Crete Monee School District 201u COTW Meeting 2/14/2023 Part 1

001Okay, let's go ahead and get started here. Okay, I I call this meeting to order. Roll call, please. Dr. Dr. Hall, present. Mrs. Galbert here. Brown is here. Mrs. R. Excuse me. Vice President R. I guess you're still here. Might as well since I really think things out of whack. President Alick here. Mrs. Salez here. Mrs. Walters here. Okay. Keep you on your P. Please stand and join me in 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. And Miss Rof, would you please read our mission statement? Our mission is to empower each student to positively impact the world for a bright new future. Okay, Cheryl, do we have

002any public comment? Okay. Um, are there any board updates? Okay. My first is the weekly activity report we get. I'm just wondering if there's a way to give us a little synopsis because um they put things like family night on there and I'm guessing that means yeah I'm guessing that means the families are coming to meet the teacher whatever when in essence it's a fun event and I was actually asked why nobody from the board showed up. Um today I went to the high school for the 6:30 a.m. meeting and then they had some other stuff going on and again I wouldn't have known that that was an activity that maybe they wanted the board was welcoming the Lord. So, if there's a way then instead of just listing what they're sending, I mean, I

003know it's hard to get in, but even if we could just give Yes, because they come in and they're uh they give me weekly uh updates and so they'll put that on there. So, we can just add family night with, you know, because I think that many of us probably don't know exactly what's involved. I don't didn't have children in this district. So, I don't know that family night means it's more like a fun atmosphere where they're playing games and they have entertainment. You know, the kids are doing things and stuff. So, um then when this happened at the high school today, I thought, oh, maybe we could figure out a way to just put a little Okay. something each activity so that if somebody's interested, they might understand them that the board might want

004to go. You know, somebody might want to go. That was all. Yes. My other thing is I have to put my glasses on. After the meeting, um, Mr. Hollyfield stopped me in the hall and asked me if I was going to stay for a while and I said, "Well, I usually stay say hi to people and I eat biscuit and go on my way." And then he explained to me that they were having grade level honor ropal honor roll ceremonies. And what they did was they took each level or class, senior, junior, sophomore, and fresh and they all this honoral um certificate. Their names were called. It was by class. The the juniors all were together and they came up on the stage and shook hands with Marquetta and Lamont. Well, Lamont asked me to

005be up there also and they the kids were so excited that they were being recognized. I guess they've never done this and um they were so excited and it was such a nice event and again would have never known. I saw it on the activity and it just said something of certificates or something and they would have really loved to have had some more administrators board whatever there didn't realize that we don't get an explanation of what it is. So that being said the board I I know that people would have wanted to be there. I mean it was a really really good ceremony. Every child got their name announced, walked across the stage, got the congratulations. The the was just hooting, holling for each person they called out. It was an amazing fun thing

006that they've never done before and they all wanted it to happen all the time and you know they gave tips on how to remain on it or those who didn't make it how you can make it and it was really a nice ceremony to see celebrating our students. So again that's another something but um I just wanted to let you know that that happened today and I just kind of fell into it because I was already there for a meeting. Yeah. Often times they'll put it on there. They'll just list it. Sometimes they don't have an explanation. So what I can do is go back and ask them to elaborate because then we just copy and paste and put it on there for you. Right. Because Mr. Hollyfield when he's talking, he has a bunch

007of events coming up um for different things and they're having a a big celebration next Friday night for African American history and they're having plays and I have a dream read and all these different things. I'm like, well, you need to tell us before the day before. So, I mean, those are the types of things that if we could get them a week or so in advance, I think more board members might be able to go to them also. Sure. So, that was another suggestion is that instead of getting a day, we could see if we could get maybe a future week if they've got like I said in their updates, they're supposed to provide those activities so that we can invite you. So, so that was one of the things. I mean, he just

008started running the RAC thing and all this you better send a whole lot of emails. So that's where it was today. But it was a beautiful day and very proud of all of our honorable students. Thank you for being there. I was not able to attend. I know field said that it was fun having either. Yeah, it was fun. I had a great time and I walked away warm and fuzzy. Good. Any other Yeah, I just want to make a mention real quick a big kudos um to our uh community mentoring program. Um it's we had a great event on uh Martin Luther King's birthday and unfortunately I was out of town so I did miss it but I heard that there was great feedback um great attendance that kids weren't sure at first but

009once they got there they were really excited about it and now we are doing one for our girls as well um April 15th correct that's we finally decided on April 15th um so I think it's great we hope to continue to reach out to these young people and um and even their parents and try to get them involved and uh give them a good direction, too. So, I'm really proud of that uh that committee. So, just wanted to make mention of that. Thanks. Thanks, Andy. Saturday. Yes, it's Saturday. Saturday. So, mark your calendars, ladies. Any other board updates? I would just like to shout out to Mon Township. I'm not sure if I mentioned this, but they actually received an award for township of the year. Township. Yes. I tried for 12 years when I

010was on it and it didn't happen. The next year, the next year. So, I'm like, trying to tell me something here. Okay. Well, you taught them when they wait until you got off. Yes. Yes. I'm like, okay. Do you have to apply for that? Is that something you apply for? I think you get recognized by some outside entity to my knowledge. I'm not sure exactly how that happened. And I wanted to go down to Springfield where they accepted the award, but I couldn't make it. But that was that was good. That was good. That's nice. That was good. And also being Black History Month, I'm not sure the mares. I haven't I haven't passed MC and just go steal Martin Luther King's birthday there a couple days ago. So I'm not sure. So if we

011haven't done anything, let's Friday if they've not done so ahead of time. I know um many of the schools had already had it up there. Talawa doesn't have a board yet. She reminded me about that made up over there. And make sure that you take a look at our website because we just posted that today of all the activities that we're doing and it's going out on social media today. I was going to put that in my update this week for you. Excellent. I knew you I knew you'd be asking. Yeah. It's the little fox that destroys the vine. That's the old saying, the little things, but they can make a difference. And we're on that. I appreciate the staff for for their their work out there with our kids. Excellent. Thank you. That's all

012I have. Anyone else? Oh, were you going to speak on this? What's this all about? Thankfully, this you just need to turn it into Cheryl. Have we done this before? Have we been required to take I thought that was for employees only. Consider employees in order in order to go into buildings and be with children all should really be just saying have we ever did this before? I don't I don't know if we have Do they take a credit check too? We'll take We'll take a take its out both ways. So if we deny this that means we just don't do not have well in order to the reason for that is that so as we we need to put it into our system so we can generate an ID for you and that and

013then does a background check all and and uh Mr. Sherman can you just tell them what what it looks for? Yeah, the background looks it's really looking the background. I mean, I already told you I was a gang banger when I was 14. We don't That's about it on my record. Okay. It's really looking at the sexual predator list. I'm not part of it. So, I'm just So, so that's really what it's looking for. 50 years that clear I think you know and again in the long run I think it protects you also you know that's so that's the only that it looks to flag. Nothing else gets flagged. The IDs will replace our key fob. Yes, they will replace your key. And they have them working now. See? And so yeah, and they're easily

014more easily controllable, too. And that's a standard we go to. It's a higher level of security also. Okay. Is it mandatory? Well, we expect everybody else to do the same. I'm just asking is it mandatory to get an ID? Is it mandatory? If you if you if you want to receive an ID, it is mandatory. Is it mandatory to have ID? No. Okay. All right. Thank you. Okay. Uh next up, administrative updates. I'll turn it over to Dr. Car. All right. We have two items for you. Um we've got uh a press uh issue 110. Um, I know you probably had a chance to look at it. Again, many of these, um, were some minor changes. There's just a couple that I wanted to probably point out to you. Um, on the first page, item

015four, colon 140, waiver of student fees. I just wanted to bring this to your attention. So, as you know, we we do not charge student fees at this time. That's correct, right, Mr. Surma? we we've phased them out. So, um this is just there in case. But I think my question that I wanted to ask the board and I think the attorney I wanted to ask you as well, do we need to have a policy if um that states that we are indeed waving the fees? I don't think so. That's my opinion because it could change. Okay, that's just for now. So, when we put things in policy, we hope that's concrete. So that's something that the next board may not agree with. You know, there was the sentence when that came out at one

016point. Should we wave the fees or not? And so there was not a total consensus by the board when that came at one point. We was not on wes, right? Correct. We were charging up three or $400 a family. Okay. Okay. I just wanted to bring up Mr. Sur and I were talking Yeah, I I do think Dr. Chair, I do think I'm gonna council, you may need to look into that. I thought I read somewhere and I don't know, I could not find it, Mr. Brown, that if the district has a does not charge student fees, we have to have that as part of the policy. Okay. So, I I you know, Eric, if you could just check that out on your end. I I I thought I saw that somewhere, but I can't

017find what I saw. So, I just want that blanket statement saying that the district does not charge fees fees. Fees. So, is there we're talking about certain activity fees or you have activity fees and another type of fee here and there. So, no, we're talking really about fees. Is that reg is that is it registration fees only? We're talking about registration fees. Yes, there may be some additional fees. You're right. There may be some additional fees, but like registration or textbook fees are not charged by the registration. Okay. So, if we give them a textbook and they lose it, we give them another one. We just keep That's a fine. And we will continue to find them. We will continue to find. So, these are only for like registration fees. Okay. Just wanted to clarify

018that. Thank you. Graduation fees too, right? Graduation fees we have begun waving. We we do not charge those. We incorporate those right into the budget. Boy, I wish my kids went to school now because I put four through with all the fees. So, I guess I guess the question, do we need it as a for? What number are we discussing here? Uh four. So, what fees are currently being charged? Are there student activity fees? Are there registration fees? There may be some uh extracurricular fees that are charged. Okay. Um in some of our for some of our extracurricular activities, there is no registration fee, there is no textbook fees that are charged. And then there may there are also fines that are charged. So again, if someone loses a Chromebook or in textbook or something

019like that, that's a fine. So that's how we differentiate this. Is lunch a fee or? No, lunch is lunch is basically alle cart. Now we're in the c program which is the you know so all of our students eat for free. All of them. Anything that's offered? No, not anything. There's a certain lunch that you have. Now we do offer some alocart things that the kids will pay cash for or credit card or something like that. Um that is also offered in that but all our students eat for free. So there is no or uh like fee waiver like waiver forms or anything like that. There are none of those. And then we've taken or I've taken really our graduation fees and our eighth grade whatever those fees were called to graduate like I've incorporated

020those right into the budget. Moving on I've incorporated those in the budget so we don't charge those. All right. Okay. Well, I will look into the question of what policy has to explicitly say that there are no fees. All right. I'm sorry about these not being fees are not required. It doesn't say anything. But the question you're asking, should we put it in there? Do we put it in writing? Verbalize it. All right. The next one I think um Mr. Brown I think you wanted a question. I'm sorry. Five col 250 is the next one. Was a change or a question? It doesn't seem like um yeah, the 250 I was just uh we just I just said that it's going to be a no. I just wanted to make you aware of that. I'm

021going to answer no for the district because we do not uh vac uh does the board require fully vaccinated employees to participate in a district co 19 testing program. I said no. So that's going to stand as is. Um I think do unvaccinated people still have to get tested? No. Oh, okay. Yeah, that that has completely been removed from procedures. The other piece I wanted to bring your attention, this is a loose leap in front of you. This is just a revisiting of the U CSK magnet school. This was our policy that has been put into place. We always uh need to review it every year to see if we want to have any changes. And I think the question that came up more recently is we do have some open seats sitting there. So,

022John, I'm gonna let you kind of talk a little bit about this and see if the board would like to make any adjustments to this based on this. Go ahead and talk about that. Gentel Gantel, before you talk, can I just make a quick statement? But Dantel is getting ready to talk about it's a very and has been since day one since this policy was implemented to my knowledge. I know thereafter to my knowledge very sensitive specifically to University Park. So I'll just leave it at that that you can talk about. Okay. So the question was asked how do we fill more at CSK each classroom there are two sections of each grade level K to five. How do we fill more slots? Um I think the question came up because some of the other

023uh elementary schools um classes have you know capacity of 25 or more. So how do we get more students um in the CSK slots that are open? Uh and we have um the allotment by community which in my recommendation we would not change because that's the sensitive part about the communities and um how CSK came to be and how those um slots were allotted. Uh and so last year um working with Mr. remain in all of the building principles. We did a campaign asking parents um who may not have been aware of CSK uh do you feel that the inquirybased learning uh would be beneficial to your student and if so um would you like to um move your student from their current school into those slots? Um and then we were able to fill

02420 more of those slots. Um and Now we have about 50 slots to fill and they are based by community. Um so one of the thoughts and uh we have not discussed this with Mr. May because the board just asked is uh without touching the town slots how could we you know again with the campaign how could we fill additional slots? Um and the only um in brainstorming what we came up with is uh right now in policy it says that a student cannot enter after the 15th day of school. So let's just take we start on September 1st we do not allow students to enter CSK after like September 16th 15 days of school. And so then we would um if we change that because we have a high mobility rate. we know that

025we have lots of families coming in and starting with us. Um we could um open that window a little longer and allow those families again to have their community slots that are available. Um but it would allow those families some extra time. So we could extend that window if that was the desire of the board. So we could extend it two weeks, 30 days to the end of the trimester, whatever it is that the board would like. tell what's the limiting factor I mean um I'm trying to think how to phrase the question but you know if if we have our aotments for university parks 40% so 20 seats in in a grade level of 50 students where what communities do we are not filling their slots is that the way to think about it

026or you know it it it varies it varies by grade um it ves community. There's no um I can tell you uh Moni has probably one of the lower number of seats and so they always fill those spots because they only get six. Um and so we always have students on the Moni. Um but I would have to take a look and I can provide that data to the to the board of the unfilled slots that we currently have. Just curious what the average class size is over there. Um average um here I can do kindergarten has 20, first grade has 23, second grade 20, uh third grade 22, fourth grade 15, fifth grade is um at its max at 25. So what's the concern? Is there a concern? I'm not really kind of following

027here what the concern is. Yeah, because there's a lot of schools are at capacity and CSK is not. Well, they're talking about that. Can I just Oh, I'm sorry. So, I'm missing the concern here. So, if the concern is if if I understand it right, when a school hits it capacity, overflow goes to another school, right? So whether they're from Mooney Creek, Park Forest or University Park, they get, you know, they go to, you know, whatever school. So who's not filling their seats? Is it Mooney, Park Forest, or UP? It it's a bit I could give you a breakdown of uh what community seats we have available by community, and it has to get it gets updated a few times a year. So of what we have available is the 15 day because of the

028curricul curriculum. Yeah. And the way it is like it's because it's different. Yeah. So whether it's and you're talking about K through five, correct? So the curriculum one from one to the next is not going to matter if it's a 30 days or 15 days. It would it would not it would not. So I don't understand why we limit ourselves. And the other thing is if we're missing seats, why wouldn't we reach out to those communities in the schools, the students that come from there and just fill the seats? And we that's what we did last year with the campaign that we did go to those communities. We sent an email just say you had a third grader and there was a seat open in Park Forest. Um, we sent out a letter to all

029of the Park Forest parents that said we have, you know, three seats available that are Park Forest seats. Would you like your child to have one of those slots? So, is CSK required to have a specific amount of kids? Is that another concern? It's just the capacity. No, the question I think was brought up of um I think at a last month's meeting like we were one of the I think Boro had like 29 students in their fourth grade class and so and and your average there is six 15 or 18 historically for fifth grade um that class is at 25. So that cohort of students have traveled really we've only had one or two slots over the last five years that have opened up with that fifth grade team. Um I would say historically

030that fourth grade group when they came in as kindergarteners they came in with like 13 and for whatever reason whatever year that is these fourth graders those slots were were at 15 there. So, so the fourth grade in Balmoral, Creek, Mon and Talala, are those class sizes 25 and above? And and is the one at CSK not? CSK is at 15. Balmoral is at 2728. Tala fourth grade is 2321. fourth grade at Creek is 28 and 24 and at Mon it is 23. So with those numbers, what's the magical number? Is it 26 before we have to have a conversation with the union? I think any any class size over 26. It depends on the grade. For kindergarten, it we cap at 25. Uh for first, second, and third grade it is 28 and for

031fourth, fifth, and sixth, it's 32. So I guess the question is is are these those numbers that you just gave us 28 and 24 whatever the class is that that's now obviously but do you know that in October are they the same or they've changed? Yeah, it it it changes. I think uh Lyall can speak to when we started moving students over from some of the other grade levels. What now? When when you said earlier when you was talking about we had a high mobility rate, does that mobility rate is it kind of connected with CSK or are they pretty consistent? If I would have to I would have to look at look at the number of students when we do have students who transfer at the beginning of the year out of CSK. I

032would say this year off of the top of my head we may have lost 20 students. But if we lose them like after the 15th day of school, no one can come in and take those slots. So, so, so, so I understand this. We're if we're talking about high schoolers, even junior high, you're talking about the longer the time of not being there, the harder it is. But we're talking K through five, right? Correct. I don't understand why we don't change that that date so that we can fill those slots if they want to go in there because we can't have teachers teaching in classrooms that are 29, 30, 31, 28 when we have a classrooms that are 15. But there's a component too when it comes to that percentage. And again going back the

033history of how CSK became CSK that that's not what I'm saying though is you take the the the villages that are that need that are missing. So let's say University Park um I don't know how many students are there. Let's say there's 250 students there, right? And 200 students and University Park gets uh 40%, right? So that's 80. Well, if they're only supplying fif 60 kids, then we take 20 University Park students, we put them there, right? I mean, you're trying to maintain the numbers. And I'm not questioning that, but I'm questioning why we're waiting so long on a K through five when we should be challenging like asking parents early on like, hey, we're short on these numbers. Don't go out to the entire district. You go, hey, UP needs to fill 32 seats.

034CITE needs to fill 24 seats. Mon needs to fill two seats. We go to each village and tell them, you know, this is what it is and we fill the seats. So, so that's what you did here. And I think right because you're trying to maintain and then how long and what's the cut off? Where's the line of demarcation when it comes to Okay, University Park, I'm using them as an example. They only have they allocated for 40%. And at the beginning of the school year, they only had 30 30%. Just throwing that hypothetical percentage out there. And at what point do we say what's the cut off point that we say you know what do you leave that open that extra whatever percentage that's needed to get to 40%. Do we leave that open

035for University Park to have a chance kids come in in November or whatever to bring that up to 40% as close as possible. is wait and as long as you explain to the parents, right? Yeah, John, you miss Bergens, you explain to the parents, hey, this program is IB. It's accelerate. It's different. Yeah. And they have to accept that. Well, again, University Park lost technically the neighborhood school, right? They lost it. CSK is not really considered a neighborhood school for University Park. And as a result of University Park losing a neighborhood school, also academics, not achieving the what is it? AP AYP for two years in a row. Then the board at that time came up with this and they said, "Okay, because it was University Park, we're going to give University Park the higher

036percentage." So I'm saying, "However we do it, we just don't want to affect that sensitivity." Well, That's what I'm And that's where I'm losing it because I'm not trying to change any of that. I'm not saying we're trying to change. I'm saying just don't if we I'm not saying anybody's trying to change that. And I'm I'm good with And here's here's my and I'm all for it to not let those seats be not used. That's what I'm for. I'm% I think that I think the thing that that I would look at is first what is our campaign to get to tell the families about the school? That's one. The second thing is, okay, you can almost rest assured that um I would be looking at why do we how many first of all in the

037past it seemed like nobody left CSK. Why are kids you said 20 kids left CSK? Correct. What that to me that's something I want to look into. Why are they leaving CSK? Um because that that's are they moving? Are it's not always moving, but are they moving? Did they not like it? Um, did it just different private? And if they're going to private schools, that's even an issue because that was more like the private school of the district. So, I want to look at why are they leaving? Um, and how many per like is this gone up over the course of time? Can you please tell us that like this? I can try and find the data of you know the students that we lost. What was the reason code uh of leaking? Was it

038a transfer? Was did they go back to their home school? So we can look at that data. So then we we will do a campaign I think and as well as to tell the district about CSK and the families and if we and I think that would be huge because when it first started it was pushed out. We knew what it was. We even if you didn't know what I was you had an idea, hey this is different. This is available to us. Um and now I don't have because I don't have kids that age, but I don't hear much about IV or Well, I think in the beginning there were more more people applying than we had. Correct. But that's why, you know, so and over time it was pushed. So, if we got

039rid of the 15th day after school begins requirement, would you change that to another date during the year or just eliminate that requirement period? Um my recommendation if we wanted to be in sync with the other schools would be to eliminate it period and then kids get to come um and join that school. So even if it was late in the year and it's a third grader at least now you've got somebody to move into fourth grade next year etc. Yes. But and not to change like u Mr. Brown said the a lotment of seats. We would still campaign to the community. Anybody's question that? Yeah. I I don't I don't know how I mean I'm not questioning opening it up, but I don't know how opening it up um changes. Is it like um

040I get mad because my kid isn't doing well at Mon and I decide I want to transfer to CSK or because the kid who's transferring into the district can't just transfer into CSK. Correct. Correct. So opening it up, how does that if only if it's before the 15th day of school, they can right now. So if a kid transfers in and they start on September 3rd, okay, and there's an open slot, we will give that slot in that community to that family. So you would give it to them or that would they have to say, "Hey, I would like to go to CSK or would you say this school? Here's the here's an option. We're working with registration this year um to make families aware as they come into the district." Yeah, that seems to

041make sense. Okay. So hearing the date perhaps. Yeah. I just don't even know that we need it. As long as you explain to a parent, yeah, a K through five, this is the program and they're going to come in whether they're new or not and they're going to want to they should come in and see what it's about. And if they decide that's what they want, why not? I mean, and again, remember if you're short somewhere, and again, I think a lot of the work should be done in in, you know, enrollment, but in the first two to four weeks of school, we should really do a good job trying to fill those seats, not November, but really, I think we should be filling those in the first month, trying to reach out to families,

042reach out to the communities going, you know, there's there's available, this is why. Yes, we we sent out messages, uh letters, roocalls, um any way that we could get that message out. Um we called families, um we invited their siblings, we we did the the campaign. So, we did that as soon as we had knew the amount of spots that we had available. I would be curious um like uh Mr. Mr. Hall was saying in regards to why students are leaving because I think this goes back to something that Mrs. Rub and I would say it was what do the parents want? And it ended up turning into a lot more than it needed to be. That's all our point was is what do the parents want? Not all parents find IB necessary. I was

043one of them. My kids are just as successful. But as a mom of elementary kids, I like the idea that they were close. I'm a room mom. It's right there. You know, I can run to it. So, we had said that before there's people in UP that they don't have a community school and that's, you know, maybe what they're looking for. I don't know. But I would like you to see why people are leaving. And I think that would be a good piece of information for us to see why they're leaving because as it was when it first opened. It was it was great. It was packed. It was, you know, we were turning people away and now we can't fill it. So why? Let's find out why. You know, is it a community school

044thing? What is it they're looking for? So I think what you're doing campaigning, marketing, however you want to say it, get the word out there and see if we can't get more people in, you know, enticed by it, whatever you want to say. But again, you know, it's hard to say because it just depends on, you know, what what's important to that parent. So I think holistically, I don't think we know we have been promoting the student body of 5,000 kids for the longest since I've been here, since my kids was in school. In the late 1990s, just the population, the student body has been promoted at 5,000 kids total. That number has been out there for a long time. Up until the last couple years, last couple years has been 4,400 thereby 4600 kids.

045I don't even think we know just where did the sun drop come from and who does those kids you know that number to 600 what grade levels we don't know that I don't think we know that so we're trying to figure out why just CSK dropped just as a district as a whole why have we lost 600 kids five 600 kids over the last couple years we've been around some um data reports to tell us where where our students have moved. Have they gone to private? Have they transferred out? Have they moved? Um I would guess that um the residential checkins did. I'm sure that that had a large um impact on on that percentage. And was it a big number in University Park? Was it a big number that had kidn people parents had

046kids at CSK? Was that reflective of the national investigation? I can tell you that it's just and a lot of it has to do with change. I mean, I can tell you 12 families that I know personally that are friends moved out of the district because they were never going to send their kids to our high school. It's a fact. They're all going somewhere else. They're either going private, they're going to Lincoln Way, they're going I don't care where they're going. They just said they're ne they moved out of the villages. Mooney has a great turnover rate. I mean, when a house goes up, it sells. It's a great price point, but unfortunately the last two years I've talked to our care our stigma. We have to change it. We have to change everything about

047there's so many good things that are happening in our high school. And I have people that I know that are friends that would never send their kids here not realizing how amazing this place is. That's correct. And they and and I'm telling you right now, it happens every day. It's not just it it's about the stigma that we have and the negativity and we have to change it. And I think working with the Donovan group at the beginning is working with the Donovan group and changing our communication department because we have to get all the good that comes out of this of these schools out to the public to change that. And also I can tell you when I moved in my house 30 years ago, there were probably a hundred kids in the area.

048There are probably 10 right now. It's older people in my neighborhood now that have bought houses. There are no school age kids around me. Just there's like two. That's it for 10 houses each side. So, I also think that the population has changed. It's not t those families have grown up and those kids that went to our school are now off doing whatever they're doing and they've not been replaced by new people who are buying in my neighborhood don't have children. Right. When I moved there in 2000, my kids were um one and three or, you know, two and four. And all the families in my subdivision, they were a lot a lot of young. Most of them are gone. And the problem is it's older people will come in or somebody with kids will

049come in because of the school district. I had a conversation with somebody and I do a ton of new construction in Pieton and I was wondering why Pieton and why Mooney and CIT and UP and why we can't get new construction and four people said school district stigma was it was a fact and that's for two years since we you know trying communication getting the positive stuff out getting all of that everybody doesn't realize that when you step outside of our community I asked Dr. holiday. How's Thornton? Thornton has the same issues or different issues than we have in Lincolnway or uh Evston or whatever district in this state. We they all everybody has issues. It's how we handle them and how we present them and how we try to fix them. And I think

050it's our job, the seven of us, to change the stigma of what's going on here and communicate everything out. Well, I I can tell you this too. Um you you definitely have communication. Um, but people and I know you all tease me about this, but I when I talk to people, um, it's all about, oh, everybody's want now want to go to rich. Why they want to go to rich? Because they have all these shiny new things. Regardless of what um what's there or what's not there, everybody looks at they are doing these things for the kids. They're building up these things for the kids. They're building up their facilities when I can't key they're growing they're building all these new pretty things I don't know if they're educationally they're getting better but they the

051stigma is out there that they're doing these things for the kids they're they have new fields they have bloom they're building a new I I've had tons of people talk about now sending their kid to Bloom because they're building this indoor football facility HF is pretty so as much like we joke about it but that's a a real thing out there people want those things. So I remember Mount Carmel, they got a big rise in in with kids going there when they redid their facilities and as long as and and one of the things I I see is when I talk to parents when I'm out there even kids in the community. Oh, I have I know four families that are that are sending their kids to Morgan Park. What is Morgan Park doing? They

052have a new football field. They have a new baseball field. They're building facilities and they're like, "No, we're not going to." I'm like, you you have you live right here. Well, we just dropped them. So, boundaries don't really matter anymore except for here. And new and new things. They want new things. Uh people, that's I'm sorry, but it is. So, so is the recommendation to bring this back and just eliminate that bullet point that no classroom openings will be filled after the 15th day of school. Correct. and bring that to the board next week for a vote with the other policies again. Okay. Can we clear that up again? Again, because Yeah, because again, you know, I I might look at it from a different point of view here. Again, looking at the more sensitive

053point here. Okay. So, just say for example, you're talking about the recommendation coming from the headman is to change that date, correct? presently is presently is where the 15th day of school and we want to go to what? Um I would say recommendation at minimum would be if we wanted to try it out for one year and fill it fill see how many slots we feel we can do the end of the first trimester or we can just take it out totally and say that there is no um there's there's no cut off. So if the percentage of University Park go down to 25%. And now for whatever reason this date come where other kids can come in and fill that other percentage of University Park 15%. We're we're not we're not touching. So we're

054not University Park 40%. That's that's exactly what we've been saying. We're not changing that. the number of University Park students would still come there. That's never been a question. Okay. They still have to be eligible from Yes. to fill those slots. The date is giving them more time um to figure out where the numbers are because remember if registration comes and then all of a sudden the first two, three, four weeks of school, you know, it's hectic. It's crazy, right? New families coming in, trying to get them registered, people complaining. I've been trying to get registered. Look, Ken, Ken knows people, I'm trying to get registered. I can't get a hold of anybody. You got to give a little bit bigger window to allow administration to be able to say, okay, now we have three,

055four weeks. Let's try to get these filled. And then their goal is that if you're at 25 students and you're supposed to be at 40, then your job is to get 15 University Park students to fill those 15 spots, not six from Mooney and nine from here. Nope. Everybody stays in their category, but it coming from their village, right? That's what I wanted to clarify. Understands if if they're supposed to have 40% of that population and they're sitting at 30%. Your team or whoever does it is going to go out to University Park residents to try to fill them up to the 40%. Correct. Absolutely. And if they don't And if they don't, then they remain those remain. They're not going to no it remains vacant like it is now. We're just going to try

056to get those children moved over to give them the experience and to ease up on some of the overfilled classrooms that parents may not understand what CSK is all about. That's what I I wanted to say also is maybe we need to make sure that we're getting that information out that this opportunity is for children to get a different type of education. Well, so when you go to University Park, you say you don't have this percentage, you want to go to University Park, say, "Hey, you still got 10% to go." Yeah. And you still don't get then let's just say there 17 seats at that point. Um those 17 seats, we will not fill them with any other students besides 17 University Park students. Right. And if you can't get 17, it just stays open.

057They just stay open. The perfect example is we have 15 14 students in fourth grade where we got other fourth grade classes that are that's ridiculous. Okay, we beat this horse to death. Let's let's move on. Uh okay, that's all I've got for that. Um next up is the safety and security update. Yes, we've asked Mr. to come and give some update on safety and security. And I think this is actually quite timely uh considering we we've heard some issues out at the um Michigan State just recently, it's still out there um our need to constantly evolve in what we're doing. So that's actually a good presentation title for evolve. So Mr. Tobias, you want to share with us where we're at? Yes. Thank you. Thank you, board president, superintendent, members of the board, and

058cabinet for having me here tonight. Uh, I was asked to come and discuss some recent observations, some visits, uh, I've made with schools regarding our quest for a metal detector process. Uh, it's very interesting to see how some schools deal with it um, in one capacity and others um, still have a work in progress in some other capacities. Uh having metal detectors is not an an easy thing to just initiate. Say we put them in place, plug them in and and go to work. Uh requires staff, requires procedures, requires process. It's a very exhausting process with metal detectors coming into a school. Uh they're great. They can be a deterrent. Um they can be useful in identifying threats, but they do require a lot of hands-on searching process constantly. um with students coming into the

059building. On the one hand, you could say we have metal detectors and and we can deter that threat. Um but at the same time, we might create other threats and other dangers with lines of students, uh groups of them as they wait to come into the building. Uh as soon as you put metal detectors in, you've totally disrupted your process of of traditional entry for anybody. I'm not saying that's good or bad. I'm just speaking to the observations I've seen. um metal detectors um can add anywhere from 10, 15, 20, 30 minutes um to the arrival of students in the building if they're going to be used properly. Um and all the identifying hits or alerts that you get from them are investigated properly. Uh the investigations of those hits or alerts do take place

060uh on person, whether it's a wand, a pat down, uh bags are searched, pockets are emptied, and just about anything can hit on a traditional metal detector. They have sensitivity settings that can be calibrated. Um, but anything from keys to a wristwatch, uh, to maybe buckles on a belt, um, hinges on a laptop, uh, undergarments, um, wired undergarments that are worn by people. Anything sets them off. Um, and it's not just, um, one or two things or or three or four people that come through the line. Uh, it it is going to be an exhausting process. It's well worthwhile. Some might argue in a sense, but I do want to be sensitive to the other dangers that are created when we do have those long staggering lines. Um, kids late to class. Um, there are

061other options out there, too. I've observed um, and have researched. Beyond traditional metal detectors, there's other devices such as what the packet I put in front of you today. Evolve, um, is another system. They market themselves a weapons detection system. And I'm not here to sell anything to you tonight. and present an observation of another uh device I've learned of and have seen in use at other um community schools not far from our district. Uh the device itself um can be calibrated to have more ease of movement and flow of students into the building or any visitors um as far as what our procedures will do. Um it has a camera operating system, a digital system uh that can pinpoint or target um items that you don't want into the building either on somebody's or

062within a backpack. Uh the packet I gave you in front of you there gives some visuals to how this device works. Um there's also um some description uh descriptors that talk about um traditional metal detectors. First, a system like Evolve and there's a couple case studies I included in there that talks about how it's been used at other schools. A school in Champagne, Illinois, as well as a school in Nebraska. Um these devices can be marketed primarily to your school as well. They can integrate to current camera systems and technologies. Um they can also integrate into alarm and alert systems uh through a Wi-Fi access with local first responders, police, SRO's um as well as building admin at the same time. Um the the procedures for using metal detectors or evolve can be similar. Um,

063but this system here can be done with um, less staff. Um, and it's marketing itself is more accuracy. And I'm not speaking to be an expert on any one of these features right now. I'm just speaking to my observations of what I've seen, what I've learned, and what I've researched. Um, some of the the pros and cons between metal detectors and and other options like Evolve. Um, the list can be pretty grand from the simplicity of of long lines to no lines to things looking like a prison and the perception of that to items um uh devices that blend in with your school and and can have decals and and work um with very ease and transparency. Uh a lot of us have passed through these objects, these um alternative metal detector devices. If we've

064entered a lot of public events, McCormack Place, White Sox Park, Wrigley Field, a lot of businesses are using these and and we don't even know it because we walk through seamlessly. Um you wouldn't know it unless um uh the attendant gives you an alert and then maybe there's a secondary search that takes place for you. Um without me speaking further, I have a video I'd like to show you that was shared with me. Um uh it's it's pretty good um in terms of some of the details. It's about four minutes. Um but let me get you to watch it and I'll try and answer any questions you might have after that. And this would be um an alternative to standard metal detectors that that ping and and alert on anything metallic. This one's supposed to

065be an AI intelligence system uh that eliminates the lines uh lots of flow of traffic and pinpoints exactly where you want your security to target um either an individual something on their person or in a bag. So what we have here is our standard configuration express system. This is a dual lane configuration for high throughput screening. We can screen up to 3,600 people per hour in this configuration. What you'll al also notice is that there are some tablets that are connected to this system. These are wireless tablets which gives you some flexibility in the positioning and uh where you want to uh place the tablets. Uh there's two different types of tablets here. One is our flow control and then the other one would be used for a resolution area. If someone alerts, the image

066will be displayed on the tablet and that person can be directed to a separate resolution area to resolve any type of uh threatening object that they may have. Uh so let's get on with the demonstrations. The first thing I'm going to do is walk towards the front side of the system. Here I am on the front as if I'm entering a facility. I'm just going to walk through at a normal pace. I don't have to stop or anything. And you can see that nothing has happened on the system or at the tablet. And that's because I don't have anything threatening on me, but I do have everyday objects like a cell phone and keys and a wallet um that are non-threatening and don't be considered alerts. Now, I'll demonstrate an alert using a backpack. Here

067I am on the front side of the Express and I'm going to walk through normally and what you may have heard is the alert. So, I have an item in this backpack that does alert. It's shown on the tablet screen, and in this case, it's a a pressure cooker device that could be used as an explosive device. Next, I'm going to show you what it looks like for kind of non-threatening items in a backpack. And again, I'll put the bag on my back. I'm going to walk through at a normal pace. And again, you'll see nothing has happened. And in this case, I have a lightweight laptop. I have a power adapter and some of the usual stuff that uh someone may have, you know, in their bag. The next alert I'm going to show

068is an item that may alert in a bag that's of a smaller material. Here's the bag again. Here I am walking through Express. You can again you can hear the alert from the tablet. You can see the lights on the back of the system turn red. And in this case, it's the barrel of an assault rifle. So, we can find large objects and we can find smaller types of objects that can be threatening. The last alert I'm going to show you is an item that's on my person. I'm going to put a jacket on so it's concealed. Again, here I am on the front side of the express. I'm going to walk through at a normal pace. You'll see the lights on the back of the system turn red and you'll hear the alert. And

069in this case, it is a small firearm that's on my hip that the express detected. So lastly, before I move on, I'm just going to show you a detailed view of that alert and how it shows up on the tablet screen. So you can see we have two different types of images that we show on our tablet. One is a static image with an with a box around the area of the threat and the other is a moving image which really tracks the movement of that particular item as it goes through the express system. So it makes it very easy for operators and guards to determine where the item was found and how to resolve it. I'm going to talk about some additional controls that are available to the operator to identify threats and tag

070them but also request assistance if needed at that particular location. In this case, because I walked with through with a firearm, I'm going to tag this alert as being found finding a gun. I'm also going to request assistance to a supervisor that a gun was found at this location, at which point the supervisor will be notified by text that there was an incident. So that's just one brief example of how these devices work. They look like metal detectors in terms of the the statute, the the sidewalls. Um they can come in single or double versions that we just saw. um they target more specifically weapon grade items rather than um everyday instruments that our kids might be bringing in such as laptops, your headphones. Um it can be calibrated to certain sensitivities whether you want

071it to pick up the the flute or the clarinet or or some other instrument or not. Um in those terms, again, I'm not an expert. I'm just speaking to what I observed, what I've researched, what I've learned. Uh board is interested in looking at getting some sort of detection devices. Metal detectors are are great and they can be a deterrent. Um, this is an option that that allows us to do very something uh similar if not better than metal detectors with less staff and more convenience to our students and visitors at the same time. What I did not see on there, it detected the larger mass of a weapon, the gun and extension, rifle extension, whatever that was, right? The barrel, whatever, did not show a smaller. It said it would not detect ordinary things

072like keys. Did not detect detect the keys. That's telling me it probably would not detect a metal a bullet a bullet that's lead but the casing is metal. That's a good question. Uh I don't or a small knife. Correct. I don't have an immediate answer because I haven't I haven't seen everything but um what I understand it can and there's two categories to that. We're not so much concerned, although it's not legal to have a bullet in the school, um, and have it on person or on property anywhere, um, we're less concerned about a single bullet than the item that can be brought in to fire that bullet, too. Um, this system would definitely detect that, uh, the bullets themselves. And I can't speak to the the intelligence that this device uses and the types

073of metals or phosphorous things it picks up or whether it's it's the granules of gunpowder within that shell. Um, I'm not I'm not intelligent enough to speak to how the device operates. Um, it's a good question, but that's a question I think um it might appear in the FAQs um that I included in the packet as to how it determines a weapon specific item. Uh, it also um there's some issues whether or not it it picks up blades that are one or two inches long or five or six inches long. I don't have an answer to that. Um, and it might due to the calibration that the device has. Um, again, I'm not bringing this here to sell you on anything and say let's get it now. But I wanted to to show you what

074I've learned, what I've observed, and provide some other options that I I think are more convenient for what our communities would look for in a weapons detection system as opposed to a straight metal detection system. What what I like about it is so when what what you do is you have the some schools that have metal detectors some schools have metal detectors in the conveyor belt to send the bags to. What I like about it is it kind it sort of has it's a twoin one. Um even if um you have just metal detectors, there still some things because people idle. So if I do hide something, at least it gives me an idea. So I do like that. I mean, I guess we do have some questions about other capabilities, but I don't think

075those are questions from a negative standpoint. More of a curiosity to see what our limitations are. So that we understand what the limitations are or even other strengths that you might find out. But I do like it most most of I definitely like it. I mean it's it's I mean it's 10 times greater than a metal detector just from the standpoint of waiting and just how you can just go through and I have walked through a couple of those before not really knowing what they were. Okay. So my my question my last question here is I think we were talking about metal det cost like $8,000 for a metal detector. How does the cost with this device relates to the old metal detector? Uh this is significantly more more mo yeah more um up more

076uh the the cost value um you're dependent on on the vendor you might go with you're you're paying for devices as you would standard metal detectors but you're also paying for a software um usage and fee um and that becomes proprietary to to what they so you're kind of leasing you might buy the device but you'reing the software for a one or four year package on how some of this rolls. Um, and that gets you the updates, the upgrades along the way, as well as additional devices. And there's more to it than traditional metal detectors because you've got those those visual pads, the electronic pads, um, which multiple come with each stand. So, you could have somebody standing um, a security administrator standing at the entrance point staring at the pad too and watching lights

077come through, somebody over here, they can communicate between their pads. Um, also is convenient is this will record. Not only do you have the the um visual of the of the person coming through as you saw that that can be a recording um but it also generate reports for you um electronically by the end of the day. Um your your school administrator can go through download um the entire entry of students from that period if we started opening the doors at 7 a.m. and we got our last student through at 7:12 a.m. per You can get a report generated how many bodies came through that how many alerts or pings we had on it. How many were false positives and we determined it was just the trombone. Um how many were legit hits on something

078whether it's a bait pen or brass knuckles or an actual weapon element and then a blade or firearm form. It'll generate a report for you. You don't get that out of traditional metal detectors either. How many did it say came through in an hour? Was it 1,600 or 36? How many students would come? 3600. That's why I thought it was 3,600. And that's the the uh the people flow is in that packet there in terms of number of items. And so how many would I say how many would we need? We have would you Great question. On our student arrival, we at the high school, we primarily have uh three entry points for students. We have our main entrance where we have our walkers, our um student get dropped off by a parent or somebody

079and our student drivers park in the front. when they come in the main entrance. So, that would be a point that we'd have devices. And then we have our A and our B wing where we have um our bus lot and those kids coming off the buses. And we probably have 11 to,200 kids coming off those buses right at 7 a.m. all coming into the building at once. and um it's staggered as they get off the bus and move, but it's a constant line of students coming in that's uninterrupted at this time because they come in, make a decision, go to their locker, see a teacher, go to the cafeteria. Um we we would filter 11 to,200 students through those two doors. So, you can say 600 on each of those wings. Well, I think

080that's what I like. I like the the flow of it because I think when you have kids standing around, you could obviously have more problems erupt. you know, someone's gonna shove somebody, something's gonna happen. That's a trade-off. But if the flow keeps going, I think that's just a I like it. And none of this is and again, none of it's perfect. Neither metal detectors or a device like Evolve markets itself as 100% foolproof. There are the anomalies that that we have to deal with in the human world that that things happen. Um, but it markets itself as as more convenient, more accurate. Um, the the documentation we can get from the devices is very real. And what I like is the convenience of flow where even though if you have traditional metal detectors, you're going

081to have a line. You're going to have a as Dr. Hall alluded to, there's a TSA process that takes place. You're going to have pings. You're going to search bags, persons, and it's just going to happen. That's the nature. Uh we're going to treat every pain with attention. Um and then that's where the lines will develop. And even though you say, well, we're trading off assuring security and you got to deal with that, but now we're creating another security issue in the forms of lines and that not even count the inclement weather that's out there. You said that it was, you know, significantly more, but if you look at the ratios, it's 2 and a half to one to 3:1 more people you have to have with metal detectors compared to this. Yes. So, it's

082four to 10 to four. So that's six people we don't have to have that we're paying there again is part of the trade-off as well is to keep everything moving. It seems to and I'm sure with the AI technology they're going to be able to we're going to be able to tell them what we want to search and they're going to be able to to tell it to what to look for. Meaning if we wanted to look for a bullet can I answer that question? No. But I'm telling you the software has got to be there because they're doing it in airports and everywhere else. Correct. So, and if we're paying for the service, someone will come down, we would tell them what we wanted to start looking for, and then you just keep evolving

083as you go. Yes, that's my assumption how that's going to work. I think you're spot on. And Bill, thanks for bringing that up because in the committee meeting this morning, we talked about the difference in staffing with metal detectors. We know that we're going to need more detectors and we're going to need more people. So, you know, at some point, you have to figure out the tradeoff for what you're getting for your money. The other This morning you made a visit to you told us I visited a few local schools. Yes. Can you give them I asked you in the meeting about how many uh students they had, how many came through and the timing. Could you just tell what you did see to give them an idea of what you saw? It was kind

084of similar. Sure. One of the schools I I visited um has a double lane just as you saw pictured there has a double lane in place. They have pretty much one primary student entrance for their They have a a staggered start day um for a couple hundred of their students based on some career classes and things like that. But they all come through the same entrance um as the buses drop them off and it was pretty flawless when when there was an alert or a ping as you see it on on the tablet. Um security administrator there would just kind of usher the kid out of the line or point to it. Kids were very cooperative. It was low stress. kids came over, opened the bag. Okay, thanks. You had an amplifier for your guitar.

085Okay. And um it was it was reading those and and not reading some other things. Um in terms of the convenience for headphones and things like that, it was very smooth. It happened rather quickly and rapidly almost normal other than from my perspective. I saw the tablets, I saw the devices, but I saw a lot of good cooperation out of students too because there was no stress and there was no inconvenience of having to weights um to get where I needed to be inside the building. So, what system did they have? Same. They had that system. This system. Yes. So, they didn't have metal detectors. They had this. They went right the um that district has four high schools and they outfitted all four of their high schools with this system. Did you go to

086a high school district that has metal detectors? Yes. And how did that function? I I think they had a very organized process and it went very well. Um to what you can expect, the lines of students waiting multiple multiple minutes from the start of the the day where the buses unload and get kids in to get that last kid through was a great inconvenience. Um and I was visiting on days where the weather was cooperative and nice, no awnings or anything for anybody to stand over. They had to increase a lot of staff. And it was very TSA like because it was ping ping ping search search ping ping ping search search search search search search search. Uh the school one school had to develop a special pass process uh your metal detector pass because

087the system delayed you get the first period um by a significant amount of time. The kitchen staff had to also adjust their schedule because kids won't get into the lunchroom on time for their morning breakfast. Um but their pass got in the breakfast and then they they got to class and then halfway through first period there was normaly that you can see but it was as much as you're looking for the convenience of of security and deterrent there was a great inconvenience to operate the day. Thank you Robin are these portable they can be uh yes they have wheels you can move them if you need to move them from one entrance to another. Um they they spoke to their durability to that but my experience with technology uh I would I would prefer to

088have devices that stationary to assigned to an entrance and not be moved. Um, but they do have the convenience if you have to move them. These that we saw are not designed. Um, they have two different models. They an indoor and outdoor model. So, you can you can order models that would be more rugged for the elements and used at outdoor facility events too. My is my thought is um activities like you know show choir we just had you know we have hundreds of people coming into the building who aren't normally there or even gra I was looking around at graduation last year you got so many people coming into the building that aren't normally there you know can you move it over to the activities entrance or have one set that's kind of dedicated

089to move maybe you know you have permanent ones for the school day, but you have an extra set that you can move around for, you know, certain activities where you want to heighten the security. I I think that's a real discussion that we all all our brains will have to have at one point is what what are we targeting? Um, I spoke to our three student entrances, I also when when I met with these reps and walked our building to kind of scout out and start putting some quotes together. We also targeted our athletic entrance, which is door three, um, to models would look like there. Um, as the convenience if we decided to do extracurricular and move there, we'd have at least that entrance. Um, we could pinpoint um, visitors for extracurricular or other

090things. Um, I I but that's a real philosophical question on on what we want to do and how we're going to use them. It's one thing to look at the start of the student day and assure our school day safe. Um, but you bring up another portion as to are we going to use them for every entrance and all the time. A lot of are not doing their extracurriculars um at this time. They're just focusing on their student arrivals um or they've pinpointed them to some of their indoor curriculars such as um the arrival that you have for volleyball, football, basketball games because you can have a pinpointed entrance. They haven't done a lot with their um extracurricular theater or choir stuff um particularly if they're hosted elementary. Um traditionally they haven't had a ruckus

091visitors um in that degree. That doesn't mean that that we're not sensitive to somebody still bringing in something into the building, staging it, or doing something as we got to think outside the box. But I think schools are still evolving to how they want to use it and treat their public with respect, but also ensure the safety of those visitors at the same time from one day to the next. I don't have an easy answer to that other than it's a philosophical the only other part of that is probably for Ken, there's going to be something coming down the from the state of helping the schools uh with safety and and I would imagine that's got to be coming soon because this is after yesterday. This is just a continual thing that's happening in society

092and I'm assuming that at some point someone's going to have to cough up some funds for that. I don't know. I haven't seen anything yet. We have heard that part of the infrastructure that was passed nationally had some safety things in it, but I haven't seen that filter down to the states. You know, I you know, you just wonder if some of the art funds that are going to be left over from people not using art from art our funds would be reallocated to something like school safety. I I don't know. I haven't seen anything yet. I haven't uh I haven't done a lot of search on any type of other type of grants or security that may be out there too. So, that's something this is, you know, more expensive system. You know, it

093is quite a bit more expensive system. So, I think it's something that you know to see if we get a system. Okay. The next step, can we get some You've talked about you're getting some quotes. Can you Yeah. And the quotes we'll have will will cover initially our our three student entrances um and as well as our athletic entrance. So, the dollars we have that that I get to Ken, we'll we'll have some negotiation room in terms of do we want as many devices um right now the the quotes I was looking at was you saw the double um the double-sided it functions as a single too um and flows just as easily. Do we The question we need to ask ourselves, and I can walk with Ken and everybody else at some point, is

094from our door A and our door B um at our high school, uh do we really need a double or can we get by with with a single lane having stansions up as as some schools do, we have double sets of doors they can come in that way, swing and and go through or do we want a double set there where we do have that flow of traffic uh and and divide those students up each way. Um doubles are more than singles in a sense. So it it just depends on what we think we can we can do conveniently and safely uh as well as maximize the use of technology as best we can. Is there any way of finding out from the high school what how many students per day go through each door

095approximately and then that would probably determine Well, I I can tell you that we we have about 600 through the A door and about 600 through the the B door. We're talking about 11 to 1200 students that come off those buses and it's almost divided evenly. Um we haven't stood there with a with a ticker. I just know from my But you're guessing six to 700. Yeah. And we have probably uh you know two 300 students that come in through um our main entrance uh between drop off parkers um and and um walkers at the same time. So that gives us we're over a little over 1400 students almost 1500 at the school. The main entrance would also cover visitors during the day. Yes sir. Yeah. that would that would be um looked at and

096staffed all through the day. Our our main B entrance and our main A entrance behind the school where the buses that would be primarily for student arrival. We don't have any visitors or extracurricular events that come through those doors. So we we would have that marketed as just a morning observation time and usage. I'm sure that we have something that tells us how many bus riders we have. Absolutely have to. That would be something. Um my other suggestion is that maybe we also reach out to our local police um because they get they are aware of grants that we probably aren't aware of. For instance, um I know that there's a grant for Ring doorbells in our town. So there's money coming in for Ring doorbells, but it hasn't been told to the village yet.

097But there's a grant that you can get to get your residents ring doorbells. So that type of thing may be the way. Maybe they're seeing things or whatever also that maybe they could pass on to us. Sure, that could be looked into. Hey Robin, now are you looking for us to buy these or are we looking to lease get these leased to us? I don't know if you answer that right now. That's still something to be learned. I believe the devices um and I'd have to speak more thoroughly with the vendor and if dollar signs got involved and I know Ken would be involved in learning more about that product, too. But um these devices I think would be purchased um with a maintenance plan and what is really leased is the software to operate

098the devices. The AI technology that um integrates itself into what these devices do because you saw the the image of of the gentleman walking through the device. Each device has a camera system on it. It's recording exactly that moment um should there be an alert. Okay. Yeah. I see you know with the technology artificial intelligence I kind of understand that but the sensor technology trying to understand exactly multiple sensors out there and all of that right so I'm curious to see just what type of technology these sensors provide and the last question I guess I agree with you I think taking a look and see is leasing an option versus buying just because of the technology Exactly. That's kind of where I'm going into the system and all that. Yeah. I think I think we

099should take a look at that and see because it's always like we do we do copers, right? Yeah. Yes, we do. That's a good example. So, I think I think it is the you know that because this is one of those areas of tech where it may be better than loose than it is. Yes, I agree with that. Excellent. And battery are these battery operated? They plug in just traditional but can you have these to be battery portable portable to the point where you don't need an AC outlet or external power source? this brand. I don't know. They have made battery operated ones that are um pretty cumbersome as far as the size battery that would operate and the technology did our computer, right? We plug our computers up. Correct. Chose to use the battery

100pump. But the the convenience is they just have a normal three-prong plug plug right into a wall. And we do have outlets by every door. Did we look at that at the front door to run a long 20 ft 30 ft extension? We would have to work with our maintenance and in-house electrician. Not difficult. I've walked it already with our maintenance just to see we would need an outlet here, an outlet there by these doorways. Um, and not an inconvenience for us. It would be a task, but not an inconvenience for us to run the power we need in house. Keith Keith, you can do that. Would you bid that out? Okay. Okay. Thank you. Good. Very good. Yeah. Thank you for having me. Thanks, Doug. Okay, next up is business. Dr. Hall has asked

101me to talk for about an hour, hour and a half. So, we're gonna, you know, take um President Alrech, if I can just go back to fees because this is scary, but I did find what I was looking for. So, Eric, if you could please look into this. It's in the administrative code um under section 1.245 of waiver of school fees. There's a statement in here. B, it says school boards that do not charge school fees must adopt the policy still. So, just kind of look into that. Give us some advice on that. Not a problem. I'll send an invoice. I'll send it for he retires soon to his second career. So, there you go. Ken, you can pay him. You can pay him out of your pocket. Yeah. lot of crowd. Um, uh, good

102evening board, Dr. Cara, uh, rest of my team here and also to the public in that the first couple of things are about the property tax relief grant. Uh, good news, good news and bad news. Good news is that we did receive a portion of the property tax relief grant uh, to the tune of about $343,000. We were actually eligible for $3.8 million. Uh we were school number 32 on the list of 32. So we just we got on the list uh uh in that amount. So u next week for approval do both years. I've I've uh been in consultation with John ISO Eric's firm and uh so we turn these then over to the clerk does some calculation with a limiting rate when they do the abatement. I honestly and I'll be all honest

103with you I I can't figure this one out but they do it just like they do county. So it's a little crazy but it will bring some relief to the property tax uh payer. Not a lot. I mean it's 345,000 $40,000 over everybody. So you may only see $2 out of your tax bill or something like that. But it is something and I think something that uh board approves this. I'm assuming they will next week. We'll begin advertising this out. After two years, it becomes part of our evidence-based funding module model. So that gets added to our evidence based funding. So we get this and this is the second year we're doing that. Pardon me. Second year we're being well this second time that we are not asking for the additional funds of taxes uh

104from all the adjustments and all of that stuff. So yes, there are the the first one is or the second one that we got for two years now is really nonab. We're just not asking that, but it does not put more of a tax on the tax. Yes, last number 40 on 39. This year 30 we're 32 and 32 got it. So we got a little bit. Okay. So So that's for that that'll come to 10. Is is this a baited against our um debt service? It's it's not and I've asked that question specifically, but it's done they do a calculation with the limiting rate Nelson that I I'm really not understanding. It does not hurt us though in the long run when we do our levy and all of that. Okay. So, it does

105not hurt us with that, but they do a calculation. We're one of the few counties um John had said to me, we may be one of the only counties in one of the only school districts in Will County that gets this. Most of them are all in Cook County. Yes. So then we get a grant to replace that. Yes. So it's a wash for us. Yes. But it does again, you know, part of this is to provide assistance and give a look to the tax. So So again, next year we'll reapply next year and we can get more money next year. This is guaranteed now for two years. As long as we get it for two years, but we can also apply next year for more money. So if we keep on moving up the

106list a little bit, we could get more money up to a max of about 3.8 million. No, it's still reduced. Those amounts are still reduced. They spread it out over a lot of our operating. So that's all. $410. Yes. Right. Sure. Right. Yes. Wait. You said that we have to do it for two years then. But the second year, are we guaranteed to get that money back again? Yes. Yes. We're guaranteed this for two years now. Yes. And then after after two years, we're guaranteed to have this go into our evidence-based funding model. So that goes into then our our funding that we will get every year. So we'll get this now forever. model. Well, that's one of the factors that is calculated to determine what tier you are in to to determine whether you

107get additional funding. So, our evidence-based money model has a base amount that we will always get. It's a whole harmless amount that we will always get and that always increases based on the additional money that we get depending on what tier we're in. Right now we're in tier one. So that means we get the most additional help. So we get an additional about I think it's about $700,000 in a year. Yes, we did for one year. Yes. And then and now weed back. Yes, I I honestly don't know. There's 30 different calculations and factors that go into this and it is a spreadsheet and I and I just look to I just to see what tier we're in. That's all I look at, you know. So, um but I know the one time around we

108talked about u student population and that had gone down a little bit. So, uh I think it now has stayed steady and that's one of the the ways that this evidence-based funding works. So it stays steady. But again, EAV is in there and all that is in there. So it's forces back. that question. I don't and I I'll have to I'll have to find that out. I'm not sure. Yeah, I don't know that. Yeah. Okay. So, these will come as resolutions. These will come as resolutions next week. Yes. For approval. And are these approved before we just read the title of the resolution? Just read the title of it because they'll be published. We'll have them published and everything. I'm just looking out for a secretary here. Yeah. Just planning ahead. Guess next up, the

109next one is uh discussion on the purchase of property located at 690 West Exchange Street. Wanted to come back and have a discussion with the board and let you know where we are at with this. Um I have had legal counsel Bill Gleason has worked on a purchase agreement. That agreement is right now uh has been passed over to the Old Plane Trail Bank for them to review. It's a pretty simple um agreement. The purchase price is 750,000 which is the um actual appraisal price. Um there is we have put in there a 5% credit in there. Uh I think that may be a little bit negotiable but we'll see. And but that has been put in there and offered to them which would be a credit on that price for us. Um and then

110what also is included in there is all of the and fixed furniture and fixture that is in the facility. So everything that's in there we would get and all that. Um I don't see this this won't be ready for next week's meeting. Uh it'll come back in March if that's the board's favor. We'll bring it back uh because we just want to make sure that the agreement is pretty well set before we do anything on that. So, uh, uh, they have a good chunk of our money over there. So, uh, yeah. U, the other thing that'll be included in there is actually a right ofway easement that we have worked out because in order to access our facility, if we were to buy it, we have to come through their parking lot. So, there is

111a rightway. I have talked to them about put a sign putting a sign out at the front also electronic sign and they are in agreement with that as long as we don't block their big LED sign and I said no I won't have too many things going on so u you know eventually we would probably do that also Ken can you check that address and make sure it's right because everything else on that side of the street is an odd number that's the address we've been using that's actually the address that's on demand it's got 690 it's 690 like the high school is 155 15. Yeah, it's on the building actually. Okay. I just wanted to make sure that we And Amazon's been delivering there. So I Amazon delivers anywhere they could find you. Right

112ac right across the street is 7:15. So I don't think it's Well, the high school is 1515 and the dome used to have I forget 735 or something. So I just wanted to make sure because that side has unless they because it's the back. Yeah, I'm something. I just want to make sure before we go all the way through and we got to run the address. Well, they're going to go they're going to go by PIN number anyway. That that's what they go by. Yeah. You know that that's But doesn't address appear somewhere on there. It will appear somewhere, but the big thing is the legal description of the property. The legal description of the property is not your address. It's your PIN. Okay. How that is. Okay. I just wanted to make sure because

113I get the high school's mail sometimes. Oh, okay. Because I live at 1515 but a different street. So, it's interesting. Exchange Wayne Drive. They all sound the same. So I guess my question is what is do we have an idea what the actual cost is going to be after construction because if we're planning on doing like any add-ons to it have we like tried to calculate that? I have I' I've looked at that if you remember a couple months back when I presented. I don't. All right. Well, we talked about athletic facilities that during that time. No. No. Uh during there we looked at and I and I talked to our architects about spending if we wanted to add on both a boardroom, separate entrance, a few more offices and all that which are needed.

114It's about a $2 million cost to do that if we eventually wanted to do that. Okay. Essentially, it could be $2,750,000. It could not. And I say that I'm saying so not that the 2 million is added into the 750. Yeah. Okay. So it's Okay. I guess but that's the decision down the road. Yes. Yeah. Well, here here's the thing. Um have you have you been over there? It's a nice place, but it's really small. I don't see it's kind of like the reason they built the new high school. People would say it's just so crowded and it was uncomfortable for the staff and there was issues with so I would want them to have the room to operate and be comfortable. That's what I was thinking of. I I thought that too. I said

115that. I said that you would you would not have to worry about people being on their cell phones. Okay. Next up, uh personnel and culture staffing discussion. I asked Mr. to give just a high level overview of some of our staffing changes. I did send that out to you as you recall yesterday based on some feedback I got. one of our board members again. [Music] Thank you. by 17. Okay, this was a this is a pretty lengthy process to come up with the staffing. Every year we uh do have meetings with all of the principles uh most of the directors who uh have extensive staff and we discuss the needs of the district and the limitations on resources and try to determine what is most needed from year to year and sometimes uh there are

116reductions sometimes there are additions and then when all is said and done we try to come down with a bottom line. So, if we can all look at the this is a two-sided I did teach seventh grade for a long time, so let me be clear. This is a two-sided piece of paper. On the side we're looking at, it says administrative changes at the top. So, I'm not going to go line by line, but uh just to kind of show how this works. Obviously, it's colorcoded. So, the current positions or the current uh the current positions are in the blue 2022 2023 positions and they correspond to the blue dollar amounts over to the right. And in the center you have the 23 24 proposed positions which correspond to the yellow in the middle on

117the right. And then uh the 2425 if there's any changes already being proposed there those are included under the pink which are also the pink dollar amounts on the right hand side. So that's how this is set up. So the the bulk of these changes have to deal with restructuring due to retirements and departing administrators uh as well as uh making sure that we have a smooth and efficient succession uh particularly given uh a retiring principal uh actually a couple retiring principles plus a retiring assistant superintendent of business that we keep trying to bar the door but he still wants to leave. and then of course a retiring director of technology and ultimately a retiring director of food service. So those are all addressed in here as well as the restructuring pieces that we have

118discussed uh in FYI in closed sessions as well as uh I believe uh we've even talked about openly. So the total amounts again not going line by line but the total amounts of changes for the coming year uh for 2324 would be an additional cost of $450,667. Uh and then looking at the following year after that in 2425 with the reductions that would be from the retiring individuals uh would reduce it again by 42,168. So that difference in green underneath there is 48,499. That's the net increase in those two years. If we look underneath there, we have the district level changes. Again, not necessarily going line by line. Most of these uh again deal with the uh the uh adjustments in technology and a couple of uh changes in the uh business office uh with

119a shift in duties and responsibilities for a couple of employees. So the 23 24 increase would be about 39,436 and in 2425 it would increase again uh to 65,900 and that net in green below that would be 105,336. At the bottom of the page, the summary of both, you can see the totals there. We have a net increase uh for administrative and district level changes of $153,835. If we could al together flip over to the other side. These are the the building level changes. Most of these again are fairly straightforward. Uh we do have one additional section uh for elementary. there is a building listed but that may not be the building where it occurs and that is intended to help balance enrollments uh particularly in uh in in a particular grade level. We have

120uh three teaching positions and two teacher assistant positions for the ELC expansion that we have been discussing for several months. And also uh we do have uh one elementary has a combined position. It's a leadership position. It needs to be divided. The duties are too much for one person. And so that is factored in. And then below there are just two uh teacher retirements where we have a teacher at the top of the pay scale leaving who will be replaced at the lower end of the pay scale for a significant savings. So the net change uh for 2324 at the building level will be $249,278 and the following year is at a zero because there's no increases built into these costs uh for cost of living at this point. So for uh this these totals

121uh that $249,278 the amount that could potentially be funded uh by a prek expansion grant is about $177,999. That leaves $71,279 to come out of the operational budget. And the total increase and decrease for all of this, if you take the total at the bottom of the front side of the paper and add that total, is $225,14. And Ken will tell you how we're going to come up with that. So re real quick on the building changes that is accommodating for the fourth grade class issue with uh extra students, right? That is the plan. Yes. And then obviously the other ones are for the ELC expansion. Yes. And so on down that line. So that's where you're getting that increase. And obviously on the other side is all the administration administrative uh changes. The administrative

122changes and the district level employee changes as well. And then Ken is going to explain how the 225,000 Ken Ken Surma the one to my left is going to explain that. So with this this does not calculate any of the does that calculate well we're so we're in the middle of negotiation with CEA it doesn't calculate any of that and it doesn't anything with acne right this is just straight change positional changes yeah just straight positional changes it doesn't put into account any cost of living one of the things you know when LA slid this under my door and ran the other way uh you know one of the things I I like to see is is and I think this is a question the board always asks is this sustainable? You know that's the

123thing and you know next year there is going to be a bump in salaries there there just is and you know a lot of it has to do with transition that is going to be taking place and all of that. So u a lot of that cost u I I'll be honest with you I I think I can cover uh with some er funds. We got a year left. we got some funds available and I can put a lot of this into there and make a cost for that. So, I think I can get reimbursed on a lot of that stuff. That's not sustainable. Well, but here here's the thing and this is that's why these net numbers are really important because again, your net numbers are telling you that it's only $225,000 over this

124year's cost in 2425. So what you have to come up with is 225,000. Compound. It does. It does not compound. That's why we did this straight math. It does not compound. It doesn't. So because Mr. Brown, if you look at this sheet, what you'll see in the very first category next year, administrative salaries bump up $450,000. Then they drop $42,000. And that's because of of the retirement pipeline. It's it's a retirement pipeline and then we're not, you know, like I'll give you example, you know, we're recommending bringing in a director of operations to shadow me that that goes away, right? That goes away. So, so there are some of those things that are happening. So that's where the drop. So it is not a compounding effect, okay? And all that. and the 225 if you

125if you're looking at this the 225 is based over two school years. Yes. So essentially we have to figure out the sustainability um you know after that basically uh what 15,000 a year. There there's two ways there's two ways of doing I shouldn't say doing this but this is the way I do it. I I need to find the money next year for the increases. I believe I can take a lot of that out of ESER and get reimbursed for that. I think there's some things we can do with grants like you see the ELC grant that'll cover some of that expenditure. So, I think we're okay there. My concern is going to be 2425 when those ESSER funds go away. And again, we're going to be searching really for $225,000. I think you'll be

126fine. I think that that is not, you know, in a $90 million budget. That's not a lot of money. And so I I think it is sustainable after that. So I you'll be okay after that. I won't be here, but you'll be okay after that. Say it each time. I said it before you did. But but to think about it another way that 225 is then kind of in the base budget on the out years. Yes. And those assuming those people will get some raises and stuff, but it's not 225 every year. And if we can get it in the budget, then as the cost of living and all that other stuff goes in, then it's a lot easier to tolerate, right, than a big hit. Well, and one of the things that I'll I'll

127share with the board, too, and I know this is something, Bill, that you've talked about is doing some long reach planning. So, Brian and I went to a workshop uh about two weeks ago with Forecast 5 that does a lot of our financial statements, and they have just implemented a new uh uh financial projection system. that we took a look at that doesn't cost us anything. U and it is it's really slick. It uses our actual ledgers that are in the system and it'll project things out for us based on information. So Brian and I are beginning to work on that and and hoping that by the time you get the budget section, you'll also have a fiveyear plan. So essentially when I look at this, nobody's getting a raise. We haven't factored those in

128right now at all. This is just straight salaries. We have not factored that in. Well, a raise would be part of the salary. Well, I'm sure that I'm sure it will be, but we didn't want to put anything out there because we didn't want to guess. I mean, I I know you can't guess, but I'm I mean, I'm just saying, right, that this was this 402,000. It's probably not going to be 402,000 then, especially if you consider raising It could be more, you know, but again, some people will not get a raise because they're going to be new on the salary schedule here. Some people will get a raise. So, all right. Okay. So, this is a constant constant dollar constant 20 22$23. So, is Dr. of all like the new uh director of technology

129for 2425 that is a constant figure that they will not get a raise on they're new to new position so that's what they're doing you know other than Mr. the mic. Okay. Other than the tiff that we're looking to get over the next couple years, we're not bringing much additional revenues in. We got very few new construction going on. Probably more over the last year than we have over the last many years. Our EAV is probably I don't think it's $800 million. I don't think we hit the million billion dollar plateau. So what I heard and correct me if I'm wrong, I don't want to compromise the educational component here. I think Lyall, you said that one of the higher pay paying teachers was leaving and you're going to replace that with a lower paid

130person. Why would we want to do that? Correct me if I'm wrong. Want to it? They're paid on a salary schedule. So certainly you're going to replace an outgoing retired teacher with a lot of years of experience with a younger teacher who will get paid less on the salary schedule. They will start their path upward. So we can bring a teacher of close to being much more seasonal than a starting teacher. Do we look to do that or do we look to take advantage to say, "Hey, we lost a big gun here. Let's bring in a new gun for the sake of saving." We will hire a more experienced teacher. Absolutely. There there's not a li we have not put a cap on a cost of a new teacher. So it could be higher than

131what you see here. We put the base salary because that's that's the amount we know it has to be. But it could be higher if we hire a more experienced teacher or a more you know a teacher with uh higher degrees and so forth. If they place higher in the salary schedule, yes, we bring them in at that. Yeah. Because I would not want if you post the position that a more experienced teacher look at it and you seek to hire that least experienced teacher just for the sake of money. That's not considered No. And and very few districts would do that. That used to be a practice years ago, but it is not. No, we just No. Well, we we just put the numbers in there just because it's the base salary. That that's

132that's really what we did. But Mr. Brown, if you think about it, it's on a salary schedule. So if you brought somebody in at the same dollars, they're ready to retire next year. It don't have to be the same dollars, but I'm just saying not here you have one that's, you know, ready to retire and you're going to bring one in between, right? So obviously they do not have that knowledge base like that one that's going out, but it meets somewhere. Yeah. Here to bring in that experience because we're trying to get our educational component up too, right? Yeah. you know the most position at the time. I'm assuming Lyall you would take if they applied you would. That's all I'm saying. I just don't want it to be Oh, this is the lowest one.

133Oh, no. No. That is that is absolutely. We have not put any any constraints on our administrators to select candidates. We have hired teachers who have 20 plus years of experience. We've hired brand new people fresh out of college and everything in between. That's why I was kind of getting like, okay, hey, look, we can save $50,000 here because we're bringing in a younger person, you know, less experienced person. Da da da. All right. Thank you, sir. Dear, Mr. Surma, how are you? Always well. How are you? Are you count are you are you are you Hey, Ken, are you counting the days and the months and hours? No, not yet. Not yet. That starts. No, my my boss won't let me. Give that to you. Yes, ma'am. Um, so these numbers, we're not figuring

134in anything that's going to take place in negotiations. We're just saying at this point we need to look for 225, but we're going to be looking for more than that. We could be I I don't know that. And we didn't want to guess on any of that stuff. I don't want to guess, but it's I mean, let's be realistic. Well, it's not going to stay the same. No, I I don't think it is. But but again, I didn't know what number to put out there because again, in the middle of negotiations, I don't want to throw a number out there. What I'm getting at is the 220. We're not in the middle. We just that 225 is going to change. There's no doubt about that. You're going to be looking for in my estimation could

135be a chunk more, maybe not a chunk more, but that 225 we have to make sure people understand that's not all we're going to be looking for to sustain. I think Well, let let me let me mention this though, Janine. Okay. Because a lot of these on the front page are non-union people, right? But they're se but what I'm saying but let me what I'm saying is that those salaries won't really change on the back the ones that are teacher salaries. A lot of those would be grant funded and I can get the extra money through the grant whatever that is. Right. But we have a lot of union teachers, right? But we're only talking about these on here, right? But in the when everybody's saying we're going to be looking for 225 more sustainable

136that I think we need to make it clear to the public who's watching and anybody else that there is going to be more than 225 we're going to be looking for sustainable. I believe it's going to be higher. Yes. I don't believe it's going to be a chunk. But this this God bless you. This 225 is just related to the staffing changes on this page. It's not for the overall right. So Sure. Sure. All right. Ken, you just I agree. You just made a statement about grant funding. I know ELC here I would imagine all the positions are grant funded, right? I'm sorry. Say that again. All of the ELC positions here in the school is grant funded or No, no. The program is grant funded or no? We we receive uh in the preschool

137grant and I'm just going to think off the top of my head about $450,000 a year is what we receive for the preschool for all grant. I believe we also have some preschool money in our IDA grant. I'm looking at Miss Perkins right now who's rumbling through the papers right now. And while she's looking at that, what positions are grant funded? 45,000. So there's an additional 45,000. So it's about $500,000 that we get in grant money for the ELC program. So the preschool teachers are grant funded. Some are not all of them. Some are. So if you look on page two, there's little footnotes there. Four through nine. If you look on the right side, perfect vision. Four through nine are grant funed. Okay. Yes. Okay. So, positions four through eight or footnotes four through

138eight funded positions. I got it. Okay. All right. Which those about $177,000, Mr. Brown, in addition to grants, we spend we have local budgets of about Don't hold me to this, but I think it's about $1.2 million in additional local budget money that we spend in the ELC program. uh teachers supplies blah blah blah all that so off hand I I don't expect you to know this but I'm going to ask you anyway our fund balance at this point and we borrow quite a I don't know I'll have to borrow we borrow working cash we borrow working cash to replenish our fund balance we not to add on to that and technically that is not sustainable income once you use it has gone. It erodess, right? The fund balance, the working cash. Yes. So, right

139now we have a balanced budget, we have a surplus. And again, God forbid we do not get this tiff expirement from University Park, we can be kind of going down without coming up anytime soon. Right. Right. Okay. So again, a lot of this and with our negotiating that's going on is going to be predicated on getting that tiff. I think I think a lot of it will be I I think there's a lot of programs. I'm not just talking about, you know, as I shared with the board, you know, that tiff money has a lot of I mean, you know, I say this tongue and cheek, a lot of value in what it can do for this district. That is sustainable income. You know, that is sustainable income. And again, it can help pay for

140salaries. It can help pay for maintenance program that the buildings need. And it can help pay for new athletic facilities that are needed. I mean, but all that's future. Yeah. No, I I I understand that, but I but you know, the future is getting close and and so but again, I'm just saying that, you know, there there's a value to that. And so, you know, um you know, we just had a we just had an issue from one of our schools and it's not a life safety issue, but those were some of the that occurred at one of our schools a week this past week. Yes. That we're going to have to look at those things to make big capital investments on. Right. And and again, that that's part of our facility assessment plan that

141we have moving forward with preventative maintenance. That's all part of it too that you know we need the funds in order to do that. I don't think that's a preventable maintenance at this point. We need preventive maintenance. That is a that is a these are some it's a capital needs assessment. It is it is you know so those are things that we're going to have to look at is I think I think we're getting a little far field from staffing here so let's let's get back on track. No we're talking about money. Yeah I know but that's the thing. So the item on the agenda is around staffing. So um any others questions on staffing? Okay, next up, teaching and learning presentation of the calendar for 22 23 24. Thank you. How how do we

142how do we calendar to have Valentine's Day on board a board meeting on Valentine? Thank you. Go. Okay. Good evening again to the board, Dr. Cara, staff, and our family at home. Um, each year, OTL presents a calendar to the board um for approval. This is a proposal of what the calendar committee worked on, which includes uh administration uh CMEA members and ACME members. And so I will ask for a recommendation for approval at next week's board meeting. Uh in the packet you will see the uh committee members. We met three times this year to deliver this 2324 school calendar. And when we are meeting, we try to look at balancing our trimesters um for our elementary buildings. Um because we are still um don't have full air conditioning at the elementary buildings. Uh we

143put in some construction concerns starting as late in August as we possibly can. professional development days, orientation, institute days, um taking into consideration with the high school, uh trying to get them to finish their um quarter so trimester by I'm sorry, semester by the uh before we go on winter break. Um the start of grade levels uh K through nine on that first day of school. uh as well as assessments that we put into the calendar and graduation dates. Uh we also look at the state holidays that we have um and uh think about our our families in terms of being consistent with the days that we have off for school improvement where we have our early early dismissal. And so you have this open a copy of what that calendar is uh that we

144will ask to be approved next week. Do you have any questions and then this will be posted on the website once approved. We don't put the prom on uh the calendar. Okay. The high school chooses that date once they work with their um the vendor where they will hold it. Make sure it's not. But we did hear uh from our families that they would like to know graduation dates ahead of time. So we did start adding that to the calendar. Yeah. Not to have Valentine's Day on board. So So by starting the 24th of August, is that why um they're going till June 5th and 6th? Correct. And next year for the calendar committee because we will have air conditioning in all buildings, we can move that date up. And June 6th is the with

145the emergency days though, right? So wouldn't it be No, that goes that is without any emergency. That's not making up any days because we have the e-learning plan, right? And that would be only if we did not use our e-learning days, which we can use in lie of um trying to make up those days. I don't really have a question, but what does it mean that the state holiday is non-attendance unless a public hearing is held? That's if you want to have school on that day, you have to have a public hearing. Yes, we have to have a public hearing and then we have to um have a curriculum in place of not being in school on those days. Okay. Seems to be a going long into the year that we are in the school.

146I've ever seen school end in June. Maybe that's what it is. Seniors get out at their graduation. They they finish right at the I thought it was only the Chicago schools get out in June. No, they're uh late too. Yeah, they're It looks like they're a week behind and I think they accommodated the construction. Correct. Yeah. Okay. Because I think the seniors are getting out a little the graduation's about a week later. It's usually before Memorial Day and this and this year it'll be after. Yes. So I what we used to call Columbus Day. So that's actually officially indigenous people's day. Yes. So in Chicago it's called Columbus Day. Wow. Okay. Recommendation about three or four years ago. Okay. Now, Veterans Day, officially the day is the 11th, right? And why why are we celebrating

147on a Friday as opposed to a Monday? I think that's the the day that's marked um Saturday. I think that's the federal holiday. I think they do Friday and if you have it on a Sunday, they do it on Monday. Okay. So, that's the rationale for there. That makes sense. Okay. So, this will be on the agenda for approval next week. It will. Thank you very much. I didn't see my birthday. Okay. Um, is there any old business? Yes. Yeah. Um, the only one I have is I know last week we had an issue over at Creed Elementary. Um, I guess where we at on that? And I guess the frustration I which I think I sent in my email was more or less that it took a teacher to bring it up where I

148think three of the previous administration brought it up. So work orders I I would assume and and Ken, correct me if I'm wrong. I know we have a system for it, but obviously if a teacher or administrator or someone in the building comes to somebody or files work order at 2:00 or 3:00 or 4:00 or 5:00, every morning somebody's got to be logging in and figuring out what's priority and goes to the top of the list because water on the floor is safety hazard, right? So just wondering what came about that is it fixed and then moving forward how are we who's monitoring and work like who's sure um two separate issues so let me share both of them I believe we've had the roofing contract behind and that and the result of that was

149anything Okay. All right. So, it is a roof issue over there. Um, there are I'm walking lightly on this one, so bear with me. There there are some issues I I believe internally with how these are looked at in that um that I have become involved in and we'll take care of that. Um I think um you know I always as I've shared with the board I always systems and how our system is, you know, um and usually where there's fault is because the system is not being used properly. So, uh I have uh gotten involved with that and we'll stay on top of that. Keith and I have already had a few discussions about this and we'll be having I I equate it to a fast food drive-thru. So they're on point is we

150have so many seconds that when an order is placed to get it out whether it's going to be satisfactory or not to corporate. It's kind of the same thing here. Our staff I think um teachers uh even maintenance and custodial uh but definitely our students if they slip and fall and hit their head right it's a problem. So I just need to make sure that I think we talked months ago that you can prioritize the work order. So obviously you have um something in here that needs to be rehung could let's say a level four but water on the floor should be a level one and I think that's where we need to make sure because we don't want any issues of someone getting hurt then they go to the doctor or work with comp

151now it's a whole different thing let alone a student getting hurt right yeah you know and one of the things I think I shared with the board when I responded to this was you know a lack of communication you know and that and you know And this is where again I look at a system, you know, the system will do the work for you. If when you go to respond, if somebody's looking at those work orders and now delegates it to somebody else and I change the status of a work order from being, let's just say I'll just make from being entered to now I passed it to somebody. it will automatically communicate back to the person that sent it saying here's where the status of your work order is. So the system will do

152that for you. It's just that you have to work the system the right way and you have to have the proper people in place to do right and and so and so that's what I'm saying. So this is you know operating the system properly and make sure it's done on consistent proper basis. The same thing when either the maintenance person goes out um or uh we have a contractor go out that work order has to be updated. The status needs to be changed. So it goes back again to the person that submitted that and said, "Hey, I've had the person out there and then we put notes and all that. So, so those are things that need to uh be corrected and will be corrected." So the person that sent us the email, have they

153been at least contacted? And Keith personally contacted them to let them know the status of everything. Yes. And that it's taken care of. That that person did not submit a work order. No, not the one that not the one that sent us the email, but at that point there were other ones that it was the fourth one. I think it was very redundant at that point. Yes. Yes. So yes. Okay. So if you don't mind if you can if it's not it's February now. Maybe by April give us an update. I I sure would on that how that system's functioning by next month. A report would be kind of like the bus incident we used to have where we would get a monthly report of how many incidents we have and miraculously they all went

154away. So if we have a find outstanding ones, how long do they take? I'd like to know how long a work order actually takes. Yep. I guess what my question is is last month or the month from the floor, Mr. Swallish asked you how an update on work orders. Were we taking care of them in a timely fashion? Blah blah blah. So this was looked at recent.