BSD44 April 14, 2025 Board Meeting

001That was the cutest pledge we've ever done. That was the cutest. Oh, just stop talking. Stop talking. As required by Montana law, members of the community are given an opportunity to make brief comments to the board on any matters not included in the agenda. Individuals wishing to be heard shall first be recognized by the chairperson. Individuals after identifying themselves will proceed to make brief comments. The board would like to remind everyone that to avoid violations of individual rights of privacy, a member of the public wishing to address the board will not be allowed to make comments about any student, staff member, or member of the general public. No action may be taken on any matter discussed during the public comment portion of the meeting until such time as the matter is specifically noticed on an

002agenda and the public has been allowed the opportunity to comment. Do we have any public comment on a non-aggenda item? Please come on up and uh state your name for the board, please. My name is Sarah Taber. I am a teacher. I've been with the district just shy of 20 years. I'm also a parent. I have two kids that are working their way through their K12 education here at our schools. And I'm here today to make a comment about artificial intelligence. I had the opportunity to attend a um AI for educators summit in Helena through the um support of my admin at the high school and uh while I was there I was able to hear presenters that are um that speak both internationally, nationally and locally here in Montana. And I just wanted to

003point out that some of the things that I learned there because um I'm looking forward to our school having a policy regarding AI and I wanted to point out that the Montana Digital Learning Academy has a framework available for districts to help build their own framework um and their own policy. I also learned that um a class A school in Montana Pollson is one of the leaders right now in um implementing AI in their school. I have a um teacher who is a in a AI leadership role and he shared with us about how they've worked on staff development and student literacy and a book club reading the book called co-intelligence which I'm working my way through and I hope if you're readers maybe you'll check out that book. Um some important points I wanted

004to make are one that students can learn AI literacy without having access to AI. And when we talk about AI literacy, we're talking about understanding what it is and how it can be used and applied and what's um proper and what's improper. I also learned that teachers need access not just for saving time, which is what all the education articles are all about, how teachers can save time with AI, but that we can actually use it to partner um with other teachers and with AI to develop um instructional design. And I just wanted to say that um you have a lot of innovative, intelligent teachers in your district and I hope that you'll provide us access. Uh the current policy is that we don't have a policy and that has meant that we don't have

005access. And so while other districts are being innovative and moving forward, I'm concerned both as a teacher and as a parent because I want to make sure that my kids are going to be learning um about this tool that is not going to go away and will drastically change their future. Um so anyway, please just trust your teachers and allow us to teach our kids um and like develop our own understanding of AI in the future. Thank you. Thank you. Do we have any other public comment on a non-aggenda item? Okay, seeing none, we'll move on move on with our regular agenda. Um, superintendent report DD. All right, welcome everyone. Glad to see you here and it was great to hear our our young voices saying the pledge that made our hearts happy. So, thank

006you guys all for being here. Um, I just want to remind um, uh, folks that uh, we have an election on May 6. It's a school election. Uh, ballots will be mailed this Friday. So, you should be getting them in the mail on Saturday or Monday hopefully. Um, the Belgrade Schools has requested has a request for voter approval for two general operational levies on the ballot. $100,000 for the elementary district and 65,000 for the high school district. Um if both pass, the estimated tax impact is um $2.7 per year for homes valued at $100,000, which we know don't exist. But the law says we have to break it out that way. Uh $6.20 per year for homes valued at $300,000 and $12.40 per year for homes valued at $600,000. We have a tax calculator on

007our website if you go to the school board and elections link and um you can you can figure out exactly what it would look like for your own home. Um these levies leveies are part of what the state expects local taxpayers to do to contribute. So the state provides 80% of our funding and our local community provides the other 20%. And that's where levies come in. And you see levies being proposed by school districts. Some do it every year, some do it every couple of years. That's to keep us up to 100% funding. And that's the way the system is built. And that allows our local taxpayers to have a say in their school district. That's why it was it was designed um to give you voice in your school district. Um the monies will

008support um teacher and staff salaries, curriculum and materials and um um maintenance of our buildings, things like that. Part of our general operating funds. If you have any questions about that, you can call me, the superintendent, you can call Carrie, our finance director, and again, we have more information on the website, and you should be getting a postcard in the mail, too, with some information on it. Um, we also have four school board trustee positions on the ballot. We have one one-year position and there are three candidates for that and three three-year positions and there are four candidates for that. And I just like to say thanks to people who have stepped up and are interested in running for public office. It's a big job and um pays nothing. And um but it's an honor

009to work with people who contribute to their community that way. And I I just appreciate that people step up um to run for c for office. Um I'd also like to thank um Thomas Reynolds who has been our HR director for the past year and three quarters. Um his last day will be on Friday. He's um going to have some new adventures after this. And so um I just like to say thank you to Thomas. Thank you. Okay. Uh board report. Did anyone on the board have any thing they'd like to share? Um I will start with um I went to with Steve I believe um and there are other some administrators there to the CTE night um spring meeting and um the overall theme that I kept on hearing was we are leading the

010charge in the state um for our CTE program. Um, it was always amazing to hear from our educators and to see the presentation that they put forth. It would be great to see more community members attend that because it really is impressive what our educators and and the whole team is putting together for our students and just to hear we had people come from the state that spoke um in the department of industry and um just seeing the recognition of what Belgrade is doing is pretty amazing. So um thanks to the CTE program Randy. Yeah, congratulations. um he's got more applicants than he can take next year for CT. It's really growing. It's a credit to you and your work you put in. Mhm. Anyone else? I just wanted to thank the uh middle school

011and high school administrators for cracking down on cell phones. I know it's a thankless job. Um I can tell you honestly I can see a difference with my kid. Um the other day she came in came home and was talking about how she had talked with some people in her class for the first time in a long time because they had downtime and they didn't sit on their phones and I think if we did more of that everybody would be better off. Anything else? Okay, let's move on to student and staff recognition. Wesley. Good evening. I am Lesie Atkinson, the public information officer, and I would like to start by inviting uh Miss Michelle Anderson, her second grade class, as well as Mr. Jesse Jackson up to the front, please. I'm Michelle Anderson and uh

012I'm just so proud of these boys and girls and their families and um town and country with uh Jesse. Just to give you a brief synopsis of what we did, the children were asked to bring in money. The idea was to just maybe a dollar per kid coins to practice counting and um they actually brought in $3656. And then uh Town and Country Foods Belgrade matched that amount. And Ty Elliott from State Farm also matched it. And then Carter, there's Carter. He wrote a letter to his um dad's employer, Mr. Fredell. Did I say that right? And they wrote a check to the food bank for $250. So, um the receipt was um it was ended up being $1,9586 in groceries and foods that we were able to purchase. The receipt was almost 5 yards

013long. U Town and Country also paid for the bus transportation. Um Jesse is the assistant store manager at Town and Country and um he gave the tour of the store and um they shopped in small groups. Thank goodness for the chaperones because they were tremendous help. Uh groceries eroded on the bus. Lesie helped with that. She took pictures which helped with making the book that we have at school. We unloaded the groceries. The total weight was 690 lbs. Um, we were able to do some real life experiences. And I'm just so proud of them for the community service and the thoughtfulness that they put into this. And I know that they were um really happy to be able to help provide a basic need for so many people in our community. And um the other

014was um one boy I think he brought in was like almost $50 worth of quarters from his piggy bank. So just every year they're just amazing. Um I also want to thank Mrs. Columbbo for um allowing me to do this project also and she a was able to see us in action at the end and help box up all the groceries. So, thank you so much. I appreciate your time and recognizing these boys and girls for the great work that they did. We're going to recognize the students um from Miss Anderson's class and she'll hand out the certificates. For all of the students, if you can wait just a couple of moments, we're going to do one other recognition, then we'll take a picture and then you are free to go. So, thank you for

015coming this evening. Uh the students in Miss Anderson's class I have Britney Cruz Rivera, Aiden Dickerson Daker, thank you Daker Dolan Everest Elkins Liam Gallagher Killian Hton Ty Manager Maya Person Mason Perkins Valor Samson Carter Todd Tucker Troxell Von Van Dyke, Lana Vanderloot, and Hunter Young Bloodood. We would also like to present a certificate to Mr. Jesse Jackson who's here from Town and Country Foods. We greatly appreciate his partnership. Unfortunately, uh, Ty Elliot is on an airplane coming back from Kansas City. He was taking his daughter to a volleyball tournament and could not make it this evening. But again, want to recognize him as a community partner uh, who is always in support of Belgrade schools. So again, thank you. Hi, I'm Jesse Jackson. Um, I just wanted to say how much we at the

016store really enjoy this program. It's something we look forward to every single year. Uh, it's really great to see the kids kind of reactions and hear some of the questions. We always get some good stories out of it. Um, but yeah, it's just awesome and Michelle Anderson is amazing and we love having her as part of our staff as well. So, thank you All right. Next, I'd like to invite the Belgrade FFA up front, please. All right. Belgrade FFA spent April 1st through the 5th at the Montana FFA state convention. FFA is an allclass competition, meaning that Belgrade competes against 105 FFA chapters from all school sizes across the state of Montana. The members also spent time building their leadership skills by participating in a variety of workshops. Several members attended the Montana FFA Day

017of Service and helped prepare shelf stable meals that will be distributed to people of need in our community. Um our FFA students competed in a number of events um aronomy, egg mechanics, floor culture, horse evaluation, livestock evaluation, veterinary science, prepared speaking and extemporaneous speaking. We are going to highlight some of the uh exceptional performances from our team. The the Belgrade FFA sales and service was the first place team. They will represent Montana at nationals in October and those members are Gavin Fuller, Taylor Ditz, Hayes Holland, and Alexis Mia. The junior egg mechanic show, we have the champion project in the outdoor recreation division with a pergola project. Uh, second place team, showmanship, Alex Missouri, Chidiaak, Hayes Holland, and Ben Rogers. In environment and natural resources, we had a second place team with Emma Burnernhard, Katie

018McKini, Alex Missouri Chittiac, and Jocelyn McKini. In parliamentary procedure, we had the second place team of Kaylee Reid, Gavin Fuller, Heidi Dyke, Piper Davis, Katie McKini, and Alexis Miha. Farm and Agra business management. We had the third place team, Kaylee Reid, Joselyn McKini, Alexis Miha, and Katie McKini. These kids did a lot. In forestry, we had the third place team with Ben Rogers, Emma Burnernheart, Taylor Ditz, and Liam Young. And our food science team was fourth place, and they were Kaylee Reid, Ally Pearson, Katie McKini, and Alex Missouri Chittiac. Our adviserss are Cav Kyle Gavin and Evan Nilson. Did you want to say anything? All right, perfect. And this is your Belgrade FFA. We're going to take about five minutes to take some pictures and then you can resume the meeting. Moving on with leader

019reports. Piper, student representative. Good evening. Uh, still kind of a slow um month over at the high school. It is starting to speed up as we near the end of the year. Um, we did have our ProStart teams. They did very well over um at the state competition with our culinary and management teams both taking first place. Um our our key club did a fundraiser last week where they were raising money for um Erica's Lighthouse, which is a mental health organization. Um I believe they raised um at least a couple hundred dollars and then as part of their fundraiser um the students would put money into different jars and they got to whoever had the most money raised for them, they got to tape those teachers to the wall um at lunch on Friday um

020which was exciting to see. And then prom was just this last weekend. Um prom committee did a really good job with um setting up and organizing everything. Um I think everybody had a lot of fun that did go. Um, as we get into April, uh, AP review has started for a lot of AP exams as that's I think three weeks out is when they start. Um, people are kind of stressed about that, but it's also the last little push that they got to give for those classes. Um, and then finally, we have our student council has just started planning what we're going to do for teacher appreciation week. Not going to give any spoilers yet. Um, but that's all I have. Thank you. Okay. Thanks, Piper. You can take off whenever you want. Um, district

021clerk Gary. No, I put stuff in about the election as well. Um, and then I just the House Bill 15 passed and was signed by the governor, which was our um inflationary bill that they they do the inflationary increase every year. And so that one was passed and signed and um so that was positive news. It kind of gave us an update on our budget. We're still waiting for um House Bill 252, which is the STARS Act, to go through the Senate. It's um still there right now. And as soon as that passes, we'll have updated um funding numbers for that. So, any questions? That's all I got. Looks like we'll And if anybody wants a hard copy of the audit, I have copies for you to help you sleep at night if you want

022to read those. So, they always send me five hard copies. So, if anybody wants one, yeah, I'll leave you one. Get them quick. They're going fast. Okay. Any other questions for Carrie? Uh, let's move on to the consent agenda. Do we have a motion to continue? I move to adopt the consent agenda items 1 through five as listed on the agenda and board packet. Authorize necessary action for these items and include the same in the minutes. Second. We have a motion and a second. Is there any public comment on the consent agenda? Not seeing any. Comes back to the board. Any board questions or comments? Okay. See none, it comes back to a vote. All in favor of approving the consent agenda say I. I. I. All oppose. Same sign. Motion carries. Seven to nothing.

023Uh let's see. New business. Selection of construction manager, general contractor. Why don't we begin with a motion? I move to hire Langless and Associates as the construction manager, general contractor for the fourth elementary school project. I'll second. We have a motion in a second. Brian, did you want to describe? Yeah, I thought I'd just give you a quick summary of what we've been up to for some months now. uh you previously took action to pursue the alternate project delivery method for a future fourth elementary school project and following uh we did then publicly solicit uh written responses to a request for qualifications and proposal. Uh those were scored and then created a short list uh for interview which we conducted on March 28th for a viewer in that room together with us. And so, uh,

024we had, you know, a great spectrum of local firms, um, that we interviewed that day. And, uh, really the outcome was, um, with consensus to select Langless Associates for recommendation for your approval tonight. And so, just wanted to kind of summarize that that journey and certainly answer any questions. Uh what that really means moving forward is uh kind of break up the addition of them to our team into two parts. One would be the pre-construction phase that we're active in right now and really looking forward to their input and helping us um wrangle the budget and talk about constructibility issues and and um just the contractor's perspective on the process that we're working with SMA on. And so, uh, right now, Langlas and Associates would be focused on that pre-construction phase, getting, uh, a permit

025set of drawings ready and getting the project shovel ready, so to speak. And then, uh, if uh, everything aligns and we if and when we choose to actually go to construction, then they would be, uh, our partner to to build the school. So, not unlike other recent capital projects the district has had over the last some years. So, uh, that probably sounds very familiar, but certainly wanted to give it a little bit of time, a little bit of explanation, and if you have any questions, just let me know. Okay. Did we have any, uh, public questions before Brian steps back? One more thing, uh, Langless and Associates, raise your hands. They're here tonight, so I just wanted to recognize them as well. Thanks for coming, guys. Okay, I don't see any public questions. Did the

026board have any questions for anybody about any of this? I provide a comment that short list of terms we all evaluated and I think we probably all had different rankings of us and evaluated them for two through four but number one was just consensus they did outstanding job and it was pretty pretty easy discussion yeah appreciate all your time and effort vetting this any other further comments before this comes back to a vote Okay. All in favor of approving the motion to hire Langlist and Associates say I. I. I. All oppose. Same sign. Motion passes seven to nothing. Thanks guys. Thanks for coming. Up next we have the presentation from SMA um schematic design. Dee, did you want to talk about this? Where are you guys are going to speak? They're going to Yeah. No,

027it's going to go fine. They're really good at our technology now. We've been We've been We've been having great meetings. They've been doing a lot of hard work in between meetings. Um and so they wanted to present some of the work that we've been sharing together. Yeah, thanks everybody for being here. Uh I'm Charlie Franklin with SMA Architecture and Design. Good to see you all again. Uh Lee Elder here also with SMA. Um when the screen shows up like DD mentioned we've been doing um the schematic design phase over the process of about um eight weeks and this is um an update for you all as to uh what where that process has led. Um we've done a lot of great work uh getting floor plans and um then extruding those floor plans into a

028building that that um you kind of see before you here um as at a schematic design level. So um this is really taking all the concepts and everything that we've been learning from your district and and putting that into paper and understanding what that looks like uh in building form. So uh our previous program or previous phase was the programming and concept phase and with that we um just kind of a recap real quick. We met with u various committees and we developed uh a series of kind of visioning and these are the power words that we had um welcoming, safe and adaptable. And so we were carrying those through our schematic design to try to make sure that um our building is welcoming, safe, adaptable. um it's it's able to advance and in that

029phase two potentially grow and make sure that all of our getting weird audio here. Uh and making sure that right um all the students are feeling safe at all the entries um and that interior of it um it's feeling yeah very local um to the to the classes. So, this is just a brief overview of our site and our landscape. Um, very similar to what we've shown before, just a little bit more developed with some of the playgrounds, um, the site queuing around that and some of the landscaping. This is looking more at to the first floor plan um where we uh are setting up the entryway, the admin areas um, right directly adjacent to that entryway in the blue. Um and then we have kind of back of house and storage and mechanical and

030that kind of is in the gray. Uh what we were really looking at is um kind of setting up some axes for uh supervision and um clear views down the hallways. And so um we've set up kind of a real strong north south and east west access for for the first phase of the school. Um we have the multi-purpose room which um as you'll remember will function as a gym and uh the cafeteria uh when the school opens. Um the school will house uh five or 400 excuse me gez 250 students um to start when it opens. So this would be the phase one. Um we also have a music room that's elevated that has a little bit of a stage that comes off of the uh multi-purpose uh multi-purpose room. And then moving down,

031we're setting up classroom pods. And so, um, each one of the classroom pods has three classrooms in it with a shared collaboration space in the middle. Um, we're separating the grades. Um, so kindergarten and, um, first grade would be on the lower level. Then we'd have second, third, and fourth upstairs. uh and fifth obviously to get um to get ourselves the fifth grade uh out of the middle school when this school comes online. Um we'll on our second floor we have uh the green space there is our library space which is uh the big space that you kind of see at the entryway as well um looking out towards the mountains. Um and then we have our second uh you know our second set of pods, classroom pods with their shared collaborative space in the

032middle. Um we also have uh a teacher lounge overlooking uh towards the north that would overlook the playground area. So this is kind of a little bit of a view of how that sets up um a little bit more uh understandable in three dimensions there. And then as we move forward, this would be um what the plan would start to look like in phase two. So um start off with phase one as our building. But then um you know understanding kind of where that that budgetary stance will be. That's kind of a a big next step that we're working on um now that now that Langless is on board which we're very happy about. So we can start to understand how um you know what is what is this building going to cost um in

033a much more uh detailed and uh reliable way. So in phase two, we'd be looking at adding a gym onto the north wing. That's the large gray. That' be a full-size gym at that point. And then the multi-purpose room could be uh more dedicated towards that uh cafeteria function. And then we'd be looking at adding another block of classroom uh down onto the west wing of the school. And so you can kind of see how that is starting to take shape. That has that wing hasn't been fully developed yet, but um our our plan would be to have it uh have it more developed um as we move through the next few phases of design. Um same thing with level two. It's uh here you're just kind of seeing that addition of the classroom pods

034um to the west. So here within the multi-purpose space of course within this phase one it is going to be acting as the classroom um for a classroom multi-purpose area gym uh cafeteria and then also an event space if there's ever going to be like a performance from the stage. Um so we have lots of storage to the south of it for PE storage and table and chair storage. Um, we have a basketball hoop above those storage areas. We've got a half court um, line system there so it can fit a half court. We have an 18-in level raise stage. Um, so just a little bit of an elevation to make sure that you can see the the kids up there. Um, we do have kind of a dual partition system between the music room

035and that to make sure that we're maintaining acoustics in case there's a class within the music room and also a gym um, class going on at the same time. We have the kitchen um in the upper right corner over there. So then we also have kind of the dish pit. So we're working on making sure that that circulation can flow around um with in is in cafeteria mode. Um and then we have our PE office with a couple of AB rooms um there in the upper left corner. Then this is the next uh space we decided to highlight. This is the library. And so within the library, um when you see our exterior massing, we kind of have a a shed roof above this space. Um when we did a lot of tours of your

036current existing schools and some of the other schools that we looked at, um some of the the most enjoyed libraries that we saw had kind of this vaulted um ceiling. And so we wanted to mimic that and also bring in a lot of natural light into this space. So that corner over there, the southeast corner is going to be a lot of glass trying to bring in views of the valley as well as some light. Then also we have on the left side of that image, you can see that's going to be the kind of the classroom space. We're in a whiteboard and a smartboard over there with some tables and chairs for some workstation. Uh a number of movable bookshelves inside so that the librarian can move those around as they see fit. Um,

037and then one of the other things that we also kind of planned within the floor plan is that the library and the multi-purpose space are always accessible so that in case it needs to be used for an after school function, you can still gain access to that space. Um, and here I'll go back to the layout here. You can see we have doors kind of between the library and the classroom pod. And so with this, we wanted to make sure that uh downstairs as well as upstairs, nobody can access those classroom pods where they're shared resourcing rooms um in the event of an afterchool, you know, activity. So that that site is always private and maintained. Uh and then these are those educational spaces. So currently right now we have three classrooms coming off of

038the shared collaborative zone. Uh the southern zone we have a student project room. So within that room, we have some casework for some storage. We also have a table and it's just a little bit more private, but we still have a lot of glass on there so that teachers can always see in if kids are working in there independently. Um the shared collaborative zone also has a lot of um windows looking onto it so that teachers can monitor students if they're out inside that space. um we have some natural light there and then also we kind of have it separated by a little bit of a hallway so in case classes are going down that corridor they're not fully interacting and distracted um by anybody kind of moving within the halls interior finishes um we

039have kind of this uh natural palette looking at kind of um some natural colors among the valley we're going to be using some polished concrete on the first floor resilient sheet flooring on the second uh carpet it in areas to make sure that we're bringing acoustics down. We've got resilient flooring inside that multi-purpose space so that we'll make sure that it's clean or able to be cleaned after cafeteria and be ready to go for uh gym class right after that. Um but then we have some ceramic tile and bathrooms. Um and so a lot of this is also just kind of helping Langless understand exactly what the finishes of this building are as we kind of go into this pricing exercise. So, this is a view uh of the of the building from Frank Road.

040Um, looking at the main entrance um with with the library above and the admin wing uh below with a nice canopy um to provide a bit of coverage um as as people walk in. Um we're looking at using um three main materials. Um, one currently that you're seeing right now is is like a CMU um a masonry uh block uh for the multi-purpose space and the classroom uh pods and then intermixing that with some more um kind of contemporary and and local um metal panels um and some uh potentially some wood sophets and wood uh posts and beam. Um so this is again another kind of entry uh looking at the entry we're really trying to open up um kind of uh you know we have three levels of security uh into that um vestibule

041and so we also have you know a window from the reception out to this front entrance. Um and then looking around the backside at at more of the playground area again using kind of the same pallets. We really wanted to try to use um you know the the the CMU is is a permanent uh type uh type structure that that gives the building a lot of weight and it um and it feels a little bit more timeless and like it's it's meant to be there for a long time. But then intermixing uh a little bit more contemporary feel with some metal panels um and some options for some colors. right now are kind of showing a a muted green, but that that uh could could uh could change over time. We'll see. Um, and then

042this is uh this would be the entry off of the west side, and it's looking uh this is the entry that you would see from the bus uh from the bus loop on the west side. And you're seeing phase one and phase two here. So, in phase one is the larger image up above. And um you know this side doesn't have a lot of windows because every classroom has uh one set of windows on one wall and they just don't happen to face this way. So those classrooms windows are facing um north and south. And also when we put phase two onto this um you know these walls these walls go away. So we start to get um you know more of a more of a look like the front in phase two when uh

043when that happens. This is kind of just a just an overview of kind of what those uh larger south and north elevations start to look like. Um among all the architectural progress that we've made, we also um our consultants have also been making a lot of progress. So um we've been working on a lot of the site and civil grading. Um some of the other big things that we've been working with the city of Belgrade on are exactly what that infrastructure piece is looking like. um you know in the programming concept that is a big piece of this budget as well. So we're still exactly trying to determine what the best route um and the most cost-effective route for this school um is there at this point um we're still having conversations with the city

044of Belgrade. So there's not kind of an exact um decision on that front yet but that is still in progress. Um, of course, we also are working on exactly what the landscape is looking forward. Um, making sure that we're going to be using kind of local droughtresistant um, plants. Uh, we're trying to reduce our amount of irrigation. Um, and also trying to make Leroy happy. Um, so make sure that he doesn't have to maintain too much. It's not me, it's grass. Um, in that view, you can also see the outline. the the white dash lines are where the second phase addition would happen. So trying to plan this out so um you know you don't have to uh tear up you tear up as little as possible um when the second phase comes in. Um

045and then of course uh MEP is also a big big piece here. And so just looking at how these systems are starting to route within our building um and what kind of um you know requirements those are going to have as far as the ducting and the space within the rooms um all the classrooms. It's got a couple of plans there. Um project schedule currently right now um Langless is pricing our SD set and we will be picking um design development up again in a couple weeks. Uh and then after that we'll do another pricing exercise um before moving into construction documents. Uh about halfway through that process, Langlist will be um giving us another perspective on exactly how much our budget is going to be. Sorry, I keep going away from the mic here.

046Um and then after that, we'll be kind of going into a permit and um kind of a bidding phase if everything is working out. Any questions you guys might have? Go ahead. No. Um, I am concerned about having those library windows um at the entrance facing that big. Oh, sorry. That big of uh windows facing at the entrance and facing a major road that people are going by. Just concerned. Yeah. Sure. I mean, people could drive by and shoot. I mean, we've talked about that too of I mean, I hate to say that in this day and era, but that's a big concern. I mean, if that's the facing of Frank Road. Yeah. Um I mean we've talked about having to put uh shatterproof glass in other areas in our school. So I I see

047that as a big safety concern. Okay. Um the other thing is is I was wondering how many parking spots we have. Sure. I don't know why that's a big concern, but um that would be a concern of parking spots for not only um parents, but what the parking spots are for the staff because if we add on to that, we need to have enough for our staff with the second phase as well. Correct. Um and so kind of to your first comment there, there is definitely a lot of glazing up on that second level. um to kind of make sure that we are always maintaining eyes on the road. Uh a couple of those offices down on the very first right below that window, that's your principal's office. They have two uh windows out, one

048looking at the parking lot and the other looking at Frank Road. Um they're kind of the very first eyes on the street. We also have the conference room there. So any um people, you know, inside there have a window out to Frank Road. The assistant principal's office for that phase two, we have another office planned for that because we can't expand on that. So that view is also looking out on Frank Road and then the main receptionist office um looks directly towards the parking lot. So we have a lot of that admin staff views on Frank Road and on the parking lot to make sure that that safety and security is maintained. Um we also have a sill of about 24 in on those windows. So while the windows are big, they're also more um

049you know they're starting here and going up. So the vantage the vantage point um Frank Road is a little bit less. And then we have these trees, but we'll definitely um start to look at exactly what those vantage views are from Frank Road and try to minimize that. Um we also do kind of have a bid alternate that Langless is pricing for a film for protective glass um to just make sure we're kind of covering that on all bases. Thank you. Uh parking spots, talk about your loop. So yeah, we have two two parking spa spaces. Um on the on the left hand on the west side that is the teachers parking lot as well as the bus drop off parking lot. They have an entrance off of Frank Road. Um how many space it

050says there's 30 30 parking spaces in that. Um and then we also have a queuing loop uh all the way around the entire site and then that goes into our main drop off lane on the east side and 66 spaces on the east side. In phase two, we would propose adding uh if we need to a a second um a second loop of parking there, which is 19 spaces um just up in that north corner there. So, and then when we've talked to facilities, they've also mentioned for pickup, we would be um you know, potentially blocking off this so that it's not a right turn in. So, everybody is looping around and these are a double lane. So we have two lanes of queuing all the way until you get to the pickup and then

051it would start to make sure that we're not back. So I think we would have what is that uh 96 total spaces um to start in phase one. Okay. I just don't see that especially for parent parking. I can tell you right now that that's not going to be enough. Especially if you have I know it's not that many times a year, but a Christmas concert of where are we going to park for Yeah. Yeah. that many kids. So Okay. Yeah. And right now like at Story Creek, there's people trying to park on the Presc Ranch property and they don't obviously want us to park there. So, you know, just thinking of where are those car cars going to park when you have a Christmas concert, a basketball game or volleyball, whatever is going on

052over there, some sort of sport. Um, yeah, it's a great great comment. Yeah. Yeah, we'll take that into further consideration for sure. Frank's looking at me like he's got something to say. Um, and I'm not an architect and nor do I fan to be one. So, I'm probably the wrong person to comment. Um, and I think architects try to be timeless and not contemporary. And you you guys, it seems like it's still to me it feels contemporary. And I worry about when we expand that whole campus, how that goes. Not just that building, but that campus. it and I I don't know if it's the color scheme or the the you know the slight slope to the roof or the what what's doing it for me but it it doesn't look like what our community's

053comments have been around some of our buildings in the past that maybe have not been as successful. So I I express a concern but I I hate doing that without offering a solution. I think that sure most irritating thing if I'm sitting in your seats but it just that was my initial take as I look at it. It looked like you tried to do both and made it contemporary still. Okay. But that's a I know it's a big ask for just the nature of Yeah, I think there's a few things in play there. Obviously, we know that like uh masonry and that sort of in brick and that kind of thing that we used to build with is more expensive, right? So, we're trying to do a bit of balancing um in that respect. Um

054and and you know, comments like that are something that we we get as architects all the time. So, I think, you know, we can we can work work through that and uh and and and think about what that what that means. Maybe there's maybe there's some detailing and in the ways that we um you know, approach openings and things like that that could could help with that. My favorite house we owned was a ranch style house, so you know, you get it. Um the the size of space, I know again it's money. It restricts us on the gym. Yeah. But that sure looks like an awful small tight space for fifth graders to do anything of value. Yeah. What is the square footage on that? About 3,000. Uh yeah, multi-purpose is 3,000 square feet, right?

055And we're upping class sizes. So that just struck me as I don't know if it's how many again I don't have you measured out like how many of our tables we could fit in there for as far as how those fit students and back to back like this. right for lunch um we can fit enough tables for I believe uh two or three lunch periods um with 250 students I think two um but yeah it is it is like you know like we said it's about the it's a little less than half size of a full size like a full-size gymnasium would be about 8,000 square feet. So this is a little this is about h a little less than half um in order to kind of fit it within the programming of like where

056we think the dollars are going to land. But if the dollars land lower hint hint um then potentially it maybe gets maybe we can grow it a little bit. But that is you know I mean that is somewhat of a constraint obviously. So Langlo heard that we wanted an exterior structure of like brick and a fulls size gym. I'm sorry. Yeah. Um, no. And I I appreciate it. I understand. I just it just feels like a little defeating if we're that's part of our thoughts as we're going to open this fifth grade like the sizes of like Ridge View's gym or some of the other gyms for all pulled up right here. Look at you. You're on the ball. Right. Um uh so our smallest gym in the district is the east gym of the

057middle school. It's at 4,000 square feet. And what's this again? The east one at the middle school is it has two sides. It's not a half court. It just doesn't have any room. I mean the sidelines are basically How many students are at that? Well, it's the middle school. Then there's two gyms there. So the for comparison sake, the west gym is 7,100 square feet. Um and then the the three elementaryaries uh vary from so Bridge View is at 5,500 square feet and there's no bleachers in that one. Whereas Story Creek is at 6,000 ft and that one doesn't. That includes bleachers, but I I only measured I didn't include the picture size. That was just quart of That would be about 6600. Um, so yeah, something to keep in mind. I think it's a

058dollar bill. So, we're about halfway there. It is It's not It's not a No, I know. It's just is it worth doing if we can't get something we can use, right? I would agree with that. Like, don't buy a Ford Fiesta if you have a family of eight. I don't know. I'm just throwing it out there. Differential timeline phase one, phase two. Do we have any like idea? No. Yeah. Is that phase two has that massive gym? Yeah. What was our community? We need those. Uh what is the square footage of what our original lunchroom was in Saddle Peak? Do you know that's an ask? I don't have that in a spreadsheet because that was too small and we ended up using the gym for that for lunch and had to do the addition onto

059the lunchroom for that. So that's where I'm like I agree with Frank like if it's not going to be practical and be able to be usable. We can get two lunch periods out of it. Like what's the size of this? What's the size of headqu? What did you did you pull that up? How about you have because that was fun through fifth this time. So, who's I would add just a little perspective to the challenges that we're showing to you tonight and what we've tried to do to work with the objective. And part of that objective, the leading objective was to create an opportunity to use the capital that's available to you from a previous pond campaign before it disappears and separately to create an opportunity to move fifth grade out of your middle school.

060Uh there have been some hard decisions where we've had to cut bone and muscle out of this project um to make a project that conformed to the available funds and be fiscally responsible to the district and the taxpayers and simultaneously create an opportunity to bring that fifth grade out of the middle school. And that has resulted in some less than optimal programmatic spaces. But I just wanted to provide that context to say we didn't uh we haven't been working for the last few months uh oblivious of the shortcomings of some of these spaces. Um and so they they have been difficult conversations that this group has been in um many dozens of times. And so it's it's maybe shocking to see that for the first time here today, but I I wanted to give you

061some perspective with uh what some very real constraints were and what some real important goals were at the same time. And so just adding that color to uh some of what we're what we're struggling with here tonight. So yeah, absolutely Brian and I don't want to feel like we're attacking you or just it's just just a concern I have when I look at it in question. I but yeah I understand we've given you a impossible equation. Yeah. And so um ultimately what the best we can do I think is show a solution set that um for your consideration whether you want to you know uh given those marching orders if you will and if if what we can provide you is is in conformance to that but um definitely it's been a while since some

062of you maybe have thought about what some of those goals or constraints were so I just wanted to bring that back up to the top and no there's like Charlie said you know uh this is a a process full of input and um I I think that's what it it's not criticism. Everyone here has thick skin and so we welcome the comments. I wanted to be perfectly clear about that. Um so yeah, thanks for that. I had one more. The uh um infrastructure if you have that um the the waterline loops are those consider considering the bigger campus here ultimately we Okay, that's what it looked like there. We are considering the bigger campus as well as uh other developments like on the other side of that that are not our property. We are um

063in contact with them to make sure that these are viable options for the future. Does the I know the city hasn't given any kind of commitments yet. Have they given any timeline to give you a commitment as to what we're looking at? Because they they gave a sticker shock last time at the end of the day I think. Or actually they were good at the end of the day. It just took a long time. Brian's gonna Brian's taking I'll fall I'll fall on the sword there is the question about repeat the question just in terms of city giving you a timeline for when they give you an answer of things like infrastructure like what are we going to be required to do on Frank road are we going to be able to how wide are

064we going to need to signal somewhere what are we going to re I can speak to the traffic impact study so we've only recently received that in hand that'll go to Belgrade has gone to Belgrade and so we don't have their input yet on improvements to Frank road. That traffic impact study does make some recommendations that our civil engineer has summarized. Um it does require some signage. It it what that traffic impact study does is to identify um deferred growth as a municipality in general in that part of the area and assign and and certainly um describes what city of Belgrade along with its partners in this case maybe Belgrade schools needs to do but it doesn't place the burden of that on on on Belgrade schools. it it recognizes that you've grown and you

065have to do some things in this part of your community to address that. So, um we don't that's an indirect answer. We don't know yet what they'll require for Frank Road, that's very new information. Um the other infrastructure items, water and sewer, we those have been productive discussions. Um none of those are easy right now and so sadly the best I can tell you is we still are we're working through that. But um it's been productive. Okay. Right. Versus the other alternative. So thank you. Thanks. Any other questions, comments? Appreciate your time, guys. Thanks for coming. Thank you. Yeah. All right. Uh next on the agenda, theou between Belgrade School District and the Belgrade Education Association. Uh, do we have a motion to continue? I move to approve theou between Belgrade School District number 44

066and the Belgrade Education Association local number 7508 to provide written commitment of compliance with House Bill 252 for the 256 school year. I'll second. We have a motion in a second. Let's see. Thanks, guys. Dee, did you want to speak about this or Sure. Anyone want to give a quick summary? So, House Bill 252 is the STARS Act. That's the um act that the legislature um they haven't passed it yet. It's um sort of the big ticket um financial um uh act that's going to support school districts across the state. Um the Bgrade School District anticipates benefiting by about $800,000 from this act. Um so very important that it passes and um that you know that we um see the results of that. Um but it hasn't passed yet and and so we don't know

067what's going to happen in the future but we do believe that um there's a darn possibility that it'll be passed. So what happens now is we um as a school district have to be ready to say we have in place the the the basic requirements that are needed to qualify for the the STARS Act the way it's written. And um right now our current um agreement is super close but doesn't quite meet the requirements. So our base salary in our current agreement is 41,000. it would need to be $41,615. So, we're $615 off from meeting the basic requirements. So, what thisou does is just agree that um you know, we are we are willing to make any changes that are necessary to meet the basic requirements of the STARS Act, assuming it's passed and we

068don't have a new bargained agreement in place. our bargained agreement that's being discussed right now would also meet all the qualifications of the stars act. So um once that is in place then we should be good to go questions back to board. Um, this could be completely me just not understanding it, but it says this agreement will take effect immediately. So, we're going to give the raise and then if it doesn't pass is just that if the stars act passes and we don't have we haven't agreed on a new contract, we would then amend the contract prior to July 1 so that we at least met the minimum basic that. So I'll have to certify that we that the board has agreed with the union that we'll meet the qualifications for the stars act and

069that has we have to have something in writing an agreement by July 1st. Thisou just says we're willing to make whatever changes are necessary basic changes to make sure that that happens. Um assuming the new um uh agreement is ratified by the union and then is um approved by the board on May 2nd, we'll already have something in place. This was the information too that Lance had emailed outformationalally. Correct. Yeah, this came Yeah, sorry. The um the language came from MTSBA. Yeah. scratching your chin. You good? Okay. Right. Any other questions? It was just me misinterpreting how I was reading it. Okay. Uh I believe that brings it back to a vote. Unless anybody has anything else to say. All in favor of approving theou between Belgrade School District and Belgrade Education Association HB252 say

070I. I. All oppose. Same sign. Motion carries seven to nothing. Out of field out of state field trip request. Why don't we begin with the motion? I move to approve the robotics team. Okay, hold on. I move to approve the robotics team's overnight out ofstate field trip request to Chicago, Illinois from July 17th to the 21st, 2025 for the Premier Robotics Tournament. We have a motion in a second. Let's see. Shann is here. Was there anyone who was gonna speak about this? Oh, come on up. Yeah, you guys want Why don't you come up and just give us a quick summary of what you got planned just so we can put you on the spot. Yeah. Yeah. Uh this is Gavin. He's a junior on our team. So they um qualified at the state tournament

071to go to Rachel, turn on your microphone, please. There you go. Sorry. One button. I'm used to just projecting my voice. I'm so sorry. Uh so they qualified to go to this next level of event. And so um we have all the information that we can possibly have at this point. um because we didn't know where we were going. So um I also want to take them to uh the Museum of Science and Industry in Chicago and so um we wanted to go one day early so that we have time to do that and sort of make the trip extra but mostly go to compete and take the robot. So and Gavin really wants to go. You cannot say no to this kid. Look at him. How many students will go, Kevin? Um, we are

072hoping to get our full 11 student roster. That's what we that's what our current budget is planned on. Um, but we that's the current plan, but we suspect that we may only be able to get eight to seven of our students. Okay. Will that increase the costs then individually? Um, it is a semi-individual thing with it when it comes to fundraising. You might be able to explain it a bit. Well, so the actually plane tickets are kind of cheap right now, so I'm hoping to jump on that. But, uh, the biggest cost is hotel room and so adding one or two kids doesn't really change the cost. You get to get six hotel rooms or whatever, no matter what. So, it would be about the same. We want all the kids to go if we

073can. How does that affect your um ability to compete if not all your team is there? Well, I see it as you need a minimum of three people to be a part of a competition. You need two drivers and a coach. The more people you can add to that, the better. Like, you want to add one to have a potential human player. You want to have one to be able to manage your pit area. You want to have one to go out and talk to other teams and scout and see which ones you want to ally with, make an alliance with in the final qualifying matches. So, the more students that can come, the easier it becomes to share that workload. Can I be a student? Yeah. You want to come, Jesse? You can come.

074You can come. You can you can go. You You can stay in my room. It'll be fine. Yeah. How many teams do they expect at this? Um I they 35. Chicago I think is 35 or 30. Yeah, it's somewhere in there. Yeah, these teams are from all around the states. I believe there's even one coming out from Hawaii. Oh, the Griffin Museum's awesome. That's a good choice. Okay, sweet. Wonderful. I've never been. Okay, go ahead. Super cool. You can take the kids pork pillows for their famous Chicago dogs. And we get there on the train. That's the big thing. Okay. Okay. Any other questions? I believe that brings us back to a vote. All in favor of approving the out ofstate field request robotics to Chicago say I. I. I. Motion passes. Seven to nothing.

075Congratulations, guys. Good luck. Thank you. Yeah. Good luck. Item number five, recommendations for roofing bids for the middle school. Hey folks. Hi. Nice to see you all again. Um, so, uh, this has been, uh, boy, it's been a long time coming. The east end of that middle school, the roof is, uh, been end of life quite some time ago. and we've been dealing with leaks. So, uh it's really great to finally get to this point and have all the bids and everything and um have a path forward. So, of course, we're recommending um that you guys hire ACE roofing. They came in as low bid, but also um we still put put all the bids through the scoring matrix and they ended up in first place as well. Um you guys have any questions? Make

076a motion first. Oh yeah. I move to hire ACE roofing to replace the east roof of the middle school for 810,784. Thanks. Right. Questions for I'm just figuring out what the east the east fifth grade mean. That's a lot of money for a building that we have considered tearing down. We won't be able to tear it down. It'll fall down if we don't do the solve our problem. [Music] Mary Ellen, you are 100% correct in that. Our first choice was tear it down. Yeah. And the voters said no. So, this is plan B. Um, and we don't even know if we're going to get the fifth grade out of there. So, if we didn't do this, we could certainly have a problem right away with the the fifth grade. Plus, won't it'll be several years

077before we even if we do get the other elementary, it'll be uh probably two to three years before we get the the kids out of that part of the school. Plus, once the kids are out of that part of the school, there's probably an opportunity to use that part of the school for something completely different. And so, um, whether that's CTE or whatever there. So, we I don't think we can take this one off our inventory. I think we need to, uh, do the repairs. And there, you know, there are a lot of these situations in our district in our collection of buildings, but this is probably the worst of the bunch. Gary, there's some uh there's a bill that just is going through the Senate, I believe, right now about uh building maintenance. Um,

078do we know how much we would potentially be getting from that at all? I I haven't seen any numbers on that yet, but I'll I can pull up the fiscal note tomorrow and see if it breaks it down, but I haven't heard anything that'll help. But I think there's still some match with the um from the property owners for that even with the even with Yeah, I think you're right. Yeah. Okay. Any other questions? Did you sit on the committee for this, Rocky? I did. Okay. Thank you. Were you shocked at the difference between like Ace and like Wayne for instance or Yeah, I was sort of surprised because I think Leroy said in the la the last time that these were a little bit different from each other. We use Ace a lot though

079and u so we have a lot of confidence that they're they're good. Um and uh when we went through everything that on the bids they came out well ahead of the others. So, you know, we feel good that it's the right choice. They did the other side of the middle school, didn't they? Also, ACE. Yes. It's working okay there. Shingles on the west end. Yeah. You're pleased with that? Yeah. I mean, I've only been here for almost four years. I've not had any issues with it. Perfect. All right. Any further questions? It's okay. There's wood. I knocked on it. Fine. All right, let's bring it back to a vote. All in favor of approving ACE roofing to replace the east roof of the middle school say I. I. I. All oppose. Same sign. Motion carries.

080Seven to nothing. Uh, up next, remodel restroom remodel bids for middle school. Why don't we begin with a motion? I move to hire RNR Taylor to complete the remodel of the middle school bathrooms, including the base bid of $787,000 for multi-stall bathrooms and the alternate of $86,722 for single stall bathrooms for a total of $873,722. I'll second. We have a motion and a second. Want to describe it a little bit, Leroy? Uh well, so this is um this is to remodel all of the multi-stall bathrooms in the middle school of which there are 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 of them. Um and then also the three single stall which are currently staff bathrooms. Um, also there's a a couple sets of bathrooms in the east end

081where there's a single stall between the two multistall and currently for one of those you have to go in through the girls' room to get into it and then the other one you have to go in through the boys' room. This will wall up where those doors are and put the door on the hallway side as well to make it accessible um from the hallway instead of having to go in through one of the the bathrooms. Um, if you guys have seen those bathrooms over there, they are they're dated. Uh, so yes, absolutely. Um, so this will this will definitely there. Oh, okay. Well, we're all in agreement with that for sure. Um, I'll miss the race cars and sports balls that are on. Um, but sometimes that's a sacrifice we have to make. Um,

082you know, this is this is updating everything uh fixtures, flooring, lighting, walls, partitions. Um, also bringing them up to code to make them ADA compliant ones that are not. Uh, welcome. What questions do you guys have? I don't Well, is there any public question or comment? Any board questions or comment? Yeah, I see this is base bid. Um do we have some unknowns that we are um kind of prepared for or are what what are we looking at there for change or potential change orders? Well, so the base bit itself was just for the multi-stall and then we we threw in the single stall ones as um as an alternate just to give you guys a choice. I don't like throwing just one thing at you. You can pick and choose. Uh we we may

083have a potential increase in that. Um of course this was figured out after the fact there there was a an asbestous study that was done in 2013. Um and and of course that that east end of the building has 9 by9 flooring. So there's there's asbestous uh in the flooring itself which is maintained properly perh standards. But of course to do this you need to remove it. And the on that study they called out one of these single stall bathrooms as is um showing positive for asbestous. Uh but the bathroom that that's connected to they didn't. And yet it's the same tile in there. So my guess is that we're going to have a change in that. And of course that's unknown. We didn't catch it till after the fact um for the removal of

084that. But luckily with with flooring and the fact that it's in a bathroom, um it's not going to be something that's crazy uh causing up a lot of dust and the containment would be fairly simple from what I'm [Music] told. Any other questions? Okay, guess that comes back to us for a vote. All in favor of approving the recommendation for the restroom remodel bids for Belgrade Middle School, say I. I. I. All oppose. Same sign. Motion carries. Seven to nothing. Thanks, Leroy. Thank you, guys. Item number seven, out of district attendance agreements for 2025 2026. Do we have a motion to continue? I move to approve 19 non-resident student attendance agreement for the 202526 school year. I'll second. We have a motion in a second. So, I don't know, Trey or D, do you want

085to say anything about this? This is just the yearly agreements. Correct. Yes, sir. U this is our annual process. We've established some timelines for submissions of applications. That timeline is closed and uh we're ready to submit these recommendations to the board for your approval. Okay. What is the um there's I see there's one disapprove on that list. That one is not approved. And that there's 19, but there's 20 on this list. That's what I was trying to count. So that's like I wish it was numbered. I was shoot number kind of numbered if you look at the Yeah. And the ID numbers. ID numbers. Oh, I didn't even look at those. Okay. I do see those are up or here. Just a point of clarification, when we accept these children, we do not provide transportation.

086Okay. Any other clarifying questions or comments before we proceed with a vote? Oh, sure. Come on up. Can you uh state your name, too, please? Are there standards that they have to meet? Yeah, there are certain criteria that need to be met and criteria that were formed when the board created the policy and when we created our strategic um alignment goals. So, yep. Sure. Thank you. All right. Last call for questions or comment before it comes back to a vote. All in favor of approving the outofd district attendance agreements for 2025 2026 say I. I. All post oppose. Same sign. Motion carries. Seven to nothing. Item number eight, high school credit for certain eighth grade courses. Do we have a motion to continue? I move to approve students to receive high school course credit for

087classes taken at the middle school when aligned with courses offered at the high school and taught by a teacher with the appropriate endorsements. I'll second. We have a motion in a second. Matt, did you want to talk about this a little bit? Sure. Um, so we've had some conversations with middle school and high school administration with teachers uh moving forward next year. one of the examples of the algebra 1 uh as we've restructured the math at the high school and if a student in 8th grade is taking a course that coincides with a a class in the high school uh we would like to be able to offer them high school credit for that class. It allows them to access higher level classes sooner in their career uh in the high school, potentially AP uh

088dual enrollment classes. Um and um yeah, that's just kind of what we're looking for right now. We have a current class in the middle school that is a Spanish class that coincides with Spanish one in the high school. Um but anything else we would make sure that it's aligning and we would make sure the teachers have the correct uh endorsements. Talked to OPI about it. They uh they did say me tell me that it was quite common. Uh DD looked into some other double A's. Not all of them are doing it. Some of them have students that go from the middle school to the high school to take some classes. Um there's different options. We would I would probably prefer a teacher to be traveling instead of 25 eighth graders. Um, just logistics. That's all

089I'm saying. Um, but we would be doing our due diligence to make sure that they're matching up and the curriculums are matching up. The course code in the middle school would have to match the high school course code and inside of Infinite Campus, there's a little box we can check that says high school credit. So, OPI said that this is pretty common. Okay. I have a question. Sure. So, like I saw algebra one as an example, right? Mhm. Um because typically like if somebody's on like a STEM track, they would, you know, take algebra 1, eighth grade, and then algebra 2, geometry, during pre-cal and cal, right? Like AP calc. Is this more for maybe somebody who's not planning on hopping into that? I'm I'm I'm trying to figure out how this benefits like high

090school credit wise, like with the algebra one, the algebra one credit. So the way that they the math department restructured the math program was algebra 1 as a freshman class then geometry and then algebra 2 and advanced classes after that. Um but if we can start algebra 1 as an eighth grader as a freshman they could jump into geometry then they could take algebra 2 as a sophomore and they could access those AP stats AP calc um you know those higher level courses sooner. uh they could probably get more college credit for it if it's AP classes or dual enrollment classes uh and then graduate high school with more going into college than if they had to wait to do that. So right now if they take algebra 1 and 8th grade they still have

091to take it in high school. No. Oh no. We would put them right into geometry. Okay. But I mean but right now they they're taking it double. So they even if they've taken algebra 1 and 8th grade they can't go to like algebra 2 in high school. Not right. We don't offer algebra 1. It's integrated math model right now. I see. Um like Spanish u my understanding is they takes they can take this higher level Spanish essentially Spanish one. They're not getting high school credit for it but they can enter Spanish too when they're a freshman. But okay we believe we should be able to give them high school credit for it. How many students do you have lined up for these classes? What's the demand like for Spanish and math in eighth grade? Right

092now we're looking at one algebra one class depending on students. Um I think Mark is my current. Yeah, sure. You need the microphone. Got to introduce yourself too. Um Mark Layman. I teach Spanish at both the middle school and the high school. Currently I teach that eighth grade advance Spanish class that's offered. How many? And the answer to the question, currently there are 29 students in period 7, which they take me for a ride every day. It's been quite an adventure, but it's been big fun and I think they're getting a lot out of it and so am I as well. Uh, and I don't know the registration for next year. I think it's last number I heard was 25. So I think for one section um which is I think what Julie can fit

093in with the FTE that we currently have for Spanish at the middle school which is only 0.5. We'd love to see that be full-time, right? But currently it's 29 this year. I think there are 25 kids on the list for next year. May, what happens with an eighth grader that doesn't choose to take algebra one in eighth grade? They will not ever be able to pick it up because it's not offered in high school. It is offered in high school. They would pick it up as a freshman. So, so an eighth grader who doesn't do this can still get algebra 1, correct? Okay. This just puts them on a fast track to being able to access. Would there be any restrictions with current class sizes in the high school? Like would an eighth grader not

094be able to take that class if or is this just an eighth grade class that is being offered if there's 20? I mean, if we have five eighth graders, are we going to offer a class in the high school for this or are they going to be integrated? We would look at FTE discussions and that if there's only five kids, we might not be able to offer it. But okay, so this is meant to be like an actual eighth grade class that would be offered at it wouldn't be integrated in with the high schoolers necessarily. Correct. It would be at the junior high or at the middle school. Okay. Thank you. Dumb question. In our current model, if we don't do this and we're switching to algebra one freshman and then whatever sophomore Jer sophomore,

095algebra 2 junior, you'll never no one would ever take calculus in. can't get to calculus. You can't get to calculus unless you take algebra 1 and eighth grade. See, you'd either have to take calculus at the same time. So, not necessarily because they can be taking AP Calc alongside of other classes. Drag in AP Cal. Well, tell them how it's set up now. No, the way now it's integrated math, it's different. Correct. Yeah. The new curriculum though that we're talking about would be algebra 1, geometry, algebra 2, and then dri. So it almost Are you saying that it almost seems like we should just be offering algebra one? It seems like if we're not doing this, how are kids taking AP Cal? Yeah. Yeah. And and I will just say the whole reason I'm a

096mathematician is because I took I feel dumb. I feel like I'm missing something. No, that's what I was like that's why I asked the question. The reason I became a mathematician is I took algebra 1 in eighth grade and that's where my love of like upper level mathematics came in. So I you that's why I asked the question because I didn't know we weren't doing that already here. Well, we're still in integrated so we're trying to move to that, right? That's what I mean. It's it's such a valuable like that algebra that that that higher order math is such a valuable class. I don't think we intend to limit it to one class, but as we get started and build our capacity, build students up. Certainly, it would be our goal that that a majority

097of students could take algebra in 8th grade. Yeah, I like that a lot. It's also possible if you had a smaller number, they could walk over to the high school and take it, right? Potentially. Yeah. The challenge with that is the block scheduling. Yeah. But that's what I did. You know, it's possible. There's ways around this. And you turned out okay. Yeah. Sometimes There'd be there'd be some logistics to work out. I'm sorry. What was that, Matt? There'd be some logistics to work out, obviously. But if you have the demand for this, it's good problem to have. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. So, we're okay. We We figured out that you can actually take calculus if we do this. But if we don't, I don't know why we're offering calc, which is confusing to me. But they're

098taking it combined. So, let's just do it and then I don't have to think about it. Okay. Any other questions for Matt? Well, Hold on one sec. Let's just finish up with the board since we're doing this backwards and I'll come back to you guys. No, nothing else. Okay. Community, please. Who would like to speak first? Randy, come on up. Uh Randy Radkey, high school teacher. Um, currently eighth graders right now can take um, high school credit classes. They are taking Spanish one. They do take integrated math one at the middle school. The one thing that you guys want to think about if you're allowing eighth graders to start taking graduation uh high school credits is what's that going to do with our graduation um requirements at the high school. we have lots of people

099that early grad now um increasing those you're going to have juniors that are going to be eligible to graduate high school. So just something to think about that's a little bit bigger that you haven't heard yet tonight. Thank you again Morrison. Um I'm gonna speak on behalf of doing this. I think that we really should because if we don't transcript those credits when they get to college and they're applying and they have Spanish 2, they have to have Spanish 3 then also because they don't have 2 years of high school language if we don't transcript what they took in 8th grade. So that starts with Spanish because that's already going. But for algebra, for um if we get a French teacher or we allow them to take culinary, it does really also open up their

100opportunity to take more courses through our AP courses or through the Montana Digital Academy where they can do even more dual enrollment. And if we encourage students to do the dual enrollment, there is a trend across the nation where students are graduating with darn near an associate degree, if not already an associate degree. So if we can provide that for our students or at least their core courses before they graduate high school, then we set them on a good trajectory to incur less debt in college. That's it. Thank you. Say one other thing. I think it does give us some positive kudos with the public with the uh uh you know, we're looking for ways to have better recognition. So, this is one of those things that I think would set us up a little

101bit better than where we've been. Okay. My name is Jamie Swinson. Uh, I have a daughter currently taking Spanish. She's also in the integrated math class. Um, we're on in the understanding that that will not be given high school credit. Um, one because it's all changing next year. two because the other teacher that's teaching it is not accredited to teach the high school level class. However, my daughter is also in the Spanish class with Mr. Layman who is a high school teacher and is accredited to teach high school classes. And so my daughter's concern is is next year going in she will have already taken Spanish one. She will be in Spanish 2. Yes, she intends on taking Spanish three. She's an overachiever. that's why she's in Spanish one right now. However, she would really,

102really, really appreciate you guys giving her that high school credit this year. So, I think there's a few of us parents here who have kids that are currently in Spanish one and it was kind of portrayed to them that they were going to be given credit for this when it's leaning towards that not being the case. had she not been I mean she probably wouldn't have taken it had she known she wasn't going to get high school credit for it. She could do a lot of other things her eighth grade year. Well, it's too early to tell yet. You'll know here in a minute once we vote. Okay. We can I can counter those promises, but we'll see. I mean, so that is something you're voting on though is for the current eighth grade Spanish

103class to receive high school credit. Trey says no. Others say yes. Yeah. No, next year. For next year. It's for next year, right? Uh, this year is not grandfathered in this year. That would be okay. Because the one says current Spanish and then it says next year algebra. So I I wasn't sure. That's how I was reading it. So does the kid that didn't have that drew the wrong teacher for math is screwed and the other one gets it. That seems pretty inequitable. Math doesn't get math. It's just for Spanish one. This is about Spanish. Henry had Spanish one twice because he was that's the way the electives fell in high school. Couldn't he have this high school credit for it? He was willing to do it. We'll have to change our motion. I don't

104think that's what was presented to us or is that just not the way it was presented? I think it's a different it's a different agenda. I think it's a different conation. What was the intent of this map? The proposal for next year, but what about situations for this year? The intent is for Spanish one this year and for algebra 1 starting next year. Okay. It does say current Spanish next year algebra. Okay. Yeah. All right. Do we have any other questions for Matt? I think we have to re I do too. I think we need to add the retroactively to just because the school year is almost over. That's to me when I read that motion is for next year. Yeah, I took it the same way, Trey, until I saw that like little like

105kind of note. So, I do think I agree. I think we need to word it like retroactively for Spanish and next year for algebra ones. Is that it? Spanish and algebra. Are there any other classes being taught by a teacher at the eighth grade level that's certified to teach something that's at the high school? They're going to come to us next month and say, "I want college. I want high school credit for that because you guys pass that motion." Not to my knowledge. That's the buyer beware part of it probably because it says just it's a current example. I don't want to put words in Matt's mouth, but I I think the motion is just to approve for any courses that we offer that a teacher that we deem appropriate going forward when there's a

106high school certified teacher teaching teaching eth graders that we would consider giving high school credit. for example, algebra 1, Spanish, and maybe down the road there's a science class you want to offer or maybe there's a I don't know, English class or something that you could you could then add those to that repertoire, but the motion is just to approve the concept, not the specific courses, right? So that year, is this for next year or is this for this year? Well, the motion should include the details. It says in the details doesn't say current example Spanish one new year's example. Yeah, I think we're getting in the weeds because I they they said they only have Spanish currently set up with an accredited teacher. Algebra isn't. So I think what they're saying is once we

107get or have the ability to set up any um class that's taught by an accredited teacher, then we could add it to this. So the only one that's currently eligible is Spanish one, but we need to change the motion to rec. Correct. So we just need to change the motion. So who made the motion? Was it me? Yes. One public comment. Sorry. Sure. Again, Mark Layman teach Spanish at both the middle school and the high school. And just to be clear, I have been teaching at the high school. This is my 16th year. Taught high school full-time for 10 years. I've been at the middle school now. This is my sixth year. It's the first year we've offered this the year-long course of advanced Spanish course. And this year currently, I'm teaching u a Spanish

108one course at the high school and then this course at the middle school in addition to the Spanish three students that I'm also teaching. But um so I go from the high school in the morning where I've just taught Spanish one to the middle school in the afternoon where I'm teaching the exact same curriculum, same rigor, same pace, same common assessments, same expectations. They have to achieve a certain level of proficiency. And so the this the eighth graders this year that are taking this course are being held to the exact same standard as those at the high school. Just to be clear about that. Thank you. Okay. So, so who had the second motion and who the second you didn't you? Yeah, that was you. So, I guess I revoke my motion. Revoking motions. Strike

109it from the record and then we need a modified motion to continue. Would it be to how are we going to say this then? You can say it the same. Just register and activate. It just say 425. Okay. I move to approve students to receive high school course credit for classes taken at the middle school for school year be retroactively for the school year 2024 to 2025 when aligned with courses offered at the high school and taught by a teacher with the appropriate endorsements. I'll second. We have a motion and a second. Is there any further discussion or comment about the modified motion? Carrie, can you read that one back? She I wrote it down. She said she added retroactively for 2024 2025. I thought she was going to add it at the end. So,

110I was waiting to add it at the end and so I didn't when you did it I was like what? All right. But then what we've done is we've eliminated we have limited ourselves to 2024 2025 and we haven't said that it will take place in the future. No, it's retroactively starting in 2024 2025 school year. So she moved to approve students to receive high school course credits for classes taken at the middle school retroactively starting in 2024 2025 when alive when aligned with courses offered at the high school and taught by a teacher with appropriate endorsements. You okay with that one? I think she taught English or something. I know. I was looking. They been telling me. Okay. Goes back to a vote. All in favor of the motion as stated say I. I.

111All oppose. Same sign. I. Motion passes six to one. We got to word stuff better. Item number nine, consider new course proposal for creative pathways or statistic expression. Do we have a motion to continue? I move to approve the new high school uh course proposal for special education visual arts with the course title creative pathways artistic expression. I second. Have a motion in a second. Matt, do you want to talk about this at all? Yeah, it's a course that was brought to us um in conjunction with special education teacher and a vis and an arts teacher to offer art classes to students um that might have diverse needs with some different accommodations and modifications and [Music] um adaptations to art. Okay. Do we have any public questions or comments from Matt on this? Seeing none,

112comes back to the board. Board questions or comments. I'm just curious what what we think the value what what value are we getting out of this? Students that uh have specific disabilities uh might need a different level of differentiation for art classes and this would offer them that chance. Is there any um can you share any examples of that or if I was an art teacher? probably, but I'm not. How many students will take advantage of this program? Uh, through the special education department, how many do you think? Think they had enough sign up to run a full section next year. Oh, okay. Really? What grade level are we talking about? Freshman, sophomore, junior, senior. That wasn't specified in here. Just high school level. So, anybody could take it. And will they get credit for

113it? Half a credit. Is a half credit in here? Is this will this be taught by a current teacher that we have or is this an extra? It would be co-taught between this uh special education teacher and the art teacher. So the cost is just the teaching salary and the $1,000 annually for art, supplies, and materials. Yes, sir. And you have good demand. Any other questions? [Music] Somewhere do we put in that it's a half credit? It's listed on the front new course proposal form that's attached but so we supporting document. We don't have to put it in motion and if it's no because we have the new course proposal form. So your school board chair will sign off on that form. There's a place. Okay. believe it comes back to a vote. All in

114favor of approving the new course proposal for creative pathways say I. I. I. All oppose. Same sign. Motion carries. Seven to nothing. Item number 10, revisions to board policy 3210. Do we have a motion to continue? I move to adopt revisions to policy 3210, equal education, opportunity, non-discrimination, and sex equity. I'll second. We have a motion in a second. Uh let's see. Dee, did you want to talk about this at all? Yeah, these next couple of policies are um we had um Thomas's names written in the policy. So, we want to move away from writing a person's name, write uh the you know the title and then we created um generic email accounts for title 9 and for 504 coordinator that will go to whoever in the district. So like the Title N coordinator email

115will go to me and Trey and so we'll be able to pick up on those and then and then move forward with any Title N um investigations that we need to do. We did that on purpose. It means Thomas can't leave us and we have but it didn't work. So apparently our our sneaky trick did not work. So uh that's the only change to the policy. That seems to be the same for all of those. Yeah, that's the only thing that's changed. Yep. Nothing else changed. I don't So 10, 11, 12, and 13 are all No, not 13. So we could conceivably do 101. We could do 10, 11, 12. If I change the motion, just go through them. Will you change your motion? Just go through it. Okay. I resend the motion. And who's

116the new one? No, we were just gonna Well, she rescended it. Okay, we're going to go through them. So, I move to adopt revisions to policy 3210, 3225, and 5010. Do I have to say them all? No. Equal education opportunity non-description and sex equity. Sexual harassment of students and equal employment opportunity non-description and sex equity. I end of motion. Yeah, we have a motion in a second. Does anyone in the board have any questions or comments on these three policies? Rocky. Oh, I'm sorry. Any public questions or comment? Seeing none, it comes back to the board. Any last chance? Any questions or comments before it comes back to a vote? All in favor of Mary Ellen's motion to accept all three policy changes, say I. I. I. All oppose. Same sign. Motion carries seven to

117nothing. And item number 13, revisions to policy 7336. Do we have a motion to continue? I move to approve revisions to policy number 7336 P1, travel allowances and expenses. I'll second. Motion and a second. Uh Dee, did you want to talk about this at all? We're gonna let Thomas have one last harrah here real quick. Um so the state MCA updated their travel rates. So this is just aligning if you look at the instate travel uh updated the policy there. We took the out of state travel column out because it also in the MCA refers to the GSA rates. So, if we have employees going out of state travel, they would just refer go on to the website, refer to the GSA rates and um select where they're going and then it'll tell you what

118the predium is for that. So, that's the changes there. This is based off of the bill that just passed, right? The one that's going to be No, this is just off of this is the the month. Yeah. MCA change that. So when they when they have pass this new bill that's going through that's going to be adjusting employee travel overnight travel then we'll have to bring this policy back potentially. But I mean it could be sitting in limbo or not get it passed. Yeah. But we need to adopt it because we have people traveling that we need to reflect the current rates at. Okay. You have a half breakfast for 820. I got the right now. Have an orange juice. You have any public com question or comments on this or it comes back to

119the board. Any board questions or comments? Yeah. The comment that we use the GSA amounts everywhere else. And then for instate travel, we give people about half of what's listed on the site. Why? Because that's what the instate I made that same comment to Carrie. It it doesn't seem fair. Um, but that is how the state law writes the the law. It it out specifically outlines the dollar amount for for state employees when we travel. Carrie, is that one of those where if our policy is different and supersedes it or no, we can't do that on that one? We would have to meet the state minimum. I' I could have I'd have to look into that. I know we can pass it, but I think we should meet that because we don't I I will

120tell you if you guys any more fester. I will tell you that nine times out of 10 we don't pay perdm. We send them with a PC card and then they get what they need and they turn in their receipts with their PC card. We very seldom pay perdm anymore. Okay. I' I'd recommend we find the answer out in Yeah, that's why my concern was when it first came up. If they don't take a pec card, part of me is like, let them get the smaller pdeium because we tell them to take the pec card. I'm honory. Okay, I'm buying it for $16 a month and orange juice. They couldn't have traveled with me last week. You can't even go to McDonald's for $16, I don't think, anymore. Oh, okay. Any more questions before we

121take this to a vote? All in favor of approving the revisions to policy 7336. Say I I close. I believe that it's our patience.