001Mr. Cerrone >> here. >> Dr. Martin here. Dr. Mario >> here. >> Dr. Pak >> here. >> Miss Robinson >> present. >> Miss C here. >> Miss Wenma >> present. >> I'll stand for the pledge. Pledgece to the flag of the United States of America and to the republics. One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. >> All right. Good evening, board. >> Good. >> Side news. >> All right. So, good evening everyone. Tonight, we're going to do um something new. We're going to spotlight a student and we are going to welcome Mr. Braden Thompson to join us up at the table here. Braden is a senior at Asiggo High School who possesses a very unique talent. His ability to solve a Rubik's cube, even blindfolded, is truly amazing. Recently, he participated
002in the Cubing World Championships in Seattle, where he placed 12th in the 3x3 blindfold category. Since his first competition three years ago, he has complete competed in 41 competitions across the United States, breaking several state records in the blindfold categories. So, we want to thank you for joining us this evening, Braden. We'd love for you to um do a little brief demonstration of your skills for us. >> Do you want to say something? >> Grab the mic. >> They can't hear you. >> There you go. Hello. >> There you go. >> Someone like to scramble it for me? >> Yeah. Look at her go. >> Every single board. >> Now, I'm going to make a special request. When you're doing, if you wouldn't mind staying away so that our our viewers online can see what
003you're about to camera right behind you. So, if you would stand maybe next to Dr. Concaid when you're doing >> Okay. I'll do with my eyes I'll do with my eyes open first. >> Wow. Are you kidding me? >> I think they have some questions for you. >> AI technology. >> I'll take one more volunteer. I'll do a blindfold at this time. >> Oh, really? We got second round. >> Let's do it. >> Scramble it. >> Yeah. Go scramble it. >> Go. Go. >> Oh, not scramble it. >> Do you need something for the blindfold or Oh, you're ready. You're always ready. >> He's a world champion. >> Ready to go. Oh my god. I have to look at solve it. >> I'm going to record you as well. >> Two in a row. >>
004Just trying to help you out. >> We're going to try it before. That's Stop. >> Thank you. How do you know? >> Would you take questions, Brandon? I'm sure some board members have lots of questions. >> Yeah. >> How How do you do that blindfolded? I mean, how do you >> um Okay. So, I look at the cube and then I look at this a certain spot that I know and then I'll see this piece. This piece goes to this spot and then this piece goes to that spot. And then I'll do that all around the cube. And for each like sequence of pieces going to certain places, there's a certain sequence of moves that I do. >> Wow. >> Well, yeah, that's that's extreme process. >> What do you want to do when you
005grow up? That's my question. >> Uh, right now I'm looking at mechanical engineering. >> Yes, >> other question. >> So, uh, somebody picking up Rub Scoo for the first time. >> Awesome. What do you what do you kind of uh you know >> beginner? >> Yeah, beginner >> beginner advice. >> Yeah. >> Um don't be discouraged because a lot of people are like, "Oh, I can never do that." I remember when I was in like when I was in fifth grade and I learned how to solve it. I went on YouTube and saw the people doing it in like, you know, 10 seconds or whatever. I saw people doing it blindfolded. I was like, "Oh, I can never do that." But like now here I am. >> Where were you when you first picked up
006the Rubik's Cube? What was your first Yeah, what was your first >> I picked it up in I think it was fourth grade. I was like, >> I want to figure out how to solve this. But then I like I looked on YouTube and I genuinely thought, "Oh, I couldn't do this." >> And then um as I said I said in the uh news interview in fifth grade, uh my teacher, Miss Tusaki, had the whole class do a thing where we all learn how to solve it together. >> And that's when I first solved it. And I just kept wanting to get faster. >> Oh, that's awesome. >> That's really cool. board. We would love for you to join him for a photo real quick if you wouldn't mind making your way to the middle.
007>> Oh, yeah. Okay. >> Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Sure. >> Yeah. >> All right. So, yeah, >> I'll I'll go a little more in depth on like what I do. >> Um, >> sure. >> Each like I said the piece like a piece will go to a certain spot. I actually assign that piece a certain letter >> and I make like combinations of several different letters. And the way that I'll remember those is that each combination of letters is a certain word. So like DG is a dog and I'll think of a dog. And then when I keep going around the cube, I'll place that image in a room that I'm familiar with so that way I remember it better. And this is said a whole technique. It's called like Roman rooms that like memory
008athletes and stuff use. >> Okay. So that was something that um you you learned from from others doing it >> from YouTube. Yeah. >> Okay. Okay. Yeah. >> Yeah. Either way, I mean it's still >> incredible. >> I got to look into that. >> YouTube. YouTube. >> I can't remember any dogs in a room. Okay. All right. All right. So, all right. >> Congratulations. Thank you so much. Thank you. >> Thank you. >> Your phone. >> Oh. Okay, we're going to uh this is >> Yep. >> Moving on to 52 phase two long range facility plan 51. >> Okay. Good evening board. uh just under a year ago I think it is we we started our partnership with Whiten company and this evening we are uh welcomed by three members of the team and we
009want to please introduce yourself and want to thank you for the work that you've been leading as we start to think about the facility needs of our district um beyond thinking about them we've been impacted by them significantly and so your timing could not be more appropo as we think about our future and so thank you so much for all the hard work really being on on the ground and working with our team. >> Well, thank you. Um, so I'm Stuart Brodzky. I'm the project director principal uh for the project and I'll let my colleagues here introduce themselves. >> Hello. I'm Nathy Sham, architect and project manager for this project. >> Good evening. I'm Steve Sheer, architect and design principal. >> Okay. Do we have a We have a clicker. All right. So, we've been
010here before and our colleague Brad Pollson and our partners McKinstry were here oh about a month and a half ago I think in June and they presented phase one. We'll show you in a moment remind you in a moment. You've seen that diagram probably many times at this point about the three phases of how a master plan works. And then we also want to remind you uh Beyond Your Base is a part of Whiten Company and and they work with our clients to explore funding and help build consensus consensus about the solutions with the community and with the public. So where are we? Okay, so table of contents. So u a long range facility plan is is kind of like solving a Rubik's cube. It's it's definitely as difficult and complex, but it takes a
011lot longer, about a year roughly instead of 5 seconds or 10 seconds or however long it took. Um, but tonight we're going to kind of walk you through that process. And again, we're in phase two. We're going to focus on that, touch on some of the other things, and then kind of roll along. Oh, I'm doing this one. Okay. I I've already forgotten. Um, it's good thing I don't have a Rubik's cube up here. All right. So, facility conditions assessment really focuses on the the nuts and the bolts um which are all too important to you um as we know and uh we've completed that part of it reported back in June and now we are finishing up and proud to say we're completing um have completed phase two which is called education alignment. So
012it really looks at your educational vision for the future and which is highly tied you'll see in a moment to your strategic plan and then forecast to the future. what would it take to move toward that so you are prepared for the future. And then um we are now moving into the third phase which is when we take those ideas, those needs assessments and all the information we're going to show you tonight and really come up with solutions of how you might solve that and think of it as a framework, a flexible framework that can last a number of years and adapt but stay true to a set of what we'll talk about um guiding planning principles. Yeah. >> All right. Um just to kind of remind you all of the overall schedule. Um we
013are at that red dot right now. So we're kind of switching from phase two to phase three. Um you know we know you guys we kind of started this process last year. We knew your strategic plan was kind of being created created and wrapped up in March. Um we started the phase one portion um last November and we wrapped that up in June with the board meeting and presentation. We've been working throughout this year and wrapping up this summer phase two and we are starting phase three um currently and we will be presenting that at the November board meeting. Kind of an overall overview of the district. Um we have kind of encompassed 22 buildings within our report. These are all your educational buildings. We about 32 3.2 million square feet of um building and
01416,800 students approximately. We really looked at this in in different types. So you have elementary schools, you have 13 total. We looked at both your prototypes which is a majority of the buildings and then your nonprototypical which is Boulder Hill and Long Beach. Um so those are four categories we looked at in terms of elementary. Um then we looked at your middle schools in two categories. So your prototypical buildings which are four um of your schools and then Thompson. We looked at the high schools individually, um the early childhood center individually, and then we we kind of named um the build the programs within the district administration center 30 um 8 extension programs. Had fun coming up with that title. Um so that includes your HBO Academy, pathways, and goal. So when you look at
015how we review this in the plan and kind of when we talk about all the buildings, those are the categories we we align these with. um we kind of take a look at your building age. So you can see um their oldest buildings are from 1957 and uh a lot of your buildings about what 80% are were built within uh the last 21 years. So that really means it's a really good time for strateic plan because all your buildings in the 20 to 30 year marks a lot of your systems need to be replaced. it's time to take a look at um you know updating your buildings and then we can look at the educational portion of it while we're doing all the wholesale changes. Um just in terms of the schedule we in terms
016of educational alignment schedule like I said we began in January and it really began with a process of engaging all the principles of your schools. So we met with all the principles uh we gave them a packet basically a survey kind of getting all the documentation of the types of um spaces they have in their building what works what doesn't work and we met with them individually each together after they finished this survey um in February so we met with every single principal or each each program we also sent out teacher surveys which we got back the next month as well in March and April we had educational alignment workshops which um Stuart will kind of go into what that means in the future slides but We met with five different groups of um staff
017and uh administration to kind of review each building type and what was working educationally in each building type. Um we visited about 12 buildings. So all of your proto one of each prototype and all your nonpartical buildings. Um we met with the steering committee which is a group of um administrators and community members who are helping guide the long-range plan process. Um we met in May and in July a few times and we're meeting throughout the process um to kind of make sure we're aligned with what the district priorities are and here we are today at the board meeting. Okay. So you just heard a little bit of a summary of the process and all the steps and all the engagement and the different ways we gathered information. We wanted to just touch on the
018in a in a little bit more detail. There's really five five different groups and those five groups collectively represent the whole district. So that's the the way we've been gathering information and um from the board of education down to um community engagement which will really begin in phase three as you're going to see in a moment in um September. The heart of gathering data in phase two and education alignment has really um been with the education leadership committee which was a is a group a construct you already had in place and then we formed academic advisory groups for the purpose of this planning process and they represent each of the major levels or building types and we had um really intensive hands-on workshops with them that you're going you're going to see in a moment
019and with the education leadership committee and through that really formed the vision. So I think the the main point here is that any good planning process is going to is going to look in many different dimensions at how it gathers information and we're about to step into that next step in a much broader way with the community and kind of excited about that actually. Next. So, um, this just kind of puts it to numbers. Uh, nothing more than that. A lot of meetings, a lot of survey responses, a lot of participants. And what we find is it's important to almost in a way build in redundancy in a process because uh, some people feel more comfortable expressing themselves in a workshop. So, we're going to get the quality of information and others are very busy
020and and particularly teachers and survey responses are able to give us broad um and finite detail all at the same time in a very thorough way. And we've assembled all that information. So when we uh produce our final report, you'll see a lot of that reside within the appendix um where we can really dig deep and then we'll do executive summaries and summaries by level. Okay. So throughout the whole process we've been organizing the way that we gather information and interact and look at the buildings um through four lenses. uh space organization and efficiency, the learning environment, sight and access, and safety and security. And in a way, the physical conditions kind of fall into these as well. But we really were looking at these from the education alignment standpoint. So, how well do your
021buildings allow you to fulfill um the criteria? And for each of those four major categories, there's at least two or three subcategories. And for each of those, you can see those bullet points. And within each of those bullet points, there were anywhere from four to six um points uh key indicators of of compliance with that particular topic that were binary choices that we were looking at. And eventually we'll have a data form, an actual score that'll come out of that. But the main purpose in doing that, frankly, isn't really to say a number is good or bad. A number is just an indicator how well a building is meeting these criteria. And the reason this is a part of um what's called the alignment rubric. The purpose in building this rubric um and customizing it
022was at the extension or at the end of those workshops where we could gather all the information and really could formulate your vision and make sure the tool that we're using to measure them was a reflection of that. So we can we'd be happy to answer any more questions about those in detail as we move through this and we and we kind of keep going. So why don't we hit the next one. We mentioned the workshops. So when we gathered the academic advisory groups and the education leadership committee and put them all together, we really had three learn three um exercises and the first one in a way was the most important part of it called learning practices. So, we've assembled at White and developed a series of uh basically engagement tools. They're custom tools
023we created that really explore through research-based um modalities what learning practices occur within the realm of teaching and learning in the United States and around the world and then allowed the uh participants to really focus on those and say, are we doing those no now and want to keep them? are we not doing this and want to um adopt it um or is it something that we're doing but we or not doing and don't want to have. And they were allowed to really break that down, look at it carefully. And then we utilized your um portrait of a learner, your strategic plan, and had um a series of exercises to help them apply how those learning practices supported each and every one of your five um portraits of a learner. And then through that process,
024they also came up with two really great ideas. We'll show you in a moment. The second exercise, the learner experience, it dig it dug a little bit deeper. We looked a little bit at spatial types, types of rooms and spaces that would support a vision and then collectively describe what that learner experience should be in a building. And we did that through again a series of um tools that we've developed and organized um uniquely for our clients and for your process. And then finally the sixword story, a summary exercise to collectively talk about it. say it's 5 10 years down the road the master plan has been completed. What does how would you describe the district? It's that type of thing and through that we're able to get um both qualitative and quantitative information about
025the way that the participants saw the vision for the future. Next, and there'll be a slide, by the way, in your packet that has a little bit more detail about that. We're not going to go over that tonight. Again, be happy to answer any questions. And so I mentioned a moment ago the you see these blue boxes if you they'll look familiar to you. They're the portrait of your learner. So we are going to be meeting with the education leadership committee this month and digging deep into a series of um action statements we've created about what that means in as a physical environment. and we're going to gather um reflection and information about that so that we can make sure that the the guiding what I've we're calling the guiding planning principles are reflective of
026the way you see the future of the district's learning environments and then interestingly through those activities two of them two new ones evolved they're colored green up there active and informed citizen ambassador of the environment and wellness and I can tell you in our experience we're seeing those trends all all over the country. And it was um very uh validating to see your um your leaders, the mentors for your your students really um bringing those ideas and elevating them because that's what they're seeing in the values of your students. What do we have next? >> All right, we're going to kind of dig deeper into what what are our summary and findings um for your buildings. So we kind of categorize this in four different categories. Elementary um junior high school, high schools, and then
027your extension program. So you'll see this four four times in this uh way. The first slide here is really about all your elementary schools as a whole. So when we see this slide, it applies to every elementary school. And then the second slide will be a little bit more particular about all the different building types. So, we're looking at the four categories, which is um space, organization, efficiency, and learning environment, site, and access, and safety and security. Um, and you'll see some of these kind of go throughout all the different building types as well. But I think we'll kind of point on kind of the major ones in each category. So, I don't have to read through every single one, but I think the biggest thing, two things here is, you know, create grade level
028based learning um communities. So that really means you have a first grade, a second grade community and all the resources that that grade level needs is within their area. So you and that it really depends on what the district wants. So that could mean mean small group rooms, related services within there, um special ed spaces, collaboration spaces, which is a connected learning space, a living room that you want to have to activate your corridor. So that's kind of the major takeaway from your space organization and efficiency. This really helps create a school community. And we've really seen in the last, you know, education has changed. There's a lot more related services I think after co as well. There's just so much more besides just a classroom that a student needs in a space. And so
029making sure they have all those spaces um in a way that is functional for the for the building is a key. Um the learning environment is a little bit more about this space individually and what that the categories that has. So um one big topic was really about improving flexibility and um adaptability. So that could mean you have really flexible furniture in your room so you can do different types of group work. We talked about a lot about individual learning, whole group learning pairs, having furniture that's flexible to do that and having the technology in your room that helps you do that as well. Um we also have some results from the surveys in there. We saw a lot about temperature control in there, acoustics. Um and then um another part is really your special
030education programs. you have a lot of special education programs within your buildings, which is great, but creating an adequate space in the currently aligned space for what your curriculum is. Um, a big other one that we really heard about is really steam and creating a steam maker space within your buildings and robotics. It's a really big program that people have been talking about in the district is what we've heard and having an individual space for that for students to thrive in would be really ideal. Um, site and access. I think the biggest one was outdoor learning spaces. Um, currently we just have playgrounds outside and safety and security was just about enhancing just keeping it up to date to what we're doing today. We've heard a lot of PA systems too. That was something we
031heard about. >> N just for a second. Um, Dr. Kate or Dr. Paul or Dr. Hall, anything you want to add to this particular area? I think there have been some this was an area of great discussion um as our principles start to think about it especially around career technical education. Uh, Dr. Kade, do you want to open up or anything related to this? Um, as both Dr. Katti and Nidi have mentioned, um, our steam and maker spaces have been an area of interest. Um, through the work of Dr. Paul and her team, sorry, Dr. Campbell and her team, um, we've actually introduced during the summer some, um, experiences for our students to come in and really um, expand their learning and knowledge. really partnered um with this also is the kind of reimagining of
032the libraries and um aligning from elementary to junior high to high school um with exposure to what would become the future of college and career. So wanting to make sure that the spaces are connected um to learning that they really see that hands-on interaction is um what the students are expressing, the teachers are expressing. Um so really trying to align both curriculum and the learning space and the environment um to that. So any addition >> anything Dr. Wall? Thank you. >> Okay. Dr. Wall, did you want to add anything to Okay. Okay. Yeah. I I will just echo that and just add that uh for our school administrators and when you look across the district, these buildings were all built very quickly for almost all of our buildings as you know. And so where we
033were almost 20 years ago, right? And where we are today is very different and what we're envisioning for the future. And so this particular side I think is really exciting. Um, when we think about what we've learned from our educators and starting to reinvision the future and and I also think it's that some of our buildings have some of the extremely important fundamentals, some of them we're struggling with roots. We're start we're we've got challenges in terms of just basic safety and health life safety. Um and so I think this became a very important exercise that you all led and I think the vitality of the the kind of energy that the space felt. Uh it was very exciting to hear from you all as you engaged in those debriefs and meeting teachers when we
034visiting our schools last year. Um we did school connections and so to hear the voices of our teachers talk about what they wanted to see and to see those now show up here is really important. Thank you for making sure that we got those voices and it's not the end yet, but definitely it was an important laying of that foundation. >> Well, and I think that that's an important point of it's not the end yet. Through the work of Dr. Dubil's team last year with some of the realignment of our um English learner and our special education programs. We really wanted to make sure as we were going through this process of the long-range facility planning leaning into that student assignment that we made sure that we really anchored our special education programs to make
035sure that we weren't moving students continuously around. Um the other thing that I think kind of not yet but we've taken steps to um improving is um noted under the safety and security with our entrances. So that's been some of the focus over the last two years of enhancing both the technical and the audio for our um uh visitors coming in and also our school personnel to help manage that. So it was good to see um kind of the recognition of some of the work that's been done but also the need and the want to continue that for um improving both in and out of the school environment. So many of these things we've been talking about are through lanes that you're going to see um reflect in different ways when we get to junior
036high and high school. A couple things I wanted to highlight just kind of keep a lookout for because it was consistent um there's a consistent affinity toward the idea of creating school community. We heard that at all levels and so at an elementary level it means uh gradebased learning communities. So when we do the planning and we plan for the planning, meaning programming, um we're going to make sure there's the right kind of space to create a sense of community, some space to break out and connect and be able to see into those spaces. And then the second one, strong affinity for connection to the outdoors and to have outdoor learning space, not just outdoor play and recreation and physical education, which is equally important, but to be able to get outside. These are um
037topics, by the way, that really did evolve and become more important out of COVID. So, we're continuing to see that importance um really elevate and and again, we saw it at all levels. >> Can I just ask one clarifying question about the um outdoor learning spaces because I see it comes up in other areas as well. Um I heard you clarify a little bit that it's not necessarily just about Is my mic on? >> Yes. >> It's not just about PE. Correct. So, we're not talking about just creating outdoor learning spaces for physical education, but maybe for like science exploration or like some social emotional type of activities. Is that correct? And what would be some examples of an outdoor learning space that would support something apart from PE? Yeah, I might let Steve chime
038in, but just the the idea of literally creating a classroom outside. We have done um that and to the to the extent that there's access to wireless technology that there's surfaces you can actually write on. The furniture often tends to be more um heavy and and you want to avoid it moving around because it's outside. Uh but the idea that you can replicate what you're doing inside because the daylight, the fresh air, the access to seeing green, seeing to the horizon, and the plants are what we call biofilic principles >> uh that promote promote health and wellness and students being calm. Yeah. >> So those are primary and then Stephen, >> well science is a good example, but then it provides the opportunity to tie some of the curriculum to some of the things you
039have outside. the idea of science and farmtotable or agriculture or sustainability and sunlight and daylight. So it just gives you direct access to more the natural resources you have on all your campuses too. >> Yeah. Okay. Thank you. >> Or just math, you know. >> I I I I was I was just really happy to see that that surfaced. >> Yeah. >> Um I've been pushing for more outdoor learning >> past probably 15 years. It's helpful to have some examples. I can imagine you mentioned like an outdoor classroom. I can imagine not I don't know what we will imagine together but like some outdoor seating like like a circle area or something like that where students could sit and things like that. Can you also clarify what activate hallways means? >> Yeah, I think um
040so some schools kind of already have this in your um district. So if you look at Wolf Wolf not Wolf's Crossing um Fox Chase, you have that upper library area where there's a really wide corridor. um students are using that as group spaces to do projects and we see saw stuff posted up over there and the thought is just to make it designated that way. So you could put some furniture in there. You could create an al cove where you have a whiteboard or a digital display you could project. So you create you activate your hallway in terms of when there's kids that you know during class they can go out there and work on something. >> Okay. Thank you. >> So that was kind of the overall elementary. So that's that applies to all
041elementary schools. We wanted to kind of dig in a little bit to each different type of prototype, the two prototypes, Boulder Hill and Long Beach. So I think we look at Foxchase, the biggest thing we saw for prototype one was really about the library space and that that it's open. And I think that the idea we're talking about is how do we program around that to make sure the programs adjacent are, you know, a steam lab or something like that or something that really makes sense to be adjacent to a library. um and creating programming that um helps align those spaces and the type of space you want there. Um they do have some a couple buildings that have preschool. So talking about you have preschool programs, that's a different set of standards you need,
042different size of classrooms, different resources. So how do we get to the two um Long Beach and believe it's um Liquid Creek um in terms of getting their their build that portion of the building where there's preschool aligned. Um when we look at spaces like Southbury um it was really about the gym and the cafeteria. That was the biggest thing we heard from all the the principles and the teachers is you only have one you have a gym/cafeteria. If you have kind of them running at the same time it's really difficult for certain students to concentrate or to kind of talk and have a good experience during lunch. Um Boulder Hill and Long Beach both are your older buildings. I think a big thing that was discussed was really about comprehensive updates and innovations there.
043really looking at the facility condition assessment along with educational alignment taking a hard look at there's some global item we need to take a look at to take to get this building up to the next level um and I and I think Long Beach also had the elementary um the early childhood program so the playground in both those buildings as well and I think Long Beach had such a great opportunity with these circles and creating pretty they had a pretty big library and just kind of opening that up and maybe creating a common so there's a lot of lot of great spaces within these buildings and how do we utilize them to the best that we can? That that's what we have already there. Good question. >> That library is great over there. Um but
044it just keeps the roof keeps leaking. >> And we know we've heard, you know, this past week has been a really tough time for the district. So we are taking all that into account too when we look at this all globally, right? We know you've had a lot of your three buildings, two high schools in in Long Beach had a difficult time last week. So that's something we consider as well when we look at these these buildings. Anything else? Anyone questions on elementary move to junior high? >> So, looking at uh the junior high buildings again, most of them are based off of that one prototype design with the exception of Thompson. Um but even with Thompson, there were some common findings that we found across the board um at the ele or at the
045junior high level. Um, one is we talked about grade level communities at the elementary school. In a similar way, we're talking about how can the junior highs be organized or space allocated differently to allow for the sort of team um teaming structure to happen at the junior high schools and then if any space is needed to sort of help create that sort of teaming approach to to learning. Um, also specifically at the prototype building, but even so at Thompson, there's spaces that are like was once computer labs or multi-purpose rooms that actually lend themselves as an opportunity when we think about either that reorganization or the introduction of more steam kind of based programming at at the junior high. Um, a lot of the common themes are shared at the elementary level and they just
046sort of graduated up to the um junior high level. Um, but I'll make a specific note about this idea of steam maker and robotics. That holds true at the junior high level, too. Um, there's great programming with the fax program, the applied arts, the art program. Um, but what new offerings in terms of robotics and maker can we achieve through the space at the junior high level. Um, and then lots of conversations across the board about the classrooms, you know, how can they be made more adaptable u through the furniture, through the vertical writing surfaces on the wall, through the technology in the room, anything down to the thermal thermal comfort of the students and the acoustics in the room. Um, and like at the elementary school, we are also keeping tabs on sort of
047the the unique features from each of the schools. Um, namely the Murphy prototype. Um that's the one that has a lot of former computer lab spaces adjacent to the library. Um there are multi-purpose rooms that are already sort of at the heart of the school. That's one that you know in what ways can we activate those spaces to support some of this um programming ideas. Um there's some specific art labs that are, you know, could function a little bit better that offer some expansion of the art room there at Murphy. Um but otherwise, you know, that prototype design, you know, we often say has good bones in terms of how it's laid out. There's sort of open communal areas in the corners of the buildings um that maybe with the the reduced use of lockers
048could be more activated um to to create this idea of connected learning. Um Thompson's a unique one, but even then there's some unique features like the really it's got a really main wide hallway that you cir circulate the school through. um that could be opportunity to find space for this idea of either connected learning or um just activating the space. This one because it's the outlier um and of a different vintage might lend itself to just more comprehensive modernization um because it is the different school. Um and then certain special program classrooms um might need just some better functionality just to align with the needs of those students and what they need. Um, but just kind of creating those common spaces just might have to happen in different ways just because they're two different layout
049designs. And then as we move to uh the high school level, you start to see some of the common themes kind of u move up here. At the high school level, we're thinking about building organizations by department. I think for the most part, both high schools were organized by department. um there might be a few anomalies that in what ways can we use this long-range plan to get departments better grouped together in the high school so that there's like-minded curriculum happening in in different areas of the building. Um same notion about connected learning. In what ways can we repurpose spaces or um leverage as much square footage of the existing building as we can to sort of create um this idea of connected learning um at both campuses. um this you know the spaces for
050student services and related services they've just been incrementally kind of growing and taking over adjacent spaces in what ways can we consolidate those but still make them very common place for the students. So access to deans guidance related services is very common for students um to have access to those resources. Um and just just the idea of school identity and wayfinding um at each campus came up. Um so where we talked about steam at the junior high and elementary level lots of conversations around career technical education at the high school level. Um you know what are sort of the offerings that you are offering at the high school? What do you want to continue to offer? And in what ways can the spaces be made more functional to support those offerings and um maybe done
051in a way that really puts those spaces like on display where students could get really excited about the different offerings that are career focused at each of the high schools. Um reinvisioning libraries, classrooms, you know, those kind of carried up to the top. Um and then likewise, we kind of looked at some of the specific differences between each high school campus. Um there's a lag. I get it. Um so Swiggo High, you know, it's the older of the building. It's one that's sort of received additions over time. So it's grown very organically and very densely. Um so things like daylighting in all the classrooms um was compromised over time. Um sometime some of the efficiency and wavefinding was compromised. So that's one that actually might lend itself to more comprehensive improvements just because of the
052age of the building. It's the older building and it's undergone uh more additions over time. Um one specific um nuance about Asiggo High is that the main office is actually separated from the visitor entrance. Um in what ways could we maybe get those two functions together just to um ease visitor access to administrators and make that more common place? Um but still large hallways that are currently being used for good number of locker bays that are offer opportunities to sort of activate those in different ways at Figgo High. Um and there's clearly some science labs that are newer, but then there's still those original science labs that are um probably best pass to for updating to make them in line with some of the newer ones that are there. Um and then fine arts and
053auditorium spaces at ESGO High along with some traffic studies that we want to do in terms of the the um the parking and um approach vehicular approach to the high school. Um at East um same story about you know the administrative space. Um there are moments of congestion things like the event entry gets a little um congested in terms of way binding throughout the building. Um and then the the weight room and fitness room um their functionality and both supervision kind of um could be something that we could look at and is is a challenge at that campus. Um and then just right out here, you know, the common spaces, things like acoustics, supervision, safety, lighting, um things we that's a kind of a heart of the school that we want to take a close
054look at in the in phase three in the planning approach. Um, next we're going to go to the extension programs. Um, so we're talking about pathways, goal, and east academy, the district administration building. So, kind of these are all pretty um much the same. It's really talking about how do we incorporate all three programs into one facility while still maintaining all these categories and making sure the students get what they need and the programs get what they need when they're sharing a building. So this is one another one that's an older building and it's really a thought of comprehensive modernization really to make it so these three programs can really shine within one space. So this one we kind of delved into a little bit more of the different areas. So East View I think
055the biggest thing space and organization was you have K through 12 all in one corridor. So how do we create separation between those students those ages? Um they don't have a separate library. Their library is in their um believe their cafeteria space their gym space. um the main office. I know you guys did some renovations recently to that, but there's still you're already kind of need another office space there. Um you know, a secure playground for this area. You're right off a main road. So really creating some safety for that. Um sensory and breakout spaces. So right now you're using full-size classrooms for things for deescalation and things like that. So how do we utilize your space better so you can get more breakout space and calming areas instead of utilizing a full-size classroom? um
056you know and then creating art and music therapy environments. Um you have a student store that would like to be expanded. Um and the last two is really about you know when you come up to the building we don't really know where is where east view is versus where goal is for where path pathways versus the district administration building. So really designating the exterior entrances to make it clear where to enter where to come in and then creating you know secure vestibules for each area because these students um you know you can't just leave the door open. know you might have someone that runs and you immedately need their safety and consideration. So creating a secure uh vestibial with a transaction window so you cannot get into the building without being um you know checked
057in would be ideal that kind of applies to all pathways is really um another program where there is a lot of multi-use spaces. So kind of making some designated spaces in terms of um lunch areas and staff areas would be ideal. um you have a multi-purpose room um or some type of uh sorry I'm like trying to read um you know in terms of getting some type of micro business or something like that for the students to engage in when they're really trying to learn life skills creating a studio studio apartment as well so they can actually learn laundry kitchenet there's a small space there right now but it's you know you could there's room for expansion um and then like I think there's no indoor recreation or fitness center they they don't use the
058gym within the building it's kind of clear cross that's really used for goal and pathway or an EVA. So getting some type of recreation for that those students would be ideal as well. Um similar story about the exterior parking entrance as well as the cure vestibule. Another part is you know some of these programs um inter intersect with the district administration program. So really creating designated areas so they're not overlapping so these students kind of have their privacy as well. um goal really needed a little the classrooms and things like that were similar to the the rest of the um rest of the buildings. Um but PE offerings was a little bit more on that end would be ideal there. Um connectivity and transparency are kind of in your own corridor. Um there's no commons
059area for these students, so they don't really have a place that they go eat lunch or a place that they can go and have a high school experience. So that would be ideal there as well. Um, and then another area where I believe you have to card access through a few areas, but really creating a secure vestibial for checking in because I believe you check in the same location you check in for EVA currently for goal. Well, that's that facility right now. Any questions about um extension programs? >> There's a lot. Yeah. >> Okay. Lots of info. We're almost through it. Um so you remember one of the lenses we looked at during the educational alignment was space organization and building layout. A subset of that is looking at the building capacity at each of
060your campus. And the first part of that is um taking information from the demographer um RSP and taking their information in terms of um enrollment growth projections where density is throughout the district. Um this is one of the heat maps they provided um that kind of demonstrates that you know your highest density of students is on the northern end of the district. Um they also provided projected five-year enrollments at each of the schools. So um we kind of took the information they had and started rolling it into um uh a comparison metric at each of the grade levels. Um so typically what we find for planning purposes um and even just peer districts in the state is that elementary schools kind of fall around this 130 square foot per student uh metric. It's kind of
061one of the first metrics we look at size in a building and checking capacity. Um so we took both the current enrollments at the school and the projected enrollments and kind of took stock of where the buildings are falling relative to that metric. Um, and then what it does, it kind of just highlights areas that we've sort of highlighted in red. Those are schools that maybe we want to take a closer look at um, to see how they're falling across that metric. I would say that this is just one of many metric. It isn't like a definitive metric that could give give full diagnosis of a building that it's overcrowded or undercrowded. There might be a school that has special programs and therefore smaller class sizes that might change that number. Um there might be
062schools that just aren't efficiently laid out and they have extra hallway space that might sway that number. Um but you know if this is just the checkup of a building we're just kind of taking the height and weight but we can't give a full diagnosis just off of this metric. >> Can I invite Dr. Kay to add something there? I think if you wanted to add a few comments about this work here because I know you've been working very closely with our demographer and our school leaders and with white company as we think about this. So I just want to make sure we frame that if you don't mind. >> Absolutely. So um we have been looking at student enrollment projections um have been having those conversations and definitely um as you have aligned space
063allocations. We are also seeing um some need based on some of our growth just in our community especially um around our Wolves Crossing corridor and South Ferry. Um so over the next couple of months um as we bring in more and more information about our long range facility planning, we really want our student assignment to go hand inand um with your findings and conclusions and use that information to work not only with our buildings but our community um to readjust and accommodate for to maximize our student learning opportunities. So, um we will be looking to follow essentially right behind you um with our student assignment uh discussions >> and we continue sort of doing this this first check um at all grade levels um you know seeing that the junior eyes um kind of are
064close to and on par with that metric. You'll see though that the metric standard kind of goes up as students get older, they get bigger, there's more program offering. So, we're kind of comparing it to that 180 square foot per student is sort of the benchmark that we see at the at the junior high level. And then at the high school level, um that square footage gets even bigger. Um and probably even more variable, too. You know, you can imagine you add a fieldhouse to a high school, it could sway that number or a large auditorium. Um so, the range of square foot per student at the high school level is getting bigger and bigger. Um but again as a first check um this is something we kind of take a take stock of as
065we go into phase three in the planning of these buildings. So that's looking at the overall building square footage, but we also want to take in account the individual sizes of classrooms and learning spaces. So, we've collected data in not only your peer districts in the state um but also capacity best practice standards from um your peer state guidelines, even some from um Illinois State Board on capacity of rooms. So, those are sort of the benchmark square foot per student when we look at individual classrooms. Um and what we're looking at this is to prepare us for phase three when it comes to planning. Um, so when we take your current multipliers and assume that you're going to max out every classroom, which we know isn't the case, um, there's a number of school building
066that sort of fall in the red. And basically what this tells us that the existing school building classroom size aren't really sized according to that benchmark to accommodate a full class size of 2830. Um, but the good news is we know that most of the cases you're not maxing out to the fullest every classroom and more so your average is much lower than that. Um, so what we're doing from a planning standpoint as we get into phase three, we're actually taking account what can your existing classroom sizes accommodate and that's what we're going to use when we long range plan into plan three into phase three. So, it's a way of sort of building in the flexibility for you to um sort of accommodate enrollment changes. Um it's a tough term, but in a way
067sort of futurep proof the capacity of each building. So, you have flexibility in terms of um the number of students and the capacities kind of built into each school. Right? So, kind of wrapping up with a district-wide consideration. So, when we looked at this all these categories combined, these are the big takeaways we had. So we'll have this slide and then a summary slide, but one of the big items that kind of affect the district as a whole. And when we take into consideration during phase three planning, the first we've kind of talked about just recently class size and reassignment that really makes a difference if you're doing a 24 versus 28 students and how many classrooms that needs and the size of those classrooms. And then also just the reassignment portion that we're working
068with uh Dr. King Kaden RSP on. Um the next one is really teaming and learning community structure. So we talked about that. How do you want your buildings to be organized? Um what's in a learning community and what's that? What's the definition of the programming there? Next big one was CTE programs and maker space and steam alignment. You know, how do we want that to to look at each grade level and throughout the district? What does that mean at the high schools in terms of do we have a capstone at each high school? Do you have a separate CT building? There's lots of different options or do we just enhance what you have now? lots of different ways we could look at the CT program from each, you know, grade level. Early childhood is a
069conversation. You have two satellite buildings and one um standalone building. So, what's the future of your early childhood? Is that growing? Is that staying the same? Is it staying where it is now? And those considerations. Um we talked about your uh 308 extension programs, what we want to see those how we want to see those buildings laid out, what those students their future is, and what we how we want to see those in the future. Um then one part we did talk about with Dr. Concaid a lot and they've been working with RSP and you guys already had a shuffle is the location of your special programs. So stars um heart of hearing those programs and if they're staying where they are and how flexible we want in the future if they're moving 5 years
07010 years we want to make sure we look at this long range plan um we give you flexibility to move those around if that's what you need or we're locating in one loc one spot. Another one we um didn't touch on, but we'd have heard a lot about throughout is athletics and activities and outdoor play. So that means your playgrounds in your um elementary schools or outdoor areas in your junior high school such as soccer fields, which we know is used a lot, and then your athletic fields at your high schools, which we've um really heard a lot of from the community and from the district about. And then we we kind of touched base on this as well when we looked at, you know, these older buildings that we have that aren't the prototypical
071buildings, but what comprehensive modernizations do we want to take into consideration when doing this long range plan? So, this kind of just summarizes what we talked about and a lot of these kind of tie together because your district-wide considerations are really what drives the long range plan. Um, the first is really about capacity. So, what RSP's findings are and really we looked at Southberry was the biggest one that really had the enrollment growth and what what that means for the district in the future. Um, the class size consideration that we just talked about as well, the learning communities and what that means for your program and how your buildings change and the square footage changes and the layout changes for that. CT and steam. Um, connected learning spaces. So really talking about group rooms, living
072rooms, um how do we want in the high schools for connected learning to happen as well as early ch as well as um elementary and middle schools um junior high school sorry um I think the two big program locations is what's the future of early childhood and then your extension programs those really make a big shift if you're relocating them creating one building adding another building that'll really change the plan depending on how we move forward with that um technology and communication systems was something we talked about. You know, I think we have a pretty standard set throughout the district, but is there some where in the future you want to enhance that with the technology? Um, we always talk about security and kind of what the future of security is and how you want
073to keep modernizing. Like we said earlier, the district's really taken strides to do that already and you're in a good shape, but what's the next step of that? And the final one was really, you know, if we're looking at comprehensive modernization, where do we want to target that and how do we want to move forward with those? because that those are not just small feats, right? Doing looking at an entire building as a whole. That's that's some money cost and some um time there. >> Next, so um an important part of phase three is not just what are those ideas, uh but what they cost and how um we go about looking at them. So we're proposing um an idea of looking at it as a series of four four major components and um the
074reason to do this is that we can you saw a lot of detail right in the last few slides. It's really complicated. There's little things here, larger things there. when we begin to look at it as a series of components, it allows us to do budgeting in a more organized and consistent way uh so that we can make sure we're not missing things and we can also understand how things affect each other. And so the the big one is if if a building needed air conditioning and it also needed fire protection sprinklers and you're taking the ceilings down, you begin to get toward a a comprehensive remodeling. So you're not gonna you're not any longer going to look at just what if we replace a mechanical unit in kind. We're looking at whole systems. So
075the first component is really the capital repairs and infrastructure. So the physical most of the work that you saw in the physical conditions assessment falls into this category. And then we take a critical look at it and say, were we just replacing something or were we modernizing it to meet new code or to meet new needs? Like air conditioning and technology are examples. You could put heating and air flow in a building, but ideally you're air conditioning in today's day. And with technology, you're not just putting in wireless. You're looking at extended bandwidth for multiple devices, the ability for students to interact with multiple displays throughout every space. So, there's different things that wouldn't just be replacement in kind if something is wearing out. The second category really lives in the realm of what we
076just showed you for this whole presentation tonight. Um, educational enhancements and modernization. So, are we are we really making changes to spaces, which is component 2A? Are we modernizing finishes and casework? Because if the bones of a building, a term that kind of I thought I heard tonight, um if you have a really good building, it's structured really well and there's not a lot of walls that need and doors that need to change, um significant improvements that really do impact students could be made by simply looking at finishes and casework aesthetically, functionally with casework. There's a lot of great things that can be done. And then finally, um furniture. Furniture is a universal. It's a great one because you can do it over time. Um, you can make a gigantic impact on the learning environment.
077So, a lot of improvements in what we talked about tonight live within component two. Uh, component three are a lot of the things that um, Nidi was just talking about, whether it's a a renovation within a building, a complete system replacement, reconfigurations, maybe envelope modernization, and then um, addition. So, are are build are some of the buildings needing to expand in place? An addition would fall into this kind of component three. And then finally, component four is really dealing with um safety and security. Um any enhancements to secure entrances, exterior envelope, um that keeps the perimeter very safe and secure, lighting, things like that. And then also uh what happens inside the building? Do all the classrooms lock down the right the way that you want? Do you have the the cameras and the intrusion
078detection and the kind of electronic systems that really u make a big difference uh for and communication mass notification things like that. So we will look at the budgeting in this manner and it will allow us to get a very organized and very clear focused snapshot of where money um is being applied and then when we try to prioritize um we can look at the good better of these various components. So then you can make value decisions about where you really want to focus dollars, which we know, not that it wouldn't be in any planning, but we know that's going to be really important is to have really uh careful prioritization so you're good stewards of the the money that needs to be applied to make the district um infrastructure ready for the next, you
079know, 50 to 100 years. So I believe that concludes the formal part. We do have some next steps, I bet. Yes. Um, we mentioned community engagement that uh week of September 8th, sessions one and two, focusing primarily on a lot of the things you heard tonight as well as physical conditions, but we are going to structure it so that we can get unique feedback on some of the things that we know you want to um really hear from the community about. And then during October, a little more than a month after that, we will do um three and four. And the reason there's two is just to give two different opportunities uh for the public, two different two different times, two different locations so that you can have the most I think the big thing
080was making sure the process is equitable and allows um access for everyone. And um that session will focus on we'll really dig into number one reporting back what we heard in the first one and then secondly what do some of those solutions and approaches what does that framework look like and and perhaps get some prioritization. You can't really prioritize until you know what you're prioritizing. So that will allow us in that session to really hear um what's more what is one thing more important than another. Sometimes there are exercises we can do with the community um that are fun that begin to get them thinking. We have constraints. If you have constraints, how do you think creatively about what you should choose? And then finally um we'll be back with you um on the 17th
081for a more comprehensive uh presentation of the whole package and then on the 8th of December for adoption of the mass of the long range facility plan framework and questions more questions. Yeah, I want first of all I want to say thank you all. Um and I want to just frame something for the board and really get your reflection and questions you may have. I want to just this last week and a half we've had a chance to visit multiple classrooms and nothing gets us more exciting watching walking to classrooms and seeing how educators have prepared those spaces to receive students. So when the student enters that space they say ah I matter. I'm important. I am seen. You prepared for me. This is our chance. This is our chance as a district and for
082the board to really lead and champion. Really what I would say is at the beginning of this next phase of our district saying to our students collectively, you matter. And our buildings and our spaces deserve to be the best so that we can champion who you are. That our educators walk into spaces and say, ah, this space matters to me. I was thought of because I matter. and I can then in turn make sure that our students feel that they matter. And so our community and parents aboard your questions as you hear this is, you know, we timed this because we wanted this this juxaposition honestly in relation to also the start of the school year because we really want to be able to connect th those two concepts. This is not a summertime conversation.
083This is a now conversation. Randy, >> you have the question. >> So, just a quick excuse me um just a quick comment in regards to the community engagement that is going to be upcoming. I can understand how granular this process is and I appreciate just all the context. However, for the community engagement, will that be very high level? So, it's just kind of like quick hits so the community can understand it. Yeah, we actually met today to go over all this and yeah, we're going to be pretty high level. We're going to kind of go over the steps in the process, but not get really granular into these. So, you won't see the slides with the two with the elementary school items and then the specific school items. It'll be high level just districtwide. >>
084Um, thank you for all the uh information. Lots to dig into. Um, I asked a couple questions earlier, but a couple other one other thing um two other things actually. Um, is is broken not in this study? Bro call I >> It is in the study. Yeah, >> it is. >> And we we put it in the elementary school category. >> It's in the elementary category. >> Yeah. So we do have we didn't see it on that four square but we did include it because and we talked to it was part of the bigger considerations districtwide considerations. Um so that was one of those >> because we have prek in the elementary satellite building. So we put it we categorize that together. But we can >> okay >> focus in on that a little bit
085more if you need us to. >> Yeah. It is a it's a one of would be one of the unique prototypes. Correct. >> Correct. Yes. >> Yeah. Okay. Um yeah, I think that would be good to add something in here or to have information about that building as well so that they know that they're seen and to Dr. Helgott's point that they you know that that space is important as well. I know preschool or is a big topic as you you know uh you know highlighted at the end of the presentation as well. Um the other question I I think the the conversation about space and demographics is really interesting. So this might be a question for our administration rather than you all. But um I know that our last demographic study indicated that we're
086okay on space, but we might need to transition some programs or some lines and things like that possibly in the future. Um so that everyone has access to an appropriate space. Um, do we have a timeline for how often we do that? Because I know markets change and other buildings might stop might pop up um and how that might that impact future planning in that area. So we are currently um aligning uh we've been meeting with RSP um as uh Nidi mentioned earlier they are recalculating our instructional capacity based on the alignment of our special education programs. Okay. Um as you mentioned uh South Berry at our last presentation is projected to be over capacity. Um but then there are some schools that are very very close to capacity. Um so as um our timeline
087uh as I mentioned will start in the next few weeks um and be very similar in terms of um both school and community engagement and then uh plans. We're looking um really to go out the next five and then six to 10. So um that will be the questions that we will be bringing forward of are we wanting to repeat cycles every 3 to four years or do we want to make some um what type or level of movements would we want to do now and anticipation where or opposed to the the depth of of uh proposals. So that will be forthcoming in the next few weeks. >> Okay. Thank you. >> Yep. That's all. >> I I I did have a a couple. Um first off, as far as um what I'm hearing is
088the the meetings or the you know the the sessions that you're having with the community or with teachers um uh facilitator is does a great job. um seems very knowledgeable, looking for appropriate feedback. So, kind of well done. Um as far as you know, the South Berry um getting over capacity, we've said it here a couple times. I want to we're not looking at special programs. Correct. >> Correct. So the um the only discussion has been do we need um an an additional site? We currently have one site for skills. So but in terms of moving the locations of our stars program um we are looking to leave um our special programs um where we uh the the recommendations from last year so are in place right now. So we wanted to make sure that
089that was our phase one and then we would build around that. >> And so any consideration for special programs going into another building would be um just so that if that were to happen that it' be easily transitioned. Correct. So that these we have spaces that are appropriate for um for all kids essentially. Um and then I you know we had this conversation about prek um you know so I know that this probably isn't you'd be looking at the infrastructure, the spaces, um, you know, expanding prek, for example, would be a large project. Um, so would we like kind of be able to see, you know, if if because you you had a a good, better, best, right? Type scenarios. I would assume with best scenario would include expanding our prek program, you know, things
090like that. Um would there be um you know additional revenue considerations? Um you know there's kind of just that whole picture you know I don't know what we would see in this in this uh base you know >> so expanding uh early childhood would definitely have uh revenue implications. Um >> everybody looks at the CFO right now. >> Well I I know it has expensive implications but I wonder if it has revenue implications as well. you know, revenue. Yeah. So, >> more more expense. I would think right now our revenue um our PFA is our um current uh state allocated grant is uh consistent. Um there has not been any additional funding. Okay. That we have received um in PFA. So, it would require more expenditures um to expand our current uh early childhood. >>
091Yeah, we would have to. Okay. And just to be clear, as it stands right now, the grind doesn't even come close to covering the cost of operating the program. >> I know. I know. And we don't even, you know, don't advertise, you know, and we still have um growing population and, you know, I'd like for all our kids to have that opportunity, but that's maybe an eventuality. Um but not something to not consider. >> No, we typically have waiting lists um by the end of the year. >> Yeah. Okay. Um I think everybody else said that they're they're good. So, thank you. >> Thank you. >> Yeah. Appreciate it. >> Thank you. >> Oh, yeah. >> Thank you. >> Have a great night. See if I can get the number right this time. 52. >>
092All right. Moving uh to 52. We got 25 26 school year story beginning highlights. So we got a >> Yeah. So um this is a quick um as we were brainstorming as a senior leadership team, we were talking about how do we want to bring you some of those first day highlights. We've captured some video, some photos. You know, we've had some really high highs and some really, you know, tough moments in these first few days. So this is kind of just a quick conglomeration to give you a glimpse into a lot of what's happened. some voices from across the system, from students to staff leaders. Um, we just thought this was a great way to kind of bring you up to speed on where we're at. So, this is this is our start of
093the year highlight video for you. >> Ready? [Music] I am a parent in the community, but I'm also now back as a staff member teaching second grade. And these past six days meeting these new students have been amazing. and quite the adventure in second grade. The mentorship program is great here in 308. My mentor is actually next door to me, so it's kind of nice to be able to pick her brain if there's something that I'm unfamiliar with or even just to share a funny little story that's going on and I hope everyone has a wonderful school year. >> I am a math teacher here at Plank Junior High and uh my first several days of teaching have been really great. um really had a great time getting to know all the students, working with
094my new colleagues. Everyone's been so nice and so helpful here and I've been uh having a great time so far. My favorite part about working in uh 308, well, I grew up in Asiggo. I think my favorite part is that I get to be part of the community I live in. I get to work here, too, and and and get to see the students and the community and um you know, and give back to 308 since they they gave me so much when I was a student. [Music] The 2526 school year is underway here in school district 308. And already we have experienced excitement and opportunity everywhere we turn. Every day our students come with smiling faces to our 24 sites ready to learn and be with their teachers. As with every year, we have
095encountered some challenges. But again, like every year, we have faced those by collaborating with our communities to solve our problems. As we have worked to be more fiscally responsible and efficient with our transportation, we have worked with individual families and communities to ensure that the safety of our students is always at the top of our priorities. >> And something I find good about having our backpacks in our lockers is that it can give us a little bit like more time or stamina to think cuz look because like you have to think how can you get to your locker in time and still be able to come back in time without being tardy. It can give you a little bit more brain power because you have to think about about it more often. >> I think
096it's easier because normally the backpacks are really heavy so they put a lot of like weight on your shoulders. So like um so like they're like sometimes they cause back problems. That's what happened to me cuz I had like my back was always sore from like carrying the backpack. So now that I don't have to carry the backpack and keep them in my locker, it's a lot easier. The main thing that I really like about not having backpacks always on us is I have a few very um populated uh classes with my classmates and the classrooms are very much more open because we don't have backpacks um all the way everywhere. >> Love having no backpacks in the classroom because it frees up a lot of space and kids are much more organized with bringing
097just one folder, one notebook and just their materials for that class to the classroom. So, it's been great. students are doing a great job with it and we I encourage it for uh the rest of the year. >> I learned that I didn't have changed without my backpack is I'm very much more organized and I have a lot of time to get to class to class and it really helps me out a lot and I don't have a backpack full of junk. >> All right. And Luciana, >> um what I learned for not having backpacks, I learned how to properly manage my time going class to class. And also, um I thought I would be so bad. I'll be late to every single class, but it's really not that bad if you learn how to
098properly organize your time and properly spend it. >> For our sixth graders, backpacks aren't needed. Like, it's no different. They don't know any changes. So, it's been perfect for them. They have been coming with their materials, being more responsible, uh being prepared for class, and really succeeding. went down stairwells, went through the through the flooring, um in between walls, that type of thing. And then just spread from there down into the second floor. >> Just saw kids in the school a couple days ago. And then just to see this happen over the weekend was quite shocking. that we have had a very successful start to the school year. Uh specifically regarding our five brand new stars classrooms that we've opened this year at Prairie Point Elementary. Uh without the support of the board and our
099district leaders in resource allocation, ensuring appropriate curriculum for students, ensuring supports for students, and ensuring the staffing for the program to not only start successfully but continue to run successfully is noticed every single day. And without those commitments in action, we would not be seeing the success that we are. So we are deeply thankful to your commitment to putting students first. [Applause] Thank you. >> That's great. >> Um, going to public comment. Do we have any? >> Yes. Yes, we have five. >> Okay. All right. On behalf of the board of education, make sure it's um on behalf of the board of education, I would like to thank the public for attending tonight's meeting. We value the feedback we received from our members of the public and encourage everyone to take an active interest in
100their public school system. Individuals interested in speaking to the board this evening are asked to have completed a comment card and presented it to the secretary to the board. When the secretary calls your name, I ask that you come to the microphone, state your name for the public record, and provide your feedback. Please note that comments are limited to five minutes per person. The board does not participate in discussion during public comment. Comments should address the board of education as a whole and not be directed to an individual board member, audience, or staff member. Followup to your questions or concerns may be addressed by administration through the contact information provided on the comment card. Thank you, >> Kelly Welch. Hello. Does this work? Okay. >> Um, I've never done this before, so I apologize if
101I'm a little nervous here, but um, I just wanted to bring a safety concern to the board's uh, attention um, with transportation. So, I know we just watched that lovely video where they talked about the challenges of transportation and how they're working with the community. That is not the experience that I have had with transportation this year or last year. Um, transportation has allowed a student on the bus that has assaulted now multiple students on the bus over the years. Um, the student was removed from the bus and placed on an alternative transport for a while, but I have been informed this year that he will be back on the bus with my student who is one of the students that was assaulted by this child. Um, I have reached out to transportation over a
102dozen times, left messages with both the um the director of transportation, the assistant director of transportation, the route coordinator for my particular bus route. Not one person has reached back out to me. Um, I've also left a message with the superintendent um and haven't heard back either um in that regard. Um my principal has done a fantastic job of trying to work with transportation and with me to uh work through this issue. Um but even she is hitting roadblocks with transportation at this point and it just comes across as transportation does not want to be bothered by my issue. Um whether or not there are alternate circumstances, I'm sure there is. Um, but because of the lack of communication, they have not made me aware of what these are. And um, at this point, I'm
103not sure where else to go. So, I am here asking for your guys' assistance in hopefully getting this rectified. Um, not only is it a safety concern for my own child, but as I said, multiple students have been assaulted. Um, we have one of the busy uh, one of the most crowded bus routes for our school. Um at times the students are three to a seat. Um and so having that additional safety issue aboard that bus is um to in you know in my opinion extreme. Um so hopefully we'll be able to get somewhere from here. Um but I figured you guys were my next step before the district becomes liable for something else happening on this bus. Thank you. >> Thank you. Michelle Triger. >> Hi. Thank you. Happy birthday. >> Um, I want
104to give a quick thanks to the people around the table who um were out at our schools welcoming families and at Panther Fest and a thanks to our our building staff responding to those weather emergencies um last week. Before I get to my main point, um I did want to ask if we could do a survey of elementary parents regarding curriculum night. Many of us would like to see it be brought back. Um it's not working to combine it with preview night, especially in like dual language as the grades get higher. There are changes in percentages of instruction time and how that's managed. And a lot of us were saying like, "Hey, did you see on the calendar where's curriculum night?" And then we remembered like, "Oh, they took it away last year." So maybe
105we could survey because I think there's a lot of parents that maybe would like to see that brought back. Um and I really enjoyed OS's curriculum night. Um it's really exciting to see the teachers that my students are going to have. Um so my main point is that September is fetal alcohol spectrum disorder awareness month and again I encourage our district to recognize this month. We recognize autism awareness in our district and the prevalence of FASD is actually one and a half to two times greater than autism. And um our communications director has been good in the past utilizing FASD United as a resource for information about awareness month. Um and I like to share new information because I I know that I bring this up, you know, fairly often. Um so we usually state
106the prevalence conservatively estimated is one in 20 which would be basically one in each classroom who's had prenatal alcohol exposure. Um so there are newer studies that have come out. um October of 21 the data was showing a prevalence um in the sample was actually 7.1% which is 1 in4. So that's quite a leap up from the one in 20. And if you think about food allergies, the prevalence of food allergies of a student having any kind of food allergy is 1 in 13. So we're really close to that and we are used to seeing the signs on the classrooms like this is an allergyaware classroom and we're accommodating those students. um uh behavioral risk factor surveillance system. In 2022, there was a study found that nearly one in seven pregnant people reported drinking alcohol
107and one in 20 reported binge drinking in that month. Um there's the you guys probably know the um ABCD study. It's the cognition brain study for adolescence. Based on parental reports, nearly 26% of almost 10,000 adolesccents participating were prenatally exposed to alcohol. And then this is new from May uh of 2025. Compared with February 2020, consumption in April and November of 2020 increased by 36 and 39%. Exceeding the drinking guidelines um increased by 27 and 39% in April and November. And what's really interesting is that these included women with children younger than 5 years old. that the increase was 323%. Why am I giving you numbers from 2020 and 2021? Because our kindergarteners who are entering our district this year and next year were born during that time. That's profound. We need our staff, general
108ed and special ed, to learn how to identify students who may have been prenatally exposed and how to intervene and accommodate more effectively. Many of these students have issues with impulse control, executive function, uh, planning, judgment, sensory needs, social challenges that look different from what we see in autism, and learning challenges. And if we're not in the habit of thinking brain function, then we often attribute these neurosymptoms as intentional behaviors. Our reward and consequence charts, point level systems, FBAs, FIPS, and cognitive behavioral methods are often not very effective for students whose brains function differently. And this will affect not just the teachers, but also the deans and the resource officers, mental health counselors, and student support personnel who need to consider brain function when interacting with students. I do have information about a free statewide
109FASD training for caregivers and professionals coming to Illinois in October. um when we saw earlier the slides where there was a portrait of a learner. Um I want to thank you for continuing to be open to learning about this this specific neurode divergence which is also a prenatal trauma. Um because if we if we're open to learning about that we can better support students on that journey to becoming that portrait of a learner. Thank you. >> Thank you >> Alicia Hansen. Good evening. >> Good evening. >> I'm Alicia Hansen. Um, I've been a resident here for over 20 years. I've graduated two of my children uh from SD308 schools and I still have one left. Um, and I'm also been in education for over 20 years. However, this is my first time speaking as a
110parent on this side. So, the fact that I'm here means that I'm kind of at the end of my rope. I have no other choice but to bring it to this platform. Um, like one of the previous parents, my biggest concern is transportation. And I've tried all the other avenues. Um, hers might be a little more significant, but I am dealing with transportation for the past four years and it's specifically the routes from Church Hill and Plank um with my son and they've been consistently 30 to 45 minutes late. So, this year I tried to head it off and problem solve it and collaborate because collaboration is one of your core values. And guess what? I can't get a hold of anyone. No one. I tried calling. So then I called central office and I
111left a detailed message last Monday. No one has called me back. And I'm spending in my own school day hours trying to problem solve this. The only one that's working with me is the admin at my son's school and he's been amazing. But his hands are tied. My husband and I have like rearranged schedules, dropped things at work because we have sports appointments to get to and I can't wait an hour to an hour and a half for my son to get off the bus. And I know that may sound petty, but we have busy lives and I don't want to keep him there longer than he has to be, nor do the staff want them there any longer. I'm really trying to problem solve. And so last Friday, my son used his common sense
112and he got on another bus. Probably not the right thing to do, but that bus dropped five houses from us 10 minutes before his supposedly time he's supposed to be dropped off. I called and asked cuz I finally got a hold of somebody to be switched to that route and they kind of gave me the runaround and said to check Monday. Well, he's still not switched. I still don't have a functional route. They told me he's not to ride that bus and this is what's working. I said, "We've solved the problem. We have it in a timely manner. So, we're back to square one. I don't have a time frame. I don't have a solution. And this is year four. If this was just me dealing of a week of it, I get it. It's
113the start of the school year. I can hang on. This is four years. So, we've got two problems here. it's transportation. And my second issue I really want to bring is a systematic approach to addressing concerns. We cannot run a district successfully if we don't have systems and procedures in place. And that really is what's concerning to me now because I started with transportation and now I'm even more concerned that I can't get a hold of anybody or the right people to work with. And all I'm trying to do is help you solve a problem. I'm not here to give you a problem. I'm here to help you try to solve it with me. Thank you for your time. >> Thank you, >> Kelly Bernardoni. Sorry. Good evening. This is my second year in the
114district. Last year when my daughter started kindergarten at Boulder Hill, we had an excellent experience with her bus driver. Unfortunately, this school year began with a serious issue that highlights broader systemic concerns which are related to the other speakers. On the very first day of school, my daughter's bus did not stop to let her off at her assigned bus stop. I had to run after the bus with my four-year-old son, screaming and waving my arms to try to get it to stop. I had to rely on a neighbor who at that time was a stranger to me to watch my son so I could continue running screaming after the bus. Eventually, another parent who had heard me had to step in front of the bus so I could get on to get my six-year-old daughter.
115This all happened after my son and I had already been waiting in the sun for 5050 minutes with no communication about a delay and the bus app was not working. I reported what happened right away by calling the transportation line and using the district website to message the transportation director, but I still have not heard back from anyone to discuss what happened. Since then, things have improved with a different driver, even though daily the bus is consistently later than our scheduled pickup and drop off times, but the larger problem remains. On that same first day, some children were not dropped off until after 700 p.m. This is more than 3 hours after school had ended. And from what I've heard from other parents, this is not new. This is becoming something that we as parents
116are expected to accept at the start of every school year. But this is not acceptable. What is the industry standard for delays in the first two weeks of school? Where does our district fit in the industry standard? Is anyone measuring this and tracking where our district is year-over-year when it comes to delays and communicating with parents in a timely manner? Our students and families deserve better. Drivers need to be properly supported and trained so that they know their routes and stops. Parents need timely updates about these delays. And we all need accountability. When concerns are raised, they must be acknowledged and addressed. So tonight, I am asking, what concrete steps will this district take to fix these problems? How will you ensure this does not happen again? And when will parents get clear, timely communication
117that we can count on? >> Thank you. Lydia, good evening. I'm a little nervous. This is my first time doing this, so I don't do very well with public speaking, but um as they said, my name is Lydia, and I'm a parent of a first grader and a second grader at Churchill. This is our third year at the school. In previous years, there have been some challenges with transportation, such as delay arrival times and inconsistent communication through the app or through email, but we've always managed to work through them. I understand there could be occasional issues that need to be addressed, and we have been very patient with this process. However, this school year has begun in a way that both has been very stressful and overwhelming for our family. Less than one week before
118school started, I was informed that my daughters no longer qualified for school transportation. This came as a shock. My daughters have attended the same daycare for four years and for the last three years have always had the bus transportation to and from school to daycare. Because of the sudden change, my husband and I have been forced to rearrange our our work schedules for the last month in order to manage pickups and drop offs. We've also had to seek out alternative daycare options that could provide transportation. But after contacting three different centers, we have had no success. I now find myself facing the very real possibility of having to uh quit my job because of the lack of transportation that I do not have for my children. I also want to note that I am not
119the only parent impacted. There are at least three other families in our in our daycare that are facing the same situation. This shows that the decision has a widespread effect on working parents in our community. Three key facts are a lack of communication. Parents aren't almost given enough notice for major changes. Why was a decision not communicated earlier in the summer when we w when we would have had enough time to make arrangements? Pickup uh alternative pickup forms. Why do these forms exist if parents aren't allowed to use them as intended to designate a safe pickup and drop off at a daycare? Three, impact on work on working families. While I understand that students who live less than one mile from school may not qualify under certain guidelines, many of us rely heavily on daycare
120as a school transportations so we can balance work and family responsibilities. On behalf of myself and fellow parents, I respectfully ask for the board to reconsider the policy as the as it applies to families who dayare who uses daycare. Reliable transportation is not just a convenience. It is a necessity for working parents who want to ensure that their children's are transported safely and consistently. I thank you for your time. >> Thank you. >> That's it. >> Yeah. >> All right. Thank you everybody. Seven points. Okay. The superintendent report today. >> All right. Uh good evening board. uh as we gather for our first board meeting. Uh first of all, I want to thank again our communications team and our educators and staff across the district for the support and making um the really wonderful delight
121vid video that really centers the voices of our staff preparing. Um this has really been a a remarkable start to the year um as we've been able to visit schools and really get to hear the voices of our educators and um our students and our staff as we launch the year. Um, we've had the privilege of visiting every school since the first day and to really begin and we are continuing to do so until we're able to visit every single classroom. What stands out the most is really the dedication of our staff. We truly believe that we have an incredibly uh hardworking and dedicated staff who really centered the needs of our students as we prepare for the school year. As we prepare for the school year and then we're able to receive them. Uh
122today uh Mary Joe got to enter a classroom where we were celebrating a student's birthday and to see some of the wonderful ways in which our teachers are already moving right into writing in each of their classrooms and quite impressed actually by the writing that we already saw so early in first grade. Um of course this year began with what I would say was a significant challenges um across the system. We within the first couple days we saw flood damage in several of our schools. our operations teams, d district leaders and school staff put in countless hours um to minimize the impact. I want to especially thank the US we go east high school staff and students for pivot pivoting to e-learning for two days. Um, this is not easy, but it really allowed for
123our staff to really uh engage in really the appropriate amount of remediation and uh making sure that our spaces were dry and clean in order to receive students back in the building. At Asiggo High School, um, it's been an even more pronounced challenge actually as we continue to face uh the remediation and the repairs related to our gym. um that was uh significantly impact and that gym will remain closed for a few weeks as that work is completed. Um we did see um we also had an unrelated um repair issue that's come up related to our East High School Performing Arts Center um that's going to be out of use for a period of time. We are working with our school district leadership team and um neighboring districts to make sure that students capacity and
124experience of performing arts is not impacted um and across the system. I want to say that the collaboration has been excellent as we start to think about solutions. On a positive note, uh this board made a decision um in early summer to support our decision to reach out to get repairs done for Trober Junior High School. And those units were found to be beyond repair and we were able to have some temporary system and thanks to decent weather, we were not too heavily impacted. And now those uh we have a working HVAC. We're able to replace the chillers there. Um these are not again these are not isolated challenges whether it's from our transportation challenges which we've heard this evening are significant or our building repairs. Many of our facilities um are have been really
125struggling due to due to being built during the same era um which many of our systems are aging um requiring significant repairs and replacements at the same time. years of deferred preventive maintenance driven by the financial constraints in this district are now showing up in very real ways. That's why tonight, as you heard, we were able to hear from our long-range facility plan in terms of phase two and um really to think about ways in which we can take the next approach that's sustainable and to ensure that we have not only safe but also functional and adaptable spaces that are really responsive to the needs of our students. This past year we in relation to this also as I mentioned um our new transportation director discovered in the mid year that we're using an antiquated
126DOS system for example if you remember those floppy discs uh those DOS systems are are what our essentially our transportation system was using and we have started the process of migrating for improved now granted we have not been able to finalize that change in that migration but that is one of the functions of why planning for the future today, we see that with our buildings, makes the same difference for our transportation and any of our systems. Um, through it all, what gives me confidence is the resilience of our staff, our students, and our families. Together, we have faced challenges head-on, and together we will continue to build bright futures. And one of those bright futures that we are celebrating today as a result of that work. I am honored to share that this district is
127celebrating 20 years of the anniversary of our dual language program. Yes, that is worthy of applause. This is a program as some of you may recall um our former board member who always Jared Pilgar always talked about the history. Uh this was a program that was almost removed from our district and uh thanks to the leadership of the board and I would say many dedicated staff members and community members, we centered the dual language program and we brought it back full swing. And so we're just getting started 20 years. But this dynamic program uh for our students becomes uh to become biliterate and multicultural in an increasingly globalized world is incredibly important. Please join the BPAC. Join us on the September 13th from 10 to 12:00 pm at the Prairie Point Pavilion. Uh for additional
128information about the event, please visit the multilonger learners page on our website and I couldn't be more proud to be in the district that has been able to celebrate this um really milestone of achievement and we're just getting started. So with that, there are so many things to celebrate. So, it is our tradition that we invite board members uh separate from their comments to to share some of the good news of things happening in the district and I welcome some of those uh reflections. Yeah. Churchill Obigon, a third grade student at Boulder Hill Elementary Schools was recognized as part of the National Math Stars 2025 cohort. Churchill is part of a select group chosen from thousands of nominations who receive a long-term package from this 10-year academic initiative that supports gifted young mathematicians. This is
129truly a life-changing experience. Congratulations, Churchill. And uh if I remember, this is worth about $100,000. >> Yes. So yeah, I mean really congratulations. >> Yeah. >> All right. Thank you. Um, Madison McNana, I do apologize if I said that incorrectly, a senior at OHS, has been selected to have her artwork on display as a part of the extra credit art educator and student exhibit exhibit exhibition, excuse me, 2025 in Chicago. This exhibition presented by Art Connected Ed and Art Space Chicago will feature an opening reception on Friday, September 5th and closing reception on Friday, September 26th. Congratulations, Madison. Uh, next, Dileia Akia, OEHS, class of 2025, received a silver medal from the 48th annual Afroacademic, Cultural, Technological, and Scientific Olympics awards ceremony hosted by the NAACP. Dileia was recognized in the Earth and Space Science
130category with her project, which of course we all do, soil monitoring, using Arduino technology to monitor soil moisture, pH, and CO2 levels with agricultural contaminants. Duh. Uh, congratulations, Julia. >> Yeah, great. >> Good job. >> All right. Prior to the first day of school, Hunt Club Elementary School held a ribbon cutting ceremony for the stage, the center for creative thinking. The stage is a space for new ideas, problem solving, collaboration, and living out Hunt Club school mission. We're excited to see how the Cougars utilize this room throughout this school year and beyond. Yay. >> Uh, Long Beach Elementary School has adopted a house system which will allow them to group students into different teams for a number of activities. The Lions recently held a house sorting ceremony where students spun a wheel to see which
131team they are now part of. We are eager to learn more about the teamwork and new connections to be formed as a result of these four houses. Jordan Wear and Kayla Haswell, freshman at OEHS, were busy at work the last several months. They decided they dedicated time to planning for and designing the beautiful new blacktop games at Long Beach Elementary School for their Girl Scout Silver Project. Thank you for your contributions to the students of our district, Jordan and Kayla. We are proud of you. Uh, as a reminder, both OHS and OEHS are participating in T-Mobile's Friday night 5G lights sweep stakes. Over the next several weeks, these schools will be looking for your help in posting to social media, particularly in Instagram and X using the hashtags FN5GL and # sweepstakes, as well as
132tagging the official T-Mobile and OS and or OEHS accounts. Check out both schools social media pages for more information. >> I think we won $5,000. >> We did. Yeah. And this time >> Yeah. >> And I noticed that a lot of times when we're doing kind of these things where all it takes is participation and we go tends to do a pretty good job, you know. >> So I think we landed somebody what like Sports Illustrated, >> you know, high school player of the week or whatever by like margin. Um so >> just do whatever the set. >> Um and we're moving on to uh board comments. Erica I don't have anything. >> Neither do I. >> Okay. >> No, I just wanted to thank the teams that were out dealing with the uh the
133storm damage on the schools. I know that was like a 24-hour roundthe-clock job and um and that everybody was working really hard to get things ready or as ready as could be for the students as quickly as possible. So, thank you to to all those folks. Uh granny's away. >> Okay. Um actually I I have a couple things but most of these we've already touched on. Um Dr. Kalgatti mentioned the school visits. Um I think we still owe old poster visit. >> Um so I it it was as you said it was great seeing all the kids come back at the beginning of the year especially the first couple days when there were kids that were really excited and kids that were just like this was the last place they wanted to be. But it
134was but it was fun nonetheless. So um that was good. I think I was I Dr. Kelgotti went to all of them. I think I was able to make it to 17 of the schools. Um also wanted to congratulate Plank and all the other schools that are celebrating our 20th anniversary as um as BPAC. Um it's quite a milestone and it's funny how well it's not funny how all of them are celebrating 20 years at the same time. Goes back to kind of the the growth in the area. Um, I was also able to get to both the Blue and Silver over at East and Panther Fest over at O uh for the family celebrations at at the beginning of the year. Um, great meeting a lot of people. Got to catch a couple of
135uh scrimmages for um women's for girls flag football for both teams. So, that's going to be pretty exciting to watch. I think I'm going to try to make it to the game on Wednesday at OE. And then finally, and the reason for the Gear It Forward shirt is because Geared Forward had their open house this past Saturday at their location on Stonehill Road. Um, again, um, after these students always amaze me at what they're able to do and I'm happy to report that it appears from what I can tell and what I was told anecdotally, uh, it's now just about half and half, ladies and gentlemen. So, we're kind of at 5050. It's it used to be kind of an allmale an allmale sport. Um but again, um they are so excited. They're they're gearing
136up for the new season. Um and I look forward to hearing more from them in the not too distant future. So that's it for me. >> Randy, do you have any comments? >> No comments. >> Okay. Um you know, I was just thinking about it with the the 20 years of dual language. I didn't have anything prepared. Um 20 years ago, there was maybe the few, >> you know, dual language programs in the entire state. I mean, it was like Woodstock, >> you know, it was very hard to find. Um, so was kind of like ahead of the game on that and and lo and behold, it's kind of Yeah, it's it's the gold standard in EL programming. Um, and this the state continues to, you know, push for that because it's increases academic achievement.
137So, that's that's the whole goal, right? So, I don't know. Yeah. It was uh yeah, just thinking back 20 years ago I didn't live here, but it was dang close at this point. Um 18 years ago. So um nobody else 8.1. We're going to move on to consent agenda. >> Right. >> Okay. Um can I have a motion to approve the consent agenda, please? >> Yes, you can. I make a motion to approve all items under con under consent including 8.1 minutes from the board of education meeting on August 11th 11th 2025 open and close sessions 8.2 to acknowledge the foyer requests received by the district 8.3 to approve field trips for overnight and or more than 200 miles. 8.4 for to acknowledge and accept a donation in the amount of $4,025 received by the
138district from an anonymous donor at become at becoming to support Ascend student equity conference. >> Any discussion? >> Second. >> What? >> Yep. Any discussion? Thank you, Erica. >> Um I had a question or maybe just a comment about the the donation. Um I don't I mean I appreciate any donation uh to our school district. Um especially to support a program like Ascend that I know has great impact. Um I wonder a little bit about accepting anonymous donations just in um terms of transparency. Um, and then I also just wonder about accepting my understanding that is that becoming is a religious organization that I think from my research aligns with several of our values, but I just wonder about um, you know, the separation of church and state in regard to the acceptance of that
139uh, donation. >> Um, I'm still going to vote yes for it, but I just wanted to lay that out as a consideration moving forward. And the one other thing is I think we could maybe I I don't know if the donation is from an individual or if it is from the church as a whole. >> It's from an individual once the individual is affiliated with that. I do think it's an important question that should go to policy and I would put that as a question that we should bring as a policy agenda and topic to explore further. I think these are the kinds of reasons why we have community um policy committees and then also bring to the board then for follow-up review and reflection on this. >> I think how we think about and
140I'm jumping I don't know if you wanted me to address it now but I but I would say that I think any of these opportunities are there are a number of ways in which we think about those donations and so definitely um the individual want to remain anonymous and so I I would say that the board has a right to think about how it wants to accept those donations. I think that's the perfect move actually to think about it through policy and I just want to express my appreciation for the anonymous donor out there uh because obviously we appreciate all all that any support but I think it is something to put on our policy agenda >> everybody else anybody else >> all right >> Miss C. >> Dr. Martin >> I >> Miss Robinson
141>> I >> Dr. Pock >> I >> Mr. Cerone >> I >> Miss Wmmouth >> I Dr. Mario >> I >> motion passes 70 moving on to 91 financial statements >> thank you Mr. President. So I just wanted to review very quickly the financial information is for the end of June. As you can see in the treasures report, we ended the month with 108 million and that actually doesn't take into account the audit adjustment will inevitably be done and when our audit is completed around October, but that's that's what is reflected in there. we get the 50% of our property taxes in June and we get the uh the other 50% in September. So what you see here is slightly overstated because some of that uh revenue that is shown in the fund balance will
142be reallocated to prior fiscal year. And then the next uh document is the district's portfolio. We are at the end of June, we're at $96.4 million, which is one of our high points. But then we will wait till September when we get the other 50% of our revenue and then we will start uh creating a really um detailed cash flow and then start investing that money and putting it to work and we will come back uh after that is done and share that with the board at the uh the October board meeting. the uh the budget memo shows that there's really nothing as far as revenue and expenses that is uh out of out of the ordinary is um is really in line with what we expect at that time. And the same thing with
143the budget report funds shows that revenue as well as expenses are in line with what we projected. And the one thing I want to point out is the CPIU. CPIU for June shows that um for the 12 month from June of 24 to June of 25 um the index rose by 22.7 uh%. Which you know is trending high but we know we we t we we follow that but we don't really pay too much attention to it. What it does is it impacts how much we spend for the things that we buy as a district, but this is not the the month that will have the uh significant impact on our revenue source from property taxes. And the last uh financial document is the activity fund summary from all our uh all our buildings. This
144is funds that are raised and spent in our individual buildings. But we as a district, we monitor that to make sure the expenditures are in line with board policy. But at the end of it, what I can say is revenue and expenditures for June were on track with what we expected. There were no anomaly in there. Thank you. >> Thank you. I have a question and I think I know the answer to this but when it comes to the activity funds um the beginning the individual schools raise the funds themselves. Is that what Okay. So there's not an allocation at the beginning of the year. Okay. >> Okay. >> But we're still responsible for making sure that the funds are spent in accordance to board >> policy. Okay. Um I have two questions regarding the
145budget memo. Sure. >> Excuse me. Um, first question is for the purchase services since they are significantly down, is there a timing difference and are we realizing permanent savings? >> We actually are realizing some savings. What we try to do is as we get towards the end of the year, we work with our cost managers and just communicate to them to make sure that uh expenditures have to be absolutely needed in order for them to incur. And if it's something that can be delayed for the next fiscal year, let's do that. So that's we that's a concertive effort on our part to limit expenditures that we deem as not being necessary for us to be able to function as a district. >> Thank you. And then the second question um still um regarding the budget
146memo, the other objects increased nearly by 500K. Can you provide a breakdown? >> Yeah, that is uh really uh related to mostly tuition payment out of district tuition payment that we pay while placed kids and those tend to to be paid at the end of the uh end of the fiscal year. So that is pretty typical of what we see at the end of the year. Now, when you say typical, that's just across the board like what we've seen as a benchmark for the past three years because when we say outplacement, I'm assuming that's our special ed kids, right? So, that 500k, we we've seen that for numerous years at this point. >> Yes, that's not out of the ordinary, but >> And do we have any opportunities at this point? >> Do we have
147what >> opportunities? >> I I don't know. >> What do you mean by opportunities? >> So, the increase of 500k, right? So, how can we the opportunity? How can we keep some of these kiddos into our district? >> Oh, >> so we don't have the expensure of 500k. the uh I'm I'm going to defer to the program uh person here, but based on my experience and knowledge with our placement of uh of students, we do everything we can to educate our kids in district. But there are certain services that some of our students, our special needs student may have that we just don't have the ability to be able to provide those services to them. Some of them require residential specialized services that we don't have the the ability to be able to do that.
148And so what we do we place them but it's done as as a last measure. I'm going to have uh Dr. Dubio jump in. can as you're grabbing the mic I think where I would start with is really that that is one of the to your point great question really fits within our strategic plan and our work that we identified this past year as a significant opportunity for us and so I know that Dr. Dubl has been working with her team and with uh district leaders across the system to start to think about how we assess your question in a more profound way and start to provide what do we need to do to get to a place where we can do that. Right. So correct >> Dr. Jubio, >> would you mind repeating the
149question? >> The question was if there's a pattern um over time we're getting a significant expense for students being outplaced, right? Why have we not necessarily moved then if that's the level of expense or you know why have we not moved to bring those services in district right and I'll add to whatever you have to say I have some additional comments I'll make >> yeah there's a wide spectrum of needs that we always try to meet um beyond the different programs that we have within several buildings when we cannot not fulfill or where we cannot meet a student's need within the program. We have our own therapeutic day school. And when that doesn't become an option, there's a lot of conversation several IEP meetings including the parents and guardians where in some circumstances out placement
150would be best. It's usually involving a lot of conversation and a lot of data to support that because of the services that are needed. Some of our outplacements offer a wide array from residential that we couldn't necessarily accommodate through public schooling. >> That's fair. I just wonder are we being proactive with these students? Right. So my gumption is we have an idea of the accommodations that they are needing when they are coming into our district, right? Whether it's an assessment or functional behavior, what have you. So what are we doing with that proactiveness? So we're not necessarily continuing to add to these expenditures. >> Do you want to add can I add one thing Dr. D? Just one thing. >> So I think those things are really studentled and given our current circumstances and then
151the the question about being proactive. It is we are proactive in terms of we need to really determine to your point how do we get ahead of from our tier one instructional supports all the way through to those identified very personalized individualized learning experiences where those students have very acute individualized needs. Which is why, for example, in the health care system, you're going to have everybody from your primary care or people who don't even go to primary care, they engage in healthy practices to students who really deserve our extreme attention and support. And we as a community make significant efforts to ensure that those students are supported. What Dr. to dubl has named and what we are doing this coming year is we're saying okay if we have programs like our therapeutic days program what
152does it look like to go from it's a fringe program to an all-in program right and when I say a fringe meaning that right now you heard in our long-range facility plan it's kind of it the facility itself does not have the expansive level of support that it's it hasn't been invested in the past which is why when I got here and the board approved We went to a long-range facility plant because we said we can't peacemeal this anymore. We have to make substantive investments in our physical plant. I would say the same can be true of every department we talk about whether it's transportation, our curriculum, our innovation work. Those all require meaningful investments. But you also can't just do it to the loudest voice because a lot of times it's the voices who
153aren't getting to the table to have those conversations. which is why it was really important for us and I really I'm so glad you raised this question because it really becomes a function of how do we do this in a way where we are really attending to the whole system and not just those people who today are able to come and make public comment tonight because there are a lot of people who may have comments about lots of different things they may not be able to come here today and it's our responsibility as a district to ensure that we're addressing those needs and I think your question is right on point which Why haven't has why haven't we why haven't we made those shifts? Well, there are a lot of reasons behind that, right? From
154a a job market issue to the kinds of things that are in front of us in terms of being able to organize when we heard the mass the CMSI audit. And that group came to us just over just a little over a year ago and said, "If there's anything that this district can do, you all need to plan. You need to organize and you need to plan." That was their primary message when I met with them in close session when they did the audit and they said to us, "You need to invest in planning. You need to take time, make time to plan your moves as a district because there's so many wonderful things in this district, but just a few people are getting the benefit of or some people are getting the benefit sometime.
155How do we get to all the time?" Which is a question I hear you raising. I'm sorry. Uh Evette, do you want to add that? Yeah, I will reiterate everything you say. I we always want to keep our students here. Um significant investment will have to be made in staffing facilities and resources to take private uh or outplacement out of the equation. Nevertheless, as far as proactive, one of the things that we do is we have a private day program administrator who works very closely with the number of private day facilities that we work with. And several of our students, we want them back. So, we have students that are transitioning back from private day and we have programs in place whether it's half day, whether it's checking in with teachers. So the goal is
156always to bring them back and we have several students who are also in um that um scenario. >> Dr. Dubel, can you speak about the investments we made this year to expand for example our stars program and what the impact of that has been for our students in the stars program whereas in prior times those investments were not there and so how does that make a difference in terms of this point and I think it's connected to what you're saying. Thank you. And I think we witnessed it this uh this evening when we saw the opening day video and you heard one of the principles. Um historically from what I understand is when a new stars program opened in the building there wasn't enough preparation andor support and there was a lot of preparation and
157support that started last school year that included visiting sites that included doing professional development for all the staff that was having the new stars program to checking in over the summer to ordering a wide array of sensory and enhancements supplies for all of our STARS classrooms thanks to the work of the occupational leads. Um to ensuring that we had proper training for a multitude of staff including our teacher assistants that historically have not had the opportunity to receive certain type of training like deescalation. So we're very proud of that work. Um lot of still work ahead but it's one of the celebrations that I think we can recognize. >> Okay. Um that's any other question. >> Okay, moving on to uh 10.1 action item. >> Approval of personnel report. Can I have a motion, please?
158>> I make a motion to approve personnel report as discussed and presented. Second. >> Any discussion? >> Okay. >> Dr. Martin, >> I. Miss Robinson >> I >> Mr. Cerrone >> I >> Dr. Mario >> I >> Miss C >> I >> Miss Wenmouth >> I >> Dr. Pock >> I >> Motion passes 70. >> Can I have a motion to adjurnn? Hi.