001Mr Cerrone here Mr Gatewood president Miss Johnson president Dr Maria president Mr ploger President Miss simultan president miss venmuth president please stand for the Pledge of Allegiance I pledge allegiance of America and to the Republic for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all 4.1 public comment okay thank you very much no public comments we will move on to 5.1 superintendent report thank you Dr Calgary we will have your superintendent report now good evening board good evening this evening I'd like to actually begin by inviting us to pause for a moment of silence we as you heard lost the student Elijah McDuff Craig McDuffie and he represented really truly the Oswego Journey starting here in our broker Learning Center all the way through um ending his journey here as
002a member of our Oswego High School Oswego East community and so I like to invite us to just take a minute and we're thinking of his family I had a chance to speak with his father today accept my condolences and we want to just send out thoughts of Courage and support and I know a number of things have been put in place to support both his family but also resources for the community during this time so I'll ask us to just take a moment of silence thank you during these times it's an opportunity for us to also reflect on all the important things that are in our lives and to be grateful and I know that this student would want that of us and we will do that for him and I also want to
003thank the crisis team for their leadership over the weekend in organizing the board's very and speaking with the many of the board members everybody's very appreciative for the rallying together and also for the leadership of the principal at OE during this time well today marks about 30 days and I have truly continued to be daily excited optimistic hopeful and also resolved in the priorities that brought me here to this board um board your your vision and the community's vision in coming together and thinking about what Oswego could what could happen in Oswego what does our future look like and it's really been um I guess you could say illustrating the names and the people I've been meeting right so I've this past couple weeks I've had my meet and greets um you have for those
004community members watching those are available in public notice on our website there's more information about that I welcome you all to reach out if there are opportunities that you think that I'd be have an opportunity to join to hear um the theme of this year is really community the message that I'm hearing as I meet people is community we need more Community we are Community but we can be a stronger Community by learning to listen to our each other and to really Bridge across our various divides and focus and support of children to that end I know that our staff have been working very hard to prepare for back to school it's been exciting to see the hard work that our administrators who work this summer we had our new Administration orientation last week this
005week we continue this with all of our admin who are returning and who have returned to the buildings who prepare for the year I got to tell you summer is always like preparing for the launch of a ship you always know that you gotta get everything ready just kind of like where the captain gets ready to launch their ship you don't want to forget a single Supply because you know once you get out to see there's no one going no going back and so I want to appreciate all our administrators right now who are working many countless hours to prepare their ships for the arrival of our most important resource which is our students today both of our high schools kicked off their one-on-one orientations proud day to be a a panther or a wolf
006and I want to congratulate our staff and those who gather together to prepare those today it's I think it's three days right it's three days of orientation so welcome freshmen if you're listening or or a new um students to your new spaces congratulations we believe in you and we know you can do it we are excited for your future students um as I mentioned we have Institute today also coming fast and quickly in the next couple weeks I know educators are out there traveling resting I hope you're making time for your last few days of summer and getting those rested because I know that soon enough our schools will be filled with students in our pre-k program all the way through our transitions program to those who are age 21. so I want to thank
007all the the range that's one of the awesome things about this district is we're able to really build that whole Bridge across multiple years and lay a foundation I'm looking forward to our discussion later on this evening around some of the board priorities that we've surfaced and really start to think about how we want to take some next steps there and with that I want to turn it over too thank you thank you tell Gotti 5.2 board member comments in [Music] oh you know I I I did attend one of the meet and greets um The Churchill Club clubhouse last week um just wanted to let the community know that those in attendance really appreciated it they enjoyed the event and the opportunities to be to be able to meet you and hear from you
008um there's going to be many other opportunities as you indicated and it's going to be communicated to the public it's already been communicated but I think we're getting some more robust Communications as well and uh please attend thank you it's a unique opportunity so to those in the community please attend I'll go um I want to make sure that the community is aware of start strong this weekend start strong is a program that's put together by the Kiwanis Club of Oswego along with the community cares group what we do is we want to make sure that every child every student is ready to go back to school so we'll be handing out school supplies at Old trauber this Saturday from I think it's 9 to 11. um I I'm going to be there um I
009know Jared's going to be there I know damn you're going to be there there may be other other people too Jen you're going to be there as well uh come join us but you know the important thing is again no child should be coming to school ill-prepared based on something we can't I'm trying to think of how to say it every child should be able to come to school prepared for class and economic status or anything like that should not stand in the way so that's happening on Saturday um please please be there if you're interested and please spread the word I definitely want to put an exclamation on on that an exclamation point you can also drop off supplies if you can't be there to pack backpacks you can also drop off supplies there
010I just wanted to also um probably more as a comment to myself than anything but to all the parents out there I know we were we are all anxious and um utilizing that patient's muscle that we all have right now as our staff and our admin are working behind the scenes around the clock to prepare for a new school year with new systems and new tools that will all make our life easier in the long run but certainly um it feels a little clunky right now so um just a little bit of patience I see a lot on social media about PowerSchool and that and transportation and all the things that we as parents worry about prior to school starting just know that that communication is coming very soon and it will all get to
011us in a timely manner and then I think the last thing just getting a lot of feedback from the community is that feeling of hope that a lot of people are feeling right now that Dr kilgotti has brought in and that our staff has really embraced and I look forward to our students starting off this year in a very POS with a very positive momentum so I'm very grateful for that um just real quick I had the opportunity Friday to um give give back I guess participate I don't I'm not sure the proper word here uh 71 reasons um and you know anything we can do to excuse me to um come together as a community help with um uh help with bringing um awareness to um to suicide and um and in addition to
012that problems that um you know arise for our youth and it was tremendous outpouring um I couldn't believe how many were there I walked in with with my wife to go bowling and she was like whoa you you were right there was gonna be people here I said yeah but this is even more than I thought and uh I want to give a shout out to uh um you know there were a lot of people I saw there I saw um police officers from um I know Oswego I believe I saw a couple fire uh firefighters from Oswego um and uh I I was bowling on the same Lane with our village president uh so to Mr Kaufman uh thank you I know he was a one of the donators for sponsors or what have
013you and so um great outpouring thanks to Parkside Lanes also um um thanks to the students it was it was tremendous to see how many students were there former and current and and them participating in that so thank you for that Jared um one thing I wanted to just add that I am Jen you reminded me was that really we want to the team has been hard at work at really lifting our new website and our student information systems and actually tomorrow um if you're listening you will have a chance to receive an email first about PowerSchool and then you'll receive an email with your access code and PowerSchool password and Dr Kincaid has been working very closely with Dr petsky to make sure that this launches you're going to get a number of information
014pieces if you don't receive anything so basically just a reminder two emails are coming tomorrow so if you don't get two emails for PowerSchool please reach out to your principal or any of the other tech support lines that are available I just wanted to share with the community that um Dr Calgary and our vice president Eugene Gatewood and I had an opportunity to spend some time with our village Representatives um um Dan DeSanto and Ryan Kaufman we sat down and we were we broke bread together and we just started to talk about our Visions for what we want to see happen in terms of our relationship and we want to build on that relationship we want to be very collaborative we want opportunities to sit on the different committees that are available so that our
015voice is represented you know we are one of the two largest taxing bodies in in our our communities and we just want to make sure that our community understands that we are working together to provide the best in both of our our our situations whether it's the district or the village so that was a very um good time and an opportunity for us to really start to talk to each other and open those lines of communications and then I just wanted to thank my SD 308 family and I and I do mean family for their outpouring of support and condolences to me as I experienced an unexpected loss of my brother and you know there were so many um condolences and cards and flowers and plants and I just wanted to say I feel your
016love and I feel your support and I thank you for just allowing me this time to grieve as I go through this process sometimes everything's okay and then the next minute I'm in a pool of Tears so I thank you all for your patience with me thank you next 6.1 discussion of the board not even start that discussion so for the purpose of our community and for this board I really want to start by situating this conversation this evening around the board priority so the board has had a tradition for many years of having hosting a board retreat in the summer and I think that's reflective of a healthy board attempting to really align itself and prepare itself for the year and this board was gracious enough to hold off on its Retreat to my
017appointment and so a week before the appointment or a week and a half before the board retreat on July 1 I was a advised that not only am I attending I will be assisting and leading it so I want to thank uh our dear cabinet colleagues who joined me that day Dr Kincaid Dr petsky and Dr dalquist Who assisted and really coordinating and helping structure this and we met with uh our vice president and board president in preparation for what the goals of what and I think it's important to note that this day was really focused on the priorities and during this Retreat we really went deep into what Envision 308 represents right it was a chance to learn and to hear each other um but I want to underscore something here for the community
018that the work of Envision 308 and where this board stands is really connected to the equity statements that the board agreed upon back in September of 27 2021. and the reason why I'm lifting this is because no strategy not a strategy if it doesn't have a Clear Vision as to where you're going is going to mean much right so where are we going and if you want to know what the board is interested in and I think that this board has made it very clear to me in my interview process we want to know where we're going those statements I would say represent the best of where this board wants to land and so as I enter and as I think about the strategies that are here it was important for me to understand what
019the boards instincts I guess I was that's the best way what are their what is the the spirit what is the energy what is the thinking around the current Envision 308 and where do we want to see because clearly to be honest with you if you ever tried to move a project you really can't do everything on that project at once you have to get to some priorities about where you're going to start what you're going to do first what are you going to do second how are you going to drill down how are you going to analyze it what are you going to do in getting to that goal and honestly that was really the purpose of that day spend some time starting to distill we didn't come to complete answers but we initiated
020that process and so one of the activities we did during the retreat was we engage in some reflection and we we posted all the strategies um on the wall and board members had an opportunity to essentially vote together about um in an informal way it was an informal vote about what would what surfaces to the top of the priority list um not as a exact science but rather as a way to support me as I came in to then also analyze where I would put some more focus in my investigation and in learning from what's Happening and from that work for board priorities um became kind of really the the top level we could say that I am proposing to the board to consider as we start to think about this year not that any
021other priorities um are less important but rather where do we start when I think about this exercise this activity of really learning about the system but also working through it and so in that end you can see here uh focus on there was real consensus amongst the board members around the priority of improving math and literacy and really thinking about what are those common expectations for instruction and what are those systems necessary to really ensure that their early intervention um is available for every child to be successful in this District next I would say that thinking about the way in which we're thinking about our post-secondary work around our curriculum in terms of Financial and digital literacy a high priority in our conversation in addition in addition to our voting and I would say really
022in speaking with board members is a focus on behavior and social emotional health of all our students and I would put a caveat under that our staff as well So Not only was that a dotted activity but that is a voice I've met with every single board member multiple times and in meeting with you this is always at the top of my climate and culture for students and for staff because before behind every student is a staff member last are Recruitment and Retention approach how are we thinking about recruitment how are we being Innovative how are we pursuing high quality and diverse staff how are we becoming the magnet for this community to retract of color and diverse staff I'm going to pause there and it's open if there are any you know this is
023really a conversation for discussion so how does this resonate as you're seeing these are there things that are anything that you think you'd like to add colleagues who are there have missed something please I'll just make a quick piece yeah you know I I appreciate the retention of staff and diverse and you know I I had you know Jen and you and I kind of exchanged this week and one of the things I appreciate what you said because one of the things that um it it had me go back as you know and look at evidence-based formula right and I don't think sometimes the the community realizes that if you take the evidence-based formula and look at the percentage of the school where the school districts are at funding Oswego is the lowest of every
024District it touches um it's even lower than than East Aurora which is the closest to us and so I wanted to say you know um I think that piece is connected but I don't think it's an impossible task in front of us where we we all took this job because we care and we want what's best but clarify I'm sorry clarify when you say lowest clarify what do you mean by that what's that at least funded for its needs right and that's the that's the caveat right I thank you for that because it's it does obviously we get way more resources than newer but we could also fit both of their districts probably in one of our schools if we needed to um I'm not saying we need to I'm just saying we could um
025but as far as need we are the lowest and so I want to say I appreciated that because you know it got me to say okay well I'm gonna look at this and and I all of us are here because we we believe we're up to the up to the task of taking that on but I I think there's those opportunities to make sure the community is aware of those things I have never sent somebody 120 plus page document and have them whip around data so fast in my life I was like whoa okay okay I was like I just needed him to help me understand some things and he is so fast um I just want to say one thing all of these things are spot on um I think a lot of the
026things that we we spoke about were Envision 308 was created prior to the pandemic we can't do everything we have we have a budget we have resources that are finite and we can't do everything and we need to get better about doing a few things those few key things really really well and embedding in it the other things that um as as capacity builds we can add to it yes what I want to share and something that sparked when um Jared and I were going back with the numbers and um uh the reports from isbe and so forth is that one of the things that the community has talked about with regard to transparency there's another there's like a complimentary part to that that comes with it which is education of why these things are
027important why we do the things we do and I think that we have the other thing that we talked about in our Retreat I know that a lot of the board members have shared with you is showing the community why we make the decisions we make sometimes they see the end result they don't see the journey that we get there and I look forward to that happening and the second thing is we talk a lot about how we are still today the fastest growing County in the country we grew at a at a phenomenal rate but what we didn't do and and it happens a lot when you have big organizations is we didn't scale well and what we have tasked Dr Calgary and his staff with his team is to break down and rebuild
028systems and processes and procedures so that that we're never built and so things have been kind of cobbled together but not formalized and memorialized so across all of those things also behind the scenes he is actually building the plane while the admin is flying it and so I think it's really important that this might seem really simple to narrow it down to four things but there's a whole there was six hours that went behind this of discussion and you've gotten that from community members from staff as you've met them so I think one of the most important things and one of the reasons I know that you were the right person to hire is because you talked about systems in your interviews a lot and realized that it's not people that fail it's systems that
029fail and so as we start to build those systems and processes and procedures we are all if things will become more transparent things will be communicated better because the systems are put in the place to make those things happen so I just wanted to make sure that this is what we need to do is to simplify so we can clarify and get really hone in on but there's also so much that this team is doing behind the scenes that people don't realize one thing you said I appreciate them of course we service multiple which county are you referring to Kendall yeah us being the largest employer in Canada and Kendall have a have as a moniker because with that comes a lot of responsibility and so therefore um as a board we're tasked with um
030organizational Effectiveness that is one of our key roles organizational Effectiveness and student learning and so we we want the moniker but we also want to have an organization that is effective and efficient and is taking care of the needs of all those that we impact and so we understand that the systems give us what there are how they are um structured is the result we get and if we don't like the result we get we're getting then we have to change the systems and I know that we we want strong people because only strong people can build strong systems and so we're we're looking forward to the work that we're all going to do together to bring those systems into play so that we are organizationally effective said something there that I really appreciate is
031really this idea of as a system we have a system newsflash we actually have we do lots of systems right the question now is really intent versus impact yeah right and so how are we thinking is the system and the intention we have for this system getting the impact we are seeking and I got to tell you I love starting a place where we we care because it's one thing when I go to these meet and greets if I were going to the meet and greets and there is one person or two people but so far they've been 15 20 25 and two-thirds plus of those are both people who are not just as you said in employers they're employers of the employees of the district but they're also parents they're taxpayers they're in our
032this is this is us there is no one else this is us right us we go but this is really our community and there's such a deep commitment and care that that's a I got people are surprised they're like wow you seem really upset because it's easier to start with motivation what people are motivated to come out on a Monday night or on a Wednesday night when I mean um was one person five kids I said this is like a vacation for you but for most people you know it's a sacrifice again for that person too right and so there's motivation so that's where my enthusiasm feels where's your motivation coming for why are you so enthusiastic this is because people care it's great to start there how do we how do we um make
033[Music] of many cities right and how do we make everyone feel like they there are they are a part you know because even though our name says Oswego we are much more than just Oswego thank you thank you for saying that and I I've been working with uh Theresa our communications director with board members and um Michelle early our parent and Community engagement um coordinator and really just expanding that vision and so again Reach Out given you access to make sure that you know Aurora are those of you in Montgomery the playing field please reach out and we are hosting multiple events in these different spaces and our and our goal is to really stretch across and if if what you see doesn't fit reach out and we'll make sure we find a way to
034fit you in right um so as you look I want to take a step go ahead I just Jen Jones had some great enough please getting strong at a few things yes you know those uh kind of those those things that build upon you know the rest of the that our building blocks um and then having that Snowball Effect to where once you get great at those you can do lots of other things and that's we're a district that doesn't have the financial means with the ebf um but yeah that's I I just really like that you said that and I just wanted to kind of um and say I like that Snowball Effect and yeah I'm also hoping I appreciate the focus on systems and I do think that these priorities not only reflect
035the board's discussions at our retreat but also Community discussions that we've had for a long time whether it be you know two three years ago or on the campaign Trail or whatever the case may be so I appreciate that and the focus on systems I think also allows you to think about what are the things that we're doing that we can stop doing yes um that aren't working because we can't just build a system on top of other systems you really have to think about um what's working what's not working and build it that way so a big part in this next slide speaks to what you just said Dr Mario um is really to also what requires further analysis I didn't agree and I want to say that really the both slides could actually
036fall under both categories right because even to understand um how to go deeper you also have to understand where you are where you are standing and what do we need to do next So to that end we've also identified ways in which we'd want to focus and so on this slide you can see these priorities here that emerged as areas that maybe they don't fall in the implementation Focus but they fall on the inquiry and better more analysis Focus right it doesn't mean that there isn't going to be continued effort we have people across the system who are working on these different layers and that's part of my work which is to gain better understanding of who's owning what part of the strategy who focusing who's got Let's uh there's uh smart goals or what
037we call Key performance indicators a metric a metric to know that today I'm starting here at the end of the day I'm going to be there so part of my entry work has been to talk to people say which part is your part where do you see yourself in this Vision do you see yourself in this vision and if not what what becomes a part of our work as we shift I know that the cabinet members of our I should say District leadership team are extremely committed to making sure that wherever we go next has some holistic and engagement from everybody in the community um can I interrupt you yeah I've been thinking a lot about this for the last couple weeks and I think it's very I think important to say a lot of
038people say can we just focus on the fact that we are this is education it's about education it's about math it's about literacy it is and there's no doubt that we are all here about education we are also a business we are we are the largest employer in Kendall County this is a business and so being able to understand that if if you and your cabinet can put together the business that functions really well it automatically allows the Educators to do their job and so we have to focus on both of those things we do have a dual purpose we have to run a business with 17 000 plus uh consumers of education and with 2500 employees and surrounding um other governing bodies that rely on us as well so um again to talk about
039what we needed in a leader but also in as we move forward with our priorities and our vision is that we have to run a business effectively so my entry so when we think about the role that I am playing and in my entry and partnership with the cabinet and with principals and staff and our Union leadership is to really start to think about what are the coherent practices what are the things we are doing right now how do we build on those how do we how do I support those how do I support alignment in this system to really promote our social emotional learning and our climate for learning as well as that sense of connection and belongingness right we all want to feel like we're a part of it so that's the first
040thing right so how do we build upon this strengthen it what's happening and the two questions I ask people is what is our intent and our impact right so that's a way to help the system start to think about how to improve itself second thing is really is really start to identify and engage and really what's driving our high quality curriculum to your point about instruction right so what does what's the high quality curriculum what's the use of our standards in supporting those the curriculum the second part of that is what does the what is the caliber what is happening with instruction how are people learning how do Educators have opportunities to learn about their own instruction how do principals learn about instruction how do we as District leadership learn about a structure and then
041assessment is naturally one of the ways right an assessment doesn't just have to be a paper a digital test um but assessment what are the ways in which we're assessing our instruction and really monitoring student outcomes and then really a big priority that the board has put before me is really to prioritize really understanding our finances and strengthening our financial profile and so for me that's about laying a strong foundation and understanding what those and part of that work is um really going to have to be in terms of really auditing the system and really looking at our current our past audits but also future audits of what's happening in our um so one of the works that the leadership team and I did is we really looked at okay so here are the priorities
042you've identified as you're entering the district and then here are the priorities that you have a board is identified and so is there intersect is there is there a connection across these and we use the the mod you know a Venn diagram and I want to thank Dr Waller and Faith dalquist for their assistance and really helping create this visual of this and so kind of there's some connection between them clearly really I think all of them are our priorities right and so ultimately it's really here that the boards our recommendation is that the board has identified these four key areas for this coming year that would for both implementation but also analysis team any no okay um one other part of the activity we did and what you're going to see on this next
043these next two slides are when we were looking through Envision 308 what we found was what we call almost supportive element strategies in Envision 308 and so when we thought about them we created kind of like a nesting effect of like here's the big goal and then what are the types of support priorities that really lead up to this bigger goal and so this is a draft um again this this whole thing is a draft to kind of really show our thinking um as some initial processing and so we saw that there were things that are nested within the priorities to help achieve these goals so for example maintain safe and nurturing learning environments absolute foundational to improving in math you can't create high quality outcomes in terms of student engagement and learning if you're
044not having a safe right so that the goal isn't just to create a nurturing and safe environment the goal is to improve literacy and math achievement how do we get there is you by using some of these other stuff for anybody who's in the system listening tonight um this is a reminder that every person who's got a part of this this Mission and the strategy has is important part to play can I just say I thank you for articulating how all of this is to help students achieve yes and so um it's all the same yes it's awesome I also appreciate because we type we did talk about this at The Retreat as well kind of the nest you describe it as nesting like these things that support the major priorities and as I look
045through it I can tell which makes sense that some of them are repeated and like the reduce you know there are some you know supportive priorities that support both you know Improvement in literacy and math as well as you know your SEL plan and so I think that is a good strategy to hit all the priorities in an Envision 308 and I'm interested as we move on to see how all those supportive priorities are enveloped in the processes you'll take to look at systems and so you see again with our district-wide plan to support behavior and social emotional health of all students similar structure and then so this is really where I would say this is a long-term articulation of where I would say that we are going to move towards right so how do
046we enact this right so this is just a not not just but this is a vision for where we would move towards over the next year and Beyond really which is that there's a and I would say that I want to start with on the right side so this visual that you see currently is kind of a traditional approach where you have board priorities that inform District Administrative goals plans which then informs School Improvement plan which then inform teacher teams right leading to increased social emotional health and academic achievement and we have within that are Envision 308 now I'm going to flip this a little bit on its head right and so part of our our our our approach is that really Workforce collaboration and my theory one of the things that the board was
047very interested when I joined this community was how do we do this in partnership with our unions and how do we do this in partnership with partnership with our Educators and so there's a term there's Workforce collaboration and so that is really engaging in a partnership with our Educators to rethink this the schematic and so if you were to Envision the arrows moving upwards right so our Educators help inform our district leadership plans our our school Improvement plans help inform our district plans and that will then in turn inform our board priorities now that is a two to three year plan where we are today is really in this term in this schematic of where we stand today and I'm working on establishing some partnership work so that we can bring in our education to
048partner with us in this in this leadership work can I just make a comment about this live yeah I like this slide and I'm thinking about it from a reporting standpoint and I think when we think about the priorities in the district and if we're being successful I think it all I feel funny sometimes I guess it's not a hierarchy it's just really a flow chart but but my point is is that when we're considering the district admin plans and the board priorities I think it's it'll be good for us to understand from a school perspective because the schools and the performance of the schools make up the district's goals and plans and divorce priorities so for us to be able to see not only how well the district is doing but how well are
049the are the schools doing individually because it gives us an the ability to start thinking about it from an equity perspective and you know even drill down to the of course when we say culture and climate from the teachers because if we take care of the teachers they take care of the students but I just think that it'll help us to have a greater understanding of how the district is doing globally if we also understand how each individual school so when the reporting comes back we can see both really we truly are the sum of all these different parts right and that really makes a difference in our in our everybody knows their role and their part well that actually dovetails with the last slide which is that what this idea that that we have
050to measure and that which is um how we can measure our progress and so these are tools that I'm using that we're using internally which is when we think about accountability who's really on who's overall responsible who's these needs assaulted on the work who needs to be informed in the work in working with board members really thinking about when we talked about spheres of influence right and so what's the sphere of influence of a Cabinet member versus a principal versus the impact the teacher has on our system and so these are just different tools to help us that I've identified in our work we started um I really like this because you know one of the things that jumps out in my mind is you know um Dr Kincaid you do a great job with
051um with all of our grants and and so forth and not maybe not all but a good chunk right right yeah and um you know I think about like consulted I think about spheres of influence and I think about like the fact that the federal government is trying to cut Title One funds 80 and what that would mean to our district and so suddenly that becomes reaching out to community members which you know I've done in the last couple weeks to make sure that they're touching face with those who are supposed to represent us on a federal level because that would be um a hit to say the least and granted it's just one example but I really like this because it really does involve all of us I mean you know great work that
052Dr Kincaid does but also the the strength that we need from our community members and also what we need from our federal representatives to help to help us those are all pieces and just that's one example but all pieces that are involved I like that to your meet Jared so this is in my project management world this week we have two things that really um solidify what we do a racy chart and um a project management schedule and those two things are very important to any project and I should say a governance chart as well but when we talk about Clarity and we talk about focusing on goals it's really hard if everybody attacks it together but nobody knows what Lane they belong in and that Clarity is really important and it also makes you
053say oh wait a second we haven't informed this person or we haven't informed this group or we haven't let this group know I think as we move forward as you're building these systems and putting in these um guard rails it is going to become very apparent where those holes are and a lot of times people kind of feel like accountability is a gotcha like oh you're not doing it and I always like to flip it and say no it's how we figure out where we need to sources and so I think this will be very helpful and one of the things that I struggled with with Envision 308 is not understanding where something belonged and how we were following it and so that is um obviously just very exciting to see a second which you
054both just said I just have a question about this site in particular at the bottom it says reports on progress on these goals will be shared in October January March and may I hear that as a proposal as a proposal from you know the superintendent to the board my question is and maybe this is still to be decided but when you say goals are we talking about the priorities and then are also at what level can we expect reporting are we going to have a report on the district admin goal the school Improvement plan you know like that is something I'm trying to imagine to help us better think about what to expect so two things I thank you for that question and there's been a routine right so the Strategic plan and I mentioned
055kind of joining incoherence as I enter joining in as part of the rhythm of what this district has had as practices and so and bringing attention and reflection about what are the intentions what are the impact right so those two things but I didn't want to immediately remove the Rhythm and the pattern of the learning that the system already has and so I'm going to ask Faith to speak a little bit to what that Rhythm and pattern has been to date and how we may would consult about making some of those adjustments what we have been doing with Envision 308 is having a almost a monthly report from different departments on what of those progress and then having a beginning of the year at September of what are the intricacies we're wanting to accomplish within
056for this school year and then the mid-year progress that we've sometimes done in person then sometimes we've given via report and then the end of the year piece as well I think the feeling with this is going to be more around those board and common priorities and show how the supportive priorities from Envision 308 feed into that creating measurable goals so you can say this is what we're going to do you know who is responsible accountable the whole racy piece and then looking at what are the detailed plans and being able to give quarterly or every other month reports on how far along our journey that we said we would be are we there'll be alignment as we're talking with our administrators this week about the priorities that we have here how they align to
057the school Improvement plans and our school Improvement plans Focus around literacy math behavioral and social emotional so we'll see how that funnel if you will have that graphic from those other pieces fit into that and we've still got some work to do to talk about the specifics we wanted to make sure we're on the same place together and then build those plans so more details coming as a note of encouragement and I'm only one board member but I like the idea of hearing reports specifically about the priorities we have this continuous conversation all year long about the for the four priorities we should be able to name them we should be able to name them to our community members it's hard to name everything in strategic or in Vision 308 because there's so much um
058so I know that there's still more discussion to be had about how to report out but that would be my personal encouragement so I have a question is this uh then are we moving towards let's say we have another board meeting a week from now uh adoption of these as the form of board priorities and that may be something to and I think that so I want to thank the board for your feedback and Reflections this was really a collaborative effort everybody involved we had executive leadership teams who part members of the executive leadership team who participated in the reflection work we have Dr zumke this evening Brian executive director for human resources also weighed in as we were thinking and planning for this evening's presentation and Dr Waller as well may I ask you
059a question before we move on you've I know you've only had two um but do you feel that what you've heard from the community in your meet and greets thus far reflect what you're seeing up here so uh for let's say 90 yes there are some things that are still I think if those are priorities that would emerge from students because I haven't met with a lot of students to be honest with you I've met some students so I think but in terms of from but for the majority of the priorities absolutely very much reflected feel free to let us know what those are and how we can incorporate them in the future yes so you know how you talked about nesting and that there were going to be some supportive priorities yes how they're
060going to be some supportive priorities and so every time I look at this I get overwhelmed because so is there a way to like maybe color code this slide if because if we're going to keep using it it needs to be reflective of what you just went through which is some of the things up there are supportive priorities and some are the priority itself so if we color coded it we would kind of know what was supportive and what was not because just looking at that that way that's not where what you what you are articulating I think that so I did just I just really good point I I agree this is overwhelming and but it's overwhelming for us imagine just a regular Community member checking in to figure out what we're working on
061a suggestion I do think there's maybe something we can do graphically to kind of look at that but also if we think if if we decide and you know look for proof I don't know if it's a vote on board priorities based on what we heard tonight maybe there's even a new graphic that emerges from that so we know what help like I've said this before help us tell the story to the community about what our priorities are if I say we have a strategic plan it's Envision 308 and they go here they don't know what's happening and so I think it's contingent upon us and the superintendent along with you all to help tell the story of the community of what our priorities are and like I said we should be able to name
062them you know math and literacy social emotional learning like that speech yeah an elevator speech correct I shared a um uh some past strategic plans formatting one page formatting with Dr Calgary that I think answers all of your questions and I know you're already working on yeah yeah we wanted to before we I think it was important to hear your feedback this evening um before we we raised something to crystallize because sometimes when it goes too far out then you're like wait where were we starting from right so it's a little bit of where we felt the conversation with the board ended with these priorities and then move to extension what those workflow or graphics Mary Jo is there anything else no no I uh I think everyone is pretty well articulated what what okay
063okay I have a motion to go into closed session okay I make um a motion to go into closed session um or I'm sorry I make a motion to move to closed session following action items 8.1 through 8.5 second Miss simultan aye Miss venmuth aye Mr pluger aye Dr Mario aye Miss Johnson aye Mr Saron aye Mr Gatewood aye okay 8.1 action item approval of New Oswego High School Marquis can I have a motion please make a motion to award the contract for the new Oswego High School Marquis to Aurora sign company and the amount of 53 577.58 second myth aye aye simultane I Mr Gatewood aye Ms Johnson aye Mr ploger aye motion passes 7-0 action item 8.2 approval of athletic training contract can I have a motion please make a motion to approve
064the athletic training contract with Athletico as presented second whoop whoop s sorry before we second pending attorney approval I miss I Mr cloaker aye Mr Cerrone aye Mr Gatewood aye Ms venmuth aye Miss Johnson aye motion passes 7-0 action item 8.3 approval of agreement with Community cares can have a motion please make a motion to approve the agreement with Community cares as presented second Mr Gatewood aye Ms Johnson aye Dr Mario aye Ms van Smith aye Mr ploger aye Ms simultan aye Mr Cerrone aye motion passes 7-0 action item 8.4 approval of Transportation tracking technology can I have a motion please make a motion to approve the upgraded transportation technology with synovia Solutions second and I have a question um well you shouldn't be surprised by this one I don't know if you'll have an
065answer yet um but it has to do with the ID cards yeah the RFID cards and um you know yeah yeah so I so after our conversation the other day Dominic did you introduce yourself Mike the Armin director of Transportation with District 308. hello after seeing everybody just recently I forgot I needed to do that so thank you for letting me be here tonight to and I want to thank you Mike for taking attention and before we answer this question just to really this community has had a lot of concern about the transportation and as I've entered to Congress had about some of the priorities for preparing for the school year we're excited about some of the changes we know that we're not going to over promise but we are committed to ensuring that students
066are arriving safely and I wanted to thank week of really really preparing this so there was a question would you clarify the question of Dominic just about well um this program you know after reimbursement it's it's negligible on the amount of money that it would cost incremental to what we are already paying for something much much less one of the things that I wasn't sure about was the cost of the RFID cards which is a potential use of this so that a student all you need is an RFID Card and then they're checked in on the bus and they're being able to be tracked right there's a manual way around if that's becomes a financial burden but I just wanted to find out what that um what that looked like financially what that card would
067be um yeah so like say it's a proximity card um I've only only spoken to the vendor that they recommended initially so I just got that information just today because we I think we spoke earlier last week but uh um and I know there's other vendors out there that I will look at but uh the pricing that they gave us for the number of cards we would need would be about 1.75 per card okay now there is also a a printing solution that they offer that so we can print our own cards right on the spot and depending on how many printers you get probably the number we would use for the number of buildings we'd have would probably be about about a thousand dollars a year per printer so so you're looking probably another
068almost eighty thousand per year probably something like that and would that be would there be a reimbursable yeah would it be at the 75 or would this also like take the place of a student ID and therefore you know yeah I was still looking into that I haven't got that far into that yet I know so even even if it it's still not a it was eighty thousand eighty thousand dollars we could reimbursed a decent amount yeah um still not to the public this is a vast Improvement so and again not over promising and the RFID cards even if we were to say not use those there is a manual solution and there is manual solution not not the not the most ideal though right correct all right thank you Dominic time timeline for rollout
069yes I think that was yeah what jumped yeah if you want to jump to down right there so Senator rollout um would be we would start actually equipment installation probably right around uh Labor Day right around that time we can start the installation of equipment and all our buses we would plan then to start doing kind of a soft roll out on the on the parent app the mobile app early at the beginning of October with the intent of rolling full doing a full rollout mid-october to November just in time hopefully for the cooler weather and then then for the ridership process or ridership program uh we'd be looking at like a soft rollout in December and then finally for the turn-by-turn solution uh probably a soft rollout for that by January so in the
070interim it would just correct the things I wanted to share the conversation that uh Dr Mario and Michael Dr Calgary and I had was there's two major parts to transportation and when we look at this from a big picture perspective one is the piece that we're talking about today and approving the other is routing and we have another year with the routing that we approved last year which is using an outside Source we still have to figure out how all this works together symbiotically and get better at that and so Mr diamont he obviously has a lot on his plate right now but I did ask for the board to see what everything looks like on like one sheet of paper and what all the costs are involved so um this is definitely a step
071in the right direction but we still have to solve for the fact that we're going to continue to have routing issues until we make some sort of investment in um routing software ourselves so I just want to make sure that everybody understands that I know it's something that Mrs simultane and I have been trying to um uh really nail down over the last couple years and it's still something that remains you know we have a year to go on this contract for this school year but something we're going to have to start talking about um again yeah so just just so we're maybe getting trying to help everybody understand so the contract that we we signed with first planning Solutions was not for routing software it was for actual a router Personnel correct right so
072so the solution to that to resolve that with is to solidify my staff and get my staff in a position where they can do the routing themselves the new employees that I've hired so and to get a and to hire a uh sped coordinator that does our sped routing so for special services routing so so that's it's not necessarily a uh a software issue as much as it is a personality no I know but that's what I'm that's I guess what I'm trying to get down to boil it down is there's all these parts and we we keep we continue to see them individually instead of the whole picture of what it takes to run the trans what are the resources that it takes to run the transportation department and so I think for the
073benefit of the new board members for the benefit of Where Mrs simultane and I worked with you during negotiations and talking about all the things that you need we need to see that in a more holistic presentation versus like the one-off asks and that's what we talked about the other day in our meeting so I wanted to share it with my colleagues I I appreciate that um and that is definitely a commitment of ours and I know that I'll invite um for I'll request that Mike and John be prepared to share in September an update on how transportation is launched for the school year I think it'll be important for us to be prepared to reflect on what are the procedures that were put in place what's the communication that was enacted and what is
074the workflow of the budget of what's Happening as we looked at so I know that it'll be it'll be timely because we will be right into the school year and in for those watching in the rest of the presentation you will see in there both the challenges that we observe during the Spring and the solutions and um do you want us as we come to I don't know if there are many more questions but I did want to leave give Mr Mike uh opportunity to say any more you'd like to say about anything that you noticed with your presentation tonight um I I guess first off I want to say that you know I hope you guys understand how bested I actually am in the in this process because not only am I director of
075Transportation but I'm also the parent of four SD 308 students so who ride the bus so so it is in my best interest uh because I have a boss at home who wants our kids to get to school on time in a safe manner so it's it is in our best interest my best interest both personally and professionally to succeed in here so um you know is Dr Calgary and I were talking and we getting to know each other a little bit and but it came down you know it came very clear that we needed to take a deeper dive a more more deep look into um the concerns of the community and to also better understand those root causes of what what what the issues are you know and sometimes it's easy to hear
076the you know the noise but to actually understand what what what is underneath that's really causing the problem so so um I don't know if you you want me to go through the whole thing just this particular slide will be important to share as we think about the year yeah so this will be the most important so yeah so looking at you know these are some of the issues that we we identified so Staffing shortage um you know that was you know people were tired of hearing us say that I get I get several emails or phone calls I got several emails phone calls last year saying there's no such thing as Staffing shortage anymore there's plenty of drivers well just uh just as I was fiddling through my uh my news reel here before
077I came up here I actually came across one that says 8 000 Chicago public school students won't have bus service on the first day of school due to being short of 1 300 drivers can I add on to that real quick I don't even interrupt you but yeah you know as as the son of a truck driver right who uh one of the things that I've heard plenty of times right and and uh you know brag a little bit there's sometimes you might see a truck with my last name on it right that was my father's company right and you know you can make good money as a truck driver and one of the things that I've heard in the community is well just tell the truck drivers to come and part-time and help and
078I you know my dad would love to have made what what some some not saying all but what some truck drivers make and and to think that they're going to come off these routes that they have I mean my dad did long hauls it's just not I don't know how to explain this that the way the market is set up for the you know the labor market that's not going to be a feasible solution yeah I'm trying to be diplomatic but I wanted to add on to that yeah no and I appreciate that and as somebody who's been in the transportation both Trucking industry and busing um you know there it's a different different ball game I mean it's I mean hauling 40 you know 80 000 pounds of freight that doesn't talk back to
079you that doesn't give you any kind of grief yeah it's a very different game than than driving a bus with you know trying to drive UH 60 kids that are loud noisy and screaming in your ear so but uh but thank you for your point there so getting back on point here uh so our response was that to that the Staffing shortage um we really worked hard last year for the the contract negotiations with and getting the new CBA with increased wages and and a very healthy what I consider a very healthy uh attendance bonus so that was a good success there uh Professional Services Services shortage so I don't know for those that weren't aware the pre-covered first student and septran are providers and with the Professional Services we're between the two we're somewhere
080around probably 60 to 70 buses that they were providing a year last year they provided between the two of them we had less than 30. routes that they covered for us so we were able to get new contracts with new providers or one new provider New Durham school service and then septran but this time we implemented route minimums in our contracts with them so they're they have to provide us 25 routes each at a minimum and that's in contractor there will be penalties the other issue that we really struggled with especially early on was you know getting our bus notification getting late bus notifications out to families in a timely manner we did work really hard with Teresa and her team and Communications to try to become more efficient and try to use the the
081platform that we had to the best of its ability and I I did we did see Improvement but there was still room that we could improve there one of the other things I kept hearing from parents especially parents of junior high and high school parents it was that their students aren't receiving the notifications of the buses being late the platform that we're on or the platform that we were on blackboard was only sinning for the most part messages to parents and so if the parents weren't home then they had to reach out to their students and and vice versa if the student was home and the bus hadn't shown up well the student that was reaching out to the parent trying to find Hayes did you get a bus message or not so what we
082did then we wanted to look into an application a mobile app that will go beyond the parents that will can include the students if the students have mobile devices one of the things challenges we also felt like we were have experienced especially when you're short staffed is you know supporting your drivers the drivers that are working hard working more hours than they're used to working more hours than they want to work a lot of times and then keeping them safe while they're out there working those hours and working hard so one of the things we believe would be a great addition to supporting them and and making a tough job a little less tough is a turn-by-turn navigation system that would be supported by the GPS platform also and then the last piece that we
083want to do would be is is fiscally responsible and try it as best as we can to optimize our loads in our buses we don't want we don't want to bus with only only half full and we don't want to bust with 20 kids more than its capacity we want we want to be in that sweet spot so which is you know Comfort safety and then using our equipment to the best of its ability for what it's made for so um so those things that we looked at you know looking at those criteria we were looking for a bus tracking or an ETA bus app for parents and students with the ability to integrate multiple GPS providers I say that because our contractors and on our different GPS platform than what we are so we
084wanted to be able to integrate their GPS systems into ours for that so that everybody can be seen we also wanted to have that ability to in addition to our mass communication platform that the district has we wanted to be able to additionally send out push notifications out to the app if there's buses running late or we can send individual messages per bus out and then that student ridership piece to maximize that load that load optimization the turn by turn and then also a time and attendance piece that most of those systems that we looked at have so that would give us an opportunity to centralize that on into that platform and we'd be able to remove the time and attendance that we currently use and then the project implementation timeline was another key piece
085so so that was key piece so so this evening the recommendation to yep so the recommendation is that we would go with synovia Solutions and there here comes the bus parent app we currently have synovia is our provider um so we would actually um just it would be kind of an equipment refresh it would like I said it integrates the parent the contractor's GPS it gives us the student ridership the turn by turn the time and attendance we actually have contracts with them for our current Service as I said they would actually we would give us credit for our contracts and we would start fresh with a new contract and then the implementation is going to be you know long term you know 10 to 12 weeks yeah yeah we already made the motion this
086time open aye Dr Mario aye Ms Johnson aye Mr Gatewood aye Mr Cerrone aye Ms venmuth aye Mr cloger aye motion passes 7-0 thank you Mike thank you thank you thank you action item 8.5 approval of resolution providing the issue of General obligation refunding School bonds can I have a motion please make a motion to approve the resolution providing for the issue of not to exceed seven million dollars General obligation refunding School bonds of the school district for the purpose of refunding certain outstanding bonds of said School District providing for the levy of a direct annual tax sufficient to pay the principal and interest on said bonds authorizing the sale of said bonds to the purchasers thereof and authorizing the execution of certain escrow agreements in connection therewith as presented second I have a question
087yeah um have any assumptions changed Dr petsky do you want to introduce yes is our PMA consultant and Bob Lewis will uh he's been working very hard on putting together the bond sale for us I'll let him answer where we were and where we are yeah thank you pardon me thank you for having me here tonight uh so the month of July you know the economic news was uh favorable mostly for the bond market CPI PC deflator both coming in at or below expectations those are two different inflation reports which has been the Big Driver of market conditions the last 18 months so interest rates are roughly where they were at the last time you saw this presentation um we were on the more conservative side s main savings last time so our estimate as
088of today refreshing the rates is probably about 80 000 higher on a present value basis so our current estimates right around 465 000 I think the memo had 000 so um just from a pure dollar instead of a present value right this is what are those numbers now uh and yeah in the past 580 000 over the life of the body versus 500. previously it was 437. okay um and is this getting executed tomorrow it can be executed as early as tomorrow the subject to board approval so that's oh I'm sorry if I wasn't talking to Mike um that's all I had I have a question so what interest rate are we looking at now as opposed to what we were last time yeah the estimated interest rate is 3.44 it's a true interest cost
089it's a composite rate I think the when I emailed you last time it was 3.7 so okay I know and that was just Market it was Market but you know is there's about seven basis points that was Market change in your favor and the other portion was just a little bit of conservative estimate okay okay I appreciate you baking that in the conservatives yeah that's all I had what I Dr Maria aye Miss Johnson aye Mr Cerrone aye Ms simultan aye Mr ploger aye Mr s hi motion passes 7-0 action item 8.6 approval of District administrator 8.1 going into closed yeah can I have motion to go into closed session make a motion to enter closed session under statutes 5 ilcs 120 T 2 C1 the appointment employment compensation discipline performance or dismissal of certain
090employees and individuals bye bye LCS 120-2 C2 Collective negotiating matters between the public body and its employees or their representatives or deliberations concerning salary schedules for one or more classes of employees