my principal goals as well. Let's walk you through the set. So on our instructional design goal, we want teachers to have formative and subnetive tools for each unit, which to demonstrate instructional alignment, comply with our assessment policy, um, which is IB terminology, and are reflected accurately and consistently in teacher grade books at six week checks throughout the year. Uh,

041it's been incredibly important that our teachers keep those grades up every six weeks. uh not only so that their grades are accurate but also that's when we sometimes do the cross check between the D and F list and the engagement level of the student so that we can get a more holistic view about what's going on and how that student is either approaching their education or receiving their education in their own mind. Uh and so our self-study as a reminder uh which is due this summer in preparation for our authorization visit from IB which will take place a little less than a year from now um at the high school. So we reviewed IB policies. We took a look at some of the AI language that IB has out there. Um our NYU my unit

042plans for 9th and 10th grade will be reviewed and our DP course outlines will be reviewed as well. and of course our CP pathway articulation. Uh we're going to continue our course mapping. So the expectation for experienced teachers is now we want them to have two curricular maps completed and one map for any teacher that came into the district new this year. Our course mapping helps as a reference point for several initiatives. So, we had this moment where I was like, we're really struggling to come up with uh standards missed for students at the end of the semester or we're really struggling with a makeup plan where if you do these five assignments, it's going to impact your grade so significantly that you can go from failing to passing. And so, why are we struggling

043with why is this difficult? And one day, we just kind of sat down and told ourselves, okay, if they had their maps done, we could just go to the map for all of this. and then that rep prioritized mapping at the high school so that we can get those published so that we can go back to the teachers and say of this map what are the parts of it that the student needs to complete to demonstrate proficiency in the subject area. So that will inform our D and F course interventions our credit recovery plans for what I call partially passing students and reduces the number of licenses required for summer school saving the district real dollars. Um, and I think I have stats for you on that later. Classroom engagement, teachers will integrate the engagement

044continuum to inform instruction, assessment, student progress, and ultimately positive impact student achievement. So, as we've moved throughout the year on this engagement piece, students are being asked by me and the main office once a month to fill out an engagement survey, generally measuring their engagement in core classes and elective classes. There's an additional layer where teachers are asked to test their engagement in that individual class at the end of each unit. So on whatever the summitive assessment is, there is some sort of question getting at the students level of engagement in your particular class. And here's some of the data. So this was as of November the last time I spoke with you. Um, and you want to you want to definitely live in um that purple or blue is what I would say. Well,

045green, purple or blue really, which means you're either participating, investing, and exploring. So, at minimum, you're with it and you know what's going on and you're paying attention. And then investing is one level up. So, you're valuing, you're valuing the learning, you're working on the material. And then exploring is setting goals, monitor others, a really high level of engagement. So we went from those level percentages to this level of percentage. And what I just want you to see here is that the numbers that went down went down as a result of the blue going up. So we have more students in March of 2026 on a higher engagement level than we did in November. If you consider all of the factors of winter, a semester changeover, um students maybe not realizing the academic success of

046semester 1 that they thought they would have in October and you know things hitting them hard or maybe the classes have become more difficult. Despite all of those obstacles, we have students at a higher level of engagement across the building. The increase in responses the number >> the increase in responses is because that's toting November, December, January and February and March. >> Okay. Just >> so the trend is that since November they've consistently gone up. >> That's awesome. >> Yeah. And you'll see a similar thing here of the elective classes. So already naturally more engaged. If you remember we were at 8% blue. It's because they picked these courses because they want this to round out their educational experience. But again, that percentage of most engaged goes up by roughly 2%. And so, we're seeing

047an increase in our most engaged as we move throughout the school year, which is exactly what we want. Um, despite that, on the lower end, you know, so you've got the dark blue, uh, which is barely visible, you've got the, uh, red, and you've got the yellow goldish color of the withdrawing. Those show up as like a gray scale on our engagement scales that we actually give out. And so, you know, you've you've probably heard our elementary principal say, you know, you got to get in the colored area, not the not the green area. We kind of say the same thing to the high schoolers. Like, if you're on grayscale, what's going on? And why aren't you trying or what makes you not try anymore is a popular question that I ask at this point

048in the school year. Um, and some students are picking the classes that they're spending time on because they're more confident they're going to pass those classes. And so we're making a lot of academic decisions here um that may or may not be the right ones but definitely under the circumstances as they move on. So I also wanted to talk about that other side of engagement and what we're doing there as well. Um frequency of being talked about engagement. When we first started October and November, we had um a lot of people talking about it once or twice and now the number has grown um basically in that middle level uh where you have them talking about it about weekly and that's probably consistent with our minimum expectation where they're talking about um the engagement check

049in their classrooms on the formative or the summitative assessment at the end of the unit. This is kind of the back end. So I I mentioned in November we're meeting with students where the teacher is categorizing what they believe the engagement level is. They're identifying whether or not the student has any control and influence or total control. And based upon that, um, we take that and they're actually notes interviewing my plans that I make with kids based upon their grade and their level of engagement that the teacher thought they were at. Most of the time, the student agrees with the teacher. I am not engaged in that class. I'm checked out. I'm lost. Um, the teacher's delivery uh is not natural to my learning style. And so then we make plans on how to get

050through to the teacher that that's not working or maybe there's another math teacher that explains it differently. And so it really helps to try to find them that one thing and and pull one lever uh in the hopes that you can help that student incrementally improve um despite maybe their low engagement level. What's one thing we could do to try to get them a little bit more invested with datab student support? um we are identifying and making relevant improvements for effective and efficiencies to help ensure every student has every opportunity to earn 60% more in every class. So this is something I'm really excited about. Uh we we revisited our student action plans and we decided um for the student that students that need the most help, we place them are called student action plans

051where we're checking in with every teacher at least once a week and they're filling out um part of this survey or part of this uh chart. And so there's evidence in each classroom of what's going on with the student. So, direct teacher observation and then the teacher plans interventions using you probably can't see that link, it's very small, but there's a link up top um that has all sorts of intervention ideas based upon your observation. So, if I'm a teacher that's not really uh skilled at thinking about how else to deliver this content or what other um academic strategy can I use, I can click on that and say, well, because I'm noticing this, what do you recommend I do with my teaching practice or how to reapproach the student in a different way to

052help them find more success? So, currently at the high school, we have four students on a student action plan. one student that was placed on an action plan uh at the end of October graduated off the student action plan and passed every course in first semester. So that's a huge early success story of these student action plans. Are they working? Yes, for the most part. I think so long as teachers are filling it out regularly and that the interventions are directly tied to the observation. Sometimes we get observations that are more like narratives and it's not like that direct thing I noticed. that's just, you know, a long- winded story. And so we want to get right to the fact and then we want that to inform what the intervention is. So we're still learning.

053We're still kicking the tires on student action plans. Um, but for the most part, it's an additional layer that we hadn't had before directly tying a strategy to a student. So what did that do overall in semester 1? Well, 31 of 39 of those partially failing students, so students with 50 to 59% successfully passed their courses. So that means we had eight students in the entire high school who had 50% or more that did not pass a class. Everybody else did. How? Well, detailed completion plans were submitted by teachers. So work that you have to do in order to be able to meet that passing threshold or outlining standards student did not meet um were shared with the counseling office to determine the completion plan. Some of those completion plans just needed a week or

054two more. Um, so some students earn final grades by the incomplete date and others signed individual contracts to complete that credit. So overall this means um roughly $9,500 in savings of credit recovery licensing that we would have needed to purchase if we did not try any of these strategies. Uh below 50% it's largely attendance and effort concerns. Some are good candidates for s summer school. Others are good candidates for reenrollment or credit recovery. So, it's really up to the counseling office, the main office, our intervention teams to determine, does this student need that whole semester over again or do they just need to do more work um based on the standards that they didn't fulfill? And it can be different for each kid just depending on how much effort and attendance they contributed to the

055class. We're also um fighting through it's a really tricky conversation this philosophical shift between grades and learning. So is a grade something I earn? Is it transactional by nature? Or does it reflect my learning over time? And have I just not passed it yet or have I chose to fail it? And those are really heavy conversations. Um but we've started to have it and we're going to continue to have it as soon as tomorrow morning. we have our instructional leadership team meeting where we're going to talk a little bit about those grading practices and uh you know I thank the middle school for also kind of leading the charge on grading practices and we're going to be joining so that we can have a 512 vision of what our grading practices look like um so

056that it's more consistent for our students and families our cup cycle 25% of our students testing in some or high-risisk fast reading math will move up one risk category or meet beat their predicted score by one or more points by the end of the school year. Looking at preliminary numbers, this is where we were at in the fall. And so our goal was to raise the score of 21.75 or roughly 22 students in reading and 19.5 in math. So here's where we're at after winter testing. Um again, those goals, well, I can walk you through these numbers. So, ninth grade reading, um, seven went up, one went down in winter testing. 10th grade, two up, two down. 11th grade, 10 up, two down. Um, resulting in a total of 19 up and five down from

057fall to winter. So, we're close. We're not quite there yet. We've got some months to get working on those reading uh scores, reading intervention, um exposing students to reading, exposing students to vocabulary, and also using some of our strategies that we're talking about through our AVID professional development, our ADSIS interventions, and then also some of the things we're learning about our multilingual population as well. As I go down to nth grade math scores, um eight nth graders went up, two went down, seven up and two down in 10th grade. Um and then no change um for the testers in 11th and 12th grade. What does that mean for Rockford High School? 15 up, three down. And again, that goal is 19.5. So again, we're getting there. I'm encouraged by the numbers. I'm encouraged by the

058growth of the numbers. I'm especially encouraged by the students who went up um in those categories and then also recapturing those that might have slipped down. Um you'll notice that those that slipped down slipped from uh that category of low risk to some risk. And so uh we're working to understand what that might mean and what those students need to again go back on the right track and become low risk or on track by the end of the school year. And our student connectedness goal finally um through student connectedness uh survey and student led staffled measures uh we want 95% of our students to identify a trusted adult in the school. We have 92.5 and uh we too are doing things um in the school at lunch um some of the community events that we've

059been highlighting um to try to increase that student connectedness with teachers. Uh we also have students who are identifying new friend groups and are joining new activities for the first time and that can all help a student feel connected especially at high school. So we're close on this goal. Um we want to see that rise up to 95% when we push out the spring student connectedness survey. >> Awesome. >> Thank you very much, Principal Manard. Anybody have any questions? Thank you. Um, last year you did standard aligned summer school as well, correct? >> And has the So I would guess social studies, new standards, mathematics, right? Kind of all of those new standards and we're not doing standardsbased instruction, right? We're doing standards aligned in, right? So, how is that progress going to implement the

060new things and how are the teachers actually communicating that this is the standard, substandard, whatever that might have been unpacked to whomever for summer school so they can do what they need to. >> It's a great question. Um, typically it's our summer school teachers going to the content experts and not the other way around. Um, ideally you'd like to see it the other way around. Um, but I believe when it comes down to that individual student, the person who knew where they were at in their learning process the most was that classroom teacher. And so it's this idea of looking at those new standards and that goes back to the maps and that's why I think we're creating more time so that they can update with the new standards and not that we need new

061maps but we need new alignment and so hope we'll get that. >> Dr. Ra, >> thank you. That's a really great question and um this is a a process and evolution around this when we would typically see and this isn't just Rford this is education in general you know what part of the course did that student not have demonstrate proficiency well the whole thing and the answer is that can't be if the kid scores for example 59% and ends up with an F um they must have gotten something out of the course and so um in working with the principles along with Kathy Matson and myself um this will be again something that evolves along the way and that we have to start with the standards the learning targets and the maps so that we

062are able to help our teachers identify the areas in which kids aren't finding proficiency because a student who gets 59% should not take a whole class over the areas in which they found um challenges that we can help them get across the finish line and um we have plans for all of this. So, it's a great question. Um, we want to really drill down to what kids know and and they can show us they can do um versus just saying it's one big package of take the whole class over again. So, um in a in an ideal world, nobody is at that spot. Um but when they do land in that spot, we're able to um get them across the finish line in a way that identifies areas of growth versus just the entire package.

063So do you do do you expect so I mean standards are easy to be seen right and attached and different things and the kids aware hopefully have you seen better communication of this is what this is for this is what you'll learn by the time you're done and the kids hitting that so you'll have less so I'm basically what I'm asking do you see that these mappings that the teachers are creating and the children being aware. Do you find that less kids will be summer school bound because of it? I mean, saying that there's benefit in the work. >> Hopefully, I I think that's kind of the next articulation is look at what we've mapped and now how well do my assessments align with the standards I say I'm teaching. >> Dr. Relover. >> Yeah.

064And I would say we probably aren't having the teachers talk to the kids about the standards as much as the learning targets. um which kind of encompass you know several standards um because I could say this Minnesota has never met a standard they don't like um we have you know hundreds of them for every course um but learning targets are more specific to you know if a kid says why do I have to learn this well here's why and we are had in a place where learning targets if you remember were part of our uh instruction last year so they're all in full implementation at the schools now you know whether it's you know K um through 12 um kids know what they're expected to learn because their learning targets are being reinforced on a

065regular basis. >> Thank you. Anybody else have any questions? >> Well, thank you very much for your presentation. Really appreciate it. >> Thank you. >> All right. We will move on to our next agenda item, the end of year staff recognition and uh that's up for approval. Dr. Mr. Rhoover, >> we do this annually where we celebrate our staff for different milestones on the last teacher day of school uh which is the the half day following the last student day. And so uh I'm asking the school board night to consider the um the approval of our staff recognition program. >> Does anybody have any questions at this time? >> All right. At this time, I'll entertain a motion to approve. >> I'll make a motion to approve the staff recognition. >> I'll second. >> Motion

066by Hilstrom, second by Shadine. >> One more comment or question. >> Yes. I apologize. We also need to select the committee of the board who's going to assist in uh selecting those folks. >> Oh, yes, that is right. All right. Um, we can still approve this. >> We still approve it. Just want to put that on your radar. >> So, let's uh put that to a vote, a roll call vote. Madam clerk, >> Jamie Hilstrom, I >> Kevin, >> hi. >> Miss Morgan, >> hi. >> Eric, >> hi. >> Jessica Johnson, >> hi >> Ed. >> Hi. >> That passes unanimously. All right. And then let's uh discuss a selection committee for that. We usually meet is it beginning of May? >> I have uh nominations have to be in May 3rd. >> Okay, perfect.

067So, we meet shortly after the nominations get in. Um, I believe last year. >> I know I was on it last year. Who else? Jamie, Kevin, >> are you on that with us? >> Kevin was so >> Anybody else interested? All right. >> If if you need >> someone I find doing it again, I don't have to. I've done it. Been on it many years. Um Beth, >> we'll be on it. >> Yeah, I can do it if there Yeah, just let me know. >> I've been on it for two years in a row, so let someone else do it. It's fun. >> It's about a 30 minute meeting. >> And you might have to speak unless you tap out of that one. Yes, >> I just I'm not sure I can be at the

068end of the year um breakfast. I might be at Scotland. >> Oh, you might be. >> I mean, I can do it again. No problem with me. >> Y All right. So, who >> Okay. Me, >> Kevin. >> Chris. >> I'll do it, I guess. Sure. There we go. that the only reason is um just having to be at the end of the year I think is kind of important if we have to. >> All right. So yeah. All right. We can do that. All right. So that'll be Kevin, Chris, and Jessica. >> And then I'll just email and we'll schedule. >> Good. All right. Thank you very much. All right. Our next item on the agenda under culture of collective purpose, launch your future presentation. Mr. the nar back up. >> Okay. Not that

069I wasn't thrilled to give my original board report, but I'm even more excited about this. >> Me, too. This is awesome. Okay. A little over six years ago when I arrived and we were about twothirds of the way towards seeing if we would become authorized as an IB school. Um it was said that the career program is probably the best fit for Rockford area schools. And six years later, I really strongly believe that um the issue with our career program is if you just use sort of the IB structure of it, it's really hard to explain and it's not very impressive. And so I wanted to create something and have my team, my very talented team come up with a visual way of depicting it. And this marries the IB career program requirements and the

070Minnesota Department of Labor and Department of Education career clusters. >> And so it's very localized to Minnesota, but still fits those IB requirements. A goal that uh Jill Gordy, our IB coordinator, and I set five years ago when we got authorized was we ought to have an opportunity for every student in this school to have college credit or a career certification before they walk across the stage at graduation. This is our answer to that. Um, tied to each of those career clusters is a thoughtful and brief career pathway because we do not expect students to know with certainty what they want to do when they grow up in nth grade. So, they're meant to be short. You're meant to want to try a pathway that you might that might translate into a career. And whether

071or not that means you'll have a six week training, two week or a two year or four year college experience, or you go on and get several advanced degrees to do whatever it is that you want to do. The experience is out there for you. And so I have personally changed the way that we say college and career ready and I say everybody is employment ready whatever job that is and however much post-secondary training you need. So you see that mapped out uh very clearly um by career cluster, by pathway and then all the way on the right is the potential amount of credits that students can earn either through our college and the schools program or IB exams and then there are also certain career certification tests that are tied to those courses. So

072this is the complete package today. There are upwards of 15 live pathways and we have the potential to add six more making a total of 21. For a school of about 500, that is an incredible opportunity. And I feel really lucky to have the staff that I have and the team that I have to be able to help structure this and meet with kids and explain it and help them kind of choose whatever course they want to go on. And that dictates then their elective experience and their preparation for a career field that they probably are going to be interested in entering after high school. >> Wow. >> And so we also have a video to show you um that articulates this. >> Dr. Ry, thank you. Before we get to the video, I just

073want to echo what what Paul just said. For a school of 500 to have this, it does not happen on accident. And I use the word intentional a lot because we are very intentional with what we're doing. And the work that's occurred at at the high school um is nothing short of astonishing. Um, I I thought maybe Jill would be here tonight because this is kind of one of her babies and um, she's not, but I really want to mention how influential she was along with Paul and his team in putting this together. The idea is to provide as many doors for for all of our students as individuals to walk through and then let them choose which ones they want to walk through. And that's exactly what um, Paul and his team are doing

074at the high school. And I am I am incredibly proud of this work and the work that's happening um at Rockford High School around this because it really speaks to how much we care about kids as people and letting them choose where they want to go and giving them some direction to do that. So I just wanted to make sure I said thanks for your leadership on that. Please bring that back to Jill as well because she's a huge part of this work. >> This is incredible. The purpose of high school has changed. Today's graduates need to be able to think critically, be curious, work collaboratively, and be as fully prepared as possible for a meaningful career. At Rockford High School, through the IB diploma and career related programs, every student has the opportunity to

075earn over 40 college credits and/or career certification across six Minnesota career clusters. This is the Rockford advantage. One of the unique things about our opportunities here in Rockford is that we do them all inhouse. You're not having to go to a career technical center. You get to weld and then go to math class and then go back to a business class without ever stepping foot outside of our building. You can explore and you can try and there's no risk. And then when you walk out of this building, you'll have a better idea of what you want to do, which will make college cheaper and easier in the long run. At the end of this class, I got my CNA license. So, I work as a CNA now in a nursing home, which has been such

076an eye openening and insightful experience. Just being able to have the patient skills and just learning how to work with people. Everyone needs those skills in the real world. >> It's a lot of good important skills to know whether it's welding, wood shop, or DIY. So, I think that's pointed me in a better direction towards my career cuz it's another skill set you kind of have. When I got finished with General Woods, I can go into advanced woods, which really helps out because then you can get a OSHA certification and that can obviously help you in the future a lot. >> It really turns into a launch point for their future. Whereas if they love the topic and they love what they're doing, it can really set them on a path for success later on

077because then they'll have a leg up when they get into college or into the trades or just into the real world. >> I learn better when it's hands-on and everything. And so personally, I think that what the school is doing with that is a lot better for student learning. I feel like the IV program is extremely challenging at Rockford, but we also have constant support from all the staff and all the teachers. It's really been a great experience to be pushed to such a high level. It'll help me as a student in college, but also as I move into my future career because I have that work ethic and drive that Rockford motivates us to have. The academics that we use here prepare every kid for their future, no matter which pathway they're on. And

078that's going to allow them to go as far as they want educationally in order to get the job that they want. You know, doing hard things helps you do hard things. And the CNA class is challenging and the CNA state test is really challenging. So I think anytime a student goes through that process and is successful, they realize that they are stronger and more able to do things than they thought that they were. >> Wow, that's awesome. >> That's a great video. That's absolutely wonderful. Does anybody have any questions for Mr. Gordy. >> Uh, Mr. Awesome. Right. And I know that your uh student services people set up something for kids for visibility as well besides this Amy. Right. Can you share any? >> Yeah. Yeah. So, we've started to flag uh students who are

079in the career pathway on Infinite Campus and we've started to build their academic planner around the electives needed and some of those upper level courses that are needed. Long story short, if you're on an official IB career pathway path, um you have to take two IB diploma courses. Students generally are all in the language and literature 11th grade course. So, really, it's just one other diploma course >> um that you want to try. And then those um those pathway courses and certification exams and yeah, our student support services helps us out with the the software on that in Infinite Campus to be able to track that. You can see it visibly on a student profile and then click into it and and see where they're at on their journey. >> That's awesome. Dr. Brand, >>

080thank you Johnson. The other thing, and this has been alluded to a little bit, something that I'm very proud of is the work that Paul, Jill, and their team has been engaged in has gotten out there, if you will. And so, I know they've been hosting schools to say, "What are you doing?" Um, Rockford is on the map because of the work that's occurring at that school. And I'm I'm really really proud of that as well. >> Anybody else have any questions or comments? Can we clap? >> Yeah, I'll clap. Very well done. This >> is amazing. Super excited about this. That's just wonderful. Thank you. >> All right. Well, thank you very much, Mr. Manard, for coming in and uh sharing all your presentations with us. All right. We will move on to our

081next agenda item under stewardship of resources, our tech report. Mr. Pets. >> Good evening. Thank you for letting me be here tonight. Uh the purpose of today is to give you a technology update. Um and hopefully I can be briefer than normal. So uh the first part is just to let you know that I guess you guys already know that technology in our district uh supports more than just onetoone and and devices in the offices and such. We're also very heavily involved in student and staff safety and student learning as well as our district operations and we've also uh partnered with many uh inter agency support agencies. So uh without going through all of these one by one uh I think you guys have been able to see that. Um to start off with safety

082and security update. Uh currently we're working on you know the levy passed and I'm extremely grateful for that. Uh so now we're working on our enhanced 911 improvements. Uh we've been working on a product called Red Sky uh that's associated with our phone system to enhance our uh location services uh when 911 or other things are called. Uh we're hoping to get that completely rolled out uh by the end of this fiscal uh school year. And uh 911 inform, which is a product that integrates, for example, the geo fencing and and we've talked about before at different schoolboard meetings. Uh we're hoping to right now I'm in the process of finishing the specifications uh reviewing the contracts that have been sent and We're hoping to take get that stage out of the way before the

083end of the school year so that we can start on that in July when our new fiscal year begins. Uh in terms of emergency response coordination in our department, uh we've also partnered with uh headup and red counties to digitize our facility mapping and with an emphasis on emergency mapping. So, we've already worked out the the paper maps and have given to them. And in April, uh they'll be coming out as a team to walk through our buildings, the three main buildings, and we'll be mapping things like where the AEDs are, fire extinguishers, the exits, uh looking at what the maps had, and the changes that are in place like our new entrances, you know, our safe entrances coming in and those changes. so that uh these maps would be shared out with other emergency

084managers in Wright and Henipin County so that if we did have an incident uh they would have the school mapping digitized and available and uh pointed north on the compass and it's uh so that we can expedite uh those services and of course we'll be able to use them as well. Uh this is a grant that Henipinite or the state has and I would say three4s of the state of Minnesota is working to uh to digitize their maps as well. So and then our security systems, we're currently in the process of upgrading our servers. I mean, our servers are fine, but the software is way behind, and our firmware out to all the devices is really a mis a mix match of of numbers. So over spring break and the week after spring break, I'm

085hoping to have, you know, all of our cameras and door controls and and all of those devices uh on the same level and that our servers are up to date because then right after that, uh I have hardware to install that'll help us connect to Henipin County Operations Center so that again if an emergency were to occur, our cameras would be visible at their operation And uh so we're hoping to get that done by uh July. In terms of crisis management in our department and in our district, uh you know that we started Sandy Hook Promise say something program about a year ago or two years ago now. Uh this year we've had about 20 uh tips. Uh the majority being from the middle school and uh they vary. We had one uh that's considered

086a a life-threatening tip where we also are they also called in law enforcement and administrators to monitor the situation. Um and so far the program has been rather successful. In the fall, the schools uh do training uh with the students on how the tip line works and etc. Uh the bulk of the tips, if you're curious, have been in the bullying and cyber bullying realm. I'd say probably 60% of the tips deal with that. Uh home and security. Uh we had the Minnesota Department of Homeland Security School Safety Center. uh they came out and did a walkthrough of our high school and middle school recently and I just received a report from them in the last couple weeks of uh recommendations uh for us to uh shore up physical security and to help manage risk.

087So we're starting to look at that and uh so that we can improve our overall safety position. uh classroom communications. We are looking with levy passing. We are now looking at upgrading our uh PA system to the new our servers are like a decade old and our software needs to be updated in each of the buildings. And when that happens, then we will be able to fully integrate our classroom uh amplification devices with our Clever Touch boards. And then the or admin would be able to also push out uh visual messaging if we had an emergency or just simply announcements. Uh they'd be able to take the boards over and push them out. So, we're hoping to get our PA system servers up to date so that we can work on that this summer. And

088we have there's I love you guys training scheduled for August. I believe it's the 17th of August. It'll be in uh St. Michael And uh we already have a number of staff who are signed up for it. Uh in March, which I believe is actually next Monday, uh we have been invited to relocation and reunification training at Monaceel. Uh Wright County, well, I should say S. school district and Monaceel School District are going to go through a reunification drill uh at their reunification site and we have been invited as observers to watch them go through the process and so that we can uh mirror uh what Wright County Emergency Services are doing at our reunification site. So, and we actually have two different reunification sites that we're working on. So, we'll be able to apply

089that. We have one in Henipin County and one in Reich County. Um, so that's scheduled for March. We're also working with Wright County on reunification planning, an actual uh uh written guidelines that would be an agreement between us and Wright County Emergency Services online staff training. We're finishing that up. A few years ago, we didn't have much for overall staff training annual and this year I believe we did 6.5 hours of training online for all staff including new hires coaches across the board and next year I think we're looking at about eight hours of mandatory online training for all staff. We're just going to shore that up and finalize it so that we can get it approved by the end of May and get it put in the system by July to start. And uh

090I think that program has been pretty successful. Uh finally, uh earlier we sent you a link to the district safety plan uh for your overall review and this plan will go up when the handbooks go up later, I believe in April or May. Uh, this plan will be part of that in the consent agenda. This district safety plan is a new overlay of what we've been using for years with our emergency procedures. The district safety plan is written in a way that it's more public so that we can be more transparent and give uh staff and administration an overall view of what is expected of us in preparation and training and and roles that are being played. While our emergency procedures are private, that's considered private data. And we don't we're not obligated to share

091that by statute with the public because that does contain um procedures that perhaps we don't want that within the public. In terms of supporting classroom learning, uh he alluded to it earlier. Our digital hall pass system will be put out uh beginning quarter 4 in the middle school and it's been implemented all school year at the high school successfully. Then for more classroom technology updates, uh because we were able to realize a grant this earlier this school year, uh that dealt with cyber reimbursement of cyber uh tools that we have in place. We were able to redirect those funds to finish out our clever touch installations into all of the classrooms. So now uh basically all learning rooms or learning K through 12, uh, we now have the Cobra Touch capabilities in all those rooms.

092So, um, that's great because our old Smartboards and, uh, Prometheian boards, they were horribly outdated and now we're on one single platform districtwide so that training and materials and all of that is supported and standardized. Uh just so you know, we have uh national testing coming up March 19th at RES. Uh and of course we have our normal state testing with MCA testing and ACT testing, but uh RES was selected by the federal government to do some u other testing and that's coming up this week. uh state reporting. Just an FYI, Minnesota Common Core Catalog and Perkins data reporting is now tied to state funding, not directly but indirectly. With Minnesota Common Core catalog, uh they're tying professional development funds to the successful completion or submission of that data. And with Perkins uh reporting, they're

093now tying grants to the successful completion of that data. So that gives us further um uh reason to uh improve the quality of our data reporting and the federal digital equity reporting has been discontinued. You know as you know the DEI and all those programs at the federal level have been pulled back greatly and one of these is now the digital equity. In the past when CO was around, we had to uh contact all the families and and we had to report who had internet, what speed they had, etc. Uh were they able to afford it and a whole bunch of other questions and this year we've been told that that has been discontinued. So we are slowly removing that from our uh systems and through our online registration programs. And then finally, uh, we

094were ed by certified by MDE, uh, through the use of Infinite Campus. And you can correct me if I'm wrong, but at the time we were like number nine out of out of the state for schools. >> It's only 11 certified. >> Yeah. So, we're still one of the front runners to become certified, which is considering all the infinite campus schools, I think that's a good thing. And a lot of people get credit. helping in that. Uh the high school with Amy Rolls and Samantha working very hard getting our data up. Uh Tiffany and early childhood, us with helping get Perkins and and MCC up. And the bigger person in this picture was Christa who's usually here. >> Uh Christa really did a lot of heavy lifting uh in getting our Myers data qualified to

095be edified certified. So, it was really a huge team effort and uh Crystal Larson gets a a great feather in her cap to getting that done. >> Boy, that one's small. U one of the things is uh >> thought the same thing. >> I know. But so, moving on to operations. uh one of the large areas that we deal with is technology risk management or school risk management and governance. So uh this gets tied down into four general areas for me and that is student data protection or uh personnel data protection as well. Operational resilience and how we can get our systems back up to speed or protect them if we have something wrong. uh school safety integration and uh just responsible stewardship and making sure that we have continuous improvement in our programs and

096policies and uh to integrate our levy in a responsible manner. So putting that together uh for this reporting period uh we've been working a lot on our cyber security governance updates and I did send you a link earlier on our on the governance standards that I wrote. Uh I didn't realize tonight when I was working earlier today that I need one more. So I'm in the process of writing 1.8 which is our uh ADA web uh standards uh that we need to uh have in place by April of next year. So, I'm writing that standard. I'm hoping to get that posted tomorrow into that group. Uh again, uh we set forth the new uh policy 731R. uh we sent that up to the policy committee and so that is in the process of being improved.

097Uh that's basically a complete rewrite because I wrote that I think two three years ago and so much has changed in the past few years. uh from that uh the the ones that were published to you was our government standards and uh you'll see that that's like 500 wonderful pages of reading and uh that is the public facing side of our standards. Uh from that we'll work on our operations security procedures. In the past when I wrote protocols uh the standards and the procedures were kind of put together and our auditors and insurance as well as uh uh NIST and uh other agencies are now telling us that we should be more transparent and pull them apart. So what I sent to you was our standards uh what is being published based on policy 731.R

098and uh our security procedures uh I'll be writing them independently in the very near future and they'll already coincide as what we're already doing. And then the next tier, which would be tier four, would be the actual data. So that when the auditors come in and they look at our standards and our procedures, then they can see the data the data to make sure that we're actually um compliant log files. Uh and I tell you, they're even more exciting to read. So, the other part that we're working on is just the five-year technology plan since the levy passed. I'm hoping to get that finished and up for uh your board approval next month with the handbooks and then the one to one plan will be revised after that to reflect um changes in uh how

099we've been putting one to one out. For example, as you know, I think fifth and sixth grade are now in house versus uh seventh and eighth grade are still going out. So, uh, and then I have an external cyber security audit scheduled for this late spring. And again, overall, we're our aim is to protect our data and uh, and our district. Finally, uh, inter agency support. Just to list a few that we've worked on over the last few months is we've worked with Metro State University. uh they came out in I believe November and did an uh an audit uh and we're working through the findings of that audit to strengthen uh that was in November and in March this month recently uh we met with Metro State University uh with the high school and

100we're working to develop another pathway for um techn technology and we're hoping to meet with Dr. Riddle Hoover next week to give them all the details. But in essence, uh, Metro State University has agreed to provide the, uh, the instructor so that we can maintain our STAR compliance and they have agreed to work with the data compliance, the governance stuff that we sent out, and they've already developed the course to meet the standards, and they've already made uh, arrangements if our students choose to test test and become certified that it's a 50% discount off the testing standards, which is usually around $400 a test. >> And of course, uh they're looking at uh offering a four credit course, college course for that. So we're hoping to break into the technology strand and do it in

101such a way that it can be continued. So if someone here, you know, and they would staff it. So uh their only hitch at that point was in order for them to break even, they need at least 10 students. So, we brought in ECME, who's a regional uh district, and uh they have 43,000 students uh involved in ECME land, and we're hoping that they're willing to offer it as well so that hopefully we can achieve the 10 student limit or more so that we can carry on this for a number of years. So, we're we're working it all out, but right now it's we're still working it out and we hope to have it all down to present to Dr. Ry Hoover next week. Uh at recently, we did uh a neck security conference in

102December. We attended a state uh technology leaders conference and during the conference in January, I learned or was told that there were two doctorate level presenters and they actually gave Rockford School District um uh they highlighted us for our collaboration and the work that we've been doing. So, I thought that that was really nice that uh other uh entities know what we're up to. And then finally on the emergency and public sav safety coordination side some of the things we've we've been doing is we've attended incident command system training which is a FEMA course uh through department of homeland security and what that does is it identifies all the positions needed in an emergency like reunification training so that we can better assign people and know what they have to do. And then following that

103we had NIM's emergency training, emergency management training which then puts those uh people together in an inter agency role so that we can best mitigate risk in the school district. Uh in April there will be the Minnesota school safety conference in Duth and we've also been working with Hannah and Marray counties and the BCA and the Minnesota Fusion Center. Uh they've been feeding us uh all of the information regarding the protests in Minneapolis when and where they've been and they've also fill us in on national and state uh emergencies or issues so that they tell us how to show up our systems for a particular event. So, all right. So, overall, what we're trying to do is create a safe learning environment, effective classroom instruction, and reliable district operations. At that, I'll if there's any

104questions or discussion, >> does anybody have any questions or comments? Mr. >> I have a couple questions. Um, we looked at policy uh 731R earlier today. Did I hear that that helps with our like cyber security insurance cost having that policy? >> Yes, that that policy when I wrote it, it was sent to our insurance company and it was also sent to our auditors and both entities wrote back like the next day with um improvements to that. And so it is really collaboration from insurance and from the auditors as to um how we should move forward in the current environment. >> Okay. Um and then uh you talk about onetoone devices in the middle school, fifth graders and sixth graders staying in house and seventh and eighth going home. Do you anticipate that staying like

105that or >> I wish I had an answer but I don't. >> That's fair. that'll um we're going to sit down with the leadership >> and figure out what works best >> and then just a comment um I'd love to hear that we were highlighted here for all the stuff we're doing technology wise >> surprise >> due to you because I mean I know we've had some struggles in technology and cyber security. So thank you so much for all your work. >> I love all the details. >> I'm a detailed person. I love it. >> It's really a team effort. So, a lot of a lot of fingers are in there. So, >> I had that on my notes as well. I wanted to highlight that just it's your your leadership and your team. Thanks

106for everything you're doing and that's why we are highlighted at the leadership conference. So, thank you Dr. Ral Hipper. >> Thanks Johnson. I want to echo that. Um you are a loved and the work you're doing Jeff. Um, not only is he our tech director, he plays point on all of our safety and security information. And we give Jeff a hard time because he's so detailed. Um, but the things he's been sharing with me lately. Um, the safety plan, all the other things. Um, he's not missing a beat and and it's u we are a pre-minent district in the area of technology and school safety because of you. And I just want to also thank you for your leadership. >> Thank you. Um, again, it's a group effort. So, I represent I guess. Um and

107again for the next steps here again we're working on school safety planning and getting that safety governance out. Uh we're aligning our emergency planning to the NIMS and ICS structure. Uh cyber security governance framework which you kind of seen my first draft of that and then the 731R update. uh our emergency response coordination, technology planning, and then our technology level implementation. Those are the next steps that we'll be doing in earnest over the next few months. So that's it. I would just like to note um with the passing of our capital projects levy um for our community to even go through this presentation just shows their tax dollars at work and for such wonderful things um super important. So, uh, thank you for all of your diligent work behind the scenes, um, making sure that

108we have safety in all aspects of the school. So, thank you. >> Yes, thank you. Um, yeah, I'm very, very grateful for the passage of the levy. It I don't know if I can stress my stress level, >> but you know, the planning that I was making to start retracting our services because we simply just couldn't afford it. And uh the levy doesn't solve all the problems, but it keeps the lights on and I'm very I feel very good about that. I'm very thankful. So, >> thank you. Anybody else have any questions? >> Thank you very much, Mr. Penis. We appreciate you tremendously. >> Thank you. That's a great presentation. Thank you. >> All right, moving on. Our next item on the agenda. Um, moving into community school and family partnership. We have a resolution

109of acknowledgement of contributions and donations. Um, Dr. Ryolver, is there anything you'd like to point out? I mean, there's so many amazing amazing donations on here. So, I would just like to say on behalf of the district and and the board um thank you to all of these donors um this month. Those donations are um all financial in nature. Most of them are financial in nature, although a few other donations towards the bottom of of items as well. Um but on behalf of the board and district administration, I would like to thank them um and ask the board to accept um the donations on behalf of Rockberry Schools. >> It's an incredible list. All right. At this time, I will accept a motion to approve the resol. Make a motion to accept the donations as

110presented. I will second. >> First by Gordy, second by Shadine. Any other questions or comments? All right, Madame Chair. >> Eric Gordy. >> Hi. >> Kevin Shadine. >> Hi. >> Jamie Hilstrom. I Chris Morgan. >> Hi. >> Jessica Johnson. >> Hi. >> Beth Fra. >> Hi. >> All right. That passes unanimously. All right. Next item, board of education work session. We will have on Monday, April 6th at 5:30 here in the district off our um district office boardroom. Uh the next regular meeting of the board of education will be Monday, April 20th at 5:30 right here. And then our last item before adjournment will be board committee updates. Who would like to begin? Uh I went to the uh Moesco meeting in lie of Jessica this last month and had a great time meeting with

111that board and uh kind of getting to know the lay of the land there. So had a great time. >> Thank you for attending that meeting. I really appreciate it. All right. Uh >> I I can go next. >> Um I had a staff meeting um and then uh the school board retreat which is also at >> um a couple couple MSDA things. Um specifically, uh the webinar about the AI policy that they are rolling out. Um and then I also got to attend the Apac drum circle performance. Oh, and also the policy committee, right? >> All right. Thank you very much. >> Yeah, >> I was No, >> sorry. He was raising. >> Oh. Um yeah, I missed last board session, but we had a really good um finance committee session right before that

112just talking about strategic plan and all of the um independent analysis that we're sourcing around district growth and the operations and the facilities. So, >> all right. Wonderful. Thank you. All right, Beth. Hello. So, the retreat where we all got together, it was a couple weeks ago, can't remember, and we had the policy committee meeting today. >> All right. Thank you very much, Mr. Moody. >> Yep. Thank you. Uh board prep meeting for this and the work session, the uh retreat. That was enjoyable. The um AMS AMSD I want to put a C in there all the time, but that's a different committee. uh AMSD virtually had been able to join listen through uh some of those objects. Um then gone through with the Corkran visit for um discussion about how Corkran and Rockford is

113able to work together a little bit more. Um and then Northwest Suburban planning meeting for a uh work session, work session, I don't know, committee session that we're having. Um the current Northwest Suburban executive director has resigned for a different position. Um so we are in the process of creating working agreements and understandings of how the three groups can work together, the superintendence group, the board as well as the um executive director and that staff. So that's work that's ongoing. It's enough for that month. Yeah, there was a lot. >> All right. I also had board prep for work session and uh the regular meeting. Um the retreat uh the corporin meeting as well. Um I had a Masiko uh committee meeting. Um I've also been meeting a couple of things for MASO as well

114uh with the renewal of the executive director's contract. So, I've been working on that. Um, am I missing anything? >> Nope. >> I think that is it. All right. So, with that being said, our next item on the agenda is adjournment. >> I'll make a motion to adjurnn. >> Motion by Shadine. >> Second by Gordy. >> Any questions or comments? All right. It is a roll call vote. Shine. >> Hi, >> Eric Gardy. >> Yes. >> Nstrom. I >> Chris Morgan. >> Hi, >> Jessica Johnson. >> I Beth Braa. >> Hi. >> All right, that is unanimous. We are adjourned at 8:10