001to the FL 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 all right uh first on the agenda is our recognitions good evening so I am so excited to introduce Miss Carly Thomas as the tigerpaw student that exemplifies that portrait of her graduate characteristic of critical thinking we have her preschool teacher Miss Michelle Cameron here to tell you why we chose Carly for that trait so I chose Carly for critical thinking because I have seen her consistently solve problems for herself and her friends this school year she asked great questions to gain insight and grow her understanding and whenever we're learning new things she's always able to make new connections with the new information and then tie it to
002something that she already knows so I am very proud of her hard work this year so way to go Carly good evening I'm here with Miss Delilah banan and her teacher Mrs huet um and Mrs huet going to say a few words about how she earned the trait of being our critical thinker at North hi Delila has really excelled in academics all throughout the year she came in with a wealth of knowledge and she has applied what she knows with what we're learning very well um she pays attention in class she's always willing to participate answers questions she works well with her Partners works well in a group and she's a really strong leader for others in addition to those qualities soila is willing to help whenever there's a need she's a good friend and
003always comes in with a positive attitude yay Delila good evening we are excited to bring Bella mcfaden one of our second grade students at S as our student of the month and Miss bellings Le is here to share a few words on her behalf I chose Bella mcfaden as my portrait of a graduate winner because she's an amazing example of a critical thinker both in and out of my classroom yesterday at morning meeting I asked her peers to describe her to me and hear are some of the things that they said about her Bella is always ready to help Bella always gets her work done and pushes herself to do better and lastly Bella listens the first time and figures out problems on her own Bella is all of these things and more she sets
004goals and achieves them she problem solves even the hardest task she pushes herself and others to be the best version of themselves and she encourages me to be a better teacher I am so lucky to have Bella in my class all right good afternoon somehow East got second string Miss Capen is gone Dr Sappington somewhere else so uh here we are Kingston white is their student of the month I have not been with Kingston but I was only at East for about three hours this week and two people approached me and Saidi heard you're going to get to introduce Kingston and he is the greatest kid so way to go to let your reputation precede you so his third grade teacher Ronda Roman's with us and she's gonna uh tell all the fabulous things about
005Kingston all right uh Kingston is new to Ozark this year he's comes to us all the way from Utah and he has has started he started the school year not being familiar with the school not being familiar with the kids or really knowing anybody and he very quickly became loved and respected by his peers and his teachers so he's off to a great start here at Ozark Kingston has shown great critical thinking skills in all areas of it of instruction he is an excellent listener who actively participates in class discussions with the Curiosity for why and how things work his love for learning has been a joy to see and a wonderful example to his classmates we are so happy to have him in Ozark and especially at East Elementary so congratulations Kingston want to
006make sure Dad can get a good video do you want to stand right here okay this is Coulson Cox and Coulson is a kindergarten student at West Elementary in Mrs mccary's class and she had the following things to say about Coulson Coulson is an amazing boy with the biggest heart that I have ever seen in a six-year-old he is quick to include anyone or be a partner with anyone in our classroom one day stands out in particular when a fellow student was having a hard day regulating some very big emotions throughout the day Coulson had earned free choice block corner at the end of the day and instead of choosing one of his best buddies he asked that particular student if they would like to play with him Coulson is a tremendous leader in our
007classroom but he does it by example and never calls attention to himself so congrats Coulson and then this is Matthew pic and he is a fourth grade student in Miss reck's class and Miss reek had the following to say about Matthew Matthew is a critical thinker both in the classroom and outside of the classroom he is great at Making Connections in the classroom to real life situation he also sets high standards for himself and always tries to solve problems Matthew simply does not give up critical thinkers know to try first then ask questions Matthew is confident in asking good questions to help make connections as he grows in his learning furthermore he is a role model for people around him in his actions and words he includes others and has an awareness of the people
008around him and how he should respond to them in addition Matthew is great at collaborating with others when working in teams congratulations Matthew all right good evening so tonight um our March critical thinker I have tonight miss Lindsay settle but we have a first tonight typically uh when I email the teams at the middle school we'll get one maybe two teachers who want to come and and represent our student of the month but this month we actually have her entire team here and that just speaks volume to me about what they think of this young lady standing standing here all three teachers chose tonight to be here in attendance so with us we have Miss Lauren Taylor our science teacher Mr Jamie Dugger teaches math and Miss Fraser she's GNA talk a little bit about
009um Lindsay here and why they selected her we love the opportunity to get to share Lindsay with you she's an amazing student and all three of our classes a critical thinker and she goes above and beyond in her learning she's flexible and we love that she can work in all groups and she works with shoulder Partners amazing and she is an overachiever she always likes to know how she can do more and do better um especially in writing and reading she loves that and so thank you for letting us share her with you tonight hello this is John Bush he's a seventh grader and he is on team oceanana I could not pick which teachers write up to discuss so this is going to be long I'm not I don't normally go very long but
010um so a first one is social studies which is Miss Jenkins John is an outst outstanding student and I love having him in class he always is the first student to have his hand raised when I ask the class a question when I pose a challenge or give the students a problem to come up with ideas on how to solve the issue he always comes up with ideas that I would not have thought of he always thinks outside the box he is one of the sweetest I have ever had a true critical thinking rock star and then Mrs ramlo in English John stands out for his sharp mind and impressive vocabulary he is always eager to answer questions and his ability to articulate his thoughts clearly using a wide range of sophisticated words shows his
011strong grasp of language and curiosity about the world around him and then last one um Mr mcfeeders in science John excels at challenges in class he strives to truly understand the science and thinks about about how the concepts could be applied in situations other than what is discussed in class and then Mr mcfeeders gave me a side note for you he also likes to word play and he likes jokes talking with John is always interesting because it could be a deep conceptual thought a good P pun or a setup that you never see coming Finley school student of the month is Sebastian Decker Sebastian's a senior um we have parent teacher conferences happening today and about an hour ago I heard a story that derailed everything I was going to say about Sebastian um and
012The Story Goes Like This perhaps some of you have heard of a website called Community chitchat um Sebastian was the subject of a post on community chitchat where a customer at Taco Bell raved about the nice young man that took care of her as a wonderful representative for Ozark Ozark schools um specifically his parents raised a fine young man and I would like to Echo that that mirrors every interaction I've had with Sebastian in uh this year um it was so impressive that the lady has offered him a job at the bank uh because she is looking for young adults that give that kind of customer support uh that has very little to do with critical thinking but that's the kind of stuff that we're looking for in an Ozark tiger and a Finley Finley
013student so Sebastian Decker is our portrait of grad good evening guys our Ozark High School critical thinker is Miss Juliana kashuba uh this is what her teacher had to say about her Juliana is a motivated driven and well-rounded 12th grade stud student with a bright future ahead of her I'm confident she will continue to excel in her future endeavors and I wholeheartedly recommend her for the portrait of a graduate she recently achieved first place in this year's TSA CAD architecture Challenge and is certain to do well in the upcoming Missouri Bridge contest which speaks to her outstanding technical critical thinking and problemsolving skills Juliana is a valued A+ tutor and mentor to other students she m maintains a spot on the honor role and her involvement in extracurricular activities further demonstrates her passion for Learning
014and Leadership after graduation she plans to pursue a degree in engineering from Missouri State University ladies and gentlemen Miss Juliana kushu e e e all right next on our agenda is a culture and climate report that's NE I want to quickly go over some information that um we have gathered I will say that Dr Carson he is usually here and in the three years I've been here he has not missed I don't think he's missed a board meeting yet uh but I will tell you that his daughter is getting married on uh Saturday and he goes oh I can still make it to the board meeting I said if you do I swear your daughter and your wife will kill you so he is uh he is working hard on setting up the the wedding
015for her his daughter so um each year we send out a survey a climate climate and culture survey and U we do this not only to have actionable data to help with our culture and climate but but also in the past 3 years with the new MP 6 regulations it is now a requirement that every school does this and there are specific questions that they want us to ask uh for MP 6 and then we can add other questions that we want we have three years now of data with the same questions and so I'll tell you um the parent survey we had 546 responses staff survey 183 and I'll talk to you about that in just a second uh third through sixth grade almost 1500 and 7th through 12th grade almost uh well a
016little over 1300 as I said the uh Missouri school improvement process requires us to send out a survey and then also we use this as part of our feedback for our comprehensive School Improvement plan um as we develop our new strategic plan this will be something that we work on and develop that U culture and climate I have no doubt is going to be in our strategic plan and so we'll be we'll really hone in on some questions that that um meet that and give us some guidance so uh the format surveys are given to the students staff and parents in the month of December through winter break communication or communication Department sends out reminders to parents multiple times throughout the window and students are given the survey during the school day because they pretty
017much have a captive audience we do we have a captive audience um in the past uh I will tell you that the staff survey with the 183 responses we're going to send that out again and ask for them to do that tomorrow uh the goal was that when they when the staff came back the Monday after winter break that they would uh once again have a captive audience and they would fill out the survey unfortunately or fortunately for the teachers and staff we had a snow day that day so they were not able to do that and then if uh they're like me on Monday when the students come came they hit the ground running and it wasn't a high priority so we understand that uh a survey of 183 probably skews the data a
018little bit um and we it's not getting the information that we want so we're going to ask that they uh take that tomorrow and then we'll bring back that information to you uh the themes that we ask or we look at from a climate and culture survey engagement culture relationships support Safety and Security uh right now we have uh a liyer scale of one to five strongly disagree at one and five strong L agree we will look as we are developing our our survey for our strategic plan um at changing that lyer scale a little bit if you go to yes the next slide uh Dr Carson gave some information and this is just a snapshot of some big themes that he had um and you can see student engagement personal relationships classroom culture academic
019expectations instructional methods Safety and Security uh what is good about the Third through sixth grade it's pretty even and and if you know anything about elementary students they're a pretty happy lot and they you know they're they're positive and so if you look at those our numbers are really good and they remain steady um there was no significant swings in the survey they were generally satisfied with their teachers uh their learning and their classmates the lowest strand for the students grade three through six was classroom culture and it was made up of two questions students behave well in my class and remember you're asking third through sixth graders on this students behave well in my class and students in my class treat the teacher with respect the students did not did not have a strong
020positive or negative response to either of these questions and so it does bring to light behaviors I think and that we is something that just as our teacher as teachers have said numerous times um how uh behaviors have changed over the past few years and things that we need to work on and hopefully we will address some of those in the strategic planning if you look at and I'm I'm quickly going through this if you look at grades 7 through 12 if you notice that it goes from a four point something to threes and that usually happens as kids get older um they're not as happy to be in school sometimes uh but in this uh we also had uh we had some different themes here student engagement student School culture academic rigor relationships with
021teachers relationship with peers and Safety and Security it said he says that the Safety and Security and academic rigor were the highest themes he also says most students uh let's see the biggest movement were in the questions most students in this school want to do well in class and the school system assures student voices are heard and respected both of these dropped by point2 points the student voice question is a desie mandated question for MP 6 within the theme relationships with peers the question about a feeling a part of the school Community also fell overall movement among secondary student responses were slightly down all the averages fell within the three to four point range but we do need to celebrate that out of the secondary that excuse me a celebration to point out is that
022secondary students believe that my teachers expectations make me want to do my best it was at 3.5 so that is a really positive thing uh our my teachers have expectations that make me want to do my best another celebration is that the secondary students believe that most of my teachers want me to use my thinking skills not just memorize things and that was at 4.1 so kudos to our teachers and kudos to our students that recognize that and then like I said I I we do not have the uh School data the faculty and staff we will bring that next month but we do have parent data and on this we have culture engagement relationships school safety and support and what is good about this is that it it remained the same or went up
023uh parent data either remain the same or slightly increased the themes of culture and support both went up by 0.1 regarding trans transparency within the MP 6 questions parents believe that the school provides climate and culture data periodically um the same as last year regarding the school system providing information related to parenting skills the rate increased from 0.1 to three increased by 0.1 to three both of these questions are required by MP 6 parents believe that teachers in administrators create an environment that helps students learn that is a positive um aspect to celebrate it was at 4.2 so I repeat that parents believe that teachers and administrators create an environment that helps students learn and that students are safe that's at a 4.0 they also report that their family feels safe when visiting the school
024and that is 4.3 so we will take this information we have this broken down by building and we will take this information and uh make sure that the principles are well aware of uh where their numbers fall and we will create action plans especially when we start working on the Strategic plan with using the culture information yes ma'am thank you for doing these uh surveys it's important to get feedback and data to see what the different perspectives are from the different sure clientele the different students and parents and teachers and um it's and I appreciate you putting the graphs together and giving us the results I when I was reading over it earlier this week I appreciate you explaining some things now but I thought these numbers are kind of meaningless if we don't have
025any idea what the questions were would you be willing to provide the questions to us also please yes we sure can we will thank you hey this is great to see that the parents U survey is basically all either the same or better in the last three years so it's it's great to see that parents believe that the school is uh positive in that sense as far as the the the staff survey is there ability to add a comment section for their question it just went it went out I would say that not on this one but when we do our next one for alliver strategic strategic planning yes there will be comment sections 100% And when there is comment section can you provide those comments to us we don't want to hear just the
026themes of someone's summary but we'd like to actually or I would no I can't speak all the rest of us I would like to actually see what the comments are okay something to consider something to consider thank you yes I will say when it starts naming when we have um information in there that because a lot of times they will there may be names that we wouldn't provide that but we we prefer to do themes and and hope that you would understand that um we're reporting to you what the themes are and that we're going to take care of the items that we need to take care of sure yeah of course and you could redact names you know but uh one person's interpretation of a theme might be different than another person's interpretation of
027a theme and I always like to see the whole picture sure okay thanks next is the superintendent report did you have anything to add I uh first of all I want to say thank you for being on the board this is board appreciation month um it is a thankless job and we all know that and we all know how well paid you are for this position um and but you know it takes a special person to be able to do this job and the first thing that I know each of you believe in is that we want to do what's best for our children and the students in our community and that it should be every time the number one decision no matter what the number one factor when we make a decision is it
028best for our students and I know know that you as a board make that that uh decision with those students in mind every time um I will say from just a board report or a a report we'll just keep a breast of all the legislative issues that are going on um there were three of us and Dr Curtis I see that went up to Dr Curtis Dr chesse that went up to uh leg to Jefferson City on Tuesday and spoke with our representative as well as our senator and just express some concerns we had about certain bills and uh it was a great conversation and it was great to hear um from other viewpoints as well so just keep in mind all the legislative issues that are coming down the pike and um we will
029know where everything stands I Believe by May 5th right around that time frame anything to add on the uh District reports from admin Curtis can you speak to the I guess an update about the the tennis courts and the the other projects there what yeah so the tennis courts uh once again thanks to the board for supporting U reallocating the money that we saved on bond projects to uh that list that's before you tennis courts is moving quickly um we have uh we met with the tennis coach and um coaching staff and and Dr Mr little to set up a schedule as as far as practicing so we're just a hair behind on that but Rebecca Jenkins was amazing uh in working with us and allowing us to start the work uh to leave the
030courts in a safe manner for practice and to work with us through um the 17th will actually shut the courts down completely to begin that resourcing which then uh yansy and and Coach Jenkins would be able to work out an agreement uh for the additional practices on rented space and then we also are where we are hosting the local we're actually then going to go away for those games so uh really appreciate their work working with us to get that done at a timely manner to save the money that we did but also to get the courts in a not only working condition but a great condition so uh that's moving along uh wonderfully we're going to go head head long into it next week over spring break it'll start the arneal the the boiler
031projects um that those were approved and the agreements were signed last month those are progressing we're waiting on our parts to arrive talked with train on Tuesday uh the goal was to hopefully have those in place to do the work before cooling season it was 81 degrees today I think we missed that Mark but that was a really that was a pie in the sky that really was uh so as soon as we can start working on those we'll get those replaced with parts ordered are signed we're ready to move on that uh baseball field we've have an additional drawing we're still trying to work through the details uh get a contract and how we're going to proceed with that we'll have more for you on that when we come back after uh the break
032playground a lot of progress we have I I will tell you and the conversation I've had with several uh companies is we are one of the most attractive opportunities out there right now uh with the dollar that you guys have allowed us to put into tiger paaul uh we've had two on site so far and we have one next I'll have another one next Wednesday coming down from Kansas City to look at the it's built on a hill so a 2% um elevation change or or slope is all we're allowed to have for a proper Ada so there's some questions on how they're going to do that everybody has plans um tomorrow we're taking 12 tiger Paul uh T tiger Paul and then myself and Dr sapon are going to go and we're going to
033tour four different uh Early Childhood special ed Ada inclusive playgrounds to they're going to score those and they're going to come back with ideas once we have the proposals back then we'll score those and then there'll be ideas that we get in those from each person they'll give but real reality is is those are going to be a starting point then we once we have the proposals the board approves the approp vendor then we'll sit down with tiger paaw as well as the whichever vendor we choose to come up with the actual design we just want to make sure that we have an ADA Compliant allinclusive playground and the vendors been vetted properly so uh softball we will hopefully have some action on that later tonight which will give us an opportunity to sit down
034and talk with uh individual about what they and and Mr little think would be appropriate there so we're making movement um and honestly it's a it's a lot of different projects all going at the same time I've communicated with Mr Richie on on these and we'll continue to keep because some of these are going to they'll all go well beyond uh the roof um I think I have the dates in there for you on that the 27th is going to be our pre-bid uh meeting and then we are hopeful to have uh we will have an opportunity to bring you the board a recommendation next month so we're good thank you I have two quick questions yes when you said the stadium is going to be shut down starting the 17th that's the tennis the
035tennis court yes yeah it's and so right now it's open to the uh Team to practice and then starting next week we're going to shut it down not only to the community but to the teams yeah y okay and then um maybe I just don't understand how it works I would think before we approved a vendor we would know what the plans were that were being proposed but you said we're going to approve a vendor and then they will sit down and develop plans yeah so it's a request for proposal so the proposal will come and they look at the proposal and they say I like this and we're going to score all of the so we're looking at the different vendors tomorrow so we'll know the the team will know what they're looking for
036and what they like and it's just so we don't want a vendor who's never talked with any of our piger fall staff for administration to come in and say here's the plan for you right what they're doing is is here's a plan and then we can come back and say you know what I really don't like the steering wheel I'd rather have some kind of musical apparatus right here and that that's really what we're talking about when we talk about the design so the thing we're approving is not the contract or the details of the plan because I haven't even talked about that yet the only thing we're approving is who is working with them yes ma'am okay yeah and and in those and in those recommendation or in the when we get those back
037they're going to put dollar AMS so it'll be that we can that it'll cost us this much to do the new uh and it'll be itemized as far as because we have two pretty substantial Ada sidewalks that we'll have to put in to get there so they'll break that down and then we also have buffer room for fixing the other playground so we'll all of that will be itemized when we come back is it not standard if you have to expand a building or put in a new building and it tears out something else like they lost so much of their playground wouldn't that have would is that possible to normally in the future put that as part of the building is replacing whatever gets kind of torn up yeah there there was they didn't
038lose any playground they added students and when they added students the the additional playground was needed so the when we built West we built in one playground we had to come back and put the other one yet so absolutely PA they didn't I thought it was on top of part of their old playground am I misremembering that so what what moved with the the storm shelter it took up green sprays but they didn't lose any apparatus actually we added an apparatus oh they lost the Green Space which is what they have behind so they they had a place where they had their Little Tikes and I that's a brand name I don't know if they were really little Tes but they had the little playhouses and and stuff that that that stuff is now in
039the Green Space where we're going to put the new playground but as far as they didn't lose swings basketball anything like okay yes thank you you're welcome okay uh next on the agenda is uh future dates sorry I had something I had a question about the attendance I like it that the attendance report is on the district reports every time but it'd be nice to see a trend I happen to have one of the old ones still open on my computer and I had printed one out so I mean I could look back and see oh we lost a student or we lost two or three students but maybe but is it too much trouble to ask could you put on there a trend of what's what's happening each each month how it's gone from
040August yes we one of En en oh I meant yeah I'm talking about enrollment sorry sorry so you would like to see plus minus on each building to see what they lost previous month yeah or even just overall just one number overall or if you put it on each building that'd be awesome I wasn't trying to make more work for you I just thought it'd be more helpful to be able to compare the trend surek okay uh future dates the uh election day is April 8th uh we do have a meet the candidate date on March 24th from 6:00 to 7 and that is here is that a town hall where people get ask questions or what is that so it is um sponsored by the PTA and yes they are each building will submit
041a question that the candidates will have in advance and then there will be online questions that can be submitted and that those will be answered um we talked about and I think that there's going to be if there's time for people that are there they're going to have to look at uh you know online versus people that are in the audience and see if the questions are the same and and try to work with that but last year I think there was the time frame for that and that's the intent I believe also yeah thanks and then uh next board meeting will be April 17th following the election next uh public comment we didn't have anyone sign up for tonight U moving on to consent agenda there a motion to approve the consent agenda I'll
042make a motion to approve all in favor we okay like we can't see his face got to see his face all right um new business oh approve Pro policy jg- RI okay so this was brought to you last month as far as the as the procedure goes um and there was some changes that were made based on the conversations that you had last month with uh Dr um Carson and so after that we came back and said we need to change the acade under academic dishonesty a certain portion of that policy which is jg1 so it did say uh just basically AI was academic dishonesty it that's that was included so now what it says basically cheating on tests assignments projects or similar activities plagiarism claiming credit for another person's work fabrication of facts sources
043or other supporting material unauthorized collaboration facilitating academic dishonesty and other misconduct related to academics including unauthorized use of generative artificial AI such as large language models chatbots so we ask that you approve this change to the policy one thing I would uh I think I mentioned that to you on page three under the violation of these Provisions uh it says shall result in disciplinary action including but not limited to suspension can we change the word to say something like may include suspension or because how it reads to me is if you use it it's suspension and the other stuff yeah and I talked to Dr Carson and since he wasn't here he wasn't able to go back and look at that but yes we will yeah so I ask for your approval on the policy
044please with my change that's on the procedure so the policy is just adding in that green the inred yes I'm making a motion that we approve policy jg- call second we have a motion and second all in favor I motion passes next on the agenda is um eate bid approval right so thank you for considering um approval for our networking equipment so the networking equipment we put out for an RFP is for next fiscal year um so it' be on next year's budget um but we are doing it through the e-rate reimbursement process so if you ever get your phone bill from your cell phone if you ever see a universal service fee for like $245 that's actually what the federal government collects for the E rate program to reimburse schools uh depending on their
045free introduced lunch rate so some schools that have a really low fre lunch rate might get a reimbursement percentage of like 40% um some that have a really high one might get as high as 90% where Ozark sits with their current free and reduced lunch rate we receive 60% reimbursement and so um they have a a long process that it takes to get reimbursement you have to fill out a 470 first to basically put out the projects that you're going to want for next year and so after you put out a 470 which can include an RFP you get vendors that respond to those rfps and the one that um our biggest one by far was for networking equipment so what this networking equipment does for us is when we have our internet connection that
046comes into the high school um we also have lease fiber through Liberty Utilities that connects each of the buildings to create a mesh Network to connect all those buildings together and so the network equipment is that switching equipment that connects all those buildings physically together um so basically it can communicate um your access points communicate with your um your switches so any student that's using a Chromebook and teach using a laptop that is how that that um communication happens for it connect to the network so um what the equipment we have here is what we call the core or layer three of our Network meaning that those switches are the actual uh components that actually connect to our internet connection and connect the fiber between the buildings so um that is the proposal you have
047here um and so when we got the responses from um all of the vendors that responded to our RFP um we had four different companies respond yellow dog networks provision networks cdwg and Howard and so some of the uh criteria we had in our RFP um number one is price so one of the components of bate is your number one criteria has to be price um and then the other four that we had was the capacity to achieve desired service levels uh the company experience so how long have they been in the industry doing these type of projects references from other school districts that have used these companies and then also their project delivery methods what type of switching equipment are they using and how are they going to um basically schematically scheme out our
048Network and the best solution for that so um myself uh Kyle Anderson and Brad Elwood got together evaluate all the bids use that criteria um and after looking through that yellow dog was not only the low price provider but also provided the best bid so because sometimes your best bid might not be low bid you don't want to go with a company that's Fly by Night you know not going to have a warranty on their product not going to stand by their solution and so but in this situation yellow dog was not only the lowest but it was we considered the best bid based on the criteria uh so what I'm asking today is to approve um yolow do networks as the vendor selected to purchase this equipment and so the next steps are if
049the board approves tonight um I would let yellow dog know that the board has approved the proposal and so we would um have sign a contract to purchase this equipment and so that contract would then be used to fill out a form 471 through eate which would then um go through and get approval to get reimbursement so um although you see that the final price here is $260,000 plus um we would get 60% reimbursement on that um through the eate program for all equipment so there are some small things that don't qualify um but uh the majority of that does qualify for a 60% reduction so the actual uh amount that we would pay would be about 60% uh discount from that so um quick math uh you know we're looking about um you know
050$110,000 is what the district would pay off of this 260,000 that was quoted from yellow dog so um of course all that has to be approved after we fill out the 471 so so to get the 471 I have to have a contract and so that is why I am here in front of you today asking for this uh bid approval is there any questions that I can answer on this quote from yellow dog or the process we did to select them you're saying we get a 60% reimbursement or so there's two ways you can do it you can pay the full 260 up front and fill out a bear form it's called which gives you reimbursement or you can do the SPI method which takes the discount right off the top and we're going
051to elect to do the SPI method so we just get the straight discount and we're not paying the 260 up front and then receiving a check on the back end so we receive about 156,000 back that's correct now all the 260,000 isn't there's a couple things in there uh like we have some redundant power supplies that aren't um eate eligible um but most of that I would say 90% of that 260,000 is eate eligible and then we plan to every single year you know have equipment through this eate program and so you know to have a contract this large especially you have to have board approval and so you should continue to see around Springtime this type of year um you know these type of asks to hey here's our RFP here's the vendors we
052have would you be able to approve that for next fiscal year um I know it's hard because you know June is the time where we have the uh budget proposal for next fiscal year and so you're asking for um that approval now um but to get up you know funding for the next fiscal year their deadline is March 25th to finish your 471 and so that is why I'm coming to you so early now asking for this and not waiting longer until like April or June you know through that time period so and when did maybe you said this when was the reimbursement you said the following year sure so once we sign the contract um they will bill us after July 1 as part as the eate rules and so when they bill us
053after July one um that will be discounted and so we should see a bill somewhere around July from yellow dog uh for this equipment with that that discount oh okay for this yeah so why is it that anybody why would a district choose to instead of getting the discount immediately to get it reimbursed later are there some fees or interests or something like that associated with it that's a great question um I can tell you one reason so um in the past we I will make this company I will not name the name but their billing was very fusing um from month to month they would have different credits and rebates and all sorts of things and so it was very very difficult to understand how their billing worked and what it was and this
054is this is another District so when I was with and so to make sure we got the right amount we did a bare method to make sure the whole basically because it was a month-to-month billing it wasn't just a one time like this to make sure that we were charged the amount that we you know had been agreed to and that we were having the right reimbursement because if we had done the SBI method and they did discounts each month we didn't believe that we would have got the correct discount and so that's why we chose the bare method for that situation I would think most people would choose the SBI method so that way you get it up front um there's maybe some smaller amounts where people just decide to do a bare method
055but any anything that's larger why wouldn't you want the discount right away except for you have to pay the whole thing at the beginning and the people who do it monthly could pay a little bit each month is there an interest fee with that there's not no so it's it's just to each their own I guess you could say of how they want to um you know do that so thanks I just wanted to hear the pros and cons of reaching different methods if they have difficult building I can see why someone wanted to do bare method and wait for the reimbursement to make sure they had the right amount but something is cut you know clearcut as this is um there'd be I can't think of any reason why you wouldn't do SBI and
056and do the discount right away there a motion to approve the e rate bid I'll make a motion to approve motion by James I'll second second by Dustin all in favor unanimously approved thank you thank you for your hard work on that and I love the way you wrote The Proposal that was awesome I love how you put all those details in there of who did what and all the and that was good thank you next on the agenda is the approv approval of the 2526 employee Insurance all right well before we uh hop into this uh that company logo in the upper lefthand corner I got to give a big shout out to bpj our three Brokers are here in the back uh with us tonight we've got uh Stan Scott and Mike um
057they've just been incredible to work with over the last year it's hard to I can't believe it's been a year already that we've been working with them but they've been incredible advocates for us uh and helping uh look out for the best interest of our employees as we go out and look uh for insurance here and that's they they've put a lot of time and energy into this to making sure that we have a great product for our staff and for our employees uh so what uh I want to highlight are four things tonight that are changing for our insurance for next year uh the first thing that we're looking to change is our plan year currently our plan year runs um July 1 through June 30 of every year um smack dab right in
058the middle of that every January 1 are deductibles start over again so uh to eliminate some confusion and to be consistent uh we're going to align our our plan year with the calendar year that's one of the the the first changes uh doing that will require about an 18-month commitment here on the insurance so uh we'll have a six-month um you'll see a six-month premium at the bottom and then you'll have um underneath that a 12-month premium uh so that that'll carry us for the next 18 months all the way through the end of December of 2026 uh one of the great things about this too is that it moves our open enrollment from being uh you know at the end of March beginning of April when everybody's getting ready for map booc testing to
059uh the end of October so uh I think from an employee standpoint I think this this is a really good move uh uh for just changing our our calendar year uh the next thing we're looking to do as you see up there now there are four plans uh we had two prior uh we're adding two new plans uh one of those plans is a PO plan the um partners 83,000 that is going to be a 3,000 uh $3,000 um deductible 6,000 max out of pocket uh for the employee and that plan there leads into the third component that we're changing is that's going to be the new uh District paid plan that everything's going to be based off of employees still will have the option to buy up to the $1,500 deductible plan that would
060just cost $37 uh a month not per paycheck just per month because we get paid twice a month so it's just $37 a month for the first six months and I believe it jumps to 41 I can't see the bottom number but I think it jumps to four so it jumps uh if they want to buy up to 41 there uh for that next year um another plan that we're adding uh is a high deductible health plan with an HSA we have one already but that's the plan on the far left there that's in the EPO Network that's the plan we have now and that's a very limited very small network if if you choose that plan really you can go to Cox Hospital Cox doctors you can go to Barnes up in St Lewis
061if if you need some heart work um but it's a very limited very small group whereas the HSA just to the right of that one that column there thanks for highlighting that Dan uh that is a new one and that is in the the PO Network so that's an expanded Network it's still the same level of coverages but what we're offering our employees is an opportunity to have that high deductible health plan but have that First Health Network so heaven forbid you're up in Kansas City and and you got have your child on your plan and they're uh you know in a playing volleyball and they roll their ankle and you've got to go to emergency room well if you had that high deductible health plan that we have just this year U you'd be
062in a tough spot and be a lot of out of pocket cost whereas with uh this plan if you had that one uh you would have an in in network provider up there uh so that' be a great thing so we just wanted to give our employees more Choice uh so adding in those those additional plans there and then the last thing that we're looking to switch with our insurance is our supplemental uh benefits providers um right now we have MetLife and yum MetLife takes care of our vision and dental uh yum takes care of uh our Voluntary Life our uh long-term short-term disability um we're we're looking to bring all that in under one house under Kansas City Life some of the great things that KCl uh will provide for us is the same
063level of coverages except the premiums are actually less than what we're paying now uh which is great um especially for like Vision same network um Kanas City Life came back and for the employee it's about two two and a half dollars cheaper uh next year than it is right now so um same levels of coverage I'm really excited about that and then when you look at um on the Voluntary Life side um Kans City life is going to offer our employees a true open enrollment so if they don't have Voluntary Life insurance right now they will have an opportunity no medical questions to pick that up um and that is an incredible benefit uh to our staff so again um bpj has been great working for us trying to find uh just some great resources
064and and again those are supplementary benefits there that employees choose and employees pay for and when the costs are coming back less than what we're paying now I'm really excited I feel like they're really going out and looking out for our best interest so um that's really the again the four main changes that we've got for insurance this year you guys have any questions yes ma'am so it makes sense in some areas to make the plan Year from January to December how will that work in this situation where a lot of contracts are from July to June how will that work when somebody comes in new or somebody leaves early yeah we would just onboard them we would just onboard them and start their benefits that that doesn't change their rates or they deductibles or
065no their rates and deductibles are set there yeah yeah that won't change uh it would just be the the start of the next month so just 30 days or the next month only have like three months left for your deductible you know which we do that for for non-certified people too yeah can you talk about how you've uh kind of relay this or communicate this to the to the staff and teachers across the district the changes here yes sir thank you for asking so prior to this meeting Dr Wilson and I uh for the last two weeks have gone around building to building different departments just meeting with them uh we send an email blast out to each building uh inviting them it's was non-mandatory but just giving everybody an opportunity to sit down in
066a small group ask questions and not feel intimidated just and just try to educate because we're talking about health insurance and we want to make sure that um your employees everybody understands what is in each plan so that they can make the most educated and the best decision for their family and for themselves so uh we we try to be very intentional about getting around and talking not only about the plans but the why we tell a little bit about how last year's claims compared to payments absolutely so uh last year's claims our loss ratio uh hovered around 125% ideally you'd like to see that around 87% so um but as bpj assured us and I'm going to hold them to it they said that every you know we're in a 10e cycle every five
067years is good every five years is bad that's right right guys yep yep it's a roller coaster so you know a few years ago we were at an 87 uh so it is possible it's just unfortunate right now we've we've got some members um that are sick and and when I say sick they're just they've got some real real illnesses Cancers and you know and and and that's tough but that's why we have insurance and we want to make sure we have that to help help protect our employees so that's part of the reason why we are having to offer more choices now where it's going to cost just a little bit to stay with the same deductible if we want to have that same that 1500 yes ma'am and and when we look and
068when we at bpj looked at the analytics it was really only about 55 people that from last year's uh plan that used between that $1,500 to that $3,000 threshold so when we look at about 2,000 members on our plan we really felt like in the best interest of of the majority making this this decision would not have impacted wouldn't have been an impact so I appreciate you asking thanks for explaining that we have a motion to approve the uh presented plan I'll make a motion to approve this present I'll second have a motion in a second can I just add something to the discussion I remember reading that they said there weren't bids to have insurance plans besides this so like this is our only choice to have insurance it's not like we decided oh
069we're going to raise the rates there weren't any other options no they they went out they advocated bpj advocated for us it's just with our loss ratio being what it was we just didn't get bids from from the major carriers that we were hoping for but at the end of the day I'm very thankful for Cox because they could have come back with with us having 125% loss ratio they could have they could have bumped our rate way but they didn't they kept us at a six and a half and a seven and a half and that's because of also too bpjs negotiating with them and the work between those two so again just I'm I'm appreciative of where we are thank you for your hard work trying to keep costs down in a day
070and when every cost is going up and they go out to bid again as soon as this is over I mean they go out to bed every year and hopefully if our loss ratio is better I mean this is a game you you'll try but it's all going to be dependent upon what our loss ratio was and if they're that high I bet You' had a lot of decline to respond all in favor manageably approved thank you I want to ask a question that's not on here maybe it was in the district reports about is there we're studying going back to annualized pay that's a big deal that's a big help to lot of employees it's hard to have you can't just say oh budget I mean that's like Springfield that really hurt their teachers
071when they switched away from it so I'm glad to hear that we are studying possibly going back to that did I read that somewhere uh Dr hedcor would you like to speak to that sorry that's okay um so we have a communication going staff tomorrow um to talk about annualized pay um so I met with all the different um classified groups that are out what's that I can't hear you very well oh sorry can you hear me better yes okay sorry sorry thank you I'll just scoot down here a little bit um and so we met with all the classified staff that are hourly and so any staff member if you work 25 hours or more your benefit eligible uh we made that change with transportation and food service to try to attract um employees
072which did a great job doing that so um you're right when you have pay structures where you don't work during the summer and you get nothing versus maybe you have some snow days in December that you didn't get to work as many days your pay really fluctuates so what we did is we went to all the different groups that affected nutrition food service um transportation technology those are groups and did a presentation for them showing them the difference um you know what your paycheck would look like just use an example uh like a Jane do uh what your paycheck would look like now and and how our current schedule is and what it would look like on annual ice pay and how you know you get the same amount every month um and answered some
073questions then we gave him a survey afterwards that asked which would you prefer and there was an overwhelmingly majority uh that wanted annualized pay that's what I wanted to hear I thought they probably would say that but I so there'll be communication going out to staff tomorrow to just kind of announce that decision and so that gives us about decided so that's going to give us about three and a half months to do a lot of work on the back end with payroll with benefits with HR matter of fact myself Dr Whit and the whole HR and payroll Team all met today to kind of go through those things of action items we need to take care of and then we're going to go through and also create a frequently asked questions that we believe
074a lot of the staff might have with this change so that way when they come back from spring break shortly after we will have all those lined out you know when's When's your first paycheck if you work 260 days a year what's your first paycheck if you work 178 those type of things um and so that way they'll as people kind of start thinking about that over over spring break uh they'll come back with questions and and we'll hopefully answer all those in our Qs and any ones we don't we'll answer and add it to the FAQ and have a spot on the website where they can reference thank you for letting me ask you about that of course off the CU I knew that you guys would know if you've been talking about it
075good thank you y not a problem entertain a motion to adjourn motion by Amber second second by Dustin all in favor