001I have 7 p.m. Are we uh are we all ready? >> All right. Um welcome everyone to the second uh September meeting and the second meeting tonight. So if you join us in the pledge of allegiance, we'll begin the meeting of the stands nation. >> Again, welcome everyone. We're happy to be here. Happy you could be here tonight. I understand we have a couple of college students and we have a a scout with us. So, uh we're glad to have you. Uh tonight we have no special recognitions, uh which is unusual. Um but we do have several additions, corrections, and or modifications to tonight's agenda. Those include 7.01, addendum to agenda item 11.06, approval of personnel items. 7.02, addition of agenda item 11.18, approval of gifts from the public, McKelby Intermediate. 7 3 update update
002to agenda item 11.17 approval of renewal of MEL support CMS solutions 7.04 correction to agenda item 11.05 approval of gifts from the public Barretts Elementary and 7.05 update to agenda item 12.01 adoption of tax rate for 2526. Uh next up on the agenda is public comments. We only have one uh citizen who signed up to speak and that is Mr. Wayne Hartman. >> Good evening, Mr. Hartman. I've come up tonight to talk about security for the schools. I've spoke with the governor's office twice, the um speaker's office twice. I spoke with the new mayor over in Chesterfield. Now Dan's a new mayor. He said he is trying to change things a little bit for Parkway and Rockwood depending on how he can maneuver people and dollars around. Uh I've known Dan for 34 years so
003I trust what he's telling me. The reason why I'm going to talk about this is back in March of 23, you had a grade school shooting in Tennessee, Minnesota in 827 of uh 25 of this year, and Colorado on 910. Every single time that this happens, it says this should never have happened. Okay, what are you going to do about it? Nothing. Nothing gets done. I am a voice of one. You all are a voice of more. You need to start saying something about something. Let's get something going. There's a lot of ideas out there that can be done to get a security person in every school if not cameras that that can be watched while kids are in school. Um, I've got some ideas, but I need numbers. So, Mr. Todd, when you if
004you would give me a call some evening, I need to get some numbers and you may have the numbers that I might be looking for. Um, before I can go any further with that. So, I'd appreciate it. That's all I wanted to talk about is the security and try and get um something done because I don't have any kids in school. I got grandkids, but I'm not talking for my grandkids. I'm talking about for all kids, not just here, across the US, because something has to be done. And what is it going to take? There's a lot of ideas out there, so let's we got to start somewhere. Thank you. I appreciate the time. >> Very much. >> Next up is the approval of our agenda. Uh we have a motion in a second to
005approve the the agenda for the regular meeting of the board of education is scheduled for September 25th, 2025. >> So move. Second. >> All in favor? >> I opposed. Motion carries 70. Uh the next regular board meeting will take place on Wednesday, October 15th, 2025, beginning at 7 p.m. here at the Parkway Welcome Center. Uh next up is board and superintendent reports. Start us off. I'll just say we had a fun homecoming last week in at South in spite of another Parkway school given a severe beatd down to the school for their homecoming game. So, I'm going to encourage South to maybe pick a different team next year to play their homecoming game against. That's all I have. >> I'll say uh Parkway Central had the same problem at their homecoming game. I believe it
006was 45-0 at halftime. Um but you know, we digress. Uh in the past couple of weeks um was able to attend the Parkway partner tailgate at Parkway North where we celebrated our sports marketing partners. It's always a great event. The Chartwells food trucks come out uh and many of our sports marketing partners came and celebrated their sponsorships with us. Um was able to go to some field hockey games, some football games, and then most importantly uh at the Parkway Alumni Golf Tournament. My team including Dr. Bogus, Dr. McCarthy and uh Mike uh Mike Kenast won the Parkway Cup as we were the uh best Parkway team. Uh not the winners but the best Parkway team. Uh I I I didn't want to say that we won the thing. We were we we tied for third.
007Um but you know, Mr. Kilper here also played. Did not win the Parkway Cup. Um but no, it was a great event. It is every year. Uh and and again, the Parkway Alumni Association puts on a great tournament. We had a great time. So yes, it's true. We I we also played in the uh the Parkway alumni golf tour for a minute and we were just out there to have fun, you know. We were just enjoying the day. Nice nice course, you know. >> Anyway, um also attended the uh the uh Parkway Partners uh tailgate last week. That that was a good event. It was at uh Parkway North, so it was nice to go back uh to the to my high school and uh watch the game. Um we also had a uh steering
008committee meeting uh last Thursday. um got together to talk about facilities 2050 along with some others here as well. Um always a good group to get together with. Uh they they require a lot of uh hard work and and good thinking and so I look forward to those meetings and otherwise yeah just uh fall busy fall. >> Good evening. Um I really do not have anything today but so I'm gonna go ahead and pass it to Mr. Seltzer. >> Wow. Thank you. >> Debbie would have come up with something to say. >> It's only one week since I left. >> So, uh, I did not participate in the Parkway Golf tournament, which is probably good for everyone involved. They made a mistake of scheduling this year's at 7 a.m. and somewhere in St. Peters on
009the Missou football home game day. So, uh, congratulations to Spectre for your trophy. Uh last week I also participated in the uh what do we call the the Parkway tailgate which is a bit of a misleading name but it was lovely and it was uh my mother's birthday so it doubled as a free birthday party for my mom and everybody at Parkway was really nice to her. So thank you everybody. Um so this we uh not everyone knows this but we rotate some of the board members have a morning meeting which used to be on Tuesdays but now is on Thursdays and I participated in that this morning. Uh we had a tax rate hearing, we had a close session, and we have this, which makes this my fourth Parkway uh meeting of the day,
010which I'm sure is nothing for the people at the table over there, but for me, that's a personal record. So glad you guys could all be a part of that. >> You almost time >> almost. >> It has only been two weeks since our last meeting. So the one major thing that I did do in that in in that period of time was attended the special school district governing council meeting on Monday evening. Um and at that meeting it was it was an important meeting to do a budget review, look at uh various different um situations going on with the budget, have that conversation, and it was also the orientation night for new governing council members so that they could be introduced to um the special school district uh operations and what the governing council's
011roles and responsibilities are. Um so in that presentation we it was highlighted the CSIP um the SSD partnership agreements uh and we understand there's going to be some changes or they're going to be evaluating those partnership agreements over the next year have a task force to take a look at them and um perhaps offer up some evaluation and recommendations to changes. So, we'll look forward to hearing about our partnership agreement in a presentation yet this evening. So, that was that. And I'll just say the West High football team's doing great. >> So, >> I'm loving going to football games. >> I I will be at the Central versus West game tomorrow night wearing a green shirt. Uh so there's no there's no fair totally neutral. Uh yeah, it's only been a couple of weeks. Uh
012so there hasn't been too much going on in those couple of weeks. Uh we did have a PTO leadership meeting, the the kickoff one for uh this year right here uh a week or so ago, and I think it was the the most well attended one I've been to in a long time. Um I'm just so grateful for all of the PTO leaders that we have in our school buildings and the the work that they do to build the communities in their schools. um and raise money to give back to schools, which you you heard uh we're going to approve in our consent agenda. We're going to vote to approve in our consent agenda. Um tonight, and um just they just do so much for our students and our staff and teachers. Uh so really
013appreciate their involvement. um facilities 2050 which is kind of the the uh the next step of project parkway u has been mentioned and that work is uh is really starting to get interesting and uh we're looking forward to to uh continuing that. Uh we had a communications advisory meeting uh last Friday. Uh our communications team uh while they're some of the best individuals in St. They rely on the input of not random but uh individuals in communications and many different industries in St. Louis that sit on that advisory group uh and they're very instrumental to uh helping the parkway leaders make decisions and and shape uh the communication that goes out. So we appreciate their um efforts as well. Um yesterday uh Dr. Schneider and I participated uh in the gateway to success uh which
014is an endeavor um that's been being put forth by Slooh. Um it was uh it was an interesting uh experience and they shared a lot of uh statewide numbers uh regarding MAP scores and and uh student growth and uh they announced uh a number of uh different scholarships that will be available to Parkway students and almost made it sound like guaranteed um uh at least half tuition to Slooh for for a couple of students um that that will be chosen and that more information about that will be coming in the near future. Um and uh we look forward to to what their uh their plans will entail. They they hope to increase growth uh in schools here in St. Louis. So it was good. >> Uh thank you very much for all of your reports.
015I have many of the same things to say. So I'll start off with the golf tournament. So that thank you for bringing your trophy. But I was at the golf tournament and I I don't know how to swing a golf club. So I took the advice of many people not to have that first swing at that golf tournament. So I rode around in a cart and um I was able to kind of see just just how how much fun everybody was having. It was a really beautiful morning. We had great weather. I was able to ride around with um folks from the alumni association. So it it was a great time. I've also been able to make it to several homecoming games and the tailgate partners last week. It was it was really great to
016be able to thank all of our partners and be there and see what that was all about. Uh first time obviously so uh folks mentioned the steering committee which happened last week and the kind of the work that we have laying ahead of us and I'm excited to build that committee out and continue to get uh stakeholder input from around our community on where parkway is going next with facilities 2050. uh Parkway was represented at both the Chesterfield Chamber of Com commerce uh meeting today as well as the West County government and so they actually met both at the same time. So I was at one and our chief communications officer was at the other one. But it was nice to be able to just see who is out there and who we can part
017partner with and hear about what's going on in some other you know folks's worlds. Uh to echo what Mr. Todd said, our PTO's are up and running. We had a great turnout at our PTO night. It was I'm just so grateful for the parents who gave their time. One of my first questions was who's busy in this room and everybody's hand went up, but they made the time to come and uh invest in their in their PTO at their school. I too am looking forward to our mayor's cup game tomorrow night and will be wearing a neutral color as well. I won't take a side. So, uh it's been a busy couple of weeks, but but a good couple of weeks. >> Thank you. Uh next up is our uh consent agenda and uh since
018it's only been a couple of weeks since we've had a meeting, it's relatively short. Uh we've all had an opportunity to review that. So may have a motion in a uh second to approve the consent agenda as presented in the September 25, 2025 meeting. >> So moved. >> Second. >> Anything to be pulled to action or closed? Okay. Let's see. All in favor? I >> opposed. Any abstensions? Motion carries 70. Next up, uh we get to have a revisit uh with Carrie U for 12.01, the adoption of tax rate for 2025 2026. >> Um okay, so I have two charts here for you. The first one is my recommendation for our operating levy tax rates. Um this is um our four different property classes with our the bottom line being our blended tax rate. So
019I'm recommending that um we we uh levy these these tax rates for each one of our p for each one of our property classes. Um again reiterating that this is a decrease in the rate from the prior year but not that does not necessar not equate to a decrease in revenue because we had assessed value increase we are we are able to decrease our rates um and still capture um growth in revenue of $7 million. So this is just the operating levy rates. The next chart includes our debt service rate which our debt service rate is 049 cents which is unchanged and has been unchanged for the last 10 years. Um and so you'll see that in the change column it remains exactly the same as the prior chart. So the overall rate I'm I'm
020recommending or proposing is a residential rate of 3.1636 agriculture of 3.5938 commercial 4.9073 personal property of 4.2 2609 with a blended overall rate of 3.6332. >> Any questions since the meeting and half an hour ago? >> Thank you. Uh and thank you again for answering the questions that were raised uh during the hearing earlier time. Next, uh, may I have a motion and a second that the board of education adopt the tax rates by category as presented above and the blended tax rate for the Parkway School District for 2025 2026 in the amount up to a blended rate of $3.632 to be distributed with a special revenue fund rate of $2.0132, general fund rate of $1.0840, capital projects rate of 0 460 and debt service fund rate of 0.4. >> So move second call. >>
021Mrs. Hopper, >> yes. >> Mr. Kilper, >> yes. >> Miss M Franklin, >> yes. >> Mr. Schindler, >> yes. >> Mr. Seltzer, >> yes. >> Mr. Spectre, >> yes. >> Mr. Todd, >> yes. Motion carries 70. >> Next up, we have Dr. Mat, assistant superintendent of student services, who is here to talk to us about the special school district educational partnership agreement. >> All right. Good evening, uh, President Todd, Vice President Hopper, uh, Dr. Schneider, and Miss Stove, and the prestigious Board of Education. Uh, before I get started, I would like to ask Mr. Spectre at some point tonight if you wouldn't mind checking that trophy to see if there are other names in this room that may be on that trophy. um because I was unable to play in the tournament this last time,
022but I think you might recognize some other names on that trophy as well. I will hopefully be able to come back next year >> in this role and also to play one or the other. >> It's one or the other. I'll keep this role. I hope >> you'll be able to play next. >> Yeah, especially after that comment. Um so I am here today to be able to speak about the special school district and Parkway. uh um agreement and uh I want to acknowledge uh with me today is Dr. Tammy Yates, executive director of partner districts and I appreciate as she supports many of the districts. There's 22 partner districts and she supports half of those. Um and the wonderful uh advocate that she is for all students and a partner in working together collaboratively
023with me in our district as well as many other districts. Um many of you may not know Dr. Yates, but I get a chance to work with her through a lot of different um things that happen within the district. And she certainly is somebody who listens, who honors all students and and a voice of reason. And so I appreciate her being here and uh supporting us through this work um uh because it is vital work that we do for all students. I'd also like to thank Dr. Amy Blumenfeld who could not be here tonight as she is um not feeling well. I do know she is she texted me she is watching in a waiting room right now as she is trying to feel better. She does have I think three other people watching with
024her. So I would like to say hi to her and her family. Um we miss you. I hope you feel better soon. Um and Amy is an integral foundation to the work that we do here in Parkway for all of our students. Um and I think she is a backbone of somebody who cares deeply about all kids and is an advocate as well. um and somebody that um I trust and I think our leaders trust um in the work that she does and I just wanted to give her a shout out as well. And finally, before I get into this presentation a little bit further, our special educators go above and beyond every single day. Our special educators do a fantastic job for a group of students who need uh a little bit and sometimes
025a lot of help. And they work tirelessly. They work tirelessly every single moment uh for our students. And I just know a lot of times they don't get the credit that they deserve. And I just wanted to take a moment to say thank you. Thank you for the hours you put in. Thank you for the moments that you that you have with our kids because I know for a fact they make a difference. As a father who has a child with an IEP, who actually was in an IEP meeting this morning as a dad, the difference you make for our kids is is great. And a lot of times you may not see that. You're you're feeling like you're pushing a a rock up a mountain. But I know for a fact that that matters.
026and it matters for our kids. And I want to thank our special educators for the work that they do. So, I'm here to talk about our partnership agreement. I already named the people that are on the screen. Um, I didn't name myself. You did. I'm Greg Mat and I am pleasure of being Parkway's assistant superintendent for student services and get the chance to work with our special educators here in Parkway as well as the special educators in the special school district of St. Louis County. So today I want to just talk briefly about the partnership agreement. First, the purpose of the partnership agreement is to increase our knowledge and awareness of our expectations to increase our collaborative approach. It is a tool also to monitor our leadership decision-making based on seven categories and it also
027helps guide our conversations. This tool was developed, I can't give you the exact date, but it was developed several years ago. And as as Miss Hopper stated, there will be some revisions and and a team coming together to go through and mon look at where we're at with this partnership agreement and see if there's any adjustments that need to be made. Um, I was on the team several years ago that helped develop this current tool under the student services section. Um and they had members from special school district as well as members from partner districts that created this agreement as well as as the tool that uh we assess how we're doing. The partnership agreement has seven categories. It covers staffing, teaching, learning, accountability, a collaboration of roles, responsibilities, and resources such as local compliance
028plans, general assurance document, the principal and coordinator collaboration tool, our student services, which is a section I I just mentioned along with data and technology, transportation, and career and technical education. In this presentation, there's a link if you want to go and look at the partnership agreement. you guys all have a copy of that as well as we're asking you to vote on that too. Every year we do look at uh Amy and myself, we do look through the partnership agreement and we I do it individually as well as her and then we come together and collaboratively talk about what are the things that we're doing well. What are some areas that we can improve on in this collaborative environment? Uh the partnership district liaison which would be me as well as the director of
029special education which is Amy. uh in the fall and the spring, we meet to assess and determine where we are and and a set of metrics and we and we actually send that to special school district and we also usually sit down with the superintendent and go through a status of where we are. Um and and we go through that rubric and that rubric is the same for all the different partner districts and I know that SSD also takes a look at where the partner districts are. Then we look at action steps that we mutually agree upon and we monitor throughout the school year. Now, that is not necessarily written into that agreement and and I know there's been some questions around that. At Parkway, we do not necessarily always add that as as an
030additional item to the agreement, but it's something that we present to the board. And I'm going to have a slide of some of the things that we are working on this year. Um here, so uh both SSD and the partner districts we agree on will endorse the vision, mission, and and belief statements outlined in the educational partnership agreement. uh we support collaboration and shared responsibility in providing equitable and seamless implementation of services for every student. We understand that the following resources will guide our collaborative efforts to enable every child to achieve his or her full potential and that's looking at some of the legal pieces around local compliance plans, the general assurance document as well as principal coordinator collaboration tool and we're committed to work co cooperatively to implement the principles of the educational partnership
031agreement of St. Louis County and the school district. The educational partnership agreement will require the signatures of the the superintendent of special school district, the superintendent of the partner district, SSD board president, the partnership district board president, and the partner district governing council members. So, I talked about action steps. Here are some of the action steps as as Amy and I have have sat down over the years to work towards and this is our action steps for this year. As we partner with as as partners, we're committed to focusing all of our actions as decision through the lens of students. First and foremost, we're here for our kids. So, when we're looking at decisions and decision-making processes of what we can control as as Parkway and as as SSD, what is in the best interest
032of our students? So, that is first and foremost in our decision- making. Second, as partners, we're committed to looking at our staffing model and having discussions about student needs. Now, I know that there's fiscal responsibility and there's pieces that are are within and without our control, but we're always asking questions and pushing and saying what are what do our students need? What are the requirements of our students and ensuring that the IEPs that our students as written are being met? And then there are big and bold conversations that we have to have and sometimes we may say things a little bit differently, but we're going to bring those to the table and have those discussions. As partners, we continue to see the importance of shared promotion and encouragement of students exploring tech school opportunities through
033special school district through notifying families of open houses, deadlines of applications. We know tech school is a great route for some of our students. We also know that tech school has a lot of students who want to go there. And if you haven't gone to the tech schools and seen it firsthand, I implore you, you should take a look. It is fantastic. The things that they're doing there is getting kids really prepared for the real world and opportunities. They're beautiful campuses. I was at Southtech recently. Um, and it is just a wonderful place. In fact, the culinary students brought in some cookies and I had a really hard time saying no. And I know members of cabinet aren't going to believe this, but I did not have a cookie. I smelled them and that was
034enough for me, but they were they looked certainly delicious. Um, but the kids came in and they highlighted the stuff that they were doing and it looked fantastic and the and and the campus itself is really really well done and we have more and more students who are interested in that. So what we need to look at is how do we get more kids not only interested but into that pathway and maybe even look at how that could expand. So also as partners we are committed to working together to have strong supervision partnerships in each of our parkway schools between Jenna education and our special education administration. So how's that partnership look and how do we how do we look at our roles and responsibilities so it's seamless because we need to remember this. While
035there are two different distinct districts we're serving our kids. There isn't a difference. We don't have special ed kids. We have parkway kids. These are Parkway kids we're serving and we're serving it through a model of collaboration between two districts. And that is the most important part. I go back to number one from earlier and that is uh we are looking at it from the lens of servicing and working with our students and these are all of our kids. So we don't say SSD staff, we say special educators. They are special educators with very specific uh fine-tuned skills to help and support Parkway students. So, these are the action steps. These are the things that we're working on towards this year for our team uh for our staff um moving forward for this year. And
036that's not necessarily written into the agreement. Um but this is what these are the things that we are concentrating on uh going forward. So, some important dates. One is the partnership agreement. I'm presenting before the deadline of October 1st. barely made it, but we're here. Um the board uh we're asking for your approval of this so that we can get it to the SSD side so that they are able to uh go through their approval process and have that done no later than on October 31st of 2025. And then there's a principal collaboration tool um and there's some baseline data that needs to be established during this fall. Uh Dr. Blumenfeld's working through that process on that. I'm not going to go into the details. We did have some slides that go into that, but
037she's more into the weeds of that. So, I pulled that part of this presentation out today. Um, if you have more questions about that, we can give you that information as a board of what that principal collaboration tool is. I just do not feel equipped to be able to give that in in detail tonight. Um, that is going to be developed and and and for a final review should occur by June 30th of 2026. And we're going to continue to monitor those metrics quarterly. And I went through that quickly, but that is that the the agreement and the processes and the timelines as well as the action steps that we have going forward. So, do you have any questions? >> Greg, will you be participating in the um next year's evaluation of the new partnership
038agreement? >> I I don't know if I am yet. >> Okay. >> Yes. >> All right. Thank you. >> Yep. I I think they're asking for volunteers. I have not raised my hand yet. Okay. >> But I could. >> Yes. >> Greg, have you won that Parkway Cup more than once? >> Uh, you know, not yet, but I I I probably should get back out to the driving range. We will see. But I appreciate you asking that. It is It is one of my ultimate goals in my life, and I certainly hope I could have that back on my desks soon. Well, I just appreciate you highlighting some I know we've had questions and you know in preparation for tonight's meeting, so you've answered those and appreciate you and appreciate Miss Yates being here as
039well. Thank you. >> Absolutely. >> I actually have a question for Dr. Yates >> because we we hear from Dr. Matthew regularly and we hear from Amy in from your perspective. This is a partnership agreement. How has our partnership been from your perspective? >> Oh my goodness. So, like Greg said, I work with 11 of the 22 districts. Um, prior to last year, I worked with all 22 districts. As I was talking to the cabinet earlier tonight when I first started um in my role, Parkway would have been at the top of my list for having to dig in because we are one of our largest districts and um but I will tell you the relationship um that I have watched between Greg and Amy and then me now being a part of it. The
040collaboration and the partnership that we have with Parkway is absolutely amazing. Um, I will tell you that Greg, like Greg said, we sometimes have spirited conversations because we're all very passionate about what we do for kids. But what's amazing about that relationship is that we can have those difficult conversations and we can dig in, but we always keep students at the forefront. And when we walk away from those spirited conversations, we walk away with really good action steps and plans. Just in watching how um Dr. Blumenfeld has been out pretty sick the past week and a half. I have gotten very few calls because the teamwork in this district and the support for each other between principles, the coordinators, the director, the assistant superintendent, all this cabinet is fantastic. So, I can honestly say that
041Parkway is a complete joy and you guys do an amazing job. >> Thank you so much. >> Any other questions? Okay, thank you both very much. >> Great. Thank you. >> So, board members, may I have a motion and a second that the board of education approve the 2025 2026 special school district partnership agreement as presented in the September 25th, 2025 board meeting materials. >> So moved. >> Second. >> Mrs. Hopper, >> yes. >> Mr. Kilper, >> yes. >> Miss Franklin, >> yes. >> Mr. Schindler, >> yes. >> Mr. Seltzer, >> yes. >> Mr. Spectre, >> yes. >> Mr. Todd, >> yes. Motion carries 70. Next up, uh we have a policy review. Uh it's policy IGDBA, distribution display of unofficial or non-curricular student publications. Uh we've all had an opportunity to review that. Do
042any of board members have any further questions about that? Okay. Um since there are no questions, this policy will be up for a board vote at the next regular board meeting. Uh we have no reports tonight. However, we We have a couple of work sessions starting with 15.01, our gifted education comprehensive program evaluation. So, I'd like to invite Molly Glazer, gifted program lead, Carter Snow, director of assessment and continuous improvement, and Kevin Beckner, assistant superintendent teaching and learning to join us. >> Well, good evening, President Todd, Vice President Hopper, Dr. Schneider, Mr. Stove, members of the board. Uh we're back here uh for our second of third second of three installments of program review conversations and I before we begin I just want to thank again um Mrs. Hopper, Mr. Kilper and Mr. Schindler who
043all participated in the board subcommittee who were able to provide questions in advance of both of the two program evaluations we're going to hear tonight. So with that I will turn it over to Dr. Glazer to talk about our gifted program evaluation. Hi, I'm Ali Glazer. It's nice um to meet all of you. Um thank you again for being here tonight. Um so I'm excited to kick off our program evaluation for the gifted department. All right. So um in the Parkway school district are um mosaics which takes place both in every single tree building as well as the middle schools. Um we also our exceptionally gifted program that is housed both at Puremont and at West Middle School which is called the Mosaics Academy. And then we also have a high school liaison who meets
044with our high school gifted students and visits um all three or I'm sorry all um four of our high schools and is really just a um consult and a great resource for our students. Um when we started to put together our team of um who was going to be in our program evaluation team, we wanted to make sure that we were getting good representation from our whole department. So, we have representatives from our elementary level, our middle school, our exceptionally gifted program, and two building principles, as well as one of our gifted testers, and um Carter Snow, who is um our director of assessment and improvement. All right. So, um, since I met last with the subcommittee, I've actually had another chance to meet with our program evaluation team. Um, so in August, we kicked
045off the work with um, Na Nathan Tyson where we started to look at the areas in which we wanted to gather more information and developed guiding questions. Um then we um started to um meet with our subcommittee that is our program evaluation group and during that time we started to look at how we are going to evaluate all of these questions. Are we going to research them? Are we going to conduct surveys? Um are we going to have focus groups? So we met and then also started to write some of our survey questions. Um in November through December we are planning on um giving all of um our surveys out as well as conducting our focus groups and conducting some of our research in February through April. We are going to then um start to
046prepare our findings, prepare for our final board presentation and um share with our staff any additional feedback. And then in April, we're going to conclude with our board presentation. So, our group had lots and lots of discussions about our focus areas, and we've actually changed and combined some slightly since our um subcommittee mass met um last met. So, we have five areas that we really want to focus our learning on. um mission, vision and philosophy, our program structure, our um standards, curriculum, community and assessment. Um our seal, our social emotional learning, and our identification of gifted students with our mission, vision, and philosophy. One of our things that we want to do as a gifted staff is really go back and re revisit our um mission, vision, and philosophy to make sure that we are
047aligning with um DESIE, with our districts, with um the National Association with Gifted Learners um as well as the state's um portrait of a gifted learner. Um the second topic in which we're going to address is our program structures. We want to explore how gifted is connected into MTSS, our multi-tiered system of support um and really looking specifically at that role of enrichment. So we right now are offering enrichment in um our elementary schools which is serving students who are very close um to identifi or getting identified for the gifted program or would benefit from that additional exposure. And so we're looking at our role in that um as well as um equity and making sure that what we are able to offer in every single school can be um equal in that nature. Um
048we also are looking at our middle school program right now. Um gifted is um offered opposite of PE and so um we want to conduct some research and try to learn more. would this help with our enrollment if we possibly offer it at a different time? Um and so that was a question that arose. Um the other qu um area that we wanted to look at was our mosaics academy and the placement with that. um that is our exceptionally gifted program and we are finding especially since Puremont's um enrollment has increased that and just the number of students who are um in that um exceptionally gifted range has increased that we are having more students than space and we hate saying no to families and so looking to see um are we at the right
049spot for that. Um our third topic in which we're going to address is our curriculum needs. Um a big focus in our gifted department is connecting our learning to the real world. So that is an area that we want to explore a little bit more. Um and also looking at some of the best practices in terms of like curriculum and um with a focus also on our exceptionally gifted learners. Um, as far as our community, we want to become stronger, um, educating about our program. Um, and also working on having a smoother transition from elementary to middle to high school with our gifted department. Um, and then the other area in this that we're looking at is our assessment. How are we measuring growth? Is it the real world? How are we reporting progress so
050stu so parents and students know that they are growing in their learning? Um topic four is our seal in gifted students. Um we almost see this as one of the most important things because in our program we have a huge number of twice exceptionally students and our gifted students are at high risk for um not completing school um dropping out and um having some struggle with um some emotional like self-regulation as well as like perfectionism. And so some of the um work that we would like to do is that making sure that all of our gifted specialists have access to our data in which we are collecting um about students um in regards to SEAL. We want to also explore some additional SEAL curriculum that is specific to gifted students and making sure that we
051are using best practices. Um we also want to study ways in which we can partner with um other school members and um just help um explore different ways that we can support the team at school. Um our last category that we are looking at is our identification process in Parkway. Um last school year, Desi had changed um the requirements which um took out race as one of the measures in which um or that um we could use um for like equity. And so we want to make sure that we are still being equitable to all of our students and Parkway and seeing if our identification process is really making sure that we're getting those kids. And so we're looking at um how we're um having kids um get identified through for our enrichment programs, our
052regular Mosaics program as well as our Mosaics Academy. We also want to explore um some of our exposure lessons. Um do we need more of those to make sure that we're giving students all access? Um as well as looking at some of our universal screeners that we are giving. Right now we give one in first grade. Um so we want to explore more about do we need more, do we need less or also are we using the right ones. Um so the process that we are follow um following we are um going to be conducting four different focus groups so that each area of our department makes sure that their voices are heard. Um we are going to be having lots of different surveys and um my team and I have been hard at work
053on those. We have different versions of our surveys going out to um for instance like our um elementary gifted students will have a very different version than like our middle school Mosaics Academy students. And so we were um really trying to make sure that we're getting the right data. Um as well as um we're going to be doing lots of research looking at professional readings, data collection from other districts, also school visits, um interviews with other gifted program staff. And that is it. Does anyone have any questions? >> I do have a question. Um and I apologize if this was covered and I I didn't catch it and in our previous conversations, the middle school mosaics um gifted gifted program. >> Yes, >> it's at West Middle. >> So that's our exceptionally gifted program. So
054every middle school does have a gifted specialist as well as our elementary schools. >> Okay. So the exceptionally gifted do students from other schools come come there? >> They do. So, we are very fortunate that we have um a bus system and so what they'll do is um we'll look first at like the students in the north area and we'll see where are where are most of them coming from and so they will have an elementary school that is their meeting point which will be their bus stop and so there will be one school for each area of our district and so those students are able to then be bus to West Middle School and also to Piermont and then we also have like an activities bus where if they are staying for after school
055um activities that they're able to get home through the bus system. >> Okay. >> Yeah. Uhuh. >> I'm not sure this is the right forum to ask this question, but I've always been curious and here you are. So, you get it. >> We mosaic program is you know it's the gifted kids in school that go to a classroom and themies are the what you kind of what you were talking about. Has there any thought of calling those something different? Because >> that is a really good question. >> I feel like everyone always gets them mixed up and oh no not that mosaics the other. Yes, we have um that has been on our radar and that that I think could be part of our discussion here as well. Yes, I agree. It's utterly confusing. >>
056Okay, then I'm not the only one. >> Do you have an idea of how many students are in the exceptionally gifted? >> Yes, we have 35 at the elementary level and 35 also at the middle school. Um and so um we have 1,700 students in our gifted department or our gifted program um which is making up 10% of our population. >> Is that 35 is it capped at 35 or is it >> It is. Yes. >> So there could be more if there was more, right? >> Correct. >> Um I did have another question in regards to the surveys. You said um you were going to be having surveys for current and former students. Yes. >> So, what what age range are we are you trying to go back to? >> We are um also
057going to be sending a survey out to high school students because we feel like we have their current um contact information and that they could give us really good feedback on their elementary and middle school experience and because they've gone through like that whole program, we see this as a good opportunity for us to learn and grow from them. um if we can get a hold of any college or postgrad students, you know, we would love to hear from them, too. However, um realistically speaking, our program has changed a lot over the last couple years, and so our students that are now in high school have had like the most current experiences. Good questions. Uh I for one I was happy to hear that you're you're going to be looking at that group of students
058that don't just just quite make that >> that cut. Um but I did have a question on u you talk about in topic three your transition between uh levels >> and I know the high school liaison >> plays an important role for those kids who've moved on from West Middle. Yes. >> Are you >> So she also works actually with all of our um high schools. So Yes. So it's not just West Middle. >> Yeah. My question though is are you planning to look at the high school liaison or or the experience that that the students that were previously in the middle school gifted program that once they get to high school it they kind of transition out of that. Is that something that you're looking at keeping the same or >> evaluating? We yeah,
059we have a survey that is going specifically to those students and asking them um like what are areas that you want to see more of in high school? Um what are resources that we currently don't have that you wish that you had access to with this role? So, we are absolutely looking at that. Um how it's structured though right now is that she's in each building about two hours um per week. So, it's not a whole lot of time, but we want to make sure that when our high school leaison is there that we're making the most of her time there and that she's servicing all the kids that she can. >> Okay. So, go ahead. >> So, the high school liaison is there's one >> Yes. So, she um teach high schools. >> Yes.
060And she also teaches part-time at Northeast Middle School. So, she is a busy lady. >> So, Is is she tracking all Mosaics kids from middle school or just the Mosaic Academy? >> So, she's doing all middle school students. So, she has um Google Classroom resources for all of different um all different students and then she meets once a month with our counselors um and gets a list from them of students so that they can kind of tag team. So she's getting a lot of those gifted students. Um so she's trying to focus her effort on there. Um students are also able to sign up and she also will do like lunch bunches and um other activities like that where like it might be like a perfectionism group or it might be one on like time
061management. Um and so she's we're trying to really make the best use of her time. Any other questions? Yes. >> A couple of other questions that I had on when the stu when these students are in these programs in middle school and then they go to high school, do they go go back then to their home high school >> or are they all going to West High from West Middle? >> The majority of them will go to West High School. However, some will switch back to um like the resident high school, but the majority of them want to stay in that cohort. You know, it's very a tight-knit group of students. I taught in the academy for 12 years. They are very much like siblings. By the time that they are done with this and
062you know, it's such a unique experience for them to be in a classroom full of students who learn like they do. And are they still able how do they get to West High then? >> Um there's still a bus that would take them. So it's that same deal where we look to see um where they are residing the and then having a um an elementary school in each area of the district where the parents would be responsible for getting them to and then the bus takes them to um their high school. >> Okay. And then as far as the social emotional uh learning support goes, do they have special counselors assigned just to the mosaics and the uh exceptionally gifted? >> So we do um in our exceptionally gifted program. So spends half her time
063at West Middle School and then half of it over at Puremont, which is the elementary version. Um, we use her though as a resource for our other gifted students and we are constantly sharing materials back and forth with her, but we don't have a dedicated counselor for the rest of our students. So, that was, you know, an area also that we wanted to explore. >> Sure. >> Okay. Thank you. >> One last question. Um, just a reminder, you said how many students were in the Mosaics program? the >> the whole district um is 1,700. >> So it's about 10% of our population. >> Is that inclusive of the academy? >> Yes. >> Okay. >> And again like some schools have higher than others, but that is the district as a whole. >> Any other questions?
064>> Well, thank you. >> I just add one. So my daughter's in the program. She loves it. She's like I don't need to go to school any day but Tuesday. Y. >> Yes, we love having her. All right. Thank you. >> Thank you. >> Next up, we'll welcome Dr. Beckner back along with Alexis Luki, coordinator of elementary reading intervention. >> Good evening. It's nice to see you all again. I know that Dr. Beckner said there's three iterations of this. You only get me for the first two. So, two weeks ago, we talked about social studies. Um, and this week I have the privilege to talk about our reading our elementary reading intervention program. Um, and the process we'll be taking for the re the comprehensive review. And again, just thank you to the board subcommittee
065for all their questions and their conversations. We were able to refine some of the things we want to research as uh through their conversation and then conversation with Sarah McMillan who is the district literacy specialist. She was unable to be here today. Um, but just thank you to her for all of her work with this as well. So before we start and talk about what we actually want to do throughout the program review, I would just want to provide a little bit of background information on our elementary reading intervention program and some of the shifts that have happened in the last few years. So the states passed a number of laws that's provided guidance for our schools to have strong systems in place to support students through reading. And some of the biggest shifts have
066provided requirements for assessment support and response to students with dlex dyslexia or characteristics of dyslexia. Some of the other um requirements have provided guidance around creating reading success plans and you'll hear me talk about that later. We'll refer to them as RSPs. Um, but think of reading success plans as a road mapap for how we're supporting students, the the data we're gathering, how we're the goals we have, and the ways teachers are supporting them. And in addition, the states passed some laws to ensure that our reading instruction is comprehensive, rooted in the science of reading and thinking of all of the components of reading, fluency, phonics, vocabulary, comprehension. That background has played a big role in our assessment process, in our resources we use for instruction, and in the ways we problem solve and support
067students. So last year, um, and I know that Susan Herby Hawinson brought to the board the adoption of Benchmark Advance, which is our resource for students in K through five for reading, writing, phonics, and word study. and that plays a big role into what we're going to be talking about today. A little other background, we have 31 reading interventionists across our 19 school buildings. And as we talk about reading success plans, which are um guide a lot of our reading intervention, currently we have 803 of those in last school year. They're not all put in for this school year, but we're at about 830. So as we think about reading intervention, it is a wide program but supporting students individual needs. So our four focus areas revolve around resources, alignment of those resources, the structure
068of their program, the adaptability of the program, our scope and the development we provide for our reading interventionists as well as our classroom teachers. and then how this program fits into our wider MTSS and intervention processes. The questions that are really going to guide the recommendations that we provide the board in the spring are really thinking about how do our resources and indiv in supports support our individual student needs as well as how do they support students growing from one grade level to another. We want to look at the structure including staffing, our resource allocations, and how we respond to our diverse and mobile student population. When we look at um the close of the year, we see how many students were served in reading intervention through a tier three support. How many students had
069a tier 2 plan in place in the classroom? Although we know that May we have one population we're serving and it can completely change in August. Does our program respond to that is one of the things we want to research and study to understand. We also want to find ways to make sure that our resources and the way we provide supports are constantly evolving to meet students needs. When we think about the scope of the program, we're thinking about if our resources and our supports support all of the pillars of literacy. So, I talked a little bit about how there's comprehensive supportive reading. Many years ago, we focused mostly on comprehension. Now, we know that reading is a very integrated approach where we're thinking of phonics, fluency, comprehension, vocabulary, and how they all fit together.
070And we want to make sure that our program has supports for each of those pillars of literacy. Also for students with dyslexia or characteristics of dyslexia. One of our questions is really going to be working on are we providing the right professional development for our interventionists as well as our classroom teachers to continue to support students needs. And lastly, really thinking about how this program, which provides a targeted response to students needs, fits in our larger systemic approach, thinking of MTSS, and are we having a very clear and aligned process just like we do for math intervention for gifted and other things like that, as well as do we have the right processes in place to make sure it's aligned across the 19 schools and are we constantly evol evolving and growing for that continuous
071improvement? You'll notice that a lot of that overlaps because when we think of reading intervention, we're thinking of multiple processes of reading and we're trying to tailor it to individual students needs. So, some of those pieces connect to each other. our timeline. Um the fall we've really spent developing and finalizing our surveys. In the winter we'll gather our research. We'll conduct the surveys and we'll conduct focus groups. And then in the spring we'll prepare our recommendations and our feedback and share our findings with our community, with our board um and with our reading specialists. And I shared a little bit that we're going to be doing focus groups. We will have that with reading specialists as well as building leaders and principles. Um, and then district literacy specialists Sarah McMillan and myself will also be
072supporting that. We're looking at a lot of data. We're looking at assessments we give like our NWA. We're monitoring our reading success plan data on students entering a reading success plan and exiting in a reading success plan as well as the growth they're making. In between those two points, we'll be looking at research best practices and of course focus groups. >> What questions are there? >> Uh well, first off, I I want to say my youngest daughter had a reading success plan and I have to say it was amazing and she has since gone out of it and and truly loves reading. Um, but I wanted to talk real quick about uh dyslexia >> because I I know it's in the scope of providing support for students that have dyslexia, >> but I think one
073of the other at least tough parts and I think you know we as a board have heard is the detecting dyslexia. Is that going to be part of this evaluation of are we using the right tools to detect dyslexia? Do we maybe need to change that? Is that part of this as well? >> That is part of this. And also thank you for sharing that success. I our reading specialists are like unicorns. They're magical. What they can get done in 30 minutes and the connections they build are just absolutely amazing. And I've seen that as a classroom teacher, as a former Parkway student in reading intervention. I mean, they're just fabulous. So, I had to step out for a second. >> Completely agree. >> Yes, we are going to be looking at that through um
074the different processes we have. Now, some of the assessments we use like the NWA are tools that have to be state approved as well as tools that monitor a lot of things. But that is one of our questions. >> Thank you for sharing. >> Yes. >> Well, hi. One of my questions is um one of our struggles with one of our children in elementary school with reading was the summertime. And we all hear about the summer slide. Um, is is there anything that's going to be done to help parents keep up the work that is and the progress that they're being made throughout the school year because then you come back and if you're not keeping that up in the summertime, which you have to do, >> um, and sometimes it can be a struggle
075if you're on your own and you're like, where do I go? What do we do? When we don't have the resources to know what we're supposed to be doing to helping Um, so I'm just curious if that's part of this evaluation. Do you already have something in place for that? >> That's a wonderful question. So, we do have a few things in place for that. Part of our reading success planned um, guidance is providing resources over the summer for students to continue growing. Um, we actually have a hub that breaks it down within each pillar of literacy and we share that with families. >> One of the things you just shared though is it's about having the skills to be able to provide the support. So, one of the processes we already have in place
076within Parkway is our summer school program and through summer school and summer success academy, which a couple of our summer schools followed. They have very targeted approaches to supporting students. I know summer school is a very short window of time, but any time that we can work with students and meet their needs is important. Um, and we'll also provide a lot of resources through our library media services about how we can continue that summer reading and promote that summer growth. The other piece is we spend some time in the beginning of the year gathering data to prepare to support students, but we already know that there are some students that need support. So, our reading specialists kick off week one checking in with students who they supported last summer, catching up with them, seeing what
077they did learn, where they are, and trying to not lose any ground. um from the day we start school. But I think thinking more about what other resources we could provide is something to definitely consider within our program resource category >> because some some families don't want to go to summer school or or don't and some kids just need a break from from because they're working really hard in school and then sometimes they need a break. And so, you know, just finding ways to help support families because it it can be a struggle and you don't want your kid to hate reading for the rest of their lives. >> When you keep pushing, pushing, pushing it, right? So, >> definitely finding that balance. >> It's a huge Right. >> And the consistency because we know
078that the language and the way we coach into a student is really important and we don't want to add confusion to it. >> That's a great question. >> Yeah. Thank you. >> Thank you. >> I just had a Quick comment. Um, I really like the graphics. I don't know who put the charts together, but they're spot on. >> Thank you. Thank you. >> Thank you very much. >> Thank you so much for your time. I appreciate it. >> Okay. If there are no other uh golf references to be made, may I have a motion in a second to adjourn the regular meeting? >> Some second. >> All in favor? >> Any oppos? carry 70. Thank you all for attending.