001for students with a clear four-year academic plan which could be signed by parents, teachers as needed. uh the district's AM requirement is not a statemandated course and it makes it extremely difficult for her and many like her uh to fit all these courses into their schedules without sacrificing electives or overloading. All other core subjects, English, social studies, and math offer advanced options for freshmen. Science does not, which is a major hurdle for STEM focused students. The only alternative currently offered is taking a summer online course through Grand View, which is not always practical for all students. It's important to note that the AM requirement is a very recent addition implemented only two years ago. For decades, Wentzville students were allowed to take biology as freshmen, and many of them are now doctors, researchers, and veterinarians.
002I should know I taught some of them in their advanced math classes and coached them in scholar bowl. I will say that personally I miss teaching them very much. We had a proven track record of success without this restriction of AM. Every year we keep this policy. We risk holding back talented students. I urge the board to act now. Restore flexibility and opportunity for current and future students. For future years, please consider moving the AM course to eighth grade so they can have another advanced option and so that incoming freshmen can access advanced science classes just as they can in other subjects. Currently, only math offers an advanced option. Um, thank you very much for your time and consideration. >> Thank you. >> Next, Rebecca Messik. Hello, good evening. My name is Rebecca Messik. I'm
003speaking you to you tonight on behalf of the teachers union. And tonight, I know you guys will be voting on some of the proposed changes to school schedules. Um, something that you may not know is that switching to a more consistent release time is something that teachers have been discussing with the district for over two years now. Well, maybe longer. Um it was originally brought up during contract negotiations in the two 2023 24 school year. Um at the secondary level it is rare for teachers who teach the same prep to have the same plan time and because of this teachers struggle to meet consistently with with each other for collaboration. We have been operating for several years now with only two hours of release time each month and it is simply not enough time. There
004have been many recent discussions um during board meetings surrounding teacher workload and the full records stays being proposed at the end of three quarters for elementary level will be a huge benefit to our elementary teachers and their workload. In comparison to surrounding districts, we are behind the times in offering this release collaboration. All of our neighboring districts, Lincoln County, Francis Howell, St. Charles, Fort Zumalt, implemented some version of a weekly release time years ago. Thank you for listening and for supporting the hard work work of the educators in our district. These changes are definitely a step in the right direction for providing elementary educators with additional time to reduce workload and secondary educators with additional time for collaboration. >> Next [clears throat] is Audrey Mloud. >> Hello, I'm Audrey Mloud. I am a student at
005North Point High School. I'm a sophomore in AP and honors classes as well as HOSA future healthcare professionals club. Power lunch has always been my opportunity to ask questions, seek help. I take my priorities very seriously as school is a major priority to me in my future. I usually spend my lunchtime walking around a teacher's classroom with questions, utilizing my math intervention, making test corrections, or attending my club meetings as any other students would do. Although I try to stay after school as much as possible, it gets hard having work. I will have two jobs and it can be hard to find time just as it would be for students with sports, no ride, and especially since we don't offer the activity bus anymore. I know from an outside perspective, lunch can lunch can look
006chaotic, but behind the scenes of power lunch, it is organized chaos. There are many teachers supervising open areas, students in classrooms, and club meetings. Best Buddies at North Point is one of the most active clubs. We meet every Friday, build friendships between students who might not cross paths otherwise. Our first meeting have had over a 100 students plus students in the life skills room. These meetings would not have this much attendance if they were held outside of school hours. This most recent November, I worked in the blood drive during my whole power lunchtime as I did recruitment for the blood drive days before this as well. Without lunch, we would not have this many recruitment in this event as well as participants. If academic use is a worry about lunchtime, after meeting with peers and
007teachers at my school, I have found that the first year's North Point was open time was not in place. Therefore, lunch was used even more for academic purposes as students had no other time in the day to meet with teachers, clubs, and coaches. During our lunch at North Point High School, we offer a testing center where students who were absent or might have missed a test are able to redeem their grade and take a test in a quiet space for a whole hour. We also offer a calm room for students who might get easily overstimulated or need a quiet environment. We offer a wait room for students who might be interested in physical health who may not have a gym accessible to them at all time. Overall, lunchtime is time to utilize what you need,
008take a break, socialize, and build relationships, get caught up on whatever you need, and ultimately adds a positive culture to North Point High Schools. Thank you. >> And next is Nathan Harwood. >> Good evening, ladies and gentlemen of the school board. My name is Nathan Harwood. I'm a junior at North Point High School. I speak today regarding the proposed weekly schedule for the 2026 through 2027 school year as prepared by Mr. Bishop. While I do agree with the goal of this format and proposal, I speak to ensure the guarantee of power lunch for years to come. While this current proposal takes away power lunch only once a week in sacrifice of an early release, I believe this may set an ill precedent for the future and I believe the power the benefits of power lunch
009far outweigh the negative. I am a proud member of seven clubs at North Point High School such as student council, theater, class officers, DECA, FBA, World Quest, and youth and government. Power Lunch has given me time to be in these clubs that I hold sincerely to my heart. Each of these clubs serves a genuine purpose to my life in the form of a career or passion. My applicable life skills have increased and I've met so many more of my finest friends that share similar interests and goals to me in life. Not only that, but I have been able to receive necessary support in my academics from my teachers through Power Lunch. I've struggled in my classes just as much many people have before, but having my teachers be able to set aside a specific time
010to tutor their most challenged students has ensured my success in each of their classes. Not only do I have the time to improve my academics and my future career, but I still have time to eat my lunch and be with all of my peers. Being able to share a lunch period with any person in my school has created a more positive environment. New friendships can blossom and old ones will stay maintained. Students don't have to feel alone at lunch anymore. And in a time of increased social anxiety amongst young people, the very last thing we should be doing is limiting who they can talk to and spend their lunch with. Power lunch enables better grade point averages, improve student livelihood and socialization, as well as more active comm members of our community. I understand that
011this bill has no intention of abolishing power lunch, but when you pass this motion tonight and potentially amend it, do not let this become an ill precedent. The livelihood of the overall student bo body is far more important than smaller issues that you guys have had concerns over such as behavior or attendance that can easily be solved with less dramatic and less broad means. As this proposal stands, I am in support, but hear my warning. Maintain our livelihood. I yield the rest of my time. All right, moving to district comments. >> President, >> yes, >> Scott, there's a few people that walked in and it looks like the number one person is a student as well. I just want to check and see. >> Yeah, if any >> did Zachary come in? >> Yeah, right.
012>> Oh, yeah. Come on up. Thank you. Good evening, members of the school board. Thank you for the opportunity to speak with you today. My name is Zachary Bennett, a freshman at Whole High School. I am speaking regarding the proposal to reduce lunchtime. When most people look at a school schedule, lunch may seem like just a break, and for some students, it is. But for students like me, it serves a much more important purpose. I see lunch as a window in an otherwise busy and demanding school day. And for students whose evenings are often filled with extracurricular activities, jobs, family responsibilities, or transportation limitations, there's little to no time after school to complete homework, study, or meet with others. Lunch becomes one of the only opportunities during the day to stay on track. Lunch is
013essential for some students to stay involved in their community at school. Students could not be in some of the clubs they're in without an hour to engage in these meetings. In addition, many students use lunch to study for exams, work on group projects, or prepare for upcoming assignments. Having an hour allows students to do this effectively without feeling rushed, which helps reduce stress and improves focus in class. Beyond academics, lunch helps many students mental health. It gives them time to relax, eat, and hang out with their friends. This can reduce stress throughout the rest of the school day, and shorter lunches can negatively impact students by rushing socialization and eating. I respectfully ask the school board to consider how important the hourlong lunch is to students, academic success, involvement, and overall well-being. Keeping this time
014support students and strengthens our school community. Thank you for your time and consideration. >> Thanks for catching that, David. All right. Um, district comments. >> Thank you to all our speakers for participating in the meeting today and sharing your input with us. Um, also thank you to all our students that are here for coming and sharing a part of their education process. Uh, district happenings. On Tuesday, January 6th, we opened the new Reach Adaptive Learning Center, which officially welcomed 59 students and staff. I'm happy to report it was an exciting day. Everyone was thrilled to be in the new facility. We had some adjustment time going on, but overall it was an incredibly positive event. 2025 2026 teacher of the year in the Wesville School District is Discovery Ridge third grade teacher Kim Porter. Mrs.
015Porter has taught in the WSD for more than nine years. Her principal, Kelly Straman, said she could be the district ambassador for helping students and celebrating growth and success. She empowers her students to measure and track their progress forward. She's a constant advocate for all of them. A huge thank you to Mrs. Porter for all of her work and all of her with for the students and community of the Winssville School District. Congratulations, Kim. The beginning of the new calendar year means it's time again to begin preparations for our incoming kindergarteners. All the needed information for our families can be found on the website. So, if you have a student who's kindergarten age and it's time for them to come join us in the WSD, make sure to check out our website. It's also time
016for prek enrollment for 2627 school year at both Barfield and Samuelson. Enrollment opens February 9th for returning preK families and WSD employees and on February 23rd for all WSD school district residents. And then candidate filing for the Wsville board or district board of education closed on December 30th. Three community members filed to run for the district's three open seats. In accordance with state statute, the WSD will not hold an election for the three-year board of education term this year because the number of candidates who filed matches the number of positions available. The three candidates were Shawn Johnson, Bertha Schultz, and Kirby Wilson, and will be sworn into office at the board of education reorganization meeting on Tuesday, April 21st. >> Okay, moving to consent agenda. We need a motion to approve the consent agenda as
017presented. >> Motion. >> Second. >> All We have a motion and second. All in favor? >> I. Any opposed? Motion carries. Moving to new business. We have a presentation for the early release schedule. Actually, hold on. All right, good evening and thank you so much for being here particularly those who came um with an investment in the schedule adjustments and both staff families and students. So I think that a majority of the people will be pleased with what they see here. I do want to take some time this evening to thoroughly review the recommended scheduling adjustments, give some background for why we're proposing those scheduling adjustments and let you know what this year versus next year would look like and what that does for student academic minutes. Um, so I have about probably 12 to
01815 slides here and we'll go through them and then this is also now uploaded into the board packet for your reference after the fact if you so choose. So, the reason for schedule adjustments, as um Miss Messik said, is we're looking for opportunities for teachers to be able to collaborate at grade level and subject area level in order to perform a professional learning community. Um we know that teacher collaboration drives student achievement and there is a plethora of research that supports that. Um three of the things that we think are most critical are collective teacher efficacy. We know that when our teachers are working in teams um talking about strengths and areas where that they can improve their practice um they're most effective than when working in a silo. We need to be able to
019provide time for them to do that. Additionally, instructional consistency. We want to ensure that um while teachers maintain um individuality and autonomy, we want to make sure that the core curriculum and the standards are being adhered to and that we have instructional consistency in our classrooms for our students. And the last item there is the feedback loop. We want to ensure that um teachers are quickly identifying and diagnosing what's going well and not well with their students and making instructional adjustments um as immediately as possible in order to provide good feedback so that learning can continue the overview of this. Um, so a couple bullet points here and I've tried to present it in a few different ways like go uh level by level, go um staff and student and then also give you a
020um cheat sheet at the end to kind of wrap up all of the adjustments. But it's quite a bit of um small nuanced adjustments. So I really want to make sure that I hit home on the um points so that everyone understands. Um we're going to propose a weekly early release schedule for secondary buildings. Again, that means middle and high school. As a secondary building, we aim to support instructional improvement. We talked about that. Um, we want to embed that time into the weekly schedule again so that teachers are there on their time and have the ability to release and work together. And then, um, overall, the whole point of that is to improve student learning. As was mentioned earlier, this has been done in districts across our county, um, St. Louis County and even
021I believe Lincoln County for several years. and we're excited to bring this opportunity to our staff and our students. Additionally, if you hear um words or acronyms or or terms that you're not familiar with, at the end of the presentation, we have kind of a cheat sheet for terms. If you have any questions, you can reference that as well. At the secondary building, just to break it down a little bit more, again, that's middle and high schools. Um we're looking for early release that would provide the dedicated consistent PLC time. So that way all sixth grade teachers who aren't able to all be on plan together or they're not able to be in these subject areas together. And so that would give all sixth grade teachers an opportunity sixth grade math would meet, sixth grade
022science would meet, social studies, ELA to be able to talk about common practices and streamline instruction. Elementary. While we're not early releasing for elementary and we do not propose a weekly early release for elementary, we already have that PLC time built into their plan on a regular weekly basis. However, in order to provide them with additional individualized plan time to get things done for the needs of their students, we are proposing an additional 30 minutes to their weekly planning um that does not affect the student schedule at all. All right. in looking at this slide and you'll see a couple that are um mocked up just like this. On the left side you'll see our current schedule and then on the right side you'll see the proposal for 2627. So right now we have no
023weekly early release at the high school level. Um we are proposing in 2627 that at the weekly secondary early release Wednesdays during full weeks. A full week means we go five full days. So, for example, Labor Day would not count. That week would not count. Even um the first week of school, although it could potentially be a full week. We're not proposing that we would early release the first week of school. So, I believe in looking at the calendar, there's about 19 weeks that are full 5day weeks, no breaks, no other early release type of thing. So, that's when we would early release. It would be 68 minutes on a Wednesday. On current, there are monthly 2hour late start Mondays. Those are 120 120 minutes. I believe we have eight late starts per year. That
024would be moving to a monthly 2hour all district early release Wednesday of 120 minutes. So once a month the entire district would release for 120 minutes about eight times a year. Very similar to what we're doing with late start Mondays right now. Um, currently in the high school, first and third quarters, we have end of the quarter early release days, one each for the students, and second and fourth quarters, they have two early release days at the end of each of those quarters for finals. And that would remain the same in the new proposal. Finally, on the bottom of the slide, we have no student attendance four different times a year for staff professional development. We would be reducing that and therefore adding two student contact days. We would have no student attendance two times
025a year for the staff professional development. We would maintain our staff professional development days on the days where we have polling places in our buildings and that's November and April. That's slide one for the high school. This is high school continued because now they have a little that was more of like the calendar at large for the year. Um, and this is more of the broken down daily calendar or the weekly calendar. So again on the left side that's current. We have the hybrid hybrid block schedule which means we have seven period days and block days. Um, right now we have Monday, Tuesday and Friday are seven periods. Wednesday and Thursday are block. Next year we will repo propose having the same hybrid block schedule but it will be Monday, Thursday and Friday our seven
026periods and Tuesday and Wednesday our block. Currently the second um little tab there seven period day classes are currently 47 to 48 minutes each. Some are 47 some are 48. So sometimes you'll see one or the other on there and that's why. And our block day classes are 86 to 87 minutes each. proposing that our seven period day classes next year are 49 minutes each and our block day classes are 89 minutes each. Power lunch currently is [clears throat] five times a week recommending that that reduces to four times a week. So there will be no power lunch on early release days. We're able to contribute some of that power lunch time to the release time therefore reducing the amount of time that students aren't at school. We're just trading one for the other in
027that in that aspect. And the final part of that slide is student success time is 9th hour. Um in the block day it's 87 minutes during the Thursday block day. Next year student success time we'll still call it 9th hour. It will be during the Wednesday block days. The same as weekly early release, but we're reducing that student success or that SST time down to about 42 minutes. We're still doing some um man calculations making sure that we're um in accordance with state expectations in regard to bell schedules and things. So it's approximately 42 minutes right now for that SST time on the weekly early release weeks. However, um in order to adjust for the minutes on the different early releases, um if we have a monthly early release, we actually need those minutes for
028the additional release time. So there will be no SST. That will be one of the adjustments. And on Wednesdays without early release, so say it's a 4-day week, we go four full days, that will be added back in. It will become a full 89m minute block, similar to how it is this year. In middle school, oh, I think I have one more thing at the bottom. adjustments to the high school schedule after it's all said and done increase even with the early release increase the weekly instructional minutes with the students assigned teachers. So that was a critical piece um and that we've done those calculations both with and without SST academic time in front of scheduled teachers and academic time with scheduled teachers and intervention and it increases on both accounts. All right, we're moving
029to middle school. So 6th through 8th grade also considered secondary when we're talking about secondary early release. So for the current schedule we have no weekly early release. In 2627 we propose weekly secondary early release Wednesdays during full weeks. Again like high school that's 68 minutes. Monthly 2-hour late start Mondays adjusting to those district early release Wednesdays 120 minutes just like high school. End of the quarter early release days one day each quarter for the middle school. It is staying the exact same for the middle school. Currently, no student attendance four times a year for those PD days. Just like the high school, we're adjusting that to two times a year. So, students will only be out of attendance twice a year for PD days. And those are in those election days in November and
030April. Um the fifth one, I think, can't keep up. Flex time we have at the middle school for about 45 minutes once weekly. We'll be adjusting that to no flex time. that will help balance the need for the early release minutes taken from there. And the final point on that one is student success time SST at the middle school is done during one class period on alternating days A or B. On the right hand side we have the 26 27 adjustment and we recommend that it remain the same as well. All right, moving on to middle school. Um, no weekly early release currently. Also, oh, I I said middle. Elementary. Thank you, Debbie. I think that's two good catches for you tonight. Thank you. Elementary school current. No weekly early release. Still recommending no weekly
031early release for the elementary kids. Um, we do have a monthly 2-hour late start for elementary. We are recommending just like middle and high school that we adjust that to the 2hour all district early release on Wednesdays. So everybody, middle, elementary, and high are all releasing 2 hours early on Wednesdays, one time a month. I believe that ends up being eight times a year. This is a little bit different here on the end of quarter early release stays. Right now, elementary students have end of quarter early release one time a quarter. We will be adjusting and we're still trying to decide which quarters but right now in the draft uh the draft of this first, third, and fourth quarter, end of quarter will be no elementary student attendance and those will be marked as full
032teacher record days. Second quarter, so the end of the semester right before winter break would be an end of quarter early release day remaining like it is right now for elementary. And again, that's drafted. we know we need to go three um record stays and so we'll make those final decisions. And then the last tab there is no student attendance four times a year for staff professional development reducing that to two so that we'll pick up two student contact days there. So that is the overview step by step item by item for high school which was two slides, middle school and elementary school. Now for staff these are some of the the changes that the staff would see. Currently monthly schedule collaboration for all staff during two-hour late start. Same thing, same opportunity for people
033to collaborate during the all district early release on one Wednesday a month. Scheduled weekly scheduled collab during plan time for elementary. Elementary will maintain that and also increase that individual grade level teacher planning by 30 minutes. As I mentioned earlier, middle tab there, no weekly schedule collaboration for secondary. Well, that's kind of what this whole presentation is about. This allows us to do that weekly schedule collaboration for secondary which means middle and high school during 68 minute secondary early release Wednesdays on full weeks. Fourth tab end of quarter early release first, second, third and fourth for early elementary staff. We just talked about that. That will adjust to three days of no students and records days for teachers. and one of those likely second quarter will remain an early release. Lastly, you have five teacher
034PD days per year. You guys are seeing students are going from four to two. Staff are going from 5 to three because one of those staff PD days is in August before kids even come. So, it doesn't really affect the kids on their academic calendar. So, we're going from five teacher PD days a year to three teacher PD days per year. Here is your summary. I don't need to read this to you. It is basically what I've said, but I felt like the the prior slides were much more in-depth and told you what we're going from and proposing that we go to. This encapsulates all of that and gives you a really good overview of the proposals at a bird's eye view. What affects the entire district, what affects just the high, middle, and elementary.
035And again, this is in the board packet now for your reference. Um, this is a sample calendar. Uh, it helps me to have an idea visually what something might look like as I'm trying to plan things out. Um, let's pretend that Monday is Labor Day in September. So, it's a holiday with no school. That means no early release at all that week. Everything will be full days. You'll notice the second and fourth. And again, the calendar is not nailed out. This is a sample one. So, we have to still determine what's the weekly or what's the monthly early release. So, it's not always necessarily going to be the third one, but this is just a sample so you guys can see it. Um, the second and fourth one were secondary only early release at 68
036minutes. That's middle and high school. And the Navy one is all district 2hour early release. That's preK through 12. This is a sample. Again, it's nice to have it um visually in front of you of a high school schedule. You know, currently they have those seven period days on Monday, Tuesday, and Friday. And their power lunches on Monday, Tuesday, and Friday are approximately 60 minutes if you count in the passing. And on Wednesday, Thursday right now, you have four blocks on Wednesday, three blocks on Thursday, plus a a block full of SST at 86 minutes each and a 65minute power lunch if you include passing. If you notice in the the bottom row is 2627 proposal. Our seven periods days are shifting to Monday, Thursday and Friday. Our class blocks are actually increasing in time
03749 minutes. And our power lunch is decreasing a little bit in time to 52 minutes. And again, instead of Monday, Tuesday, Friday, the seven period day is now Monday, Thursday, Friday. The blocks will be on Tuesday and Wednesday. You'll do four full blocks on Tuesday with a 54minute power lunch. And on Wednesday, you'll have three 89minute blocks. Again, the block classes get a couple extra minutes as well. And the SST is 42 minutes. No power lunch because students will early release 68 minutes. Again, on the very bottom, we've indicated there's no SST on the monthly 2hour all district early release. And because we need that 42 minutes essentially to add to the 68 to make the release time work and your block time only reduces by 2 minutes in those on those days. Um SST
038is at 89 minutes on full Wednesdays. Again, if you're going to go that full day, you have to be able to make that a full block. And power lunch is 54 minutes on full day Wednesdays. So if you're going a full day on Wednesday, um there will also be a power lunch on that day. Middle school weekly schedule. It's a little bit more simple and I think this may be the last slide. So middle school has right now a sixth period day at approximately 61 minutes on Monday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday. Tuesday is a sixth period day at approximately 53 minutes because there's a 45minut flex time built in. For middle school we are uh doing away with the flex time in lie of um early release. Again that's shifting to the Wednesday. So middle
039schools Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, and Friday will stay the same. Sixth period class at approximately 61 minutes. And on Wednesdays, their class periods will be 50 minutes with an early release of 68 minutes, just like high school. Um, again, your six periods would adjust a little bit. If it's an all district early release where you're getting out for two hours, those class periods would be 41 minutes. Um, and if it's not a full week and you're going a full Wednesday, they go back to 61 minutes like everything else. There is your list of common terms for families who may not be super familiar with them. And other than that, that is our last slide. So, um, if there are questions from the board, I'm happy to answer them. >> All right. We need a motion that
040the board of education approve moving forward with the implementation of the early release schedule as presented. >> Motion. Second. Any discussion? >> I have a few questions. So for the flex time that's going to be is it going away? So for students that get extra special services during that time, what what are we doing there? >> Most of the special services are being pulled from the SST time in middle school, which is every other day for one period. So we're keeping that. The flex time was more of like a home room where they were working on um career explor exploration um leadership teamwork um enrichment activities those types of I think uh read alouds things like that. So the flex time was 45 minutes once a week. Special services are pulled from their SST time
041which is every other day for a full period that will remain. Um, and I'm sure that there is a reason. I think we've probably talked about it before, but I forget what uh the reason was why we don't go to just a full block schedule. We uh Winsville was in a full full block probably 20 years ago, maybe a little bit less. It's actually much more expensive in staffing to be able to do that. And um that would be a significant shift in the amount of money that we spent to be able to go to the full block. >> Okay. um how many academic hours are they missing by doing the two-hour release and then how are they backfilled or front-filled with the not doing early release or not not doing late start or whatever
042it is. >> Okay, so when we talk about academic hours, so there's a couple of things. So academic hours and minutes are both well above the state recommendation. Um, in looking at those times, particularly for the high school where you are carving out a little bit more time or the middle school, um, with high school, those students are actually picking up time. If you want to count seat time, like time in front of their teachers, um, by making those adjustments, by decreasing power lunch a little bit, um, by adding those two student contact days where it was professional development days, they actually end up coming out a little bit better. Um, middle school does reduce in a a minute matter. So like for example, flex was 45 minutes a week. Um, and again that was
043instruction, but it wasn't core content sitting in front of your teacher like direct instruction type of or project based that type of thing. Um, but we're switching that 45 for 68 minutes. So you do have what 23 minute difference there. But again, when we're picking up two additional student contact days, that really makes up a pretty significant portion of that. So, we feel like our student contact time, particularly at the high school, is improving comparatively. >> I'm going to add a little bit to the middle school. If you look at Tuesday currently, which is flex time, sixth period day, it's 53 minutes long and 45 minutes of flex. When you go to the early release, it's 50 minutes long. So, you're you're 3 minutes in that specific day. every other day is identical amount. >>
044Okay. Um, as for the PD days, you mentioned that they'll still be doing three of the five PD days. Um, some of them are in the summer. Which ones are they not going to be doing as far as like are they ones during school year during the summer? >> So, historically we've had one in August, which is in during the teacher work week. Um, they have four work days and a PD day. And then we've had one in September which we are proposing moving to a student contact day. We've had one in November on an election day that will remain a PD day. Um we've had one in February most recently. That will become another student contact day. Students will attend. And April was the other one which is an election day and it will
045remain a PD day. >> If elections are moved out of our schools, will we still retain those as PD days or will we go back to in-class? And there may be more discussion that we would need to have. I would say that it's still critical that our staff has professional development, but we may look at where those are placed. Instead of the middle of a week on a Tuesday, we may, you know, we may then go bump them back up to a longer weekend or a different at least to a weekend at the very least. >> I think that was it. That's all I had. >> Ask you one question. on Wednesday early released. Have we thought about or do we have a plan in place for like athletes and the kids staying after school?
046>> We absolutely do. That's a great question. I should have mentioned that. Thank you. Um so our support staff is still on the clock at that time. So we will have support staff providing supervision um providing opportunity for study halls, may even have an uh like a testing center if students need to retake tests, makeup tests, that type of thing. So if we have students who need to stay, they're welcome to leave and come back if they need to. Um, but if they need a sa a safe place to stay during that time, they absolutely will be and it will be supervised by our staff. >> I just have one question and maybe a comment just looking at the schedule. So, from the middle school standpoint, it sounds like it's actually going to be easier
047on the kids because it'll be more consistent day after day. I mean, it'll it'll alternate AB AB, but it'll be the same through each day, right? Um, and then more of that comment. I know we got a bunch of emails from kids and teachers and parents. Um, so thanks for the feedback on this. I know it's not an easy adjustment. Um, and then I think director we stole the question I was going to ask. Um, and just to look at it because I know the big concern was power lunches like at the high school level. Even though the power lunch is disappearing on the early release day, they still have the SST time and they would still be able to come in during that release time to do things. Okay, cool. Thank you. >> All
048right, just a couple as always. >> So, and and as mentioned about the number of students both speaking here live as well as the emails that were sent quite an interesting subject for students to get involved. Um did you take into consideration the impact on the students and if so how given I heard about meetings that would have to be forego um times that they doing other things in the power lunch the when they call >> Absolutely. So we have several years of of data with power lunch and so we know what that looks like supervision wise. We know what it what the students like. We've surveyed the families regarding power lunch. We've spoken anecdotally to students especially in student advisory superintendent council. Um we also looked at the student perspective in regard to academic
049time. Um like I said we looked at discipline data. We've heard the emails from students as well. And then personally I can even say I I have a child who has lived that and has had the opportunity to participate in clubs or get extra help retake test and also a spouse who teaches with the power lunch schedule. So um not only do I have personal experience, we've also sought that out from our community, our families. Uh Mr. Bishop has spoken with students in faculty or sorry student advisory council and we've gotten feedback from teachers. Um and again you're never going to find a solution that makes everyone 100% happy. um we feel like it's a fairly consistent schedule what they've had. We tried to reduce the power lunch a little bit in order to give
050them more academic time and provide for an early release but also still um understand that that's important for them and um many of them are making very good use of it. >> So one comment that we heard today was is this just the first of multiple changes to that free time at lunch? Is there a commitment that this will be the only impact to the schedule for now into the near future? Or can we expect in a couple years? Well, instead of just Wednesday, it'll be Tuesday and Thursday. Is there any commitment that the school can make? >> Uh, I I'll answer that. I think some of it's going to come down to what does our state legislator say? So, there's there's a lot going on right now about the you can start talking about
051the A throughF in schools. It depended upon how they're going to evaluate that. This schedule is truly designed with the intent to help both recognize students with power launch still and having the four hour 4 days, but it's also truly designed to figure out a way to provide that dedicated allocated play time or collaboration time. And so we've heard a lot about trying to improve academic performance and continue to get that those numbers up. And we when we look at the school districts we compare oursel against as Dr. Labrad said every single one of them has this time and there is immense data you we can pull up there it's linked in some of these slides with some of the the research that's gone on regarding PLC's. So for us and and I've talked about
052it that was an absolute priority as far as a commitment. We absolutely hope this schedule works. It it may need tweaks here and there. Is there a desire and and I think there's a false narrative out there that I want to get rid of power lunch. That's not accurate. Do I think power lunch provide or pres um is challenging to supervise? Yes, I think power lunch is challenging to supervise. And and if you walk into a school and you see 1,200 to,700 kids outside of a class environment, it's a lot of kids. There's a lot going on. So, I would be remiss if I didn't say it was challenging. Do I think our staff do a good job of trying to balance that? Yes. I think it's gone way better than I You could have
053got me to believe when I walked into this district 3 years ago. So, I don't have desire to get rid of Power Lunch. I see the benefit of it. In a way, I wish my own son could have it in in his school. He doesn't have it. The only way I see that changing if it's not working. And and by that I mean if this schedule's not working. If we're not seeing academic improvement. If we're not seeing scores increasing, then I think we've got to re-evaluate and say what's causing it. And that may mean maybe collaboration's not working. Maybe we need to add additional instruction time. Maybe we need to figure out how to go to a full black a full block, which is incredibly expensive, but still look at that. So my commitment would
054be I don't have a desire to change it. I don't think you make change just to change. This came up almost 2 and 1/2 years ago. It's not I while I know it's new to the community, it's not new to the people that have been working on it behind the scenes is is what I would say. And so there has been a lot of discussion, a lot of back and forth, a lot of give and take on what that schedule looks like. Um, at one point we put out a schedule and presented it and shared with the NEA that had one power lunch and we then looked when we we calculated minutes and were able to say, "Hey, we can change this even though it's a three- launch schedule if we add this and go
055to power lunch which will make it it more beneficial and the students will be happier with that." So then you saw this most revised schedule that came into play. So for me it's a balance of trying to do what we hope kids will appreciate and what we think is best academically moving forward. >> Thanks. So you mentioned about the number of the school districts multiple times and and so did Dr. Jay that that were have already been using this. How do their results measured by the state by district compared to ours? And is there a significant difference? significant. Yes. Depending on in every school district, no. Um the ones you like to compare, and I say you, us, we all like to compare ourselves against. I'll use for Zumalt. They're sitting at over a 95%
056APR and they've been beating us EOCC's and and MAP testing wise for almost a decade now. They moved 15 years ago to professional learning communities. So, they're way ahead of the curve. Francis How's traditionally been the highest achieving school district. They've been in a PLC district for almost 20 years. I want to say it's been a really long time. They were the first to go to that. And then you look at a lot of those St. Louis County schools that perform at a very high level. They all have been PLC's for a really long time. And so we're to a point we're we're lagging in that. And I think this is truly going to provide the the opportunity for teachers to collaborate and then take that student intervention time and actually utilize data to determine
057where kids should go to get assistance. So if if I'm behind in this, i.e. math or language or something like that, I can use that student intervention time to go get specific real time help on on content that I didn't know prior to this. It would be think of it like an autopsy. it it would be you're doing it once a month. Well, by the time you look at that, that data is done and you've already moved on to a new unit, new learning objectives weekly is a start. I mean, if you really want to see the highest performing, they do this on a daily basis. We're not in a situation we can do that. Um, but this at least provides the opportunity for more real-time data to turn around and drive the SST. And
058so teachers can actually sit down and compare what they have and say, "At this point, I want to have Brian Bishop work on his math skills and he's going to do it this way." Do you want to add anything, Jerry? I know you have your hand up. >> I think you essentially said it, but can we say that every district with release and PD scores higher than us? No. It's hard to talk in absolutes, but what I can tell you is pretty much what Mr. Bishop said and as districts have chosen to go this route, their scores have increased afterward. So you see that direct correlation of adjusting to the PLC model, improving academic achievement. >> Last question, I promise. This is plan A. Was there ever any consideration for plan B or C? And
059if so, why were they not looked at? >> I would love to speak to that. I actually have plans A through G. I have E2, B2, G2 revised and G2 revised new. So we have um put these out with a single cell in Google Sheets has a Google sheet that then backs up that cell. Um so what we've shared with our union leadership, what we've shared in our cabinet with our administrators, we have looked through them, we have sought feedback from many people. We have then taken it to our people who input core data to ensure that it matches up with state requirements and minute tracking. So yes, we've probably literally had 20 different things that were even good enough to present to others with the percentages of academic time by topic by class. >>
060All right. Thank you. Anybody else with comments or questions? I just have one last thing that I thought about with the all district early release. Is that going to be a consistent each week or is it going to vary from month to month? Just thinking like scheduling for families for the elementary kids. >> We have historically tried to keep it consistent. However, sometimes when you've got you throw Thanksgiving in there, you throw whatever holidays in there, it does make it more difficult. We also got smarter as we went on in those late starts. we shoved to the back of Super Bowl Sunday and return from break. So, unfortunately, we won't have that anymore, but I think that you will see us try to maintain some sense of consistency on which Wednesday, understanding that there's always
061going to be funky months and we're going to have to adjust. >> All right, thank you everybody. We have a motion in a second. All those in favor? I. >> Any opposed? Nay. >> Motion carries. Next we have the first reading of policy 2760 students in foster care. And last we have 11.3 approval of the Prairie Encore contribution agreement entity designation. >> Yeah, I've got a motion as part of 11.3. Um, and Jon, I can email this to you. U, I move that the board designate the Wsville School District Foundation as the entity authorized to receive all contributions payable to an entity designated by the district under the contribution agreement made as of August 22nd, 2023. Uh, among the district, Brian 364 Junction LLC, Calco LLC, and Mia Rose Holdings LLC. Need a second. >>
062Second. >> All right. Discussion. >> Did the foundation agree to receiving the money? >> Yes. They came back. They're under new leadership. They asked if that was something that they could now receive um and determine how it was meant to be spent. Any other discussion? >> Okay. >> I just want to make a comment. >> I will not be in favor of this. Um I wasn't in favor of the original agreement. I didn't get to vote on it though because I it was voted on the night I was sworn in right before I was sworn in. Um, I would have preferred we litigated and tried to recover more money from this or tried to get any kind of taxpayer funds back into our district. Um, this is now giving what would have been taxpayer funds
063to an entity that can just decide what to do with it, whether it's a special program or pet project or whatever. and the original tax funds would have just gone straight into the general um general account which would have benefited all students. So I will not be supporting it. I have a question. So why is it going to a foundation? So when this occurred when Mastercard um came in that money went straight to the general fund. So why is this different and why is it going to um a foundation? So, this was part of a negotiated settlement that was entered into through the previous administration between the district and the developers of the project. Um, as I understand it, and I wasn't here when this was originally entered into, but as I understand it, the
064developers in question were alleged to have missed some notification requirements. The district at that time entered into some sort of negotiated posture with those developers to try to claw back tax proceeds that should have been um a benefit to the district. I guess in lie of pursuing litigation further, the parties entered into a contribution agreement whereby the developers would um contribute to an organization designated by the district. The purpose behind that was so that the developers could enjoy the tax benefits of donating or contributing those funds to a nonprofit organization. So these funds would have otherwise gone to the district as with the master card um situation. So now we are going to forgo the money that was supposed to come to the district and give it to a foundation that is not affiliated with
065the district and can do whatever it would like with it. I I think one thing to um provide additional perspective is that the issue wasn't legally settled in the sense that we were going to be guaranteed money if we litigated. There was a question as to whether or not the developer met the legal requirements to move forward in the way that they did. So there was some degree of risk by litigating the case all the way through and ultimately that was why I believe again I wasn't there but I believe that the prior administration um well one of the reasons the prior administration decided to settle uh in the way that they did. So this vote is to forgo the money that is due to the district to give to another organization. >> No. So
066that decision has already been made. There was a contribution agreement entered into in 2023 uh between the district and the developers that settled the issue. This is uh a motion to appoint the organization that will receive the funds that under the contribution agreement the developer agreed to channel to the district for you know different activities and purposes. >> That agreement is null and void. There is now a new agreement between the district and the developers. >> Uh the original contribution agreement was amended. The amendment instead of identifying a specific entity which was the reason it was amended in the first place uh changed that language to say that the funds would be contributed to an entity or organization designated by the district. And so there has not been a a designation by the district as
067of yet as to who should receive those funds. And so the purpose of the motion tonight is for the board to designate an entity under the contribution agreement who the developer will have to contribute.