001e e e the board meeting will begin in 5 minutes e e e doing it right now okay the board meeting will begin in 1 minute oh no the March 7th state board meeting will now come to order good morning and welcome to the March 7th 2025 State Board of Education meeting board members please engage your microphones before speaking and turn them off when you're finished speaking please note that board members may be using their cell phones and laptop computers to access the agenda and information related to this meeting live streaming is available through the State Board of Education website with the recording secretary please call the role Kristen Christensen here Maggie Douglas here Lisa shanoff here Liz rener here Kirk Penner here Sher Jones here Elizabeth TM Here Deborah ner here commissioner Maher here
002all present Quorum is established please rise and join me in the Pledge of Allegiance iedge aliance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all information regarding the open meetings Act is posted as you enter the room from the main entrance doors the open meetings Act is also posted on the State Board of education's website the first item of business is the commissioner's report commissioner Maher please provide your report thank you and I just shared with a couple of board members that this might be my longest report ever so get comfortable um the other thing too if you're wondering about my voice I've been taking voice lessons I'm trying out for the baritone position on a
003barber shop quartet um while my voice is getting closer to that pitch the fact that I can't sing probably still works against me um I want to start with uh some good news today this was just handed to me earlier today and that is that the Nebraska Center for the education of children who are blind or visually impaired n cbvi has their 150e birthday today and it was just asked could could you celebr celebrate that I said absolutely that's a that's a big thing and I think gets um underd discussed by us we forget that they are part of us so congratulations for for them so good morning board and all those listening in I I often get asked so what does the commissioner of education do hope you don't ask ask that question a
004lot but but maybe you do and I love to tell people about the complexity and the excitement of the work that I get to do but for you all I want to use my schedule from the last week and a half to illustrate what keeps me busy and keeps me motivated a great deal of my time has spent working with Partners as part of the many other duties as assigned that go along with being the commissioner as an example um last Tuesday and I'm talking about a week and a half ago now I joined colleagues from higher education and labor to testify in support of lb11 that is funding for the Nebraska Statewide Workforce and educational reporting system or insur you may recall this was one of the agency's banial budget requests and the executive
005committee agreed with my recommendation to support this bill and testify on our Department's behalf another part of my work involves being the face of our agency um a good amount of the time speaking about our top priorities and informing all of those who will listen about the roles that our agency plays um every now and then and certainly not often enough I get the chance to speak to youth around the state um one such such event was last week about a week and a half ago on Wednesday for the Educators Rising State Conference in Carney during this time I was able to speak to my own pathway into education starting as a math teacher and physics teacher to be in a room of full of potential teachers and thinking about their future impact definitely filled
006my bucket last Wednesday in addition this Sunday I'll speak in Omaha to a group of uh Health occupation students um with a a very a very similar um and I hope motivating they'll motivate me um conversation with kids across Nebraska finally part of my role also involves building critical relationship ships with legislators and other policy makers in our state and I I acted on this last Thursday when I testified before the Appropriations Committee on our agency's budget priorities during this time I again shared more about the Department of Education our staff our funding sources our top priorities and I have appreciated our team's efforts with the legislature and look forward to continuing to build on this as this session progresses I would thank uh board president TM for coming across the state to be a
007part of that I asked her to attend because because I thought it was important that the commissioner and a representative of the board went in together so that this isn't a divide and a conquer it's its groups working together so thank you for your presence from working with part Partners to speaking on the agenes ageny behalf and building relationships with policy makers I really have enjoyed my work over the start of this calendar year a couple of other items and updates regarding the Strategic plan I want to thank you for Eng enging yesterday during our work session I took a lot away from the session and know that our team did too we were eight for eight in terms of Engagement and uh I lost a bet Kirk thanks to your being engaged so really
008really appreciate all eight of you truly being a a part of the process on the literacy front I want to share a couple of quick updates first as you may recall our legislators appropriated one .8 million per year for three years which goes towards supporting literacy coaching we've worked closely with Dr larianne poke at the ESU and several other esus to support the hiring of coaches and begin conversations on a summer coaching Workshop to expand coaching further around our state more details will come on that and just to reiterate it's I think it's hard sometimes to remember where the various fund sources are coming for our literacy work um this one comes from a state appropriation is not part of the clsd funding but rather State appropriated dollars additionally as part of tenant two in
009our literacy plan we published an educator preparation program guide to implementing the science of reading it's been well received at least as far as we can tell at this point um in the field and we look forward to continuing to iterate the expect ation and also iterating the guide as we need to I want to address briefly how the Department of Education is monitoring and preparing for changes at the federal level recent policy changes and dire directives from Washington may be creating questions or maybe some uncertainty with our school districts so in late February I shared some thoughts with our school leaders and I'll reiterate some of those to you now first of all we won't Panic on what might happen we'll we'll wait and make sure that we know what's happening it doesn't mean
010that I'm not interested in what's going on in DC I'm incredibly interested in what's going on in DC but until we have facts we won't make up our own facts um most education policy as you know is made at the local level with Community me Community leaders like local school boards implementing policy and making decisions for their students and Families State education agencies like the Department of Education Implement both state and federal law state agencies like the Nebraska Department of Education are critical for monitoring and compliance State educa State education agencies like the Department of Education are vital for adequately monitoring compliance with federal funds and ensuring both state and federally funded programs are implemented and implemented with fidelity the structure of the State Department of Education in Nebraska ensures coherence among the many facets
011in the education space we are able to work together across agencies and I and I'll pull three out in particular like special education because when I wonder about what might happen my mind goes to special education what happens there another particular area that might not be as obvious to folks is Career and Technical education a large grant that we receive is the Perkins Grant what happens there and another piece that is um I think underknown in around the state that is part of the Department of Education is vocational rehabilitation to ensure the continuity of services to all students and clients in the efficient use of taxpayer dollars so what do we know about those we know essentially the same thing today that we knew yesterday that we knew last week and we haven't changed any
012of our operations as a result of of anything changing changing in Washington but if there are changes in Washington we'll continue to monitor any potential impact on staff and the need to engage further with federal state and local leaders including and starting with the members of the State Board of Education our mission to lead and support the preparation of all Nebraskans for learning earning and living remains Paramount to our work that goal does not change I feel strongly that as long as you as this state's education leaders and our staff keep that mission as our Northstar will navigate any change at the federal and state levels so as Forest Gump once said that's all I have to say about that interviews for Deputy Commissioner they they've concluded um first I would tell you that a
013wide net was cast to bring in the best candidates possible for consideration for the position three particular areas produced candidates um internal interest folks um within the Department of Education um State Department interests from other state departments around the country and then um also interest from the field folks who are working in the field of Education currently current practitioners in k12 and highered and after a thorough vetting con uh process one candidate stood out and I have selected and offered the position to Jane staven Jane has deep ruts as a teacher Elementary principal and superintendent she worked in Columbus Lincoln and Blair and most recently and currently Jane has been the superintendent in the sou Falls School District in South Dakota if that rings a bell sou Falls is where I also served as a
014superintendent for five years uh Jane was my successor in sou Falls so I'll be anxious to hear a little compare and contrast from my friends up there after she comes down here okay that's that part's a joke um I but um Jane and I have never worked together but I'm excited to have that opportunity Jane brings strong experience in K12 to this position with an elementary perspective that is currently a little bit lacking at the senior leadership level we have a good strong um um 7 through 12 uh emphasis in at the senior leadership level so to bring that Elementary level I think will be important um in addition I believe she'll add a great deal of knowledge to our our quest to improve literacy outcomes in the state of Nebraska this item is on
015your consent agenda so you don't need to do anything about it now but you will vote on it later in the consent agenda and that concludes my report go to the red letters oh I for I forgot to I forgot the start the there are there is one item that has been identified to be removed from the consent agenda the item is 6.3. a that word that's not right it's um it's 6.7 pointb Lisa isn't it yeah okay 6.3. a was an error strike that it is it's okay it is item 6.7 pointb and it is specifically on the tobacco prevention Grant if board members wish to remove additional items from the consent agenda please fill out the form at this time any any items removed from the consent agenda will be taken up under
016additional business now I believe that concludes my report ince okay all right we're on agenda item 3.2 and this is the update of teacher of the year so if Indie staff member David jerson could come to the front of the room for an update on the teacher of the year program thank you David good morning David jerson uh administrator of the office of public information and communication and I come before you today because I'm also the coordinator of the Nebraska teacher of the year program um which is a great program and we have a lot of fun with this program every single year uh I know many of you may be saying didn't we just meet the 2025 teacher of the year uh like about a month ago yes you did um but every March
017we've begun a process where we are launching our search for the next 2026 Nebraska teacher year the process is a lengthy one and it takes um that much time to uh select our candidates and get that through so today I'm here to launch that program and fill you in a little bit on what the teach of the Year program is especially since we have some new uh faces with the board uh this year as well so it's part of the national teacher of the year program which is put on by the ccsso uh teacher program it's considered the most prestigious recognition program in the country and every year ccsso provides State teachers of the year with a year-long one- of- aind professional Learning and Development experience designed to increase their educator leadership skills while celebrating
018their talents and commitment as extraordinary teachers and every year one teacher uh from the pool of State teachers of the year is selected to be the national teacher of the year uh where we are in the process right now is that they have selected the four finalists for the national teacher of the year they come from America Samoa Colorado Washington DC and Pennsylvania and they should be naming the national teacher of the year some some time within the next month or so and that person will start their year of service um there are actually 56 currently um State teachers of the year in this program you have your 50 States America Samoa the Northern Mariana Islands Department of Defense Washington DC Guam and the Virgin Islands and ccsso is looking to expand um to include
019Puerto Rico next um and they're building a program in Puerto Rico uh as we speak to try to get us a Teacher of the Year from that jurisdiction as well every year the teacher of the year from Nebraska has and all the State teachers of the Year get to do some specific things through the year uh through ccsso the first thing that they get to do is a teacher orientation which uh just happened a couple of weeks ago during that process they visit Google to learn a little bit more about um different technologies that are happening in the classroom they'll be able to visit uh NASA space camp where they work with their cohort um they always have a DC visit and a white Washington visit that includes a visit to the White House and
020then they wrap up their year actually dipping into the next year at the college football championship game of course you met our teacher of the year from 2025 this is Lindsay Wilson she's a science and social studies teacher with Bennington middle school and she did get uh started in her year she's already done a number of uh speaking engagements we try to keep her pretty busy while also honoring her time in the classroom as well uh and she is somewhere in the middle of that crowd of uh of folks this was from their teacher orientation that happened about three weeks ago the big news for today is that we have officially launched the 2026 teacher of the year nominations so um you can find that nomination form on our main web page if you search
021Nebraska teacher of the year it should take you to the nomination and application forms as well uh our process uh is an open nomination process which means it the nomination can come from literally anyone we've often gotten nominations from students from family from colleagues uh from Principal superintendents um and any of you could nominate uh someone that you believe uh is is worthy of the teacher of the year award the nominations are pretty simple they just ask for the teacher's name what school they attend if you can if you have their email fantastic and then a brief description of why you believe they should represent Nebraska as the next teacher of the year uh the application process is also an open application process so once we get nominations in we notify those teachers that they
022have been nominated and they choose whether or not they would like to move forward in the application process someone does not need to be nominated to start the application process um either every year we have um several teachers that will enter the program and start the application process um before a nomination comes in so my ask for everyone here is that we have been steadily increasing our nominations every year last year we had just over 100 unique nominations I say that because every year um it's a lot of fun we have a handful of teachers that will get five six uh nominations come in uh we've had uh teachers in the past where you could tell it was a class got together and we'd have like a I'll get 10 nominations for the teacher like
023in the in in the same two-minute time span so that's always a lot of fun too and we love that as well so highly encourage you to spread the word that the nomination process is open the easiest way to nominate is to go to our main website um new this year I'll showcase as well I've been working with our graphic design um artist uh Sydney wolf on creating a new brochure that is just a generic brochure for the teacher of the year program um we're in the process of printing these out um it gives explanations that I just gave you along with uh a QR code on the back that takes folks to uh a link directly to nominate a teacher of the year um we'll be giving a a large portion of these to
024Lindsay Wilson as she goes to speaking events in schools across the state but I'll also have some available uh next month that I can give every one of you as well I would love if you uh when you make visits to schools or wherever you are in the public to share that as well I'd love to have the problem of having too many nominations and too many applications uh we want to find the best and the brightest and we've been doing a really good job with that and um we hope to uh have some nominations actually already we launched this uh two days ago and I already have a nomination in my inbox so somebody caught it before I even launched it officially so uh I really appreciative of that um with that if you
025have any questions about the teach of the program okay thank you thank you David next item of business is the president's report there is no president's report item 5.1 public comment we will now move to the public comment period this period may be available to any person who wishes to address the board on any matter appearing on the agenda up to 90 minutes will be allowed for the public comment period a majority of members present and voting may take action to extend the total amount of time allowed for the public comment period a majority of members present and voting may also take action to allow or terminate public comment at any time during the meeting if you are not signed in and wish to speak please sign in at this time those wishing to speak
026must be signed in at the table outside the meeting room each individual speaking to the board will be required to complete a signin card for identification of oneself individuals are required to include on the signin card their name address and name of any organization represented individuals may be prohibited from to may be prohibited to speak in public comment if the signin card does not include the required information person speaking to the board during public comment should State their name city and state at the beginning of their allotted time and may submit printed materials for the board but may not use any other form of media anyone refusing to be identified will be prohibited from speaking each person may address the board for up to five minutes a majority of members present and voting may take
027take action to reduce or extend the amount of time the amount of added time to all speakers if at any time persons appearing before the board exceed the time limitations set forth in this policy or on the agenda or become abusive or threatening in language or behavior it shall be the responsibility of the president to refuse permission to continue to address the board we have five public comment cards submitted vice president Neri will announce the names of the speakers okay if you want to uh come up in this order we'll start with Al Co and he'll be followed by Dan Hayes and Dan then you can just come up when he's finished uh and Robin mcer will be third thank you good morning uh president T Meer board members commissioner thank you for having us
028again if you remember we were here last month uh we had 11 speakers and 27 Letters by my account and we were were encouraging changes to rule 24 regarding spe speech and theater and we've heard encouraging words uh regarding our uh our request we're back to encourage movement urgency and uh uh as in aside Steve bar if you remember Steve bar was here last week or last month from crane River theater in Carney he was a guy on the crutch and uh he uh takes applications for his theater program every summer he's had 7,000 applicants this year that he's going through uh and they send in videos and he's he and his staff are going through those 7,000 videos so theater is Alive and Well in Nebraska uh we have three theaters here or three
029colleges here today to speak to the issue and uh I'm going to end my remarks with that but I do have a request if possible uh Ryan kathman from Nebraska Wesley and has a class at 10 o'clock today I was wondering if we could move him up on the list if that would be possible with your with your uh approval I know that's a little out of out of the uh ordinary if not we'll make it doe I we've only got I don't know where he is on the list but with the five minutes he should be okay but I just thought maybe give thank you yes I'm sorry we will move uh Ryan kathman to speaker number two okay thank you very very much I appreciate it Ryan kathman we don't want you to
030be late for class my students do though uh good morning board members uh thank you for having me my name is Ryan kathman uh I live in Lincoln Nebraska I'm a professor of theater at uh Nebraska wesing University in my eth year I'm I'm here to speak and express my strong support for this proposal to to uh to allow the secondary education Majors to earn a subject endorsement in theater and speech as opposed to U merely a supplemental endorsement um I'm I'm deeply committed to the growth and development of aspiring Educators I believe that uh this proposed change would significantly improve the quality not only of theater and speech education but also the lives and the career potential for students across Nebraska um I theater and speech are are core elements of a well-rounded secondary
031Ed education that that Foster creativity critical thinking communication skills and emotional intelligence um and these are qualities that uh you'll find that Fortune 500 CEOs overwhelmingly say they they're looking for and employers I think it's sometimes a shame that these kinds of things are termed soft skills uh but what it really means is they are flexible and malleable and they uh they transfer no matter matter what kind of aspect of life or careers uh people decide to pursue uh or find themselves in if you uh if you want to know about what it is to be adaptable and to Pivot uh when something unexpected happens talk to uh a student who's forgotten a prop on stage or uh has found somebody uh their their scene partner is still in the bathroom and they have to
032improvise um if you want to learn about leadership talk to students who are the head of their uh backstage Crews or our assistant directors or choreographers and the uh the effort to uh coordinate and uh get everyone working together on that and certainly talk to a high school Drama teacher um or speech coach about leadership and they uh they can tell you all of the many many skills and qualities that have to come together to be able to uh every year coordinate major efforts to accomplish uh what seems like impossible tasks on a timeline on a tight budget uh and as I you know I I played Sports I did all sorts of different activities in high school was that kid who who's never home uh but as much benefits as there are to every
033other activity of student can do I I find there's nothing that quite uh combines them all like the uh not only artistic expression and creativity required for theater but it's physical engagement you're using your body go to a dance call sometime see what that how you you can keep up with that uh the technical skills required for building sets and costumes um the list goes on of all the things all the potential benefits no matter where life takes somebody who's studying theater and speech um so a full endorsement would not only enhance the preparation of future teachers but also encour encourage more students to pursue theater and speech as a viable and valuable part of their education um additionally it would reflect the growing recognition of theater as an academic discipline worthy of specialized study
034and training on par with other subjects like English Math and Science performing arts and public speaking require innovative ideas adaptability resiliency collaboration and perhaps most valuable of all they Foster empathy in students in ways that few other subject areas can uh just going to wrap up here soon the uh this this change will benefit the educational system lots of ways it'll attract more students to the teaching profession in the Arts increase the number of qualified theater Educators improve the quality of theater instruction in Nebraska's high schools and uh this have a positive impact on students who will benefit from a deeper engagement with the Arts as well as the wider community that will benefit from their skills for the last three years uh at my own institution I've taught a methods of teaching theater and
035speech at the secondary level course it's really long title and uh all the graduates who've taken that class have been hired for full-time positions in Nebraska right after graduation um I've got a couple more that I taught recently who are still finishing this year and doing their student teaching this semester our curriculum at NW is already equipped and structured to offer a subject endorsement for theater and speech and we would welcome the opportunity to reinstate a recently deleted theater education ba degree program uh we recently deleted realizing that uh it was inefficient for our students especially when only a supplemental endorsement is available but uh our department would be thrilled to be able to reinstate that if uh if a subject endorsement was was uh allowed so I urge Nebraska Board of Education to approve
036the proposed change that will allow secondary Ed Majors to earn a subject endorsement in theater and speech uh the impact of this decision will be far-reaching both in terms of academic achievement and the long-term culture enrichment of our state thank you for your time thank you all right we have two more University professors are either one of you going to be late for class no I canel mine and I do have a perspective student at noon but I'm good till then so um good morning my name is Dan Hayes I was here uh um in January to speak before you it's good to see you all again and thank you it's been wonderful getting to see what you do and I appreciate everything you do I'm the director of theater at Midland University and um
037I have been working on this for now about a year um and um I feel like we're really being heard and I really appreciate that I've put a packet together and I'm just going to talk about a few things I'm not going to talk a long time um there's a lot of information there for you but I always feel like um I do a lot better with practical um real life things rather than just the Ethereal things so I've really listed um everything that I'm working on right now so you can see it um one of the things that I I'm oh I should do a full disclosure I want you all to know that I found out that Liz rener and I were in a show together many years ago and so if you
038all want to see a picture of her a 10-year-old picture of when she was 10 uh we were in a show together back then so um but I did put together um from we go to the thespian conventions to recruit and on it it lists their um interest of do they want to be a professional actor what do they want to do and I've put together um how many people are really looking for Education um and it's uh I think it's higher than what's there but this is the kids that we um saw um I also put together places where there have been openings in the secondary programs in Nebraska for last year and for the um the year before that or this year this upcoming year and then last year and then for the
039last five years and there's quite a few schools and some of them have never filled those positions um also um I put together um places that I universities and colleges that are willing to to put these programs forward and I'm really excited that two of my colleagues are here to also speak to that um um I want you to know that um there there there is a list there of um schools that are needed that need instructors it's not exhaustive it's just the ones I know and that I have um checked with the Nebraska high school board to make sure that I'm not saying anything that's not correct um I I um also want you to know that Midland has met as an art as an arts department and we met with the education department
040and with our Administration and we are all ready to go we have everything in place ready to go we have applied for uh a special waiver so we could go ahead and do it before it happens and a question that came to me was well then why would we need this and truly we need it at all of our universities I'm glad to have it at Midland if we can do that but we need it at all the universities and I hope that we're showing that um I also listed my students at Midland who are in the same class that Ryan was talking about uh the methods of teaching theater and uh where they're where they are right now and what they're doing um and to the best of my knowledge and um and then
041I think the last thing in your packet is a pretty passionate letter sorry it's didn't realize it was going to be five pages long but uh from one of my students who is going to be teaching she's got a job at the Ben inton School District in the fall um and she's student teaching right now and uh but she really wants to teach theater and speech and she is pretty passionate about the fact that she wishes that we offered that here at the Nebraska state level I've also listed all my contact information so if you're going through this and you have some questions I am absolutely willing to answer anything so um thank you all for considering this and again I I thank you all for all your work you're doing thanks thank you um
042Mr mcer and then Rachel Pinkerton after good morning uh my name is Professor Robin mcer I live in cre Nebraska uh I've been teaching theater at Don University for 20 years um I received my bachelor degree at per state college in my MFA at the at UNL at Peru I'm not going to tell you how long ago this was uh I received a secondary ad teacher endorsement in my area study which was speech and drama uh this Nebraska boy did really well in the industry thanks to my Nebraska Collegiate education I lived in New York for 10 years I worked on 38 Broadway shows uh including the secret garden which won the Tony award where I was the master Scenic artist uh I received the Lincoln uh mayor's Arts award uh I got best director
043in Pennsylvania and while teaching at D these past years we've won 170 Regional and national awards including one of my students who went to Washington DC and one best director in America I've come to address what I perceive as a shortcoming in how Nebraska handles its secondary education endorsement for the theater when I first started at D um there was a really healthy endorsement um that uh we saw our our young people go out and teach in the state of Nebraska but since that was removed and we've moved toward sort of a a more generalized degree secondary Ed English language arts which is a combination of Journalism forensics English and theater I want to talk about the things that I've witnessed atone with the declining number of theater students um I believe this decline is
044due in large part to this I don't want to call it a lack of Education because these universities really do a fantastic job educating in their areas but it's that endorsement that we need when I first started at D they had to take a multiplicity of theater classes in order to teach on the secondary Ed level now they take one usually acting and those teachers have to direct those students they have to build that scenery and they're not trained to do that anymore um when I started ad Don and began recruiting we had at our Zenith uh well over 80 theater scholarship holders primarily from Nebraska today that number has slipped to about 30 mostly from out of state we're missing out on a huge economic benefit by bringing these students to our universities and
045colleges uh because of the lack of Nebraska theater students we're forced to recruit in other states now including Texas Missouri Kansas and Colorado I personally recruit in Kansas and Texas I'm going to give you a baseline about what it's like in Nebraska uh at the Nebraska thespians where we see on average for a theater scholarship we see on average about 10 students at probably its Nat it was six students we interviewed um and this number has been steadily declining in Kansas at the recent Festival I went I attended last month there were 10 uh there were 1,700 theater students that attended there I auditioned 77 uh eager high school thespians with nine delineating their future Majors as uh theater Ed and that's about 12% in Texas we participate in two festivals one at Grapevine uh
046the other in Corpus chrisy we see over 10,000 students uh I audition over 700 uh of that 700 about 90 or so are going to move into theater aded those students in Texas and in Kansas will never come here in fact right now I have a student we recruited from Missouri uh she's a freshman she's a really great talent uh but she discovered she has no real opportunity for theater Ed so she's moving she's going to finish her uh college education in Missouri where they do offer that endorsement um so number one I feel that we have had a severe deficit that was created years ago and we have an eager uh possibility of rectifying this and I encourage you to do so uh uh number two we we're missing out on an amazing Economic
047Opportunity that Texas in uh Colorado the one I'm Excuse sorry the the festival in Texas generates $1.5 million for those communities for all those students who go there um it's an amazing thing to see in Texas all those eager theater students and I'd like to see that happen again in Nebraska so thank you for your time thank you for your consideration and I did get quite under a little bit so thank you very much by the way I I am directed with Steve B this summer see how it's sort of this this little world that we all work in I'm directing legally bond this summer with Steve and I'm so excited that we have that many auditioners so thank you very much thank you Rachel Pinkerton please good morning I'm Rachel Pinkerton I come today
048to from Omaha Nebraska I'm a mighty Benson bunny both my husband and I are Benson High grads I come to speak in opposition to Universal mental health screenings and interventions by people operating outside of their scope of practice I have served on this State Mental Health um advisory committee under by appointment by two different governors in 2008 I was recruited to be on the youth Behavioral Health task force of the building Bright Futures initiative if you were paying attention back then to education you probably noticed that uh effort I'm going to read you the final paragraph of an email I sent you I make no assumptions that it landed with you when you when it show showed up in your uh email in on 2012 I was part of a School Bus full of of
049of people attending the State Board of Education to support not joining uh Common Core not signing up to the Common Core State Standards Initiative it turns out we had the element of surprise that was not my plan but nobody on the entire board including my own representative had read my email with enough comprehension to realize I was announcing that we were going to bring a School Bus full of people so uh since I do uh want you to hear what I uh had to say I'll just read my final paragraph mental health is supported by living in reality education that nurtures habits of objectivity and curiosity is healthy sound instruction opens Minds to insights to be gained from literature history mathematics science the Arts and other avenues for exploring the truth about ourselves and our
050place in the universe thanks for your dedication to this High calling thank you thank you to all of our public testifiers today giving us comment uh we do have no written comment submitted this month agenda item six is there a motion to adopt the consent agenda without item 6.7 pointb I mov to a adopt the consent agenda without 6.7 pointb second is moved and seconded to adopt the consent agenda per board policy there is no discussion on the motion to adopt the consent agenda would the recording secretary please call the role shof yes ner yes Christensen yes Renner yes Jones yes Douglas yes Penner yes T Meer yes8 yes the affirmative has it and the consent agenda is adopted we're actually running a little bit faster I was planning to take a break at this
051point but I think we're going to press on um so the next item of business are the reports of the standing committees I will report on behalf of the executive committee meeting the executive committee reports on its March 6 2025 meeting members present were chair Elizabeth TM Vice chair Deb ner Sher Jones and Liz rener the committee had two discussion items first the committee reviewed proposed legislation scheduled for hearings next week and advised the commissioner on the nde positions on legislative bills the committee continues to meet weekly through the legislative session to advise the commissioner on legislative matters second the committee had discussion on board member legislative testimony on education bills and recommends this item for a full board discussion the committee reviewed one information item the committee was informed on the status of the
052nde Personnel rules and was provided a summary of changes a timeline for this work and necessary Milestones were shared a brief discussion followed finally the committee began discussion on the commissioner's performance review and Associated process and gender selection this concludes the executive committee report chair Elizabeth TM are there any questions on the executive committee report okay seeing none um agenda item 7.1 pointa board members are there questions or discussion on this item okay all right the next item of business is 7.1 pointb and this is board member legislative testimony on education and this item was placed on our agenda by board me board member Neri she did ask me to open the discussion on this agenda item typically my custom is to not weigh in um on an issue until all members of the board
053have have spoken but today I'm just going to Veer away from that um self-imposed practice for just a minute I do want to say that yesterday in committee we had very good conversation about the variety of ways that a board member could be asked his or her opinion on a particular Topic in education and even the personal choice that we have of weighing in on educational issues the spectrum is pretty broad on the way that board members uh weigh in uh having a private conversation hosting a town hall posting on social media sending a private email sending a mass email publishing updates in newspapers and submitting written or inperson testimony at the legislature I mentioned all of these I was trying to come up with every single way I could think of because they have
054all been utilized by current members that are sitting on this board right now from both sides of the aisle last night I spoke with attorney general hilders in order to clarify what the legal boundaries are for board member speech he reassures each one of us that our freedom of speech did not end when you were elected instead each person should make every effort to let the intended audience know that you're not speaking for the board as a whole in no way should any of us imply or explicitly state or write anything that would indicate that our thoughts and opinions are an official board statement to ensure this um the board past P iterations of the board have placed this restriction in our board operating policy 1.03 which you have a handout of and this states
055that board members should add a disclaimer to written communication indicating their statements represent the personal views of the board member and not those of the board so moving forward I would just encourage each board member to pull that statement directly from the board operating policy and use it in writing it could simply State these statements represent my personal views and not those of the board so at this point I'm going to conclude my remarks um that I composed early this morning and I'll open the conversation up to the rest of the board thanks Elizabeth that's a good summary of our discussion and the reason I brought this forward uh was because um there has always been a culture here and an ethical standard that we as board members while we don't give up our Free
056Speech right we have always held the standard that we don't testify on legislation in opposition to what the board is doing or in a position that is different than the boards and this only applies to education bills that the board may be weighing in on and so but it isn't just that I I just felt like there's been a lot of confusion like last year there was uh letters sent to a superintendent signed by a state board member asking for information no disclaimer and that superintendent and their board was pretty upset and wrote to all of us that they wondered what Authority that letter had gone since there was no statement and since last week four board members did write testimony on an education bill that was different from the board's position I just felt
057like maybe it was time to have a conversation on where we are with this standard that has been in place for decades at least here at the State Board and again this is not at all about anyone's legal rights a free speech it's about stand ethical standards that are pretty much in practice across the country uh and across the state of Nebraska I called the board of representatives from the board of region asked them what their practice is they said one time in recent years in the last few decades has one board member testified in legislature in opposition to the board and that person there was a lot of closed door meetings about that and that never happened again so they have a even though it isn't a written policy cuz they don't we can't
058have a written policy that says we're taking away your free speech right but there is always been an ethical standard here at the Department of Education the board members don't take actions against the position of the board that is at the Board of Regents that is on local boards across Nebraska and it the main reason is there's a level of um well transparency and trust that we owe each other like I don't know that we would have been told that this happened uh and I guess I was just concerned that four board members were following this ethical standard that's been in place forever and four board members decided to change it and to bring politics into the work that we're doing and I just I didn't know if it was a simple mistake because they
059didn't know what our policy was or they didn't understand what the ethical standard has been for boards like ours and so I just thought we kind of needed to have a discussion about how everyone feels about this uh I mean it's specific into legislative testimony but in general like when we're sending emails out to superintendence you know um also just a reminder that we always need to add a disclaimer so I would just love to hear some conversation I don't know what the right answer is but I just know what the president has been and I'm curious if we are really at the point where we really think it's important to change that precedent thank you just kind of looking to see if anyone wants to add any comments Liz I'll I'll add um I
060think this conversation comes at a good time because we have four new board members and I don't know that even the four uh not older non- rookie board members uh knew that this was kind of an Unwritten or unspoken um understanding so I think it's really a healthy activity for us as a board to discuss this together and where I come down on this issue is mainly um we only have impact and power as a board when we act together we as individuals are not really all that powerful um as individual board members and I think we really do damage to our um what we have to offer in terms of leadership as a board when we begin uh speaking to the legislature T offering testimony on education issues um and I think what it
061could devolve into if we continue is a board that speaks one way and then eight people going to the legislature or sending letters with all of our differing opinions wherever they fit on the Continuum and I think it's a dangerous uh it's dangerous because I think it sends confusion to the legislature and to the public and to us actually as a board so I feel like um the reasonable thing to do is maybe set some limits and I understand it can't be an official policy and definitely don't want to curtail anyone's uh rights to free speech but I think we need an agreement um to the culture that we want to create on this board of how we want to behave and how we want to present um this board's impact to the larger Community
062um and yeah I guess that's where I land on that I see you have your light on I'm not sure this is the time or the place to have this discussion but since we're here um I I'm actually slightly surprised by um the fact that you would be calling this out Deborah uh I have an email here from you with a caption support our schools Nebraska SOS NE dear friends you go on to say lb 753 was passed during this past legislative session and it will hurt Nebraska Public Schools dot dot dot you go on to say repeal lb 753 please sign the petition to repal repeal lb 753 dot dot dot this is November 5th 2024 uh you actually signed it Nebraska State Board of Education with your address um and so um I
063would think that um this might be a conversation that would have been better privately so um I do send out an automatic email and if there was state board at the bottom I don't uh recall that but there is a difference in what we're talking about today I think that's a really good example so thanks for bringing that forward because I know we've had board members testify on transgender bills and I've not brought that forward because that is their right and that's not a position that our state board is taking nor do we ever take positions on school financing so for any of us to have an opinion on something that is not related to the scope of the work of the board then it's very appropriate for us to have an opinion now there
064also needs to be a disclaimer but what we're talking about are bills in the legislature where there it the that are in the scope of the Department of Education and the State Board of Education and people are taking a position on those and that is very different but thank you for bringing that forward because I'm glad we had that example okay anyone else oh Kirk are you you know for the last two meetings we've sat here and been lectured by you Deborah quite frankly I will continue to voice my opinion against bills that I think are nonsense and bad for Education it's already in policy and we will continue to do that encourage everybody no matter what side of the aisle to continue to do that speak for yourself stand up for kids but if
065we're going to sit here every month and be lectured by you for things that we disagree on what's changed is it a 44 board that made it change and you don't like it when we don't agree with what's going on in education because you used to be able to just roll over us 8 07153 so I'm done I'm done with being lectured from Deb ner and we will continue to oppose things whether it's a bill an amendment uh anything of that nature and that's where I stand right now thank you Kirk I'd like to respond since he addressed something specifically to me thank you Kirk so the difference right now has nothing to do with politics I've never made my votes or opinions on politics what we're talking about right now is there have been
066actions taken taken by four board members that have never ever been taken by state board members in the past you do not know that you make wide SW you make wide sweeping accusations you do not know that you do not know that that is not factual I know that there's never been a board president that's ever done it because I did make those phone calls I also called The National School Board Association and again there's an ethical standard even if there isn't a legal standard and so I we now know what your opinion is that you want to change that standard and culture there is no standard or culture there is but Kirk I am going to point out that we do have a policy that already says that you're supposed to state that you
067are a state board member when you're giving an opinion and you have repeatedly done that with emails to superintendent attacks on teachers of the Year Etc and nobody's brought it up and I just think that now we are at a point where we need to remind each other that we are supposed to have that disclaimer in there and there is a difference between making a statement giving our opinion and testifying in the legislature so I'm hoping that we can decide what we want to do as a board and we know your opinion they know mine you don't need to hear from me anymore unless someone wants to address me specifically with something I would ask that we try and keep as many of our comments directed to the topic as we can um would anyone
068like to speak who hasn't spoken on this topic okay okay so seeing no further comments I would encourage board members to make sure that in all written Communications um not just public statements but not just the written public ones but also written Communications per board operating policy policy 1.03 please add in the disclaimer in your written Communications um just to keep that as clear as possible for people who are receiving or reading your emails and um when directed by the full board um a board member can speak on behalf of the board and can I ask you a question so as our board president does this mean that you are planning to continue to testify in positions that are different than our board positions I have not testified this year in any positions well you
069wrote a letter of testimony which is the same thing I did not write a letter of testimony I sent an email to nine state senators that is not a letter of testimony it was not submitted as um official legislative testimony so that we know as a board what our new culture is are you planning that based on everything that we know about the ethical standards across the board and on the national level and here in Nebraska and school boards that are you telling us that leadership is thinking that we are going to change that standard and that you are going to lead us in that change I'm going to allow myself okay to have freedom of speech as the district 7 representative not as the board president when I make a statement as the board
070president that's because I've been directed to as this full board has directed me to do so but that wasn't the case when you wrote that email so but it was not signed as board president but it was signed as a state board member without a disclaimer so and so with was your mass email so I think that we just need to move forward from this point and make sure we have the disclaimer but my mass email wasn't on a position that the board was involved in so I think there's a clear difference and I just wanted to know where you're leading us and so maybe we should have had this conversation in the executive committee and you should have just brought that out yesterday we did and I you were leaning differently yesterday so at
071least that wasn't leaning differently I mean I I feel like the choice is I can silence myself or you will silence me and that's not that's this is America so um please board members As you move forward make sure you attach the disclaimer and um I know that you will each represent your District to the best of your ability do believe it's been an hour and five minutes we'll take a brief 10-minute break and board will recess until 10:15 e e e the board the board meeting will resume in two minutes two minutes grabb a cup she did okay well we all learned okay if board members could resume their seats we'll begin in just a moment okay all right we will resume the board meeting with agenda item 7.2 chair Kristen Christensen will report
072on behalf of the budget and finance committee meeting the budget and finance committee reports that at its Thursday March 6th meeting members present were Christen Christensen Maggie Douglas Lisa shanoff and Kirk Penner the committee reviewed four action items the first item was to amend a contract to extend work related to agricultural food and natural resources education and FFA support the committee recommends the board's approval the committee then reviewed a grant to support stronger connections technical assistance and capacity building programs no committee recommendation was established the third action item reviewed was the support the expansion of farm to school and walk to unlock funds the committee recommends the board's approval the last action item reviewed was a contract for a new survey tool the committee recommends the board's approval of this item the committee reviewed two
073discussion items that included the monthly board travel expenses with no concerns noted and the commissioner provided an update regarding the mental health training for staff funds last the committee reviewed seven information items including the following a school emergency response mapping Grant the Nebraska Improvement Grant funds and potential uses for 2025 26 the 2024 annual comprehensive financial report audit a contract for the child program and family outcomes measurement system contracts for the support of the children who are deaf in heart of hearing and updates on the comprehensive literacy State development Grant including the grant expenditure update this concludes the budget and finance committee report Kristen chair thank you Kristen are there any questions on the budget and finance committee report okay see none are there any questions on the reports in item 7.2 pointa item 7.2
074pointb is there a motion on that item yes I move to authorize the commissioner to amend the contract for agriculture food and natural resources education and FFA support Second it is moved and seconded to authorize the commissioner to amend the contract for agriculture food and natural resources education and FFA support is there any discussion on this motion okay so the motion is to authorize the commissioner to amend the contract for agriculture food and natur resources education and FFA support with the recording secretary please call the role Christensen yes ner yes Jones yes rener yes Douglas yes shanoff yes teg Meer yes Penner yes eight yes the affirmative has it and the motion to authorize the commissioner to amend the contract for agriculture food and natural resources education and FFA support is adopted is there a
075motion on item 7.2 Point C yes I move to authorize the commissioner to accept funds from the US Department of Education to support the stronger connections technical assistance and capacity building grant program aimed at local Education Agency engagement student support and staff and student mental health second it is moved and seconded to authorize the commissioner to accept funds from the US Department of Education to support the stronger connections technical assistance and capacity building grant program aimed at local Education Agency man engagement student support and staff and student mental health is there any discussion on this motion Lisa yeah I uh would like to point out that uh last month we talked a little bit about the mental health um Universal screenings and Universal um approaches to solving some of the issues we're having in our
076schools um this particular one I had to really dig into quite a bit I read through the grant multiple times um I'm going to just read one thing that kind of stood out to me results of the Nebraska risk and protective factors student survey were available for the Behavioral Health Region located in esu's survey items included questions specific to whether or not in the last 12 months the student has experienced a lack of sleep most of the time or always due to being worried anxiety B the student felt sad or hopeless almost every day for two weeks or more that they stopped usual activities depression and see those who responded Yes when asked if they had considered attempting suicide results of this survey indicate a higher proportion of students at risk in the region in
077nearly all grades um and so I got to doing some research and reading into um the universal screeners once again and I pulled there's a there's a lot of research out there that's coming out there's a lot of data that's coming out um there's a study by Oxford that uh does a large scale study um and is being replicated it says we we need to be moving away from Universal prevention and instead invest our limited resources in the refinement and dissemination of interventions with stronger evidence based such as onetoone targeted and um indirect approaches and so with that being with that being known there's a lot of research out there saying if we have treny issues we need to Target the treny demographic if we have um depression then we need to to be giving
078resources for our kids outside of the schools for depression um I've done a a ample reading about it um this book which I'll recommend again and again um kind of talks quite a bit about it it's um called bad therapy things that are happening in our schools and how it's actually hurting kids not helping kids um this study also shows evidence from several large scale trials that therapeutically informed Universal interventions are less effective than targeted approaches and often lead to null effects or unsustained positive effects and also have the potential to elicit negative effects and so with that being said I think it's great that we're partnering with um Children's Hospital esus DHHS but I think it really does need to be more targeted um until we have more data that proves otherwise that it's
079effective and so while it is only $153,000 Grant I think that when we look at um every dollar it needs to we need to have positive impact and proven positive impact before we just automatically vote Yes because we all care about kids we're all compassionate towards kids we all want what's best for kids but we can't just vote Yes because of compassion we have to do facts we have to look at facts we've got to do the research and we've got to put in that time that it takes to make sure that what we're doing is right and so um going through this I am not seeing any clear evidence that this is something that is going to prove to um lower treny and increase um positivity and if it does it may only be
080the day of the the actual assembly or it's very short term so for that reason I wanted to bring this up thank you Lisa any other discussion on this item okay so the motion is to authorize the commissioner to accept funds from the US Department of Education to support the stronger connections technical assistant and capacity building grant program aimed at local Education Agency engagement student support and staff and student mental health with the recording secretary please call the role Jones yes ner oh to pass this to support it yes yes sorry rener yes Douglas yes Penner no Christianson yes Shoff no TM yes six yes two NOS the affirmative has it and the motion to authorize the commissioner to accept funds from the US Department of Education to support the stronger connections technical assistance and
081capacity building grant program aimed at local Education Agency engagement student support and staff and student mental health is adopted is there a motion on item 7.2 pointd I do I move to authorize the commissioner to accept funds from the Nebraska Department of Agriculture to support the expansion of of farm to school and walk to unlock second thank you it is moved and seconded to authorize the commissioner to accept funds from the Nebraska Department of Agriculture to support the expansion of farm to school and walk to unlock is there any discussion on this motion I just had one question because I'm not on the committee that discusses this and and I'm not sure if it would have even come up in the committee but is this a similar program to what we saw when we toured
082um I believe it was Hamilton Public Schools where they Hampton hton Hampton where they where they grow kind of grow your own it is okay thank you and that was that was an impressive program and fun to see and tasty food to eat so te I do have a yes maybe a guess is on I just want say that I appreciated the plans for sustainability that are in this plan I mean it's just a note I wrote so the sustainability I think is an important factor and I appreciated that being in this all right any other discussion or questions okay the motion is to authorize the commissioner to accept funds from the Nebraska Department of Agriculture to ex support the expansion of farm to school and walk to unlock with the recording secretary please call
083the role Douglas yes Penner yes T Meer yes ner yes Christensen yes rener yes Jones yes Shoff yes 8 yes the affirmative has it and the motion to authorize the commissioner to accept funds from the Nebraska Department of Agriculture to support the expansion of farm to school and walk to unlock is adopted is there a motion on item 7. 2. E I move to authorize the commissioner to contract with question Pro survey software second it is moved and seconded to authorize the commissioner to contract with question Pro survey software is there any discussion on the motion seeing none the motion is to authorize the commissioner to contract with question Pro survey software with the recording secretary please call the role rener yes Douglas yes Christensen yes Jones yes teg Meer yes Penner yes ner yes
084Shoff yes8 yes the affirmative has it and the motion to authorize the commissioner to contract with question Pro survey software is adopted all right agenda item 7.2 F and the speaker on that is commissioner Maher he's Gathering I'm ready thank you um this topic is on the agenda simply to let you know what has happened since the February meeting with regard to the mental health training program Grant um I did my best to listen to the whole dialogue last month and really to continue to listen to that that dialogue as the month's gone on in addition I've done my best to determine what path this board sees as a good path knowing that no vote has been taken on the topic so here's what I've done since February I've listened to a few school districts
085very small sample at this point on some successes they are experiencing in helping students get the assistance they need to navigate school and just being a kid well also I recognize the difference between the roles of teachers and licensed mental health practitioners there is a distinction there I have heard from several Nebraskans you heard from one of them earlier today um I got I was part of that email response as well on the mental health topic since the last meeting I consider each correspondent's well-intended Ed well intentioned and well intended please know there was not a unanimous thought on what we should do I think that speaks to the complexity of the situation so here's what I'm asking from the board give me more time to research what best practice might look like if I
086find a solution that works for Nebraska's kids and fits the letter of the law and meets substantially with what I've heard in the last month I'll bring that to you for further vetting or or at least for your consideration if I cannot I'll move on to other topics but I think the I think the topic is complex enough that it that it warrants more conversation and more research on our end so at this point that's all I'm asking I'm happy to hear your thoughts today or your thoughts any at any time between now and the April meeting on what we're doing and what we're finding that's my report on the topic yes ch yeah just briefly um just want to give a little background and I appreciate zanab for getting me information but over the
087the three years during covid we spent $13.1 million on Mental Health um it's a big number and so my what I want to do and I want to make sure it's sustainable because I don't believe all those schools are continuing with what they did in fact I know they're not so the asks that I have are to Define mental health whether it's statute Define what screening is address surveys make sure it's estain uh sustainable measurable do not add load to our already overwhelmed teachers do not do that please and the and the uh involvement of parents at the appropriate time which is always so those are my suggestions after we spent $13 million it's not all sustainable and she does have a nice report that University of Nebraska Lincoln did um so if you want
088to see that ask Z for it um but we need something that continues 10 years from now we tend to throw grants out at things and then they're gone and and everything's done or the teacher moves on um and so that's kind of where I stand so Thank you Kirk just for clarification you said she has a report she being same Dr Rita okay thank you so other board members would like that you can contact Drita that's the right okay okay yes Maggie thank you um my biggest I know I don't speak up very often I'm working on it but my biggest takeaway from last month's discussion about the mental health training was that the word therapy was thrown around a lot and I just wanted to clarify that therapy is a tool within mental
089health it's not synonymous that's all I wanted to share thank you I appreciate that coming from your professional perspective yes love it Deborah any other questions or discussion anything all right well once again thank you for the continuing conversation I know sometimes It's Tricky but we navigate together so thank you uh item 7.3 chair Lisa Shoff will report on behalf of the planning and evaluation committee meeting thank you the planning and evaluation committee reports on their committee meeting on March 6th 2025 the members present were Lisa schonhoff Sher Jones Deborah ner and Kristen Christensen the committee reviewed four action items related to a media specialist requirement waiver request rule 11 teacher waiver request request and pilot processes for clinical observations of speech language pathology and school psychology candidates the committee recommends board approval on these
090items the committee reviewed discussion items with nde staff providing summaries and answering questions related to NCT organizational policies plans of Corrections for schools the approval of non-public and and interim program schools a pilot process for cooperating teachers of world languages and a model behavioral intervention policy for schools the committee also reviewed informational items related to approval of rule 11 teacher waiver requests conditional approval of new rule 14 Schools accreditation of public schools nonpublic schools and ESU systems and the social studies standards review process nde staff willing will bring these items to a future meeting for discussion and subsequent approval this concludes the planning and evaluation report are there any questions on the planning and evaluation committee report thank you Visa is there a motion on item 7.3 pointa yes Madam president I move to approve
091the rule 11 teacher waiver request from Skyler Community Schools second is moved and seconded to approve the rule 11 teacher waiver request from Skyler Community Schools is there any discussion on the motion the motion is to approve the rule 11 teacher waiver request from Skyler Community Schools with the recording secretary please call the role teg Meer yes ner yes Penner yes Christensen yes rener yes Jones yes Shoff yes Douglas yes8 yes the affirmative has it in the motion to approve the rule 11 teacher waiver request from Skyler Community Schools is adopted is there a motion on item 7.3 pointb I move to approve the pilot process for conducting clinical observations for speech language pathology virtually for the University of Nebraska Carney second thank you it is moved and seconded to approve the pilot process for
092conducting clinical observations for speech language pathology virtually for the University of Nebraska carne is there any discussion on this motion the motion is to approve the pilot process for conducting clinical observations for speech language pathology virtually for the University of Nebraska Carney would the recording secretary please call the role rener yes Douglas yes Christensen yes Jones yes T Meyer yes Penner yes ner yes stoff yes eight yes the affirmative has it and the motion to approve the pilot process for conducting clinical observations for speech language pathology virtually for the University of Nebraska Carney is adopted is there a motion on item 7.3 Point C yes I move to approve the pilot process or I move to approve the pilot process for conducting clinical observations for school psychology virtual for the University of Nebraska Carney second
093it is moved and seconded to approve the pilot process for conducting clinical observations for school psychology virtually for the University of Nebraska Carney is there any discussion on the motion the motion is to approve the pilot process for conducting clinical observations for school psychology virtually for the University of Nebraska Carney with the recording secretary please call the role shof yes marer yes Christensen yes rener yes Jones yes Douglas yes Penner yes TM yes eight yes the affirmative has it in the motion to approve the pilot process for conducting clinical observations for schools psychology ology virtually for the University of Nebraska Carney is adopted is there a motion on items on item 7.3 pointd I move to authorize the commissioner to approve a waiver request from the ncf regarding media specialist requirements second it is moved
094in second in to authorize the commissioner to approve a waiver request from ncyf regarding media specialist requirements is there any discussion on the motion the motion is to authorize the commissioner to approve a waiver request from ncf regarding media specialist requirements with the recording secretary please call the role Douglas yes Penner yes teg Meer yes ner yes Christensen yes rener yes Jones yes shanoff yes a yes the affirmative has it and the motion to authorize the commissioner to approve a waiver request from the ncf regarding media specialist requirements is adopted president you just let people know we're aware that this isn't working okay okay so so we are aware that we are having some difficulty with our screens and so I'm I do apologize to the members in our audience as well as those watching
095online we are now on agenda item 7.3e board members are there any questions or discussion on this item oh you said 7.3e yes yes I would like to share okay thank you president te Meer at our last board meeting I shared a proposal regarding the teacher membership selection process of the Nebraska Council of teacher education since that time I have received input which I considered and I've made some modifications I've spoken with planning and evaluation committee members and they have had the opportunity to view the modified proposal and also just recently it was posted on the Facebook Facebook full board FB full board I don't even like Facebook I don't even like Facebook okay the full board agenda and um so for the benefit of the public and also to the other board members that
096are not on the planning and evaluation committee I will read The Proposal aloud okay the number of teacher Representatives would remain at 16 of the 16 teacher Representatives 11 would be selected by the Nebraska State Education Association and five selected by nde with approval of the board of the 11 NSA selected members one member would be from each of the State Board of Education districts with no more than two members from the same district thus each state Board of Education District would have an nsea representative with three additional members at large the five Representatives selected by nde would be individuals with no teacher organization affiliation or having a teacher organization affiliation other than nsea in regard to these five members nde would seek the applications with board members being able to encourage teachers to apply
097and I might add that that's at as the practice is now in current policy State Board of Education members are encouraged to make recommendations so that would not change in regard to these okay I res said that um Nas's and nd's applicants and recommended Representatives will be brought forth to the executive committee after conferring the executive committee would bring forth 16 names for approval by the full board I established these numbers based on the information I have because this information is considered proprietary I do not have exact figures but from what I can discern there are about 8,000 Nebraska teachers not members of nsea and there are close to 27,000 teachers in the state thus about 70% of teachers belong to nsea which rounds to about 11 um Representatives 30% rounds to five so 11
098and five seems like a fair allocation of Representatives this proposal allows for all Nebraska teachers to have an opportunity to be considered and provides for a fair and balanced representation on the NCT with representation from each of the eight State Board of Education districts board members I welcome any comments or questions today and prior to the April board meeting thank you Magie what sorry Sherry what was the 11 and five that was 11 um members from nsea and five from either having no affiliation or a different teacher organization affiliation so 11 and five corresponded with the 70 and 30% Thank you yes can I ask a question you bet um so I'm new to this but so nsea they nominate their own or make their own recommendations and what you're asking is that of the
099other 16,000 990 teachers that happen to be nsea uh members they can't on their own apply to do it like they have to only go through Ana to be on Nick okay it's from what I was thinking it would be representative of they could go through nsea to apply because any I believe unless there's something I don't know that any of their members could apply I mean currently that's where we get all of the members are from nsea so they could apply for the nsea 11 members Representatives and that leaves the other 8,000 to be in the five positions yeah I maybe we can talk about this later so I understand better I think I'm tripping up on disqualifying people from applying independently if that's an option even though they happen to be an nsea
100member like I I don't know that I someone might be a a member of the Union but they don't go through the union route to do this and so you can probably enlighten me about the process but there's something about that that isn't it just feels a little off to me okay we can sure be willing to discuss that thank you Liz Chris thanks um yeah I agree with the geographical distribution that you've proposed um making sure that there's members teacher members that are from each of our districts um so they're representing all parts of the state so thank you for for thinking about about that um and also appreciate the distribution of 70% that are rep represented by NCA and 30% that are represented from the state at large um though I would agree
101with Liz that um while there are teachers that are doe paying members of nsca they may not be active and involved in the organization um and therefore may not be selected or informed about the process to go through NCA to be part of this organization so um I I would propose that we just strike and reward that those five selected that we just State their five selected through nde um and not have the other uh qualifying portions of of that statement um to make sure that it really is open to the whole state um and with that making sure that our alternates are allocated with the same percentage that there's um 70% of the alternates through NCA selection and 30% of the alternates through nde selection um so that it's the same same balance there
102may I re respond absolutely yeah um I appreciate your your thoughtful comments Kristen what I would in the alternates I think that's well thought out that makes sense to me what I would like to encourage perhaps is that the nsea organization itself makes sure that they reassess and see if it is truly open to all of their members fairly so that all of the members whether they are fully participating or engaged or active that all of their members have an opportunity so I think I would take that to nsea and encourage them to make sure that all of their members MERS have the opportunity that's how I would respond to that thank you I'm just goingon to say that I appreciate this I I'm not on this committee and so um this gives me a
103lot to think about before our next meeting next month um I appreciate board member Jones bringing this up for because because as I was as I've been rereading through our board operating policies we are supposed to review um our advisory boards and how those are put together and so it's it's nice to be working with a whole team where where we all have eyes in different areas um because that wasn't something I had even thought of so um Thanks for opening the discussion to us I appreciate that ad Deb yeah I agree Sher and thanks for thinking about ways to compromise because I I just like that thought process that you used and you Quantified things with good reason and I um the only feedback I had somebody called me last week that's associated with
104Nati and um wanted to talk about this and their only feedback to me was that the way it stands now there's been two positions that the Department of Education has had to fill and historically at least for the last five or more years the nde has had trouble filling those and their concern was to actually give nde more positions and that was without all the rules that you're putting on it now and to give nde more positions to fill uh that they had concerns about that and I I also just feel and comments that I've heard is that people don't understand what we're trying to fix because it really looks like we're only trying to reduce Nas's participation I and get some geographic distribution which I think we all are for but um you know
105if those five positions can be open to anyone one uh whether they're nsea or not uh it certainly uh would be worth considering for support uh because it does feel like a compromise but uh in general I I still I'm unsure what we're fixing so thanks Sher Kirk So currently all me all the teacher Reps for NCT come from the sea is that currently correct other than the two that are appointed by the state board of education but they may be members so it could be anywhere from 14 to 16 and I don't look back to see what their affiliation was cuz that wasn't I just wanted to make right now the 8,000 that are not getting an opportunity and haven't for probably 84 years to give them an opportunity not real Equitable very fair
106and balanced I think absolutely and I and I did cons may I I'll add one thing I did contact nde staff before as I came up with the five numbers and they thought that they could fill those five I just think perhaps it's how we go about soliciting and maybe we can be a bit more involved in that process so I think it's doable maybe we just need to change how we reach out that would be my thought but did check ahead of time to see if they felt like they could come up with five and it was the affirmative so thank you all right Lisa I see you want to speak I um appreciate learning about what NCT does because before you brought this to the attention of our committee meeting I I didn't
107know and so I think to clarify for um Nebraskans who may not know it is an an advisory body excuse me to the Nebraska State Board of Education it is responsible for developing and recommending standards for state board approval and adoption relating to State approval of higher education institutions providing teacher counselor Andor administ administrative Preparatory programs um and so I think it's definitely a very very important Council and um when we look at um t teachers in classrooms across the state you're you're right it needs to be well represented because there might be teachers who are willing to speak up and say hey I wasn't prepared in this area when I started teaching this is something we need to work on and if they're being guided or led by um anyone that it could actually
108hurt the process so um I I appreciate that you brought that up I would have never known to look into that thank you okay right great well thank you for the the things to think about and this is a discussion item today so we will see it moving forward agenda item 7.3 pointf is a discussion item plan of Correction for Schools board members are there any questions or discussion on this item I know it was a rather lengthy file to read through okay see no comments we will move to agenda 7.3g approval of non-public schools for 2025 2026 board members are there any questions or discussion on this item Deborah well there was a discussion about the difference between approval approved schools and non-approved schools I'm sorry accredited schools and approved schools and uh we
109asked for just a little bit more information so that all of us could better understand the differences I know that uh there are very few people out there that really understand the differences and unless they've been through the process and so um and I've been on the board and asked this question a lot and I've looked at all the checklists for everything but it's still um I mean I think I understand it a little bit better but with so many new board members that might be a a a discussion or a work study or work session sometime thank you for that appreciate that anyone else okay agenda item 7.3 3.h this is the approval of the interim program schools for 2025 2026 are there any questions or discussion on this item I had an over
110underbed no I didn't about what time we're almost done I'm might have to slow down so I can beat Ryan's but all right agenda item 7.3 point I hi this is the pilot process for cooperating teacher qualifications in the area of World Language board members any questions or discussion on this item I'm just going to say that I appreciate the thoughtfulness of this item because we do know that that we do have a bit of a teacher shortage and sometimes in a Cooperative cooperating teacher for our student teachers is difficult and so um making some allowances is appreciative so thank you to our staff for for thinking this through all right item 7.3 J model behavioral intervention policy for schools are there any questions or discussion on this item Lisa this is a passion of
111mine because um it's a it's a really uh big concern regarding teacher retention behavior in our classrooms I have had the joy of um sitting in the hallways teaching my English as a second language groups and so I've gotten to observe from another perspective from uh a classroom teacher because they're in it and an administrator because um you know they're not usually just sitting there in the hallways watching listening teaching and um parents as well so as a mom a teacher and specifically a teacher that teaches in the hallways and sees a lot going on um and being friends with lots and lots of teachers who will say the biggest complaint is the behaviors that they're that they're having in their classrooms and sometimes they can feel that there is lack of support um in
112dealing with those behaviors and I was really excited to see this Behavior plan uh because of the fact that um I thought oo this could be a really great opportunity to solve this top problem in education that our educators are feeling um come to find out this might not be the best place to do it and so with that being said I look forward to working with the esus and the people who are providing training for teachers and administrators and having further conversations with our commissioner as well to see if there's more that can be done in this area um if there's encouragement on some trainings that we can do I'm not sure how all that works where the training comes from I know we've been using PBIS for a long time and CPI which
113is Crisis Prevention Institute um and so if there's a place or time that we can kind of re-examine some of the things that are being um pushed out to our schools and where that's coming from and if it's really the most effective um because I think if we wanted to solve teacher retention figuring out our behavior issues in our schools and from what I've seen over time it's kind of gone in the wrong direction and I know there's a lot that goes into that but I appreciate all the work you've done on this policy model policy Kirk so I just have two questions um and I don't know how you Kirk do you want to ask a staff member to I would like to have say Dr Rita could you come forward thank you Elizabeth
114so good morning Zena breida student services officer so on this as it stands right now if I am not trained can I intervene in any type of student Behavior issue how when you're training um and I haven't been able to pinpoint everything here so my question is is really if if I'm not trained can I help break up a bad situation or do I have to stand and watch so the the purpose of this uh it's a model policy so and uh what we did uh we utilize the language that it says in in a in a statute what is the purpose of the model policy so we do not say like what do you need to do so it's up to the school district so um we uh give uh kind of um mention
115about what are the best practices in each of those component that's required by the statute okay so you're just writing it's a model policy I get that so no influence to the school districts on how they write their policy specifically no they can go above and beyond as long they have all these components that it's um outlined in the statutes okay and then the other quick one so in this policy which I have not read through so I apologize it's going to be broad stroked so if if I'm a school district that has a classroom where the student is misbehaving and the empty the entire room of all the nonb B excuse me misbehaving students is that a and leave the student that is misbehaving in the classroom is that a class is that a
116school district policy if you look at the page number four of the the draft it mentioned about how to address in what are the criteria for removal the students of the student that's causing the misbehavior right so there are criteria outline What's um what are the steps that the school they can take they can as opposed to emptying the room and leaving the misbehaving student in the classroom it depends on the situation yeah okay and it's going to be up to the school district correct okay thank you okay Deborah oh say sorry I just um we just in the last year have had more model policy than we've had before and so I certainly have an assumption that I think I know the answer but I'm hoping you can um validate or or or share
117with me the correct answer but my understanding is that when you're writing a model policy that everything in there is I mean you're just we're only doing this because there was a law pass that says we have to but the work that you're doing is based on it's evidence-based it's based on research and data it's based on talking to experts across the state and teachers across the state that you've really pulled from uh everywhere that there's evidence in order to call this a model policy okay that's all I wanted that is correct okay thank you sure thank you Dr Rita any other questions okay okay well we will move to agenda item 7.4 chair Maggie Douglas will report on behalf of the rules and regulations committee meeting the rules and regulations committee reports on the
118March 6 2025 meeting of the committee members present were chair Maggie Douglas Vice chair Liz rener Elizabeth chm and Kirk Penner committee members reviewed the rules report committee members asked for staff to contact the Attorney General's office on the status of rule 21 certification and Rule 24 endorsements nde staff provided information on the proposed repeal of rule 8 school finance and budgeting State funding of Education Service units and learning communities in response to the repetition of statutory Provisions the committee recommended proceeding with the repeal nde staff provided information on the proposed repeal of rule 202 sorry of rule 22 Master teacher program in response to legislation repealing the program the committee recommended proceeding with the repeal nde staff provided information on the proposed repeal of Rule 25 excellence and teaching act in response to legislation
119transferring the program to the coordinating Council for postsecondary Education the committee recommended proceeding with the repeal nde staff provided information on the proposed repeal of rule 26 procedures for the mentor teacher programs in response to the repeal of funding Provisions the committee recommended proceeding with the repeal and placing the guidelines on the nde guidance page nde staff provided information on the revision of rule 20 approval of educator preparation programs staff shared a policy scan of information from other states the committee will continue to discuss this topic nde staff shared that the public hearing for rule three identification of high ability learning is scheduled for April 8th 2025 at 9:00 on Zoom this concludes the rules and regulations committee reports Maggie Douglas chair thank you are there any questions on the rules and regulations committee report
120okay all right so we are now on item eight additional business we had one item pulled from the consent agenda item 6.7 pointb and I would like someone to make a motion on that item would is anyone willing to do that could someone I have it right here can read it I move to authorize the commissioner to accept funds from the Nebraska Department of Health and Human Services to support the prevention of Youth tobacco use and prevention education for local education agencies across Nebraska second it has been moved and seconded to authorize the commissioner to accept funds from the Nebraska Department of Health and Human Services to support the prevention of Youth tobacco use and prevention education for local education agencies across Nebraska is there any discussion on this motion Lisa yes thank you for
121pulling that one out um one of the things that I noticed is that this is a grant from the uh DHHS for 190,000 to be renewed twice and we're in our second time uh or we're in our first renewal and um so one of the things that I'd asked for was any data that shows that it's been effective and um there is no data out yet at this time so one of the things that it brought me back to is of course we don't want our children smoking we don't want our children doing drugs um it brought me back to as a kid when we we did dare programs and so I looked on the NIH website to see what we found with dare and over and over again it says we provided an updated
122meta metaanalysis on the effectiveness of project dare in preventing Alcohol Tobacco and illicit drug use among School AED youths methods um dot dot dot but overall the results show that um our study supports previous findings indicating that dare is ineffective and so um I'm wondering if there's something that's um really fantastic about this program that um is working and if so absolutely I would be all in but if not I think we really just we need to watch what we're doing with our taxpayer dollars um if it is not effective so I would need to know that it's actually effective before I would want to vote Yes on renewing the $190,000 Le Lisa do you have a question I mean I I'm not sure if if that was a question that you'd like staff to
123come and speak to or um I just am stating the reason why I pulled it out of the consent agenda okay thank you do we have an idea of what it's going for I mean that's her question I mean it's $190,000 do they have a program that they've been doing for decades or they do what they want with it or do you anybody I'm asking you and you don't know either I'm sorry I'm sorry but that's kind of the the is if there's some information we could get would you like to call call a staff member forward to answer your question sure let's do that all right I believe this is put on the agenda by Dr Rita we're getting your steps in today good morning again Z breida student services officer um would you
124please State your question so I can Lisa you want to State your question so you can if you're not speaking can you please turn off your microphone thank you um yes so what I had uh emailed earlier was is there any data that shows that this is working is there anything is there any more information about it um and it appears is that DHHS is over all of that and there is isn't any at this point that is correct so this is a fiveyear grant that D we re we are a excuse me we are subrecipient for this grant um and uh we have one more year left for uh to conclude this grant however DHHS is the agency who was responsible on collecting the data and EV with the evaluation and usually um those
125data would be available when we when they conclude the grant which is in five which is next year can I ask a question deborra I just want to ask a question about process and I don't know if this goes to you or some other staff person but I guess I just always assume maybe Ryan this might be yours sorry uh I just assume that if something's on consent agenda it's gone through a committee uh can I make and if so then I'm just wondering if this was discussed at length in the committee or if it just didn't go through a committee so Dr for I I think what we're asking is could you explain to the board the process for items being placed on consent agenda thank you good morning I'm Ryan for the question
126is how are items placed on the consent agenda and I also heard about this item specifically okay so uh board policy allows for uh an item to be placed on the consent agenda a grant or a contract ra for example um for up to three times after it first came through a committee okay and so in the case of this item yes this item would have been reviewed likely by the budget and finance committee if um previously so it would not have been reviewed necessarily by the committee this year or I shouldn't say that at this meeting right but at a previous meeting yes we do not Place grants or contracts on the consent agenda until they have been reviewed by a committee and within the scope of that 4-year time limit if that makes
127sense any further questions before Dr for moves back to his place Kirk you have a question for Dr four so at the end of in 2026 April this contract's over that'll be the five years yes I'm getting the affirmative okay I keep looking okay so then we would have data after that did we did we do this 10 years ago or is this a new looks like the I'm getting a negative we did not do this so this is new okay so we'll have data after this year okay thank you Dr for thank you and yes may I comment yes but is personally I would like to see in the future like asking DHS DHHS for midterm Gathering of data because when we go five years and at the end if there isn't showing significant
128benefit then we've kind of used a lot of money I think not very effectively or I'm not finding the right word but so I think just I need to be more in tuned when I see a grant for 5 years and okay we're in the middle of it I need some information because I really need to see Effectiveness if I'm going to consider voting for something like this but now if I were to vote no and it's like they've got one more year how can I expect if I say no and it doesn't go through then I'm kind of chopped it off at the knees so to speak and so for me it kind of puts me in a um difficult situation but I just I guess I need data in between is what I'm
129saying great feedback Deb I just want to say I totally agree with you on that one Sherry I've uh I haven't had the conversation since I was first on the board about our grant process and the reporting back during you know especially in a 5ye but back then I was just surprised at some of the leniency because I spent my career just writing grants and reports and uh and maybe it's change so I'm not saying that's what it's like today but I I definitely uh think especially with a five-year Grant some kind of summary that comes to us when we're renewing it would be really helpful so thank you for bringing that up all right great points and I know I know Dr Rita especially is taking note so getting lots of affirmative from her
130so the item and I don't want to cut off any more discussion is there any more okay the item is the motion is to authorize the commissioner to accept funds from the Nebraska Department of Health and Human Services to support the prevention of Youth tobacco use and prevention education for local education agencies across Nebraska would the recording secretary please call the RO tagm yes Christensen yes ner yes Douglas yes Jones yes Penner yes rener yes shanoff no seven yes one no the affirmative has it in the motion to authorize the commissioner to accept funds from the Nebraska Department of Health and Human Services to support the prevention of Youth tobacco use and prevention education for local education agencies across Nebraska is approved the next items on the agenda items 9.1 to 9.2 are information items
131and written reports for the board agenda item 10 the good of the order this section of the agenda is intended for board members to offer informal observations of the work of the state board board members may make brief announcements about attendance at future events for the purpose of informing other board members no business or motions or suggested actions of the board may be offered at this point in the agenda nor should board members engage in substantive discussion about other agenda items or introduce new agenda items does anyone have anything for the good of the order thank you to those who attended in person and who tuned in to the broadcast the next meetings of the State Board of Education are scheduled for April 3rd and 4th 2025 in Lincoln Nebraska the March 7th 2025 state
132board meeting is adjourned e