001okay I hereby call this meeting to order a roll call please Brown is an eye Mrs Galbraith here Dr Hall Mr sawales here Mrs Walters vice president rupe here president off work here 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 us and Miss rupe can you please recite our mission statement yes our mission is to empower each student to positively impact the world for a bright new future thank you Cheryl do we have any public comment tonight okay so first up is board updates and going to go around the table and have everyone update uh what they learned what they did what they
002attended at the triple I conference which was held in November and for those listening at home the triple I conference is the Illinois Association of school board annual conference all the boards from around the state attend and and there's lots of information there so anyway who wants to start I can start at the this end okay um at the AAA conference I am uh the boards IAA ASB delegate representative so it's actually an interesting process but the delegate assembly allows us a representative from each district to go there and vote on different resolutions that are coming up uh new ones amending them or future future things coming up out of the resolutions there were 16 original in the summer they only eight of them they pulled three of them were new and the only one
003there that passed was they're trying to adjust the fund balances uh make an adjustment to that to a lot of schools want to spend money pull from a fund one way or another they're going to start that process the other two which is a big topic is alternative fueling for school buses whether they should go all electric or hybrid and then on the second part of it they had five that they amended the two big hot topics that we we're in there I think for three over three hours Capital grant funding for school buildings so they want to allow open up some Capital grants to allow us to schools to put it and reinvest and the second part which is another big one was school safety so I ASB is going to legislation to figure
004out how can they approve money for schools to invest into school safety which is obviously a Hot Topic so that was primarily um that was pretty much my entire Saturday it seemed like we were there for a long time the way the process works but so it was agreed that the iasb is a lobbying organization would promote those that type yeah yeah and and the Kappa grain funding for school buildings was adopted in the school safety fund the only the only other one that was somewhat of a hot topic was they're adopting to they don't want if you're running for school board they don't want you to accept contributions from uh political influences or you know parties let's say like the NRA they just don't want you to be involved in that so they're just
005amending that resolution okay it was good you want to go sure okay on Friday my first meeting was making your meetings count and actually a lot of the changes we've made were changes that people were suggesting they were thinking about doing so we're on target the only thing that I really noticed after leaving the meeting was the only thing that we don't do is we still spend quite a bit of time in our business meeting this doing discussion and that what they're saying is you should have a committee of the whole or some other meeting previous to your business meeting do your discussion there and then just use your business meeting for your business do your votes and get out of there unless something's come up so that was the only thing I noticed that
006we really weren't practicing real solid because we do have a lot of discussion in this meeting sometimes too and sometimes it's necessary so really going to that meeting showed me that all the changes we've made in the last couple years is what other people are looking to do to streamline their meetings so that was interesting then in the afternoon I went to the equity in wow I can't remember the second word like it was a whole group of vendors and speakers and our wonderful Dr kaglinis was one of the speakers and they had roundtables her speech was great I got to see Dr Harden there and there were a lot of people attending that you could come and go to it and the vendors were different types of colleges and I got some information passed
007it on to Dr Karen there were some some good tidbits at the round tables the round tables were excellent discussions and um there was one other I went to oh then I went to safety I tried to go to safety on the weekend because I'm on the safety committees and I hooked up with Eric Johnson who I took class from two years ago and he remembered me and asked me if we had made the changes and I've now hooked him up with Dr with Mr Tobias and they are going to get together he is going to come and assess our buildings and see if what we're doing is what's perfect because we have such a large layout that he wants to see if what we've done in all of our buildings is meeting and it's
008all free it's through the Illinois safety technical team and they're out of Springfield and he will come up he's going to arrange it with Mr Tobias for some time in February I believe to come up and spend a day or two with us and see if you know by then after checking doors he's just going to walk in a building and check a door and see if we've got we're up to date and we're watching things so that was that was a good I spent about two hours with him um and I took a couple other classes and safety and it does it's now appearing that we're doing the things that we need to do we're kind of ahead of the game I'm finding that going to some of these sessions we're already doing what
009they're talking about you should be looking at doing so I think we're ahead of the game in a lot of them okay um as long as we're going around the table I'll go next um I wanted to get into see that that was a threat assessment class that I think you safety threat assessment or something you were you were there because I tried to get in the room was packed and one of the things I found this year well I found a lot a lot of the topics on safety they had they didn't anticipate the number of people that wanted to attend so it was hard to get yeah right and uh so I saw you were in there so I slipped off and found went to one on superintendent evaluation which was hosted by
010Perry our former iasb rep so it was a good refresher on superintendent evaluation and then um the other one that I attended was called stop the shortage labor and employment I was talking about negotiating uh contracts Union contracts in a period of where there's a shortage of teachers and there's some good information in there the interesting thing though was that one of the panelists was an attorney from Springfield Samantha bobor and she's a Crete money grit so I was very very impressed that so anyway so that was really my report so no uh half the book or just a third which how much do you want me just what I mean well I really always enjoy going to these conferences it's so much so much as many of my colleagues have already alluded to so
011much to learn but I stay focused again I went to quite a bit of the sessions there but I stay focused primarily on stem you know classes that dealt with the stem program and strategies and goals so I would like you to connect to the Roselle School District sd-12 the superintendent Henderson and I think I made this remark before over the last couple months about she was so committed to say all students who enters the kindergarten we'll be reading at the grade level by the end of third grade I know we have a little different demographics than that school district but I found that to be a very robust commitment Roselle you know that's way up North West it says all students will successfully complete algebra by the end of eighth grade and that will
012be determined how successful they were when they take a high school math placement she wants to eliminate the team of gap which is strong and dear to my heart as well as the whole board with the math achievement achievement Gap in ela so again they had a they actually had a contractor or consultant and it was a data driven very data driven and I thought the data that they were showing and I stayed at that table around table for quite a few hours and I turned around it was about 30 people in line waiting to sit down to talk to her too so I helped her show up it wasn't new with Mo right so that was good with that and again I'm real good on trying to seek out opportunities for stem and there
013was another school district and I have it here but nonetheless it was I think this was a great opportunity and they called it colonel to coin popcorn popcorn to making money coin with a k k o i e n so that was a stem program and we have a large agriculture District here that they had about one acre that was meant to them to be used by a personal property owner where the kids grew popcorn and learned the science behind it and then they actually sold a popcorn and made money I thought that was really good so if we have an opportunity to do that you know I have at least an acre half an acre or whatever I can share with the district at no cost and the popcorn that they actually grew it
014was delicious I wish I had enough to share with the board but I don't I ate it all I did bring it back so and there was a couple other stem programs that I'm looking to take a road trip up north that have similar demographics than us so I can go on and on but primarily or one more again big and this is part of our strategies when it comes to partnership and engaging our communities that it was a good speaker from Northern Illinois University and that topic was that was table 31 partnership with the community on stem program okay it was kind of hilarious her story how she engaged as I saw you I believe was yesterday was it yesterday you are definitely engaging with the community okay but I don't know if I've
015seen you engage like this lady with this example I'm about to give you she says she engaged with the community she actually went to a local church and she said she just wasn't accustomed to the church service service that she attended she said but at the end of the day she was saying hallelujah okay she was Raising her hands but that's how engaged she felt and how receptive she was to the community to get out the stem program and partnership with Northern Illinois and the local community so I'll share that with you as well okay all right okay I'll go into a church service well you say hallelujah it's over now okay all right well I I find when I go I always enjoy the Saturday morning General Session and this one had an author
016Amanda Ripley talks about conflict conflict in and of itself is not a bad thing in fact you probably can't accomplish much if you don't have some conflict that you can have positive debate and that type of thing but she has a book called high conflict and that's when it gets bad because then it's like all or nothing that's when people are very highly emotional that's when it's us and them you know when you're making another group your enemy and um and so she just talked about how to work through that had some really interesting anecdotes about some gang members in Chicago that truly hated other people but then because they had a common goal which was to stop the violence they listened to each other they communicated and they found ways to work together and
017you know we see that on every level I mean we've even seen that on our level um and and I think have done a good job working through it because we have a common goal which I read every week or every meeting so that was really good otherwise I think my word was practical I like practical things so I went to an onboarding board members for Success because we know we're going to have at least one new board member in the spring and then possibly more possibly not but I don't think people realize just how much is involved with being a board member and how much you need to know and I think it behooves us who are have been here to make the transition smooth for whoever comes on so I thought that was
018good I went to something similar board and superintendent relationships and I think we've done a good job there like Janine said it reinforced that we're doing things well and then I went to um explaining the tax levy which showed me that Ken does a wonderful job every time everything he says is true but I went because it's not an easy subject matter for me for some reason so the more I could drill it into me just the better so um yeah it was kind of practical session for me it was good okay oh thanks everybody Nelson can I just do one more thing for your board updates um I would just like to say thank you for my family and myself as you know I had a loss over Christmas and thank you to the
019board the administration and all the staff members I reached out it was amazing the acts of kindness the emails the texts so thanks to all of you for helping me through that period you're very welcome okay if I just want to add one more thing I'm regarding yesterday event that was outstanding is he going to steal my thunderstorms right there but just kudos to you kudos to Janine and all that was involved just so proud of the how many people participated and I mean it was it was it was amazing it was amazing so for our audience that perhaps at home well can we just turn that over to superintendent updates okay I wasn't sure I didn't I wanted to take an opportunity it's a good segue yeah actually you know we wanted to certainly
020uh acknowledge and recognize Martin Luther King's birthday as of Monday all of our schools that are you know excellent job in the classrooms on their Marquees you know recognizing and remembering uh Dr King for his tremendous contributions um and then also on that day we took that as an opportunity to hold our very really our very first Community mentoring um really a youth Symposium so we had over a hundred of our students register for it and I would say we probably had over 100 adults from the community uh come and support that so basically what that looked like we invited many of our students our male only students from eighth grade to 12th grade to come and to have some panel discussions with other males African-American males as models mentors some of them sharing their
021stories of how they themselves you know were in trouble as a youth and how they turned their lives around and really focusing this attention on our students one of them was um you know what happens when you get in the wrong group so kind of kind of that gang awareness Guilty By Association they had one where we had police officers from the various areas one of them from Chicago um African-American man telling his story and then we also had entrepreneur and then we had one that was out with the vendors we had all sorts of vendors from our area again um many of the fraternities that were there we had the fire department from Crete was there you know they're going to be focusing on blood drives and trying to to elicit some support so
022it was an amazing event it was from ten to two um it was the students were there from from ten to two and we had the students give an exit interview when they were done so we're going to be reviewing all that but again the purpose of this was to again reach out to our males and really start focusing on um letting them know there's some Alternatives out there and listening in the sessions because I went to all the sessions some of our young men were asking some really good questions they were thinking and I can tell you by looking at all of them nobody had a cell phone out nobody had any earbuds and nobody had their hoodies on and they were mesmerized by listening to other men talk and so it was really
023an impactful day we are going to be doing one for our ladies uh probably this spring in fact we're going to be meeting tomorrow with our met Community mentors to do brief on yesterday and then also start planning our ladies event for this spring so anyway I think all the board members that were able to come I know it was during the day for for many of you working and you had other family responsibilities but for those that did come we certainly appreciated that I was able to speak to some of the vendors and the students the vendors were thrilled the fire department was like what a great group of young men and some of the two of the four firefighters graduated from here so that made it even more interesting to see the interaction
024to see what they were seeing but because they had to come to me for food I was able to talk to students and they were loving the fact that they felt like they were in a safe environment where they could interact and talk and not be looked down upon or somebody saying oh you're a wuss or whatever they really felt really good in the sessions they felt like we were we really were listening to them and that was one of the things I kept saying is they were listening they were listening the adults were listening so I never got to talk with you much afterward but that was one of the highlights of the all of them coming through the line I would ask them what were you in who who was who was your
025moderator you know just trying to get them and they freely were discussing the whole day which is a good sign in my book because they weren't ashamed to talk about what what was going on that day so I think I agree with my amazing is probably the only word I could come with at the end of the day of course it was amazing that I hooked up with you at the end of the day yeah the sky blue here because Mr Brown I was there at uh but I was you know glad to see another board member there I know it was a holiday and all of that so I pressed my way out it was a sacrifice but I when no regrets no regrets at all and again thank you Dr coglinese for getting
026the message of Dr Martin Luther King on the Marquis okay in some way shape or form a little different the the message was a little different but nonetheless it was a message there but however there was two schools I did a drive around yesterday it was two schools that was not lit up at all that was Bo Morrow and Talala so I don't know if you can look it to that find out did they pay their electric bill or what okay both okay you shouldn't let me know I would have came and put a jumper out there or something okay to light it up yes but that was good good job that's the community engagement that's great uh look will you put up something maybe in your board update about the debrief from the um
027we had a couple professional uh photographers there one that was all you know volunteer from them and I'm hoping to put together some sort of a slideshow so that you can kind of take a look at some of the things that were happening and yes we will do a debrief on that I'm just anxious to see what the kids had to say it seems like we've got momentum so how do you continue it well right and we we tapped into it just a really a talented group out there of individuals from our community I just so enjoyed meeting all of them who really would have just did it all for me if you would have got up there and started dancing with those guys okay that would have did it that would have did it
028I could yeah that was uh what were they called uh Kappa League yeah they were saying so she was like he was like very good um they are hosting at Southland is it Southland Academy or whatever they're on um Sauk Trail in Richton Park yes um February 18th I gave Mr Holly field the flyer they have a stepping contest and they're looking for Crete to enter a dance team so Mr hollyfield is already working on that because he would like to see us and it's just about 1200 young people who go out and dance and mingle and meet each other and uh so he's he's working on that already I gave him the flyer and the their coach and Mentor is an amazing man also I gave all that information Mr Holly Fields remember where
029I work I took a video I showed it to my wife I didn't know what they were doing what type of dance there was gone my wife so that I stepping us it is yeah I didn't realize I didn't step in the first time it's a different yeah there's many different types of stepping I guess but those young men were amazing and as polite and kind as could be so yeah they thought it would be interesting to try and get me to do it I'm like no I fed you that's all you get but like you said that's just that's just a surface part of it and keep that momentum going as the president alluded to that that'll be great that's that's what I'm here for keep that going thank you okay uh next up
030is the consent agenda um Dr cagwanese would you read the items on the consent agenda let's do that uh under the superintendents number one approve regular meeting minutes December 20th 2022 item two approved Committee of the whole meeting minutes of December 13 2022 item three approved Committee of the whole meeting closed session minutes of December 13 2022 under teaching and learning number one is the cmhs dance team overnight field trip application for February 10th through 12th of 2023 under business item one approved Board of Education financial report item two approved a payment to CCC Holdings Inc for a 392 thousand 100 961 and 39 cents for the work at Crete money High School item three for the Edition item three approved payment of uh 93 700 795 and 24 cents for RL Soho for the
031work at CSK item four approved payment of 134 522 19 cents for RL Soho for the work at Balmoral Elementary item five approved payment of um 6025 and 14 cents for our also hold for the work at CSK for 2022 item six approved payment of 11 578 and 94 cents for RO Soho for work at Crete Elementary item seven approved payment of 39 341 and 11 cents for our old Soho for work at Bellmore Elementary and item eight approved payment in the amount of 81 961 and 24 cents RL Soho for the work at ELC and talawa Elementary item nine approve a payment of 131 267 and 70 cents for our El Soho for the work at Crete Elementary for a Personnel report item one would be to approve the Personnel report which includes approval
032of certified staff employment leave of absence return of leave of absence resignation dismissal educational support staff employment reassignment leave of absence return from leave of absent resignation and is it okay before I get a motion is there any item on the consent agenda member would like to have taken off and voted on separately okay hearing none can I have a motion to approve the consent agenda moved second any questions or comments on the consent agenda okay oh that's one one quick question under the finance report Ferry it's not I think we had again I can't recall which page but it was very simple but I'm just curious to see what it was we had it looked like approval for our kids to go to I believe Imagine Theater in Frankfurt I believe recall that Imagine
033Theater trip I saw a picture me too on Facebook we take the kids to see movies was that high school or I think it was I was just curious I'm just curious but the whole ninth grade eighth grade okay was that the C what was that the see the second version of the Black Panther movie or something I'm seventh grade now so I don't know I'm just I'm just curious to see what you know what I mean I'm curious I mean it's I'm not looking to to find something bad out of this is good I'm just what was that all about that's that's okay thank you thank you any other question any other questions on the consent agenda okay roll call Brown is an i Mrs Galbraith aye Mr sawales hi vice president Rook aye
034president Albert aye motion carries okay next up is action reports under business can I get a motion to approve a resolution providing for abatement of the 2022 Levy adjustment moved second you can maybe you can put some color behind this where the municipalities or districts can recoup any adjustments that were made as part of tax appeals or anything like that this year that amount last year if you remember the board also approved a baiting an amount a little bit over three hundred thousand dollars this year that amount is 295 42.22 so we will not be asking the taxpayers for that money okay can you can you say it again 295 295 042.22 should that be in there if we're voting it is actually in the resolution itself it's just not on it's not on there
035we didn't have the number yet so it's not on here but I have it in resolution in fact I was just checking in Mr swallis so once you're with that resolution we'll go over to the president secretary for Signature that we're good okay yep and that was why because the amount wasn't here that's why I asked him to elaborate myself any other questions or comments going back to resolutions does all resolutions have to be read out in some capacity or some has to and some does not that's is this one that skipped the process of what what do you participate yes you got to earn your money Bill you traveled all the way here is to opinionated on the bonds want you to read the whole title that's why when you do a lot of
036those finance things you do it under the open meetings Act and the school code what you're required to do is provide an agenda that is describes insufficient efficient is that you're going to be a ble to help within the agenda as Mr service explanation there's certainly sufficient information here or to approve it okay when you talk everybody listen so so okay roll call okay Mrs galbirth aye Mr swallis hi browners and I vice president Rue aye president Albrecht aye motion carries um next up can I have a motion to accept and approve the base bid of thirty nine thousand four hundred dollars for a total contract of thirty nine thousand four hundred dollars for Midway Contracting group for the abatement of asbestos and the gymnasian at Talala elementary school so move second and Kenwood would
037this work start this would be work that would be done over spring break okay um for this is so that we can use that area for storage when we do the main asbestos abatement in the summer 23 at the rest of the school okay that's so we're going to be doing it over spring break okay any other questions or comments no and that was part of our presentation and plan that we did when we were talking about all that just so everybody knows yes it is okay a roll call Mr Swang hi Brown is an i Mrs Galbraith aye vice president aye president Auburn aye motion carries okay next up is old business does anybody have any old business I have one item for Ken don't look at me like this it's a pleasant subject
038uh how are we doing on the laundry equipment for athletics um I honestly have not done anything on it to be honest I'm very honest with you I've talked to John kaneki about it we haven't had a follow-up conversation on it so I have not talked to him the question that comes up is when you put laundry equipment in somebody's got to do the laundry now I mix salads and stripes and darks and lights and all that stuff but um I'll have a follow-up conversation with Mr kaneki see what the need is over there thank you because we have employees that take it home and do it now and and they haven't turned the whites red so okay I think my understanding when I spoke with him is he does have a plan for how
039that would be handled okay um so I would appreciate it if you could just follow up and see where we stand on that because my last one I chatted with him when I ran into him I guess he does have a location okay because I know that was another issue where would they be put sure so I will follow up with you thank you sir yep the only the only thing I had was Mr Brown last week brought up um the safety and metal detectors and where we were at on that and that just led me to to bring up clear backpacks so if I understand right we require that second grade and up correct so I guess we're it's January we've got a couple months left in the seat you know in the school
040year four months four and a half about next year do we change that and I hate to even say it but do you do that for first graders now that what happened down in if that was I think Virginia so I know Mr Brown brought it up because of that reason so I guess we just want to be proactive to that of where we're at um I know I spoke with Mr Tobias yesterday when I was here at the high school he said he's looking at two other schools I think this week on a different approach than metal detectors but he'll bring that and stuff but we're at least he's on that because this isn't going to go away so I want to make sure that we're yes on the Forefront yeah thank you for
041bringing that up again because that'll be something you know as it was before the board uh really initiated we have a district Safety Committee actually this Thursday so that will be something that we we want to make sure we discuss then and then we invite Mr Tobias back here I've got I'm going to have him scheduled for the February committee the whole meeting that might be a good time for us to kind of flush that out because if we do go in that direction that will be something we need to uh get ready for an order it's just a sad conversation to have a kindergarten and first grader second grade or third year Creator even talk about a backpack you know the kids they want to go there and be a kid um but Society
042is not allowing that it's changing so we have to just make sure that every everybody in these buildings are safe whether the students the staff members so I hate to say it yeah we all heard the story of a six-year-old toned a gun and just this evening they had on the news of a four-year-old yeah in the hallway an apartment building collected yeah so age has no barrier when it comes to a gun thanks Bill bringing that up any other old business I guess this would be old business even though it was on the agenda today I want to go back and backtrack real quick on the Alec the I guess the approval of the asbestos contractor and I'm looking at the process can as far as present at the walk down was that are
043these mandatory walk downs yeah president mandatory walkthroughs yes okay so you have a person that did not attend so if that person would have been the lowest bidder they would not have been able to be awarded okay yes so can you make moving forward can you show us that that person disqualities disqualified oh okay sure yeah so I can have you know better eyes on this yep okay yeah quite a few bidders on that we did wow I've never seen that many music there is we had the same thing when we did the the work this over winter break also which is just a good time and get some good pricing you really working at that time and they were relatively close relatively close competitivity okay great and I'm not sure stop me Bill or
044a coconis or president if I extend way before Way Beyond what this the intent of what I'm about to say during this meeting on the president report where a person that accepted a position and then they chose not to take the position and that person has been dismiss I'm not mentioning any any names is it okay so far you'll keep going with this not mentioning about right it was right did it show up it was in the FYI yeah right yeah I saw that FYI is on a report that we approved today today so I mean you couldn't talk because yeah I think I'll subscribe I think I'll yeah I think I was I think I'll curtail it right now for that because I probably want to go a little bit more deeper all right
045that's it that's all I have okay any new business okay we do have a need to go into closed session for a couple of topics um can I get a motion to go in a closed session for the appointment employment compensation discipline performance or dismissing of specific employees and number two the purchase or lease of real property for use of the public body moved second roll call Brown his and I Mr sawales hi Mrs Galbraith aye vice president aye president Albert aye okay we are in closed session when we come out a closed session there will be no other items on the agenda no other action other than adjournment so we'll uh we can cut off the video feed at this time thank you