001foreign thank you foreign board members we will begin the meeting in one minute the June 2nd State Board of Education meeting will now come to order good morning and welcome to the June 2nd 2023 State Board of Education meeting board members please engage your microphones before speaking and turn them off when you are 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 roll Patsy kojons here Lisa Fricke here Patty goobles here Jacqueline Morrison Kirk Pinner here Sherry Jones here Elizabeth tegmeyer Deborah Neary Deputy Commissioner Friesen here six present to absent there are six members present Quorum is established please rise
002and join me in the Pledge of Allegiance 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 next item of business is the Deputy commissioner's report Deputy Commissioner Friesen please provide your report thank you madam president well this will serve as my final Deputy commissioner's report while serving in this interim capacity and to say that I'm proud of the nde's work is an understatement each day I learn more about our dedicated talented staff and how they're supporting the learning earning and living of all Nebraskans it's been an honor to be at the Helm of the agency over the last five months months and I look forward to continuing my time serving Nebraska
003as Deputy Commissioner in supporting the transition of our next commissioner today like the last several months I will Orient my report on the agency's work in May in three parts Partnerships processes and pride points I'll then spend some time foreshadowing the next month Partnerships the Rel Central convening and governing body the nde receives professional learning and technical support from the Regional Education laboratory and additionally as acting commissioner I serve on the governing board for this organization this partnership with a national technical assistance convenes States in our region to learn together address common problems or opportunities and plan for the year ahead we met in May and discussed the teacher shortage the nde and other states priorities and next steps special education advisory committee or seaac the seaac met in May and continues to serve as
004an invaluable advisor for matters pertaining to special education the Nebraska Chamber our partnership with the Nebraska Chamber continues to deepen and as you recall the nde invested Esser funds to contract with the chamber for Workforce and education alignment specialist Dr Jim Sutphin filled this position and attended the advanced CTE conference in Phoenix with ndes CTE team Dr Sutphin has also been meeting with community colleges businesses School leaders and others next week Brian Sloan president of the chamber will be presenting at the Career Education conference and we're thankful for the partnership and we look forward to continued collaboration Nebraska Early Learning collaborative Nebraska has a vibrant Early Childhood ecosystem and nde meets regularly with Partners including DHHS private funders and the university system through the Early Learning collaborative in terms of processes rule hearings well a
005significant amount of work and processes across multiple nde teams go into the preparation of hearing drafts and the actual hearings themselves the three rule hearings this week were well attended and we look forward to moving to the next steps Essa state plan Amendment our staff work diligently and made to Garner input from multiple stakeholder groups on an amendment draft which you will consider later today these groups included the AAA and Tac in addition to the U.S Department of Education as well as Consulting with Governor pillin's office in addition to posting the document for public comment legislative wrap-up our staff work closely with legislators staffers and other policy Partners doing this legislative session we are excited to begin implementing what we believe will be many transformative policies and new Investments and pride points 2022-23 school year
006comes to a close I'd be remiss if I did not share my pride and appreciation for the Educators in our public and non-public schools most of whom have now dismissed for the summer I'm thankful for their dedication and hope they are able to find some time this summer to rest relax and rejuvenate Deca International Awards many Nebraska Career and Technical student organizations held their national conferences and competitions over the last several months Nebraska had several medalists at the DECA National Conference in Orlando earlier this month we want to recognize Ben Jackson and Allison kilzer from Millard South for placing first in sports and entertainment marketing and Jacob heider from Millard North for finishing in the top ten in the same event two students named presidential Scholars two Nebraska students abhirab Ari and Sarah wood both
007for Millard North were named presidential Scholars for their accomplishments at academics the Arts and career in technical education spring activities and sports congratulations and great work to All Sports and activity participants it was fun to watch and see our students compete at such a high level Nebraska student advances to finals of Scripps National Spelling Bee we are so proud of Nebraska 5th grade students Sarah Fernandez who advanced to the Scripps National Spelling Bee finals yesterday and looking forward even though our schools are dismissed for a much-deserved summer break our agency is in full swing this summer here are a few of the happenings at the nde in the coming months the Nebraska Career Education Conference next week we kick off the conference season with the nce conference in Kearney hundreds of CTE teachers and directors
008from across the state will convene for professional development resource sharing and discussion Statewide longitudinal data system monitoring well nde has received several federal grants to support the development maintenance and security of a more robust Education data system monitors from the U.S Department of Education will be in Lincoln to meet with staff and learn more about the last Grant and its impact on our state the Nebraska Council on teacher education ncte will meet next Friday to get legislative updates and plan for the coming year the Supreme Court Commission on children in the courts nde staff and I will attend a meeting with members of the judicial branch to consider next steps in policy change to support systems involved youth legislative implementing planning with the adjournment of the legislature yesterday the nde will spend the next several
009months planning and beginning the process of implementing legislation and lastly Dr Brian Maher we are thrilled to welcome Dr Maher in His official capacity as commissioner on July 3rd later in July is administrator days including nde in nde day on Wednesday July 26th we look forward to Dr Maher's addressing the feel and board members attendance at this important annual event so this concludes my June board report and again thank you to the state board for your confidence in me and to all nde leadership and the full staff for not missing a beat during these past months and more to fulfill our responsibilities to lead and support the preparation of all Nebraska's for learning earning and living thank you thank you Deputy Commissioner Friesen it has been an honor to work with you as our interim
010commissioner so thank you please let show our appreciation [Applause] Deputy Commissioner are there any items to be removed from the consent agenda there are no items to be removed thank you okay if you would please continue then with the reports well at this time we have an update on the annual review of priority School progress for Asanti elementary middle and high school from Dr Shirley Vargas thank you Dr Vargas exactly good morning to your runway for sure nde blue all right my voice camera is okay good morning everyone Shirley Vargas ND School transformation officer thank you for allowing me some time to engage with you today regarding our priority school work and um hopefully I will not take very long but those are famous last words so bear with me um you're going to receive
011a lot of information and I want to make sure that if you have a question that you potentially hold on to it until the end because it might be answered as we go through it but if it's not definitely there'll be time at the end to go back and engage in anything further so really quickly some objectives always want to ground the work that we do in our statute statutory Authority and requirements related to our priority schoolwork want to make sure we provide an overview of the designation process of these schools actually talk about some updates related to our three current priority schools which is Asante elementary middle and high school and then lastly share some recommendations and next steps for you to consider for when I return in August with you all so to
012get us started we'll just ground ourselves in our statue um 79 760.06 and 07 which grants us the grants the State Board the authority to designate um priority schools that shall be in the lowest performance level at the time of their initial designation so um used to be Formerly Known needs Improvement and our languages need support to improve no less than three schools may be designated at any time and then only the state board can remove or identify a priority School based off of the recommendation provided by the commissioner if there is a school that has been designated for three consecutive years the bar the board shall re-evaluate that progress plan to determine one of three actions significantly revise that plan engage in an entirely new progress plan or engage in an alternative administrative structure
013now that third bullet should sound familiar since it's also something that is identified in your legislative priorities and I'm super excited for our incoming commissioner to engage with you all and myself and the rest of um nde staff to Think Through what we mean by alternative administrative structure right sometimes vague is what vagueness is wonderful and you know the devil is in the details if you will but it's really important that we also consider the actual um legal Authority we have when we consider this so this one is something that I know we will continue to discuss as a full board along with identifying what is within our capacity and within our legal Authority so more to come on that one I just wanted to preview that now for you all so I wanted to
014also remind you all of the work that we have been doing um and the schools we have been supporting so here just wanted to give you a visual representation of our former and current priority schools we have the three in the dark gray that are our former schools we have the three that are in one box on the top uh right there that are our current schools then to give you an in a actual table here is what I wanted to show you so the three that are highlighted in grayish you can see they're kind of like grayed out those are schools that have exited the priority School process and just last year in June 2020 the board voted to remove Schuyler Central High School from that designation also um the asterisk near the three
015dates in the current status you see in year six year three year three there's a little asterisk what we also know is that during the time of initial identification for all of our schools to where we are now we have experienced a pandemic and what that pandemic came some flexibilities but also came in eruptions so in May of 2021 this board voted to exempt the 2019-2020 school year to count towards years in status which means right that that year didn't actually go toward the number of years at that school was identified so for right now what you see in front of you and what we've also reviewed from our statue is that a school that has been in priority status for three consecutive years you as a board under the recommendation of the commissioner will
016need to take an action for those two schools which is Asante Elementary and Asante High School I'm going to provide more context about the schools themselves but I wanted to make sure I at least Center this work so you all know kind of what we've been what we've been doing here with our priority schools so then the age-old question how do you become a priority school right we're always ask that question I want to make sure we are clear about this process here because what we have done is we have learned a lot from the first time we've executed this work so in a typical school year when we're running our accountability Cycles we're starting in November or December right we always strive to get better but it has a lot to do with data
017quality and making sure that we validate all these pieces so around November December we're releasing our aquest classifications and our federal designations I want to know at the time of initially starting priority schools Essa was not necessarily in place so the designation piece was a little different but now we're having these two things happen simultaneously then in January we're engaging internally around narrowing that list of all the needs support to improve schools to potential schools then we're engaging on an on-site diagnostic review to inform final recommendations to the commissioner that are brought before you as a board we would then be engaging with you in March to identify the schools and for you all to approve who those schools will be and then spend the next few months actually working on a plan that is
018where a lot of the work takes place just identifying the school is insufficient it's about what are the things the actual strategies activities and the specific goals that that school will be held accountable to that work happens through April and May and then in June the board is coming together to approve that plan so what that actually then looks like is internally right we're engaging our nde staff members across the agency our aqueous classification data gives us information on how our students and student groups are performing on our end scas assessments how they're performing on attendance on graduation right how they're doing on progress towards English language proficiency whether or not they're growing in their academic areas but it doesn't tell me if there's a risk on how they're spending money it doesn't tell me
019if there's any violation to other rules it doesn't tell me if in fact there's been consistent turnover over time so it's important that we're actually Gathering additional information across the department to obtain a clearer picture of that school's quality and performance and the district in which it's situated so through that thorough review of qualitative and quantitative data we're identifying patterns and Trends also over time right so if we're identifying a school we want to make sure this is actually something that we're seeing is a trend right so we know that different offices have risk assessments so we want to make sure is this school and District continuously coming up on your cycle for something that definitely is a red flag so to speak right for us to ensure that we are focusing on the schools
020that need the most support to improve that all of that information right is um informing the recommendation that is made to the commissioner that is brought before you and then the board as you all would um approve or not approve the par the proposed priority school and then their plan so that is a high level overview of what that process is like and I wanted to provide that just so you all have an idea of what you can expect coming up this year so now I'm going to transition to the actual three schools that we currently have that are identified so Asante Elementary School Asante middle school and Asante High School so they do share a building right they are in the same district but these are three distinct buildings because you can only identify
021a building you cannot identify districts I just want to make that clarification before I do that though I want to provide some context related to the actual District though so that you understand that when we're working directly with schools we're also working with districts we're also working with their school boards and in some instances we're working with their tribal councils we're working with their community members it isn't just the one principle and whoever is under their purview right so to provide further context here you'll see that um leadership turnover has been critical and has been unfortunate at this District in the last 10 years have been nine new superintendents in the last five years have been four new high school principals they have submitted an affidavit for instructional hour exceptions for the last three years
022I will save for the 2019-2020 school year and I know the team in the back can clarify for me I believe every school district submitted an affidavit right that was probably one of the most significant years so that can that should have an asterisk next to it I will say this year the team did engage in their cognia external accreditation review and received accreditation through cognia this year so they are an accredited school and will receive their um uh will continue their accreditation cycle every five years right so um that's something that and it's their continuous Improvement accreditation cycle right they're accredited every year but this process here is about continuous Improvement you may have noticed that in the news earlier this year there was a big deal that Asante High School had a 100
023graduation rate for their four-year cohort and I know that has to be a pride point it is unfortunate though that when we talk about graduation rates that the school then is identified for comprehensive support and Improvement for low performance so when we talk about increasing graduation rates yet students are not necessarily meeting performance benchmarks it begs the question what has yet to be done in order to ensure that there is alignment between High graduation rates and achievement the school board President and Vice President were both seated this year in January as well as the tribal chairman who started this year in January so we are talking about four to five new people every so often at least this specific year four to five new people coming together with the best of intentions to wanting to
024support this individual's individual schools and the school district and the community as a home I'd also be remiss to say that Asante Community Schools is on a Sovereign Nation right it's on tribal lands so it is part of the Asante Dakota people want to be really clear about the fact that I am not an expert when I go there I am not from that Community I am very clear about wanting to make sure that the conditions are set and that people hold high expectations for themselves and for the school regardless of what background they have so I want to remind you as a result of all that where we were in 2019 right so every individual School wrote a wrote a goal based off of these areas to ensure and increase academic achievement right focus
025on learning intentions and success criteria right so they wanted to focus really specifically on do we know what objective students are supposed to meet and do we know how we'll know that they met them focus on increasing four-year cohort graduation rate as you can see that's something that's been a really focus for them reducing chronic absenteeism and emphasizing restorative practices across the school district and then lastly and most importantly centering Dakota culture and language throughout the district from the board to the tribal council to the school district but again A lot has shifted since 2019 when we were we were identified at that time right so what we wanted what the school wanted to and the school district teams wanted to focus on was really related to academics and having a really clear Focus on
026high quality instructional materials implementation we have heard a lot about that work we've heard a lot about the importance of our schools selecting and adopting and it is imperative that we focus on but what does it mean for a teacher who's brand new to the school district has no idea what it means to live so far away from home because they finally got a job and now they have to implement new materials that they've never seen before so those are the types of complexities that I want to make sure you continue to keep in your mind the next is around Dakota language and culture and ensuring that there is an acknowledgment of the fact that all of these students are coming from a shared identity and that all of many of the educators are not
027sharing that as well right so that there is an importance on the language and culture and identity of the children of that community and the support that teachers need in order to be respectful and acknowledge their shortcomings where necessary and that they have the appropriate professional learning they need so they can be successful in that and then lastly I would say is Talent another word for human capital another word for teacher and leader support and development this is really critical because if you heard me a few slides ago every year there's always someone new coming through so we want to make sure this excuse me the district team and the district leaders wanted to make sure that this was a continued focus on having specific processes and structures for this to be successful for this
028year and Beyond so for the 22-23 school year you're seeing here some conditions for continuous Improvement you've heard me speak multiple times about the difference between continuous Improvement and school Improvement we don't live in school Improvement we have to live in continuous Improvement these are healthy practices every school and District engage in where they're going through reviewing their goals setting goals constant Evolution and school Improvement is dramatic interventions that are not meant to be there long term and we're just wanted to highlight that right there right so we want to make sure that our school districts have talent management practices are related to human resources related to a hiring practice right relating to um that when they're recruiting they're recruiting Educators that share positive mindsets about the students that they're serving next is around instructional
029structures you heard me say about the affidavit it is really important that we understand that those are minimum requirements for students to have access to high quality educational experiences and the district when submitting an affidavit has stated that they are unable to do that right so it is important to highlight that if things always happen to you you feel like you have no control so the school district has chosen to really be intentional about the dates that they're having professional learning about the dates when cultural events you know might happen right there's some um Cadence to that and then there are some things that happen that you can prepare for but nonetheless you want to be as prepared as possible second is Elementary literacy really focusing on the implementation of their um high quality instructional
030materials from K5 Secondary School design you heard me mention that the school the high school has been identified as a comprehensive support and Improvement School because of the flexibility of the funds because of the size of the school those funds can also be used to support transition grades like seven eight right so we want to make sure that there's some continuity here so there's a focus here on the school design and then lastly communication so you heard me also say that the new board president started in January right so it's important that the board president and the superintendent have a really close relationship and also are able to hold each other accountable for the things that they want done in that District so for challenge management really quickly I just wanted to touch base on
031this here is that they have been conducting um hiring processes and board members have taken part of the interviews of their incoming School leaders so they now have a new uh High School principal and an assistant principal there's been some shifts related to moving the Middle School supervision under the elementary principle to create instructional coherence and continuity between K-8 especially since materials the materials themselves are in alignment for K-8 and then lastly thinking about well always in the back of our mind what's the transition plan if this happens or if that happens and that's something that the team is currently working through related to identifying a dean of students identifying teacher leader roles and really focusing on what are the necessary things the board also needs to have in place to support any incoming superintendent
032that comes through their doors so this data I want to show you really briefly is focused on the elementary and you see that I wrote estimates from nscast and nwea portal I do not have access to this this is information provided by the school district you'll hear from Dr Clark later related to the standard setting process that will happen so this information is very preliminary because the school has done this information themselves but this is not related to accountability or a quest yet I just wanted to at least share because there are some small wins right not everything is you know something that is called an alert but we also have to acknowledge small wins with the urgency of what needs to happen next so what we see here for K2 the school uses nwea
033map to create goals for themselves to ensure that when students enter grades three and beyond that they are meeting their projected growth expectations as well as meeting grade level expectations because we do not offer right a Statewide assessment for K2 so what you see here is that meeting grade level expectations the um school did not meet that specific benchmark they did meet K2 meeting their projected growth so what we're seeing here is that at times students may start so far behind that they're going to demonstrate growth and we'll need some time to actually demonstrate proficiency or close to proficiency over time for Dibbles we're also seeing here that really focuses on um reading and we see here that the school is on track but has some work to still do and then related to nscast
034specifically again there's an asterisk there so you take that with the grain of salt and know that these are not final by any means but we're seeing some growth and some improvement on students that are meeting proficiency benchmarks right students that are on track or advanced in the in the elementary school and then we don't know of growth yet so that's forthcoming information for the high school the middle school and high school is just slightly more difficult continues to be a growing area of concern has a lot to do with the lack of consistent leadership in the secondary grades this Academic Year the middle the middle high school principle was removed and the superintendent had to assume the role of the principal and the superintendent we also know that because of privacy concerns I cannot
035share data with you even data that is projected if it doesn't mean a particular Benchmark a particular like point so if they're less than 10 students in any particular category I'm unable to share that with you that should be enough information to let you know that I'm unable to why I'm unable to share that with you um again as you saw increasing graduation rates for four-year cohorts but what we also know is that in our state we track students up to seven years right and what we're seeing is a disparity between students who are still part of that school district and may potentially be receiving educational support or services but are not still graduating after their four years so right so they're staying for the let's say they're coming back to school but their seven-year
036Co excuse me their seven year graduation rate is still really low and one would say in other school districts that we have worked with we actually sometimes see the inverse where the longer a student stays with you the more opportunity the child has to graduate and therefore your extended graduation coherk your extended graduation rate is higher um but that is some work to be done here and also for accountability purposes we do combine the four-year graduation and seven year graduation rate and that is currently at about 75 so we definitely want to see an increase in that so some Focus areas for the upcoming school year given that context is really focusing on centering high quality instruction materials adoption implementation focus on high dose tutoring continuing to work with a graduation coach that has been
037consistent since 2019 to not only ensure that students are graduating but that they're actually graduating with the skills this positions and the things that they need to be successful and earn a family sustaining wage and then you heard me mention before moving the middle school grades under the elementary so that the high school principal is focused on high school 9 through 12. and the elementary the assistant principle that will be coming on just really quickly wanted to share some chronic absenteeism data as a reminder chronic absence is um when a student misses 10 percent or more of their time in membership and the focus here is on the academic impact of that child right so what is that child missing because they have missed a particular class or a day of school whatever the case
038might be and I just wanted to offer these two data points right from 2019 when we last ran accountability in 2020 when we just ran accountability this fall what you see here is some increases in Elementary and high school a little decrease in the middle school but overall as a district we're seeing an increase in chronic absence this I can tell you is something that the board President and Vice President are making it their priority for this upcoming school year working with their Tribal Council to better understand what are the codes that the tribe uses themselves for um attendance and truancy and understanding what truancy means and how important it is to ensure that we're setting expectations for attending school the school wanted to also focus on average daily attendance but what this data doesn't
039tell us is um how important it is that this could be just you know an average of the number of students that are in school that on a given day right but it's not necessarily about whether or not there's a significant academic impact on different groups of students so I just wanted to offer these two things and again schools will have an opportunity to validate their data throughout this summer because this is the data we will use for accountability purposes so this is a preview and it says as of May 31st so again other piece of data to hold as a preliminary information but this information will be finalized and then shared when we engage in our accountability Cycles this fall so what does this all mean what are we leading towards right so you've
040been hearing me talk about the fact that there are two schools that are in their third consecutive year so we need to um what I really want to share with you here is what the team has been working towards for their plan for understanding the importance of delivering strong tier instruction strong tier one instruction every day so here we having what you see in front of you is what is the base instructional material that's being used and the aligned interventions to support the different students that may need that support and how they're all in a line together so you see math I just wanted to highlight math because zearn has been such a pivotal investment that we have made in our state through our Esser funds and we're seeing this play out here um in
041one of our priority schools I just wanted to highlight that here and then the CSI action plan you heard me mention that the high school was identified as a CSI School the all CSI schools had to submit a funding application that also talks about goals and talks about their action plans what we don't want to do is have a funding application for CSI over here have a priority School plan over here and then hopefully have a continuous Improvement plan over here and none actually talk to one another so this CSI plan because it was required for them to receive funds had to be done um but is not by all means finished at all but it will continue to be revised based off of um the data that we receive as well as um the
042input from the incoming administrators and Educators just wanted to quickly um highlight something here too so we have seen across our state age com implementation in high schools actually be an area of focus for us as well right there has been a strong focus on early literacy there's been a strong focus on Ka we also know that sometimes when you get to high school I love this book I want to read this book and we're going to do this book and I think it's really important about how we understand the complexity of the standards and the materials that are necessary to support teachers to support student learning every day just wanted to highlight that there for student attendance I want to uplift really quickly the Hana Consulting organization that we partner with through the office
043of special education Consulting is a native American-owned organization that works specifically with tribal communities and school communities to truly understand what are the needs of the community and to support cultural competence and instructional practices that support the values of that community and then lastly for the graduation rate I really wanted to focus here on the importance of not just maintaining 100 graduation rate because like I said it begs the question of well what does it mean to graduate um if everyone's graduating 100 but we're not meeting um achievement benchmarks but I really want to focus here that there is a holistic approach of including community members and Elders to support student engagement as the first point of ensuring that students are getting the education that they need every day so as I can start to
044wrap up here we have some District priorities for the upcoming school year that I wanted to share with you and really focus on building out that leadership team for this upcoming year and the future years so you heard me mention CSI funding and obviously there is an item on consent agenda today for tntp for leadership focused uh leadership coaching focused the last one I want to mention here is related to the investment that the local board is making to support teacher leadership development and how important it is that these the school district is attempting to address the issues that they are identifying through different sources of funds which is what we want all of our schools to do but also to be intentional about the board actions and how important the board leader and the
045leadership team there um and the Authority that they have to set the expectation and fund the things that they need to fund to make these changes so recommendations and next steps ultimately this is to end in a recommendation the recommendation uh recommended action is for Asante Elementary and the high school to continue as priority schools with a significant revision to the plan Focus specifically on the implementation of these instructional materials continuing to develop the teachers and leaders and to have an explicit focus on community and tribal engagement we understand I will say I I'll speak for myself I understand that it has been many years of um investing not only funds but time and people into this school district and it may feel it may feel at times like it may be for a lost
046cause and it's not right these are children that we are talking about the end of the day these are generations of people that we are talking about so um I strongly believe that this action with this contractor with the people will be the best plan of action for this next school year and I'm being really intentional about seeing this next school year I'm not talking about any further right we want to make sure that the team and my under uh with my direction as well right wants to make sure that there's coherence between all of these different things right CSI School CSI work priority work special education needs that are arising as well as working with just any other entity that wants to support the school district and ultimately to strengthen the community structures and
047communication um between all of these different entities I'm going to turn it over to you all and see if you have any questions but thank you I liked it even better the second time I heard the presentation I I picked up even more today and uh yesterday our committee spent a good 45 minutes to an hour on this topic and I just want to say I I hearing this and the discussion we had yesterday makes me so proud to serve on the State Board of Education and with the Department of Education and see the work that we're doing uh because we are showing every student in this state matters uh you've spent years working closely and what I loved not only hearing from the nbe staff yesterday but also hearing from the leadership of the
048school the new leadership was you know the uh the respect for the cultural identities of every youth attending that school and you know we all know that you know kids are going to learn better and more if they feel like their school environment is safe and they're supported and I think there was some real Innovative things happening uh there and I just big kudos to the school district and to the nde staff and yeah just look forward to having a successful year this year so thank you for that report thank you for the report I'm yesterday we had a conversation in our board meeting about legislative priorities and so as we try to think about what we're prioritizing going forward I think one of the comments that I've heard and maybe you can correct me
049if I'm wrong is this our priority schools are a place where we don't have a lot of staff like it's you and um and is so would we be able to do more or serve more if your department was funded more is that or if we had more funding for priority schools in general is that a place where you think that you could I want to put you on the spot but a place where if we had more resources we could do more either for the schools that we already have or for adding additional schools and so I'm just wondering what you think about that and then my second question is we also heard from Lane yesterday and started the conversation about um the funding that we have for adult Learners and so when we're
050looking at priority schools and really you know the community that we're serving are we or have we looked at the eligibility of um or or the need for adult education in the communities to be able to kind of build that pipeline our parents who can help their kids at home and things like that and just looking cohesively at everything so those are kind of my two questions the first I will say um if I had more money absolutely I'm doing it let's do it um I want to say though we engage in an RFP process right because there's very limited capacity right because we rely on contractors who can you know extend that reach and extend the capacity that we have so there was a moment in time where we were hopeful that we would
051get more fun so we started developing um a leadership track with a former contractor and um you know aside from other you know things around how you negotiate pay and how you figure all that out right but the fact that we want people from our state to support our schools because they're most closely related to the context that we're in right that's super important um and also yeah if I had more money we make be way more school but I also hope you hear my comments that like it isn't more schools because um we're dying to tell schools what to do it's because the need is in fact great right and our accountability system continues to signal that there is a great need but there's always sometimes a misalignment between how we can actually support
052that so thank you for that question I would say for the second um with Schuyler Central High School we did work closely with Vocational Rehabilitation and we did make some attempts to work with our adult basic Ed team as well um and uh I probably said that wrong I apologize but um the point is that that is something I think to consider moving forward and also ensure that it's something that the community sees as a need and that they're ready and invested to take that take that role because that takes a different set of strategic planning and um potential resources that the school will need to be able to to allocate but I I take that point so I'll I'll take that back thank you Patsy well first I wanted to say that you as
053part of the Nebraska education um whole group and the people that are on your team are leading are living proof that we don't give up on kids we don't leave them behind um we hang on and and keep working with them and so I've heard that over and over that that's really important that we don't give up on kids and Nebraska Department of Education in your team prove that every day as you're working with them and so I'm I'm happy to hear what you're saying about what you're doing um some people might look at the number of years that we've worked with them and say well um are you really succeeding well yes you are really succeeding because you're still there and they're still working with you and I think that the thing that I
054heard that was the most hopeful in your presentation and I truly believe this is it's not just oratory I believe that the answer to what you're searching for in education at Santee is the development of communication and consistency and it's so that's so hard that is a really difficult thing as we see in our world today all around us so um I'm impressed by your bravery and by your creativity and I um hope that you will come to us and ask for anything that you need that we can give that we can provide oh thank you again for the presentation there were um three things yesterday that were mentioned that I thought were very positive and if you feel comfortable sharing a little bit about each was how the new board president wanted to work
055with the school leaders that relationship and the relationship between the local board and the tribal council and the other thing if you could elaborate a little bit more about the partnership with we mentioned adult learning and so what they have with the college there that's been um I want to say revamped but reconstituted but it was exciting and I I don't want to misstep and say something but those are three things that really caught my attention yesterday absolutely hopefully I don't miss that be there um so the new board president understands the importance of holding the superintendent accountable and you may remember that in a prior Contracting period we did have a board consultant right that worked specifically with the local board and um what we are really focusing on here is actually that local
056board leaning on the Nebraska Association of school boards right The Entity that is there as a membership organization that they work really closely with all of our boards in fact they're having a retreat coming up soon and they're attending their leadership conference as a board right so this board president understands the importance of people joining a board being elected members and also needing some development themselves right um and ensuring that the superintendent understands that it is a navigation between that board president and a local board and what's best for the school district without you know overstepping and without you know the delicate line as you all know as sitting board members right just a little different context but nonetheless um so I think that's really important that the board president and the vice president showed
057up yesterday um to engage with you in committee so appreciative of that the next is the relationship between the tribal council and the local school board right so you heard me say there's a tribal council Sombra Nation there's a public school that is um under the rule 10 Nebraska Verizon statute requirements right and then you have this um school board that is also you know elected elected body so with a new board president and a new Tribal Council leadership team it's important that they also understand and acknowledge things that have happened in the past because these are community members right they all live in the same general area right so everyone knows everyone everyone knows everything but it's important that they denote what their responsibilities and their authorities are and that they then come together
058collectively to work on what is best for that school district I have met with the tribal council leader at least three four times since he's been on on his uh as a tribal chairman right and it's a big deal it's some would say that's the equivalent to our president right so it's important to acknowledge the you know the nature in which we're operating um specifically I'm in the school district so they are attempting to work together and also acknowledge that they have discreet roles and responsibilities and then lastly um the Believers the nebraska-indian Community College which is right down the road from the Asante school district and um the board provides a scholarship to some students from the graduating class to attend nicc and there's more work to be done on establishing that relationship not
059only to offer dual credit classes but also to offer other Career and Technical educational experiences just one more thing what you said reminded me how important getting the elders into the school and how revered they are by all of the students and so that collaboration getting the elders in the school and working with the students in some capacity I was really impressed with that Nuance as well so you got it Dr Vargas did I also remember hearing that they have plans for more engagement with their local ESU number one which they haven't had in the past so I was encouraged to hear that yes so we also know that um the ESU continues to be a resource that sometimes the school district might not know where or when or how to engage and we do
060know that there's a lot of resources there especially when it comes to supporting their special education program so that's something that will be continued conversation with our office of specification with the ESU office and other things like professional learning data literacy you know all those things thank you one thing I wanted to ask and and uh have some clarification on it do you think that turnover like today you talked to us about you know having a major turnover in leadership and along the way you've talked about turnover in teachers and staff do you think that that of course has a negative effect I agree with that but do you think that's getting better and if so what do you think is missing uh had been missing that kept people there longer or what do what
061needs to be done to keep them longer sorry put up no that's great thank you for that question um I think sometimes uh as Educators we like to solve problems and we're courageous we want to jump in and this is a really big problem right and from afar you'd think you might be able to conquer it and then you realize that the day-to-day is actually not what you thought it would be so um with that it requires a lot of support and it requires a lot of tenacity a lot of resilience a lot of perseverance right all of the words it also requires skill right you need to actually be able to have the skills possess the skills to be able to lead um a school community that may in fact be entrenched with their
062own beliefs that this is their reality right so that they're in fact hopeless right and it's not the case I want to make that crystal clear that it's important that um leaders are receiving the support that they need and are supported by the structures like having an appropriate calendar right like things that seem so small like every school district should have no big deal right but it's important to um like identify that piece there I think the other thing too is um it's okay to be able to say that you need support to do something and then you receive that support and then lastly I would then say um to keep people there this school board the Asante School Board um had a retaining bonus this year for educators that chose to stay so there
063are things that boards can do that also signal to their staff right that they matter that they want them there and that's a really big deal so I just wanted to shout out to board president for that so it's just one one thing yeah thank you uh thank you for your presentation you're doing wonderful work how do you are you seeing a trigger event from 10 years ago that started this kind of more we're there now as CSI school is there something that triggered it or was it kind of have you looked at their data from 10 years ago compared to what it was when they first placed on this six years ago did it was it a boom it happened or was this kind of a Slow Burn and I have one other follow-up
064quick question of course um I'll make my attempt to answer the question but I know that there are potentially other folks that can help um I will say when I first got here first thing I did was look at we would have lists that were called persistently like low achieving schools right and you can tell right if I'm looking at that list what those schools were and this was one of them um and these three were one of them so uh this I wouldn't say is necessarily something that like this event happened and overnight this happened I believe that it definitely has been a progression of potentially internalized beliefs that this is just our story and we're going to do the best that we can with what we have versus really raising the bar and
065saying we can be just as good as a school in Elkhorn so and you mentioned it twice in your presentation how do you marry The Chronic absenteeism and being a priority school with a 100 graduation rate do you have an opinion on that how that is accomplished are we maybe not I think that schools in general will do the best that they can to support their students succeed right and it's important that because children might be chronically absent they do eventually show up to school and when a child comes to school I'm going to capitalize on the fact that child is there that day and we're going to do whatever it takes to catch you up on that work is that the same as having a high quality instructor facilitating your learning every day it's
066not and I think that may be part of it without getting off the rails here but looking at my dear boss here to see if she'll want to interject with her Infinite Wisdom my first thought goes to sustaining the community and I think as um this District really thinks about its continues to think about itself that um we want to work with them to have young people who want to even be in their community and sustain it and in this Century that takes a lot of skill that takes a lot of skill so as they understand um and really impose on their students the importance of being there and then the education being um correlating to what the skills really are that those students need to sustain that Community I think as we marry all
067those things together as we've even seen in the Omaha Nation up at Macy the other day and saw some great things in terms of careers that sustain their community and if those students choose to leave sustain our state our our world I think we as we work on those kind of skills it will make it will make a difference yes and I'll just add a quick comment because Dr fries and mind ties in with yours and I would personally have a hope that there will be a CTE component for especially for the high school as in the Omaha Nation district has developed because I think that will give the high schoolers something to sink their teeth into and encourage them to want to be there every day and so I hope that the administration from
068that the Santi School District can visit the Macy and and just maybe check that out that'd be my hope thank you I promise I won't ask any more questions say anything else but just crossed my mind to ask this question how are the young people of Santee involved in being a part of the solution to these problems um I'd love to answer that question so um I will say that this past Academic Year they have revitalized their student council I mean there's work to be done there but what we know is that if we continue what is known is that at the school leaders in the school district team continues to create Solutions without you know in bringing in and learning about and learning from those who are it's going to mostly impact they're going
069to continue to fall short so the student council I would say is um something that is what was the word you used Lisa before re read something right but reconstituted thank you Sherry right so yeah so that that is one piece of it we also learned through their um cognia uh visit as well where they had um you know a student panel just kind of how students felt there as well so even establishing like surveys that can at least get to the sense of how do students feel about their school and what they're learning right and how important it is for that data along with achievement data to inform Solutions I think will be critical so that is what I would say related to what you asked thank you Dr Vargas this was very informative
070and great questions asked by board members really appreciate the work thank you men president as Dr Vargas steps away I want to just really give her a shout out as she takes her runway walk back because she has done uh tremendous work and um I remember in the early days um Santee then as it was called now Asanti as it brings even more of his culture in there was a community thought that and for some families if they had several children that may be there best children their most academic children would go outside of that District to another school and some of their other students would stay within ascenti as if it couldn't live up to someplace else and I think under Dr vargas's leadership and work with the team and others in the nde
071and now working with Asante that that mindset has changed I mean just imagine if the Omaha Public Schools parents there thought half their children needed to go one place in half state within the district then within the district they wouldn't be working on the issues that needed to be resolved and uh we've come so far so far with that um but it is an everyday work it is a mindset change it is bringing people in who believe and have high expectations and I just want to shout out to Dr Vargas because I know for her um it's it's every day it's um tremendous presence and there's there's uh I would say there's none like Dr Vargas but there are many in the nde who just have that commitment to make the difference so thank you
072to Dr vargason team thank you Dr Friesen word agenda item 3.3 so I'll turn that back to you to me I think I have another presentation coming up and this time it's discussion of standard setting process for uh ends gas assessment in English language arts and Mathematics and science validation from Dr Trudy Clark taking her runway walk and here we run uh here we go again with um yet another nde leader making a tremendous difference for us this time in assessment so thank you Dr Clark thanks I appreciate I mean the opportunity um okay so standard setting is a process that we are required to do basically um it's just a process of describing the levels of performance and then identifying those ranges of scores that associate or are associated with those three levels the
073State Board of Education in 2017 established that there would be three performance levels presently we are utilizing developing on track and pro and advanced just bring to mind that when we talk about those three levels it's on track and advanced both of those refer to proficient students just at different levels to give you a little bit more detail about those three levels though is this slide that really provides you as I mentioned more detail about what a developing student would look like what an on track student and then what an advanced student it really comes down to how um how they demonstrate their learning and also then how prepared are they to engage in on-grave level content so those are the three levels that we work with and to answer the question about when we
074engage in standard setting there are three precipitating events that kick in when we do a standard setting the first year of a new assessment when a test changes significantly and then also when policy makers want to adjust the expectations so our precipitating events that we recognize for our standard setting processes this year for English language arts it was the adoption of the revised College and Career ready standards in 2021 which then required us to change the test so the new test which is the ends gas growth computer adaptive test in 2023 measured those new standards so because we have new data that's measuring new standards this data needs to be calibrated so we understand where that developing student would interact with that learning what the on track and then the advanced for mathematics it came
075down to um conversation around the educator concerns as someone who is engaging with the assessment and advisory committee I heard more and more about concerns regarding the standards cut scores and so forth so I took this to the technical advisory committee and we reviewed the Ed metrics technical report from 2018 standard setting process and there really were indications that there was sufficient evidence to suggest that a new standard setting for mathematics was necessary or could take place and so we entered into conversations about how that would look and um that was necessary so we are conducting standard setting for ELA and for mathematics a full standard setting process so what that means is ACS Ventures which the department which the Nebraska State Board of Education approved the contract for this company they are conducting the
076standard setting process so ACS Ventures will then facilitate this work of the Nebraska Educators and we have about 65 content area Specialists so when I talk about content area Specialists we're talking about teachers who are engaged with students daily and understand what a student that would be on an event on the developing level on on track and advanced what they look like in the classroom and how they interact with on-grade level content so those 65 content area Specialists these also could include instructional coaches um and then the content area Specialists that are on staff at various districts so these panelists engage with the achievement level descriptors so um each content area has expectations that are associated with each of these three levels as well so they're going to interact and engage with that information and
077also the test content those conversations are part of the basis for those cut scores it's also engaged these panelists are engaged in multiple rounds of discussion so they actually take the test and then they begin asking for each of those items that are make up the test where does a barely on track student how do they perform on this item so they go through each of those questions and ask that same question and they Mark for each of the items this is what I believe this person this student that I have in my mind would interact after they do that then they go through and they ask that same question except they now ask what does a barely Advanced student how do they interact with this item and so they go through and identify that
078as well so that's when I what I mean when I say panelists engage in multiple rounds and discussions one of the other major steps and important steps of the standard process is they have the data of these students that have now taken the test that information is now um the cut scores are applied to that data and so they have an opportunity to understand what's the impact what is the impact of these cut scores on this data and so they'll see where how the percentages of students that would most likely Fall within the developing within the on track and then with the advanced and also then we asked them to look at a vertical alignment to make sure that it makes sense as they go from grade three through eight what does that look like
079we just want to make sure that there's consistency in expectations moving from third grade through eighth grade so those are all part of the process one final piece of that is when they look outward uh they may look at data and results from nape the problem with nape is that they only test at Fourth eighth and then the high school so there's limitations there as I was reviewing the information from ACS Ventures they're also perhaps going to be looking at how this information or these um levels and the data that results from it how does that line up with what they're seeing in map growth because that is a norm-reference national test so what they're looking for is something that's a national test it might be the ACT they're looking at maybe the map growth
080results so it's a it's a way for them to gauge again does it align does it make sense is it reasonable and then in August when I come back to you with the results and the recommendations that are coming from the panel what you're going to see is two cut scores one at on track and one at Advanced Four and scas growth Ela and math grades three through eight and then also the English language arts altered it um they also are doing a standard setting for the alternate assessment and again the the question is that they've answered with these cut scores what does a student who is barely on track need to know and be able to demonstrate this where is this level at and then also for the advanced student the final step before
081I bring this to you folks for your um response adoption of the cut scores is a final opportunity to review the results I'm going to be presenting along with the chair of the talk Chad buckendall he's going to facilitate a policy review with a subcommittee of Educators from the assessment and accountability committee to determine if those cut scores are reasonable doesn't make sense that really is what it comes down to is Will those results make sense as we go forward for science it's really just a it's a validation it's not a complete standard setting process so again the main emphasis with this work will be again presenting the data and applying the cut scores that were adopted last year looking at the results and again will the cut scores are those reasonable and so those
082conversations will take place amongst the content Specialists and also again the policy review well those are those cut scores reasonable for um results coming off of this data for barely excuse me for developing on track and proficient students questions no question just a comment I uh I I guess it's safe to say that uh cut scores and how they're created is not my area of expertise and so I'm grateful to have someone that does have that expertise and I also um am grateful that you've really been intentional about using the TAC committee because I uh you know that's a governor-appointed committee I I don't think they were brought together for a couple years but I know since you've been in this seat man you've met with them at least four hours these are like four
083hour meetings each so and I've been really impressed that you really use um that kind of a sounding board for these types of decisions so just thank you and kudos thank you Dr Clark for this explanation I was just curious when you talk about the 65 content area Specialists how are those Specialists selected for this process we solicit request we send out a request for teachers who are interested interested they cannot have been part of the item writing activity that created the items for the test the content area specialist That's on on serves nde so Becky Michaels for the ELA Marissa pizant has had to step in but I have tapped the and she has as well the math Cadre of ESU content Specialists other assessment folks we have garnered their input as well to
084make sure that the the folks that are selected have the necessary content strength to make those decisions so we rely on first creating a pool and then we get input from folks that have worked with these individuals and know that they have the strength of content knowledge thank you Mr I just have to share this yesterday in the lobby I I don't know if I was checking in or whatever uh gal from my district came up to me and says Lisa I'm volunteering for the math cut scores and she was so excited so I think it might be due to how you request and how you talk to them about the commitment but kudos to you I mean she was really excited I mean she's a big math person yeah but I thought that was
085pretty cool somebody was actually excited to be a part of us so thank you we we recognize how valuable the time and energy of these individuals who give us days out of their summer to item right to align items to the test and then the standard setting it's not easy work so I really appreciate each and every one of them that comes forward and volunteers and says I want to be a part of this process it's great professional development um but we rely so heavily on individuals who are willing to give us their time but they are recognized as very strong in their content or else we wouldn't be it just wouldn't be right to include them when are the the questions that are on the test going to be written for Math and the
086others um the item writing takes place the item writing takes place uh in latter part of June and then um July for math let me look up for sure it's on our website here we go for math item writing is July 11th through the 13th are there other the ELA as well Ela is yeah okay we have item writing July 10th through the 14th okay so this summer for both of them yes and science has done already or that that's actually science we're doing two because of how involved it is sure we have one in Kearney June 12th through the 16th and then one in Lincoln from July 10th through the 14th the standard setting will take place for all three at the same time so those July 20 fifth through the 27th all three
087will take place I mean well I see some of us will want to see those questions I know we'll have to be embargoed but some of us don't want to see that okay just so you know you have to sign in blood okay no you you'll you have access yes you don't have to do that though just just any other questions or comments or Dr Clark thank you Dr Clark whoops appreciate that sorry I must I pushed the wrong button thank you next on our agenda is the president's report the more you read the more you know the more you learn learn the more places you will go I hope you recognize that as not my original quote but Dr Seuss that was my best Dr Seuss voice and I'm sorry it's not really great
088as long ago as 2002 the Nebraska State Board of Education acknowledged the importance of early literacy by creating a standing position more recently some State legislatures have passed laws related to reading Improvement or to early literacy for example in Mississippi passed the literacy-based promotion Act which is a comprehensive Statewide fully funded early literacy program and it's interesting that by 2019 Mississippi had the highest fourth grade nape reading scores in the nation in Nebraska in 2018 our legislature passed the reading Improvement Act the reading Improvement act includes some requirements such as k-3 students have to be assessed three times you're using diagnostic reading assessments during the school year and any deficiencies that are identified for students those students then have an individualized reading Improvement plan that's developed and that is communicated with parents there's a real
089emphasis in this law on Parental communication and then another requirement is that there of course are interventions in school interventions to try and help those students who've been identified with deficiencies to overcome those in response to the Nebraska reading Improvement act nde developed a website Nebraska reads many of the resources necessary to fulfill the requirements of this law are found on that website for example they have an individual reading Improvement guide for teachers they also have approved reading diagnostic assessments so that schools can look to see which assessments are approved I don't know if that's important for us to acknowledge we'll keep going until we're issued out um so this website though has much more than just resources that are required as part of the reading Improvement Act it has a dyslexia guide for individuals
090it has a take home reading um packet I would call it for caregivers to use to help preschool age children start learning pre-reading skills and then some early reading skills and really for me a huge part of what's on Nebraska Reed's website is the professional development information and opportunities that are all based on the science of reading the science of reading very generally defined is a body of multi-disciplinary research and by multi-disciplinary I mean this this includes research from cognitive and developmental psychology from education from communication and from linguistics so all of those science areas in the research they do they are working toward understanding the cognitive processes that are necessary for an individual to be a capable reader and they're also really focused on understanding and answering the question how does reading develop so
091from that body of research have come some evidence-based instructional practices so they've relied on the research to help them identify how how can people provide instruction to help young children read and read effectively really the science of reading typically includes five areas those five are phonemic awareness phonics fluency vocabulary and comprehension you know and if you think about phonemic awareness that's the beginnings where children start recognizing that Matt and cat oh they end with the same sound right that there's that excitement of recognizing sounds and letters and then that progresses to with phonics being able to recognize that c sometimes makes that sound and sometimes it's the KA sound and being able to actually decode words to look at letters say the sounds and then be able to as I say to my grandkids sound
092out the word right put those sounds together and you can read those words obviously fluency is being able to read quickly but accurately and with expression vocabulary understanding the meaning of words right and comprehension really when you talk about cognitive processes that is the most complex because it takes higher level thinking to be able to understand what you're reading and you certainly see that as you think about how reading progresses and how in comprehension sometimes at higher levels of elementary students have to be able to make inferences okay so those are the five areas and I've noticed in the work that we are doing we have also included the notion of knowledge and that comes from a body of research that really suggests that you put kids at an advantage if when they're young from
093early on you're exposing them to the world and you are building their sense of knowledge of what they see what they hear what they experience so those are the areas really that are part of what we call now the science of reading nde has made great strides in helping teachers across our state be trained in what's called letters letters is a science of reading based instructional program but we have limited resources right so it's it's impossible for us right now to be reaching every teacher across the state and really to that end when Dr eppler was still here part of the biennial budget request was for over two years 20 million dollars with the first year for 10 million dollars being focused on high quality instructional reading materials of having funds to be able to
094assure that any teachers who are teaching young children to read have been trained in letters or science of reading based program and then the third thing that was part of that request was funds to help us support educator preparation programs because we know how important it is for Teacher candidates to have this knowledge of how to teach reading you know as as you know that was year one year two the request was for the funding for regional reading coaches so the idea was there would be Regional coaches who would then train District level coaches in those District level coaches would be there to support any and all teachers who are teaching children to read we know that that biennial budget requests did not come to be but I think we also need to think about
095that we we have some things to help guide us forward yesterday in our work session we talked a little bit about legislative priority related to English language arts that by 2030 the hope is that 75 of third graders will be at the proficient reading level having a comprehensive Statewide fully funded early literacy program would help us tremendously in reaching that goal we also know that today we have an opportunity to pass revisions to rule 20. and in rule 20 under instructional strategies we have Incorporated that teacher and candidates need the science of reading okay I think also moving forward as we talked about in our work session we have some opportunities because this legislative session there was interest from several senators in providing additional funding to further the reading Improvement Law's goal and that goal
096is that by third grade all children would be reading at or above grade level so I think we do have an opportunity to look forward to this next legislative session and really be working with Senators on trying to um to further their interest and to help us be able to get additional funding so that we can have all students reading that concludes my report I don't know if there are any comments or reactions before we take a break oh I shouldn't have said that because there won't be any comments or questions at least um I just want to reiterate what you just said about legislators realizing the importance of reading and putting money there because when that first came to be when the two senators traveled around the state there wasn't flow through money from
097my understanding to get the job done that was mandated so it's really nice and I think we need to remember to thank the Senators that allowed that to happen this past or this session that ended yesterday so thank you for mentioning that we will take a five minute break board members we will come out of recess in one minute since we're not quite all here do you think and I know that Jonas really already I don't know if we can get it but maybe yeah okay remind me again yeah all right we are at Agenda item five approve the consent agenda is there a motion to approve the consent agenda anyone I mean commotion to prove the consent agenda is there a second okay been moved and seconded to adopt the consent agenda per board
098policy there's no discussion on this motion to adopt the consent agenda with the recording secretary please call the roll Jones yes tegmeyer yes Penner fricky yes code Johns yes Morrison yes goobles yes niri yes seven yes one absent votes are seven years one absent the affirmative has it and the consent agenda is adopted agenda item six is standing committee reports 6.1 executive committee as the chair of the executive committee I will provide a report the committee reviewed the commissioner's position description and essential functions performance indicators and evidence of attainment examples recent suggested revisions provided by non-committee members were discussed Joel Sherling will put the draft appraisal document together and it will be discussed at a future committee meeting this month the committee discussed options for the administration of the commissioner's performance appraisal committee chair Google
099spoke with Marcia herring from the Nebraska Association of school boards about how the commissioner's appraisal might be administered by that organization the the committee chair will ask Marcia for a scope of the work and will invite her to come and demonstrate and explain the appraisal tool that would be used to the committee the committee discussed the format for the commissioner's informal progress assessment Joel Sherling and committee chair Google spoke about using the same functions and indicators but have people give feedback without a ranking Steve Joel will be helping with the commissioner's goals for the year committee chair Googles will contact Steve Joel about reaching to discuss the process he will be using to establish the goals and will identify dates that he is available to work with the board in either July or August the
100committee reviewed the 2023 legislative and Regulatory priorities this concludes the executive committee report are there any questions for the committee chair agenda item 6.1 point a is approved commissioner's position description and the essential functions performance indicators and evidence of attainment examples is there a motion on item 6.1.8 yes Madam chair I move to approve the commissioner's position descriptions and the essential functions performance indicators and evidence of attainment examples is there a second okay it's moved and seconded to approve the commissioner's position description and essential functions performance indicators and evidence of attainment examples is there any discussion um chairman Google I just appreciate the fact that you went outside the executive committee and asked our input regarding these two documents so thank you for that okay will the recording secretary please call the roll Morrison yes
101goobles yes Jones yes Neri yes Co Johns yes fricky yes Penner yes tagmire yes eight yes the votes are AAS the affirmative has it and the commissioner's position description and essential functions performance indicators and evidence of attainment examples are adopted item 6.2 budget and finance committee chair Patsy KO Johns will provide a report from the budget and finance committee meeting the budget and finance committee reports met on Thursday June 1st 2023 we met and the members president were myself Elizabeth textmeier Sherry Jones and Deborah Neary the committee reviewed the proposed new expansion grants for early childhood education programs with nde providing an overview of the process including the selection requirements uh the committee supported bringing this item to the board the next item was a proposed contract with leader Services who was selected during an
102RFP process to provide a support in developing a web application for collecting and using federally required Special Education data the committee supported bringing this item to the board for a vote also the third action item reviewed by the committee was the revision action grants for 23.24 nde staff highlighted this election process for um for this with amounts awarded to the recipients the committee recommends bringing this item to the full board as well the committee then reviewed and proposed contract with pearl strategies a company to provide assistance to districts in addressing homelessness in both urban and rural districts in our state the contract is funded with Federal ARP homeless children and youth grants the committee recommended bringing this item to the full board also the last action item we had a lot of action going on
103in our meeting the last action item reviewed was the local food for school grants the grant was to address food supply issues that were caused by the pandemic the committee supports bringing this item to the full board for consideration Additionally the committee reviewed the monthly board travel expense report and in-state authorizations noting no concerns lastly nde staff reviewed work being done that will result in action items being brought to the board next month including the procurement that is being undertaken for any contracts there are several action items that may be coming to the board during the August meeting that include related idea part C funds a potential contract for a vendor to analyze and submit Special Education data a contract for educational interpreter training funding for special education transition programs a contract to support the
104Nebraska Statewide Workforce and education Reporting System a contract for continued canvas support a possible procurement Contracting system and contract for the night north side of the first floor construction for disability determinant determination services all of this foreshadowing as we have requested possible actions that we will be able to consider this concludes the budget and finance committee report and I expressed my gratitude to the staff and the members of the committee who are working with us thank you are there any questions for the committee chair Lisa I I would just like to make a statement on the action item about expanding Early Childhood because Melody's Hobson has done a wonderful job and she shares the Nebraska information with the zoom for nasby the National Association of State School boards and she does not only an awesome
105job for Nebraska but she's sharing what we're doing you know Nationwide by joining those zooms so I think that says a lot about our BCE program agenda item 6.2 point a are there any questions related to the monthly travel reports okay agenda item 6.2 point B is there a motion on item 6.2 point B I do I move to authorize the Deputy Commissioner to approve awards for new and expansion early childhood education program grants to the identified public school districts is there a second okay it's moved and seconded to authorize the Deputy Commissioner to approve War awards for new and expansion Early Childhood Program grants to the identified public school districts is there any discussion on this motion with the recording secretary please call the roll Co Johns yes Henner fricky yeah Jones yes goobles
106yes tegmeyer yes Morrison yes Neri yes 8 yes the votes are eight years the affirmative has it and the motion to authorize the Deputy Commissioner to approve awards for new and expansion Early Childhood Program grants to the identified public school districts is adopted agenda item 6.2 points C is there a motion on this item I moved to authorize the Deputy Commissioner to contract with ldp Incorporated doing business as leader services is there a second I second that motion it's moved and seconded to authorize the Deputy Commissioner to contract with ldp Incorporated doing business as leader Services is there any discussion on the motion will the recording secretary please call the roll Morrison fricky yes Jones yes goobles yes kill Johns yes Neri yes tegmeyer yes Penner yes eight yes the votes are eight years the
107affirmative has it and the motion to authorize the Deputy Commissioner to contract with ldp Incorporated doing business as leader Services is adopted agenda item 6.2 D is their emotion on this item I moved to authorize the Deputy Commissioner to approve the revision action grants for 2023 2024 is there a second to the motion I second found motion it's moved and seconded to authorize the Deputy Commissioner to approve the revision action grants for 2023-2024 is there any discussion on the motion Jacqueline yes so I think that I've asked this question before and I think it's going to become even more pertinent as we receive more funds to match Perkins funds and so on this particular matter is there someone who can so on the funding it says These funds represent 15 of the flow through formula
108funding and must Target one rural areas or areas with high percentages or numbers of CTE concentrators or areas with gaps in performance in recent years the requests for these competitive grants exceed available funds um so for 2023 50 000 from the Statewide funds were included in the total allocation for ESU so is there someone who can speak to how we determine you know if we're targeting rural areas or if we're targeting higher percentage of concentrators areas with gaps in performance does that change year over year is this a competitive application and and with scoring how exactly are we deciding these things come on up Katie good morning Katie Graham administrator of the office of queer Technical and adult education thank you for the question Jacqueline um the criteria that you read those three options are
109exactly what stated in law so in the application part of the criteria is the district assuring that they meet one of those three criteria past that the scoring criteria I think is outlined in there about the different constructs that are reviewed so like alignment to their revision needs assessment process the alignment with labor market demands either regionally or for the state I think their application just in general the quality the commitment and sustainability information that they've shared happy to answer any specific questions so when I look at the award amounts for instance it looks like the maximum amount awarded is a hundred and fifty thousand with others being one hundred thousand is that our cap or is that the max that people are requesting do we have a cap or lid on that another great
110question we have stated that there is a cap what was unique about that application that I was able to share with the committee yesterday and I don't believe you were in there that request was made on behalf of 19 school districts to work on a regional approach to CTE delivery so the funds we were able to leverage and I think I wrote in there some of our Perkins leadership funds which have different requirements and parameters because that activity is aligned with some of our strategic priorities of regional CTE delivery we were able to leverage those to add on to the original request their request was for 150 all other requests were capped at a hundred thousand and all of the other requests were specific to one Lea that one was unique because it was addressing
11119 different ones um and maybe this is just something I need to ask later just to get more understanding so can you talk about so are the revision action grants for carrying out action how do they get money to do the revision needs assessment process how do those two work together another great question and that's changed over time so in 2018 when Perkins 5 was reauthorized it included a new requirement a new eligibility requirement for every Lea to complete a comprehensive local needs assessment because we had already had the revision process in place we were able to take something where it was very school by school or District by district and revised the process so it could be used as that needs assessment and every District undergoes that process by themselves so we support we
112give templates we provide the data right as covid was hitting we had set up Regional meetings to help with a lot of the labor market data review but there are no funds that are I'm sorry there are no State funds that are earmarked to help carry out the needs assessment process once they do that process based on the needs that were identified they can then apply or we call Action items that they've identified they can then apply for an action Grant to help with whatever the difference is between their local and Perkins funds these would go to help address those activities that they'd like to carry through so when it says this represents 15 of the flow through formula funding the other 85 percent does that go directly to school districts through a set formula
113based on the same I guess based on needs assessment it does go based on a set formula in the Perkins legislation and it's based on the school age population of the district boundaries as well as that same population the percentage that are living below the poverty threshold and so is the amount that an entity receives through their Federal their automatic flow through taken into consideration when you're deciding who gets the discretionary funds um not directly and the reason for that is most of the smaller rural districts can sort together with their ESU so it wouldn't be as easy to pinpoint how much that particular District would have leveraged in any particular year because they're working more towards those combined efforts but the scoring criteria alone doesn't take into account their allocation amount just two more
114questions I noticed in I'm gonna guess I'm making an assumption I could be wrong but Omaha it looks like Metro Community College applied and that's the recipient but I don't see any I guess so I do see Ralston public schools in the Omaha area but Metro Community College looks like it's the only Community College that received funding and so can you tell me about you know K-12 Perkins versus looking at the community college and why would they be eligible or all community colleges it's eligible can you tell me a little bit more about why there's one Community College and I know they get funding from other sources as well that schools aren't able to tap into definitely So within the Perkins legislation and in our state plan we do support community colleges technical colleges colleges
115that might be um uh within the Indian colleges and the other tribal areas we determined several years ago every state has to determine a split between our federal allocation and how we're going to split that between secondary and post-secondary CTE so we are according to our state plan splitting our funds the flow through 60 40 between 60 to secondary programs and 40 to post-secondary programs they are equally as entitled to apply for the competitive grants through those Reserve funds because it's the same pot that flows through to leas so uh previous years many other community colleges have applied this year we didn't see as many apply and only one um you know warranting and award I believe last year we might have awarded two different community colleges happy to provide the history if that would
116help and then the only other question I had under funding source it says Perkins and the grace Fister Foundation trust can you give us information about the how we oversee or what the gracefister foundation trust was contributing or how they contribute to this absolutely several years ago I believe the grace Fister Foundation trust reached out to the department and I believe there was Direction left that the funds should be leveraged to support schools and it was very general and at that time the general counsel I believe worked with a number of different people in the department to determine who may best benefit and I believe revision was lifted up as one of those options that might meet the um I don't know if it's a requirement or maybe the wishes of how those funds would
117be used so we proposed and sent all of the information about what revision is and who it supports to the foundation manager the trust manager and the family and the foundation trust agreed that they would like those limited funds to support revision and every year since we've made sure to go back to them and they've confirmed that this again is still how they would like those funds earmarked to be used so it really is more of a donation I believe that they have made to the department and then this program was identified Lisa um this was posted May 17th and my question might be in there but I'm not sure but I know there's a needs assessment in you know attaining the grant money my question is what is the accountability piece do you know
118how many participants are in the projects that they plan to address and is it a report or data or combination of both we're talking about the revision action grants right so for accountability we have a couple things so on the up front we do have in their application they have to submit a plan demonstrating capacity and commitment for sustainability of the the program we do all of the finances on a reimbursement basis to ensure that what they've asked for aligns with what they're being reimbursed for and then from the accountability side a lot of that goes back to the same accountability measures we take with CTE in general as this would be a part of enhancing their whole CTE system so we have seven Federal accountability indicators that we measure and all of these activities
119should be aligning to enhancing student performance on those indicators and that would be the same with the new state funds that would be become a part of that accountability to be determined okay I will hang on to that one thing here other questions thank you Dr Graham thank you the motion is to approve the revision action grants for 2023 2024 with the recording secretary please call the roll Jones yes freaky Penner yes goobles yes Morrison CO Johns yes tegmeyer yes Neri yes eight yes the votes are eight years the affirmative has it and the motion to approve the revision action grants for 2023-24 is adopted the next action item is 6.2 Point e is there a motion yes Madam chair I moved to authorize the Deputy Commissioner to approve a contract with pearl strategies is
120there a second second it's moved and seconded to authorize the Deputy Commissioner to approve a contract with pearl strategies is there any discussion on the motion will the recording secretary please call the roll s yes Neri yes Co Johns yes Jones yes fricky yes tegmeyer yes Penner yes Morrison eight yes the votes rate is the affirmative has it and the motion to approve a contract with pearl strategies is adopted action item 6.2 Point f is their emotion yes I moved to authorize the Deputy Commissioner wait we have discussion on this after I make the motion we do don't we after motion okay yes I have moved to authorize the Deputy Commissioner to distribute the local food for schools Grant funds to school food authorities is there a second okay it's moved and seconded second by
121Patsy got that it's moved and seconded to authorized the Deputy Commissioner to distribute the local food for schools Grant funds to school fund School food authorities is there any discussion on the motion I just have a comment in the budget and finance minutes it was stated that the local food for school grants were in response to the issues caused by the pandemic and I don't remember us discussing that and it's not included in the rationale but rather the focus seemed to be the utilization of local resources in our school breakfast and lunch programs and that I fully support so just a comment where I might have missed in our discussion but it was in the minute so just wanted to point that out I guess for clarification thank you thank you any additional discussion with
122the recording secretary please call the roll Penner Jones yes freaky yes Neri yes Google's yes Morrison tegmeyer yes coach ons yes eight yes the votes are eight years the affirmative has it and the motion to distribute the local food for school Grant funds to school food authorities is adopted agenda item 6.3 planning and evaluation committee chair Deborah Neary will provide a report from the planning and evaluation committee meeting thank you we met yesterday and the committee is made up of myself Vice chair Lisa Fricke Sherry Jones and Patty goobles and we met for at least three hours it was a good one we're not going to call it a retreat yet but that was for you Jackie all right sorry uh back on track the committee reviewed the following action items uh the approval of
123rule 11 teacher waiver requests for Creek Valley Public Schools and Red Cloud Community Schools the approval of new interim program schools under rule 18. the approval of educator preparation programs in Nebraska colleges and universities under rule 20. the approval of the Nebraska's every student succeeds act or as a plan Amendment for section four the committee recommends the approval of these five items the committee also reviewed the action items to approve the accreditation of school systems to operate for the 2023-2024 school year under rule 10 and to approve the new approved schools and adding grades to approved schools for the 2023-2024 school year under rule 14. the committee reviewed the compliance checklist for school systems under rule 10 and Rule 14 as well as we clarified the nuances among rule 14 accredited public districts and Rule
12410 accredited non-public school systems and Rule 14 approved non-public school systems the committee recommends the approval of these items uh I wanted go off script here uh I really appreciated the staff's help and helping me at least and I hope others too better understand [Music] some of the differences between these different levels of accredited public schools which is redundant because all public schools have to be accredited and then there's accredited non-public schools and then there's approved schools and based on phone calls I've received since I've been on the board I know that parents most parents don't know if the school unless it's a public school if their school is approved or accredited and I'll say even I you know I sent some of my foster youth to Phoenix Academy which is a great school but
125I didn't know that it was approved and not accredited and so and then uh anyway so there's nuances to those levels and while we only spent probably a half an hour on those nuances I'm hoping that we can as a group spend more in understanding what the differences are and what the approval process is because we are approving schools today and uh you know we all need to know what that entails um at a very high level um you know I learned some a few things that I learned is that if a school is accredited if it's a non -public accredited or approved School there's academic areas that they are not required to teach that are required of public schools they aren't required to teach financial literacy or Multicultural education or computer literacy or I
126that was only a very small sampling because as I said we did not drill down in every item on the checklist um I had tried to study the checklist before the meeting for Approved schools versus accredited schools what I didn't know but now know and hope to share this with everyone so when you're looking at those lists they refer to Public Schools as districts and refer to accredited non-public schools as systems so uh it helps you understand if your youth is your child is in an accredited non-public school how is that different or if it's an approved School how is that uh different some of the other ways that I learned and again there's so much more but superintendent requirements are not as rigorous if your students are in an approved School teacher endorsement requirement
127percentages are not as rigorous for both accredited non-public schools and approved schools there are different standards for a teacher endorsement requirements assessments are not the same requirements although if you are if there if it is an approved School or a non-public accredited school they are required to um oh what's the term normative oops I lost my notes normative and Criterion referenced assessments thank you Sherry um but not the state assessments that our Public Schools take and what I learned about the process or what we all learned is you know in spark are the applications for the schools that are approved schools that we're approving and it's a one-page application to submit and then there's a lot of self-report on some of the other requirements and this is because we have such a small number of
128staff that are able to do the checks so an approved School may have their initial on-site approval where there might be two site visits one with students one without but they may not there may not be another site visit for five years or more unless there's a reported problem and so and that's not I mean our staff is doing what we can given the number of Staff we have but uh it just helped me kind of understand like what what are the differences uh in those levels and how do we approve these schools and I want to make sure and say there is no judgment in any of what I'm saying I uh we have amazing schools at all levels of these different criteria and so I just wanted to make sure that I understood
129better what we were approving all right I'll go back on script the committee received an update on the rule 11 teacher waiver request for Scott's Bluff Public Schools nde staff members provided an update on the waiver process for schools seeking Educators in early childhood settings nde staff will return next meeting for the discussion and to seek approval for the district waiver the committee also received updates on the approval of instructional our affidavits the 2023-2024 Nebraska Council on teacher education membership roster and we have somebody here today and the 2023 legislative session and potential implications for our committee's work we will be returning next meeting for discussion and to seek approval and our me our committee is going to have a zoom retreat again for you sorry uh inside joke uh Adams uh Adam Central uh
130Sherry is invited Adam Central to come and give us a presentation about their experience with enscess growth as a formative and a summative uh and so we are going to have a special Zoom discussion of that later in the month so that concludes my report thank you everybody are there any questions for the committee chair action item approve rule 11 teacher waiver request from Creek Valley Public Schools is there a motion on 6.3 point a yes I moved to approve the rule 11 teacher waiver request from Creek Valley Public Schools is there a second I second that motion okay it's moved and seconded to approve the rule 11 teacher waiver request from Creek Valley Public Schools is there any discussion on this motion with a recording secretary please call the roll freaky Morrison Jones yes
131Neri yes go Johns yes goobles yes Penner tegmeyer yes seven yes one absent the votes are seven years one absent the affirmative has it and the motion to approve rule 11 teacher waiver requests from Creek Valley Public Schools is adopted is there a motion on item 6.3 point B yes serious I moved to approve the rule 11 teacher waiver request from Red Cloud Community Schools is there a second to the motion it's moved and seconded to approve the rule 11 teacher waiver request from Red Cloud Community Schools is there any discussion on this motion with the recording secretary please call the roll Neary yes code Johns yes Penner Jones yes Ricky goobles yes Morrison tegmeyer yes seven yes one absent the votes are seven years one absent the affirmative has it and the motion to
132approve the rule 11 teacher waiver request from Red Cloud Community Schools is adopted is there a motion on item 6.3 Point C yes Madam chair I move to authorize the Deputy Commissioner to approve the accreditation of school systems appearing on the accompanying list to operate for the 2023-2024 school year under rule 10. is there a second to the motion that motion it's moved and seconded second by Patsy to approve the accreditation of school systems appearing on the accompanying list to operate for the 2023-2024 school year under rule 10. is there any discussion Elizabeth I have some questions for the staff so maybe if Mickey or Brad could come forward thank you for coming down so I I see in the attachments that all 244 school districts in Nebraska the public school districts are on that
133list and I'm curious how many visits were made out of those 244 districts good morning Mickey sharp director of accreditation and for the 244 public school districts we conducted 17 what we refer to as on-site compliance visits those are the visits where we sit down with the school administration and go through item by item the regulations on rule 10 and in addition to that we have continuous Improvement five-year visits as part of section 9 of rule 10 for both public and non-public rule 10 schools and there was I want to say 47 or 48 five-year visits this year and then I another question I have is there anything that would then trigger the 17 on-site visits um for now our criteria is to look at the length of time between the last compliance visit of
134the school system we are working actively to get into a more routine rotation and so 17 schools selected depending on the length of time from the last compliance visit and then also in the last five years we sometimes will hear from a new superintendent or we'll reach out to a new superintendent and say it's been a while since the school has been unvisited would you be open to a compliance visit and and they usually are and then the third scenario of course is if there's a pattern of non-compliance where we might have some concerns or need to do a deeper dive to see if there's any way we can collaborate and work with getting to compliance okay well that sort of answered my next question which was a cycle of visitation and I know you're
135working on that um so then I'm just I'm just seeing a connection a loose connection and and I'm sure you explore and I'd love to hear more about how you as a department work with Dr vargas's group because because I'm sure that these visitations and following up on this The Continuous Improvement plans can help forestall the becoming a CSI school so could you just maybe go into some detail about what you do to help more schools not fall into the next category yeah I think that's a little bit of his is our office with the continuous Improvement visits going through and making those recommendations to the schools to make sure that they're kind of steered in the right directions or at least providing that guidance but I think it's also Way Beyond just the scope
136of our office within the accreditation section I think also like the special office of special education Federal programs there's a multitude of offices across the department that all contribute to helping schools um helping to ensure the quality of Education within those schools and so and so one final follow-up question then um are you feeling like there's more cooperation between the various departments at nde I know I know we're a little short staffed and so trying to to do that and have that overlap it might be difficult but are we able to do that just to make sure that like you said all students are receiving a quality education yeah there is a quite a bit of collaboration amongst different offices we have uh different uh structures within the department where there's a lot of cross
137communication amongst administrators but also at the level of we're making as a director I know she reaches out and talks to um Amy Roan over in special education I know she talks to other areas as items come up um and then they also make sure that they provide us with information so we can all work collaboratively together so there is a very collaborative nature to the Department I sort of figured I figured I just wanted to hear you say that so thank you for both coming up here any other questions Mrs stigma I might comment um when Dr Vargas is considering a priority school for instance or needs Improvement schools I'm thinking of the kind of convening she does internally with the department and brings together um in in Dr Vargas if you want to
138you can speak to the process even better than I can that you take but brings together several offices I can't count I'm just I'm just seeing our convening and has each of those offices give in details when their last visits were what they saw um all the way again I'm saying the same thing as as Brad just said but um each one of those offices reporting if they have concerns if they don't have concerns what their what the achievement what the benchmarks are in their particular areas it's a real delving into in a disaggregating of um the data that they've collected within their various offices Dr Vargas you can wave if that's sufficient or if you want to add more okay thank you Dr Friesen sure I had one question just thinking about all the
139different departmental kinds of on-site visits that we have and that we do is there do you have a like a master's schedule so that you don't have a school that ends up with three or four visits all in the same year uh recently we have had some internal discussions about the number of visits and being aware of that and then providing some communication opportunities with schools so we are currently working on that so we don't overwhelm school systems with multiple uh visits however there are times where we're federally required or visits a line and there's there's situations but yes we are aware of it are working towards that thank you both the motion is to approve the accreditation of school systems appearing on the accompanying list to operate for the 2023-2024 school year under rule
14010. with the recording secretary please call the roll Neary yes code Johns yes Henner Jones yes Vicky yes goobles yes Morrison yes tegmeyer yes seven yes one absent the affirmative has it in the motion to approve accreditation of school systems appearing on the accompanying list to operate for the 2023-2024 school year under rule 10 is adopted is there a motion on item 6.3 Point d yes I moved to authorize the Deputy Commissioner to approve the new approved schools and adding grades to approved schools appearing on the accompanying list to operate for the 2023-24 school year under rule 14. is there a second I second it's moved and seconded to approve the new approved schools and adding grades to approved schools appearing on the accompanying list to operate for the 2023-24 school year under rule 14.
141is there any discussion on the motion with the recording secretary please call the roll tegmeyer yes Jones yes Morrison Penner fricky yes Neri yes gibbles yes 7 yes one absent the votes are seven years one absent the affirmative has it in the motion to approve the new approved schools and adding grades to approve schools appearing on the accompanying list to operate for the 2023-24 school year under rule 14 is adopted is there a motion on item 6.3 Point e yes I moved to authorize the Deputy Commissioner to approve the new interim program School appearing on the accompanying list to operate for the 2023-24 school year under rule 18. is there a second if okay thank you it's moved and seconded to approve the new interim program School appearing on the accompanying list to operate for
142the 2023-24 school year under rule 18. is there any discussion on the motion Jacqueline yes um so we've had quite a bit of conversation today about approved schools versus accredited schools and I think you know we can continue to have that conversation but this is a separate system of schooling that we have and so I think just to make sure that we're clear could staff discuss what interim schools are compared to accredited and approved schools do you want that discussion today yes if they could give an overview of how they're different I personally have read it but I think it's helpful for everyone to hear I apologize Brad Mickey you just got set down and you're back but thank you Mickey Scharf director of accreditation yeah so could you please explain how this type of
143program or School approval process is different what makes this separate from other schools so much like the rule 10 and Rule 14 checklist we do have a rule 18 checklist and I think the first thing I would mention is a rule 18 interim programs serve a very specific student audience these are residential group homes with an educational component these are interim programs maybe in a medical setting and also programs that are serving incarcerated youth so the checklist has those specific items there there are different different requirements for Content area quick example would be the four primary content areas are are required for instruction but you might not see requirements for elective type instruction and then another thing that's unique about rule 18 schools is they aren't able to award diplomas and Rule 10 and Rule
14414 Schools are able to award Nebraska diplomas so it's really important that we have this checklist and compliance regulations so that when that student transitions out of a rule 18 setting and goes back to a 10 or 14 school that those credits transfer in those content areas and so that they can proceed on towards graduation so um I know this particular site that we're approving radius is in the district that I represent and it's a new facility typically when you see these uh facilities that are who have incarcerated youth I think this one would say that they're a little bit different in that the students can leave it's an Open Door facility when they want but um other facilities let's say if it was a facility being operated by DHHS would that the schools inside
145of those facilities also be rule 18. or would that be different no they would be rule 18 programs and so those are do we does nde or DHHS if you know are we funding those schools I do not know the funding source okay um and then if you had to consider the rigor from accredited schools to approve schools to interim schools the amount of Staffing educational requirements and things like that would you say that this that rule 18 has I don't want to say less rigor but less onerous requirements than the other two I think in the terms of numeric value the numbers are smaller um in regards to instructional units number sheer number of classes or volume of classes so the numbers look at different and the education in those settings is tailored for
146the population being served so sometimes you'll see synchronous asynchronous learning more so you will see that the school day instead of elective courses will have more therapeutic components within the school day so those would be the differences I would share off the top of my head are the students tested at all or is there a requirement that they be tested do they have to take ends guess yes yes that is a requirement that a student takes assigned and scas and Criterion Norm reference tests while in a rule 18 setting in my understanding it's part of rule 18 and the is to be able to help students who are pulled from let's just say the traditional educational setting when they go back to their schools eventually they'd be able to take those I'll use the word
147credits or academics that they've learned would be able to transition into some type of credits and a School setting or or have an equivalent of a math or science that they'd be able to use to to continue or to get get credit for is that part of the process yes very much so and there's a specific regulation in rule 10 and in rule 18 the reciprocality of a rule 10 School accepting rule 18 credits and a rule 18 School pursuing student completion of additional credits thank you any other questions perhaps you'd just like to stay up here for a few more the motion is to approve the new interim program School appearing on the accompanying list to operate for the 2023-24 school year under rule 18 with the recording secretary please call the roll freaky
148yes Jones yes Coach Jones yes enter Morrison yes yes Neri yes tegmeyer yes goobles seven yes one absent the votes are seven years one absent the affirmative has it and the motion to approve the new interim program School appearing on the accompanying list to operate for the 2023-24 school year under rule 18 is adopted is there a motion on item 6.3 Point f yes Madam chair I moved to authorize the Deputy Commissioner to approve the educator preparation programs in Nebraska colleges and universities under rule 20. is there a second to the motion my second it's moved and seconded to approve the educator preparation programs in Nebraska colleges and universities under rule 20. are there any is there any discussion on the motion with the recording secretary please call the roll Morrison yes Neri Penner coach
149ons yes Google's yes tegmeyer yes fricky yes Jones yes seven yes one absent the votes are seven years one absent the affirmative has it and the motion to approve the educator preparation programs in Nebraska colleges and universities under rule 20 is adopted is there a motion on item 6.3 Point G yes Madam chair I moved to approve the amendment for section four of Nebraska's every student succeeds act Essa plan is there a second it's moved and seconded to approve the amendment for section four of Nebraska's every student succeeds act Essa plan is there any discussion on this motion Elizabeth yes I have some questions for our staff I was wearing Dr Vargas and Lane and maybe Vicky would be available I mean let's bring the whole crew down yeah well pre-lunch exercise here for you
150give a little way thank you for coming down so as I looked at this agenda item I did refer back to your presentation during our work session last month um and the filter is what I understand is changing a bit and so the previous was the lowest quarter of stage one schools that are either not demonstrating growth or have high levels of non-proficiency and we've changed the ore to an and then the second little filter that I'm thinking of your graphic I just pulled out this morning chronic absenteeism and then we're having chronic absenteeism and low achievement in science so I expressed concern last month you know about that how that that more schools will slip through and not be identified and so I'm wondering the plan that you presented to us that is the
151plan that you're asking for approval on I want to know if there's a follow-up to the to the question or if you'd like for us to talk further about something but this is the plan that we are asking you to hear us quickly yes and so so I I appreciate the limitations that we have and I appreciate the efforts and working toward this new plan but my concerns haven't changed and so you know with all respect to your expertise I will not be in support of these changes and I think I think I expressed that last month and you know why so it's nothing personal but just wanted to confirm that those changes had stayed in and we have the and words okay thank you so much I appreciate it if I am remembering correctly
152I ask a lot of questions of you guys about this topic and I think what we got down to or at least my understanding was that though the entire the point of this is to give you a tool to be able to identify those schools with the highest level of need and to be able to Target the limited amount of resources that we have to those schools with the greatest amount of need the exercise is not to just at the end of the day end up with a list of schools that really have need but to be able to really get it down to as narrow of a list as possible so then we can then deploy the resources that we have and if we have a lot of schools the resources just don't go
153as far and so I think that's how you explained it to me of why we were adding or at least looking at more specific criteria is to be able to tailor this true truly to those those finite amount of schools that we could help am I remembering or summarizing that correctly and if I'm not tell me that's I think you're the fourth member of this team um right now free free labor now um I in all seriousness yes you are explaining correctly and to underscore a piece there and to kind of uh address kind of what you described um Elizabeth today and in the previous month um we have to run accountability this fall right we also know that because of the flexibilities and that were awarded to us and the interruptions to data we
154will potentially right we don't know until we have the actual data in our hands later you know this year um but there could be a potential of having an over saturation of schools that gets us to then we have so many schools to support and we don't have the resources to actually do anything about it so then we're on the other end so we're attempting to get to the just right moment and also know that there is a future where we will be doing a full scale as a planned Amendment and this doesn't have to be the future of our federal accountability system but we do need something operational for this fall so which is why we heard your concerns and definitely labored through that but really wanted to make sure that we presented the
155best thing that we could for our stakeholders but also for our stay in our capacity so thank you thank you Dr Vargas when when is the next long-term I'll call it amendment of revision great question for our administrator policy and strategic initiatives so as wild as it is to say almost as soon as we get this we need to start talking about the long-term future and as part of this consultation process we've been engaging I've been engaging with the governor's office and there's a real interest in the long-term conversation here what what does accountability and look like in general and then how do we leverage this Federal accountability lever that we have into the long term so I think almost immediately and remember this is just one of six sections of our Essa plan so
156there's a conversation we need to have about long-term goals and where we want to be that section one section five which is all about Educators where do we want to be with that what's our vision for supporting recruiting retaining Educators and leveraging our Title II funds there so almost almost immediately after this we might take a minute and then we'll get back to it and that will involve a ton of stakeholder feedback just like this has as well let's take more than a minute have and to understand is that this is short term and that we're already looking ahead to what can be different what can be more effective thank you for the reminder through your question and your answer I guess when I first heard this I thought about triaging where um you look
157at what you have you look at the data and you're focusing in on the most needy to address first and then your question follow-up for the long term am I understanding that correctly only what we wouldn't do the third leg it's the triage because we're not going to give up on anybody right so if that helps any other questions all right thank you the motion is to approve the amendment for section four of Nebraska's every student succeeds act Essa plan with the recording secretary please call the roll Neri yes Jones yes Morrison yes fricky yes tegmeyer no Penner goobles yes code Johns yes six yes one no one absent the votes are six years one a one absent the affirmative has it and the motion to approve the amendment for section four of Nebraska's every
158student succeeds act Essa plan is adopted we are at about 12 o'clock a little after I not really wanting to start rules and regulations if we can't finish it and I know there's a lot on that so we'll take a lunch break we'll start public comment at one o'clock this time rather than 1 15. so please be back we'll have public comment and then we will finish the rest of our business meeting after death we're in recess cool foreign basketball oh did he coach baseball too all right we are back from our lunch recess we will now have our public comment period this period may be made available to any person who wishes to address the state board on any subject within its Authority including items appearing on the agenda except for contested cases up
159to two hours will be allowed for a public comment period a majority of members present and voting may also take action to allow or terminate public comment at any time during a meeting please note that public comment should be on topics related to the work of the state board's constitutional and statutory Authority those wishing to speak must be signed in at the table outside of the meeting room persons speaking to the board during public comment should State their name at the beginning of their allotted time 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 action to reduce or extend the amount of individual time allotted if at any time persons appearing before the board
160exceed 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 determine what is out of order the president May refuse permission to continue to address the board we have two public comment cards submitted all right uh we have two Lisa schoenoff and Linda vermutan So Lisa end to end all the time that you dedicate to this very important position in making a difference for children across Nebraska I have been a teacher for more than 20 years um my goal after I graduated college was just to travel the world and teach I accidentally met my husband eight months before I left and so he came to visit me when I lived in Taiwan and he said
161Lisa how do you feel about moving to Kansas City and so I did inner city teaching in Kansas City I taught ESL I was an instructional coach in schools multiple schools that had approximately 97 percent free and reduced lunch and 90 percent ESL one of the most impactful um strategies in improving literacy was actually having well-trained instructional coaches that went into classrooms and trained teachers and so with that being said I love a lot of the things that I heard about coaching and training teachers and CTE I think those are all excellent for school priority schools something that's really that I've been reading a lot about I'm an Avid Reader I love reading I love to teach reading I'm writing articles on literacy right now as we well not as we speak but on my
162computer at home before I go to bed at night um I've been reading all about the science of reading and while I wholeheartedly agree that explicit systematic phonics instruction is extremely extremely important I would love to question the authenticity of research done in the 90s when related to kids today because in the 90s there was no internet and I've done a lot of research I don't know if you have any of you have heard the book glow kids it was written in 2017 by Dr Nicholas Cardaras he is a doctor in clinical addiction the research is showing that our kids today are addicted to screens and these screens are rewiring their brains and changing the research there's multiple things that are happening in classrooms now that did not happen in the 90s for one our
163classrooms are are more diverse than ever before and we have teachers that are not prepared to teach the demographics that they are that they have in their classrooms um the amount of time that kids are on screens in school and out of school is detrimental to the way that they learn um I think that in time this is a prediction of mine is that we're going to say we the reason why we're seeing more dyslexic students is because of the amount of time they spend on screens so what I would like to do or something to push all of our thinking is to really think about how we're training teachers in the best practices that we can do to have highly qualified teachers in every classroom and that doesn't mean spending millions of billions of
164dollars of taxpayers money on expensive curriculum materials it's training teachers it's having administrators walking through classrooms it's having people that truly understand literacy doing learning walks and being in the schools um and so just something that I want to uh to think about is this article that was written in 1999 it was put out by I wrote it down see I have chicken scratch here um I'll just read it to you and it'll come to me this quote says there is no single method or single combination of methods that can successfully teach all children to read therefore teachers must have a strong knowledge of multiple methods of teaching reading and a strong knowledge of the children in their care so that they can create the appropriate balance of methods needed for the children they teach
165so teachers in the classroom are the most important part of raising literacy instruction s so thank you for your time and I appreciate all the work you do thank you it's at Lori here Lisa I lost my sheet you're next I lost this year thank you if you are told you are bad because of the package you wrapped in how does that make you feel it doesn't make you feel good so some of the comments I want to address today is related to CRT that we put out there and if we just listen to the title what's the very first word critical it's about criticism it's not about positivity it's not about valuing who I am and then looking at how I fit my piece into the puzzle it's looking at what is wrong with
166me package I was wrapped in I was raised as a minority within a minority in a predominantly black country so that has a lot to do with my world view trilingual so I understand diversity visited four continents and speak three languages fluently in a smidgen of others about 20 others I can have a very brief conversation like how are you and thank you so it helps you understand people from a different perspective so I want to challenge us about our thought process as to why we want to have this critical component in our schools in the state critical race so I'm going to criticize why I'm different than you the reality is none of us are the same you put two of us together you can say well we're similar but we're not same because
167everyone is unique is it not better to look at our uniqueness and appreciate our uniqueness and say now from a piece of uniqueness how do we all come together how do we work together we have a unique board and you've all come together from different backgrounds from different experiences working together sometimes it's a little bit of jostling but that's part of fitting together and isn't that what we want to model for our students in our state how do we get people to think we allow them an opportunity to go outside of the boundaries you know as an educator I understand you cannot educate in one methodology most Learners are not auditory Learners I'm not an auditory learner I'm an experiential do a kind of learner most education is set up for auditory Learners so how
168do we get the other people engaged in the learning process how do we engage the best teachers to do just that if we're listening to some of the policies proposed that are saying we have a structure you have to fit in the structure you have to answer all these questions this way otherwise we might put you in this category because you didn't meet all of our Criterion where do we allow the individually and the creativity of our teachers to come forth so they can do what they train to do I Marvel at the one house school teacher I was talking to a product of such a school friend of mine who lives in La Vista who went to a public one-room schoolhouse in that neighborhood in that classroom when they went on to high school
169the valedictorian and the saludatorian came from that one-room schoolhouse where she had eight grades to teach in one room you had to be very creative you had to go outside the box and say how do I help this person learn oh what's unique about you how do you learn how do I pull out of you that's inquisitiveness so where is it in our policy making process that we allow the individually the individuality and the gifting of the teachers to come forth without constricting them so much that they're not allowed to think outside the box listen to the lettuce thing and I want to just say this there are lies they are blank lies and then they are statistics and the thing with Statistics is you can make it say anything and when you look at
170research any research past 2000 is ancient anything past 2010 is old and that's the problem with research so when we say we look at the research when was that research done is it relevant to today in the technology that we have and all the ways that we can enhance the learning of our students so I would encourage us to get rid of the critical race Theory and inclusion but look at how we can validate every individual student and every individual teacher thank you for your time thank you Linda that concludes our public comment period so we will return back to our business meeting we are at Agenda item 6.4 rules and regulations committee chair Elizabeth tempmeyer will provide a report from the rules and regulations committee meeting so the rules and regulations committee we met
171yesterday June 1st um I actually don't have a list but all committee members were present it just doesn't say that in my minutes so that was Kirk Pinner Patsy kojons and Jacqueline Morrison as well as myself the report on rules is attached in spark for board member reviews so for non-committee members if you'd like to see that report on rules please refer to that nde staff provided a summary of the rule 20 revisions and we received a summary of the hearing held that was a public hearing the committee recommends approval of the rule 20 revisions in the East staff provided a summary of the rule 21 revisions and also a summary of the hearing that was held this past Tuesday the committee recommends approval of the rule 21 revisions I'm going to sound like a
172broken record because we've done a lot of work on rules Indy staff provided a summary of the rule 24 revisions and we they also gave us a summary of the hearing on this past Tuesday that was held the public hearing the committee recommends approval of the rule 24 revisions the committee also reviewed the content test and passing score requirements for endorsements that were set forth in rule 24. we recommend approval of this document nde's staff provided a summary of title 93 these are new personnel rule revisions and there was a hearing also held on Tuesday about this we recommend approval of the title 93 revisions as a committee and then nde staff presented on the 2023 legislative session and the political implications for our committee committee members discussed priority for the next year and we
173as a committee reiterated the teacher shortage as a priority for our committee work committee members discussed having a meeting prior to the August meeting to receive information on the potential revisions to rule 59. this concludes the rules and regulations committee report are there questions for the committee chair we are an action item 6.4 point B is there a motion yes Madam chair I moved to authorize the Deputy Commissioner to approve proposed revisions to rule 20 92 NAC 20. regulations for the approval of teacher education programs is there a second I second it it's been moved and seconded to approve proposed revisions to rule 20. is there any discussion on the motion um just want to talk a little bit about some of the changes that that were brought to this rule for the the teacher
174education programs it's actually going to change and we're calling them educator preparation programs because it does encompass more than just the classroom teacher so we have a lot of programs that are for Specialists and different content areas so that that's one thing that changed but um I think an important addition for for me that I want the rest of the board members to know is that one requirement for Teacher education programs will be that they do include the science of reading because it's much more efficient to teach our teachers how to give proper reading instruction before they enter the classroom than to try and re-teach all the teachers in in the state which I know it takes a lot of professional development time and and so we do want to in addition to addressing the
175teacher shortage one of our priorities as a board is literacy and so I felt that adding that in and I know the other committee members too felt like adding that in was going to be very beneficial to the students of our state that their incoming teachers will have the training and skills they need for reading instruction any other discussion okay would the recording secretary please call the roll Penner yes Neri Morrison yes tegmar yes goobles yes Jones yes co-jons yes freaky yes eight yes the votes are eight years the motion to approve revisions to rule 20. is approved is there a motion on item 6.4 Point C yes Madam chair I moved to authorize the Deputy Commissioner to approve proposed revisions to rule 21 nac-21 regulations for the issuance of certificates and permits to teach
176provide special services and administer in Nebraska schools second it's been moved and seconded to approve proposed revisions to rule 21. is there any discussion on this motion with the recording secretary please call the roll s yes Penner Co Johns yes Neri fricky yes tegmeyer yes Morrison yes Jones yes eight yes the votes are aeas the affirmative has it and the motion to approve proposed revisions to rule 21 is adopted is there a motion on item 6.4 Point d I moved to authorize the Deputy Commissioner to approve proposed revisions to rule 24 regulations for certification endorsements five seconds that it's been moved and seconded to approve proposed revisions to rule 24. is there any discussion on this motion Lisa um in in Reading rationale it says if revised rule 24 is approved by the board at
177this June board meeting and signed by the governor prior to the board scheduled August meeting there would be a period of time where the board would not have passing scores for certification endorsements so to prevent that this potential issue the board May adopt certification endorsement passing scores after potential approval of rule 24 revisions so I guess my question is are we talking about two votes that need to be taken today to address what I just referenced I believe so yes okay I'm ready is there any other discussion Lisa and Mark um iPad in the past oh gosh eight months or so people worried about they were fine with the Praxis one going away there were no questions but they were concerned about the content area and I know that there was a proposal where if
178I have this correct that um there's a certificate I can't remember that if it's provisional or some kind for two years for the district decides if they just miss passing the content they can teach with the supervision and after two years they'll be able to have that expertise in their content area so so I don't know is that going to be part of this Vote or the second vote Lisa that was part of rule 21. okay well there you go any other discussion laughs the motion is to approve proposed revisions to rule 24. with the recording secretary please call the roll tegmeyer yes Google's yes niri yes Morrison yes Jones yes Ricky yes Penner yes Co Johns yes eight yes the votes are aeas the affirmative has it and the motion to approve opposed revisions
179to rule 24 is adopted and now Lisa the one that you are waiting for is there a motion on item 6.4 Point e I move to adopt the content tests and pass passing score requirements for endorsements set forth in rule 24. second it's moved and seconded to adopt the content test and passing score requirements for endorsements set forth in rule 24. is there any discussion with the recording secretary please call the roll Jones yes goobles yes tegmeyer yes Morrison yes yes Neri yes Penner yes fricky yes kill Johns yes eight yes the votes were eight years the affirmative has it and the motion to adopt the content test and passing score requirements for endorsements set forth in rule 24 is adopted is there a motion on item 6.4 Point f Madam president I moved to
180adopt propose revisions to title 93 Nebraska Administrative Code chapters 1 through 16 Nebraska Department of Education Personnel rules second it's moved and seconded to adopt proposed revisions to title 93 in Nebraska Administrative Code chapters 1 through 16. is there any discussion on the motion with the recording secretary please call the roll Penner yes co-johns yes Jones yes fricky tegmeyer goobles yes Neri yes Morrison yes yes eight yes the votes are eight years the affirmative has it and the motion to adopt proposed revisions to title 93 Nebraska Administrative Code chapters 1 through 16 is adopted we are now to additional business there was an item added a state board of education consultant selection process and history Patsy and Deborah okay um I Patsy I appreciate your putting your name to this but this is really me
181that made this request and I mean I so that you aren't held accountable for anything I say okay you can take credit if you like any of it but um you know one of the things we I keep saying and hearing everyone say um is just uh how you know in the last uh two years and especially since January with new board members there's just uh more of a willingness to uh for transparency to ask questions about processes to challenge each other and I love that because I I want to be challenged about how I think about things and you know Sherry gave each of us a book uh last month and uh you know it's as I read it it made me think about why I have certain ideas and I just think that
182these kind of conversations are are really important and I thank all of you because I'm learning from everybody here um and one of the things that you know I've I've heard uh discussed that sort of made me think differently about some things uh is just a look at our processes and I know we all have said we want to make sure we move forward not backward but I also feel like sometimes you have to make sure that we are moving forward in a positive way and reflecting on where we've been so that we can make improvements um and you know I I think I voiced last month I there was discussion about too much transparency or toxic transparency and I I feel like we have not had enough transparency and that we need the pendulum
183to swing a little bit more in that direction before I am going to worry about too much but um having said that I specifically so I made a request a couple weeks about two and a half weeks ago for some items that I wanted to review for this to be on the agenda I received the items I requested yesterday morning and you know as you know I've been in meetings all day yesterday and had a meeting last night so I haven't reviewed everything that I requested but what I did review just really quickly were some financials I wanted to know about how we select Consultants that are specifically for to consult and support the State Board of Education and so I learned that we've had two Consultants and I you know some of you were
184involved firsthand because you were on the board or some were in the audience watching this I know because you were uh running for the office but I think of all the time and energy that we put into hiring consultants for the search process and all the steps that we took for that and that was a charge of thirty five thousand dollars to uh to uh well taxpayers to pay for that and I was very proud of how we spent that money I personally thought they did an amazing job in bringing us some outstanding candidates one of which is here today we appreciate your interest um but through the and so I was pleased with the fairness in which we put out rfps and made selections so the other consultant that's been utilized in the past
185five years I'm not going to name but and I'm not in any way passing a judgment about whether it was money well Sprint or not that isn't my point it's about process but it appears and please for those of you who are in the know which would probably be Brian and Ryan and um I mean please correct me if I have stated something wrong and this was before Deb was commissioner so I don't expect you to I mean unless you want to because you were certainly but this was not you know uh you weren't the commissioner but it appears to me that we started a contract with a consulting company uh at a time where we felt we needed some extra support and the person who was our board president the time is not on
186the board I don't know what processes were used for making that selection I know it wasn't a board decision and I was not involved in any way I know that at least one other consulting firm associated with a large University here did request to be considered and wasn't given an opportunity for an RFP um I don't know how that decision was made but that first contract was around thirty thousand dollars since then if I am correct two more contracts with that consulting firm were made last year in 2022 it looks like in April and again in November now to my knowledge based on conversations with the board member we had in 2022 that person was not involved in any discussions regarding the extensions of this contract which went from thirty thousand to eighty thousand if
187I'm understanding that correctly so I'm just saying I have had many other pain points with this process that I'm not going to go into today because I'm still looking at the materials that I was given but I just wanted it out there that I my personal opinion is that if we are Contracting with Consultants to work with us that we are going to have a chance for more board input into the processes uh that we utilize and so I just wanted to put that since this was of interest to me put that out there um about just some intentionality I'm hoping that others if you share my thoughts uh that you might bring forward at appropriate times or if you don't share my thoughts that's okay too but just something that caused me concern so
188that's all I have to say today thank you unless someone has questions for me I have one question okay in the documents that you were provided and I can't remember so I did each of those authorizations or any of the authorizations for expenditures come before the board for a vote did we as a board vote on the contracts do you know or does anyone know I'd like to ask Ryan if those came before the board because I can't tell you that I don't recall but I mean for the extensions or the original contract I don't recall Ryan do you know if those came before the board for a vote or Deb or Brian anybody Brian Halstead um you mentioned the McPherson Jacobson one so we're talking about the other vendor I believe the cut there
189were two separate contracts with that same vendor in the time period you asked for so there were two separate contracts there was not one contract both of those contracts were below fifty thousand dollars and each of those contracts were amended while each of the contracts were still in force and effect um and I don't remember what the amendments were to each one one did start out with the damn board president being involved the other one however was not about the State Board of Education it was about a contract that dealt with providing services to staff of the agency the second that one that second one was amended I believe in November of last year so that it would include providing some services to the orientation of new board members who were elected at the November
190meeting that then occurred in January so that was a mandate which added more funds to it but it did still did not take it over the fifty thousand dollar threshold so if you I suspect I didn't look at the detail if you would take the one contract when it was finished the total amount and the second contract when you total it up that might get you to the eighty thousand dollars but they were two separate contracts two separate Concepts so that's the only quote information I don't have those in front of me now but um so they they would have followed the standard processes established for the agency anything I got to remember the state statute if the value of any contract is going to be seventy thousand dollars or more you are required to
191do a request for proposals and bids on that I'm looking to remember Morrison because she may remember that statute too it's it has the dollar value hasn't changed since the late 1970s so that's in play board policy now you're going to challenge me on which board operating policy it is sets the threshold that any contract for greater fifty thousand dollars or greater needs board approval and any contracts that are below that there is a month through the report provided by the commissioner to the board of those contracts and then there's a quarterly report on any contracts below ten thousand dollars um so the the two contracts with the same vendors I believe if you go back and Spark you'll find the monthly report that shows that contract for its dollar amount and the second time
192you'll see a separate report for the second contract and its dollar amount that was reported to the board so the process was followed but I get the point you're trying to make about what is the board's process and that so that that's the only additional information and I I sincerely suggesting any wrongdoing other than requesting we think about some more intentionality to the process that we have any time money is spent on us and the work we're doing okay thank you for your answer and and for your concern when I think back to that first contract when the previous president was involved um there was a lot of learning curve for us and to set some parameters about what would make a good meeting and so I could see logic in wanting the new members
193trained in the way that we were trained and so I appreciated the first training and the logic in my mind is saying that whoever decided the second to amend that to include new members I thought that was a good idea so I was the one who asked the question of whether or not that contract would have come before the board because I always I'm trying to think about places of checks and balances and so if something under fifty thousand dollars would not have met the threshold for to come to us I think that that's an opportunity if that's a concern that the board has or if we want to address we could change a policy that says something to the extent of you know anything over 50 under 50 000 can be come to us
194as a report unless it's an expenditure that's greater than let's say five thousand dollars that's expended up specifically on the board and then that would create or carve out an exception that we would have to approve anything coming to us the other thing I think is interesting or what I'm thinking about I cannot remember but we do get a kind of a board expenditure report that we approve every month and I do remember one month I saw my expense go up and I said how did I get charged like not charged but accredited dollars and I wasn't even at the board meeting that month and um my understanding was that if you know catering happens and food is purchased for everyone it's just divided by eight and then we all it goes on our line
195I don't think this was necessarily put on each person's line but I think that might be right for a conversation that if forty thousand dollars was spent on a training that was technically five thousand dollars that was spent on each board member as part of expenses of the board and I think if we had seen it that way that again would have been another opportunity for a discussion or sparking a conversation about whether we were comfortable with saying that amount of money was spent on us as an individual when I know I I try to be cognizant of how much the board is spending on on me and so I think you know just food for thought things to consider and if this is a pain point or a place where we want to make
196improvements those are some considerations I think that could be helpful in the future okay so so this is a question for for Deb Neary um so so every month I read through the contracts ten thousand to fifty thousand and four different staff members can tell you that I either sent them emails or approached them about hey what what is this help me understand why so so I'm I'm just wanting clarification on your concern is it concern that maybe we need to re-examine our ten to fifty thousand dollar policy or that you want more board input on money that would be spent on the board yeah I personally thank you for the question for clarification I'm not looking to change the way we process and review any contracts I my only concern is when we spend
197what to me looks like eighty thousand dollars for one consultant on state board well that's a reflection on me like I just remember when the first contract was made and I asked the question at the board meeting how much is this costing us and I was told it was thirty thousand I remember you know looking at some of the Facebook pages right after that meeting and a lot of complaints like why did they spend thirty thousand dollars and then I had no idea that we even extended it well beyond that and so I I'm just saying if it has to do with supporting the State Board of Education I would hope that I mean it's not just how much we spent the Consultants were that we amended contracts without our even our board president knowing
198and I as a board member didn't know but also that there were other people that wanted to provide those services and weren't given the opportunity to submit an RFP so I'm just saying intention intentionality and I don't know that we um need to have a policy but maybe respectful understanding if if others agree and and maybe others don't I guess I guess I just like a little clarification because my understanding is the total amount of all the contracts was eighty thousand am I understanding that correctly yeah I understand it was for one contractor but I heard Brian say that one of those of the two was for staff that was not spent on us that was for staff consultation correct or was that a so my recollection of the two contracts I found for the
199same vendor the first contract did start out and was all about providing training and whatever with the State Board of Education and that one uh eventually expired and I don't remember if there was an amendment because something was added on that wasn't included in the original The second contract was one done to provide leadership training to staff of the agency while that contract was still in place and work being done it was amended because the vendor said they'd be willing to do some orientation training for the state board and the newly elected members that was not included in the contract for providing leadership to staff so it had to be amended there was a dollar amount added to it I'm sure Mrs Neary has it to see what the actual dollar amount but it had
200language that indicated yeah we can do this for board members and that's the second one they were not I don't believe not for staff training so are you saying that the reports a part of that 80 000 included some staff training I did not look at the specifics for the second contract and the payment information that was just here's the payment intro information for this contract there was no Deep dive done on the the details so a large portion of that may have been for staff I so I didn't break that out nor did I direct uh Finance dig into the details of this second it was quickly trying to assemble the information as Dr Friesen had directed it be done before the board meeting and that's what we've done so far so what I
201just gave you was what I was handed yesterday morning and I've just done a quick review to me those look like two amendments not new contracts and I guess if we did it the way you're saying then what you're saying is we took a contract intended for training for the staff and turned it into and just extended it for training for the board without it being a new Amendment or contract no The second contract was amended to add additional language okay and specifically provided that the state board's newly elected board met will be facilitated through a new board orientation and what the details of that was that was not part of the contract to provide the ND leadership team with train training and whatever so that it went up by if I do my math
202there was five thousand dollars looks like five thousand dollar increase in the total value of the contract for the additional work of the orientation newly elected board members were facilitated through a new board orientation Workshop so yes there was work added on to the staff contract that now Incorporated doing work with the board you asked for any contracts dealing with Consultants with the state board and I guess in my mind this contract was amended so I provided you with that so you could see that information so that that there's a separate sheet that shows what's been paid on each one of those the dollar amounts on these are the this is what it's estimated to cost whether this actually costs the full value on the front of the contractor less I don't know thank you
203president I just have a clarifying question my question is from what I heard or I thought I heard if it's fifty thousand dollars or less there's not a requested RFP is that correct okay that was my clarifying yeah I'm wondering as we're discussing this uh is there Patty your your the person I think that's worked a lot with policy and not to put you on the spot at all I just want to know is there in our policies a description of how we handle hiring consultants and taking bids for that and all of that yeah not that specific okay should there be yeah I was just gonna so I think we're hearing a a combination of a few issues here and again I think if if the concern is about the processes then we could
204always create our own threshold to say if a contract for the board is going to be over ten thousand dollars or fifteen thousand dollars then we will issue an RFP and that will be our we can make that decision I think that's a consideration if the concern is that we don't think that this was competitively bid or that you know other people didn't have the opportunity and so I think that's a conversation we should and could have in a committee meeting about whether or not we want that for us it sounds like another conversation is about what type of input the board wants in decisions regarding procuring services for us I think if the staff had come to us and said this is the search firm that you are going to use to find your
205next commissioner and it's under thirty thousand dollars and we're authorizing it and improving it uh we all probably would have had a problem with that and so I don't think that this uh is any different and so I do think I and so Deborah I think the context is the same and I think again we as a board we have the ability to change this it's just a matter of if we want to change the competitively bid part if we want to change the threshold part if we want to change where we approve it um and I think that happens in committees and whichever committee wants to take up this work or look at it I think that that is ripe for a conversation but I think all the points are valid it's just a
206matter of yep there's a problem but how do we want to solve it or or what problem do people care about the most or is there a consensus that there is a problem the echo some of what um Jacqueline stated if the executive committee is going to be looking at bylaws and policies in July and so if this is a consensus of the board to look at this and when it's directly where it's money spent on us if there needs to be a policy that would be the appropriate time so I think this has been a good discussion to figure out what happened and the amounts and there seems to be a little bit of concern about maybe perhaps there needs to be a policy so there is a chance when we're working on policies
207to make a a change if it's what the board wants in reference to what's spent on us so Deborah I'm just wondering if you're willing as we kind of maybe wrap this up if you're willing to dis disclose the name of the agency or the individual that wanted the contractor is if it was re what was not allowed the opportunity I will give you the contracts and you can have it I think you understood what she asked sure do you want to ask her she wants to know the name of the no and had wanted to bid the contract but wasn't able to oh uh I don't want to say that publicly but I'd be happy to share that with you because I don't want to make anybody uncomfortable I'll tell you who that was
208thank you foreign thoughts thank you uh may I just you asked her final thoughts I should have chimed in Deborah and I know we're all probably getting ready to go home but just so that I'm clear we we discussed decision making steps we discuss process history decision made except related conflicts of interest but you didn't touch on your concerns if you had any about gift policies and so I didn't know if you wanted to talk about that now or at another time I just uh as I was looking back at what we were supposed to be discussing we didn't talk about that and again if we if there's no need to that's fine I just realized we didn't touch on it so the materials that I requested in order to have that conversation I didn't
209receive till yesterday morning so I haven't had a chance to review those so I don't know if that requires further discussion or not so I'll let you all know if you see it on the agenda next month you'll know thank you for asking though thank thanks Pat we are go ahead oh sorry Patsy thank you for directing traffic I certainly think that um at the executive Retreat that um it would be worth your time and effort to go through this and my reasoning is not that you know that I think anybody did anything wrong or anything like that but if we're spending thirty thousand dollars on a consultant then it should be transparent that we're doing that and that we're following a policy for that um and I when I asked if there was a
210policy on the books and nobody they said you had my answer was no there's not so um if the executive committee would take that up in some fashion then I think that would speak to our transparency as a board to our constituents may I make one final quick I I just want to say again I this was not about the consulting firm that we hired I learned a lot I think there was a lot of very positive things that came from the work that we did so it isn't about that or that I think there was any wrongdoing by anybody on the staff it was just a process I was asking that we consider something different in the future so thank you going going gone I don't want to miss anybody all right we are
211now at Agenda item 8.2 written public comment submitted written Public public comments if there were any are attached so that you could review those items 9.1 9.2 those are for information only for the board agenda item 10 good of the order do any of you have any things that you would like to share with the board in terms of upcoming events or information Ryan right administrator days was mentioned earlier today okay Ryan is excited about administrator days of July 26th am I remembering correctly is nde day so please put that on your calendar typically we have a presentation that we do and typically the commissioner gives a keynote so it's a an opportunity for all of us to be present and among administrators from across the state so yeah please look forward to that anything
212else we have something else in July too don't we yes what is that nseau is coming up in July and there are four board members who have volunteered to do two panels during that day so that's that is coming up I'm certainly a couple of things that I would like to mention nasb has a board leader and law day that will be held in Kearney it's it's structured for local boards and superintendents but if you are interested in school law or learning more about Open meetings law public comment they spend time talking about those I noticed on their agenda they do have one on civility as as boards so lots of different opportunities to learn it's a one day if you like golf you can go the day before and they do have a golf
213tournament that people can play in for a small amount but that's coming up I'd also like to mention I believe Ryan sent emails to our newest board members about new member Institute with that nasbe puts on those are virtual meetings the first one is going to be June 28th from 12 to 3. the second one is July 26th 12 to 3 and August 30th from 12 to 3. there is no fee for attending those new member Institutes they and really any of us as board members if we want to attend those we are free to do that there is one session on parliamentary procedure there's information about federal education advocacy communication strategies with constituents what's the role of being a state board member so it it really is a great professional learning opportunity if you're
214interested in those Patsy and those of us who have gone to those can testify to the fact that as a new board member it answered a lot of my questions and made me feel more comfortable in my position at Lisa and I went together and it was well worth our time and effort so encourage those of you who are new members to go and make new friends make new friends and and learn a lot at the same time one last Lisa um nazbe was mentioned and I hope the date hasn't gone by but they're asking for ideas for sectionals at the National Conference and I know um it could be open to staff and we've had our staff present some pretty awesome things from Nebraska so if you have any ideas to share it with
215the president and uh get Nebraska on the map again with your ideas so I I believe the deadline for submission of proposals for session presentations is June 23rd so we've got time yeah there is time yet and I know that at this point we have two proposals that will be submitted so but that's you know as many as we can have is great they're not all selected but it really is it's a great opportunity to be able to share the good things that are happening in Nebraska with nde and with us as a state board may I ask for some repetition because I have to have repetition with how I learn so administrators day is what day July 26th 26. and at SCA is July 17th okay I've got that one right all right all
216right and you are testing me today all right thanks 17 . yeah all right thank you to those who attended in person and who tuned into the broadcast the next meetings of the State Board of Education are scheduled for August 3rd and 4th 2023 in Lincoln Nebraska the June 2nd 2023 state board meeting is adjourned