001Welcome to the September 8, 2025 meeting of the Great Falls Public Schools Board of Trustees. And uh I remind us all that these meetings are recorded audio and video and will be posted on our website at some point in the future. So keep that in your in the back of your mind. And at this point in time, Mr. Deakons, would you please administer the roll call? >> Thank you. Uh Gordon Johnson >> here. >> Kim Cornagosski >> here. >> Bill Bronson >> here. >> Craig Duff >> here. >> Marley Sunchild >> excused. >> Amy Thompson >> here. >> And Paige Terasi >> here. >> Uh Chairman Johnson, you do have a quorum from which to work. >> Thank you, Mr. Deakons. Um ladies and gentlemen, please rise for the pledge of allegiance. Trusty Duff, would
002you please lead us to the flag of the United States of America and justice for all? >> Thank you. >> Item four, adopting an agenda. Mr. Chair, >> Trustee Terraski, >> I move that we approve the agenda as presented. >> Second. >> Then moved and seconded to adopt the agenda as presented. Any questions or commentary from our board of trustees? Any commentary or question from our gallery here with us this evening? Hearing seeing none, I'll call for the question. All those in favor of the motion, please signify by saying I. I opposed same sign. We have adopted an agenda. Mr. Chairman, >> Trusty Bronson, >> I move that we approve the consent agenda with the exception of item 5A, which I propose to be removed and considered separately under action eight. >> Second. >> Then
003moved and seconded to approve the consent agenda with the extraction of an item to be discussed further under Roman 8. Action other. All those in favor of the motion, please. Excuse me. Any commentary or questions regarding this motion from our board of trustees? Any commentary or questions from our gallery here this evening? Hearing and seeing none for the I'll call for the question. All those in favor of the motion, please signify by saying I. I opposed. Same sign. Motion carries. That brings us to item Roman six, communication, introduction and report of the student representatives. Mr. Boyd, >> welcome Mr. Boyd. >> Good evening, Chairman Johnson, members of our board, Superintendent Hoyer. School's back in session, so we're excited to get our students back up to talk to us about what's going on in their environments.
004Uh tonight uh will be their report for September and we're going to start with CMR going first followed by Paris and then Great Falls High. CMR, come on up. Uh good evening, Chairman Johnson, Superintendent Hoyer, members of the board, and members of the community. Uh my name is Emerson Hammond and I am a senior at CMR. Um this is my third year being a representative. Uh I participate in both cross country and track being all state with a ninth place finish in cross country last season and a fifth place finish in the 3200 at state track last season. Uh in my free time I enjoy spending time with my family collecting shoes and hot wheels and playing the New York Times games. After high school, I plan to major in business and finance or mechanical
005engineering. I haven't decided yet. Um, at a school that I can also run collegiately at. And I'm excited for my last year of sharing about CMR. Good evening, Chairman Johnson, Superintendent Hoyer, members of the board, and members of the community. I'm Lydia Commtock, and I am a junior at CMR. This is my second year being a representative and I'm going into my first year of being the representative for the Montana Board of Public Education. I play cello and I sing soprano and choir which I will be attending all state for. And in addition to that, I love speech and debate and I spent part of my summer at the national speech tournament. Um, the remainder of my summer I spent studying in Nepal and I love to bake, read, travel, scrapbook, spend time with my
006family and my many, many pets. After high school, I plan to study policy and political science so that I can eventually work in foreign service. And I'm so excited to share CMR with you this year. Good evening, Chairman Johnson, Superintendent Hoyers, members of the board, and members of the community. My name is Addy Christ, and I'm a sophomore at Cummar. So, this is my first this is my first year as a student representative here. Um, I'm a three sport athlete competing in cross country, swimming, and track. I qualified for state in both cross country and swimming last year and lettered in these sports as well. I also play the viola in which I'll be attending the All State Festival for the second time this year and hoping to return to the All Northwest Orchestra for
007the second time as well next year. In my free time, I love creating art, playing music, and spending time with my family and being outside. I love to hike, climb, repel, and be out on the lake during the summer. And I enjoy skiing and pond hockey in the winter. After high school, I plan to major in music performance and get a degree in biomedical research at an out of state university. I also started a project recently called the Encore program and I'm kind of revamping this program and it's going to help bring more music to our community and um more instruments to our schools. I'm super excited to work with Emerson and Lydia and sharing exciting things happening at CMR this year. Okay, so we have our foreign exchange students. Um here um first we
008have Jovana who's from Brazil and she's not here right now. Um she's excited to experiments Christmas and snow in the United States and she also loves watching soccer and hanging out with her friends. So who we do have here is Prim from Thailand. Welcome. >> So, my name is Prim and my first name and my last name is Puritzi. It's quite long and hard to pronounce, but yeah. So, I'm exchange student from Thailand and I'm go to CMR as a junior this year. Um, I hope to get a chance to try it out for basketball in this winter and I'm really excited for American holidays and homecoming because I heard a lot of them and I wish I have a wonderful year this year. >> Well, welcome. Happy to have you here. >> Um, finally,
009our last foreign exchange student is from Spain. His name is Jacobo and he is excited for big school events, specifically homecoming. Um, he loves soccer as well and is a swing player on both our JV and varsity teams at Seymour. >> Nice to meet you. >> Nice to have you here. [Music] Okay, so now we have our first lesson that we love. Um, in Mr. Hibbert's honors chemistry class, students experimented with aluminum and copper 2 chloride in their first lab. They were able to experiment and identify chemical and physical changes of these substances while learning about single displacement reactions. This was a fun and interesting lab that was a great way to start off the school year and learn what honors chemistry is all about. Um we had some community in our service and even
010though the school year has just begun, students are already getting involved in the community. Students along with a local church helped clean up Seymour campus before school started. And we also had orchestra students volunteer at the Luminary Walk. All right. Um for our next lesson we loved uh Mr. Halverson's AP government classes have been full of chatter as students debate the constitutionality of proposed 28th amendment. Uh some argue for freedom of speech and others for the future of democracy. With each new perspective, they're becoming more politically literate and excited to engage. We're only a week into the school year and sports have already begun. Golf was the first to kick off in Anaconda uh with Brooklyn Brooklyn Hegaman and Jack Pinsky placing first in both the girls and boys respectively. The Belgrade invite also took
011place last week with half of the players placing top 10. Uh soccer faced off against Billings Sky View on August 29th and most recently had their first cross town of the season with both boys and girls ending in 1-1 ties. Uh cross country was in Cutbank on the 29th and Belgrade on the 5th shaking off the rust from the summer and showing off some new fitness. Football started on the 29th with a win against the defending state champs Helena Capital and they played in Missoula against Sentinel on the 4th. Volleyball has started off strong, defeating both Callis Bell schools on August 30th, Helena Capital on the 2nd, and sweeping the East West Crossover tournament at CMR this past weekend. Good job, Russells. Uh, another lesson we loved in Mr. Hibbert's AP chemistry class. Students got
012to review the spectr photoometer they practiced on last year in honors chemistry. Using different dilutions of blue dye number one, they ran each sample through the spectr photoometer and recorded the absorbance and transmittance of each. Uh the students created a calibration curve graphing the negative logarithm of transmittance which is also absorbance versus concentration. The slope of the line will help determine the concentration of an unknown sample. This is a good way to review concepts from the previous year. Um the annual high school house groundbreaking is on Thursday, September 11th. We are so proud of all of our students and the work they do in this community. This is one of our favorite traditions. Uh the speech and debate team had their first meeting of the year for freshmen to meet upper classmen and get an
013introduction to the program. Kids are excited to start the season off on October 25th. BPA also had their first meeting of the year. New students learned from current members and treats were enjoyed by all. It's exciting to see all of our CMR clubs kick off the new school year. Good evening again, Chairman Johnson, Superintendent Hoyer, and members of the board. Another lesson that we loved was in Mrs. Rollins AP statistics class. Students were learning about dot plots, stem plots, and histograms. To gather some data, students were instructed to count the number of pairs of shoes they had at home. This led to a set of data that was unique. The students put the data into each of three types of graphs and determined whether the variable was discreet or continuous. The CMR performing arts department
014has been busy. The drama department held auditions and released the official cast for their upcoming production of the Adams family. Choir students have already started preparing their performance for homecoming week and orchestra students have been fundraising all summer for their trip to the National Festival in San Francisco. In addition to that, all of the students in the music programs waited anxious anxiously over the summer to see who made it to All State. Congratulations to all the students who made All State and the Adams family cast. While most students were at home, student government members came to school early on the first day. They helped give tours to freshmen and transfer students and present important information about school rules and traditions. What a great start to the new year. Another lesson that we loved, or I
015guess an ongoing lesson, was in Miss Ingamman's honors English 56 class. They have been enjoying a new daily ritual. Most days from now until the end of the year, they get to start off class by writing for 5 minutes about an interesting interesting prompt. They wrote about new beginnings, things that brought them joy, and the brave ones went totally off script. It's such a great way to improve writing over time and encourage creativity. And finally, we have wrestler bride. The beginning of the school year is always full of excitement, and the first day assembly was full of fun because of the hard work of the pep band, ROC, cheerleaders, wranglers, and upper classmen with meets, matches, games, and so much more. We can't wait to see what the upcoming year holds. We are so proud
016of our students, old and new, as they take on the year with positive attitudes. They are wrestler pride. And that concludes our presentation. Thank you. Thank you. Good evening, Chairman Johnson, Superintendent Hoyer, Trustees, and members of the community. My name is Aspen Logani. I'm a senior at Paris Education Center and I'm here to present to you today. For the first few days of school, Paris Gibson students and staff spent time building relationships, attending seminars filled with fun and games. We started this school year off with 55 new students, and these first impressions really matter. The Indigenous Education Department set up our beautiful lounge this week. Students did the heavy lifting under the direction of staff. Students learned about pole placement and the order of operations along with how to place the canvas on the pool
017structure. Students also practice the many replicas in the classrooms to solidify their skills. Students learned the beautiful story of how pearls are formed with chemistry and biology. The popular science seminar results in students walking away with a piece of pearl jewelry. This is the one that I made. I attended the seminar and I thought it was very intriguing and fun. I learned a lot about how pearls are formed and the rarity of them. Good evening, Chairman Johnson, Superintendent Hoyer, trustees and member of the community. My name is Caitlyn Mccclur. I'm a junior at Paris Gibson Education Center. In the intro to beating where math and art meet. Well, let me try. In the world of beating, math and art meet and students learn to make wearable art with simple mathematical patterns. All students start with
018a lesson in making earrings and then later advance to loom beading or other more technical patterns of their choice. So far, we have three blood drives planned this year. Our first one starts on September 27th, 9:00 a.m. to 2:00 p.m. And our next two will happen in winter and spring. Anybody who plans to donate at these blood drives can call Judy at 4062686600 to reserve a time to donate. Thank you and have a happy school year. >> Thank you. Good evening, Chairman Johnson. Sorry, I just came from cross country. I'm a little a little tired. Uh, Superintendent Hoyer, trustees and members of the community. My name is Seth Royer and I'm a senior at Griffals High finally and and I get to start off our September board report. Starting off with our senior sunrise. um
019our Gville High seniors kicked off the great year with a bit of a cloudy senior sunrise, but I was able to get a picture of it peeking over the school right there. Uh it was a beautiful early start to the school year, so big thanks to everyone involved and all the people that showed up to make this event really special. Uh our staff and admin had a back to school breakfast full of blueberry and chocolate chip pancakes, sausage, and eggs. This is a great way to show respect for all they do in the Great Falls High community. What a great way to kick off the school year for them. Next up is our Bison Beginnings. Uh, Griffals High had Bison Beginnings on the first day of school with our freshman and new students getting to
020school at 8:00 for a day of instruction on tradition and finding their classes. A huge thanks goes out to all the StuCo and teachers who help the first day go smoothly. Uh, after the senior sunrise, I get to watch a couple freshmen walking to school at 8, and I feel really happy. Uh fall fall sports are already in full swing with volleyball, soccer, and football all having games already. I'm pretty sure soccer's already at cross town and I don't know how that went. Um but hopefully I don't know. Is it tie? That makes everybody happy. Okay. Um cross country's had a couple meets and we're scoring pretty highly which is fun. And all of our student athletes are doing really great and we're so proud of them. Hopefully you all get the chance to come
021out and support the bison. And I'm going to hand it off to Caitlyn now. >> Good evening, Chairman Johnson, Superintendent Hoyer, trustees of the board, and members of the community. My name is Caitlyn Fulbright, and I'm a junior at Great Falls High, and I'll be continuing our presentation. This year, Great Falls High is doing something different in the past years with our cheer and dance team. They have decided to all join together and become a spirit squad that works together to bring the school spirit and show inclusion. This is they still have their own identities, but when it comes to cheering on our sports teams and dancing during halftimes, they combine during pep assemblies and school events. We are excited to see how this new transition goes as a spirit squad. Our 2025 royalty candidates
022have been chosen for this year. Congratulations to Luke Allen, Coulter Devos, Jericho J, Michael Lamir, Braden Williams, Eliana Frank, Eva, Eevee Green, Alleta Hagen, Brie McDonald, and Aya Wood. Our 2025 homecoming things have also been picked. Monday is me Monday. Tuesday is dress like a teacher and students dress like student or teachers. Wednesday is class themes. Juniors are reality TV. Juniors are animated, sophomores are fantasy, and freshman are sitcoms. On Thursday, it's our traditional dress classy day to watch the homecoming candidates perform. And on Friday is bison pride. Some of our teachers at Great Falls High have been hosting are going to host trips to Italy, France, and the Galapagos. This will be a great opportunity for our students to get out and see what the world has to offer. Good evening, Chairman Johnson's, superintendent
023Hoyer, trustees, members of the community. My name is Weston Stole. I'm a 10th grader at Great Falls High School and I will and I'm happy to finish this presentation for you. All Northwest Choir for the year 2025 through 2026, Great Falls High Delian Choir got invited to a and asked to sing for the 15th time to represent high school choir talent. This year, Delphian will travel to Tacoma, Washington. Good job, Delphian, and good luck. Science teachers Mike Hodes and Matt Cray Cray had their geology club featured in a rock and gem magazine August edition. The article focused on how two teachers got into geology, the process that they have used, and how the club has sparked students interest in geology. Great job, Hodes and Craya, for inspiring students within the classroom. A lesson we love.
024Miss Wild's general physics junior po posing with their boats before hitting the water. They brought creativity, teamwork, and a little bit of bison spirit to the Great Falls High pool. History of Great Falls High. The news article from 1998 about Great Falls High. Here are some things you might not know about. The school the school day went from 9:00 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. If you disturbed the school day, it was a misdemeanor and you could get fined from $10 to $100. People were between the ages of 6 to 21 for the entire school district. If you if you vandalized the school, you would need to fix it or you would be expelled um till you fix till you fixed it. High school costs $3 a month for non-residents and a no subject less than three
025candidates were allowed to be taught. These are just a few of the of the neat history facts about Great Falls High. And a big thanks to Great Falls High Tribune and newspaper.com for this page. Remember to follow us on Facebook and Instagram to stay up on date on all the awesome things we do at Great Falls High. Thank you. >> Thank you. Well, I have to say that hearing about cheer and dance, track and field, homecoming royalty, geology club, building boats, we're all quite jealous, aren't we? It sounds like a lot of fun that you guys are having. And so, we're so proud of what you're doing and thank you for those reports. Moving on, communication. Item B, superintendent's report. Mrs. Hoyer. Well, >> thank you, Chairman Johnson, members of the board, members of our
026community. That is incredibly difficult to follow these amazing young students as they represent not only our district um but their school and our community, and we're really, really proud of them. It was fun to see. And I'd like to know whose boat it was that was upright in the water. We'll have to ask Mrs. Wilds whose boat that was. Wasn't any of yours, was it? No. >> Okay. Okay. So before we begin, just a couple of changes um to let you know. First of all, behind you, that is our future home of Character Strong. So um our carpenters were in here today and they began the work on putting that up. It'll pretty soon have a wooden trim around it and it'll be painted and covered. Um and then Mr. Cornick from over at Paris
027is helping us out with the labeling of Character Strong. And so as our elementary students come forward and talk, we'll be putting things up there for you to see. So we're really excited about that. And then there are going to be some holidays between now and our next board meeting or this month that I will be highlighting next board meeting. Um we will have Constitution and Citizenship Day coming up. That is on the 17th of this month. Just as a reminder, it's uh 238 years old. Our our constitution is American Indian Heritage Day is on the 26th of this month. And then Freedom Week um wraps up this month with the 22nd through the 26th. More to come on that, but a thank you in advance to Miranda Murray. She is doing a fantastic job
028organizing all sorts of information, and I'll show you some of the cool things that we're going to be pushing out to teachers. So, a celebration. Um, this summer, Mr. Ty Moore was um recognized as the 2025 administrator of the year for Shape Montana. SHAP is the Society for Health and Physical Education. Mr. Morris here this evening and I'm just going to have him wave because he's had a long day as the principal of Sack Jia Elementary for us. Um he was recognized for his support of health and physical education at the local level and for exemplifying the highest standards and accomplishment, innovation and leadership as our outstanding administrator of the year. So Mr. Moore, congratulations. >> You're here. A very special thank you to our community. Last time that I visited with you, I shared
029how our gener generous community donors provided meals to our new teachers and our specialists. This meeting, we get to thank our generous community donors who provided swag for the welcome bags. And look at all of those individuals and those companies that came together and um gave Becky Nelson goodies to put in the purple Mother Puffers bags that our new staff took home. There were some really cool things from coupons for um free ice cream and Voyagers tickets. There was I think a pizza cutter in there and some barbecue shears. There were gift certificates. There was hand sanitizer. um you name it, it was in there and we couldn't say welcome in a more wonderful way um without the help of our community. They really stepped up and wrapped their arms around our newest employees. So,
030very special thank you to them. Staffing um wanted to update you as we continue to move through staffing. So, we have 17 total teacher openings right now. Um, plus two long-term substitutes that are in positions in, I believe, a world language. I'm looking over at Mr. Decon's world language and family consumer science. Um, but special education, we still have 16 openings. It's important to note that nine of those have been open for over a year. So, it's not like we had 16 just last year. This is kind of a compounding effect of that. And then we have one elementary counselor opening. I'm hoping that Mrs. Mainwearing and I have a lead on perhaps an elementary counselor. Um, a member of our community who left us for a job in a larger urban setting um, emailed
031us a wonderful email and told us he didn't realize how much they would miss our school system and they're looking to get back to Great Falls. And so we're keeping our fingers crossed that he pursues a conversation with the OPI and maybe we can have another elementary counselor in our ranks. So, we're excited about that possibility. So, you heard about the high school house groundbreaking. Really is cool. So, Emerson, I would agree with you. It's a pretty amazing event um to go to to see the house that is at ground level with not much there. I think our foundation is poured um and we have starting to put some walls up, but we'll see it there all the way to um a walk-in ready home for a family in the spring. So, we will celebrate
032that on September 11th. we will um kick that day off. But then we also are going to be doing a business after hours because we're members of our chamber of commerce and we're going to highlight Lewis and Clark Elementary's inclusive community playground. Um this is a celebration because we received a community block development grant to help us with that playground, but we also partnered with MSDB to make this inclusive. So fingers crossed on Thursday, September 25th, 4 to 6, um everybody is welcome. Please join us as we cut the ribbon on this. Um, I believe your husband's probably going to be racing people down slides, Mrs. Jake, because those are quite the slides for the kids over at Louiswis and Clark. It's really cool. Uh, and we will be serving milk and cookies, which is
033a little bit of a divergence for um other business after hours events in our community. Um, but please join us for this celebration. We are looking forward to showing off our newest playground and and welcoming students to play on it and and learn. So I have two data for the day um slides that I want to share with you. And the first one is when you're looking at our buses and the amount of busing that we do and the number of miles um that we travel. So we have 25 IDA so individual um our individuals with disabilities and education act. So our special education assist routes throughout our district. We have 42 general routes. We have two type E vans. For those of you who have seen the minivans driving around town, a school bus
034on the back, that's what we're talking about. We make eight midday runs for students who need to have a compressed or shortened schedule in the middle of the day. There are 68 drivers. Four of them did not return to us, but the cool thing is is that Big Sky Bus Lines added 12. And so, we're on the positive side there. All of those vehicles and those 68 drivers combine to drive 4,989 miles per day on average. Um, for each driver, that's about 73. And we say that about 73 because some of them do multiple routes. Some of them um have some other things that they do for us. Uh you roll that into the year 871,844 miles per year to serve our 700 7,932 students who are eligible. This is for the runs that they're
035on, but this also includes our athletes for the trips um and our school events um that are on our buses. Um as a reminder, there is the state law where we have to have safety drills for every student who is in our school who could possibly be on a bus. And so that's everybody at any given time. Um you have to do them two times a year whether they ride to and from school or not. So we did our first one already and then they'll do the second one at the start of second semester. And our last data for the day deals with athletics. So I started collecting this because I know we like to see a 3 to 5year trend. So this was last year moving forward. Um you'll see some adjustments to my
036numbers. So with high school football, we're starting or holding pretty steady with about 228 kids um down just one from last year. Volleyball is also holding steady. Um cross country is down just a few but not much. Um so boys soccer and girls soccer too is is holding steady this year. Our girls is down just a tad. Our golf numbers however are up. When you look at pep band last year when I shared this with you um I shared that there are 266 students in pep band. Those are the students that are eligible to play in pep bands. The ones that are actually showing up are the ones that I showed this year which is 167. So it's not that we have any less students. That's about what we had last year. But these are
037the kids showing up after hours to celebrate their peers and their schools. Um and they turn the tide. they're, you know, they're in charge of really momentum swings um along with the cheerleaders and the spirit and the dance. So when you look at the cheerleaders, um you might see that there's a little bit of a drop in cheerleaders, but that's bumped up by the number of spirit and dance. Some of that's due to the realignment at Great Falls High. Um JOTC, last year we only counted color guard. And then I got thinking, you know, we have more than color guard with JOTC. We have our um students who do the archery shooting. We have the students who compete doing the esports. Um, we have the students who do the trivia. We have a whole bunch
038of students. So, in all, 91 of our JOTC students are involved in some capacity beyond just their studies. And that's a total of 962 students. I'll be drilling down into that a little bit more with middle school as those numbers come in and sharing that with you. But, um, our students are involved in Great Falls and it gives them a connection to school in a very special way. So, thank you to all of the coaches um who coach, the administrators who supervise, but most of all to all those students who go out and make the most of their high school experience. With that, that is my report for this evening. Thank you. >> Thank you. >> Communication C, audience communication. I have received no requests to speak before this board of trustees this evening and
039that enables us to move on to Roman 7 which is action items. But before that I would like to offer uh our student reps the opportunity to leave and do what it is you guys do so well. And thank you again for sharing the details of your first couple weeks of school with us. So, we look forward to seeing you again in two weeks. Thank you. One more, Jack. >> Action item A, initial startup costs for baseball as a Great Falls Poker Schools sport. Mr. Boyd. Good evening again. >> First 101,000 from the foundation uh and Stephanie's team and the foundation to our accounts for the schools uh so that they're able to build uh a baseball program with Mr. Henterburgg for the spring of 2026. Uh noting that there is a second fundraising goal
040that accounts for all of the travel uh and coaching salaries for the second part of the year and then two other goals that happen every January after that. Uh but this will be allow us to get the equipment and the uniforms and everything that needs to get done well before January uh and process and work. So, I would request that you approve uh the 101,000 to move from the foundation uh into our general fund accounts for baseball. >> Thank you, Mr. Boyd. >> Mr. Chair, >> Trusty Traski, >> I move that we approve the acceptance of 101,000 in startup costs for high school baseball from the Great Falls Public Schools Foundation and approve baseball as a Montana High School Association sport for the 2025 2026 school year. >> Second. been moved and seconded to move
041the $101,000 startup cost for baseball from the foundation to the general fund. Any uh questions or commentary from our board of trustees? Any questions or commentary from our remaining gallery hearing? And seeing none, I'll call for the question. All those in favor of the motion, please signify by saying I. I oppose. Same sign. Motion carries. Thank you, Mr. Boyd. Action item B, trustees as voting delegates to the Montana School Board Association Delegate Assembly at the Montana Conference of Educational Leadership. And as it stands, those uh of us who are attending in person uh Mel and Helena in October will be uh Trusty Bronson, Trustees Konagoski, and myself. By virtue of us three being those ones in attendance, I would propose that we then serve as voting delegates to General Assembly. Mr. Chair, >> Trustes Gerans,
042>> I move to accept the appointments of the three trustees just listed to be delegates for the Montana School Board As Association Delegate Assembly. Second >> been moved and seconded to appoint um Trusty Bronson, Trustees Scornagoski, and myself as voting delegates at the MEL conference coming in October. Any questions or commentary from our board of trustees? Any commentary from our gallery? One fewer already. My goodness. And uh I'll call for the question. All those in favor of the motion, please signify by saying I. I >> oppose. Same side. Motion carries. Thank you. We promise to represent you well. Action item C, school psychologist compensation 2016 2017. Mr. Deakons. >> Good evening again, Chairman Johnson, members of the board, Superintendent Hoyer, and members of our community. Um, I'm here tonight to let Heather Spursom, our interim
043director, get a little experience and see how the conversation goes here. So, I'll be presenting this um with our school site colleges compensation package that we have for 202527. It is a handbook CDA. Um but I'll walk you through what those pieces look like. There are 12 individuals in that particular group. They are licensed and certified as school psychologists. Um, all of these are required under special education law and necessary for us to do our business within Great Falls Public Schools, especially with the assessment of children with disabilities. They assist in many other management areas as well throughout the RTI or individual processes as well. Um, when we talk about the fiscal uh implications of this, again, it looks a lot like the teachers because our certified generally does look like the teachers. There's a
0444% increase in 2526 while a 30% increase in 2627. What that means is the approximate budget will be $936,653 and 2526 which is a $36,000 $36,025 increase over the previous year. And then 2627 would be $964,752 with an increase of about $28,99. there is an increase of a longevity stipen like we have done with the other individual certified or licensed groups across the district that they will receive that after year 18. I think there was a question trustee Bronson had asked me earlier just to clarify we keep that similar across all of those. It's after year 16 but on the salary schedule it says step 18 sorry year 18 it said step 18. So just to clarify that that step 18 does mean year keep track of it as it goes by. Just to clarify,
045uh, building coverage, when we're down a position and it's unfilled for the particular school year, there is a $750 sip for that individual taking over for that school. As well, there were a few, um, language changes. When we look at it, the dates, um, again, we've modified to make sure that they say next available business day when it's a particular date in in the handbook. if it's a holiday or specific date in which we do not have school. We have also altered it so that there is a five briement days rather than the three. Um so that's consistent across our district again um with bereavement and then building coverage. we worked closely with them um when they're having that that's at $750 um that does have the stipen that goes along with it but also
046there's a calendar readjustment hours and then the other pieces are the salary schedules that are attached so with that I would ask the district board to approve the two-year psychologist handbook for the 2526 and 2627 school years as presented >> thank you Mr. Akens. >> Mr. Chair, >> Trusty Scorski. >> I move we approve the 2-year school psychologist handbook for the 2025, 2026, and 2627 school years as presented. >> Second. Been moved and seconded to approve the two-year school psychologist handbook for 2526, 26 27. Any questions or commentary? from our board of trustees. Any from our gallery? Hearing and seeing none. Call for the question. All those in favor of the motion, please signify by saying I. >> I. >> Oppose. Same sign. Motion carries. >> Thank you, Mr. Deakons. Action item D, second reading
047of new and revised board policies 2050, 2100 23 35 3310 3416 and 5255. Mrs. Hoyer. Well, thank you, Chairman Johnson, members of the board, and member of our community. Wait, sure. Um, I bring before you the the second reading with the exception of one. I have had no feedback um as of the start of this meeting. So, I would request that you approve policy uh 2050 2100. We will discuss I believe um trustee Bronson will discuss a friendly amendment to 2335 that comes through MTSBA. Um then uh 3141 is written 3310 3655 and 5255 is written. Thank you. >> Thank you >> Mr. Chairman. >> Trusty Bronson. Uh, in accordance with Superintendent Buyer's statement, I move that we approve the policies listed in the agenda report with the exception of amendment to policy 2335 which
048uh I will explain once the motion is second. >> Thank you. >> Second, >> Mr. Chairman, >> Mr. PR uh and this the other trustees may have noticed this. Last week we received an email from director of policy services at MTSBA who noted just through an inadvertent error on his part uh the version of policy 2335 that we considered policy committee level uh is actually somewhat incorrect. uh it includes the phrases sexual orientation, gender, identity twice in the statement should only be included within the policy statutory definition instruction. So for purposes of approving the new policy 2335, the amendment simply strikes sexual orientation and gender identity from page 42 line 14 of your agenda as these are already included within the definition of identity instruction follows that. That's the purpose of the what we need
049to do is we need to uh vote on the amendment part first. come back to proposals as they were appreciated. >> Thank you. So, can I hear a motion to uh address the amendment? >> Mr. Chair, >> trusty Terraski. >> I move that we approve the amendment suggested by Trusty Bronson. >> Second. >> First and second. Uh it's been moved and seconded to approve the amended amendment as the as mentioned by Trusty Bronson. Any commentary or questions from our board of trustees? And thank you for that explanation by the way, Trustee Bronson. Any other commentary? Hearing none, I'll call for the question. All those in favor of the amendment, please signify by saying I. >> I oppose. Same sign. Motion carries. Now on to the remaining policies. So the recommendation as it stands is that
050the board is requested to approve the new and revised and amended board policies 2050 2100 2335 is amended 3141 3310 3416 3655 and 5255. Thank you. >> Thank you. Yeah. >> Uh, Mr. Chair, >> Trusty Tereski, >> I move that we approve new and re revised board policies 2050, 2100, deleted policy 2335, amended policy 2335, 3141, 3310, 3416, 3655, and 5255 as presented. >> Second. moved and seconded to approve the policies as enumerated by trustee Terraski. Any questions or commentary from our board of trustees? Any commentary from our gallery? Hearing none. All those in favor of the motion, please signify by saying I. I >> oppose. Same sign. Thank you very much. Those who work on policy, Mr. Bronson, thank you. Mrs. Hoyer, thank you. Moving on to Roman 8 action other and we did
051have an item pulled. Motion was made by Mr. uh Bronson. I would invite you to elucidate upon uh the change. >> Yes, Mr. Chairman, at this time I will move that we approve minutes of our August 25th, 2025 meeting with the following amendment on page 12 of your agenda packet, lines 40 through 42. Bear with me here for a moment. >> The uh amendment will change the language in lines 43 42 as follows. And I've already provided the text of this to staff. It would simply read, "Motion Paige Teraski, second to Bill Bronson to approve the three-year negotiated contract with Coca-Cola Bottling Company High Country as presented. Motion failed. No votes in favor. Seven opposed." If there's a second, I can then speak to the reason why. >> Second. >> Been moved and seconded. Please
052proceed. >> Thank you, Mr. Chairman. The reason amendment is proposed is that the way the language in the current version of the minutes reads it's technically not what we voted on. We had a positive motion to approve the contract but based upon uh all the considerations that were mentioned meeting all the seven trustees voted against the motion. So it may seem overly technical but for purposes going forward if a positive motion fails you should recognize that record. >> Thank you. I would entertain a motion to amend. >> Very good. Any commentary? Any questions from our board of trustees? Anything from our gallery hearing? And seeing none, all those in favor of the motion, please signify by saying, "I oppose." Same sign. And thank you very much, Mr. Bronson, for that clarification. I think we've got
053that cleaned up. Moving on. Roman nine, reports, discussion, and policies. A, opening of school report and summer school data. Mrs. Maidwearing, welcome. >> Good evening. Thank you for having me, Chairman Johnson, members of the board, Superintendent Hoyer. It is the beginning of the school year and we have a little bit of data and information to share with you about our summer and the start of the school year. So, the first slide that we want to talk about is our enrollment. And if you look at the numbers along the bottom, you will see that uh our numbers are a bit lower than they were last year. Uh, I do want you to note though that the the numbers in the columns on the left, all the columns except the very far right one are from count
054day in October. This information in the last column for 2025 was taken the day after Labor Day. So, we're about a month out from what our count day will be. So, just preliminary information for you, but we are down to aboutund and or so kids. On the next slide, our online enrollment. You know, we um began the Egenuity online school for credit acrruel. Uh at our 7th through 12th grades, we have approximately 76 students enrolled at this time. Some are full-time online, some are a little bit of a hybrid. Um and approximately 30 of those students are new to Great Falls Public Schools. summer school. We had some elementary summer school with summer jump start and this has a literary literacy focus and it's for prek students through entering third graders. Uh we had two
055sites, West and Lewis and Clark this summer from June 10th through July 3rd. So it was a quick full day uh experience for the kids. It was four weeks and all day during those four weeks we had 164 students register and then 131 of them attended. Um certification was sent to OPI from our data center last week and so that'll be that extra quarter A and B for those students. We look at the data from that. Um, in order to qualify for jump start, students had to um score below benchmark uh in the middle of the year on an assessment that we do for students. Um, we also screen or gave that same uh assessment to students at the end of the school year. So when we look at that end of the school year
056assessment and then how they scored on that same assessment again at the end of Jumpstart, 52.53% of them showed growth. during those four weeks. So, as much as we could narrow that down, um over half of them grew. And then that 9% is students who grew, but they also now scored at benchmark for their grade level. So, that's that's good. On the secondary side of the house, we also had summer school. We had more than 163 high school students receive credit. It's just a few less than last year. You're fewer, but um we awarded 271 half credits at the high school level. Um and our indigenous education department had 12 half credits with four students that participated. We also have our virtual academy that we run during the summer. So, we had 263 students enroll
057for summer classes through that platform. It's taught by Great Falls Public Schools teachers and we had 423 half credits. So those students took more than one class. >> Yeah. >> Often great. >> And student services also had extended school year as we do every year. This year we had 114 students that were offered services. 76 students attended 90% or more of the 19-day program in June. and that ran pretty consistently with our um jump start for dates. >> Any questions for Mrs. Mainwearing? >> Trusty Scorioski. >> Uh just a quick question about um summer school opportunities for high school students. Are those numbers just sophomore, juniors, and soon to be like incoming sophomore, junior, seniors, or does that include freshmen as well? >> Freshman as well. >> Okay. Any other questions for Mrs. CS? Trusty
058Thompson, >> I was wondering about the the 30 new online enrollment. Um, are are they from Great Falls or >> They have to be from Great Falls. >> They have Okay. I couldn't remember. Yep. Okay. Thank you. >> Any additional questions? If not, thank you very much for your report. >> Thank you. Moving on to B, first reading of new and revised board policies 1051 FE 3650 and 5430F. Mrs. Hoyer, >> thank you, Chairman Johnson, members of the board. Um the policies that I bring to you this evening on First Street Read um are a fewer than last time. Um but b reflect a lot of change that comes to us from uh legislative updates as MTSBA works to get um the updated language to us. So um starting with uh 1015 FE, if you
059take a look on PA on line 17, that's page 66, line 17, you'll see that there's a strike um from grades 7 through 12. That's a change in funding or not funding but a focus on um career opportunity for grades 6 through 12 that really was a push from um Representative Tilman um as he worked in the legislature. So, we want to be sure we give him a shout out and thank him for that. And then the definition of transformational learning down at the bottom um it is a legal update, but please know that Great Falls Public Schools has historically used this definition of transformational learning. We've been a member of that grant um for years since its inception. um as an approved opportunity to personalize experiences for students. For policy 3650, you will notice
060on lines 9 through 15, page 67, that is a language update per law um that comes to us and it has been codified. So that is um also memorialized on line 15 as well. And again, thank you to Ally for keeping up with all of that in all of the cross references and legal references as well. And then if we move over to 5430F, this is the volunteer agreement form for coach, helpers, aids, and chaperrons. Um, you will notice on line 14 the striking of the word regular on supervised access because it's really hard to define what's regular and what's not regular. We felt that was just an odd word to have in there. Clarify the language in that. And so we um are proposing that we take that out. And so with that, those
061are the first readings of updated policies. Um, again, thank you to the policy committee who works really, really hard on keeping up with all of the legal um, changes to our policies and to Ally for pulling it all together for us. >> Thank you very much. Any questions for Mrs. Hoyer regarding these policies or members of our policy committee? No. Thank you very much for your good work. Reports, discussion, and policy. C. discussion, committee reports, and comments. Miss Thompson. >> All right. I don't have too much. >> I sort of ambushed you there, didn't I? >> That's all right. Sorry. Um, well, first I I want to thank um everyone for our athletic pass that we get. Um, as I always say, that's my payment for being on the board. So, um, and I already
062got a chance to use it. Went to cross town soccer. And I just wanted to point out, yes, one-1 ties across the board, JB as well, boys and girls and varsity boys and girls. >> Well, that's good to know. >> Very consistent. >> Um, and then I loved um Mr. Hobbles. I Well, I think it was Mr. Hobble's addition uh to the Bison Report uh the history lesson. I am guessing that that was came. Yeah, I really like that. Uh, and yeah, I think that's that's about it for me. >> Thank you, Mr. Deaf. >> Hi. Not a lot. Also excited to be back for the new school year. Excited to meet the student representatives, get to know them through the course of the year. Uh, went to some of the cross town soccer. It
063was good to see the enthusiasm, school spirit from both schools. It's a good time as always. >> Good. Thank you, >> Trusty Trumansky. >> Thank you. Um, Luke, great job on your inaugural meeting as our director of business operations. You did great. And uh I just just keep all the teachers and staff in your minds is the students are tired. The teachers are tired. You've been doing bus drills and fire drills and lockdown drills and the honeymoon phase is absolutely over and the kids are back to all their antics. So just keep everybody in your thoughts and prayers going forward because we're all tired. >> Thank you, Truste. Um, I just wanted to let everyone know that um, the Worlds of Work is September 23rd. Um, we expect to have 2,000 students um, from of
064course um, all Great Falls Public School sophomores and all Great Falls Public School eighth graders, but also students from I believe somewhere around 20 schools across the state. Um there'll be at least 60 employers there and we need 200 volunteers. Um so if anyone would like to volunteer the jobs, you don't have to have any knowledge or information precooked in your heads. Uh we need everybody from you know people to just welcome um the students to helping guide the students to each of the zones. Um people that run water to the volunteers. So, um, don't be afraid to volunteer if you've never done it before. Um, and if you want to volunteer, you can go to, um, United Way's volunteer website, which is volunteer greatfalls.org, and there's opportunities for a few hours as well as
065the whole day. It's a lot of fun. The kids are just thrilled. They're literally getting hands-on work experience with um you know dogs from Malmstrom to um you know learning how to weld. They do like weld little um like bison and little rustler head little wrestler heads. So it's just total hands-on career experience. Um, and it's really just amazing to see um, kids spark at the idea of >> they have a lot of fun >> of future careers. So, >> very good. Thank you, Trusty Bronson. >> Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I just want to uh commend our administrative staff for their responsiveness when people like me late on a Saturday night when I'm reviewing this agenda and noting questions that I have or items that I think might need some clarification or correction, they always
066uh get back to me in a very timely fashion. However, the award for real time this goes to Mr. Boyd. There is a 99.9% certainty that if I email him at nine o'clock on a Saturday evening, he will respond within five minutes, which either suggests that he's really interested in his work or he needs a life outside of administration. So, >> but but ser but seriously um our administrative team are very quick uh to respond again. I'm not expecting something, you know, within five minutes on a Saturday evening, but it's much appreciated. And as I noted today, I was meeting with uh Sean Bug from the school group insurance and he made a comment that he said among all the different administrative teams around the state extremely high regard for great falling. >> Thank you.
067And I'm going to draw your attention to the board and we have several things going on. Um, high school house on the 11th and then our next board meeting. Put all these dates in your calendar and there's all kinds of things to see and do in the district with athletics and music and all sorts of wonderful activities that we can enjoy. And I just like to also u thank our administrative staff for what it is you guys do. It's fantastic. People ask me all the time, what's it like to be a board member? And I just say it's a great privilege because I get to hang around so many smart people. So, thank you for that. And uh with that, if there's no further business to come before this board of trustees, I would entertain
068a motion to adjurnn. >> I move to adjurnn. >> Order. Trump.