School Board Meeting (January 20th, 2026)

001Okay, we'll now open the January regular school board meeting. Uh 1.1 roll call. All school board members are present. 1.2 Recognition of Visitors and guests. Thank you everyone that's here or watching. 1.3 Pledge of Allegiance. 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. >> Okay. 1.4 4 correspondence and recognition 1.41 uh public participation. So at this time we will move to public participation. Each speaker will have three minutes. Please note that this is an opportunity for the board to listen. The board and administration will not be responding to comments this evening. We ask that all remarks remain respectful and appropriate. If comments become inappropriate, disruptive, or violate board policy, the speaker's time

002will be stopped. Please state your name before beginning to speak. We do have two requests tonight. Janette Aguiler and Christa Van note. You guys may come up. Hi, my name is Christa Vanote. I uh teach e here at the high school. Um Jody asked me to say a couple a few words uh just about how I'm feeling about everything that's going on in our town and state and country. Um, so I wrote this last night and then she asked me to read it today. You don't know. You don't know what it is like to love each and every one of your students for 27 years. You don't know what it is like to watch your kids hide in their homes and not come to school. You don't know that these people are the soul of

003our community and we will not survive without them. You don't know that an entire community's heart is breaking. And if you know and you don't care, God be with you. God help your soul. Thank you. Okay, Janette. Hi, my name is Janette Agelar and I work currently as a liazison here at the Warthingington High School. Um, I just want to say first foremost that I appreciate um the effort that the school and the board is doing. I think today's statement that was made um towards the community, the parents was very much needed. Um I feel like um everybody was waiting for that. So, um, and I appreciate that as a parent and as a community member. Um, today I'm speak I'm here to speak on behalf of myself as an um a daughter of immigrants

004um as a staff member and today is a voice for our students and parents from our community. Whether you agree um on what is going on or not, this is our reality and this is what is happening right now. Our students are scared. Our parents are scared um to send off their students not knowing what dangers they face um or not knowing if they're going to be home when they return. We just have to continue working together. This is not the first time that we've had a challenge in our community, whether it was COVID um a previous event um that happened um that we're all aware of. Um we have to continue to work together. This isn't about our political views or immigration or illegals. Our duty the moment that we step into the school

005building is to hold what we um what is important to us and that is the students. It's their education and their safety. So, we have to put that all aside when we come here and that is um should be our priority. So, I hope that we can continue implementing ways to help our students and support them um and the parents as well because um you know they're all entrusting their their students with us. So, I appreciate everybody's working together in the community. Okay. Anybody else? Any public participation that's here got anything to say? Okay. Okay. 1.4.2 recognition of students, staff, and community. Um, we got Minnesota AAA award winners. Congratulations to Madison Seve and Austin Kinszer who were named this year's Warthingington Academics, Arts, and Athletics AAA award senior winners. Thank you for your dedication

006to academic excellence, involvement in activities, and participation in our music ensembles, truly exemplifying what it means to be a Trojan. Uh, next we got Treats for Teens. Our Treats for Teens students once again demonstrated generosity and leadership during their annual holiday fundraising campaign. Through a week of special treats for purchase, students raised $6,2760 with proceeds supporting school and community organizations that benefit our students. Thank you to everyone involved in this meaningful teachable moment of giving back. Trojets dance team. Congratulations to the Trojets dance team on an outstanding showing at the Big South Dance Championships. JV Jazz placed second, Varsity Jazz second place, Varsity Kick third place. K Trojan Gymnastics Team, congr Congratulations to the Trojan Gymnastics team on an undefeated season and earning an invitation to the Minnesota Class A True Team Gymnastics Tournament. As

007one of the top 10 programs in the state, our Trojans continue to demonstrate exceptional skill, dedication, and teamwork. We wish them the best as they compete this weekend. Go Trojans. Snowcoming. Today officially kicked off snowcoming week. We are excited to celebrate with our students through a fun-filled week of dress up days, activities, and events. Enjoy the week. WHS art department. Congratulations to 12 WHS students selected to participate in the Augustana High School art show at Augustana University in Sou Falls. Their artwork will be displayed for public viewing and considered for awards. Keep up the great work and creativity. Okay, moving on. 2.0 Approval of agenda. Do I have a motion to approve the consent and main agenda? So moved. >> Motion by an >> Seconded by Lori. All those in favor of approval of agenda

008say I. >> I. >> All those opposed, same sign. Motion passes. 3.0. Approval of minutes. The December board meeting and the recent committee meeting minutes. Do I have approval of our minutes? >> Move to approve. >> Motion by Aaron. Do I have a second? >> Second. Seconded by an all those in favor of the approval of the minutes say I. >> I. >> All those opposed same sign. Motion passes. >> Okay. 4.0 consent agenda. If you looked over the consent agenda, I need a motion for the items under the consent agenda. >> So moved. >> Motion by Lori. Do I have a second? >> Seconded by an. All those in favor of a consent agenda item say I. >> I. >> All those opposed, same sign. Motion passes. 5.0 main agenda monthly financial overview. Carmen.

009Um you guys have in front of you um the revenue and expenditure guideline um for the period ending December 31st of 2025. Um we are halfway through our um budget year. Um, if you look at our percentages, our total operating funds for revenue, um, very close to what it was last year. We're 43.85% of our budget compared to 43.01 last year. So, we're right on track with our revenues. Um, expenditures are um, similar. We're 41.88% compared to 4410%. So, we're just running a little bit lower on expenditures and some of that is just um, different times of the year when our expenditures are coming through. But both of them are on target compared to our budget. And um we're still working on that budget revision um kind of finalizing some revenue numbers and then still

010kind of waiting for those expenditures um with salaries as we negotiate. So hopefully the next month or two we can have that presented for this current year and then start working on our next year budget. >> Questions for Carmen? >> Done. Okay. 5.2 Special Education Programming Review by Carol Potter. Welcome, Carol. Hello everyone. Thank you for having me here tonight. I really appreciate the opportunity to share my program, special education program review, with you. It's good to see so many familiar faces in the audience. And I did get a little feedback that I was supposed to keep it really short tonight. So I'm going to do my best. Okay. The program review. So the purpose the board had asked um superintendent height camp to his first task was to complete a special education program review

011and that entails all of these things that are listed on here. So when I went to do the program review, I asked for administrative feedback, special education teacher related service provider feedback, special education leadership feedback. I dug into the MDE data to see what they say about Worththington. Um I um connected with the finance director at the Southwest West Central Co-op who manages most of the finances for special education. And then I had an opportunity to dig into the sped forms data which is the platform in which all IEPs, evaluation reports, etc. are kept in. And so combining all of that information, I made a summary of all of those pieces to share with you tonight. I'm going to go over the highlights for you so I can be sure to keep it short as

012promised. Okay. on the special education side. So, just a quick overview of what you have in Worthington. And so, your child count and I'm going to say a little bit over a year ago in December 1st, 2024 was 637 students. And I'm going to move ahead because hot off the press today, the new child count numbers came out and your new child count is actually 634 students. So, you are very consistent. a little bit about your personnel within the district. And this is teachers and paraprofessionals. And I'll just call your attention over to you can read all of it on your own. I'm not going to read all of those pieces, but over to the right hand column where it says adult to student ratio. And you can see that through each of the schools

013there's a very nice adult. So if you have one adult to 2.2 2 students for example at Prairie the intermediate school is one adult to 4.6 students and as you age up that is very typical that that ratio gets higher because kids are building independence and they can do more things on their own and so we don't have to have adult support for every part of their day. I did a comparison um a comparison district is the current district that I serve as the director of special services for and that's the Little Falls schools so north of St. Cloud. And just to give you an idea of what that looks like in another district of comparable size and so our child count that just came out today is um 633. So couldn't be a whole

014lot closer, right? And so in again in those ratios in the right hand column, you know, if you look at the second row, Lincoln, the K2 school, which would be the equivalent to Prairie, um it's one adult to 2.7 is what we serve in in Little Falls. So all of the numbers are very similar as you go down. And again, as you go down the right column, those um percentages or those ratios should get bigger as kids are building their independence. Okay, related service providers. And these numbers will always look a little bit different depending on the role that the people serve um across the district. And so this is Worthington's numbers, speech language pathologist. There's 5.75. If you look in the far right column, the total FTE, the middle two columns are what the

015district provides and then what the co-op provides and again total on the right. So school psychologists total of 4.4, 4 academic evaluators 2.5 occupational therapists 2.1 deaf heart of hearing one and a half of a physical therapist in comparison just so you have something to look at with a a with like numbers like number district um speech language pathologist in Little Falls we have five so very similar school psychologist we have two versus the the 4.4 in Worthington. And then academic evaluators, we have one occupational therapist, one that part of hearing teacher.8 and then we have a 1.0 physical therapist. More related service providers, your DAPE teacher, this is Worthington again. So Dave teachers you have one BVI or orientation mobility specialist you have.3 school social workers you have four and the reason why that

016is asteris in the right column is because they're uh half of them are paid for with special education and two of them are paid for uh with in general education and then there's nine school counselors across the district and then there's a staff serving one person, but she's serving half time right now as a board certified behavior analyst. In comparison, um to Little Falls Dave teacher, we have half a DAPE teacher. Uh BVI teacher, uh we actually hire a consultant. We are not part of a co-op. And so we hire um consultants sometimes through um other districts that are around us, sometimes through an agency. And so we just pay that person hourly for the service that they provide. School social workers, we have six again asterisk because they are they serve 50% general ed,

01750% special ed. Two school counselors. We don't have any board certified behavior analysts, but we do have one behavior interventionist at our middle school who is 84 out of our coordinated early intervention dollars, which is um part of special education. And then when it comes to administrators, so in Worthington, um obviously, you know, you have one director and one assistant director. Those folks are part of the co-op. Um there's five special education secretaries. There's five lead teachers and five mentor teachers across the district. In comparison, um again, Little Falls has one director. And because we're not part of a co-op, the district hires me and we have 1.5 coordinators which are the on the ground um supervisors or administrative positions who um are covering all of the pieces in the schools dayto-day. And then we

018also have one due process specialist. And I think I shared when when I came to Little Falls last year, we were just a little bit messy in our due process. And so I brought this person on on board from an agency to help us clean up the pieces they needed to clean up so we were compliant. And then we don't have any spent secretaries in the schools at all. The case managers um they schedule all of their meetings and connect with parents directly. They complete all their walk through process to connect with families as well. Um we do have five lead teachers in the buildings for special education and then we also have five mentor teachers again snip and pay just like Worthington and then um I have 1.5 internal folks and those one that

0191.5 they do the transportation the MARS the MA building that is completed by the co-op for Woodington So it looks like this for Worthington extra additional services that we have to have. Okay. Your students in the district are served in multiple ways and not unfamiliar at all across the state. And so in your early childhood, there's a push in to general education classes. There's pull out to individual support or small group in homes and daycare settings. And so you serve students across the community and um your teachers do a wonderful job. They're very extreme and dedicated. And in K2, same thing. Push in and pull out. 35 you see the same thing. Push in and pull out. And then starting in the middle school in 8th grade, they start a co-op model in um that

020they would love to go down into seventh and sixth grade as well. 912 again same thing uh pull out push in and um several co- classes and even in content classes at the high school and then learning center pull out push in and then vibe online is more of a onetoone service when the kids come up okay just a little and then get into this next section. And before I start this, what I want to say is that administrators, teachers, related service providers were all very honest in in their feedback. um very gracious in their feedback and I will say that um what they shared is um very impactful to the services that will be provided and I don't ever want anybody to think that oh it's a it's a gotcha because it's it's not

021a gotcha it just is a it's a a real and what's going on and I will tell you there are no significant red flags there are no significant anything that's going shortly. And so I just wanted to be sure I said that before we get started because the the feedback is um real feedback from people's perspectives. Okay. So, building administrators, I um spoke with every building administrator and collected uh feedback in five areas around program structure and delivery, staffing and personnel, student outcomes and progress monitoring, family and community engagement, and challenges and areas for improvement as well. And tonight, I'm going to talk about um overall strengths that the administrators um shared and then some key challenges as well. So overall strength strong parent engagement across the district and then all the administrators felt like

022they have very effective collaborative structures and what I mean by that is PLC's building leadership teams um sped representation on the uh building leadership teams and then ongoing some pretty consistent ongoing problem solving in between all of those pieces. And so that what a great strength to have for communication. More strengths. I've mentioned this earlier, dedicated and compassionate staff. The administrators couldn't say enough good things about the staff that they have at their schools. They really um feel very strongly in the positive work that they're doing. Inclusive and specialized practices. uh feel like the teachers are very creative in carving out space for every student need. So looking at we have students with really significant needs and so how are students served um in ways that get them to where we want them to be

023which is graduation and life beyond. And then also the administrators gave some very positive feedback about strong peer professional teams in the buildings and also um this the use of the sped clerical staff. They felt like this was very efficient so teachers could stay in instruction and um they again they just had very positive feedback about that additional support behind the teachers. Okay. some key challenges across again this is across the district so in general from administrators um staffing instability loss of some veteran teachers um feeling like we might not have teachers in buildings or we might not have enough paraprofessionals in buildings and then maybe some coming and going at you know maybe some challenging times during the school year unexpectedly. um peer professional management. This is um typically a um a challenge area

024because they need training, right? We all need training. And so what are those systems for training? How do I train the teachers and train the pair of professionals? And then also how do teachers train pair professionals on specific kids? And so just really looking for a better way to maximize um effectiveness around that. And then maybe some um they felt like there was some inconsistent inclusion and some least restrictive environment understanding you know that all kids are all of our kids um not just belonging to special education but all of our kids. So how do we do that better? How do we communicate better and make sure we're all serving our kids effectively? Additionally, um this first one is I think this is everywhere. Time and access constraints. How do we have enough time in

025the day to get everything done and also have really good conversations? I talked about that problem solving a little bit earlier and having that time in between the meetings to get things done. And so there doesn't always seem to be a lot of time to do that. Some buildings had more of that time than other buildings. And then uh some student engagement barriers. And so there's some attendance issues where the kids are. We're trying to figure out how the kids attend every day. And also in the virtual setting as well, making sure that kids are online at the appropriate time when the teachers are in. And then space limitations. So, um, the high school, Tony, I don't want to pick on you, but the high school felt like, you know what, a little bit more

026space. And then also in early childhood too, that we felt they felt like they needed a little more space as well. Um, family engagement gaps that we the feeling was that parents were coming regularly IEP meetings, but maybe not coming to parent teacher conferences as much. Okay, that was all of the administrative feedback. Now, we're going to talk a little bit about the special education teacher feedback. And again, I just wanted to caveat to say that um it was open dialogue and it's perspective. This is just perspective taking and we need perspective in order to grow and and make changes. And so the feedback from teachers, we talked about programming, we talked about data collection, we talked about support from supervisors, support from building administrators, talked about scheduling, IEP meetings, staffing across and then a

027little bit by building. So this is broken out by building because they each have some um key strengths and they each have some key challenges as well. And so the early childhood team felt like they have a very strong teaching team. They have positive family partnerships, which is great because that's where it starts. It starts with our littles. And then they felt like uh very positive about their 2.5year-old transition class that that is just a bump that will get them into the threes. And then curriculum and assessment tools, the use of strong use of the STAR curriculum and um teaching strategies gold, which is more of an assessment to determine where our kids are at. And that's widely used across the state as well. And then leadership support. So strong support from the early childhood

028coordinator providing guidance to them as well. So they felt well supported in that. All right. Challenges from early childhood. um uh they felt like there was a lack of assessment infrastructure, meaning that they are completing their own assessments. And I I mentioned this in one of our earlier meetings that it's okay for early childhood to complete assessments. Those assessments are are different than the uh part B assessments or evaluations. And so it's okay that they complete their own assessment. um that they saw they're seeing an increase in behavioral concerns and how to best support students in intervention. I mentioned space that they were looking for a little bit more instructional space that maybe wasn't shared with other teachers and then um curriculum limitation insufficient access to a comprehensive range of curriculum tools and resources. So

029maybe looking at some new curriculum and program isolation. And again, I think our our early childhood, they they function a little bit differently than our other general education buildings. And so sometimes the feeling of being left out or being not connected to the general building in the same way. And then also the thought of um uh perhaps looking developmentally at what are kids how they are learning? Are they in more of a playbased situation? Um or are they uh more sitting in a circle and looking at the whiteboard or smartboard? What does that look like? Okay. So, Prairie know and so key strengths of Prairie, they feel like they have a very strong um evaluation process, clear and effective procedure, strong team collaboration. And I I will just add that all of the teams were

030very strong and all of the teams in collaboration. Uh they seem to all get along really well, which was fun for me to step into. and um they one of their key strengths is social emotional learning uh resources. So they want to keep that going instructional programs good use of sand and the again the star curriculum as well. And then they also feel that they have very dedicated and highly effective sped clerical support and don't ever want to lose that support. Okay. Some challenges for Prairie is again staffing. So ongoing shortages of licensed and and non-licensed staff. Um there's some behavioral support gaps. Looking at how do we support kids? If um someone is called to a classroom, what does that look like? Who goes to support the student? Service delivery barriers. um it was

031it's difficult to schedule services outside of the general education classroom because of the scheduling. So they really wanted to look at how could that be done differently and I think it's a valid valid something to look at. We look at scheduling every year in special education and then administrative support feeling like administrators are being stretched across a really big building and programs. Um this was one item that I alluded to a little bit earlier. So um special education teachers were are being tasked to go out of their instructional time to go and support kids in a general education setting uh for behavior. And so there's just some missing there's some gap. So when a special education teacher leaves their classroom obviously those kids are missing instruction. And then and now what happens next? And so

032some thoughts about that. Got to look at that. And then again the schedule the schedule often drives programming instead of the needs of the kids drive programming. The intermediate school um great strengths of the intermediate school strong administrative leadership um responsive district support. So um special education chill they're happy that you are uh supporting them effectively instructional practices effective implementation the Sunday program again so lots of positives about the Sunday program and Sunday curriculum it's great um staff stability um stable they feel very comfortable where they are with their staffing right now and that they um they just feel like they have a high level of support and then again operational excellence the spin clerical that's a key strength for them as well. So, some key challenges for the intermediate school feeling like they have

033high case loads, wanting to look at that and how do we um how do we figure that out? And again, that comes with staffing curriculum gaps that maybe we're not meeting all of our students need with the current curriculum. Um limited teacher support structures. So, how do we coach especially new teachers? And not only new teachers, but teachers that might be on an out of field placement license or a tier one teacher just coming into the field and maybe hasn't been in a classroom before. How do we support those folks effectively? Um, excuse me, instructional disruptions. Again, pulled from instruction to support students. And then how do we observation and treatment gaps limited special education focused classroom observations? So wanting the teachers were really asking for more feedback. Come and visit my classroom. Come and

034see what we're doing and so I can do my job better. Middle school. So middle school key strengths. Um they have evidence-based interventions. It's a reading 180 and a math 180. They're very excited about that and feel like they have good data to support that um students are growing. They have a strong collaborative culture. District level support again is strong. And then specialized programming, strong supports and services in place for students in DCD programming. That teacher in particular said that things are going very well. It's up it's challenging. Every day looks a little bit different but felt highly supported. Okay. Some key challenges then for the middle school increase in behaviors. We're seeing kids that are are looking to be more independent and looking to grow up quickly and and may or may not be

035ready for that yet. And so seeing some behaviors across they're practicing them independence right in middle school. They're practic. And then um staffing and coverage issues, pair professionals being pulled from student support roles to serve as classroom substitutes. We know that that happens in other schools as well. Um but it impacts service delivery, right? If someone's being pulled from what they're assigned to, things change. And then administrative consistency. So maybe um the feedback in terms of administrators possibly giving different feedback. One might say one thing, one might say the other and and but the teachers recognize that this also might be a time constraint that this might not be we might not have had the opportunity to talk to both. So we talked to one and then we saw one later and we talked to

036that other person. And so um just consistency around communication and then um maybe some limited inclusion models. The middle school again would really like to move from the eighth grade co-eing model down to seventh grade and down to sixth grade as well so that kids can be with their peers in general education classes. Okay. High school. So key strengths um inclusive instructional uh models strong implementation of co-eing we mentioned that earlier as well. So they co-e not only in um reading with language and math but also in some content areas to support kids as well career and transition programming effective use of the the PAS lab. And so PAS lab, for those of you that don't know, that stands for practical assessment exploration system. And so it is a really nice lab in which kids

037can practice skills in five different career areas and they just they start at ground zero. Um, and I'll give a good example. So if you want to be an electrician, they start with, are you able to put wires, two two wires together with a cap and then the next skill that they would master maybe is hooking those wires then to a small light bulb. Can I get that light bulb to hook up? And then the the skills just keep getting more difficult and more difficult. And when a student finish those those five skills, for example, then they go on to another set of skills. It's a very nice way for kids who have no idea what they want to do to just try a whole bunch of different things and all of a sudden they

038land on something and say, "Hey, I'm really good at these puzzles. I never knew I was good at these puzzles and but it's something that I'm interested in." So that's a wonderful opportunity. And then again, academic interventions, the cons consistent use of the math 180 and the read 180. instructional leadership. Um the team is is very happy that the building principal has a special education background and can understand those instructional pieces as well. Okay. Some key challenges uh for the high school again staffing staffing constraints and what does that look like? Are we fully staffed? And the high school probably has the lowest number of teachers across, but they may have the highest number of students that they serve. So, you have to be really creative in figuring that out. And then the case loads

039become high. So, I'm spending more time as a teacher completing due process paperwork than maybe what I would like to be spending in instruction and problem solving with kids. um program capacity co dot classes it they're really high there's high numbers of special education students in those classes you know I think best practice is about a third of special education students in a co-op class you might want to look at that service delivery reductions they feel strongly about their work-based learning opportunities and they don't want to see that go away we want to keep those work-based learning opportunities going and then um because there are the staffing is lower then when staffing is lower then we have to adjust right so then we have other people doing maybe some assignments that they hadn't done before

040and when that happens then our procedures change as well and so as long as those procedures are all communicated and we're working to do things in a common way it all works out well. But again, that communication ranks right up there. And in particular, the the high school teachers wanted to talk about or did talk about the formal process for waving evaluations. when do we make that choice that we wave an evaluation for a student and um some there were some scheduling and compensation issue summer scheduling when teachers are scheduling um they you know the master schedule we'd like to have that finished in the spring and then it continues to work on over the get worked on over the summer and then in the fall in August those final schedules need to go out

041and so there's a lot of time because special education schedules. When you have when you go on classes in the middle school and the high school, you can schedule those to make sure kids are in the appropriate classes where they can get the appropriate support. Okay. The learning center, the learning center key strengths, small class sizes, flexible scheduling, strong administrative support, which is which goes hand in hand if you have small classes, right? You may have the opportunity to be in support of teachers more work-based learning growth. They want to increase their work base learning as well and feel they have strong opportunities to do so. Positive student outcomes. The student success um rates are going up. Excuse me one minute. they would on the same breath they would like to see more kids in

042attendance with that but the kids that are in attendance are doing very well another key strength for the learning center is high mental health supports strong collaboration with the social worker and greater Minnesota mental health um enhances student well-being and then adapted instructional staff so again that flexibility and I saw this across all buildings that the teachers said, "Yes, we're here for the students." And so, we just we want to be as flexible as we can, but we want to understand the role that we're being asked to do in addition to our typical role. We just want to make sure that we're catching it because we want to support students effectively. Some key challenges then for the learning center, high case load there. It's just one special education teacher. So, it's a little bit higher

043case load. It's a little bit different though because students are coming in. So, that case load just fluctuates consistently. Um limited pair of professional support at the learning center. Um maybe some late identification of students that are at risk that looking at the potential of can we identify kids who are credit deficient a little earlier and then again the attendance concerns. Okay, moving on to the special education evaluation team, the SE team. So, feedback was provided in the following four areas: program structure and delivery, staffing and personnel, student outcomes and progress monitoring, and family and community engagement. So on the C team you have school psychologist, you have your academic evaluators and then there are um there's one speech and language pathologist who also does only evaluation for the district. And so your school psychologists

044complete the cognitive or intellectual assessments for kids, social emotional rating scales, adaptive rating skills, autism rating skills, and then they also are completing FBAs this school year. Um again there, you know, a little bit of a role shift because there was um the um the behavior analyst had to shift into more of a case management role and then so it shifted the FBA again and that's what we do in special education. Okay. Then an academic specialist then does all of the academics um assessments for reading, math and written language transition provides the medical updates and then the background information as part of the evaluation very collaborative team. So just a little bit of summary over or data summary over five years and I'm not going to read all of this to you but as the

045years get higher we're completing more evaluation and that's consistent across the state. And so if you look in the very right column this past school year, the number of initial assessments, the number of reavals, those are the evaluations that are being completed. And the waved evaluations are the ones where parents make the decision that at this time that it is not don't need to have a new evaluation to determine if the student continues to qualify for special education. So adding all those three things together, you get 380. And then so they shared that their key strengths are they feel like they have a very efficient referral process and I I think that they do they shared the process and so I think that they do have a very strong efficient process and then they also

046feel like they are very highly skilled staff. They they are they know their role. They demonstrate expertise and lots of professionalism with that. some challenges with the special education assessment team. Um limited problem solving uh structures, absence of a formal problem solving team at the high school perhaps to um talk about early intervention. um there's some intervention gaps that they would like to see filled and and these folks will be um the ones who can spot those gaps because they are in all schools and looking at evaluating all students that come forward and so they would be able to help identify um the gaps that exist and then the feeling of they feel challenged by the reduced clerical support that they have had this last here and they would like some process clarity. Again, um

047school psychologists, those are the folks that, you know, they're into the details and so very much they want the process and the procedures in place and making sure everybody knows what that is. And then um high volumes of referrals, feeling like that number is that 380 is high. But remember again, there was a good portion in there that was was waved. And then maybe there's some over identification to feeling like we have kids in the early grades that maybe are being identified for special education and we should possibly be looking to see if it's a language issue first. Okay. The other related service provider team that I talked with is a speech language pathologist. And again, I won't read these seven areas, but you can look how they provided feedback to me. Okay. Key strengths

048for the speech language pathologist team. And so they too feel like they have very consistent evaluation practices. Again, they have one SLP who does all of the initial evaluations for these folks. And then they also feel like their service delivery model is very effective. Um they have data that indicates that the students are growing in in their language skills. Um they feel that the pair of professionals that support. So this is the virtual piece now that there's a paraprofessional in the building when they're serving kids and that pair professional may go get that student to bring them to the room that they are being served in and waiting for the SLP to come online. They feel like those folks are are very good at what they do. And then the um they use the 31

049service model which means they have three weeks of direct service to kids and then one week of indirect service which could be um evaluations, it could be talking with classroom teachers, it could be talking with special education teachers, professional learning, they have um they're very excited about the ongoing professional development with a website uh speech speech pathology.com and that is a highly recommended um area or or website for learning for speech pathologists. And then they also feel like there's very strong psychical support at the school that has come across in every building that that support is very highly appreciated. Okay. Some key challenges with the speech language So feeling that they could use some role clarity well and and perhaps they would like to share what their role is with administrators so it's very clear

050um what they do and how they serve kids. They have some concerns about u partnership. They feel that maybe they are micromanaged a little bit and not given some professional autonomy. They also um they talked about evaluation coordination and how they want to make sure that that SLP that serves on the seat team, the evaluation team is there consistently and so that they um are part of those conversations that go on for initial evaluations. And then they also feel that there is some scheduling constraints because when they don't want to take kids out of content core instruction and so it's always a a big matrix when you can you know figure out the schedule when you can insert particular kids and maybe I can get someone in fourth grade but I can't get them in

051third grade because they have math going on. So, it's always this balance of of figuring out the schedule. And they also they miss they said one of their challenges is especially for those that serve in a virtual format on this team that they said that they have fewer opportunities to build the partnerships and the relationships with school staff. And the last one, high case loads. They felt like the SLP case loads were high. Okay, this is just a guide um that I created to compare the the best fit model is what I call it. And so looking at what is the question was being asked is is the 31 model the best model for the SLPs is the 41 weekly model which is 4 days direct one day of that indirect service or is it

0525 days direct what is what is the best and I think it really depends on the kids that you serve and so the 31 model um it it is a more of an inexpensive model because for a whole week on not serving kids directly. So, it's a more expensive model. Um, but I think that SLPs feel like they can get all of the additional pieces done. They can get their MA billing completed. They can get any re-evaluations completed and see kids. And so, it's something that um I know that a team of you will look at to make sure that there is a best fit. Okay. due process review. This was really fun. I um had access to the Worthington sped form system like I mentioned earlier and I went in and I and I

053reviewed 20 student cases from across all of the age levels and as I said earlier there are no huge red flags. The teachers are doing some really beautiful due process and it's so nice. They tell very cleanly the stories about students in their present levels and they are able to articulate what exactly is going on with the students and their needs and so they have um consistency in meeting deadlines. There were not there were maybe a couple just a couple um that hadn't met the deadline and that that happened mainly um in the younger grades because sometimes it's more challenging um to get those uh evaluations especially in early childhood completed on time. Um and so consistent there were consistent teams present for IEP meetings on the notice of a team meeting and there was

054collaborative input from all the stakeholders at the team on the team and the families seem to be really engaged and I would say that the evaluations um were quite strong. Okay. some challenges now in due process. And again, this is not out of the realm of anything that I haven't seen before. And so there's a significant amount of pair professional supports without goals to build independence. So I always like to have when I'm having a student with onetoone support for example those adults that we looked at in one of the early slides that I make sure that we're building goals. So what does that look like then to build independence and we know exactly in a student's day maybe we're using a pair professional matrix to determine exactly when they need support. And so we

055don't want to assume that a student can't walk from their classroom to the cafeteria. Let's try it. Let's see if they can do it. And then we may not have to have that adult right by them or maybe it's just in, you know, minimal assist in eye shot range. Um and so that was one thing that I noted. And then um goals don't always have a a baseline. So the student is going from this, they're able to do this right now to we want to get them here and that is a best practice. But I will say that every district trains around that just a little bit differently. But if you were to ask MDE, they would probably say, "Oh yeah, we should probably know where they're coming from. We got to have that baseline

056and where we want them to go." Um objectives. So objectives were often stacked without end dates. And I'll tell you what I mean by stacked. And so if we are looking to have a student complete a task, it would say by and we'll start in September. So this IEP is going to start in September. So by November, we want student to be able to do this task with 80% accuracy. And then the next one would say, well then by February we want this student to be able to complete this task with 85%. What was happening is that there weren't always end dates. There weren't not by November, not by February, and there weren't always the the percentage in order to complete them. So something to look at. Um, meetings don't always include an EEL teacher,

057even when the student has been identified as dual identified, an English learner and a special education student. So, we want to make sure that that EL teacher is invited. And then the related services teams, they could just benefit from developing common service methods. And so it was um some different kinds of minutes, you know, some put them as a week in a week, some put them in a month, some put them in a year. And so what does that look like for consistency across the district, but overall, again, I'll say it again, due process really looks good. Okay, so some recommendations then for next steps. So, the first one I um it would be nice if the district could develop a decision-making model for the district, not just for special education, but for the district

058that could be used in special education. And so, teams would know who the the stakeholders are for any particular meeting or any particular um when you're gathering feedback. So whenever people are together, how are we going to make the decision about what we're doing? Who gets to make the decision and what is the input level? So if I go to a meeting, I want to know, am I just providing feedback? Am I just a listener in this meeting? Do I get to make the decision about what we do next? So, it's just nice to have a decision-making model so everybody is on the same page and delivering um everybody has a common understanding of what's going to happen at the meeting and then develop that sped administrative team. So, what does that look like? Is

059it a director and an assistant director? Is that a um director and coordinators? What are the needs? And so I I would just say, you know, you just need to look at what responsibilities do you want those folks to do. So if you want them to be superintendent higham, do you want them to be on your cabinet giving feedback from the special education lens? Do you want them to be completing evaluations for teachers that they are overseeing and and providing some supervision to? you know, just determine what are those roles and then who are they going to report to. Um, that will be that'll be key because they'll need to know what information to provide to the cabinet, for example. And then developing those communication avenues with all teams and so how often do I

060meet with the related services team? If I'm the director, do I meet monthly with them? Do I meet weekly with them? What is that quarterly? you just so everybody is consistent on that meeting and that we all can make the commitment to be there to move the work forward. It's really important and that um it really does wonders for communication and building team and then continue partnership with building administration. So that sometimes what happens, and I know this happens um in Little Falls, that I may give one direction to a special education teacher from a special education lens, but the principal might give another direction from their building lens. And so there it just takes a lot of collaboration and maybe information can be shared around procedures at administrative meetings that you are on the

061same page. And what I do is I often provide um I just did one last week for example on administrative design. So, we have some new deans and a couple of new principles. And so, what does that look like for them in the district and how so everybody knows what is that role? What what do I do when I'm in that meeting? And so, it was really nice opportunity just to make sure that we're all clear. Okay. Another recommendation for next step and we talked about this often so I'm not going to put a lot of time into this one is to increase communication with those related services teams. Um sometimes you know they are amazing professionals and they want that autonomy to make decisions professionally but they also want that overall supervision to give

062guidance for the system. And so again, I think just developing a schedule, developing a tool for feedback, and then um increasing communication. We're all on the same team. We all want what's best for kids. The next one is developing clear job descriptions. I talked a little bit about this earlier that when a job description changes, so if I am a a teacher, but then I am called into this other role, what does that mean for me when I'm doing that other role? And what is my flexibility? What are my boundaries for completing that other role? It just needs to be very clear and again falls under that communication piece. And I would recommend too holding at least annual feedback sessions. It was such a great opportunity to meet with your teachers and they are all

063they're very smart and they have really good feedback and so it I recommend doing it annually to just hey what are we thinking about? What are our goals for this year? What do we all want to do that's in common? And how are we connected to our strategic vision? what's our role in special education connected to a strategic plan and then um evaluate staff growth in a in a meaningful way. So, and what I mean by that is just simply do it regularly and provide impactful feedback for them that is more than just um you're you're really good at your job, >> but what why am I really good at my job? What do I do that impacts student growth? And so tell me about that because I want to know. I want to know

064what I'm what I'm doing well for the system. Continue to grow your own. Um you have a really good process in place right now. This year I feel like it was an anomaly for Worththington being short staffed and it sounds like there's some teachers in the pipeline coming forward. You just hired one this week. it sounds like. And um and so continue to be mindful of that and maybe develop some kind of a workload so that we know how many teachers are going to be in the building and what is that fair number um to have in a building to serve kids as well. Continue to train staff in best practices. You do all this. Continue to train staff in due process procedures. maybe some of the things we talked about and then create the

065staff connections when we have when we're connected to each other and we have a high sense of belonging. We all do better when we all do better. And then the last one is really uh just um I told the board this earlier. It's just really my favorite about appreciating the highlights and when something is going well that we say it out loud. We celebrate the victories. We celebrate when kids do something for the first time because that's a big deal. We may have worked a half a year to have the student walk from their classroom to the cafeteria and wow they did it by themselves. So just be mindful to celebrate all those pieces along the way. Okay, just a little bit on the organizational finances and finances again for Worthington in the special education

066realm. They're managed mostly by the co-op and but they look very good. They're very good. Um there aren't any um significant red flags in there. I would just recommend just knowing who the co-op is is funding and who the district is funding so we can make good decisions about the money that's being spent. And then um again along with that just knowing where they're coded planning possibly for early intervention uh VPK which is voluntary prek um coordinated early intervention and then access alternative delivery. You know, those are some things that you could look in for early intervention as well. Determine the sped administrative positions needed based on what the staff needs and what the district needs for feedback. And then just a a um I just want you to be aware that positions such as

067nursing, social work, behavior intervention, instructional behavior specialist, those folks can also be paid for out of special education. And then lastly is just encouraging a mindset. We all share in the growth of every student. We all whether we're in special education or we're in general education, we all share in that. And when we and the reason why I put this in the in the finance section is because often times in special education we have a tendencies tendency to say oh special education paid for that you might not be able to use that. So we have to think about and be careful with our messaging because it really does create silos in classrooms. It creates silos for teachers and so be just being mindful of that. That's it. How did I do Tony? On time. Okay,

068great. Any questions that you might have? >> Guys have anything for Carol? I have one question. Um, you mentioned that um, staffing instability is one of our challenges and I'm wondering if you from your perspective if you have any specific recommendations to try and um, improve staffing stability or um, at least keep the the wonderful staff that we have. What recommendations that you mentioned do you think particularly hit home that point? >> Yes, thank you. Good question. So, one of my strongest beliefs is that um staff want to work in a place where they feel like they belong and they're connected not only to the work, but they're connected to the people that they work with. And so, if we can create that as a district, create that sense of belonging, it's really important for

069staff. I think the other piece is is high communication too. And to create that they go together. And so to create that sense of belonging, I have to be in high communication all the time. And I have to be letting people know what they do really well. And I would say giving the professionals the autonomy to make decisions, but letting them know where that decision level is. Yep. I'll let you decide if that student qualifies for special education. Yeah, you're the professional. You go ahead and make that decision. And so they when people have that sense that they're making a difference and they're connected, that's my best advice on that one for sure. >> Thank you. >> Mhm. >> Anyone else? >> Have a question. Um you spoke a lot about um in your uh

070feedback uh gathering about um people seeking wanting more clarity and and more system um systematic approaches and things. >> Um what is the best practice or your opinion of where that needs to be implemented at what level and by whom? >> Yeah. Oh, that's a really good question too. Thank you. So I do believe that it starts at with the superintendent, right? The superintendent sets the tone for how we communicate and how we make decisions and then that just trickles down through the system. So then we go to our administrators. How do our administrators learn to make decisions and where is their um feedback for teachers as well? So I think it is just um it's key that that starts at the very beginning and you have a wonderful superintendent to start that process. >>

071Anyone else? Ma'am, >> Mr. Chairman, a question. As you evaluate our engagement with the co-op, did you find that there were services we should be utilizing that we're not? Or there are things that we should take in house and do efficiently better than co-op involvement? >> Another great question. And so, um, to be honest, I didn't dive really deep into all of the services that they provide because they are a very large co-op and they do a lot of great things. And so, but the services that I did look at, some of them, what happens is that those folks that they provide like low incidence um, disability areas, for example, blind, visually impaired, we don't have many students that are in the district like that. And so to hire your own would be difficult and

072they're hard to find. They're really hard to find. So for the co-op to be providing those pieces I think is necessary for you. >> What about the leadership structure of the director? Is there advantages or disadvantages of having that position in house or through the co-op? I so this is what I think about that. Um having a director in house provides a different level of support in terms of again if superintendent highamp would like that person to be on their cabinet and maybe they have a districtwide role through the system. So maybe that's partnering with administrators in on certain things. And so that is the benefit of having someone inhouse because there's great ownership having someone in house and you know the district you belong to the district, right? I'm not coming and going. You

073belong. That doesn't mean to say that you couldn't have a director from the co-op who is with you full-time, but you may just want to look at those job descriptions and you may have flexibility in determining, you know, if they are want to be a good partner with you. You could possibly look at those job descriptions and accomplish that same piece. Joel, do you have >> Yeah, if I could just say thank you to Carol for the work that you've done over the course of the last it's been almost 6 months. I if I if I remember I was sitting in that corner on a June or June evening when the board made the decision to do it and I was sitting on my porch on a Sunday morning and texted Carol and said, "Who

074might you know that would be able to do this work for us?" And so I appreciate you stepping up and and being a part of it. And uh you know, I also want to just give a shout out to our whole special ed team for their engagement through the process. Um Carol said over and over again um how much she enjoyed our time here. And and then just also want to acknowledge our our special ed team as well, knowing that um it's been a it's been a challenging year with a interim director who isn't here all the time and Jill's been running all over stretched really thin. So I appreciate her work as well. And so just wanted the opportunity to call that out here this evening. So thank you again. And uh just for

075clarity, the full presentation I think was close to 80 slides and so it's got more information that wasn't shared but will be really really valuable as we move into a new director and continue to build strong programs for kids. >> Thank you. >> One last Mr. Qu chairman, Mr. Quest. Um, what about the uh maybe didn't dive into this, but questions to our our parents and the families and their feeling about programming and is there value in doing surveys to to gauge how they consider we're doing? >> I did not survey families about how they feel services are going. However, there was strong feedback around parent engagement and parents showing up at at school for conferences and for IEP meetings. The older that the student became, the less engaged that they were maybe for parent

076teacher conferences, but they were still showing up for IEP meetings, which is fantastic. And that's not always an easy task for parents to come into a situation in which they may not speak English or have limited English. And then the use having a use the use of an interpreter as well. And so I applaud the number of families that you have engaged in the process. It's wonderful. more >> Darlan Lori. >> Um, it will be uploaded to the district website at some point the presentation. >> Yeah, we can do that. >> Okay, thank you. Aaron, good. Okay, thanks Carol. >> Thanks again, Carol. >> Okay, moving on. 5.3. Approve the second and the final reading of policy 606 textbooks and instructional materials 306 administrator code of ethics 417 chemical use and abuse and 712 video

077recording other than UNB buses Joel. >> Yeah. So four policies coming back for a second and final read. These all went through committee two times as well. uh 606, 306, and 712 uh are all uh legislative or um minor updates through MSBA. Uh just did want to call out with a little bit more depth that 417 again, just as a reminder, is a full adoption of the current MSBA policy. um in uh reviewing our current policy with the recommendations that MSBA had sent uh there were there were such great differences uh and it looked like there had been a little bit of a gap in in updating that uh it would be our recommendation as an administrative team that we we just adopt the full 417 uh draft from MSBA and get back on on

078track with that. So um both went through committee without any recommendations uh further and other than than approval. >> Do I have a motion to approve the four policies listed? >> So moved. >> Motion by. Do I have a second? >> Seconded by Lori. Is there any further discussion? All those in favor of the motion say I. >> I. >> All those opposed. Motion passes. Okay. 5.4. Approve a memorandum of understanding with education Minnesota Warington for the 2026 27 school year. Joel. >> Yeah. So, just calling out quickly to board members that there was a a slight typo on the agenda. So, it is for next year. It should say 2026 2027 on the year. Um, again, thisou went through both committee um through our negotiation process with EMW. Um, one of the pieces that

079we had talked about was the opportunity of a calendar flex day um, allowing teaching staff to have one day throughout the uh, the school calendar year uh, that they could place really anywhere uh, that they would desire to do the work that they need to do at a given time. And so, for example, that that day could come um on June 2nd, for example, for this year if we had it in place um because they needed an extra day to wrap up the year. Or it could be the Saturday before workshop week if they needed an extra day to feel ready to come back and do some of that learning. Or it could truly be on a Saturday in the middle of the year. Uh or we've even talked about chunking it up into pieces

080knowing that uh a given day is about eight hours. And so we're looking for um final board approval um to move that into language um that we can use and put into place into the calendar that I will present next. And um we did talk at both committees. Again, just as a reminder that our building administrators would have some oversight of this. Uh we've been talking with EMW leadership about what that could look like. Um, but truly just staff submitting uh some sort of Google form um stating what day they used it or what days they used it and uh checking that off that that day is uh one of their 186 contracted days. >> Okay. Do we have a motion to approve the memorandum? >> So moved. >> Motion by Ann. Do I have

081a second? >> Seconded by Aaron. Is there any further discussion? All those in favor of the motion say I. >> I >> oppos. Same sign. Motion passes. Okay. 5.5. Approve the 2627 school calendar. Joel. >> All right. Thank you. I had two drafts. So we'll go through the draft with the calendar flex day. Um this again was gone through at both committee. Uh you should have seen a copy of it there. So I'll just briefly go through it again uh for review. But uh the the calendar that is being proposed just want to call it out was a collaborative effort amongst a large group involved representation from teachers, building administrators, uh district administrators from all levels. Uh and so was really proud of the process. We did it over uh three different meetings and gathering

082feedback uh and then bringing back recommendations at each one. And so the calendar that we're presenting this evening is truly uh it's not my idea. It's not any one person's idea, but really a collective effort of a of a large group. And so uh it has us coming back full as a as a full team on August 24th for our teacher workshop. Uh starting school on the 31st, having that long weekend again around Labor Day. It has uh the the two days of MEA as giveback time. uh for conferences for our staff. I'll just hit some of the the breaks and then go back to some more of the highlights. Uh it has our our two-day uh Thanksgiving break. It has a winter break starting on the uh 24th of December going for half of

083that week and having the other week half of that week off. Uh coming back to school from from winter break on January 4th. We have two long weekends built in. One in February, one in March. Uh that was a discussion and uh and uh shared shared belief through the that collaborative process that two two longer weekends versus one much longer uh break really met uh staff's needs, allowed for multiple opportunities for for staff to uh possibly get away if they needed to. Um and then scattered throughout the calendar are a number of early outs. Three of them uh give back time for teachers setting their personal goals, three of them as professional development. The two items that I'd like to call out specifically, February 9th and 10th are scheduled uh learn from home days for

084our high school only. On those two days, we will tackle EL access testing. Um truly trying to support those students. The amount of pullout time that was happening uh for them to to complete that assessment was really disruptive to their learning. It took a long time at the high school. Uh this is a practice that's happening in other districts throughout the state and so the EL team, the high school team truly felt like this would be a benefit for kids um to to have them come in the building um really focus on that assessment, get it done for most of them in 2 days. Uh students that are not access testing will be home uh doing learning extension activities uh while staff is again focused on providing that assessment. The other day that is different

085is April 23rd. That is a learn from home day for everyone again for professional development. And so on that day we will have a a very uh detailed schedule uh of what that looks like for staff. Staff will not have to do two activities at the same time. That's one of the stipulations uh through the department of ed if you do anything like this. And so, for example, a day could look like um from 8 to 9 in the morning, staff are truly just getting students started on their day, making sure items are uploaded and ready to go. Uh from from 10 to 12:30, they're doing professional development with a lunch break, a half hour check-in in the afternoon with more professional development dedicated for staff in the afternoon, and a half hour wrap-up. and

086students will know certain times of when teachers would be available. But again, never asking staff to do two or both both of those tasks at the same time. We have a ending date of the school year of May 28th uh with graduation happening on that day and a final teacher day uh to wrap up on June 1st. So calendar includes 167 instructional days. Uh the 185 required uh teacher days and again one of those um days is a added on there is a teacher flex day that you had just approved through thatou. So looking for approval of the calendar for the 2627 school year. >> Okay. Do I have a motion to approve the 2627 calendar? So moved. >> Motion by Eric. Do I have a second? >> Seconded by Matt. Is there any further

087discussion? >> All those in favor of the motion say I. >> I. All those opposed? Same sign. Motion passes. Okay. 5.6. Approve student teaching agreement with Southwest Minnesota State University. Carmen. Um this is a student teaching agreement um with Southwest State Minnesota State University. It's a 5-year agreement. Um it will start July of 26 and go through um June 30th of 2031. Um this allows them to place student teachers in our district um which is also it's a great experience um for those student teachers and it also provides us an opportunity for recruitment as well. So um we we have this with um some other colleges as well. Um this is definitely one of the points as I'm out at career affairs that we really are trying to connect with some of those other colleges

088to um set up student teaching because it gives us a lot of opportunity. >> Right. >> So we're looking for approvement for a 5-year agreement with them. >> Okay. Do I have a motion to approve the agreement with SMSU? >> So moved. Motion by Eric, seconded by Lori. Any further discussion? >> All those in favor of the motion say I. >> I. >> All those opposed, same sign. Motion passes. Okay. 5.7 approve the tax abatement request that we had heard earlier. >> Yep. So coming forth again for approval. Um just a quick summary again. Um, Marco Ramos uh is um I believe the the builder and did the application for the homeowner single family home in Warthingington. Um again, all paperwork is uh in place for this and uh this is a a gentleman that

089has done many of these in the in the recent past. So, um there was no discussion at the hearing and so looking for approval for the tax abatement. >> Okay. Do we have a motion to approve the tax abatement? >> So moved. Motion by Eric. >> Seconded by Darla and an sorry. >> Is there any further discussion? >> Okay, it's a roll call vote. Lisa, >> Miss Dudley, >> I. >> Miss Agard, >> I. >> Miss Shudy, >> I. >> Miss Mills, >> I. >> Mr. Bloom. >> I. >> Mr. Parish. >> I. >> Mr. Woodboom. >> I. >> Okay. Motion passes. 5.8. Approve Minnesota paid leave administrative procedures. Joel and Carmen. >> Yeah, I'll kick us off as Carmen's getting uh loaded up there and just put a little background here. Um, as many

090of you know, Minnesota paid leave has gone into effect now uh as of January 1st. Um, we are just a little bit behind, although we haven't had um we've had folks that have applied for this but haven't had to process uh much of the of the leave quite yet. Um but one piece that we do need to have taken care of is a procedure in regard um to how we're going to handle the different aspects of the of the statute. And so uh although we have had multiple conversations with EMW through negotiations um at this time um we're we're deciding that it's not going to be something that's negotiated. It is a administrative procedure. And so we have um we have uh language from MSBA. They have a model administrative procedure uh that Carmen's going

091to share. She may have to just give us the highlights it looks like. Um and that's okay. But uh the the one thing we need to decide as as a as a collective group tonight is how we're handling the the piece of topping off. And so that has been a a huge a fairly large conversation throughout the state. Um districts throughout the state are choosing to do it multiple ways. Um our recommendation right now Oh, there she goes. So I'll let I'll let Carmen give our recommendations and then we can have further discussion. There we go. Um so this is just to explain how um ISD 518 will implement the Minnesota Pay Leave that started January 1st of 2026. Um the overview of the Minnesota Pay Leave um to clarify the statutory requirements versus employer

092discretion. Um ISD 518 implementation and review of the plan. Um effective January 1st, 2026. Um it provides Minnesota um Lee provides partial wage replacement. Um it does not require the employer um to have a wage contribution and that is in the statute. Um is D518 will provide paid leave through its approved equivalent plan admin administrated by Madison National Life Insurance. Um employees apply through that carrier. Um the district will work and coordinate the absences um as they apply to that in the application process. um local staffing reality. And this is this is kind of where we get into the conversation of um why right now um we're not recommending that we would top off Minnesota paid leave. Um there's ongoing substitute shortage in our district. Um increased absence and strain operations. Um and it has

093a direct impact on the instructional continuity um for our students. Um, state law does not require um top off wage. Any decision to supplement wages is a discretionary employer choice made by the school board. Um, the board has the authority to determine whether wage supplementation is offered. The conservative approach reduces compliance and fiscal um financial risk. Um for 2026 um administration is recommending um no district um paid top off. Employees will still receive paid leave benefits through the equivalent plan. Um so they can apply. So they actually have choices. They can apply for the Minnesota paid leave. They can just choose not to do that and just um use their their sick leaf um balances that they have for the leave and then it will they'll be get full pay because they'll get their their

094full percentage of sick leave. Um, part of this is, um, it it depends and we we actually are, I think we already have maybe eight or nine that have applied to the system. Some of them have conversations. There's pros and cons, right? There there's some effects on their TRA if they take the paid leave. So, as we sit down and explain that to them, some of them are just choosing to just use their their leave um for the time frame of their their medical if it's maternity or if it's just a medical situation. Um they're it's a choice that they get to make. Um this is temporary um data driven approach. Um what what we would like to recommend is for 2026 we implement with no top off during that the 20266 calendar year. Um

095we'll monitor absences the cost and compliance and then for 2027 we would um bring back a formal review to the board with some more data. Um part of this as this law is just coming into place as we had saw also with the earn safe and sick there's a lot of changes that happen in that first year and even legislatively they might make some changes and recommendations. um deed is the one that is um monitoring this and coming down trying to um basically have the legal opinion of what that statute means and as we saw with earn safe and sick there were changes based on um as cases came forward what some of that changed. Um so things that we would analyze in the review um would be the leave usage and absence cost. Um

096it would we would review Minnesota um deed guidance and carrier updates um assess workforce and um coal and operational impacts um and return to the board for recommendations. Um so what we're asking the board to do is approve the Minnesota paid leave implementation for calendar year 2026 um with no district top off and um direct administration to return in 2027 for review. Any questions for Carmen? Okay, we need a motion then to approve administrative procedures without the top off. Correct. Do I have a motion? >> So move. >> Motion by Matt. Do I have a second? >> Seconded by Lori. Is there any further discussion? All those in favor of the motion say I. >> I. >> All those opposed. Same sign. Motion passes. Okay. 5.9 approve to declare surplus property. We've got uh three

097different sets of items here to to put on surplus. Here we've got some some teach um textbooks that are out of out of date. We've got some old robotics kits that have been replaced. And then we've got a significantly old CNC router um that uh no longer works and they don't no longer make parts for. So um I believe it's 18 years old. And so if anybody's got parts laying around, it might be something good for you. But um at this time we're looking to uh declare those items as surplus. And I did share I believe at one of the committees that uh Josh and I are working to um determine how we can um offload some of these surplus items. Right now, they're currently being stored in a shed over by the middle school

098that is quite full. And so, we're looking at options of how we can um you know, offer those up to the community, get some money back for uh the district, and then anything that doesn't uh doesn't sell can be uh can be discarded. >> You don't agree with the bonfire on Friday? >> No, I don't think so. >> Okay. Okay. Do we need a motion to approve the surplus property? >> So, moved. Motion by an I have a second >> Darla. >> Seconded by Darla. Any further discussion? Okay. All those in favor of the motion say I. >> I. >> Opposed. Same sign. >> Motion passes. Okay. 510 staffing process information. Carmen. cut you off, girl. >> So, last month we um had approved that resolution and I know there were some questions on that.

099So, we just wanted to come back and maybe explain um the staffing process for the district and um some of this is new for ISD 518. We've had different processes on staffing and kind of how we're going to approach it um going forward. Um, so why is staffing um matters to the board? It's one of our largest investments um in the general fund. Our salaries are a big part of our general fund spending. Um it has a direct impact on our student learning and it's also governed by a Minnesota statute. Um guiding principles. So student centered um we align it with budget um statute and contract compliance and we want to be transparent as we go through our budgeting proc or our staffing process. Um Minnesota statutes there's um a statute that's board authority um

100for our staffing um there's a teacher employment one collective bargaining and then budget authority which you guys um is what you guys approved last month. um what drives staffing, enrollment and projections and um as we're looking at enrollment and that's actually something that Ryan's working on now when we're talking about budgeting um what those enrollment numbers look like and what the projections look like. So you know we always have our history our data um history of enrollment and then we have to project going forward and we do those um projections for you guys and present those to you throughout throughout the year. Um and some of this is based on um just past history um our student enrollment and what that looks like. Um educational programming um that is um more so probably at the

101upper grade levels but as we look at different classes we're going to offer and what um what that looks like. So in high school how many um as they start their um enrollment for next year what kind of programs they're going to offer and what staff is needed for those. um legal mandates. There are different um programs that legally we have to offer. Um and then also what kind of financial resources do we have um in staffing and some of that um which Carol had mentioned some staffing is special ed um some of it is um compensatory dollars, there's title funding. So there's different um funding sources that we use in our staffing and that also drives um what staffing we can do. if there's cuts in some of those programs, then we have to

102relook at some of the staffing in those. Um, so kind of our um annual staffing timeline that we're going to try to adhere to. Um, in the winter projections and budgets, which we're currently um working on right now. Um, spring, we're going to be looking at staffing models. Um, as we go through the process with um they're doing registrations for next year. Um, we're looking at what kind of staffing those needs are, what our student enrollment is going to be. Um we'll kind of go through each building, break it down, and then see what our staffing numbers are. And this is staffing, um all staffing, right? It's not just teachers, it's teachers, paras, um you know, clerical, all aspects of our um our district and what staffing needs are out there. Um and then May,

103um May would be when our contracts are issued. Um so returning teachers, we issue contracts then. Um in openings, we would post our openings in the spring, early spring. um as we know teachers are leaving or retiring. Um we get those posted and then over the summer is kind of when we kind of get some more clarity in our numbers and we do some adjustments. Um the roles and responsibility um the board um is is the governance and approval for staffing. Um administrators um we provide the recommendations. HR is for compliance and hiring of staff. Um adjustments and reductions enrollment are are budget driven. Um so if our enrollment drops or our budget our funding doesn't come through as we expected that can affect staffing um statute and um contracts govern. And then board awareness

104is required in all of these. Um so some key takeaways um staffing is data driven. So, it's it's there's a lot that goes into it. Um, it's not just um some random um staffing um decisions. Um we're going to take a lot of data um from different staffing models. Um you know, some of it um even like Carol's review. Um there's a lot that's going to go into our staffing. And then, um the board provides us oversight and then compliance is critical to make sure that we're compliant. And some of those compliances are in our federal funding. got to make sure that we're compliant with those requirements. Any questions and there's no action. This is just kind of information for you guys. >> I have a question. So, I I love data as much as

105anybody in this room, but when it comes to um making specific decisions about staff, it can't be entirely about data, right? And so what um what feedback are you receiving from um other stakeholders about you know that might that might turn into data points right um when it comes to making decisions about contracts. >> Um so one of the things that we're we're going to do this year it's it's new um actually Mr. High Camp had um shared this with us. we will be sending out a survey to staff um and it will be a questionnaire for them. So um asking them things that they like about their current position. Um you know we do have teachers that maybe are teaching out of lure. Um so we're offering that opportunity for them if they want

106to switch um buildings. Just a lot of questions but also we want we want to also take into account what they're feeling and you know what their needs are. So we're we're looking at that as well which we have not done that before. I mean on a personal level they have like the building administrators have had those conversations but not so much at this higher admin level. >> The other two pieces that are also new is that um I've started having conversations with building administrators. We're going to go back for um early spring spring listening sessions um with with staff. So they'll get an opportunity to talk about you know how they're feeling as a staff in the building, what needs they maybe see. And then we'll do two meetings with building administrators. Um, one

107of them really allowing for hopes and dreams, right? What what programs maybe don't you offer that you would really like to or where are you feeling there's a need that maybe doesn't show up on paper and so we are getting that personal perspective data too. Um, that's really important. And then so they'll they'll all have an opportunity um to share their feelings from their individual sites. >> I think that personal perspective is really important to round out the data elements. Thank you. Okay. Anybody else? Okay. 5.11 summer projects for 2026. Joel and Josh. >> Yeah. So, I'll go I'll go first and um at least just hit um the one that we're looking for for action on here this evening. And that is in regards to uh the asbestous abatement project that we'd like to

108complete in the high school gym. Uh we know there's some other projects that are happening throughout the district that Josh has already uh presented that he can answer questions on tonight if you have them. Uh but those have already been approved and they've moved moved through bidding process. Uh this is one that we do have to move kind of quickly on. Um I know it's only January, but many of these projects are getting bid right now because everybody wants their work done in June, July, and August. And so, um, Jeff Stad, um, the person that we're working with through Site Logic was at operation committee last week, um, and had walked that committee through some options. Uh, I believe that that committee gave some of their feedback that I can share, and then I'd encourage

109anyone else that was there to to share theirs as well. Um, but we're really looking at focusing, um, any high school projects to that gym. Uh, abatement of the ceiling, getting all of that that dangerous material out of there. um a reshaping of that catwalk, removal of the lights that are no longer used that were there um back when the high school gym was where performances for um theater performances were taking place. Um those are no longer used. They're they haven't been had power to them for for many many years. Um they'll get new lighting. Um making sure that that space since we're up in the ceiling gets gets that really refresh. Um making sure the we have the right lights for the right space. Um, since we're we're doing all that work, we're we're

110looking for authority um to include uh repainting from the floor to the ceiling. So, it's all the same color. If you go look in there right now, it's different color um from the floor to about 6 or 7 ft and it's a different color to the rest of the ceiling. Also, while they're up there in feedback through Mr. Dale, the reed, uh, our auxiliary nets, the the basketball hoops that run, um, parallel to the main floor should actually run perpendicular if you're going to run two smaller games at the same time. And so, in talking with Jeff, he feels it's going to actually be quite simple um to remove the brackets, turn them 90°, and have them run um the the the um perpendicular way. Uh, am I missing anything else? >> I think you

111covered everything. Yeah. And we >> important note too, we have been working with Mr. Dale. He's been in uh communication with some of the other buildings regarding some of the summer sports activities that typically occur in that gym. We do have plans for that and we are making some tentative plans. We hope we don't have to use them. That there is a potential that even the fall activities might be um affected due to the the work in the gym. So, we're we're trying to plan ahead for some of those possibilities, but we hope they're done so volleyball and some of those things are ready to roll in August. >> So, for for full clarity, the the abatement and the and the replacement ceiling um all falls under an abatement um LTFM above the line. Um

112and so that project along with the lighting is estimated at just over 900,000. and and then we're looking for a little bit of extra funding to do the painting, um do the movement of those basketball hoops. Truly, since we have the people here and we have the equipment here, um it is the most cost effective to do it all at once and do it right. Um knowing again that that our gym is a is a uh kind of a regional hub for um some big events and um we know that many local high schools really enjoy playing here. So, making it a premier um site in the area is also uh important. So, what we'd be looking at roughly a million dollar. I mean, I'm sure painting ain't going to be a h 100,000, but

113that's kind of your what you're thinking. >> Correct. >> Yeah. Now, the other piece that um did come up at committee was uh the LED lighting for the entire building. Um, knowing that many many members of Josh's building and grounds team have been doing um some some replacements of those as we've gone, we do know that there's one location of the building that hasn't been touched and that's the north wing. And so the question is is do we want to have them while they're doing the lights in the gym do a retrofit of the north wing and have that done or do we can do we want to pause on that really focus on the gym and do a a more of an audit of the whole district knowing that our our team really does

114know if a light goes bad we can replace it on our own put the new lights that that meet the law. Um Jeff did verify for me yesterday that regardless of how you want to how we want to do it, if we decide to do the north wing now and then do a larger project later that that wing can join into the energy savings plan um that he presented. It doesn't all have to happen at the same time. Um or we could wait and do it all at once if if and when we choose to. So >> do you have a rough cost on that? I do a complete retrofit. Um, their estimate is between five and 600,000 for the building. >> So, if we were to do the lighting, we'd be looking at about

1151.6. >> Yeah. Knowing that about a million is in above the line bond. >> Okay. >> Yep. >> Now, say we do run into scheduling conflicts. If they don't, where would we use? Would we use intermediate? Would we use Minnesota West? >> Say that again. the backup plan if the gym isn't done in time for fall sports. >> So, if it if it came down to actual varsity games, Mr. Dale is working with Minnesota West. So, we have a competitive spot. In terms of practices, we have access at the intermediate building. And then Prairie is not having summer school because of the roofing project there, but the gym space technically could be used for practices during the summertime, >> but games would be at the college. >> Okay. >> Is this then the last Abestus

116in the district? Is the gym there or >> I believe so. Through their assessment, it sounds like this is this is what's left. Yeah. >> Thank you. >> So, are we going to hear tag in the motion certain dollar amount or >> I'm looking for scope of project >> the project? >> Other questions? >> Joel, could you talk a little bit about the energy savings plan and how that works with funding the the light retrofitting projects? Yeah. So, um the way it was presented at committee is essentially for the lighting project. Um as a district, we front the the payment for that project. It then enrolls into the energy savings um project as well. And you get kind of two parts. You get your um instant rebates um from Minnesota public utilities uh you know

117through the electrical companies. We would get an instant rebate and then over time you're going to see those savings. The estimate from site logic that they had presented is that it would take about 15 years um to see all those funds back into the district. So if we did if we did the whole district um the the the dollar amount I think for everything on their um on their plan was about 2.6 to do it all right. That includes the gym ceiling. Their estimate is that we'd see that back in in a 15-year time period. It was the one of the comments at committee was do we have greater needs to put those funds into right now um knowing that we are taking care of some of the issues on our own as we're going

118and do we do the the gym project now give ourselves more time to look at full scope of all of our needs um moving forward and so >> okay so I guess the first motion I would ask for is the high school gym improvements on its own if you guys agree with that. Can we have two? We should be able to have two separate motions if you guys want to do the lighting. I'll be honest, I don't. But and and there doesn't need to be a motion. Administrative recommendation right now would be to focus on the high school gym. Get that project taken care of. Do a full audit. Um the the the lighting team from Site Logic still hasn't been here to do the full. So, right, they're making their estimates based on the

119initial walkthrough. Um, and so our recommendation would be to approve the high school gym project as presented. Um, giving ourselves some more time to continue to look at further projects down the line. >> Mr. Chairman, move to approve the high school gymnasium project as presented. >> Okay, we got a motion by Matt. Do I have a second? >> Seconded by Ann. Is there any further discussion? >> Mr. Chairman, a question clarification. And this will include the lighting improvements in the gymnasium. >> In the gymnasium. Yes. >> Correct. >> Yes. >> As a whole. >> Okay. >> That was my question too. >> Okay. >> Also just a comment that the gym is also used for performing arts still music. So acoustic >> absolutely an um assessment of the acoustic acoustic on the ceiling would be

120>> Yeah. I'm sorry I didn't bring that up. So we asked them to do that. um the material that they're they're um proposing to use is absolutely meant for all of taking all that into account. And so Jeff can provide more detail of what that is. That's out of that's kind of over my scope, but uh we did ask him to um keep that in mind with the replacement um the replacement product. >> Thank you. >> Yeah. not to get our hopes up, but he thought the material he had found um would come in slightly less than the budget he proposed. Um so, cross our fingers. >> Yeah, >> maybe we'll save some money. But yeah, he's he's looking at that. I don't know if he has a gym that they use it in that

121we could get a reference from. Did we ask about that? >> No, but I can ask. >> Okay. >> Thank you. Okay, we have a motion and a second. All those in favor of the motion say I. >> I. I. >> All those opposed, same sign. Motion passes. >> If it's okay, Mr. Bloom. I'd like to just put it here that um we would like to propose a second work session in the early part of March to talk projects 26 uh excuse me 2027 um because those will come quickly um into into the summer and early fall next year. Uh and so wondering if we could set a work session two weeks prior to the March meeting um just to talk projects for 2027. Okay. >> What would that date be? >> That would be

122>> third. >> The third. >> March 3rd. >> The Tuesday, right? >> It's a Tuesday. Does March 3rd work for everybody? At this point in time to set a date for a work session, >> I would have rehearsal till 5:50, but yes, start at 6:15 normal normal board meeting time. 6:15 March 3rd. >> There. >> I might have a planning commission meeting that night, but I would have a planning commission meeting that night actually. >> What time is that, Aaron? >> 7. Is there another night that week that works for anybody? >> Could we do the second? That's a Monday night. Um, >> that can work. >> I'd rather go later in the week. >> Mr. Chairman, could we have some just dates emailed to us and we >> Yeah, that's fine. >> Go that

123process. >> Dates and we'll just send them back. >> Thank you. >> Okay. Okay. Okay, >> additional question on the just to clarify because we discussed a committee other projects for the summer but didn't really act on those but they're still on the queue to be completed >> for this summer. >> Yes, >> that would be the softball light >> this the lesser projects but do they need any formal approval? >> We'll use currently allocated funds to take care of the the softball light the light issue where they're leaning. We're going to fix those to make them safer. Um and then you've already acted on the prairie roof. Um >> talked about some of the water issue here and some issues. >> They're still investigating water issues here. They're they're pretty confident they're probably not

124going to dive too deep into that right away. They they need to investigate more. >> Yep. >> Thank you. >> Okay, moving on. 6.0 reports, superintendent report. >> All right. I'll uh I'll try to keep it brief here as uh this meeting's gone along, but um lots going on throughout the the district. Uh many things that are taking lots of energy and capacity for all of us. Uh I did want to take a brief moment just to share one thing that maybe people don't know a lot about. Uh and that is a comprehensive needs assessment or a CNA uh that many members of the district have been engaged in throughout the fall and the winter. The work we've been doing has been focused on carefully analyzing and building uh and and district excuse me analyzing

125district and building level data, engaging in discussion around the effectiveness of our current district and building specific initiatives and identifying strengths and areas for growth across our system. These conversations have been intentional, reflective, and grounded in a commitment and a desire to improve outcomes for students. As this fa as this phase of the CNA process continues, the work will soon transition into examining our sites and staffing. As Carmen shared tonight, uh this will be an important step in ensuring our structures and staffing models are responsive, sustainable, and aligned with district priorities. Uh I want to just say that I'm grateful for the commitment shown by our building principles, our coordinators, and other district administration. They've definitely leaned into this work with focus, openness, and a willingness to challenge assumptions and serve uh serve as continuous

126improvement. This CNA process will directly inform the next phase of our work, which is strategic planning for the district as a whole. During that phase, we'll intentionally broaden our engagement to include additional staff perspectives as well as community members, ensuring that our strategic direction reflects shared ownership and diverse input. So, much more to come. Um, but uh proud of the work we've done so far. Okay, good. Joel, >> I'm good. >> Instructional committee, anybody other than myself that was there? >> Everything's been covered. >> Okay, we're good there. Operations committee, do you have anything to add? >> I don't believe so, Mr. Chairman. >> Okay, good there. Other reports have anything else? just um so Darla and Ann and I along with Joel attended MSBA last Thursday and Friday. Um I find that to be

127a very valuable experience and I attended many sessions as I know my colleagues did um some interesting things about um AI um strategic planning attendance uh student achievement etc. Um, I did attend the legislative session and it extend an invitation to all of you to our day at the capital is on March 8th. It's a Monday. Okay. I guess I'm going to add something. Matt, you had asked earlier about let me have the special ed report and I promise I won't take a bunch of time, but you had asked about parent input. So, being a parent of a special ed student, I am going to tell you that not having a director, this year has been the best year that I've seen our daughter with improvement. So, I mean, I I see Jill here. I

128think that speaks volumes of what you've done with this team, just being the assistant, working with an interm. I mean, I just in the intermediate school staff that my daughter works with, they've just been really super. She's always happy after school. She's excited to go to school where previous years there was not as good of coordination. She would be excited one day, not excited the other when a van pulls up this year in the driveway. She's she's always ready to go and she runs away from me. So that didn't happen before. So I just I want to thank all of you. Jill, you've done a great job. Other staff, Michelle's here. I know there's others, but no, thank you. Right. As a parent, I think that this is we're headed in the right direction and

129we'll do a good job. Okay. So, other business um adjust regular board time. Talking with Joel didn't sound like we were too interested in that at this time. Is that correct? Let's just leave it and we'll revisit it maybe this summer. Um, next would be negotiations update. >> Sure. I can provide just a brief one. Um, we've met, I believe, maybe just one time since our our last meeting. Um, we've got two more meetings on the uh the agenda, one of them happening uh later on this week on Friday um in our last session. Um, we've really narrowed language down to, I believe, four items. Um, so we're real close on that. We've got twous we're working through. Um I think we can can finish those up here quickly and uh at this point we

130are uh total package um.5% apart. So hopeful that we can uh meet some common ground here real soon and and wrap this up for everyone. Okay. Anybody from the negotiating committee got anything to say? Okay. We covered the work session. Did we send in dates? Okay. Future business. Anybody have anything? If not, I'll take a motion to adjurnn. >> So moved. >> Motion by Darla. >> Second. Do >> I have a second? Second by Lori. All those in favor say I. >> I. >> Motion passes. Ajourned.