001i called to order the oswego community unit school district 308 board of education meeting can i have a roll call please mr bauman president mrs doyle here mrs croner present mr lightfoot present miss morgan here mrs moyer here mrs swanson peasants please rise for the pledge of allegiance to the flag of the united states of america and to the republic for which it stands one nation under god indivisible with liberty and justice for all please put your mask on now sorry i was eating dinner i swear i had a plate right here thank you so much for reminding me can does that mean i can leave no because you did put it on thank you thank you for correcting me i apologize item four our april pride winners teresa tonight the board of education acknowledges
002our pride recognition program winners for the month of april pride stands for proudly recognizing individuals demonstrating excellence and recognizes the efforts of teachers and staff who are engaged in exceptional work across the district this year teachers and employees were nominated for this award by the schools they work in due to coveted constraints winners are being chosen using the wheel of names prize wheel we would like to thank our generous program sponsors allied first bank chick-fil-a huntington learning center and culvers for their continued support of our program the following teachers were selected as our april teachers of the month from homestead sarah walenzik from plank carrie morin from prairie point andrea pratt and from the wheatlands jolene cayman join me in congratulating our teachers the following employees were selected as april employees of the month from
003oswego high school don cino and from trauber junior high school jason costa these winners received a certificate from the board of education a congratulatory letter from dr sparlin and a gift package from our sponsors congratulations to all of our district april pride winners [Music] item 5.1 public comment on behalf of the board of education i would like to thank the public for attending tonight's meeting we value the feedback we receive from our residents and encourage everyone to take an active interest in their public school system residents 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 public record and provide your feedback
004please note that comments are limited to 5 minutes per person and that no discussion of personal matters or responses to questions are permitted the board does not participate in discussion during public comment follow-up to your questions or concerns will be addressed by administration through the contact information provided on the comment card or email justin lewandowski enough of the unwarranted policies regarding our public schools remove the masks from our children the science and data do not support the notion that kids need to be masked our kids deserve better remove the mask mandate from public schools district 308 melissa yeager good afternoon i have a soon to be kindergartener in the fall and i'm very concerned with her wearing a mask seven to eight hours each day so much so i might be looking for alternatives to
005public school example home school or private what is the game plan to get these kids unmasked it's not healthy for their growing lungs and there have been many other reasons that these masks are hurting our children physically mentally socially emotionally we have three vaccines now and even according to the who guidelines it's not even safe or effective especially for children ages five and under my questions when will the school board recognize this and not make this a requirement can we at least let this be a decision for the individual families to make for themselves wayne harshberger uh good evening i'm wayne hershberger i have two kids in the district one's a senior and one's a freshman so as a senior parent it's been a very challenging past 18 months i voiced concerns on some things
006last fall i was reassured multiple times including by this board that my concerns were taken care of regarding athletic teams wearing masks in march i observed more violations i was assured those were taken care of guess what i found over the weekend even further violations so i'm going to ask a question what's it going to take to solve this problem when our coaching staff steps on this property as an employee they need to put their own personal beliefs of this pandemic to the side and they need to teach the kids to follow the rules it's that simple okay it's that simple what's it going to take to get this through their heads okay when student athletes and other people don't follow the rules you're gonna put all the seniors at risk of milestone events when
007is this district going to take this seriously and do something about it what disciplinary action is they're going to be taken against these student athletes that are violating things what's going to be done with the coaching staff i'm exasperated by it i've reached out multiple times and for the fourth time i've been told it's taken care of is it really taken care of the fourth time i don't believe you guys i don't believe anyone in this administration and i don't believe anyone in the buildings what are we going to do about it apparently it's okay to do nothing i got a senior email on friday for mr gray's when you read through that email it talks about what guidelines we're going to choose to follow if you're exposed you're not going to go to graduation
008but yet when we're on athletic buses are we going to enforce the six foot rule if you read the email it reads like we're picking and choosing the guidelines we're choosing to enforce i'm gonna ask you has the board attorney seen that email because it reads like complete insanity their guidelines are you going to heed all of them some of them are none of them why don't we make up our mind on a positive note so i want to end on a positive note tired of complaining all the time does anyone recognize what this is this is a mask designed by coach whipple for the boys cross country team okay why isn't this part of the uniform for every sports team he started it girls tennis coach follow it makes the team look unified okay
009i've been so impressed with what coach whipple did and i said i didn't want this public but i'm making it public been so impressed with coach whipple the past four years with the tone he's set with all the kids that my wife and i made the decision to start a coach whipple scholarship there are fees that this district imposes on our athletes and that cross-country team at ohs has a chance to get state next year i'm not letting these fees get in the way of one varsity athlete blocking that dream you don't get to go to state that often back in 1990 1988 i had the privilege to go to state in indiana and win a state championship you don't get that uh often i'm not gonna let our fees get in the way i'm
010proud of coach whible and that's why we did what we did are the rest of the coaches up to the same task because apparently they're not item 6.1 board member comments anybody have anything raise your hand mrs moyer first this is my big statement um no i did want to um you know take a minute as this is my last full full you know real real feel kind of board meeting um so you know i wanted to take a minute to say something and i thought that i would have something really profound to say i've thought i'm in the car and you know commuting ruminated um about things that you know you know profound statements um so i sat down i wanted to be well prepared sat down to begin writing it out and just
011got totally stuck you know and after staring at the screen for a while i really kind of came to the conclusion that i think i need more time away from the the position and the um experience to really reflect on what it's meant to me um so i don't have anything really profound to share right now but i do want to take this moment to thank some people um thank you to our teachers your job is a difficult one it's more difficult than i ever imagined and i think a lot of us not in the educational field think we know what it's like to be a teacher because we've experienced being taught we've had teachers we've been students and you know what i've realized um and my tech with my time on the board and
012also getting to observe virtually and what what a classroom looks like um that what we see is just the tip of the iceberg so um now more than ever i know all of you teachers out there need to not just be needed because we have needed you badly over the last year and a half but you also need to be appreciated and so please know that you have my heartfelt appreciation for all that you do for our students thank you to all of our staff our teaching assistants our administrative and secretarial staff our support staff nursing staff bus drivers custodians all of you who keep the district running kind of working hard toiling away in your own corner of the district world to make every day happen for students and teachers you are seen and
013appreciated thank you to our administrators building administrators our central office you are our chosen leaders and you are shouldering great responsibility and great great pressure especially the last again 18 months you do it all juggling the varied and often conflicting needs of our students parents staff community board members so thank you for doing a often thankless job thank you to our students you're why where i'm sitting here my interactions with students over the years has been so powerful keep showing up and keep making like keep showing up and make sure that we're listening to your voice is really the most important voice that we have and we need to be listening to you thank you to my friends who have offered words of encouragement and support even through really tough times and i'm sure moments
014of them thinking what is going on up there what is what's happening um those little messages have really kept me going when things felt difficult thank you to my fellow board members those who have served with these last four years those who have come before me and those who will be leading ahead of me it's a tough job but it's work worth doing and i appreciate really all of your time and your commitment to this very important and demanding volunteer opportunity that's really critical to all of our students and finally thank you to my family my son was in kindergarten when i was born in now he's going to be a big fifth grader and i had a toddler when i started four years ago which is pretty unbelievable now at kindergartener so they have
015endured and really been just fine many nights away from mom so really the big shout out has to go to my husband who is not watching tonight i may never really know you know what i've said unless i show him my notes here but he has picked up the slack whenever i have dropped it without most mostly without complaining but he um has been unbelievably supportive so i appreciate my time here on the board i appreciate everything that you all do and um it really has been an honor even through the very very challenging moments so that's it mrs morgan um you know a lot of times we've talked about parents and how hard it's been this year for parents and i just want to my comment is pretty brief but i want to highlight
016two parents who've done a terrific job um tammy and dallas coburn who sadly this past week lost their son in a car accident and he is part of the graduating class that my daughter is a part of 2017 he was turning in a car full of kids going into judson university and i think something happened and two of the kids were killed in the car accident that happened um this thursday there would be a visitation from six to nine at judson university and then there will be a memorial service on friday at 10 but i just want to point out that no matter what's happening with your kids just be grateful even if it's very hard it's better than what these two terrific parents are facing and they were absolutely wonderful it's their only child
017and i just wanted to say that here because that's hard thanks sure yeah so it's it's our last uh full meeting um and i will i will take this opportunity to say that i 10 years ago now decided to run for and won a seat on the school board at the time there were some very difficult issues being discussed within the district for those of you that don't remember there was a push to build a third high school i'm happy that i was part of of that group that found and saw that there was an alternative and as we all know we did two additions at the high schools for half the cost of a new total third high school and our the timeline of our being able to run these two buildings without exceeding
018capacity and needing that third high school has surpassed even my expectations so that was i'm not taking 100 credit because we're aboard of seven but that was something great that we did for the district that actually think it helped everyone opening another large high school in a district of this size tends to tear the district apart even further because you splinter affiliations but i think the bigger point i want to make is as as much as i was um dead set on what my thoughts were around that building and my reasons for running for school board it was more about the way it was being presented to the community when administrators at that time who were no longer in the district said if you don't approve this third high school your kid's going to be
019learning math in the hallway i wanted to make sure that this district doesn't ever use those tactics again no matter what it does and i will tell you that in my time on the board obviously not everybody agrees with me and i don't agree with everybody and that's perfectly fine i know that i have personally helped make this district better as each and every one of us has helped make the district a better place from hiring practices to starting salaries to curriculum improvements you name it we have covered the lot i learned more than i could ever imagine and i think i in the last term i was able to provide back to the district more than anyone would have imagined in terms of the history that i was able to bring forward to help
020the board move forward instead of repeating bad ideas of the past avoiding those pitfalls i love that i am an expert on school district finances and i love being able to share that information i know tony when you first got on the board we had some conversations even though we knew we didn't always agree on things that was wonderful that you reached out to me and said help me understand this because that's what i'm here to do is to help share that knowledge so that we can move forward together the district has continued to have various issues that we have to deal with unfortunately they're mostly focused around finances while there are some things happening that are going to help this district in the short term it will continue to be an issue for this
021district that is the funding of public education in this district and so i wish those that come after me the best of luck and godspeed to the district our students and our staff thank you i guess we're doing it i mean you don't have to no but it's the right thing to do um so unlike heather i didn't take the time to write anything profound and think it through um but thinking about it tonight i thought oh my gosh after eight years john dr sparlin and maureen i think well brent for except for youtube for a period of time um everyone's relatively new so there's been so many administrators that have come and gone um some uh disappointingly some not so disappointingly but it's been a great privilege working with you to dr sparlin the
022eight years we've we've been together through this and i'm glad you're still here i really am um you can learn a lot from the administrators the teachers the building administrators i encourage the incoming board members to take the time build those relationships it's wonderful to come in with the mindset of what you kind of want to do a fresh lens a french fresh lens is always going to be good but there are so much to learn there is so much uh even after eight years that that i'm still learning and that i'm that i learn from faith faith's been you know relatively new as an administrator but there's new things that she continues to teach me so i encourage the incoming board members to be open-minded and take that knowledge and run with it um
023the the teachers and the building administrators the custodial staff as heather said there are so many people who are such an important part to make this run we can show up a couple of times a month and talk about some of these bigger issues and make votes but without the 2000 staff members that run this institution day to day it really doesn't matter what we do up here so it's always wonderful walking into this building and even though the staff here working at night i don't know them by name but they're always welcoming and greeting and it and it's wonderful and i have to think that they're that way to every single person that walks through that door so that's an important factor um lori i thought that as board president going through a superintendent
024change a boundary redis restricted thing budget cuts and reductions was a lot to go through i give you a lot of credit for working through this district through this pandemic for what we've gone through it's not easy it's been tough on everybody but it has to be have has to have been really unbearable for you just thinking about it day in and day out so thank you for leading the board through that process it's not easy and to every board member that's sitting up here i know the time that this position takes from each and every one of you i know the time it takes away from your family from dinners the emails the phone calls it is all consuming sometimes and you really have to set some parameters for yourself so i know what
025each and every one of you have given up or sacrificed to be up here and i thank you for doing that as well that has to be has to be said and that would be my last bit of advice for the incoming board member is proceed with caution because this can be involving it can become a second full-time job and you really have to be careful of that so focus on your kids focus on your family and then the district so um just thank you for allowing me the time to to serve with you guys i appreciate it and wish everyone the best of luck moving forward item 6.2 board committee reports finance and facilities brent would you like to your last hurrah just think how many questions that trivia night you can answer about
026school finance i think i'll do my own version of uh pictionary or one of those games school finance school finance properly um so uh thank you ruth yeah we met last monday a week ago on the 19th [Music] we got a budget update so thank you very much as always for the work that the finance department and you christy do good numbers to look at these are happy things that we've been able to over the course of this budget year bring that gap down and narrow it and it's it's it's not it you know it it's unfortunately that we had to use budget cuts to ensure that we're on the correct path but i'm i'm happy i think ruth is happy as well that we're we're on a good path uh looking better than last
027year we spent most of the time on monday talking specifically about the elementary and secondary school emergency relief act funding the school district is going to get quite a bit of money i don't want to quote the wrong number 12 million 12 million um [Music] thank you 12.7 million it's spread out into different tranches um and some of that money has already come in and we've already realized that towards projects such as we know um chromebooks uh more of that money will come in it is recommended i i i don't think i got the chuckle out of the group that i expected when i pointed out that the state of illinois provided a 162-page powerpoint presentation telling districts how to spend the money i'm pretty sure we can figure this out on our own again
028that document is recommendations there are no requirements there's no strings attached other than obviously we are supposed to direct those to operations and education really can't be used for for bricks and mortar [Music] the we think that the kind of the next step if you will is obviously there are a number of priorities that the district has had that we've kind of had to put on hold due to budget constraints and so i i hope that the the district because i'm not going to be part of it um on a on a day-to-day basis but i think that the district will hopefully be very mindful of placing those dollars uh in the most impactful places possible um and and hopefully less of the one time and more of the things that can help us build
029upon building an educa a better education for all of the students in the district we talked about um i guess the the theme of the meeting was talking about well how is this money going to get allocated and and obviously there are a number of ways that that's going to happen the administration obviously is going to make recommendations the board itself is going to have ideas on how things should be allocated the finance committee meeting would like to meet in the fall at their next meeting because we're done for the summer pretty much we actually talked about possibly meeting over the summer we don't know if that's if that's workable or not but um and just letting the finance committee assist if there are deeper questions that the board wants dovan into regarding those spending
030and those needs so i think there is a an offer from the committee to help and also a desire from the committee to if nothing else at least understand what the goals are and what the thought process is ruth would you add anything to that nope i would agree that that was definitely a desire to be be part of the process and you know they want to help provide solutions if possible which is great that's what you want in a committee yeah very engaged which is a good thing teaching and learning well we had our um teaching and learning uh meeting on april 14th um we um we had a you know a small a relatively small group but it was a really really good group at echo what brent said and really really engaged
031i think it was a really it was just a really positive meeting maybe with that smaller group the exchange of ideas was able to happen a little bit more naturally so um we um went over the consolidated district plan for federal grants which doesn't sound super exciting but it was come on it was great actually i think was really helpful i think it provided a lot of really helpful context um for our committee members um around you know the different um grants that we have and the restrictions and um guidance around how we can spend certain dollars and how those that decision making kind of comes into play um so we spent actually a good amount of time uh and that and asking questions kind of back and forth um so much so that we
032didn't get to spend as much time as we would have liked to on the next agenda item which was um a really nice grid you have it in your um email it's linked in your email with the minutes um but the what was it called the changes from covid that we could possibly continue and it's a nice grid of just some different things of you know lessons learned um we were able to focus on a few of those areas um with parents you know in particular able to provide a lot of really good thoughts and feedback around you know around some of those areas but i think we had said this may be a good one though it's not really up to us um to put on the agenda uh maybe for our next teaching
033learning or an upcoming one so that we can delve into more of those ideas that faith had kind of put together in that grid tony what would you add i don't need to add much i think it was a really good meeting i think that preserving what is done right in covid is a good step on the district's part and i think faith put it together nicely but it was stuff that came from a lot of different departments and a lot of different people and i'm all for it i think i've seen a lot of things that could be saved and could be cost savings and could be training people more specifically for professional development and making sure that kids get services that maybe are more varied or there would be more minutes available for
034services and things because of some of these changes so all those things are great 6.3 superintendents report good evening board uh at our last uh meeting i shared the wonderful achievements of three of our oswegovi students jensen coonrat ethan ashcroft and gavin roman regarding their selection as being finalists in the 11th annual samsung solve for tomorrow competition last week they were interviewed by fox 32 and they did a wonderful job representing themselves oswego east and district 308 i had the opportunity to speak with each of them today on the vizwiz and it was a wonderful conversation again i know there are many people who are very proud of them but i felt like the uh they deserved to be mentioned once more i also wanted to share that last week i met with approximately 40
035high school students who have shown initial interest in applying for the student ambassadors to the board of education positions uh those students have until may 14th to submit those applications so very exciting to have that kind of turnout for this first round last week was national signing day for student athletes this is a day when student athletes commit to their verbal scholarships they've received from colleges and between our two high schools we had dozens of student athletes commit in a variety of sports so congratulations to the student athletes the coaches and their parents on all the hard work and that the kids will be able to continue their education and their sports and their collegiate at the collegiate level and congratulations to our high school students who competed in this year's southwest prairie conference literacy
036festival uh students submitted writing in the following categories poetry short fiction personal narrative personal essay critical essay dramatic script and descriptive sketch uh our students from both oswego high and oswego east uh combined for 50 51 of the awards that were issued at the festival this year so congratulations to our students and the sponsors on another great season so congratulations and that is my report for this evening i have a question dr sparlin do you think enough people are voting for the vizwiz project online every day you know what i wouldn't i wish i would have asked the students today because like i said i just i just had my conversation with him at three o'clock today and i did not ask that question but i appreciate you reminding him because everyone you can vote
037once a day until may 30th yes and that's i saw that even on a big banner downstairs so we should all remember to vote every day and the information for that is on our district website correct risa all right thank you very much item 7 approval of consent agenda i have a motion to approve please i make a motion to approve all items under consent including 7.1 minutes for the april 12 2021 board of education meeting open and closed session 7.2 to acknowledge the foia request received by the district and 7.3 to approve the illinois high school association membership renewal for the 2021-22 for both oswego east and oswego high school second mrs moyer aye mr lightfoot aye mrs croner aye mr powerman aye mrs swanson aye mrs dorial aye ms morgan aye motion passes
038seven zero information item 8.1 is information on information on financial statements does the board have any questions regarding items 8.1 item 9.1 bills for payment can i have a motion please i make a motion to authorize the payment of bills in the amount of three million two hundred and ninety six thousand two hundred and thirty five dollars and thirty cents as presented second mrs swanson aye mrs doyle aye ms morgan aye mrs croner aye mr bowman aye mrs moyer aye mr lightfoot aye motion passes 7-0 item 9.2 i make a motion to approve the following board policy section 8 community relations 8 colon 30. second mrs corner i'm mr lightfoot hi mrs moyer hi miss morgan hi mrs swanson aye mrs doyle aye mr bauman aye motion passes seven zero item 9.3 i make a
039motion to approve the destruction of the audio recordings of the closed session meetings from april 29th 2019 through october 21st 2019. second miss morgan aye mrs croner i'm mrs doyle aye mrs swanson aye mr bauman aye mr lightfoot aye mrs moyer aye motion passes seven zero item nine point four i make a motion to approve the release of the following closed session minutes which no longer require confidential treatment and will be made available for public inspection as discussed in closed session january 14th 2018 2018 2008 2008 sorry i apologize february 14 2011. is this right february february 28 2011 april 23rd 2012. mark march 18 2013 september 23rd 2013. january 23rd 2017 october october 28 2013 [Music] december 9 2013 february 10 april 14 2014 january 23rd 2017 october 23rd 2017 july 30th 2018 september
04024th 2018 august 19th 2019 september 23rd 2019 october 7th 2019 may 11th 2020 june 27 2020 september 28 2020 october 13th 2020 and october 26 of 2020. second mr lightfoot aye miss morgan aye mrs doyle aye mrs swanson ah mr bauman aye mrs moyer aye mrs croner aye motion passes 7-0 item 9.5 can i have a motion please i make a motion to approve the building administrator contract as presented second mrs swanson hi mrs doyle aye ms morgan aye mrs croner aye mr bowman aye mrs moyer aye mr lightfoot aye motion passes 7-0 item 9.6 i make a motion to approve the personnel report as presented second mrs croner aye mr lightfoot aye mrs moyer hi miss morgan right mrs swanson aye mrs doyle aye mr bauman aye motion passes seven zero item 10.1 can
041i have a motion to adjourn i make a motion to adjourn second second all in favor aye aye we're drunk