001I call this regular board of education meeting to order on Tuesday, May 26, 2026 at 6:00 p.m. May we all stand for the pledge of allegiance. I pledge 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. >> Roll call. >> Jason >> here. >> Stacy Salt >> here. >> Darling, Katherine Potter's absent. Julie Jetty >> here. >> Bridget Sandlin >> here. >> Mindy Hartman >> here. Okay, we'll move on to the community input and we're delighted tonight to have um some examples from our speech ter our recent speech tournament and um I'll turn it over to Mrs. Lucas. Thank you everyone for having us tonight. So early May we held our annual speech tournament. We
002had 78 participants this year ranging from fourth grade to 8th grade. I do want to give a very special thanks to all the volunteers that came. We had high school students from Kerry Grove. We had board members, staff members, and it's not possible to do this event without all the volunteers. So, thank you so much. I also want to congratulate all the students that participated because it takes a lot of encouragement and um strength to stand up in front of a strange strangers to perform a speech. So, we have the pleasure tonight of having two different groups of students to perform. So, gentlemen, you're up first. for the request. Okay. Um now, uh comments from um board members. Mrs. Darling, uh I have nothing except everyone have a nice uh school year's almost over. Have
003a safe summer and kids on scooters. Please be careful. Another one of you almost hit my car earlier today. Um Mrs. Hartman. >> I don't have anything in particular tonight. I'm just hoping everyone has a strong finish of the year and has a wonderful summer. >> Mr. Jansik, >> just a couple things. Want to thank the speech kids who uh are outside. They may still be able to hear us. Um that was phenomenal. Always a great way to start a meeting. I want to give a special shout out to our uh junior high kids who participated in the 24-hour run this past weekend. Uh it was cold on Thursday night and those kids I got here about 10:00 just to check in and they were their spirits were high. They were not feeling the the
004the coldness. It was awesome and I think it was over a hundred kids I believe um did that and special shout out to Miss Natrop and then the retiring Mrs. Beis uh for their coordination and all the parents that helped out with that. That was a spectacular moment and just creating the moments for those kids that they're going to remember for a lifetime. Also, a shout out to the retirees here as they wrap up the school year. We've got a lot of them across the district. Thank you so much for dedicating uh your time and efforts to supporting the students of Kerry 26. We wish you the best in the next chapter. And congratulations to our eighth grade graduates coming up here Monday night, weather permitting. Hopefully the weather's looking good, knock on wood, uh
005back here in the field. So, that is all. Thank you, >> Mrs. Sandlin. Um just another great year. Thank you everyone. Have a great summer and um thanks to the speech tournament presentations. Those were awesome and funny and clever. So, thank you. >> Mrs. Salt. >> Um I'll also say a shout out to the 24-hour run because um I love seeing it every year. And at 5:45 that morning, I did not want to go for my own run, but I said they're doing it, so I'm going to do it. and I ran by and saw them all bundled up and cold freezing in the morning and they're they were super inspirational clearly cuz I made it out too. Um and also the speech tournament's my favorite thing every year. I love it. My daughter did
006it. Julie got to judge. I love everyone who volunteers. It's so awesome. Well done. And um thanks to them because May is always my favorite when they come in. >> Um I have a few things. The speech tournament was excellent. Um, our administrative team does a really nice job of putting it on. We It's fun to be with the high school kids and to see our own students take that leap and stand in front of judges. And um, I'd like to, you know, give a shout out to uh, Matt Art Rosenbomb. He has he has several kids, several groups of students that participate in the um, speech tournament and he's there with donuts for them after their speech. And also he his uh eighth grade scholastic bowl uh junior high scholastic bowl did took first
007place this year. So shout shout out. That's such a great club for the kids to be on. Um I'd like to you know wish our retirees the best of health and enjoyment of in their retirement. And I'd like to single out um at Deer Path Mrs. Marshall. Um, not only is she a very good educator, but um, she, my son had her on 911 and that was just a horrible day for our educators and everybody and she just kept every that class just normal and that, you know, that took a lot. Um, she's also a very very good teacher and um, she has in her board a picture of every class from all her years here and experience. It's It's pretty neat. Um, and I'd also like to thank the parents that were chaperones and
008and helped out at that uh run the other night. Uh, my neighbor had the 3:30 3:30 to 7:30 a.m., you know, uh, uh, time. So, God love you parents for getting up in the middle of the night to to help, you know, with the kids' experience. And uh I wish all of our staff a nice summer off. Thank you. So um next we'll go to the superintendent update. Dr. Thomas, >> thank you. So the uh the comments of um thankfulness for our staff will continue. I want to thank all of our staff for their hard work this year. A special shout out to all the staff and there's a number of them in several buildings who are packing absolutely everything because of the upcoming construction which is not easy. Um, so I appreciate that. Also,
009um, you know, about two months ago, we recognized a number of staff that were, uh, recognized by ISBY, uh, for their work. And this past month, we had several staff members recognized, uh, by the regional office of education from district 26. So, no surprise, we have amazing educators here. And I do want to specifically uh, say Don Wigington was actually named the teacher of the year for Mckenry County. Um, congratulations to her. Don is a transitional kindergarten teacher at Oaknull. Uh, the ROE has a number of categories that they have uh, represented and Dawn won for everybody overall in the county. So amazing. We had three other teachers who were also nominated. They were Jamie Bailey as a class. She's a classroom teacher at Brierggate. Julia Cristo from Deer Path is also a teacher. She
010was nominated in the early career educator category. and then Michelle Peltton who is a long-term teacher here at the junior high uh a math teacher. So all four of these educators are excellent teachers who make a positive impact on their students and we want to recognize them. Um just a few dates uh to let people know June 1st uh as was mentioned is the eighth grade graduation at 6 p.m. right out here on the football field. And right now the weather is looking good so we're keeping our fingers crossed. And then June 2nd, next Tuesday is our last day of school. It's a half day morning only. students will be released at 11:00 at the junior high and 12:00 at the elementaryaries. And then in June, we have our committee of the whole meeting on
011the 22nd and the board meeting on the 29th. Um, and I also want to wish all of our students, their families, and our staff a happy and safe summer break. >> Um, teaching and learning update. Miss Reer, >> I'm going to follow suit with the thank yous. Uh first of all, Melissa did a wonderful job listing everybody uh to thank regarding the speech tournament and she's absolutely correct with all of them. I'd also want to thank her because she is the person who helps organize and orchestrate everything from the beginning. Um in addition to that, I want to thank Deb. Every little piece of paper or award or uh prize, all of that goes through Deb. She organizes it. She is very meticulous with it. Probably has a lot of paper cuts from it. Um
012so I just want to make sure that we thank both Deb and Melissa as well in addition to everybody else, volunteers, staff, parents, students. Um I also want to thank our parents. We wrapped up our book study. Um our first one with the anxious generation. It did dwindle over time and I'm going to attribute that to the weather and all the sports and all the things that people do in the springtime. Um, but it was wonderful because even if they couldn't make it, they would reach out and say, "Can you please send me the slides so that way I could have the questions?" So, I was grateful for that. So, thank you to the parents that participated in our book study. Um, I also want to thank our teachers and our students. Sometimes, you know,
013one of the questions that I've heard Julie specifically you ask of how how do we know things are working? What's what's the the result the return on investment so to speak? Um, using your vocabulary. Um, one of those points is data. And so we're looking forward to sharing the data with you in the coming up months. Um, but as we start looking at preliminary AR data that was released, we are shifting again in the right direction. The direction that we would want to see us continue to shift, we are still continuing in that direction. I can't give you specifics because, you know, it's preliminary top secret, but once it's officially released, then we'll go ahead and do that. Well, Dr. Burke Meer, we'll go ahead and do that in November. But I'm telling you right
014now, it's looking good. We also reached I'm going to give you a little sneak peek. We reached a new milestone with access testing. You'll have to stay tuned to next month to get the details from uh Miss Kramer, but we have reached another new accomplishment here in Kerry 26 as it relates to access. Um and then last of all, our 2627 professional development is underway already and they are launching um institute day similar to what we do in January where we uh collect input from our staff to host and facilitate PDS. They're going to look to do that in August with our staff. And so I really want to say thank you to our teaching and learning department that have been um a big asset in the transition between myself and Dr. Burkemeer. And I
015also want to say special thank you to Dr. Bergmeer cuz she has hit the ground running and she's spearheading all of that with the professional development for the 2627th school year. So transition is smooth as can be I will say and in the teaching learning department. So thank you to everybody. Um and I'm wishing everybody a safe and warm and fun-filled summer. >> Thank you. Um, last Monday we met for the committee of the whole and we went over the bills, the treasures report as standard and we discussed school student lunch prices. Um, we got a uh update on the summer construction and I think if you anybody's driven by Aldi, it's starting to shape up there. the the uh footings and stuff in the driveway looked like. And we um talked about a district
016salary study that we'll be voting on tonight. Um we talked about uh the joint conference downtown Chicago in November and we did um a press review and several of those will be in the consent agenda and one will be in for discussion and that was that was it. So, and that takes us to the consent agenda. Um, included are those items that are routine in nature. Should any board member wish to remove an item from the consent agenda, the item will be discussed at the end of section 11? Does anybody wish to remove one of the items? I would like to um take out 10.11 administrative and non-union pay increases for the 2026 2027 school year and move that to the end of section 11. Any other items that Okay. So we will uh the
017consent agenda is 10.1 close session minutes from April 20th close session meeting minutes 10.2 2 open and close session minutes from April 27th, 2026 regular board of education meeting 10.3 monthly bills and payroll for approval are in the amount of 2,294,469.99 10.4 4, the treasur's report. 10.5, resignation, dismissal, retirement. 10.6, Employment. 10.7 Destruction of closed meeting audio recordings. 10.8 Disposal of Assets, which were none. 10.9 Regional Safe School Resolution. 10.10 10 student lunch prices for 2026 to 2027 10.12 press plus issue and 121 policy updates and exhibits recommended to move to policy recommended motion. May I have a motion to approve the following 10.1 10.2 10.3 10.4 10.5 10.6 6 10.7 10.8 10.9 10.10 and 10.12 as presented. >> So moved. >> Second. >> Any discussion? Roll call, please. >> Stacy Salt, >> yes. >>
018Darling, >> yes. >> Julie Jetty, >> yes. >> Bridget Sandlin, >> yes. >> Mindy Hartman, >> yes. >> Jason Jansik, >> yes. So the motion is approved. Moving on to those items for discussion and board approval. Our first one is approval of the memorandum of agreement between Kerry District 26 and CESPA IEA- NEA. Dr. Thomas, >> thank you. So in November of 2025, the Illinois Labor Relations Board certified lunchroom supervisors to join the SESPA union. Um, in February, the union requested to negotiate to add them to the union or add them to the contract. And then on April 24th, Mr. Shepard and I met with CEUS representatives and the IEA representative to bargain and add this group to the uh contract. It was a successful negotiation. The memo of agreement is in your packet. Um
019it adds those staff with to the compensation groups with annual increases aligned to the other SESSPA employees and uh the regular work hours of 10 hours per week which is 2 hours a day for 5 days a week. So we are recommending approval of the uh update the memo of agreement to the sessa contract. Any questions? May I have a motion to approve the memorandum of agreement between Kerry District 26 and CESPA IEA- NEA as presented? >> So moved. >> Second. >> Discussion. Roll call. >> Darling, >> yes. >> Julie Jetty, >> yes. >> Bridget Sandlin, >> yes. >> Mindy Hartman, >> yes. >> Jason Jansik, >> yes. >> Stacy Salt, >> yes. >> Motion carries. Okay. approval of the district salary study. Um I'll turn this over to Dr. Thomas, Mrs. Colonis. Thank you.
020So this is uh we're bringing back uh the information about the salary study. The salary study study is done by Gallagher. Looks at uh comp uh compensation of the entire district, every unit, every group uh whether they're union or non-union. Uh takes about five months to complete. The cost is $29,225 as discussed last week and the board had several questions uh and Miss Kenyon has reached out to Gallagher and has answers to those. So I'll turn it over to you. Thank you. Okay. So first question was will the Gallagher team give a final presentation to the board of their findings? They confirmed that they will give us a final presentation with the findings when it's complete. Um second question, how long is the salary survey data considered relevant and when does it lose its value?
021Um the salary survey um will be aged based on market data. Um so when we are presented with the data, it will it's aged so that when we need to use it in so for example, if they were giving us the information now, it would be um aged for like January so that we could actually have the data ready for the next school year. um the data the data is u good for three years um and it is flexible as um for us to have um uh information. So if we have someone who um a new position that we need to look at if the the um the salary is correct we can go to them for like an ad hoc information as well. Um last question does Gallagher give recommendations how how to structure
022the the salary structures? Uh, and yes, they do give us the recommendations. It's included in our contract. Do we have questions on this? Any questions? Okay. May I have a motion to approve the district salary study as presented? >> So moved. Okay. Any discussion? Roll call. Julie Jetty, >> yes. >> Bridget Sandlin, >> yes. >> Mindy Hartman, >> yes. >> Jason Jansik, >> yes. >> Stacy Salt, >> yes. >> Darling, >> yes. >> Motion approved. >> Okay. Uh 11.3 is approval of of board member estimate reimbursement to attend the Illinois Association of School Board joint annual conference. Dr. Thomas, >> thank you. So we had three board members who uh put in the paperwork for this and this is required by uh policy 2 colon 125 board member expenses. Uh so the expenses are listed
023on the sheets that you have there and uh we have three board members who are not planning to attend and I think one more who may be planning to attend as well. Uh the board has in policy to be able to approve up to $5,000 of expenses just by way of some background. Um so with that I would um I present that information for the board's consideration. >> Thank you. Any questions? May I have a motion to approve the board member estimate reimbursement to attend the Illinois Association of School Board joint annual conference as presented? >> So moved. >> Second. >> Discussion. Roll call, please. >> Julie Jetty, >> yes. >> Bridget Sandlin, >> yes. >> Mindy Hartman, >> yes. >> Jason Jansik, >> yes. >> Stacy Salt, Darling, >> yes. >> Motion approved. 11.4.
024Um I asked that this we talked about this at the cow meeting last week and I when I got home and I was thinking about it um I kind of just had some questions and so um I talked with uh Mrs. Pot Potter on this and um she kind of worked with Dr. Thomas to bring this back. So um this is the approval of policy 220 22 220 board of education meeting procedure. Dr. Thomas. >> Sure. So what we there were a couple things we talked about. One was this the thing that was added here was for the ability for the public at a meeting to be able to suggest future topics um at the meeting which would then have to be voted on and approved by the entire board unanimously. And in discussing this,
025one of the issues was that when you make a suggestion for something to be added to an agenda, it ha it can't be added to that night's agenda at a board meeting. It has to be a future agenda because it wouldn't have been posted 48 hours ahead. So the policy also says we can't be in violation of u the open meetings act. So we added a little bit of language here um to it and it is highlighted on your page. So this would be um district residents may suggest inclusions for the agenda during public comment. So letting people know when that would happen. That would be during the public comment at the beginning and then those discussion items would be uh suggested by district residents may be added to a future agenda. So they could
026not be discussed that night. It would have to be at a next month's uh meeting agenda. Um, with that said, I will say there are a lot of opportunities during public comment, during committee of the whole or during uh a board meeting for the public to comment. Um, and the addition of having uh residents be able to suggest topics was just something done as part of a 5-year review, not required by law, just so everybody is aware. kind of part two of this is um this is recommend recommended language that isn't impressed that we would recommend just to make it a little bit more clear. But also something the board will have to uh talk about um now or in the future would be exactly how does this happen logistically because uh we have to
027consider um when will the board actually vote on this topic that's suggested? Would it be right then at that meeting and when would that be a a roll call vote versus a voice vote? Where on the next agenda would it be? I would suggest section 9 as a discussion topic. Uh but those are some things that the board might want to consider about where those go. So for the policy itself, we would recommend that that little bit of change in language for clarity and then there would have to just be some discussion either now or in the near future if we're adding that to policy on just logistically how that'll work. Any questions? May I have a motion to approve policy two semicolon 220 board of education meeting procedure as presented? >> So moved. >>
028Second. >> Yeah. >> Okay. Discussion. Roll call. >> Bridget Sandlin, >> yes. >> Mindy Hartman, >> yes. >> Jason Jansik, >> yes. >> Stacy Salt, >> yes. >> Darling, >> yes. >> Julie Jetty, >> yes. >> Motion carries. Okay. Now, um 11.5 is the um 2026-2027 administrative and educational support staff annual raises and increase recommendation. Um so we we did meet in close session to go over this and um I guess Mr. Shepard, would you explain it? >> Yes. So, board policy 3 col 50 states that the board of education will consider the superintendent or administration's recommendation when setting compensation for administrators and other non-UN employee groups. District's goal for all employee groups is to provide an affordable, fair compensation package that remains within the financial limits of our budget uh but also helps us
029remain competitive uh attracting a strong workforce. And as the board will know, that is part of our strategic uh plan. Um it was one of our goals. Uh so our recommendation for our administrative team and non-union groups, this would include principles, assistant principles, district coordinators, uh the accounting payroll manager, district maintenance technician, um the district executive administrative assistants or our central office staff, uh communications and fiscal specialist, occupational therapists, physical therapists and transportation staff, uh and technology staff that uh they receive a base salary increase of 4% for the 2026 2627 school year. This is slightly higher than the measure of CPI used. However, in light of uh some federal funding that is returning to the district for 2627, we feel that this would be an appropriate increase uh for these groups. Total cost to
030the district uh year-to-year cost uh of this compensation package would be $92,348 and that has been factored into the FY27 budget. So again, we would recommend the approval of the 4% increase for non-union and administrative staff. >> Any questions? >> Um, may I have a motion to pass the recommended compensation in increases of 4% for the following groups. Principles, assistant principles, district coordinators, accounting payroll manager, district maintenance technician, district executive administrative administrative assistants, district office support assistant, communication and fiscal specialist, occupational therapist, physical therapist, and transportation staff. I'm going to make the motion and ask that we put a little asterisk on it that says except for those individuals that are going to be under contract for 2026 2027, those will not be modified. So moved. >> Okay. >> Discussion. >> I'll second it. >>
031Roll call, please. Mindy Herman, >> yes. Jason Jansik, >> yes. >> Stacy Salt, >> yes. >> Darling, >> Julie Jetty, >> yes. Bridgen, >> yes. >> Motion carries. >> There are no discussion topics tonight. So, may I have a motion to adjourn this meeting? >> So moved. >> Second. >> Voice vote for all in favor say yes. Yeah. >> Yes. >> Meeting adjourned at 6:43. Thank you everybody.