001with Rebecca madic from Stone Creek and she is in fourth grade I put allegiance to the flag of United States of America and to the Republic of which stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all president stly if I may yes can I make a motion to amend the Open Session agenda for the one January 18th 20124 meeting to include in new business 16.7 a discussion on counseling curriculum please I'll second that and and look I understand that this was pulled and you know understand some of the rationale by by board leadership to do so but I think um given the time and effort spent by staff on the matter dating back well before covid and some of the rationale behind it I think we owe our staff members in the
002community a discussion as a collective board um on what our feedback is if we don't want it so be it but if we do want it and there wants to be or needs to be adjustments to the process Andor the standard himself we should discuss that as a board today and then give that direction collectively to to the staff president STL if I may yes director olon um I would like to ask for Pat's input on implications of Sunshine Law if we can add something for discussion actually before you answer Mr Mr brazle I was just wondering uh director Goodson are you looking for any kind of vote here or just discussion just discussion no vote I don't I'm not expecting either the presentation to be given by the staff given we've probably told them
003not to present but I think having a dialogue around what our direction is here so that we can move forward as important Mr brazel President stoy I'd be happy to provide an opinion on this matter in Clos session given the particular pending litigation that we have currently facing the board on matters that are directly implicated by the the question osed president St yes director Olson would this be something the board would be interested in going five minute recess for a closed session to find that answer I would entertain going into close to get that answer louder please are there any objections to the board to go back into closed session no okay in that case we need a motion to return to close session for the purposes of legal M motion second all right Joanie
004Miss Goodwin may I have a roll call please president stoy hi director Olsen I vice president Liza hi director Lewis nay director Scott I director Goodson no secretary hanky I motion carries all right Open session is adjourned until we come back to Clos Happ all right at this time again it is January 18th 220 or 2024 it is 6:50 PM I am calling Open Session to order again um director Goodson I'm going to turn it over to you just to restate your motion please yeah thank you uh I made a motion to amend the Open Session agenda for the January 18th 2024 meeting to include in new business 16.7 a discussion around the counseling curriculum I think Julie seconded that all right all those in favor say I I I all those oppose say nay
005nay where was that three Nays yeah so miss Goodwin the N were secretary hanky directors Olsen and Lewis so motion carries all right moving on um if we could say our mission statement please learning today leading tomorrow we're now to recognitions and I turn turn it over to Dr TLA we are very excited to literally recognize Lifesavers tonight so I'm G to turn this over to bran Kramer for our introductions thank you um we've had several incredible life-saving moments across the district these past few months and we are looking forward to spotlighting those tonight so up first the quick action of Rick worth lead custodian at Prairie View Elementary helped save a student's life Rick noticed a student choking and turning blue at lunch so he performed the high maneuver to clear the blockage thank
006you RI okay up next quick thinking reach staff members Jessica chipwood Felicia Hall ith and Amanda Owens use the heck maneuver to rescue a choking student talk about teamwork congratulations thank you okay and last but not least tonight kudos to Stone Creek Elementary student Rebecca madic for saving her brother's life helping save her brother's life Rebecca notified staff and helped get her brother the critical help he needed during a medical emergency way to go Rebecca e all right we're now to public comment I want to remind all the speakers that you have three minutes each umy yes I would like to make a motion to allow all speakers I believe there's 12 I'll second that director olssen was your motion to allow all the speakers any discussion from the board any objections from the board
007how many are there president sty yes director Le I'd ask for a vote yeah she made a motion in a second all those in favor say I I I those opposed say nay nay all right motion carries first up is Megan Curts are we on okay do you want me to just start and then y okay um good evening ladies and gentlemen of the school board my name is Megan Kur and I'm a parent in the wsd I'm here today to voice my concerns regarding the future of our district under the direction of this board to other concerned parents Educators and stakeholders I ask would you want to live or raise your children in a community that creates SL ous videos on exceptional Educators that demands teacher removal because the said teacher does not meet
008their perception of gender Norms that scares Educators into being worried about what backlash they will encounter due to Simply teaching Missouri required state standards that uses private school students to create fear when students from our own schools have spoken out about the lack of acceptance due to who they are that assumes a plastic sign outside of a room will stop a perpetrator I don't but this is our current reality to other concerned parents Educators and stakeholders I ask would you expect school board members to investigate book purchasing simply because the author was a black woman or a gay person to exert power over curriculum decisions not heeding advice of expert Educators to Halt forward progress within certain curricula due to the opinion of a few who lack educational training to be more concerned about the
009sheer volume of books which service over 177,000 students yet yet expect literacy rates to dramatically increase I don't but this is our current reality unfortunately this is wizville but it's not my Windville my onville accepts the younger generation for who they are and what they dream to be my onville allows students to process issues with whoever they deem to be their chosen safe adult my Windville acknowledges the extensive expertise and training obtained by Educators to become a certified teacher in Missouri my wizville recognizes educators are humans with feelings and who make mistakes but understand educators are always wanting what's best for their students so rather than adding more red tape to this impossibly difficult profession let us support the amazing Educators hired in winville let us be architects of nurturing educational environment that goes beyond
010academics fostering emotional intelligence and resilience by educating the Next Generation with the tools to do so to end this I implore you to consider the profound impact as community members we have on the well-being and the success of our students to take action in April at the upcoming School Board election show your support of Educators by voting for the teacher and Union endorsed candidates the next speaker is Scott keel one moment please thank you for your patience the next speaker is Scott Keel he it's not here okay um max Calo oh okay all right uh members of the Board of Education I would like to give a speech tonight making three points number one a male is someone with XY chromosomes number two a female is someone with XX chromosomes number three and I hope
011you're still following is chromosomes can't change it's impossible it can't be done uh thank you for listening to my speech this evening our next speaker to tonight is Amy benen hoffen good evening to deny that there are only two Sexes male and female is to deny biology and absolute truth that is a very slippery slope do we really want to set that President could news you are not even being asked to decide that tonight so this should be a no-brainer director Goodson at last month's board meeting said that it is only a few that want to use the opposite sex as bathroom locker rooms and the administration knows who they are is the administration or someone else going to monitor the bathrooms and locker rooms to make sure that only the approved males are using
012the females bathrooms VI and vice versa my high school student is already worried excuse me about using the bathrooms and avoids it she will even hold it if she can until she is at home for fear of being accused of vaping because apparently that is out of control so now add in that biological males will be allowed to use her restrooms and locker rooms imagine how that will only exacerbate how she feels why are we only considering the few over the many policy a provides safety and privacy for all please do the right thing which is to protect all children vote yay for policy a now I'm going to read from an anonymous teacher letter as core subject core subject teachers we are giving up an entire class period in addition to extra things to
013teach leader and me lessons with the altered weekly schedule we are already we already lose instruction time but now we are each given a day to teach this type of lesson during our core classes we do not have the time for this we keep getting extra non-curriculum expectations added to our plates with less time to do it and next year us core subject teachers will have 20 a 20 minute deficiency weekly that's a lot of instruction time lost over the course of the year and we have yet to be shown any data proof showing we are increasing student growth with these additional non-curricular programs if I didn't have less than a decade before retirement I would run far away from public school it's devastating to feel this way I've wanted to be a teacher since
014I was in elementary school and I love teaching but the lack of accountability and respons ibility on students and lack of discipline has sucked all the joy out of it kids don't care anymore because they don't have to they still get passed no matter what they do or don't do that's from an anonymous teacher here in this District I would like to add last meeting someone said 8 that there are 800 teachers that belong to the Nea we have over 2,000 teachers in wsd so that would mean the majority do not belong to the Nea just wanted to point that out David Bethal sorry good evening president stolie Dr TOA members of the Board of Education and District administration my name is David Bethal and I come before you to share my thoughts tonight in
015the unique position of being a parent of two District students obviously a district taxpayer and a public high school educator in a neighboring District in our County I'm coming before you to share my concern about the priorities of this board and my hopes for things this board will focus on in the future as a parent and a taxpayer I expect my child's school district and all those involved in running it will have their overarching goal to provide the best education possible to every District student and that the school board will focus on solving problems and allocating resources to make that happen I teach in a high school which I've been at this school for the last 15 years and my classroom is next door to a single stall bathroom which about three years ago was
016changed from a faculty restroom into an all-gender restroom I have never known this bathroom to pose a danger to my students or to distract from their learning what would impact a student's learning is when their school board has to divert funds to defend a lawsuit for a policy they adopted when there were active appell at court cases pending addressing this issue and no settled law on the matter what does affect students is the board taking so much time to debate this facility's usage policy instead of listening to listening to and addressing problems that affect all of our students ability to learn as a taxpayer I expect better fiscal responsib ility from an elected school board than to pass policies which will immediately open the district to costly litigation rather than trusting Administration to handle this
017issue on a case-by Case basis until there is either passed legislation or a settled case law on the issue as an educator I'm frustrated that issues like curriculum proposals are voted down or delayed by this board after months of work by Educators on the policies but then the board will push through votes on facility usage policies against the request of legal advisers and administration as a parent I wish this board would focus on issues affecting the quality of Education my elementary school children and all district students receive rather than where a handful of students use the facilities thank you for your time Stephanie Davenport I don't think she's here tonight do you guys think she's here okay uh Ruby hope hi my name is Ruby and I'm 12 years old I would like to talk
018about boys in the girls' bathroom it makes me uncomfortable and think it's going to confuse a lot of other girls I understand about inclusiveness but this crosses the line I want people to be comfortable but a boy coming into the girl's bathroom makes me uncomfortable and my rights matter too I think the the school board to put a stop to us so us girls can get some privacy thank you Lee pich all right well good evening um I spoke about academics last time and I could definitely agree that that needs to be a priority um one of the reasons I'm running for the Wentzville School board with Cindy REI is the board is not working and is dysfunctional the board is compiled of exclusion and disrespect one board member almost resigned in August due to
019alleged verbal abuse he was experiencing the board is tied up in all this background noise internal issues and legal drama and they are unable to focus on the real work they were elected to do so my first question is to Shannon Jason Katie and Julie do you make an appointment to visit central office now I'm gonna ask that same question to Renee Jen and David are you welcomed there no so it appears different rules for different board members some can just show up some cannot second question is the board's communication platform diligent is that used in the same manner for each board member or just David Renee and Jen why is the superintendent unknowingly copied on emails sent to the school board again board members you are her boss not the other way around yesterday
020I visited Jeff City for district 63 day last night I was looking at the bills to be paid and I found an interesting Hotel expenditure from Jeff City in December for you superintendent which must be coincidence because you met your personal attorney at the same time according to my sources in Jeff City are the taxpayers paying for your overnight stay to meet your personal attorney I drove home in the same day from Jeff City with absolutely no problems my next find was two separate invoices to Spencer and Fain another Law Firm from November and December totaling $20,000 could be used on education what has this attorney been hired to do are they hired to investigate Jen Renee David I sent an email to the board many months ago but I did I didn't receive a
021response so I ask you today the public deserves to know what these expenses are as there's been no open discussion about these expenditures lastly I would like the public to know how Cindy re and I were treated on December 7th 2023 while signing up to be Schoolboard candidates at central office superintendent tormala you made it very difficult from us for us from Step One by not following board policy even when specifically questioned there was no reason to treat Cindy and I the way you did rather you decided to make it personal and accuse me of spreading rumors about you my response was and is today that everything I say I say to you or in an email stakeholders of the wizville school district need to know that while signing up to be a candidate with
022Cindy Rey we noticed superintendent talo holding her cell phone in an odd manner Cindy and I asked if she was recording us she confirmed yes and said it was for her protection the director of accounting Susan along with the custodian of records were both present and witnessed this conversation if you have difficulty recalling this please refer to your recording that being said said it was supposed to be an exciting day for us it was not I will follow up in an email for my above questions and I appreciate your time and look forward to your response and here's a picture of your cell phone on recording me that day your time has expired thank you have a nice evening thank you Vanessa hegadorn good evening I'm Vanessa hegadorn I'm going to read an anonymous teacher
023letter from within our district excuse me I have worked in the Windville school district for many years I used to feel very proud to do so sadly this district has gone downhill why do myself and so many like-minded teachers feel we must speak out anonymously why are we afraid to speak the truth why are we afraid of our current Administration why are we losing good teachers like myself I'm tired of wsd being in the media for negative issues why do teachers and parents feel this District lacks transparency why aren't teachers interests gauged before we are given extra programs that are not part of our curriculum many of us struggle to get through our curriculum as it is why is wsd creating discipline policies while not enforcing them what kind of message does this send to
024our students why do we say we are anti-bullying but we aren't as a teacher when I have a student making poor choices I try everything within my power not to send that child to the principal's office it's always a last resort but when I do I need support it's not helpful when said student returns with a g a Gatorade in hand to class boasting about playing a game of Connect 4 these consequences don't set them up for real life they set them up for for failure I've worked under some wonderful principles this is not an overall principal issue this is an Administration problem these principles need support and the teachers do as well that support begins with you our board and our superintendent thank you Lindy wiford uh good evening board member I've already spoken
025about the facility usage policy many times um it is an important issue to our community and you can try to blame the board for the time they spent on this but they are responding to what the community elected them to do and let's talk about truth if we aren't teaching our kids truth does anything else matter this board has had adequate time to review the policy and you need to vote this evening I ask that the board president please make sure the vote on the facility usage policy is taken by roll call so that those who refuse to protect our children can be known to the public as parents look around the country they will hear many other parents upset about the same issue that we're dealing with here almost as if there's some kind
026of agenda at play right listening to other parents address their school boards on this topic has been very enlightening they brought up points I haven't really thought about so I'll share them with with you tonight how many moms of daughters do we have in the room right now I have four daughters I know most members of this board have daughters how many of you have taught your daughters that if you're ever in a situation where you're uncomfortable around men you shouldn't worry about making other people uncomfortable just get yourself out of the situation trust your instincts and your gut and don't worry about making a scene you know what you'll be doing if you vote for any other policy but policy a the exact opposite you're telling our daughters that they need to stop listening
027to their gut and suck it up to look down so you don't make someone else feel uncomfortable no one is saying that anyone should be mean or hate anybody that's what people do when they try to Gaslight us and make us the enemy all we're saying is to stop telling our girls to be quiet and that their privacy right all all you're saying is stop is telling our girls to be quiet and that their privacy rights don't matter policy B says that when students are over 18 parent notice isn't required besides the insanity of no parent notice you're actually saying in this policy you may be making accommodations for an adult male to use our girls restroom how is it going to go when a young girl goes into the restroom and a boy or
028man walks in after her how does she know he's not one of the boys that has been authorized by District or Administration to use the girls facilities as outlined in policy B she doesn't you've already mudded the waters and any boy or man can walk into the bathroom and they aren't allowed to question it or say they feel uncomfortable this Board needs to do the right thing you need to stand up for your convictions and your community or you will be replaced we will make sure to it that you never hold a political position in this state ever again thank you Christina McCormick on my name is Christina McCormack I'm up here because the second day of school my kindergartener came home and said Mom a te her her teacher grabbed her face and pushed
029it and I was Bes I can't even tell you how mad I was when I heard that is it because it's my kid told my daughter try I was actually on the phone with a friend when she told me this told my daughter okay I'm trying to think I got five kids was the teacher standing like this and little girl comes behind her you know there's so many I'm trying to come up with how this could happen Okay my daughter goes back upstairs and I'm trying not to I'm trying to not explode I send an email to everyone on this board about it the first person who and this is the second day of school by the way we went to the school the next day my husband sent the record showed the recording or
030let my the te principal hear the recording of my daughter telling him what happened because I wasn't going to add extra vocabulary words when I told him I wanted her to tell him played it for the principal my daughter's immediately removed my daughter wouldn't even look at the principal that day she cried going down the hallway when we had to go to a new teacher she had stomach pains for several days I'm having the principal emailing me letting me know that she's doing okay Jen did respond to my email that was sent to the board detailing what happened then you miss superintendent sent one saying hey we're going to look into it guess what I asked for the investigation report and I was told by the principal there is no investigation report so I'm I'm
031I'm to understand that there's an investigation that was done you guys are mandatory reporters right that's that's supposed to happen and obviously that didn't oh by the way I can also go to the police station guess what we have one at the school but we didn't know what to do we didn't know what we gotta figure out what the procedures are for this oh okay cool my daughter's in another class right now that's great but you know what else is also a problem now when we go to a new church and she's got to go into a classroom with the teacher she doesn't know this has been happening you wouldn't even understand how this affects a child just because she's looks fine at school because as a mom I've done a really good job making
032sure she's adjusted to go to kindergarten because she was fine the first day of school she's excited she's number five out of all my kids she's been going into that school for lunch she was thrilled she's fine now sort of she does okay in school but every time we have to go somewhere new and she's going to be with somebody that I would trust and she doesn't know well she's worried and no one here responded except I did get from the superintendent probably to cover your butt and Jen responded nobody else and there's no investigation report and I only sent that to you guys because I thought you guys are going to think this is some political whatever guess what it isn't I'm not talking to her I'm not talking to half these people here
033has nothing to do with that but my daughter had her face lit this is what she's telling me she's grabbed her face and pushed my daughter was so upset that I was trying to come up with reasons how this could possibly been a mistake you guys need to do better Amanda kidle sorry I forgot to print um hi my name is Amanda canid I serve as president for the Piney Ridge Elementary's PTA I wanted to take this opportunity to recognize and thank our amazing staff at Piney Ridge as a PTA we have a ton of really hardworking parents that dedicate a lot of time to making all the magic happen but we wouldn't be able to do any of it um as well as we do without the support of our staff so first I
034want to thank our principes and secretaries um Dr Andrews Dr Manning Miss Patty and Miss Kelly as much as I try to stay out of their hair these folks are constantly helping me probably weekly they answer all my questions and give us so much support and we're really so thankful for their partnership next are custodial staff um which are some of the kindest and most helpful people I've ever met in my entire life a huge shout out to Richard Kathy Tony and the Stephanies I know we probably don't make their jobs any easier um but whether it's pulling out chairs for an event unlocking doors cleaning the floors after a sticky lemonade table um they never complain and I can't thank them enough for the amazing job that they do keeping our school clean and
035safe for our kids um last but not least our teachers special shout out to miss Boatright Mrs freshy Mrs Ray Mrs lock Mrs Green Mrs Parish Dr Kelly Mrs o' coin Mrs Smith coach mcone coach Knight Miss Brisco and Mr James it's a lot those are all teachers who have volunteered their personal time at our events or during our committees um not only are they amazing Educators and they help our children grow every day but they're also very supportive and their willingness to help us allows us to better support our students I wish I had time to list everyone because every single staff me member in our building um help us in some way or another they send reminder emails they support our fundraisers they come to our events they share ideas with us and
036we're so thankful to each and every one of them um and want the board and the administration to know how wonderful they are um finally while I'm here I have a quick plug um as I think all of us know there's a Schoolboard election on April 2nd the ptas in the North Point feeder pattern um which are piny Ridge Wabash journey and North Point middle are teaming up together to host a nonpartisan Schoolboard candidate Forum it will be February 8th at 6:30 p.m. in the Piney Ridge Elementary gymnasium um you can find more information on our Facebook pages all of the candidates have been invited we hope they can all attend and then tiny Wabash and journey ptas will host their regular meetings afterwards so we think it's a great opportunity for the community to
037get together meet the candidates and get involved with their local ptas thank you thank you that concludes public comment before we move on to resident agenda items we do need to do a little bit of housekeeping um we did not approve the amended agenda so from what I've been told um director director goods and I told you I was told that your amendment was just or your motion was just to amend the agenda and not to approve the agenda yeah and I can see that I said the meeting to include a new business item yeah so at this at this time we need a motion to approve the Open Session agenda motion second all those in favor say I I I I thank you for that I apologize um now moving on we have our
038resident agenda item um Denise Mitchell if you please could come to the podium I did want to inform you that you have five minutes um you can use your time to for yourself and and use the whole five minutes yourself or you can reserve some of that time to have dialogue with the board if the board chooses to do that do you know how you wish to spend your time I will probably be speaking Mo most if not all of it okay thank you okay well my name is Denise Mitchell and I am a second grade teacher at Heritage primary I've come to speak to you today to ask for your help I'm seeing a continual pattern that concerns me the academic success of our students is alarming last year 66% of Heritage Primary students
039were at or above grade level at the end of the year this percentage was not new last year I'm seeing multiple years of around 65% of our students on grade level in the school of education it is repeated often that early intervention is the best intervention we are sending many of our students to the next grade not able to read research shows that students who are not identified with their literacy struggles are more unlikely to catch up to their peers after third grade in light of this information we should be flooding our early grades with support year after year teachers are using the resources given to them to the best of their ability to help students students continually struggle despite interventions being completed in the classroom as well as pull out interventions and yet we
040are failing our elementary students on becoming proficient readers this is a literacy crisis that needs to be addressed immediately math is no better than reading my other concern is the alarming amount of student behaviors that are interfering with learning in many classrooms at our school teaching is being interrupted with behaviors that cannot be ignored disruptive behaviors are happening during a time when students are expected to learn the amount of disrespect towards staff and peers theft eloping physical harm to others and unsafe behaviors happening daily is causing large amounts of emotional distress in staff as well as students on more than one occasion this year I've had students yell in my face at times not school appropriate things throw chairs and other objects and slap me also this year I've had kids um physically fighting each
041other in my room during a time of learning some of these behaviors have required me to evacuate my classroom for student safety at that point everyone is disregulated and learning is not happening when did the emotional well well-being of others not matter I'm asking for our school to receive more help to create smaller class sizes and more staff to help support the social and emotional needs of our students we are a very large school with a large population of students in need we need a large amount of staff to adequately fulfill the needs of our District's most underserved population of students as a title one school I'm requesting smaller class sizes to better help the very large amount of student needs a class size of 23 children who need academic social emotional and behavior needs
042cannot be met daily by one adult I'm asking for a full-time ESC and social worker to assist with our school's large population of social emotional and behavior behavioral needs as well as an additional SSI I welcome you to come to our school and see what it is like at Heritage it is one thing to look at reports and hear secondhand about the we are operating in it is another to experience these things in person Dr lebrat has sat down to speak with my principal and I before to help solve problems and I really appreciate her efforts and helping our students we were able to solve some concerns but not all of them I'm also asking for our students to be trained in Orton Gillingham in the letters program last year our district provided staff with
043a great PD on science of reading as well as tools and resources to help students those were a great start to making a positive change with our current on grade level percentages it shows we need more I know our school is looking to change our Ela curriculum next year to a more research-based curriculum I think this is a great first step but it is not the only thing we need to stop failing our students a great tier one instruction coupled with the teacher knowledge needed to make decisions to best help their students is needed I stand before you right now as a last resort I've tried to make positive change by being on school and District committees speaking to multiple board members emailing staff at district office and collaborating with my principles I constantly reach
044out to district and building building coaches to improve my classroom instruction I cannot make changes alone I need your help in finding a solution to these issues I would love to discuss my concerns in further depth with board members as well as our district cabinet I take a lot of time away from my family to advocate for the students at Heritage primary who are voiceless yet I watch struggle every day why are we okay with this for our students these are the future citizens of Wentzville they deserve better thank you for your time okay now moving on to 13.1 superintendent com comments Dr tomor good evening we want to start by saying Happy New Year to everyone we're we're hoping that everyone had a wonderful holiday season we need to first start by saying uh
045thank you to our facilities staff um recently with the extreme cold weather our facilities team has gone above and beyond to be proactive to stay ahead of that work and their dedication and hard work actually ensured that our facilities remained operational and so far without incident and that is no small feat um many of our neighbors have not fared so wealth but that that does require a round of applause we did have one snow day that um it wasn't a snow day a cold weather day right um we do have six snow days built into the school calendar we've used one so we have five that remain available for use before our school calendar is impacted a quick update on our CIP strategic planning process our steering committee will reconvene in late February after our
046subcommittee work is um continues our committee has identified three main goal areas academics resources and belonging and those subcommittees are um going to get together and start working through those processes to recommend action steps back to the steering committee we also shared this information with our faculty advisory committee and have received feedback from them as well and we do look forward to hopefully bringing recommendations on that five-year strategic plan to the board in March we also another shout out to our facilities team um there's the get get the lead out of Drinking Water Act that went into place um in accordance with State Senate Bill 1075 and our team has completed all preliminary lead testing and is 90% complete with repairs the deadline for this project is August 2024 and being this far ahead on
047a project that has districtwide impact reflects our commitment to meeting our regulatory requirements and will also provide plenty of flexibility to address any unforeseen challenges that may arise one of the other um CommunityWide um uh School assessment types of groups is school Digger and so they recently named the wsd in the top 10% of Missouri districts we also had a blast last week with PL the pathways launch our students learned about the different career and expect educational Pathways available to them and to help them prepare and enroll in classes next year we're very excited about this new program we're also excited to share that we're preparing to transition to a new student information system so next year tasks such as completing forms viewing grades checking lunch balances will all be done on the focus School
048software platform rather than the Tyler CIS k12 and we will continue to share information and training in the coming months to help support you during this move we are also excited that this evening in the consent agenda the board will be asked to approve the safe defend intruder alert system for all of our schools the Safety and Security committee unanimously recommends adding this as one of our layers of additional security to keep all our students and staff safe we also tonight recognized Jessica Felicia Amanda Rick and Rebecca for their life-saving um quick action that literally is saving lives in our district so again let's give them a round of applause for their heroic and thank you to everyone who came out last week for our northp Point feeder pattern student and School showcase in the
049wsd round table event we had a great time seeing our students shine and then the wsd opened two Early Childhood classrooms this month at tiny Ridge and Discovery Ridge Elementary um will be uh opening their classrooms as well these classrooms open to offer additional opportunities for early childhood education since Barfield is at capacity um and Title One funds and Missouri quality preschool Grant funds coupled with tuition allow this to be possible for our families and it is important to note that these classrooms are full day options which is the first time we've been able to offer that opportunity in our in our school district we are planning on even more Early Childhood expansion classrooms for next school year so if you do have children who are preschool age three four and five um the enrollment
050will begin next month in February housing and interior design students at Timberland transformed their teachers Lounge thanks to a generous Windville School District Foundation many Grant and it's fun to see the space transformed into a very inviting welcoming space for our staff members also our dare and start students fifth grade throughout the district have leveled up in life skills and safety and a huge congrats to this semester's graduates and a giant thank you to our law enforcement Partners in that process we also have been officially recognized as a US Department of Labor registered apprenticeship program sponsor the wsd and the mid- America Carpenters Regional Council have teamed up to create real world learning experiences for our students qualified students can apply for the apprenticeship program earning competitive wages while working in carpentry with local businesses
051alongside their wsd industrial technology curriculum more information and application details are coming soon and learn more about this apprenticeship opportunity and Pathways programming on our academic services website High School course guide and then this year over 400 families and almost 1,100 wsd students received gifts in a coordinated effort a giant thank you to Kathy Dell our community relations coordinator our community parents our Community Partners and staff who help make this holiday season special for so many of our district families and we'd also like to welcome Dr Tim reer as our District's next Chief Financial Officer he's here with us tonight he's going to stand in wave um he he will assume his new position effective July 1st 2024 upon Rick angia Vine's retirement as our CFO now Dr reer does bring over 25 years of
052experience and education to the district and he currently serves as the superintendent of schools in the Ellsbury School District where he has served in that role for 12 years welcome to the team we also tonight are going to hear from our academic Services Department about our 2023 MIP 6 annual performance report those scores were released just shortly after our last regularly scheduled board meeting and we did see an increase in our score for this year over last year and we're excited to learn more so please stay tuned to the presentation and it is time to enroll for kindergarten registration for next year um our schools are offering events and the next one is set for Stone Creek parents on January 26th if you have a kindergartener who's going to join us next year please check
053our website for a full list of the registration dates and events that are being offered we're also accepting submissions for the wsd film festival which is set for April 24th it's a a great time we invite our community to come see the short films and the deadline to submit is April 2nd we also have our election on April 2nd for two open seats on the board of education we have four candidates up for election we have Brad Welsh David Bethal Cindy REI and Lee pich a few more updates on our facilities as we've shared we're taking a very close look at our facilities and strategizing for the district's future needs at the November board meeting we shared some highlights from our new fac Master facilities plan and it revealed that there are many areas in
054our district in need of some love and attention including our Legacy Buildings that I mean that's true right um our elementary school building capacity and boundaries are things that we're looking at we need to potentially purchase land for future enrollment and potentially need to consider addition itions to our high capacity buildings such as Frontier Liberty and Timberland um if you didn't have the chance to see that presentation we have that clipped onto our district website is about a 45 minute presentation and I encourage everyone to see that for facilities to address these needs we're exploring a no tax rate increase Bond initiative before moving forward we're going to conduct a feasibility study with an experienced vendor and seek Community feedback on priorities and support and so if between our community engagement events and our feasibility
055study if that indicates that there is community support for a no tax rate increased Bond initiative to fulfill the items that we've previously discussed our team will work towards bringing a recommendation forward to the board this spring for their consideration and approval for a future election cycle and we are enthusiastic about the possibility of improving our facilities and equipping our students and St staff with optimal resources in the future we will continue to update you as we work towards this goal so with that there are some upcoming dates that you all may be interested in we do have on February 12th we have our Holt feeder pattern showcase and um wsd Roundtable we're going to hold that at Heritage Elementary we have um shared previously at the board meeting that Heritage is one of our
056Legacy Buildings that needs so much love and it is one that potentially could be considered for a future rebuild or significant significant renovation and so at this um feeder pattern showcase we actually will offer tours of the school for our community to come and see firsthand um that that facility and how it impacts learning on March 6 we will have the Timberland High School feeder P pattern showcase and wsd Roundtable and so on the February 12th we're going to have Roundtable discussions around our fa facility needs and on the March 6th we're going to have Roundtable discussions about Community input on our bond project priorities we also have two finance committee meetings um coming up this spring one on February 1 and one on May 2nd all members of our community are welcome to come
057to those they will go over District finances as well as um any implications from the potential no tax rate increase bond issue and things like that we also have upcoming committee opportunities um we currently have openings for committee positions with our within our community for our culture climate belonging committee the board has set a collective goal of enhancing our culture and climate and the cup steering committee has identified belonging as a future Focus area additionally we've received feedback from members of the community and our schools and staff expressing concerns therefore we're seeking community support from a diverse group of Staff parents and community members who hold different perspectives the purpose of this committee is to facilitate discussions and identify both areas of strength and opportunities for improvement in order to foster a more positive culture
058and climate across the entire District it's our aim that all students staff and community members feel safe and valued as part of our wsd community and for the stakeholder input advisory committee again we're looking for committee members to serve on a superintendent advisory committee that will give feed back on major District initiatives priorities policy recommendations procedures Etc as the admin team develops recommendations to bring forward to the Board of Education we're hoping to solicit feedback from a cross-section of the wsd community as part of that process so if you are interested QR codes are there they're also on um uh in our district communication and the deadline to apply is next Friday January 26th and then we also final slide we have our wsd culture and climate family survey that is currently of open and
059if you haven't already please complete that survey by February 9th you can find the link on the homepage of our website and we look forward to your response so thank you very much thank you was there any discussion or questions from the board no uh Dr T I just have one ask or request um if it's the will the board um could you um put in the agenda when your your presentation in the agenda it's easier sometimes to see and if it's not okay we apologize it okay thank you it'll be it all right moving on to item 14 consent agenda we need a motion to approve the consent agenda as presented motion second that was Katie and Jason I have discussion president smly director Olson The Backs engineering we're on we're on consent okay
060sorry the backs engineering from the AP bill is addendum that was added I don't want to pull this if we don't need to pull it so I was just G to ask a question quick um just curious what that is Josh Schaefer executive director of facilities is coming and we'll be able to provide clarification can you repeat the question I'm sorry the back's engineering for 15,000 it says it's the reach in ECC architect um I thought are we are we making payments to the architect or is this something extra over and above the no no this is nothing extra we are making installments to the uh to the approved price uh from the February 23rd 2023 board meetings these are installments to that approved okay price yes okay thank you was there any other discussion
061from the board all right we are ready to vote all those in favor say I I all those opposed say nay I am going to abstain okay I okay Miss Goodwin do you have that yes motion carries thank you Pres toly yes director wson can we just have everybody check their mic and make sure it's off all right moving on as we fix that we are now to Old business item 15.1 CIP Board of Education goals update Dr torm thank you as you know um last year we worked together to take the existing District CIP along with our board goals and created a process to report out each semester um our goal is that by the end of this school year by our summer reporting that we will be able to accomplish um the goals
062that we have set forward so I'm going to turn it over to Dr lebrat Who has helped coordinate um the information that we're going to share with you this evening good evening everybody just a brief overview of this cpin board goals um this is the same docu like Dr tra said that we put into place in December of 22 and it was also last reported on July of 23 we had a few areas where adjustments were made thank you and um just wanted to highlight those for you measuring our outcomes again we took the fiveyear CET plan that went through 2024 this year 2019 through 2024 and we blended it with the board goals of that time and then provided a matrix of Blended goal so that we made sure that everything was in line
063alignment and that we were working toward a shared Vision um as you can see the CIP board the CIP goal is on the left this one pertains um majority of academics College and Career Readiness professional learning and then the four B board goals across the top increasing academic achievement improving communication school safety and culture and climate and then you can see where they meet um where the CIP meets the board goal are the um sub goals and the target areas so the areas that we increased this time um we had all green in the Target status two of four increased um again again across three goals and four target areas so ensuring academic achievement um those two target areas were met and we can talk about what those were so that that gives you a
064little more indication of what the goal was um in this particular instance we were looking for administrator collaboration and alignment of the school improvement process and also the expectations of alignment and um structure provided in academic rigor amongst our administrators and then what they were expecting at the building level so that did move from yellow to Green um with that improved consistency and then underneath that is a performance measure um based on the student quadrant data from I ready and we did hit I believe 5.4% increase inre in reading and over 6% increase in math which hit that green Target area of 5.1 to 10% and if Dr brat wants to to chime in on any details on there I'd be happy to share the mic I think I was supposed to let her have
065that slide and it just kept going sorry about that all right so the next one um I won't talk much on this is pack Dr Jerry could I ask a question about that slide the uh the green that's in uh let's in performance measurement 5.1 10% increases students in the high growth quadrants I I guess that's that's a nice four boxes and we're up in the top two boxes um I I struggle to understand what that really means however we all know that we and we heard from from teacher today about the challenges with reading math and such I I continue to see lots of green and we're achieving and we're doing well and everybody's smiling and happy yet we still have the students that are not learning to the level that we want them
066to do so how can we be green yet we're still facing the challenges that we are that's a great question thank you for for bringing that to light so these particular goals were set in December of 2022 with the cabinet at that point in time and also in conjunction with the Board of Education the goals were incremental um understanding that you're not going to go from you know x% to 90% proficiency overnight um but this particular goal was to increase 5.1 to 10% in the quadrant work so each looking at individual student data in making sure that they were realizing that growth and that part of the goal was met um so again we like you said not everything is green not everything is roses but this particular goal that was outlined in December of
0672022 has been met um within that threshold of 5.1 to 10 but absolutely always more work to do um and we'd like to see double that growth this time next year and if I might add so we're talking about growth not proficiency so we can have a child in fifth grade who's on a first grade level that child has grown so we'll move up in those qu quadrant but it's proficiency I think that you're talking about and there is a difference absolutely thank you all right and the next two pieces were career Pathways those have been established I actually saw some um pathway posters in the Commons area which was really exciting to see here at North Point High School and still also Green in talking about that professional learning and um tailoring it to
068those teachers needs again just because we're green doesn't mean our work is done and you'll see that as we go through this slides there's always room for improvement but that particular piece of the Target that was identified has been hit and looking at CIP goal two it's focused around uh student supportive environments I'm sorry excuse me doctor I got no problem I'm trying to keep up with you on the progress measures the rule specific learning opportunities support and inar staff personalized learning opportunities certified staff provided regularly I know that there's a lot of training that's taking place and we've got PD days a whole bit how much is is there a way of defining how much of that is actually toward a academic knowledge Improvement for the staff versus other non-academic items whether it's academic
069purpose or and example would be how much time is spent you know from this summer to to now on leader and me versus academic is is just an example y Dr BR Schneider can joim in yeah director Le I would be happy I don't I don't have that data with me right currently um we do use a platform um called kiup that we get we solicit feedback we track all of our professional development um within that system and so I would be happy to pull reports um and to gather that data and share it with you when we get it yeah I think that's important for not just me but for the community to be able to see and understand because that's obviously an area that there's a lot of discussion thanks yes we'll look
070I'll definitely look into that for you and prior to actually looking at that particular data or feedback I can give you some anecdotal notes just that we want teachers to drive that learning we want them identifying what do they need to become Masters in their classroom um do how do we provide access to them in the summer how do we provide um access to them through asynchronous courses to learn um some of those academic standards and to build into those additionally planning that Prof development plan out like a year in advance to ensure that if we have a new curriculum rolling out like you said we are teaching into those academic standards and ensuring that they're masters of that Craft um so I would say a good portion is spent on academics and pretty consistently
071throughout the year do we have other ancillary supportive professional development absolutely um but Katie can get you that feedback but I can tell you that there are concerted efforts especially to raise the bar in that area I think Dr Le too mentioned about our professional development planning um and so that is those are plans that buildings do and that we um we write as a district and support as a district also um our comprehensive School Improvement plan we align our professional development to what our district and building goals are so um that is another piece that's taken into consideration so so we'll make sure that you have all of that information as well Dr leat sorry I just wanted to kind of add a comment um so I have the opportunity to kind of sit
072in on the faculty committee um advisory committee that Dr tala has and I just kind of wanted to share some of the feedback that came from the from the faculty um as it relates to professional development um we did an exercise had some charts on the walls Etc one of the things that they said um and the word that they used was intentional professional development so I recognize and I think fact faculty recognizes that they are doing some of that but I I I got a good indication as we broke out into groups that was something that was definitely a theme um that you know was across the room and so just from my standpoint I'm hearing that from parents I'm hearing that from Educators and I think if we could try to work to
073improve that that would be beneficial I absolutely agree and um we've also compiled that data too to review at the cabinet level um I think when this particular goal was written it was more about individualizing allowing some choice for our new teachers who were coming in ensuring like some of our veteran teachers weren't going through the the um brand new teacher types of PD and kind of giving credit for for what they already knew and then also giving our um already um employed teachers opportunities to expand their learning in the summer so I think that we can absolutely tailor future goals to um making sure that that PD is very intentional and I think that's a common goal that we have as well thank you all right on CIP goal two I am on the
074right slide um again maintaining that safe caring inclusive environment really ensuring that students are supported so that they can achieve at high academic levels um we had five cross goals there and 12 target areas we did have one area increase from yellow to green and one area decrease from green to red and we'll talk about those dror I mentioned to you before you came in here that I was going to have a few questions what does more restore to practice discipline so that when I get to that like drilling into the goals that fall under that will give a little bit more example okay and then I see green yellow green green yellow some of them straight line some of them stacked do the colors on that CIS CIP go 2 slide mean anything that
075are in the boxes they do so if you will look at CIP go two and you're looking that continue to Foster and build relationships okay so if you'll look in that um CIP 2 board goal one it's green red green as I transition to the next slide you'll notice that lines with green red green okay I know it's simple you know just a quick indicator at a glance if you didn't if you weren't taking the Deep dive um on these progress measures increasing from yellow to green and comput Community Partnerships um while we have many established Community Partnerships we wanted to ensure that those were um shared on our website for our families that they understood what those Community Partnerships were who those Partners were how they can access information um what kind of presentations
076are being had at which levels when those come and we worked this over the summer and this year to make sure that that is very transparent and thorough on our website so that was one of the goals that we had that moved from yellow to Green additionally we had um questions and concerns regarding the opt out process and we revamped that and um we'll continue to take feedback and make revisions as needed in those areas but did make progress in um a couple of the goals we set in that area um unfortunately in regard to the next one it did move from green to Red we had established um a pretty good um opportunity for our staff and even some of our families utilized it as well with the Mercy Clinic on site um it
077was really able to get our staff in and out and treated quickly and efficiently unfortunately that provider um took an opportunity outside of mercy and mercy was unable to fill her position they also had several other openings so at at that time after um not being able to fill her position for some time we um dissolved the partnership because they didn't weren't able to put a provider in that clinic for us so um we weren't able to maintain that growth that we did see over the first year but um fortunately the partnership did provide for us some upgrades to that building some increased Ada accessibility to another level we hadn't had and um really provided care for our staff in a time and place where it was sometimes hard to get Primary Care and so
078there were some benefits there um the last one is the care to learn chapter that was established this year I do believe that went green last summer and is still at that status so we're on target um the next are Communications related um I believe that the communications most of those are an annual adjustment and evaluation based on um stakeholder surveys feedbacks um staff feedback right now the new website transition has been completed we're green there there we would like to improve on um the number of families having uh navigating the website with ease we said extremely easy and very easy and we have um less than 44% of our families saying that it's extremely or very easy so we want to increase and improve there um we have two social media measures increasing awareness
079and utilizing internally that we are winville hashtag that was one that again that was set in December of 22 um that hit Green in the Summer with the analytics that the communications uh Department looked at and also those external measures of we wizville not just the community relations department using it but also the um the schools the families and the staff outside of that particular Department um looking at yellow on parent satisfaction regarding communication saying that the parent communication is good or excellent because that's our Target um we are between 76 and 85% there so hoping to um improve and go green by the end of the year um here's a question that you had director Lewis um in regard to restorative practices when it comes to discipline I think that that language is maybe
080um broad compared to what those goals actually look like um so one of those goals was to create a code of conduct and Implement that and we have done that we've also Revisited that code of conduct um made adjustments to that and so we're still green there um we do have some opportunities within our buildings um for students who um have drug or alcohol suspensions or um nicotine tobacco suspensions we do work to provide um resources for them both in and outside of school to help with their families we allow their families to access those resources if needed so that would be an example um of like a restorative practice as well offering um assistance in addition to what comes with the code of conduct um another progress measure is identifying behavior supports and tiered
081interventions and so sometimes at the very minimal layer and level we are pre-teaching students kindergarteners first graders second graders and sometimes even you know middle and high schoolers what are our expectations for your behaviors um redirecting in the classroom level this really talks about the ci3t model that we have um talking about those tiered Behavior expectations how do we talk to it proactively how do we address it quickly when it does happen and how do we um Levy consequences if that is so the case and then how do we bring that student back once it could be a conference it could be a detention it could be a suspension so bringing them back into that school community and resetting those expectations so while that has been um ourc i3t structure has been um shared out
082with the building leadership teams they're now starting to put that into place and we still have a long way to go in regard to Fidelity um to ensuring that all buildings have fully implemented and everybody knows lock step what's going on so we've rolled it out but we're excited to continue on that path this one is providing multiple opportunities for Stak ER feedback um we've had lots of student showcases this year we've had additional board meetings um Communications and community relations has put out additional surveys we've had new committees so um really excited to show Green in that area security upgrades um lots of new security upgrades to our exterior door systems I think there's some things on the board packet tonight um showing interior security upgrades um we are still yellow but hoping to
083be green Again by the end of the year last one CIP goal three just a couple slides here this is in regard to Financial Resources there were four cross goals and within those four cross goals you'll see the F five flagged target areas you'll indicate that one was an increase that it went from red to Yellow um the first one was on attracting retaining and developing staff um the notes that were put into this one is we have met the goal that we were looking to it was in regard to mentorship collaborating with a specific number of universities holding new administrator meetings and that has been met but they are continuing to identify strategies to help us grow in this area and again green doesn't mean that we Clos the book and put it on
084the Shelf green means we hit that initial Target and we're going to keep working and keep setting those goals the next one is proactive planning um in regard to finances there were six indicators that were set um talking about demographic study thirdparty consultant um long range planning and both um maintenance and finances all six indicators have been hit therefore that one is green currently here you see an increase on um the maintaining safe clean aesthetically pleasing facilities and upgrading um older facilities yes director Liz thank you um the slide before the the point about the 25% operating fund as aund million company 25% we know what that equals to as a $330 million company 25% equals a significant more amount at what point is there in economies that make sense that because the buffer of
08525% is so many dollars that we say instead of 25% now 20% is there a logic to that I am going to hold hand the Baton to the finance guy yes uh 25% uh is here because uh the district uh the 25% is as of June 30th at the end of a year uh during the year the balance goes up and down quite dramatically because let's face it our assess dollars come in in December and January by keeping it at 25% uh and and a 25% plan for uh mid year that means when we get near November in December before we get our tax money we're down to about 133% not quite what it means we have to enough money we don't have to do of borrowing uh in our lowest point of the year
086uh 25% is a very good factor for our district with the amount of assessed values that we get at that particular time will ensure that we do not have to go into debt as we go into our lower portions of the year it doesn't 25% all year it's 25% at June 30th so that we can maintain a point that we don't uh go into debt the other question you asked is $300 million budget this is 25% of operating fund so it's not 25% of a whole 300 million so you know that also lowers the dollar month that you're you're considering can I if I can add to Rick and please correct me if I'm wrong but director Lewis when you said like about potentially lowering it to maybe 20% so in some districts 20% is
087their threshold right so in Wentzville we've continue to grow and grow and grow and as we're growing unexpected costs come we have additional infrastructure teachers staff those types of things and so our district has been committed to that 25% because we have been growing and there's a lot more um expense that sometimes can come along with that but I think um as we move forward those are numbers between that 20 and 25 that we can certainly have conversations around yeah I I agree and that's really why I brought it up because I mean we heard from a teacher today and and the need there's needs for sure and we got to find money somewhere so I appreciate the openness Dr leat before you continue I was wondering if we could back up one slide to
088the attracting retaining and developing high quality staff um so with the performance measures I was just wondering could you speak to any of the outcomes of some of those measures with collaborating with those the universities holding five new administrator meetings or maybe Mr B Bishop it would that would be your department yeah that's fine um yeah last year when we collaborated so that was from last year's goal uh we're still continuing those collaborations we did have a working agreement with a couple of them where we hired student teachers beginning the second semester that became our teachers in these areas which was important for us um the administrator meeting is really a mentorship program so it's trying to train those guys and and get them up to speed on where they need to be I would
089say that's one of those things we're still consistently revising there are aspects of it I've really LED last year there are aspects that are going pretty well this year but it's still not really where I wanted to go so I'm still kind of ebing and flowing with that and figuring out what that's going to look like um the first and second year Mentor plans those are required by desie um really what's occurring with those is that's that's their teacher Mentor or their administrator Mentor that's meeting with them on a consistent basis as part of the beginning teacher assistance program so we're we're in compliance with everything we need to be doing there so that's that's what that one is so I just kind of wanted to add and M I like I look at the
090performance measures and again just my individual board opinion like and I happen to be picking on this slide um but they're more action steps than kind of outcome so as we're looking to if our goal is to attract retain and develop high quality staff I would like to see at least moving in the future um just you know some information that speaks a little bit to that and I understand it's like this is a living breathing document and it's going to change but if you could just give some of those um an ad doal information so yeah I don't have any problem doing that I would just ask is there a specific thing you're looking for like are you looking for I mean just to as an example um so with collaborate with four universities
091you know um what what did that lead to did we you know how how many staff members or faculty members did did that did that produce for us um did we retain them um for the book studies what were the book studies centered on leadership did that improve leadership did that help you know our building administrators feel more confident or more prepared in their roles um ju just something that we can I I don't know I mean I appreciate um all this but I just think that would that would give us a better idea or more color to what you're trying to do yeah maybe can add some color to the thinking I think when we did this this has been old since we did this and we gave a view of steps we thought
092would help with focusing attracting retaining and developing high quality and so we obviously Meeting those steps because you're doing those things and I think the challenge at the time when discussing this specific one was around you know H how do we measure turnover rates vacancy rates you know tenure Etc I think that's really to me the measurement of whether or not the steps have worked and so you know what is our recruitment statistics and what are those goals you know so looking year over-year have we improved those based upon those performance measures and I think you know going forward I would recommend we stick to more of a what's the retainage percentage of staff and turnover rates as more of a metric of success against those steps so that's how I would characterize this I
093think this was new and fresh for us to do this and so we were throwing a lot of things in here but I think that's how on this one specifically I think we should measure sounds good I think we talked about that one all right this is one where we saw some growth but we're still not there yet um providing maintaining safe clean and Aesthetics aesthetically pleasing facilities to accommodate student growth improving and upgrading older facilities again green is not done um green has hit the goal and then it's time to set a new goal for what's next um so what is exciting is that we move from from red to yellow in regard to the reach Early Childhood Center and Welding um goals that were there we have finalized drawings they've gone out to
094bid and that moved from red to Yellow on the older facilities um we conducted walkthroughs and assessments of what the needs were and created a fiveyear plan with funds allocated to that Five-Year Plan therefore that is green and on target that this particular goal doesn't mean that all of the work is done by any means but those were the two sub goals to meet this portion of the goal doctor just one quick question in the middle of the yellow obtain bids to build new reach in ECC we've got that and a welding facility is that a dated statement or are we still yet to build a welding facility I believe there were adjustments to the welding facility so I'll let Rick or Josh speak on that yeah Josh if you want to add anything but
095but what we did is we we did the analysis on the welding facility and uh we are going to upgrade our current welding rather than build a welding facility but uh to give more details on that I'd like Josh to to move forward I think we just approved the welding bid tonight and in the consent in gend for about 800 Grand I think so I think that that was delay but I think that was the intent of that goal specifically and we're expecting the reach bids next month and to throw a little act Services side to the Logistics we are also partnering um with other agencies such as St Charles Community College to offer additional welding opportunities to our students so that's also um part of the accomplishments there and then the last one was
096to provide increasingly competitive salaries and benefits um you can see the performance measures there was a wage analysis last year uh competitive pay increase for all staff areas um um in including bus drivers and custodians and then some incentives for new employees and so that one is green and on target as well the last slide is for any more questions if there are are there any more questions no thank you so we need a motion to approve this CIP update as presented president sty Yes actually don't if I have board support I don't think we should vote on this I don't think it's just a presentation unless we're passing some sort of policy or something I don't think we need to vote on a presentation okay so um I do want to say that I
097I I've kind of expressed that as well it has like in the past the board of education has received report out and we haven't approved them um I'm find I look at this as a report out a status so I mean I would like that to be our board practice um anyway Dr tal I know you would like to say something so on this particular item for CIP that is connected to our annual performance report one of the things that we need to do to demonstrate to the state that we are reporting out to our board is to also have that on the agenda with a board vote that it's been accepted I have a question what does the accept I'm sorry president St if I may sure director what does the acceptance mean like
098what what are we saying when we vote to accept this you're acknowledging that this pre presentation was presented accurate yeah well that you're acknowledging that that this presentation has been given to the Board of Education as presented by the administration we're not asking for any um new steps or new approvals of any of any kind it's just more the um acknowledgement that we have gone through this process we've had the opportunity to have dialogue and discussion and then that becomes a part of our formal minutes that we can then submit to the state when we're providing our responses on those items president stly if I may yes can I make a motion for the board to acknowledge receipt and review of the presentation would that suffice yeah I mean that that's fine do we have
099a second or I guess rather than you making a motion since we did we have a first and the second we didn't have a motion we did yeah you may do that do we have a second can you just friendly can you just put the CIP update on on that so the motion motion is to have the board acknowledge receipt of the CIP semester update second Miss Goodwin did you get the motion would you mind repeating that please for the motion is for the board to re acknowledge receipt of the semester CIP update okay all those in favor say I I all those oppos say a motion carries moving on to item 15.2 um a policy second reading for policy 6550 or 6533 Ela English language arts literacy um so we need a motion to
100adopt policy 6533 as presented I make a motion to adopt policy 6533 as presented second is there any discussion president Sully if I may yes I Just Want to Thank You president Sully for bringing this to the board um so that we can get this into policy thank you um I did want to acknowledge though this was an effort it was a team effort so I want to thank cabinet up here for their collaboration as well is there any more discussion all right so all those in favor say I I I those opposed say nay motion carries moving on to policy second reading 15.3 policy 6532 multi-tiered systems of support we need a motion to adopt policy 6532 as presented motion second any discussion president May yes director again I would like to thank you
101and the cabinet for bringing this to the board for our review all right thank thank you director wson is there any more discussion all those in favor say I I I those opposed say nay motion carries moving on to item 15.4 facilities usage policies second reading at this time I'm turning it over to director Olsen I make a motion to approve the Privacy facilities usage policy version a second any discussion from the board yeah just so so I I I don't really have any significant comments to add to what I've stated in the previous two meetings you know I think just but just a couple of you know specific call outs you know one you know this is I've recognized it's a gray area of Law and and our legal council is clearly giving us
102viice advice to not adopt a policy so I think that can't go without being stated second as part of that and you know something that we've been counseled on throughout is that objectivity in policymaking um really matters and that the perception or potential for perception of biasness could exacerbate our problems create more legal risk more potential for damages more impacts to the potential coverage of music to the extent there's a lawsuit and a decision and look I can't I can't ignore what I think are at least growling like right up to the line if not crossing the line on discriminatory comments made by this board if I go back to the last meeting the comments around you know the potential increase of risk of rape almost targeting transgender students was not okay I think the
103post made around you know targeting transgender or generalizing transgender students you know based upon the actions of a few is is not okay calling members of the LGBT community member the alphabets not okay I think the egregious comments that have been made around the GS clubs you know them being compared to swinger clubs you know assuming that the GSA Club is using an acronym in nefarious ways to hide you know their true meaning the discussion on Chads and the fact that the suicide prevention program was supporting pride month as a reason to not support those that are fragile in the first place is a consistent pattern of behavior that I think creates an incredibly more amount of risk to this District to assume this policy adoption and that's been our legal guidance throughout I do
104not want to be part of a vote that accepts those comments is okay I don't want to be even aligned to that at all and so therefore I will not support a policy and I'm consistent in my language throughout is there any other discussion from the board president stly for May yes director leis appreciate app the sharing of all the closed comments that that came out in that presentation and I just wanted to note that uh you know it's it's been called out on more than one occasion but uh you know I guess tag you're it yeah I guess I'm confused by the process it's new to me maybe I just need to reach out and make an anonymous post to get it out there instead are you done Jason approach are you done all
105right board we're we're gonna we're GNA reain this in we are rain president sty if I may director olon just a moment we are not going to engage in personal attacks or ad Homen and attacks during this meeting we're just we're not doing it we're not we are not doing it the issue the issue on the table here is a policy and that's that's what we're going to discuss presid I would just ask that you maintain deorum with the um director who is verbally attacking fellow board members director Olen I I have just addressed that I at this time I would make a motion for a 15minute recess can I ask why I'm sorry discussion yeah it's just as simple as the person beside me said that they had to use the restroom it's just
106that second all those in favor for 15 minute recess recess hi I all right we will turn return around 8:45 give our take at this time I'm calling Open Session back to order it is 8:44 so I'm not sure where the discussion left off exactly but discussion is still open um for item 15.4 facilities usage usage policies president oh sorry promise I'm not going to ask to table it um so I just want to say that my support for policy a really rests in the expectation of privacy in a facility like a bathroom or a locker room um for both girls and boys you know equally uh my one request is uh to make a friendly Amendment director olssen to make the policy go into effect at the beginning of fourth quarter if not next
107school year but the beginning of fourth quarter I think it's reasonable for us to give sorry Administration some time to have conversations um speak to whoever needs to be spoken to um have meetings those kinds of things uh does Administration know the start date of fourth quarter director Olson they're they're looking it up president stoy yes director Lewis you know the the thing about the fourth quarter has has some Merit and maybe fourth quarter or this summer begin school year whatever but I'm I'm open to that as well you know there's there's many numerous bills that are both in the house and the Senate that are addressing this so what we're talking about here could be fairly well decided if we give it a little bit of time time yeah so so director Lewis can
108you sorry I'm just looking for some clarity because you mentioned two different times yes well I'm open for fourth quarter or beginning of next school year that would allow the the the house and the Senate have a full session and for laws to be signed by the governor and I think that that could be prudent and it it you know we don't step out to director Goodson's concern as well and uh I I think that's a place where it's Middle Ground um that allows everybody to try to work through things president stoy if I may unless you have yes director Scott so I guess I'm looking for some clarification I I don't think it's going to be a secret that I do not support a policy um as probably more eloquently stated by director Goodson
109I um also I don't support a policy when it has been consistently shared with us that um there are many way reasons not to in terms of um a lot of legal questions about um you know current litigation ongoing there's a lot of um unknown and despite numbers not being high it is still one of our students of the district regardless if it's one student if it's 2,000 students it doesn't matter every student needs a place to go to the restroom safely and our current procedure allows for that to happen without implementing a policy and I guess I'm looking for clarification from other board members who would support approving a policy today that wouldn't go into effect for many months with the anticipation of waiting for some I don't know guidance from State Legislature when
110it's not like why do why why approve it today if you don't know what they're going to say in six months eight months presid sty if I may yes director Olson okay um Caleb Rowen the Senate proem and the House Majority Leader Jonathan Patterson stated they don't expect to work on this issue and they won't make it a priority so I'm not waiting on the legislature I would be willing to accept a friendly amendment to have this policy go into effect as of April 3rd which is the start of the fourth quarter director olon could you just repeat the last part of your statement regarding the timing please I did not hear that clearly the part where it goes into effect yes please I would be willing to support a friendly Amendment for the effective
111date of the policy to be changed from the first day of spring semester to the first day of the fourth quarter which would be April 3D director Olsen could I please ask you to just repeat the entire motion for Miss Goodwin so she can get it down correctly if you need a moment I I understand I it was Katie's friend so the motion was to passy and then you made a friendly motion is any other discussion president s yes secretary hanky I just want to note that when director Goodson was speaking he was disclosing Clos session information any other discussion there's a comment I I wanted to make um so I if I were to support the policy it would also be based upon privacy and not necessarily um other statements or concerns that other
112board members who are sitting up here have made um if there's no other discussion um I would like to have a roll call vote please miss Goodwin actually sorry Dr tormala I I know you want to explain your recommendation sure thank you president stoy so I'll try to be as quick as possible with this for those of you who haven't gotten into the documents on diligent I suggest that you please do you will find um the legal backing to the administrative recommendations our administrative recommendation is that the most risk adverse approach is to ref refrain from adopting a policy at this time the current state of federal and state law remains unsettled at the federal level a circuit split still exists on the gender identity bathroom issue from both the Title Nine and the equal
113protection Clause perspective since the law remains unsettled adopting a policy now may create liability for the district which we've all heard especially as it relates to any student who already receives accommodations but who after the adoption of the policy would see those accommodations rescinded in terms of percentages for us wsd students who receive this type of accommodation make up less than one 100ths of 1% of our student population perhaps even more relevant than the unsettled nature of the laws it relates to this the student gender identity and bathroom use is the current language of the Missouri Human Rights Act section two 13.65 I won't go into reading those pieces for you but they are listed in the board documentation but as you read that statutory language together with the Missouri Supreme Court's decision that public
114school restrooms are public accommodations the Missouri law literally prohibits school districts from segregating their restrooms on the basis of sex one of the other additional items that are included in the board documents is a a podcast from Ed Council who is the wizville school district's former outside legal council up until recently Dwayne Martin that the um primary attorney from Ed council is on the podcast and he States the law for Missouri public school districts with respect to sex segregated restrooms for transgender students is yet unclear the notion by some that school districts must enact policies addressing this issue in the short term term is just simply misplaced this is an issue in which oversight and perhaps failure to act by the general assembly put school districts in a situation where they cannot make a policy
115decision without subjecting themselves to substantial legal risk when it comes to this issue from a legal perspective our best advice is that the school districts are better off waiting until the law is better settled in the general assembly acts at this point it's unknowable what the law law will be in a few years from now as to whether it's unlawful discrimination to exclude a student from a restroom based upon their gender identity that reason is that is the reason why we have taken the approach we have and that and that is you're better off as a school district not adopting a policy directly directly addressing this issue but instead dealing with it on a one-on-one individual basis that his end quote so this is the legal guidance that the district has followed for years well
116before my time as superintendent and it is in line with our current administrative practice policy version a and policy version B do not reference gender but they do segregate the use on the of the district's multi-user facilities on the basis of sex thus they both violate statute 21365 the district's best and most risk adversed option continues to be to refrain from adopting any policy dealing with these issues use the administration's recommendation is that the board take no action at this time if the desire of the board is to adopt a policy then the administration recommends that the board adopt policy B which aligns with the current District practice thank you president stly if I may yes director Olson um I just want to kind of make some closing comments um and some of that kind
117of just reminded me of it I want to point out that prior to us having a suggested guidance for for this and how this is going to work um parents in the district and probably many other districts around the state and around the country assumed that we had separate facilities for males and females because that's that's what we're being told that there are that that is what is happening and you know by by our Administration and previous Administration is what I'm talking about other districts are you know the parents in their communities are being told that no we have separate facilities there's no there's no uh unisex multi-user facilities but it's not necessarily true because there are accommodations being made that that blur that line which is why this increased level of privacy has been
118demanded from the public and that's the purpose of the policy president sty if I may yes director Scott I guess um one other question that I have is to reference what you had said director olssen that there's this public outcry for this um I guess it has there been why now I guess like why wasn't this if this was such a concern like why is it now that's one question that I have and then um and that could be for anybody to answer um and I guess you know for other people who are sitting up here on the on the board with me um who were concerned about financial responsibility um uh prudent use of taxpayer funds I guess how do you explain that to the public when you are directly um going against what
119has been stated by multiple legal Consultants that um that that we're opening ourselves up for this and how do you explain that to your constituents that this is that this is okay when um I guess it hasn't really been a problem until now I mean I don't I don't know of any particular instances where privacy was an issue or something happened so I guess my question is why now president stly if I can respond yes okay why now um um because there's a board willing to do something now and because it's been brought to our attention I honestly before I got on the board I wasn't aware that there was a an administrative guidance or a policy or whatever practice to allow for that sort of an accommodation so a lot of parents here and
120at home hundred that 100 plus that emailed us um they were probably not aware also um the 0.01% of a 100th of a percent there are 18,000 is students in this district with likely one and a half to two parents each um they you know maybe half of them would also not be okay with the status quo if we don't take action to increase price privacy that they thought they had for their children while not in their custody director Scott I don't want this I I I don't want this to get into like a back and forth because obviously we are not going to agree on that specifically I just I just have a really difficult time accepting the um sentiment if this is past that that trans student population even though it is small
121is not being acknowledged in the way um that they should be from both AMA which is the American Medical Associate American Psychological Association um respectable associations who are concerned about U mental health for students who are trans all state that school district should not adopt policies based on mental health reasons for Trans students because their safety if this policy is enacted is actually more at risk than anybody else's safety is right now because they do get um assaulted at much higher rates than they do than than if you look at statistics for Trans students who are forced to use bathrooms that do not um fit their agenda they are the ones who are getting assaulted and raped in bathrooms so I am concerned about that and it doesn't matter if it's one student or two
122students or 10 students do you have those statistics or that Happ to share them I'd be happy to share them with you I call for the vote Dr Olsson I just want to clarify are you calling the question Miss Goodwin could you please repeat the motion motion to approve facility is proposed policy version a with a friendly amendment that the policy go into effect at the beginning of the fourth quarter April 3rd 2024 may we have a roll call vote please president stoy I director Olen I vice president liac I director Lewis I director Scott nay director Goodson nay secretary hanky I motion carries moving on to new business um next is 16.1 but I actually would like to make a motion um I motion to postpone items 16.1 and 16.2 to the February regular
123meeting and that's in recognition of just time here second Jen any thank you Jen any discussion all those in favor say I I I those opposed say nay motion carries moving on to item 6 point or sorry 16.3 contract Behavior helper um we need a motion to approve the behavior helper contract as presented motion second all right uh director Lewis I believe you asked this to be pulled for discussion yeah and and I've actually gotten I think the answers that I was looking for but I I put this on the on the open because I I don't know enough about the different programs that are Loosely I'll callary counseling maybe I'm wrong with that title but that's what I'll use and I I was I was wondering is is this renewal is this something new
124and is there there is a g is there a Gap that we had that were now filling so I was trying to understand that and and I I did receive an answer that I think addresses that concern so my my only question would be and this is maybe for the public benefit as well do we have a list of all of the the various counseling groups and and what their Niche is so that I mean is are is everything covered are there still gaps that we're trying to fill I'm just trying to learn actually Dr tormala before you answer I was just wanting to kind of add on to that I I think last time around like last year around this time we had a mental health evaluation or report out um is that something
125I'm assuming that's coming up soon every other year yeah okay so I thought you might speak to that in some of your comments well actually I think Dr lebrat is ready to respond um so kind of a two-pronged response so in regard to community agencies that we partner with that may offer um thirdparty support to families who are interested or presentations that we share within the the student population that information is um what we talked about in one of those goals and can be found if you go to the district website on parent info there's information regarding opt out but we also within that at list all the community agencies and Partnerships and you can click through and see um click into that link and see what all of those agencies are what they teach
126what grade levels it is so that the parents can know the expectations of what's coming and what's right for their student and plan accordingly um this is something actually a little bit different from that this is a special education specialized out of District placement um so we have many internal placements and our goal is always to keep our students at their home school and in their classroom as as much as they possibly can um within reason while still supporting them and ensuring that they can be successful um and adhering to that least restrictive environment but we also want to provide them with fape which is a free and appropriate public education so sometimes the student needs in regard to special education surpass what we're able to um to provide for them at maybe a specific
127special education level and so then we may go to a district program or in District placement we do have some students that um need need additional supports and um they receive their services at outside placements we have several different outside placements some of them specialize in different uh Niche areas it could be social emotional it could be autism um sometime there are vision and hearing placements there's state school as well and so um we typically try to stay with those outside placements that were most familiar and have had great success with um but unfortunately outside placements are often times hard to come by and those slots have long waiting list um the behavior helper is a newer outside placement um I believe a previous board meeting maybe just last one we approved a general contract
128with a behavior helper so that we could utilize them in the future and this particular contract is for a student who will be placed there um per the IEP team and um while again we like to keep it within the placements that we've used in the past we also understand and acknowledge that we need additional spaces and um we're excited to have opportunities for our students who need those but thank you for your questions you bet thanks is there any other discussion director Lewis did you get all your questions answered yes I did okay thank you all right all those in favor say I I I those opposed say nay motion carries item 16.4 Benefit Plan self-funding presentation is next Dr TLA can president St just for the sake of time I mean I think
129we've all probably read the presentation I think it's only asking for us to go out for RFQ and for consideration unless there's a disagreement with the board I I don't know that we need to necessarily have the presentation and we just move forward and have that brought to the board when it's done I would agree with that director Goodson um can I get some other feedback because that's just too agree I would agree I would agree with that director Scott you agree director Lewis I agree directors yes okay is it okay Dr noral okay um up next item 16.5 Law Firm selection RFQ president stly if I made yes director Olson I would like to make a motion to engage with kabk as of January 18th 2024 as the board's primary outside Council and Joanie
130I have this written down for you so you have the whole thing as the board's primary outside Council for all scopes of services indicated on pages five and six of their response to the RFQ and to engage with tuth Keeny as the secondary outside Council for scopes of services not indicated by Kaa buk both engagements shall require Renewal by a majority vote of the board on the 31st of January annually second okay is there there any discussion here from the board if I may vice president Li I guess why um I look them up they're based in you know Chicago they have it looks like a small I'm just wondering if they would be able to um Supply our needs thank you for the question um so as for that aspect of it they're opening
131if if they become our attorney they are based out of Illinois and but the guy the the representative that we would be working with primarily is from St Charles County um and I actually believe it's a benefit that they have spent a lot of their time in Illinois it's highly regulated it's the swamp of all swamps and navigating it and having people that are well seasoned in navigating that kind of bureaucracy would be very beneficial to the board um the board me as as the only board member that was at the meeting I think I was kind of sitting there with looking for from a different perspective of the whole thing um they were very tenacious um knowledgeable they boasted about their um experience with the Labor Relations Union contracts negotiation process and when asked
132what they believe their role was with the administration general counsel and the board they displayed a clear understanding that their sole client is the Board of Education and that they would be in a supportive role for the administration and out and general counsel with that at the top of their minds and for those reasons that's why I believe they would be the best suited for the board just have one more question do you know if they have any clients in Missouri currently I think they do I don't think that they have a they did mention the school district of Missouri it's a smaller one um Bailey bis bis um however my motion basically allows for tuth Kini to fill any of those gaps one of them would be special education and I think Toth keini
133had a gap that they could have potentially filled had we gone the other way but it would allow for anything that they didn't cover in their RFQ respond you know saying we can do this to with keini would be able to do that or some other firm if if we went you know for for that direction but Toth Keen is in my motion as well um Dr Tor could you provide just the Insight that you have based upon your recommendation sure and Pat may also want to share information so we did interview Toth Keeny Cooper Mohan and jaat we also interviewed Kaa bosek so from Kaa bosec The Two um individuals that came to speak with us are actually former tuth keini attorneys so bosek is a newer um firm they are just trying to
134get into Missouri they do have one District I believe it's Bess which is a smaller District of about 1500 students that they're working with um with that when we reached out to them and we asked them to provide for us the services that they could provide to school districts there were many of the areas that were left open that they could not provide and some that they it was on a scale of 1 to 10 and some were you know 78 n some were 10 um when um the attorney followed up with us afterwards he also stated um we can assist with um discret projects particularly in the areas where we Excel like employment Labor Relations litigation board governance and investigations Beyond those areas though there are many areas the school district needs um outside
135guidance on that are not in their current wheelhouse and they readily stated during our interviews many of our questions were not in their wheelhouse they have I believe they stated seven attorneys in their firm only four of which who are um licensed in Missouri so as compared to Ed Council Ed Council has more Stu more um licensed Missouri attorneys and um that service that we've we've come oh I'm sorry well I'm I'm actually talking about Ed counsil our previous um service and so with tuth keini when they came to the plate they have 27 attorneys um and they were able to on our form provide um level 10 service knowledge and um response to all of the items that they listed um I believe they do have Bond Council people who are are well versed
136in that but that's not their specialty area necessarily so the district already has our own bound Bond council with that um the the rest of the board or the interview committee um very much felt that tuth keini should be our primary um attorney for us to go to simply because of the close proximity the amount of attorneys that are at our disposal the um the experience levels three attorneys came to the table those would be the three that are primarily our goto people but then they had people who are in technology or um contract law or any of those things um and they would be able to provide us all support um where we could still go back to Crea boek for second opinions or for anything that we felt like we wanted to take
137to them um for special projects investigations employment things like that P I don't know if you had anything else yes thank you Dr toralo so in followup to the evaluation committee interviews I reached out to representatives from both firms and notified them of the recommendation following those interviews and conveying that uh recommendation to Bria cooch you know it seemed like it was very much suitable to them to serve in that second secondary capacity just by virtue of the resources at their disposal to handle the anticipated amount of of uh issues that you know will be uh presented to them over time uh they did specify certain specific areas that you know they're well suited to assist the district district with um they include in particular areas of employment Labor Relations uh litigation specifically and that
138that came through in the interview itself you know the attorney that would primarily be working with the district continued to go back to the fact that you know litigation is his strong suit and so I think given everything that we learn through the evalu Valu ation process the administr or the evaluation committee's recommendation stands that to with Keeny is best positioned to serve in a primary capacity as outside legal council and so um that in connection with Brio's you know acceptance of that secondary role based on on their resources and their availability um supports the the recommendation president stly if I may yes director so before the board made a decision on who we were going to go with we we reached out to the two applicants to tell them what role they would play
139We notified them of the recommendation from the evaluation committee and that was the board notified of the the recommendation of the evaluation committee yes were and staying on board last week so you did that the day of I don't know when staying on board was published that was on Friday so when were the evaluation committee meetings okay my point is that they they wanted to be the primary that's why they came to interview so if a secondary role was offered to them I'm sure they did agree that they would do that so I I don't my motion doesn't change through throughout this conversation I think that this every area that they said that they can do and it was it was 8 n and 10 there was I don't think there was any sevens um
140I want I and my motion is for them to be our primary and for Toth Keeny to fill all other gaps as needed or or another outside Council if it's needed my perspective is we've got 18,000 students almost 200 employees a mountain of issues that we address and having a Missouri based large scale Law Firm seems to be the more prudent now if we want a second opinion on matters that are specific that they can cover I think that makes sense so I the recommendation to me makes total sense um from the administration president stoy if I may yes director Scott so I would like to Echo that I do think it is important to keep that um initial um Law Firm within Missouri I'm a little confused um to be quite Frank when in
141previous discussions there was concern about having a lawyer in Kansas City that was based in Kansas city was too far away and to be accepting of a law firm based out of Illinois seems a little kind of very um against what had been stated previously also um I know this isn't going to be a popular but um as two witnesses in an active lawsuit against the school district um I do think you should both recuse yourselves director Olsson and director hanky from voting on this thank you for your input why director Scott I'll allow you to respond but we do not have already this is really inappropriate I'm asking for members to recuse themselves due to conflict of interest for legal reasons asked and answered director she allowed me to respond director Olen you've done
142this like every meeting all right secretary question yep call a question all right so um Miss Goodwin may we could you please repeat the motion for us and then I would ask for a roll call vote motion to engage with Kiri sorry if I say that name wrong um as of January 18th 2024 as the board's primary outside councel for all scope of services indicated on page five and six of their response to the RFQ and engage in Toth keeni as a secondary outside Council for scopes of services not indicated by ker bosy both engagement s shall require renewal of the by the majority of vote of the Board of Education by the 31st of January annually president sty nay director Olsen I vice president liac nay director Lewis I director Scott nay director Goodson
143n secretary hanky I I make a motion to approv Toth Keeny Cooper Mohan and Jack set as a primary outside law firm in Kira broek as our secondary laws side Law Firm second is there any discussion I actually had a question Dr tolet so could you just clarify is this a five-year commitment the district is making could you could you clarify for some people who may have sure and Pat may want to talk about it too but these are not contracts they're agreements so at any point their um Law Firm or the district can and pull out from the agreement and um they're not exclusive we are we have the ability to work with other law firms for any issue um as we do for other things in the district so Pat is there anything
144else you wanted to add there is so I'm pulling up the RFQ as we speak but there is a an initial term um whereupon the the prices that were quoted by the firms will apply and upon the conclusion of that initial term um the rates will go up but this is more a k this is not a a contract per se this is essentially designating um preferred vendors so to speak with whom to work with and so um yeah the term is not uh the fixed but the services will be for a period of five years according to the RFQ but again it's not necessarily set in stone as to um that time period president St you have a motion to amend go ahead director olon a motion to amend that both agreements come before
145the board on January 31st annually for reapprovals so so I'm kind of AD saying there's I think we understanding there's no contract but provide feedback I think what she's trying to achieve and i would support is yes we can we can the board this board the future board within that fiveyear time frame we could choose to end that relationship at any point in time however I I think it could be a good practice just to have the board commit to annually review um you know and even get your you know hey how is this going how you know is this working out how we want are they falling short in certain areas you know um those types of things I think that's I I think that's kind of what director Olson is that kind of
146what you're intending with your motion may may I read this language from just to provide Clarity so it says the initial term of the contract or the agreement shall commence on February 1st 2024 and end on June 30th 2025 on the expiration of the initial term the district shall have the option but not the obligation to renew for up to four successive oneyear terms each renewal shall commence on July 1st of the succeeding school year immediately following the expiration of the initial term or the then current renewal turn as applicable and shall end on June 30th the following school year does that automatically renew I'm sorry does it automatically renew so without us saying no we don't want to renew they just automatically renew it like the Ed Council contract yeah so if we're going
147to build in uh review time period we should do it around those dates um so I would still support director Olsen's motion if if for Amendment to the motion if admin has feedback about how to better state that I I think the board is open to listen to that I think just an annual assessment you know before renewal don't put a date because what he just said but I think as long as we can agree that we just have an annual assessment of you know our our Law Firm representation then I think that would be suffice what were the dates again Pat starts on February 1st 2024 and ends on June 30th 2025 that's the initial term and then upon the expiration of that term the district has the option but not the obligation to
148renew for up to four successive one-year terms renewal commencing on July 1st and ending on June 30th so I would just say that the the Board needs to review before the annual renewal Pro timeline is up that's just when June 30th yeah before the June 30th day okay so can I amend my amendment to instead of January 31st yeah or you can withdraw your amendment is it and then make a new Amendment if you'd like that might be easier I with draw my original Amendment and I would like to amend the motion okay the mo the amendment is to have the sorry have the agreement both both agreements come before the board for a majority vote for renewal on June 30th beginning this year would be the following year are we locked in for a
149year until June 30th 2025 no so the the next the next provision in the RFQ actually says that uh we can terminate at any time with 30 days notice but the initial term right now is it's set up is for you know what is it 18 months 16 months and if I can that's just a pricing term right yes that's that's what I was going to say is that those terms are defined finded by hourly rates and pricing right like so so the agreement is a 5-year agreement that can continue to be renewed but it also can be terminated with 30 days notice okay so really doesn't matter if it's June or January I will second her motion all right any more discussion before we vote yes Miss Goodwin could you attempt to repeat that
150motion Jen would you mind just repeating that one more time I'm sorry the motion to amend is that both engagements require Renewal by a majority vote of the board by June 30th annually Shannon wouldn't that be beginning 25 it can be whenever because we can cancel whenever no I don't to do that that's fine yeah Miss Goodwin did you get that do you want to try to give it a shot okay motion to approve to andini as primary outside C outside law firm and ke I'm gonna butcher that CER b as a secondary outside law firm with the amendment to have both agreements come before the board before June 30th for approval for approval for approval thank you okay all those in favor say I I I those opposed say nay motion carries we need
151to vote on the original motion now yes thank you thank you for the reminder I need a motion yeah just a vote what's it just a vote on the original motion yeah I know okay sorry so we need to vote on the original motion everybody ready all those favor say I I I those opposed say nay nay motion carries next up 16.6 APR presentation Dr tormala I'm gonna invite up Dr Jill Clan Smith she is our assessment director of assessment and school Improvement and she's going to come speak to us about our recent annual performance report that was published by desie okay right good evening president stoy Dr tala members of the board and cabinets on December 18th desie released the 2023 annual performance reports for districts based on MIP 6 guidelines tonight I will
152review Wentzville report and share our celebrations our areas of opportunity and work that is being done to continue our movement forward you do have um with you I left you a folder uh with uh some uh two spreadsheets there uh just so that you can kind of follow along a little bit also um with the presentation that you have on your computers I have it linked twice in the presentation for you so anywhere where it's underlined that is that link that will take you to actually des's site where then you can go to Wentzville to access the report so before we get into the details of the report there are some considerations when reviewing the 2023 APR report this is the second year for this version of APR under MIP 6 therefore um data may
153only be compared to 202 2022 APR data and not to previous APR reports released under MIP 5 as the requirements and guidelines were not the same the 2023 report contains data from the 2223 school year only desie the commissioner of education and other educational data experts point out the report is but one data point among many that should be used when evaluating student achievement and growth within a district APR reports are combination of weighted scores of performance and continuous Improvement 70% performance and 30% continuous Improvement under performance we received points in achievement status and growth success ready students which is how a district prepares students for the next phase of their educational experience future careers and or Pro postsecondary education graduation rates and followup which is the extent to which our students pursue gainful opportunities
154after graduation under continuous Improvement we receive additional points in success ready in areas where we help create an environment conducive to learning and helping students reach their full potential this can include attendance as well as things like IAP and our kindergarten readiness the remainder of our points come from our Improvement planning which includes our CIP response to standards and District surveys the commissioner of Education released an executive summary regarding key takeaways from results Statewide the distribution of APR scores in 2023 is similar to that of 2022 resembling a bell curve the scores at the district levels reflect the Statewide assessment results and Statewide Trends in academic performance are aligning to those that are reported nationally it was recommended Statewide that interventions continue at a higher rate to fill in learning gaps and there continues to
155be a concern with chronic absente absenteeism in the state specific Ty Al among the lowest performing groups of students since the pandemic and finally it was reported that District's continuous Improvement plans are showing that districts recognize the importance of planning and how that plays an important overall Improvement of student achievement so now let's take a closer look at Wentzville weville earned as Dr torales stated earlier an 84.4% on the 20 23 APR this is up02 percentage points over 2022 score and actually up 1.3 percentage points over the points we actually earned this is due to all St Charles District having earned a bonus two point last year for CTE expansion this was due to Lewis and Clark overall all the state went down by .3 percentage points last from last year wizville is proud to
156be one of only four districts that earned an increased score out of the 10 largest districts in the St Louis area overall these districts had an average decrease of 05 percentage points in the state looking at the state overall Wentzville was one of only eight districts that earned an increased score out of the 20 largest districts in the state and overall those 20 districts saw an average decrease of 1.2 percentage points so we're proud to see those increases that we made there some highlights that helped us to achieve this included our increase in designation status for the following areas academic achievement in science for all students academic growth and Ela for all students our graduate followup and our IAP for eighth graders so let's take a look at where we have been to get us
157to this point over the last three years in ela the district has remained above the state average and has statistically remained constant in math our students have also remained above the state average and have made significant gains with an increase of 6.5 percentage points science follows the same pattern of being above the state average and has seen an increase of 5.6 percentage points while social studies does remain above the state it has an overall decrease of 2.9 percentage points excuse me doctor yeah can I ask a quick question you bet it's kind of similar to earlier absolutely the the numbers on the charts show going up yet are if I understand another way of looking at the numbers they're going down with uh percentage of somebody else on the board maybe can help me with
158the reading percentages have been 443 441 you know they're going down a little bit we saw that in ear in other reports is is am I missing something so here um our reading um has has pretty much stayed constant um and and where I'm going to get to here is so we've got some celebrations we also have a lot of work to do and and we're going to talk about how our team is is well aware of the work that we have to do and and we've got some things in place that we're working on those things and and and we um we're not finished we we we're well aware of that and and we I just I just get confused about all of different absolutely right and and um and I appreciate I appreciate
159that and director hanky um or secretary Hy my apologies um made a really good point earlier that we we have students who who are well below where they need to be but what our teachers are doing right now is they are growing them and it is going to take some time for us to get them where we definitely want them to be um but we are making that growth and so um she made a great analogy of we may have a a fourth or a fifth grader who is at a first grade level um but they're making growth and as long as we continue to make that growth and we have something that we call stretch growth and if we continue to work with those kids making that stretch growth time after time we eventually
160will begin to really close those gaps with those students and get them caught up to where we need to get them caught up um those students are not at the proficiency where they need to be but if we continue to grow them the way they need to be they will get there and and like that teacher who was here earlier we're right there with her and we've got way too many students who are not where we want them to be and we're not giving up on them and we're going to keep on working and we're going to keep on growing and and that's that's where this report also is talking about that we do have some positives in the fact that overall we're not we're not at the lowest at all and that's a good
161thing but we're not we're not where we want to be either because if we're not at the if if we're not at the top we got room to grow so um that's definitely where we want to be going so this is where we've been we've been moving a little bit but we've got lots of room to keep growing and and that's what we like to keep talking about is the growth because that that's where we can continue to move so when we dig into our report here we go what the state is telling us what this report tells us the current report that we have and what I did share with you all is um we have the current 2023 report but I put that next to last year's report as well so you can
162see where those changes were made so we do have some celebrations the areas in which we were on target include academic achievement for ELA science and social studies for all students academic achievement for student groups in social studies in success ready for Advanced Credit and in our graduation rate and in our followup the district was rated above average in academic growth for all students in ela Math and Science we're above average in academic growth for student groups and science our teachers and students worked very hard last year and these designations are proof of their dedication and as a district we do still have areas of opportunity in academic achievement Wentzville has areas that are considered either on track or approaching and those include math for all students Ela Math and Science for student groups in
163success ready our CCR assessments those are our College and Career ready assessments the district had designations of average or below average in academic growth for social studies for all students and student groups in ela math and social studies sorry before you move on to the next slide I absolutely unless you prefer to finish would you I will take questions whenever you like if it needs to wait as I ask my question I'm fine too um so going back to the I believe that's that slide so um as we look at our student group or groups and just looking from like you said last year to this year and for whatever reason we dipped but the dips seem pretty significant for ELA it's a 10% dip um from the previous year um and for math for
164the student group it's a 20% dip do do we do we know like have we identified any of the reasons or I don't know if you could just maybe right um I would like to give I would like to be able to give more information um when it comes to the growth um there's a lot that we don't know when it comes to how desie calculates growth um and there's a so and I'm going to get my little cheat sheet that I that I made here so growth is based on um multiple regressions so I'm G to get a little nerdy here and I'm G to pretend I'm not going to pretend I'm going to do my very best to to explain it the way I understand it too so growth is based on um
165a multiple regression of variables that is used to predict a score for each student okay and they will use um there's up to like seven or eight different VAR variables for each student um including past scores their demographics the size of the district all of these different things that go into them predicting what a student's score should be in the coming year okay and then they compare that to a student's actual score and then they do then the how students the score then they figure out those differences and then they take those and average them and from there they compare with like districts and from there that's where the math is where they don't really explain it a whole lot as far as how they then compare the districts so where we get a um
166like a 9.4 or a 3.0 or a 9.2 there's a lot of um information that they don't have that exact math to be able to show us so I can get as far as being able to see what each student residual is so and that's it that's as far as I can be able to get to kind of like this target that I can't see to then be able to say hey this is where we are and this is where we need to be and this is how we can get there with that other than we know we need to make for sure that each student is growing each year and how we did that it's hard to say I guess like maybe this would be a better way to ask it and I don't
167need like a specific answer just a general answer like so when you look at the student group or grow sorry student group data for um math and Ela are you seen things similar to our formative data with I ready like okay that that is maybe not exactly mirrors it but we do see more deficits you know and just trying to pinpoint what might be going on like I don't need to know tonight what those things are but are we kind of noticing some overlap some you know some similarities in those two different a little bit Yeah there and um we we were looking at it um even as recently as today and knowing that um what really makes up that student group for us the biggest population in there are um our ie students and
168so really honing in on what is it that we can be doing to help support um our students with um IEPs and really focusing in on those goals helping support those teachers and providing resources to them those and again like we talked earlier professional development that really specializes with that and so that's something again with our goals moving forward how we can support those teach feachers as well so those when we look at these things that's what we do and then in our department really looking at okay here's our data what do we do moving forward because of that okay that was more what else so thank you sorry sorry I went nerdy on you I tend to do that occasionally my friends will all tell you that so sorry about that um alrighty so
169um any questions here um on this page before I move forward okay thank you all right so so where are we going um we are happy with the improvements this report shows and those improvements um definitely do deserve to be celebrated however we're not at our destination okay um we have a long way to go and the team before you has a plan and a vision for the students of the winville school district currently we are focusing on aligning curriculum and assessments to the priority standards teachers are using consistent Benchmark assessment data across the district to determine student individual needs students are setting learning goals a new curriculum writing cycle has been developed addressing High need areas we are working to create professional development that is more relevant and engaging and useful for teachers and
170so moving forward our team has prioritized Improvement goals for our students that include a focus on consistency across the district plc's that are decisions based on student data ci3t our system of supports to provide intervention for students at all levels we rewriting curriculum and assessments aligned to Missouri learning standards we'll be looking at grading practices to ensure student learning is accurately communicated to all we're implementing a district day of testing to give students the opportunity to take the right test for their pathway in in a familiar setting our wsd pathways are kicking off to give students new opportunities to explore interests and skills through class offerings and increased internship opportunities hence increasing engagement the move to a consistent use of canvas for staff including making curriculum and micr professional learning at teachers fingertips and so
171much more as I've stated before and I know you all are you all know it it takes a lot to move a ship this size we know the importance of making the moves in the right direction this team and the wsd teachers are committed to moving students forward I thank you for your partnership and at this time if you have any additional questions I'm happy to take those president sty if I may yes go ahead can you explain explain what grading practices reform is yes so we really um this is a true passion of myself and um my large assessment uh Department of one other person um that this is a huge passion of ours to really make for sure that when um when parents receive grades that those are accurate um and that they're
172meaningful to parents as far as where is a student in their learning and that actually means something to you that when you receive something that looks like a that says a be that that be tells you really what your student is and that it's not just you know that you get a be and then you find out later on down the road that your student had deficiencies that you didn't know anything about um that when that our report cards really are informative and telling and that you are getting just the most accurate information that you can about your students and we really want to make for sure that those are consistent across the board and that parents teachers students um all are on the same page when it comes to grading so is the is
173it kind of like a completion grade versus an actual assessment grade okay absolutely so what are we moving away from the idea of the completion grades yeah okay we definitely would like to do see something that so I'd like to we we plan to you know really build a team and um do a lot of research around grading and um and and build that capacity in teachers about understanding a better understanding of grading president sty yes go ahead staying along the lines of grading so it's been reported that a lot of teachers are just handing out participate participation grade so if the child um completes the work regardless of if it is correct or not they get 100% if they do not turn in the work they get enough so um is that something that
174you are also hearing and then going forward what is being done about that right so those are all things that you know we really want to to look into um you know teachers really you know grade in the way that they feel is best like you know grading is something that unfortunately teachers we there's not a class of on grading unfortunately when we go to school and so um we really want to like I said just build that capacity and um in teachers and have teacher leaders in our buildings to really build um a consistent grading um practices and policies within the district and within our schools so that we can um have teams have like policy or like grading practices um so that it's not a question um across the board just like well
175what is this going to mean or what is that going to mean so um just really having those we're going to start with um having some good conversations and um and H having teachers doing some some good research and and just learning more um about grading practices and and what's good practice and what's not so we're g to we're going to start there and and and move that practice forward yeah and I would would agree with that and I think also like you're saying it would help the parent because when they're saying their child is getting 100% it's confusing it and um it it's damaging to the student because it's essentially a lie to that student to say you did a great job because you turned the paper in but the work isn't there and
176and I think going forward then when they go to the next grade then they're going to struggle and I think that's when we're seeing all of these students struggling and falling farther behind so I would just say yes grading is extremely important any other questions comments all right thank you thank you for the so much thanks all right moving on next it's not on our agenda but we did make an amendment um it would be item 16.7 counseling curriculum discussion president suy if you do refresh I did add that item for okay thank you I apologize yeah so this was this was my motion and discussion point so so look I I just want us to have this discussion the team has done work we need to accommodate you know a discussion around the work
177that was done approve or not approve I think um it sends the wrong message to staff that have put in the effort there's other curriculum that is being developed now and I heard concerns from the those um on those committees that you know the board will just choose to not approve something and delay things and without Clarity around that and they feel a little bit dejected that they won't be heard and that the work is wasted and so I'm just looking to set a date for us to review and have the presentation again I'm not saying one way or another we should or shouldn't have this curriculum or not it's not the point I think it's good governance and fair to our staff so I'd make a motion to have the counseling curriculum presentation on
178the next uh regular scheduled meeting in February second any discussion I have discussion if I may yeah is it possible to to have the presentation sent to us is it something more than what we I believe I believe the presentation was sent to us and staying on board so it was attached also it's also we can revie it if we need to so it was sent out to the board on December 1st and staying on board and then it was um the last two two months and we'll Bey it's the same one it hasn't changed so we're happy to resend that to the whole board so that you have it and can dig into it and we're also happy to answer any questions um the the administration did not receive any questions from any board
179members the last two months when it was on there so um we're happy to help with any conversation leading up to the February board meeting any other discussion I mean I guess my comments would be that I'm I'm just not in favor of having a curriculum uh a counseling curriculum and that's why I I don't support it so if if there's does anyone else have any comments all right I I did want to make a comment so director um Goodson so I'm open to discussion but what I what I guess my concern is is um I appreciate all the hard work that our staff has put in um and while I have not sent in specific questions Dr tlaa I I I kind of have shared some of the concerns so I I I would
180worry that if we had a presentation at the next meeting that there would be an expectation from our staff that that it would be approved at that exact meeting so um I guess I'm I'm open to having a discussion giving them feedback um almost similar to a first read that we would do with a policy or something like that rather I I just don't want to disappoint the staff um and I want them to understand our feedback um fully so um director Goodson do you have any comments to that or would you like to amend your motion I stand by what I said I don't have any qualms about whether it's approved or not for whatever reasons you know board members choose to do it but let's have that discussion in public let's give the
181feedback and then they can take that back into the next set of curriculum that they're writing they can fix it if it can be fixed and if it can't then they'll understand why it you know it was declined so I just think we have the discussion move on vote and we're done so SEC or vice president liac yeah I have a comment I've mentioned this before I think that curriculum should come to us first in a workshop as a workshop maybe let that be the presentation give it the attention I think curriculum is do and then bring it to the following regular meeting for a vote um I know I'm just one person that's just I felt that way a couple times I would love to see that with the new um the reading resource
182in the curriculum them for to come to us like that um our workshops are usually you know a couple hours much you know shorter than this meeting but being able to just give it the attention it deserves yes go ahead and we're happy to work with the board on those types of things we also I know we have several board members that serve on our academic Services Tech and learning committee and all of the curriculum revisions go through that committee process as well where they really do kind of what you're talking about they dig in and so that's also a helpful um component and I know that a few board members serve on that as well I think the question becomes which curriculum areas do you feel most compelled to have that in-depth conversation around
183because as we get into the spring Dr Brett Schneider how many content areas are coming I don't know exactly off the top of my head but I know we have five that we're reviewing and Tech and learning um next week that will come to the board in February so five additional plus the counseling curriculum if that is pushed to then um and then I believe we have kind of five more at least um throughout every month until the end of the year we have several curriculums that are being Rewritten um and that need approval these AR new curriculum sorry present these aren't new curriculum these are just rewriting updating adjusting old C or so existing curriculum um as far as what coursework um specifically I I don't have that right in front of me um
184director Olsson but I can I can get that um there are um the counseling curriculum is new I mean it's been started it's been written um around the the desie learning standards um and what the state um suggest but for as far as new curriculums um the a lot of these are revisions they have been Rewritten through our curriculum process and updated um you know within the cycle that they're in um so I can I can reshare that information so you guys know what those are um we like Dr tala said we do go through them at the teeken learning meeting and then they will come um in the in the next month for for board approval and i' i' just like to state if any board members have specific questions concerns whatever if you
185want to send those to us the presentation's ready we absolutely feel like when our staff is able to share that information with you they will be able to answer all of those questions but if you have specific ones we will go back and make sure that the presentation is crafted in such a way to fully address your questions and concerns um back to vice president LX point we do have a placeholder meeting is anyone on the board interested in using the placeholder meeting for a workshop to discuss the counseling curriculum and have the discussion there and then it could go forward to our February regular meeting well regarding Dr torm's statement on guidance on other curriculum that's coming forward I completely understand your point but I think some of that is going to have to
186be a work in progress you know it depends on like how massive the changes are if it's new you know what I mean if it's a complete overhaul of a current care so I think we're just gonna have to work through those um as you know you say hey look this is going to BEC coming in two months you know Katie gave us you know Dr BR Schneider gave us a heads up on some of those things so we can certainly work through that in the meantime um but I mean I'm going to throw it out there is anybody interested in using our PL placeholder meeting for a workshop and making that commitment when is our placeholder meeting yeah I think it's the first Wednesday of February which I believe is so it's the seventh
187president's toing yes director yeah I think that'd be really good just to have a core group where we can really dig in and I got a I've read it but it's been a while it kind of rolls off and then the next thing hits so I need to go back and re-review it re it and uh yeah I'd be in favor of that I'd attend for sure anybody else that's fine and I'll friendly amendment that put it on them I'm just saying I I'll friendly to the my amendment was okay understand I'm just amending the motion to say to the to the workshop on the 7th is fine okay are we we ready to vote on that basically having a workshop for this February sorry I forgot the date on this particular topic all right
188his motion also adds it to the next month's agenda that's what I just amended so I think I'm just saying you know it's the February 7th yep y all right all those in favor say I I I those opposed say nay nay motion passes now moving on to 17.1 board action items there's a list in there if you see the link is working I know we had some technical issues before but the list is there to view um so I didn't really get much feedback via email so some of these things we've obviously taken care of this evening but if anybody has some thoughts director Olsen I would like for president stoy and I to work with admin on refining the attorney policy um and given we're adding the curriculum thing to the February if
189there's room on the February meeting agenda so you're saying you would like it for the February regular meeting is the school attorney policy is that what you're saying after if we have time to work with admin I don't know what your schedule looks like but um if not March I'm sure we can figure something El okay does anybody object to that at all all right so that's for February anything else on there that anybody would like to bring for February um president sty yes secretary hanky I have something to add I it doesn't necessarily have to be February but I would just like to have a budget meeting just um an overview of our budget actually secretary hanky can you hold that thought until we get to the potential agenda items unless I mean that
190that is for our next agenda but would you prefer to do that or that's fine I can do it so I have another one sorry I'm just trying to take care of the list so if there's something on the list um vice president liac did you have something well it was just consideration to add to the list with the mentioned during superintendent during your comments Danielle uh you mentioned about the I guess the overpopulation at a few of the schools and what are our thoughts on reconvening the boundary committee like ASAP so with that in my superintendent comments when I talked about like my slides about the facilities that is a part of that plan so when we go through and we engage with the community on those dates around the items from our facilities
191long range plan potential no tax rate increase Bond issues after we kind of know where we're heading with some of those things the boundary committee will be a part of that process so I Envision that we will create that committee see who's been on it previously get some new families involved and then start that work this this um this spring still and we have some time we have some time the two hot spots that I'm mostly concerned about are W bash because they are exceeding but then Piney has capacity so we're going to want to look at that North Point Elementary boundary area to see if we can balance a little more and the second hot spot is for dwell Elementary and then boom Trail and potentially Discovery right like like so Dell is is
192is full and they will be projected to exceed capacity and there is currently room a decent amount of room at Boone Trail and then Discovery also has room so we can look at that boundary to see what soft adjustments could could be made in order to prevent us from having to put an addition on a building one more question is it irrational to think that that committee could come back before next school year no I think that like later this spring we can convene them yeah it'll take them a little time to come up with some recommendations I do not believe that we will have recommendations for changes for the 2425 school year but I think we could have recommendations for changes for the 2526 and I I feel like we're still okay like that
193we can have that time without issue um to to really make sure that where the where the changes happen or if the changes happen that we are able to really fully communicate that to all the families who could be impacted by it so that they they know um and see what kind of leeway we might be able to give if it's um students that are there currently like if parents can provide transportation for them if know like we'll have to discuss can they then continue to keep their kiddos at that school through graduation of their grade span um or if we can do some other soft items that help families with that change does that make sense I have a question about the hotspot comments that you're making yeah is Heritage in on anywhere on
194the radar for the resoning uh currently not at this point I mean it's it's I guess it's possible um because when we did the demographic study that was not a school that was overc capacity for the size of the facility like the numbers of students that go there versus the numbers that it can hold it wasn't approaching that threshold of being at or exceeding um when you look at w bash I don't have those numbers in front of me but I think me if I'm wrong anybody who else has looked at it recently I think W bash was like in that 94% capacity range and when our schools start hitting that 80 to 85% range that's when they start to feel tight they feel like they're not they don't have the space um and so
195we know that W bash is still going to grow right like we still have a lot of land there um but Piney is sitting there at like high 50 low like 60% capacity so they have room now they just took on two preschool classrooms so that means their capacity is a little less than um what we had previously but there's room for for shifting okay so I guess my my where I'm getting at with this is due to because it's a title one school correct um the need for smaller class sizes and increased staff rezoning could help us do that with Heritage because I mean I get the feeling that a lot of the teachers are um kind of in the same boat where they're they have a larger class size than than they they
196feel is appropriate given the uh special needs special services IEPs 504s all of the things that are involved to give the kids the education that they they need and deserve so that's why I was thinking if Heritage could be kind of on the radar for a hot spot area I mean they're in desperate need I from what I understand so I I appreciate the questions I just don't want to have a discussion when we're you know what I mean like this is just let's add let's figure out if we want to add the item she's going to bring the item it sounds like perhaps March April somewhere is around there right um and then let's just kind of go down the list before we move on to potential agent we kind of mixed them both
197here but before we move on to that is there anything on this list that we want to address in the next month or March or when to remove does anybody want to remove anything or propose to remove anything I would like to possibly add something okay um I would just like lockers to be assigned to students again um it I'm hearing a lot that parents are concerned their kids aren't wearing coats because they don't have any place to put them their backs are um they're starting to have back problems because they're carrying everything in their book bag because they don't have anywhere to put their things when they get to school so if we could maybe start looking into just assigning those lockers to students again Dr T so I haven't heard the the concerns
198recently right but the last two years I've heard some of the concerns around lockers and so all of our schools have access to lockers so if any parent or student wants to have access to a locker they simply have to request it and should they not get the answer of here is a locker please send that our way we will make sure that students who want lockers absolutely can have them what I also can say though is that some of our facilities that have been built recently because students weren't using lockers lockers were not put in those additional wings or in some of those spaces so at some of our middle schools they potentially could have an issue where they don't have enough lockers now for every student so if we were to assign lockers
199to students we may be in positions where lock lockers have to be shared or that the lockers are not convenient to where their classrooms are because that Wing doesn't have lockers so there are some compounding factors there but I want to go on the record if students or parents want lockers we will assign them a locker I just think the kids AR they're not asking so I think if if they're there let's just assign and I know when I went to school I had to share a locker it was no big deal so we could get into a situation where they just have to share right um when we've talked with our building principles because I've had that I had that conversation last year with them and they um stated that when they did go
200away from lockers they actually had um students in class more often because students were task avoidance wanting to oh I forgot I forgot I forgot so it but when they're bringing their backpacks they have everything with them they're able to stay engaged more often um they had according to the principles less bullying because students weren't Lo loitering at lockers um less discipline referrals um less litter the CL you know those types of things not to say that those reasons are necessarily more important or not than assigning lockers to everyone but those are when I've inquired about this topic those are things that are also given back to me as things are actually operating more smoothly without lockers assigned but that they would provide them for anybody who wants them may I propose a suggestion like
201with the locker um issue that you're talking about um secretary hanky what if um we just direct Administration to maybe have more communication about the availability of blers more frequently throughout the year and you know definitely at the beginning of the year yeah um if and then we can see how if that if that helped um or if it didn't are you okay with that yeah that's fine I just know like winter time is when it's a bigger deal because kids are cold and she said that she'll communicate that that's fine um if there's not anything else like I said we're kind of mincy two um looking at the potential agenda items was there anything that we wanted to add to that list is this one I would ask about the budget go ahead yeah
202I'm moving on to the next okay and it doesn't have to be February um I'm just more interested in having a stronger understanding of the budget how um things are how the money is spent specifically the the PE card how that's used just kind of an overview of the finance um I'm just more interested in having that conversation and that meeting before Rick retires when are the there's two Finance meetings coming up we just got an email about it that's right y I think budget e either February or March every year to to in terms of a prelim view of that is that the timing now yes every year we have a closed session discussion so that we can determine you know where salaries would need to be and and where uh an agreement on
203where the board believes we can go on on salaries and that because that's a negotiated item uh we discuss that either in February or March once we have that go then we then that's really what we need to solidify the entire budget and if this is something that all board all board members want to have access to we're happy to do that but we're also happy to set up small meetings for individual board members or small groups of uh three or less that have questions we could have Rick provide an overview kind of like a school budget 101 like we can we can set those types of things up which I know we exchange some emails on that so we're happy to help do that so if the board wants a session that's great or
204we can provide that kind of support for uh board members who are interested okay I'm get ahead you're okay with that okay and I mean kind of also what I'm wanting if if you could get it um like sooner just the account codes so on the bills to pay it'll have the account code and just what each one of those codes is I'm I'm interested in knowing that as well and just to add on to that if I may um potentially uh and not for this because this is we already approved everything but Excel version and I don't know if that just has to be provided to the board because it's it's hard it'd be easier for me to to look at what I'm trying to look at to review if I can sort right
205but it's all in a PDF and I can't sort and trying to transfer it to an Excel file it takes a long time so if we can just get the Excel file and the PDF it's just how you download it from the accounting software okay so what you would want is each board member to get the Excel file so they can work with it but because we couldn't really put an Excel file into the into diligent but we could get you a special file that that you could work with and sort with like a link or it doesn't have to be Excel Google Sheets or or if that's what you use we I'm just talking about the uh the bills to pay the AP bill right okay yeah just an Excel version a spreadsheet version
206that we can sort is what I'm talking about and desie does have a manual for account codes so we can get that and email it too what I'll do on the account codes is I'll I'll uh find a link that you could go to that you can look up any of the account codes on a link and that would probably be the fastest way for you to do it then you can look up any code in any area that would that would be great okay the only other thing I really wanted to call the board's attention to is we do have our msba training um scheduled for February 10th on a Saturday congratulations happy Saturday uh is there anything else no okay what what time is the um it'll likely be an all day event
207I can give the detail details later regarding timing but likely an all day event all right moving on I need or we need a motion to adjourn Open Session and return to close session oh sorry thank you I forgot board member comments are there any comments from board members no okay with that I need we need a motion to adjourn Open Session and return to closed session for the purposes of legal and personnel motion second all right may we have a roll call vote please president stolly I director Olsen I vice president liac I director Lewis I director Scott I director Goodson hi secretary hanky I that