6/16/2025 School Board Meeting

001The full board is here in attendance. So I'll call the meeting to order. Dr. Phillips. Thank you, Miss Wen. Like to start each meeting with sharing our mission, vision, and core values with the public and repeating them to ourselves. Our vision is that BCSSE is the choice to learn, work, and play. Our mission is that we develop expert learners by partnering with our community to invest in people. And our core beliefs are that we all can rise to the challenge of high expectation. The that learning is most effective when we have choice, flexibility, and see relevance. That we thrive when our physical, social, and psychological needs are met. That our community and school district are stronger when we partner with one another. that we flourish because of the diversity and variability in our community and

002that our democracy and democratic institutions are strengthened by civic-minded citizens. Dr. Phillips. And so starting off tonight with recognitions. We don't have any students in the crowd as you can see, but we had several students, many of whom are seniors and won't be won't be coming back. They weren't available to come this evening, but we at least verbally want to recognize them and we'll try to get the the students that are returning to us to come back in August. But we want to congratulate our boys and girls track and field stars from North who placed on the podium at the state championships last week. And so Jace Works was the highest individual finisher finishing second. He was also part of the 4x 800 team that finished third with Grant Pumprey, Neil White, and Logan Vanzant.

003And then for the girls, Emerson Chambers was eighth. And I believe Emerson's just a sophomore, so she'll be back for a while. She's also a terrific gymnast. And then Caris Glenn Jones, who was here last year, I think, both for cross country and track. She's going on to participate at sec postsecary level as well. She was fifth in the 800 meter run. And then also um you may have read about Nino Akal and Annabelle Sun who were fourth place in the state at number one doubles in girls tennis last week. Last one, good luck to Austin Perry who participates as an individual Norther in the state championships tomorrow morning. So, good luck to him. Visual evidence of said track. Okay. School board member reports. Can I start on this end, Mr. Schultz? Nothing from CCIC

004at this time. Mr. Quick, no meetings for me either. Um, my committees did not meet. Um although in terms of um whatever my role is as um liazison to the legislature, I will say that Mr. Major, Mr. and myself attended the ISBA session this past week on um on updates on executive orders and judici judicial um or or new laws in terms of education. And the one takeaway is that um there while there's a lot to keep up with, BCSC seems to be doing a pretty good job of keeping up. Um we had a Barthalome County Redevelopment Commission meeting on June 9th. Uh so we reviewed the 2026 um budget and right now I think there is a plan for about $450,000 of revenue to come in that tiff area is kind of building um

005and then about $420,000 in expense. That um that budget will actually be approved on November 10th. So it could change between now and then. The next meeting will be on November 10th to review that in more detail. Um Kristen Girker is the interim president of the economic development um council here in Columbus. Um so Jason Hester has moved on to Indianapolis and she's filling in um for the time being. Um and then just an update on the two major projects that are happening in the county redevelopment area. So Gillows is a pickle manufacturer. Um, and if you are up north by that interchange, they are they are moving right along with their facility. It looks really nice actually from the outside. I don't know that they have equipment in Yen, but they are planning to

006start occupying in Q3 of this year. So, they are not far away. Um, which is really exciting. That's it's new jobs for our area. And then Kings Hawaiian, their schedule has moved slightly. So, um, I believe right now they're looking tenatively for like later 26, early 27. So, have moved out a bit, but you can see the pad for their building um out there and there are still plans. It's just going a little slower than it had planned earlier. That's all I have. Yeah. So, the city redevelopment met before this meeting. They had several updates. I'll just give three real quick. So on July 21st, there's a downtown 2030 uh meeting where the redevelopment commission and city council will meet together in a joint session to talk about the downtown 2030 project. Uh the entrance

007plaza is done having all the rendering complete and they're starting to work on cost estimates that'll kind of tie in with downtown 2030. And then just uh a fun thing they wanted to highlight is uh the third Thursday of every month at Sears they're having the food truck festivals and they said that that's started to become a pretty good hit. So they hope to continue to do those and the next one will be June 19th. So just a couple days from now. Uh the health trust uh nearly half of the uh employees are enrolled. Uh things look pretty good right now but we're still doing work. we meet again tomorrow um to try and do our best to minimize the potential for any increases this year premiums. So, we're trying to do what we can

008there. There's never a guarantee in that area, but um we'll see what happens. So, uh meet again tomorrow. So, I did not have any formal meetings um in the last month. I will say the school foundation has worked really hard and spent a lot of time on the annual appeal for the annual campaign. be looking for that in the mail. Cabinet reports Dr. Hack. Um, I'm Gretchen Ganning. I'm the director for Book Buddies. I'd like to thank Dr. Phillips and all of our board members for the opportunity to share what program accomplished this year. So, um, Bookies, um, our mission hasn't changed for the past 19 years. Our mission is that all second and third graders will read on grade level by the end of the school year. We accomplish our mission through teamwork. We

009have paid BookBuddy staff members at every BCSC elementary school. Those staff members, we call them site supervisors, they coordinate with the teachers at that school and a team of volunteers to support each student that's in Book Buddies. In addition to um the teamwork aspect, we accomplish our mission of the students improving their reading skills through what we call power of an hour. Most of our volunteers donate an hour of their time. Um they work with two kids each session. Um each time they come um the first session they work with one student and they do a reread activity where the student interacts with a book that they read the day before. They practice site words. They spend the majority of the time reading a new book and they end every session um doing a word

010study game or activity that focuses on a specific phonics pattern. The site supervisor then takes that that group of students back and brings a new group of students and our volunteers repeat those same activities again to complete their power of an hour. Um, our volunteers know what to do because of um the individual lesson plans that each of our staff make for every student for every session they attend. And we do this so that if a volunteer or a student has to switch schools, the program looks the same. They know what to expect and they can continue on um growing as readers. no matter what school they're at. One thing that we've never really talked about with our program is another way that we try to achieve our mission of the students improving their reading

011skills and that's through expanding their home libraries. Book Buddies gifts our students um at a minimum of three books every year. The students receive a book from our program right before winter break on the last day of our program and on their birthdays. Um, in addition, most of our students that are part of the winning schools for our gingerbread fundraiser also receive books as prizes. And we also have individual volunteers and um community groups that will choose to sponsor a specific school um and give our students another book. So, some of our kids walk away with seven or eight books for their home library so they can practice reading at home. The volunteers are the heart of our program. This past year we had 300 volunteers enrolled in in Book Buddies. Um 200 275 remained

012active through the end of our school year. Our volunteers come from a variety of of places. Um our youngest volunteers are high school students, so 14 year olds ranging all the way up to 90 year old community members. And we truly do have 90 year olds. one of our long-term volunteers just celebrated her 90th birthday this past school year. Um in in addition to our high school students and our community members, some BCSC staff also volunteer their lunch hour time to work with the students one-on-one. We were very lucky this past school year to have 13 high school students um who were seniors at Columbus East, Columbus North, and CBP choose Book Buddies for their senior project. And those role models worked with our students for the school year. From the support that our students

013got this past year, we were able to have programs at all 11 BCSSC elementary schools. We supported 56 students. 93 of them were second graders and 63 were third graders. Our goal is always that our students will attend 100 days. And when they do, that's 50 and a half hours of individual reading attention during the school day when the kids are fresh. Um, with all the weather, there are only couple that hit 100 days. So, it was a little bit tougher this year. Um despite all that, we had great success this past school year. Our um 63 third graders did a great job this year. 100% of them passed I read and 100% of them who attended 75 to 100 days read on grade level by the end of the school year with their volunteers.

014Our second graders who began the year reading at a um in a first grade reading level range, 28% of them passed I read three, the third grade reading proficiency test. Another 27% were on track to pass I read as third graders and 79 of our students who were second graders read on grade level with their volunteers by the end of the school year. We have been working students here in Bartholomeia County for 19 years. Um the impact we've had is unbelievable. We've served over 2,910 students. We always say plus because when our students happen to be absent, teachers will send us another student that might get a little practice with our volunteers. Um we're now starting to see some of our students who were Book Buddy students who return as volunteers. I'm going to share

015a little bit about one of those students and I'm going to try not to get emotional so bear with me. Um, I had the privilege of meeting Cam Herren when he was a Bookbuddy student at Schmidt Elementary School and I was his Bookbuddy site supervisor. Cam chose to return to Bookbuddies for his senior project because of the impact it had on his life. Um, unfortunately Cam was not able to be here tonight because he's working to make money to go to college, but he shared with me um a statement that I'd like to read to you. I'm one of the few people who have been on the learning and teaching sides of the program. Before going into Bookbuddies in elementary school, reading was very challenging for me because I grew up being read to and

016not reading myself. Thanks to all the volunteers who devoted their time to helping me be a better reader, I decided to return the favor and enroll in Book Buddies for my senior project. I spent the majority of my time teaching a boy who was just like me as a kid, a little hyper and who could get off task very, very easily. Over time, I had easily earned the 20 hours needed for my senior project and could finally finish. But I didn't want to. I had a bond with my book buddy. I stuck with Bookbuddies until the end of the year because I know the impact my buddy made in my life and the impact I have made in his. From my time in Bookbuddies as both a student and a volunteer, I know the program

017does a really good job of impacting not just the kids but also the volunteers. When I completed Bookbuddies as a kid, I felt I was ready for the next years of school. And now as a teenager about to go off to college, I felt like I am a better person and have truly made an impact on these kids' lives and prepared them for future challenges. We hope Cam the best. He um ended his years at Columbus East um on the honor role and as a varsity athlete and he has committed to go play football um in college. So we can't wait to see what he does. Um, so for our 19 years, we decided this past year in April to celebrate it. And we invited all of our volunteers and the BCSC staff who we

018coordinate with to an open house on April 23rd. Um, at that open house, Karen Gerty, who is one of um the people responsible for founding our program, was able to speak to our volunteers and give a little bit of a background about the program, its need, and why um it's impacted our community. Although we're really proud of the work we've done in 19 years, we cannot wait to kick off our 20th year on August 25th, which will be our first day with students and volunteers. Um, our goals for our 20th year, I'm only going to talk about three. We always have a lot. Um, but the first one, um, we're calling 20 and 20. That goal is that we'd like to recruit recruit 20 volunteers at each BCSC elementary school because if we can can

019recruit 20 volunteers, we can add 10 more students to our program at every at every school and they can attend Monday through Thursday with a full team of volunteers. Um, a second goal that we have is to continue to fund our program through fundraising and community partnerships. BCSC does a great job of covering our salaries, giving us some technology and um our homes where we meet with our volunteers, but all the materials that we use in a book buddy session, including the books, we purchased through fundraising and community partnerships. Um and then our last goal is the one that we'll have for forever, and that's to fulfill our mission that all students will read on grade level by the end of the school year. Um, we'd like to thank the current and past leadership of

020BCSC for all of their support of our program. We've had an amazing 19 years and we cannot wait to have 20 more years of reading together. Thank you. If you have any questions, I'm happy to answer. for volunteers. How flexible is the schedule to work with in terms of like I look at it and I've thought about being part of this, but as a farmer, October and November are definitely ones that I don't know what my schedule's going to be and then April, May, definitely don't know what my schedule's going to be. I know Mr. Don does this. It's tremendous. So, in terms of flexibility with volunteers, how well does that work? Um, we're really flexible. You're volunteers. You're not paid to come in with our students. Um, one of the benefits of having a

021paid staff member at each of our schools is our staff member coordinates volunteers. We do have some volunteers that specifically choose only to be substitutes. So, when you as a volunteer say, "Hey, can't come in this week. Um, our staff will arrange for someone else to come and be there to work with your students." So, we have a lot of um retired volunteers that will take off for a month or two in the winter and get away from um Indiana Winters. So, we're we're kind of designed for that. Um we also provide the opportunity for people to share a volunteer spot. So, if you and a co-orker or family member wanted to share a spot, you could do that, too. Um just as long as we have somebody showing up to work with our kiddos

022and We know that um we're pretty flexible and our kids are just happy to have anyone there to pay one-on-one attention to them during the day. I have one question and one comment and my question is one I should know the answer to because I know I've asked it before, but the um for a second grader to pass the I read, does is that the same as what the third graders would pass or is it based on the exact same test? Okay. exact same. I will try to remember that answer next. Yeah. And the other thing you mentioned it there, but I I want to say as a volunteer how nice it is. I I work I volunteer at Schmidt, but I have filled in at other schools for people. And it's it's really neat

023to see that the program is different from like it has its own personality at each school, but but that the sheet that the volunteer uses is consistent. So, it's I don't know what you all could do to make it easier for volunteers. And I appreciate that. Yeah, we we always say it's best volunteering you can do. You're not dirty, you're not sweaty. The kids make you laugh. Um it's a great opportunity and we're very structured. We have a scoping sequence which I don't think a lot of people realize about our program. Um but it it's really easy to be a volunteer and and I Okay, I said one comment I have to and the kids really really enjoy the time which is really great to see. Yeah. I I um the hardest part about my

024current job is that I don't get to see them every day and develop those relationships like our volunteers and our staff do. I'm gonna leave um couple Oh, Logan. Yeah. A couple questions. Uh you said 100% of the ones that were enrolled past the of our third graders. Yes. 63 of them were in Book Buddies this year and the ones that took I read with BCSC 100% of them passed. We did have a couple that like moved but 100% of our third graders recall that's all the last two updates the last two years that's pretty consistent. We were at 98% last year. Um this year we're at 100% and um our second grade numbers also improved this past year I think. I mean as a parent so my daughter was one of the big buddies

025in the past so part of the 100% so I truly appreciate it from a parental perspective and I think this is an action where we have proven methods that work we need to lean in on the investments like when we look at student achievement this has been a program that has been linked to direct success probably for the 20 years but at least for the past few and I would like to see almost more investment from the board in terms of how do we help this program grow because it has the proven to drive success. Um, and really I feel like there's a lack of scalability as between the volunteerism and the materials and the funding. So that's my that's my kind of general comment. Um, I'm going to leave a couple little flyers here.

026If you know of anybody that would like to be a volunteer to have them. And just wanted to speak to Gretchen's leadership for Bookb Buddies. Not only was she a site coordinator at Schmidt for many years, she then stepped into the role for leadership as the director and the making sure that all of us have what we need as book buddies. Book buddies is a win-win. It's not only a win for the students, it's a win for the volunteers who come in. If you walk away from your book buddy time for your 30 minutes or hour not feeling impressed and re revorated as well as um hopeful for our future, then you probably didn't do book buddies right that day because these kids not only love seeing us, they love the time with us and

027they love being a book buddy. And that's because it's so well done. The volunteers know to come in. They don't have to be professional readers or even know about the science of reading, which we try to tie in as much as we can to our facilitators, but they just have to give some confidence to kids and smile and sit hip to hip and play a game and say, "You can do it, buddy. Come on. You've got this." And by February, you see the games and you start saying, "I was part of that. I was part of that kid learning to read." And that's amazing. So, thank you, Gretchen. can't speak highly enough about your leadership in this program as well as growing the program and what we can do. I'm gonna hold you to that

02820. Thank you. Real quick, one one last thing. Um to echo what Logan was saying, if possible in the coming months, if we could understand prior to the next budget season what it would take to fully fund this so that you don't have to do fundraising. I'd be interested to see what that cost is. I I don't expect it to be $4 million. I don't expect it to be $400,000, but you know, if it's $40,000, does that make sense across all the schools? But then the other challenge on that is if you get more free time where you don't have to fund raise and you can stay focused on doing the things to help the kids, how how can we go from one additional kid per school to five? So that's a big challenge because

029that comes with volunteers. But if you're able to free up time from being a supply giver through fundraising, how can you do that through a service giver and uh soliciting volunteers too? So Dr. Boseman, good evening. Just one slide from me tonight, so I'll stay seated if Okay. Um, last time we were together, there was a request for a review of all L 11 elementary schools if they were to participate in the program. I can switch to the microphone. Okay. Okay. Good. Thanks. Um, we and just as a reminder also for the board and the public, we had a public session last Monday to go through that review. This slide is a synopsis of that. It is the same slide that we shared last Monday. And I'll be brief unless you have questions for me.

030On the lefth hand side, you'll see our current participation and revenue from our title schools. That $218,000 that is reflective of a few different things. Number one, increased participation in the title schools in the C program. Also, our um realization of the reimbursement for breakfast in those schools were at the severe need rate which was $2.84 versus the $2.37 as was projected that we shared in the projections about a year ago this time. So, uh that increase and also just full disclosure that includes any catering and alakart funds which were minimal in those schools for the $218,000. the the next line, Richards and Mount Healthy, that's a projected cost of an ad of those two schools. The current participation based off of current participation from the 2425 school year, obviously. And then the increased participation,

031the 206 um in the red there that you see in the second column, that would be reflective of our estimates if 30% more students participated in breakfast at those schools and 15% in lunch. those were realized participation increases at the title schools uh which would be fantastic if we could have that increase participation in other schools but admittedly I'll tell you it is probably a little aggressive the next line is the same data with the addition of Parkside Elementary and then the last line as requested was the estimated all elementaryaries including the title schools and with the current participation and the increased participation the net annual financial impact on the right hand side. Again, the 218 carries the the rest of those figures are all considering the 218 revenue to balance out the deficits from

032adding those other schools. So, just not going through all the examples, but Richards and Mount Healthy ad, our projections were to be somewhere between $65,000 in the red to $11,000 uh nearly $12,000 positive with the increased participation. You can see the projections for Parkside added and then you can see the anticipated net for all elementaryaries just under a million dollars in loss versus somewhere in the ballpark of $780,000 with the increase of participation. So my recommendation for you tonight is to add Richards and Mount Healthy to the C program for the 2526 school year. And I believe um there'll be some procedural things for you to work through based on the motion that the action rather that the board took last time we're together. So happy to answer any questions you may have. Is the

033proposal that's shown is that a single application to the government in terms of C or are we considering two applications of separating title one schools from healthy. Yes, thank you. So the title schools would not be changed at all. So that application was submitted last year and that application as a reminder is a good is good for four years. So that will be untouched and and those title schools those applications don't change for so they're good for three more years. U Mr. Schulz your question we'll take Richards and Mount healthy on separate applications. So you may recall last time I mentioned Mount Healthy is the next highest in the direct SER um percentage by school and Richards is next. So we would take those two separately in on two separate applications. Um that way if

034we got ourselves in a situation to where we wanted to uh pull one of those schools out um if the projections are off um we could do so without affecting both. And again they would be they would assuming the um the state approves and they would be good for four years also. Okay. And uh when you said that the right hand side would be considered aggressive, the title one schools in general have obviously a higher percentage of free and reduced population today based on the studies that I've seen. Free and reduced tend to have a higher participation rate than the general population. I would if I were to infer the difference that would actually more opportunity for higher participation in areas where there is lower free and reduced such as these what I would call

035tweener schools that are in the not fully there but close to yes I I certainly hope so we're we're we're optimistic that u but again I base that comment and off of what we've been advised by the state I think we've talked about that before is around they told us to expect four to 8% an increase and obviously we've we've outpaced that Um, this was not part of your question, Mr. Schultz, but I'll shameless plug for Nancy Milspaw and her team that you and I have chatted. She does a fantastic job and um, you can give kids free lunch, but if they don't like the lunch, they're still not going to eat it. So, um, they they do a great job as you've seen with her recent presentations with meal offerings and such. So, um,

036so kudos kudos to her. But yes, I agree. There are so roughly um there are about the same number of meals served in the title schools the four title schools as compared to the seven separately. So there are high meal participation in the title schools. Uh but certainly to your point opportunity for increased participation otherwise. I had another question but it left me trying to think. I think we've um Can you describe the process of putting these numbers up here? I think we've tried to do some estimates ourselves. We tried to get some outside help just to put credibility to the range knowing it's not an exact science. Yes. So, we um actually three things have been happening. Um and I can have Mr. Schultz speak to his his work if he's if he's so

037inclined and interested. Um the the original projections going back to even last year um we had done internally brought to the board for consideration. Uh last time we were together as you recall the request was to evaluate all all the elementary schools together which um I had done. We also um uh worked with a third party Dr. Nathan Williamson of Mazy Education who uh led some conversation last Monday as I mentioned um to come to the similar figures and then um Mr. Schultz and I met last week remotely and and kind of gone through um a model that he was working on as well and worked through a couple a couple of things in there, but I'll I'll let you speak to Mr. Schultz if you're interested, but landed right in the in the same

038general ballpark um at the end of the day. Yeah, I think it I mean the majority of this cost from what I can gather of my research is really just down to participation. I think I mean I think you and I both discussed there's best practices in certain schools as it comes to breakfast, right? If you serve breakfast in the classroom, kids are more likely to take it. I think that was one of the two two or two of the four schools where you saw a statistical deviation of breakfast participation. I think the other thing is is this board took action a year ago with the risk of $80,000 and it feels low that we're taking now a risk of only assuming the same participation which is an assumption of 65,000. Um but again I

039think that's where uh discussions and then like again I've heard I talked with some members of the community and like a lot of it was like well this is going to fund really the wealthy kids' lunches. It could take away resources from others. I think that's a little bit of a a quick judgment. Um, I actually looked up the federal poverty guidelines for free and reduced lunch ahead of this meeting and a single mom with two kids, I think it was right around $35,000 is what you don't qualify for, free lunch. Um, and if you think about it, they're going to spend about 17,000 on housing based on the average rent per two-bedroom apartment. So, I don't think this is necessarily going to go uh to the wealthy children. I mean, I think obviously they

040would artificially benefit, but the goal here is those students that are stuck in the middle um and don't have two good meals per day to be able to focus on the academics. Dr. Boseman, I usually ask questions during cabinet reports, but one that comes to mind and one that I'd be interested in particularly as we expand during postcoid when we had community eligibility provision in place at all our schools for a number of years. Anecdotally, we saw a large increase in the amount of food waste. I know we don't track that currently, but since we're being incremental with our recommended step here, four schools last year, two more schools next year. I just wonder if there's an opportunity to track that and even do education both with our students and families about if you want

041the dessert, don't go up there and get a full a full tray to get the dessert because it's free. even though you brought lunch, helping with that, manage that proactively, particularly in our schools that have lower poverty rates. I wonder how we might approach that. Yeah, thank you. It's it's on my mind as well. Um you've asked me in the past what what that looks like and I've not provided a great answer, but um there's a I'll add a comment. Um yes, we can we can work on a system to track that and share. Um, I'll I'll add a a minor maybe twist to that or comment in um our food service employees do a good job of insisting there's there's some US A USDA guidelines that that kids have to have certain things on

042their plate in order to qualify for for lunch. Um, that's not as much of a concern. Our folks do a good job of insisting that that students do try things that are new on their plate because otherwise they'll just no thanks type of thing. So, there's a little bit of a balance there of of that just ending up in the in the trash can versus the the kid trying it. that's not too bad after all and you know that sort of thing. So, but yes, I it's a good question. We'll we'll work towards it. I just want to echo Dr. Boseman's kudos to Nancy. I think our team does a splendid job of trying to, you know, create solutions for kids that want to eat food that fits within these very tight and even tighter

043USDA guidelines. So, I think I mean I hear you on the waist. I think that's feedback, but I don't think that's the I wouldn't the outcome I would look at the team it's like I mean you can give the kid vegetables you can make it look like a smiley French fry I think is what she was looking at on one but there's only so much you can do the goal here is again the kids here in these tweener stages are getting two good meals I think that's I mean that's where all the statistics and studies lie on this driving student achievement we've talked a little bit about how So, we we taking a look at at schools of an ADM size of 5,000 plus and um of of those districts which which have applied for

044districtwide C. Um, and aside from a few outliers, and I'll mention the outliers are not near 5,000 plus ADM, but um, some very small schools, um, usually parochial schools. Um, we we weren't I wasn't able to find a district that was had more than 5,000 students in ADM, um, less than 50% of their their DC rate across the district that had applied districtwide. So, ours is I have in front of me, 35% I think. Um, So, the um there there just aren't any that I've seen. Um and I didn't ask a whole lot of questions of others, but I would imagine that's that's due to the the financial loss that we reject here as well. So, um I did I did have a conversation with a district that was um similar size 6,000 ADM. Um

045their their DC rate was uh I believe 53%. Um and he mentioned that their alocart sales had increased. So um it's not something I considered a whole lot but something to keep an eye on for sure is the aloc cart sale. So for example you give a student a free meal and now because they have money or whatever they buy another chicken sandwich. So that's um again you could argue more nourishment for the kiddo but also there's there's revenue there on the food service side. So we're going to keep an eye on that certainly as we um hopefully continue to expand this as as we're able to. And I think it's important to note, right, is our school size and our situation. We didn't have this opportunity until the Biden administration adjusted the rate from

046the 40% criteria to the 25% criteria. I think it's interesting and I think BCSC has a long-standing history of being an early adopter of trying to make sure students are, you know, ready and able and get all the resources necessary. But we're one of the first schools from what I can see in Indiana that have tried to attempt this at the low at the lower end of the DC rates because it's a substantial investment. It's not most schools look at it once they're in that and correct me if I'm wrong, Dr. Boseman, 50 to 60% is kind of that break even that they start looking because they're going to get 100% reimbured from the federal government. There's also side side impacts such as all the cart sales, increased participation drives increased revenue and then also

047economies of scale on lower food costs. But when you're in our 30 to 35 to 40% there's going to be a burden on the corporation and the community. And I mean, that's where a lot of schools aren't don't have that healthy savings to be able to even weigh this decision. I mean, very few I don't see a whole lot of schools that have the reserves that we do that could weigh this decision and even weather it if they wanted to. At the other end of that spectrum, there are this money making program. Uh I'm not aware of that. I I don't know that to be true or not. Um and quite frankly, I have not spent the time and to to look at it. Um yeah, I don't I don't have a good answer. Mr.

048Williamson did mention last week that it is possible to profit to to collect more money than you spend if you're at the the higher end. I mean, the cost really comes from a student who does not qualify, student who would normally pay based on income taking lunch. That's when you get in the loss category. And so districts that have a very high percentage free reduced can get a reimbursement that's higher than their costs. A good example here, right, is the title one schools that 218 is revenue above expenses that we would not have collected prior, right? It's due to the reimbursement rate of the federal being far higher than what we would have charged and a mix of participation and a mix of the DC rate. There's a healthy balance in that 50 to 60

049range where yeah, clearly I think you could, but for us given in the mid30s, it's a cost just because of the lower DC rate. But again, the higher capture of the what I would call lower middle income class and I know that we will work with our I would encourage Mr. when you work with the ISBA, we'll work with our other associations in the meantime. Uh because an adjustment, a simple adjustment of that poverty level would dramatically increase catch the tweeners, if you will. The folks who maybe have gotten a new job, worked more hours, or qualified for employment, and they're now their income puts them out of reach for free lunch. But when you take into account the fact that they have to pay for lunch now, they actually would drop down below if

050you took those two things and combined them. So changing the the poverty criteria would help us be able to serve those folks who need it most without taking money that might go towards teacher salaries or book buddy supplies or or whatever the long list of opportunity costs that are in place there. And so I I highly encourage folks to reach out to your legislators and tell them that that poverty level adjustment would really help us serve the students who need it most. The one thing I'll I'll like to touch on here is in terms of food waste, I've seen it at Parkside. I'm pretty sure Dr. Demmer talked to us about it at Taylor'sville and other schools are using the process as well terms of the non more nonparishable items. They put it up as

051like a freebie table or a second chance table and then whatever is not used tends to go to like a little classroom snack area or uh just red redistributed and and not gone to waste. So that that kind of reduced granted cucumbers and uh broccoli kids not going to eat it. They're not going to eat it, but it is kind of nice to go see the school lunches and see what we are providing. I mean fresh vegetables, you can't get any better nutrition than that, honestly. Thank you, Dr. Bman. All right. We have um an opportunity for public comments every school board meeting. Just as a reminder of our process, if you ever want to speak at a board meeting, when you enter the room, there's a blue sheet on a table. You can sign

052in. Um you'll be called up to speak. Everyone gets three minutes. Um we ask that you refrain from using the name of specific students, staff members, or specific titles. It's kind of the same thing. And we ask those in the audience to please be courteous. It can be um nerve-wracking getting up in front of a group. We want to make sure everyone feels um comfortable doing that and speaking with us. So, with that, we have one speaker tonight. Miss Amy London is here to address the board. Um, good evening. I hope everybody's doing well, enjoying the start of your summer. Um, thank you for letting me have the opportunity to speak. Um I would like to speak this evening um as the one as a parent and two um member of our community and then

053also as the president of our teachers association, the Columbus Educators Association in regards to talking about providing free meals for our students in the elementaryaries. So uh please forgive me as I use my notes because I have lots of thoughts on this, but I I don't want to miss anything. Um the first thing I would want to say is um thank you for taking into consideration wanting to make sure that all of our students have a hot nutritious meal at least two times a day. Um while if you know myself or my family, you can say that most Londons have never missed a meal. Um and we have friends that that we that joke with us about that. But um while that might not be an issue in my home, I my mom lives with

054us and my mom grew up very very poor. She actually was telling us a story yesterday about how she used to pass out the milk in her school um to get her lunch and her breakfast at school for free. And those were the two hottest meals that she had during the day. And because of that, she she talks about chili and yeast rolls and things that were delicious at that time. But so I do have some experience with that. The thing that I would like to say is that due to I feel that we have lots of needs for our students and while I don't feel that the tax dollars going towards just this fits the needs for all of our students, I'd like to use my daughter Kate as an example who just graduated

055from North High School. Um she got a great education at UCSC and I'm very very thankful for that. Um she had some great folks that Dr. Phillips was her administrator when she was in elementary school. she was a part of Book Buddies and there was funding for her to get a different book because she had read most of the books already that were being given to her. Um, and so there were there was funding for that, but due to all those excellent teachers, those excellent programs that we had, my daughter scored fours and fives on AP tests and she's starting IU in the fall with 37 credits. Now, as a parent, if you know how expensive college is, that's 37 credits Tony and I don't have to pay for 37 credits I don't have to

056loan for. So, it is my position as a parent. It is our position as C for CA that there are several things that we need to put our tax dollars toward. Um, we have some great programs to help those people who are just above that poverty line who aren't getting the free and reduced. Um, and we have some great staff who can help them get connected with those. We also have some great people, even folks here in this room that can help work on, as Dr. Phillips mentioned uh getting that poverty line to an area that helps more people. Um and also too with Senate Bill one and decreased tuition coming next year concern about how do we continue to pay for those in the future. So how to maintain that. So I don't want

057to take any more of your time but I appreciate the opportunity to speak. Thank you. Thank you Miss London. Thank you. Uh this evening we have a request for approval of old business which consists of the minutes from the May 17th board work session and the May 19th regular school board meeting, the June 9th board work session, and the minutes of the June 9th executive session. So, I request approval of item 6A, old business. Move to approve line item 6A as written. Second. Thank you. Any questions, comments from the team before we go to vote? Okay, we have a motion to approve item 6A. Um, old business. All those in favor, please say I. I. All those opposed, please say nay. Motion carries 70. Thank you. And then this is actually broken up really well

058on the slide because um I know we have a couple of items that require some individual discussion. So, for now, I'm going to request approval of new business, but only for items A through D, which consists of the regular approvals of supplemental contracts, field trips, and professional leaves, school fundraisers, and then the claims and payroll for uh June 16 uh dockets and the docket from June 16th, the pre-runs for May of 2025, and then the May 16th and May 30th payrolls which total $8.6 million. Before I ask for approval though, I'm going to actually ask Dr. Boseman in under the claims and payroll conversation. You'll note that in your your claims list, you'll see reference to a credit card payment for dozens, if not hundreds of line items. And we thought in light of the

059the news that's been pretty prominent, not just recently, but you'll see this kind of fraud happen in lots of places, we I'd asked out propos to just take a moment and walk you through the process of how we make sure we double check and we have uh safeguards in place to pre prevent credit card fraud. Yes. Thanks. In most most cases on the claims and payroll, uh you'll see this list is Bank of Montreal. It's the expenditures that we have. So, um, happy to spend as much detail on this as you wish, but there are several safeguards we have in place. So, just procedurally, the the admin assistant that's assigned to those credit card users, um, they get a they get a statement from Beimo on the 20th or so of the month. They'll go

060in and review the statement and they'll collect actual receipts. So, anytime we use a credit card for any expenditures, there's a receipt that is accompanied with that. So that admin assistant will combine those, gives that to the supervisor for review, sign off. That material then comes over to the business office um at the administration center where there's another employee who does the same. Reviews the expenditures versus the receipts. Make sure there's receipts in place. if there are any errors um or anything missing such as sometimes people pay for sales tax inadvertently so it's sent back to the admin assistant for um for review and um collection if there's a receipt missing there's a statement of affidavit that the individual completes usually that happens for parking garages when those silly machines don't give us a receipt

061when they're supposed to and um and you either choose to sit there and hold up traffic or drive So there's an affidavit completed by the individual if that's the case um that's checked by the admin um the the business office the administration building and then the deputy treasurer which is Paul Vro here will check and then uh both Jamie and I um have and will have access to do spot checks of those as well. So, um, so several layers of of of checks on those things and different different folks with eyes on things just for your awareness. And the vast majority of those that are listed are actually our credit cards are in the background of our financial management system. And if a if a administrative assistant at North Side Middle School orders four new

062pairs of scissors, it'll pay with that credit card automatically in the background. and then we get the rebate of of one and a half two% on that payment. So, it's to our advantage and all of those have to be approved before by the supervisor in our financial management system before it ever even gets ordered. So, there's several checks on I'll go ahead and request approval and then you can discuss and ask questions if you like. So, I request approval of items 7 A through 7D. I move that we approve line items 7 A through 7D as written. Second. You Mr. Schultz and Mr. Major. Any questions or comments from the team on 7 A through D. I couldn't tell who seconded. It was fast. Okay. It's your birthday, so I gave you that one. Mr.

063Major, happy birthday. Okay. No more questions and comments that are pertinent or useful. So, we will go to vote. Um, all those in fain right, Mr. Major. Okay, Mr. Major will abstain. All those in favor of approving 7 A through D, please say I. I. All those opposed, please say nay. Motion carries 6. Thank you. And then we'll take these last three one at a time. At this time, I request approval of item 7E. And I am going to defer to Mr. MacGyver, who I know has been doing some research to make sure that the wording of the um the move motion is accurate. So, so I have a motion that I talked with Mr. McCyver about. If I did this wrong, he can correct me. But um I move to amend our approval of

064the C application, including all elementary schools approved at our May 19th meeting, to only include Mount Healthy and Richards as additional schools. Thank you, Mr. Nalan. I think Mike looks happy, so I'm assuming we did that right. The reason we have a slightly different motion is because In our last board meeting, for those people that may not have participated, we made a motion at that time to um review broadening that and it was sort of left open. So, we're we're making sure we we follow up on that amendment um during this discussion. Is that a fair way to describe that, Mr. McGyver? Correct. So, at the last board meeting, the motion that you all uh approved was approving all of the elementary schools pending the which took place at the work session and then again

065this evening. And so an approved item can be amended in the manner that Mr. Non just did. So you have that motion in front of you. That would still require a second and then discussion and then a vote. Um the vote for that without boring you all too much on Robert's rules details. Um four of you if four of you were in favor of that that motion would carry this evening. Second motion. Okay. Thank you, Mr. Stanner. Questions and comments on the motion. I have a couple comments, but I So, I mean, I know I've been one of the more vocal board members as it pertains to this particular program, and I respect Miss London's uh feedback and the public comment. I I think when you look across the educational spectrum of what's student achievement.

066I've only found three things that have very minimal if none that says it doesn't. One is the food, two is the classroom sizes, and three is the recess time. All of them have driven have I mean almost universally been driven to student achievement reduced student behaviors and student empowerment in terms of feeling better about themselves in terms of being able to say and understand that they've got the same opportunity as my children. I mean obviously I'm not part of this I would say goal the goal here is to find folks that are in that tweeter stage that honestly are just struggling day by day. Um, I saw it when I was at Taylor'sville. I saw it when kids got peanut butter lunches. I am a vocal fighter against identifying students that can't afford lunches. And

067I know today we have students that go to lunch every day that their parents are barely able to put food in their lunch box and the federal we can argue about the federal government and we can argue about the state government and I'll take that argument right to them as well. Um, but at the end of the day, program enable single mothers that are in the mid30,000 range in this county that's trying to pay essentially if you make 35,000 a year 17,000 in rent for two children they're going to have to pay 3% of their income just to feed their kids lunch that's not even counting breakfast and I have a hard time believing they're able in this economy and the rising interest rates and all all the other rising inflation that we've seen over

068the past two to three years that they're doing And I remember I just had a recent about a year ago when I was at Great Clips. Um the person that was cutting my hair was like hey like I was not able to get her kids went to Schmidt and she said my kids weren't able to get free lunch but now I am. We talked about it was a great great opportunity to see how it impacts her children and I think we have to understand our operations budget has gone up by 50% due to inflated or due to rising property values. We call it one way or the other. If we can't invest half a penny on every dollar we collect, I don't know why we're here. At the end of the day, this is one

069of the few things. I mean, I can list out just a few of the sources on this, but we're talking the Brookings Institution, Center for Policy Research at the Maxwell School, the University of Washington, the Journal on Nutrition and Dietetics, obviously the Community Eligibility Provision in the USDA, uh the Oregon Universal Schools Meals Program and their research actually focusing in on this specific group that's not covered by free and reduce the food and re action center, the American Heart Association, the Harvard Chan School of Public Health, Stanford University, University of California, Berkeley, Cornell University, the USDA Economic Research Service, Feeding America, John Hopkins, University of Michigan, Colombia, Yale, Princeton, and also the National Educators Association, which is the National Teachers Union, and representatives have all endorsed making this And so I think we should look

070at it. I think at the end of the day, 130% of the property is not enough and there's a lot of people that are going hungry in this economy. Again, for a penny for every dollar on $160 million budget, a half a penny, I think we should consider um I I think we would all agree that it would be a wonderful thing if we could afford to provide lunch for all of our students. Um, I want to thank um, Miss London for sharing her concerns and I um, concur with most if not all of what she said. Um, but I also want to add, I mean, I don't want to get into the weeds of all this, but I spent a fair amount of time reading the studies that you shared and some others that

071I had found. Um and one thing I noticed for most of those studies um they while the the impact on student shima was statistically significant the effect size tended to be very small many of them were one to 3% of the standard deviation. So I I hate to say you know we think about how many how much of a achievement growth is worth threequarters of a million dollars. Um but but it's a relatively small effect size for a lot of money that I think taxpayer money could probably have more impact um in moving our school system forward in in other ways than providing lunch for a lot of kids who um already have sources for their lunch. Um, I I like that the proposal was to expand beyond title because I think it gives us

072an idea of what you could expect if you keep going. I think title is an easy decision going that next step um by adding Mount Hy and and Richard is is going to teach us something different I believe and and I'd like to see where that goes before I feel comfortable u going beyond that. And I and I do understand there's perspective that our cash reserves has gotten high. We need to be creative and thinking about ways to put that quickly into the classrooms or into the students. And I I think that the the analysis is all a little too quick for me to be comfortable moving forward. But I would like the administration um in conjunction with CA and and others to think about what are all the different ways we can can add

073back. This is one option. Um there there are probably others so that we have some opportunities to weigh with with with respect to the speed at which you just mentioned um last year I think you all remember we spent more money with less conversation around adding a bunch of admin to the high schools and look what it's doing for us huge advantage now compared to before um graduation rates will likely be up significantly compared to where they were. And we're spending more money with that than giving these kids a free lunch or breakfast. But to hit the point of reserves, um we're talking about a half a percent. In 2021, we had uh in operations reserves 11.3 million. In 2024, this is based on the uh a year ago, so it's a little bit dated

074data. Uh we went from 113 in 21 to 143 in 24. And At the time we were sitting on $ 35.4 million in reserves. I struggle with all the discussion of money. I am the most conservative person up here and I'm the one probably the second most willing to spend the money on this because I know the direct correlation between full bellies and uh minds that get filled with education. Um, so I'm I'm just struggling to see why we were so quick to do admin last year and now we're looking at not doing the kids this year. That doesn't really feel like it's focus on every student there. So, I hope we all consider significantly what uh this could do to all the schools that were able to get uh take advantage of this for

075for ultimately a half a percent of our budget. I have a question for Dr. Boseman. So, you said title one schools application is good for four years. Is there a one-year application or an ability to cancel the moving forward pending we take a look at a one-year analysis because in all reality we will not know what the true effect of this will be until the end of the school year. You're you're asking me if if we're commit if we can if we can back out of the program after a year ultimately correct. Yes. Yes. were, you know, from the state side, they're committed for four years or year to year and and and to your to your point question, it's our intention to both evaluate the current state, so title, you know, plus the two

076if that's the direction that you go, but also look at expanding at that point every year. I just have a quick question. So, someone who works in the human services industry, I I would venture uh to say that county is pretty resourcerich in terms of the availability of programming we have for families and children. Um, Mrs. London hit on that. There are programs in place to support, you know, those families nearing that cliff effect. Um we talked a little bit about that not in our most current work session but work session before last. Um that we have kids who meet free and reduced and they certainly receive that service. We also talked about the programming in place to sort of elevate the families who are in that middle ground. So by doing adding all of

077these elementary schools, are we essentially duplicating a service at that point for the families who are in that that middle area? Does that make sense? Not aware of them providing lunch at the schools. Neither am I. I I know from a providing lunch at the school perspective, um unless they're receiving some sort of cash assistance, I guess that's what we talked about that people are filling those gaps, then it offsets. That's unusual, I believe. But it's not direct to us other than every once in a while we do get some donations to cover negative lunch balances. I think Perhaps you talked about that a while back. We'll get a a donation that we put in the fund at the end of the year. We'll clean up as many of the negative account balances for students

078that are paying but they've got a negative balance. So, just to clear up those watching at home, those watching at home, no child is going without lunch currently. That's that's correct. Okay. But to to that point though, the funds that are left over the year to cover the basis covers all schools, not just elementary. Correct. So therefore, we may be able to reappropriate those funds to help the higher uh higher educ. Yes. And to clarify Miss Lloyd's point, um I I don't think one I don't know if we can measure no kids going without lunch, but also what we're asking here is is any kid going without a quality lunch? If a parent is unable to afford and sends a bag of chips with their child for lunch, they have a lunch, but does do

079they have an adequate healthy hot lunch? I think is the feedback that most of these studies would look at in being able to make sure that they are successful in their educational endeavors for that day. And I if I could just speak to the the cash balance question, so much for the board because you guys um have already received information and emails from me about it, but uh for the public really. We will be during the July meeting hopefully considering a first reading of a cash reserve policy so that the public and the board get to weigh in on what is an appropriate amount of cash for us to have on hand for uh obviously for emergency purposes following what's recommended by professional organizations the state of Indiana. So we will bring that to the

080board so that we don't have to ask question as to whether or not appropriate. As long as we're staying within those boundaries, when we propose a budget, we'll put it up there. When we report our quarterly financial reports to the board, we'll put it up there so that you can always see where we are in that range that you set for us. Okay. Anything else before I ask Mr. Non to restate the motion just to remind us? That's what I was going to ask just to confirm. So, if you would please. Yes. I move I move to amend our approval of the C application including all elementary schools approved at our May 19th meeting to only include Mounty and Richards as additional schools. That was seconded by Mr. Stanner. So that is the motion on

081the table and I will take that to vote. So all those in favor please say I. I. All those opposed please say nay. No. Okay, I think motion carries 43. Thank you. Um, now request uh permission to bid item 7F. Request approval of item 7F, permission to bid the turf uh softball and baseball fields at Columbus North High School Athletics located at Southside Elementary School. This is uh just a reminder this is part of the capital projects budget for 2025 from the operations fund. Dr. Boseman can answer any other questions that you might have. But in the meantime, I request approval item 7F. Do I have a motion? I move that we approve item 7F as presented. Thank you, Mr. Nell. Second. Yes. Second. Thank you, Mr. Stunner. Questions or comments? Do we have a

082rough cost of the turf that is estimated for this project? We uh we project that cost to be about $2 million. And the cost would come from operations fund. The cost is a combination of the capital project funds through the operations fund. Yes. and Build America bond funds um that we've had for several years but were used for the the east project also and it's paid out of operations fund over a time period of some sort like is it like 10 year capital planning or how long is it capitalized for? No, that was it was part of the budget that was approved for this for 2025 only. So the full two million is for this year correct and it's from operations fund which is the same what we were discussing correct for the C same

083fund would be to confirm it's um I'm not I'm not completely clear on your question but it's it is yes it is from the operations fund that I just wanted to be clear like this is from the same fund which we just said there was no funds for um the other question is around turf. As you're aware, a lot of the professional associations and collegiate athletes are moving away from turf due to safety issues. I pulled up a couple studies, university hospitals uh across the country conducted a a nationwide high school injury study that showed athletes are 58% more likely to sustain injury on artificial turf. This included football, but also included baseball and softball fields. And then the National Center for Health Research highlights that knees and ankle injur injuries along with heat related

084illnesses are happening happening more frequently on turf which is why a lot of the professional sports organizations and collegiate organizations are moving away from turf. So I guess my concern is from a safety perspective outside of the cost perspective that we just discussed what are we doing to mitigate that risk and why are we looking at that versus natural grass which is where all the other organizations are now. or back to because they went to turf, now they're going back to natural grass. Mike, real quick, Dr. Boseman, I had I had read Logan's email and I had a similar concern and I think Mike, I don't know the proper procedure to do this, but would it be possible for us to maybe table this one pending additional safety review to ensure that there's no knee,

085ankle, lower body injury? uh increased probability due to turf versus grass so that we could then possibly vote on this next time because all we're doing is bidding. So it's not we're not breaking ground or anything. Um what what do I have to make a motion to table? Well, there's already a motion to approve. It's to approve to go to bid, but we wouldn't actually approve the funds until August. So, we have a we have a motion in front of the board to approve it as presented from Dale and Rich made by Dale, second by Rich. Um, if that motion does not pass, it could be tabled for further study. Well, if it doesn't pass, we do further study anyway. So, I So, for the whole purpose to ask if we can table it is

086to allow more information to be collected. So we have the most informed possible decision as possible. So that's why I was asking is it what the process is to table that until the next. So the motion in front of you all I believe need to be acted upon before in terms of timelines. What what if we went ahead and asked for bids and got a report later before we actually approve the funding in terms of the safety and moving forward if we do that do my best to answer questions. Um so for clarity the the funding has been approved and it's in the budget for 2025. what what our next steps would be as we do with other projects get permission from the board to bid which is for today obviously um finish final design

087issue those bids in I don't have my calendar in front of me but um in July and then bring that to the board for approval on August 11th I think is that that date for that board meeting. So, just as we have with um as we're required by statute to bring to the board for approval and expenditure of that of that cost, we bring that um the bid results to the board for approval on on August 11th. So, would it fit that timeline to get some kind of report about safety of artificial turf for that meeting in August? I can I can work to provide whatever information you want in the meantime. I Um there's no need to wait until August 1 or August 11th necessarily prior to the AR. Sure. Yeah. Um and Mr.

088Schultz, back to your since we're on safety. Um back to your question or comments, we've not experienced that here. We've um actually I'll share a story with you. The um some of the underpadding that we use under our turf fields now were marketed years ago as um prevent uh be preventative against concussions on football fields especially. Um and um I'll gather more information to share with you, but to my knowledge from our athletic trainers, the high schools, there have been far fewer injuries, joint issues um with students, student athletes, um hips, knees, ankles, that sort of thing. U from from our turf. So we um I can I can say with certain we've not experienced more injuries as a result of turf being on our properties. I I'm not sure I can speak at the

089professional level, but I can share my research. Again, just a we may be the anomaly. We may have it figured out. I mean, regardless of the cost piece of it, I think it's worth worrying when all the organizations with all the money and all the research are moving away from it. How why we're moving to it is the question I have. Ironically, I can actually speak to that, not from a professional standpoint, but I was at IU this weekend where a turf provider was there giving us a talking about what they do. They're putting in their turf at IU now, five or six other Big 10 schools, and then also some SEC schools. But what he spoke to was different changes in the technology. First of all, the underbase being a different kind of underbase

090that uses now less of the infill. The infill being anyone who's had a kid that played on turf, the little black pellets that get in your laundry, they don't they don't use as much of that as they used to because they don't have to. And then uh to he actually shared with us the reason some of the professional teams are going to the the other direction is because they're able to invest in a turf management professional that gets paid $150,000 a year to maintain the grass on their field. And if you're in Arizona, they take it out of the stadium during the day and they put it back in for the game. And so colleges and and obviously high schools, you know, have the kind of capacity to manage uh turf professionally in that way.

091I said there at least anecdotally that was what was shared with me over this weekend. Interesting you asked those questions today. But uh better technology and uh obviously the other advantage for us as long as the there is the safety factor is mitigated is that we have short seasons. You can only play so many games. It gets rained out and the the kids really miss out on an opportunity to play. really saves us a lot of games particularly on baseball and softball. Mr. Major, there while you all have been talking I've been looking there there is a motion to postpone that may be made as a subsidiary motion so it could be made now to postpone consideration to a later date. I would encourage you all to talk to Dr. Boseman though understand that's direction

092you go of any delays in timing. Does he have any implications in timing? Thank you Mr. Major. You're welcome. Um yes I I am concerned of timing. I think I mentioned in my note that we'll uh benefit from putting this most of the time these turf companies are really busy late spring early summer as they're they're getting work done over the football fields and such for the fall season obviously will benefit from um a late summer bid on this. Um my concern is if we push this out this this project may not be complete for 26 for Columbus North. We're already flirting with that with the timeline that I've presented to you to be frank. So just for just for clarity and transparency of timing and impact, for those of you that didn't hear, Miss

093Lloyd was asking about the next time that you all would consider it if the motion would be made. and approved to postpone it to the next meeting or to a future meeting. That would be point in time when it would come back up again. I do not have any turf background. Um didn't play any sports with turf. I would be open to additional information. I'm just understanding I didn't get ready. Um I'd like to make a motion to postpone until the next meeting pending additional information from a safety perspective. turf versus grass. Second, Logan. I am comfortable getting information while we stay on the current timeline. Just making my comment clear as it will align with my vote. That's what I understood from Dr. that we could approve going out for bids and still get

094information on the safety prior to awarding those bids. So the plan would be you could go ahead and provide that information while we also collect bids. Yes. So yeah, just just as a reminder, this is this action is requesting permission to bid um which we would do over the next six weeks or so. um in the meantime um providing you with the material the information requested and then again that would come back to the the board on August 11th for approval of the the bids ultimately which would be another decision point for the for the board. So I think now that we've got two to go through I go in reverse order. So the motion to postpone is voted on first. So, a motion to postpone the bid for turf at Columbus North High School.

095Um, has a motion and a second. We've had conversation. All those in favor of postponement, please say I. I. All those opposed say nay. Nay. I think it was 43 nay. Um, so we will go to the original motion which is to allow for bid for Columbus North High School turf. All those in favor of going to bid, please say I. I. I. All those opposed, please say nay. Nay. Okay. 43 approves going to bid. I think it's clear. However, in our July meeting, we would like some information regarding safety of turf, etc. to make sure we're closing that out. or we will even send it beforehand. Yes, of course. Thank you. Uh now we request approval for item 7G, permission to award the construction manager as contractor contract for Mount Healthy Elementary School. I

096move to approve line item 7G as written. Second. And I want to jump in because I was a harsh critic on Dr. Bose last one. I'm strong supporter and all this work that we're doing about healthy and getting this done and I appreciate all the work that's going in. I know you've taken extra effort there and I really appreciate it. Thank you. Okay, so approval for item 7G, which is to award the CMC for Mount Healthy. All those in favor, please say I. I. All those opposed, please say nay. Motion carries 70. Human resources recommendations. The 28 human resources recommendations consist of two retirements, six resignations, and 20 appointments. There is also one additional personnel recommendation this evening. I request that you please approve items 8, A, and B as presented. I move that we

097approve line item 8, A, and B as presented. Thank you, Mr. Schultz, Mr. Major. Any questions or comments for Dr. Stal? Okay. All those in favor of approving 8 A and B as presented, please say I. Yes. I. All those opposed say nay. Motion carries 70. Thank you. Okay. Start at this end. Board input review. Anything to add on? All right. Um, first thing I wanted to do was just uh late happy father's day to all the BCSSE dads out there. Uh, second thing I wanted to apologize to Dr. Phillips for last meeting. Don't look so surprised. I know how to apologize when I'm wrong. Doesn't happen often, but it does happen. Um, no, last meeting I had asked for the winter academic state list and I had printed this off and and forgot it

098at home from the last meeting. So, I just want to go through and congratulate all of the 2025 academic all state uh winners from both East and North High School. And I want to apologize in advance if I get any of these names wrong, but Columbus East boys wrestling, Rowan McWills, Talon Jessup, Caleb Cooper, girls wrestling, might have been easier to talk about who didn't make it. Madison Schwarz and Trooer, Sage Plameumber, Monica McMahon, Grace McMahon, Madison Mount, Linda Dest, Eden Knight, Tanisha Deetsz, Madison Shrader, and Isabelle Wakefield. Boys swimming, Michael Makaani, girls swimming, Maline Byer. And at Columbus North, girls basketball, Emma Beaver, boys basketball, Nate Ini, uh, boys wrestling, Jackson Luke Spurgeon, Asher Ratliff, and Roelio Utr Pedra and uh girls wrestling. Um I had Reggie Holden. And so uh just want to

099congratulate all them. That's a awesome feat to be uh both um recognized as a uh athlete but also as a student. So it's tremendous. And uh wanted to thank all of them for the hard work and their coaches and their parents as well because it takes a a huge team effort to get those kids to that level. So, thank you all. Congratulations. Big thank you to all our teachers, school building based staff finished another school year since the last time and uh really appreciate all the work that happened in the buildings close to the students and thank all the staff for their work during the 2425 school year. Also want to thank uh Mr. Macyver, Mr. Major and Mr. for attendance at the ISBA legal seminar recently. Appreciate the fact that you guys are committed

100to learning about those issues to help us make good decisions here. I just want to congratulate all of the high schools for successful graduation ceremonies. Really, really well done. Nice job, Dr. Phillips, on your first graduation series. You did a great job. Um And for all of those parents out there, hang in there in the summer. I feel like after a couple of weeks, we're finally starting to settle in. But if um you were like me, the first few weeks were a little little rough while we figured out how to be a summer family. So um now we're in the groove. Um so in my career in education, I couldn't tell you how many graduations I've been to. Um, but I made it to all three of our graduations this year and and while there

101were probably fewer students graduating that I knew, it was really enjoyable and and powerful to see um how unique each graduation had it its own um flavor at East and North and um CSA New Techch. So again, congratulations to all the graduates from all three high schools. Um, thank you to Dr. Boseman and his team for the extra work you did on the C. Um, and and I also have to say um part of my conversation with Dr. Boseman since our last meeting since our working session I guess on C is I was thinking we often talk about barriers. So my question to him was like are there other barriers besides um the kids who don't qualify for free reduced lunch in terms specifically in terms of breakfast and and he told me a couple

102things that I wasn't aware of and I just commend our school system for taking care of our students the way they do. Um one thing he said was that students who in BCSSE who qualify for reduced lunch um they're given a free breakfast. We were required to give them a reduced breakfast but we actually give them a a free breakfast. So that that's a barrier removed. And also um I asked about you know the timing of our the start of our school day and kids trying to get breakfast and and we have a setup where no matter what time a student late arrivals can still get um breakfast at our elementary schools. In fact I think have this right. Many schools even have different stations where they can pick up something for breakfast on their

103way to their classroom. They don't even have to go to the cafeteria to get it. So, I I just commend Dr. Boseman and the food service and our schools for betting our backwards to to help our kids as much as they do. Um, and finally, I'm not one for self-promotion, but I'm going to do it anyway. I am not going to be at the next board meeting because hopefully while you all our meeting. I will be about 20 miles from ending the Appalachian Trail. Um and I am again doing a fundraiser for the school foundation. So um if anyone's interested, you can email me and I'll tell you how you can support Dale on the trail. Are you saying that you're overhill over Dale? Actually, that's my trail name is Over Hill Overdale. Uh, I

104would like to thank uh Dr. Phillips and Dr. Boseman for the explanation of the credit card checks and balances explanation. That's not something that we were asking for by any means, but in light of everything going on. It's a breath of fresh air. I'd like to say good luck to Austin Perry tomorrow at State. Where where's he where's the tournament at? North of Indianapolis. I don't know where. I wasn't sure if you knew the course or not. like to say congratulations to all the participants and places at the track state meet. Um I noticed there's a lot of 800 meter runners on there and as a former 800 meter runner it is the hardest race you'll ever run. You can't sprint and you can't jog. There's no in between and it is miserable. Um so

105that's amazing on them. Miss London, if you were not able to finish your thoughts with the three minutes, I would love to for you to email us as well. Whatever final thoughts you had, I appreciate that. Thank you. Uh Dr. Boseman, questions for turf that I have be local input if we have any of that. And I'm going to ask around as well. I asked some of the coaches and and parents throughout the area some of their input towards it. I never got anything back from them yet. So, um, but like Mr. uh Mr. Scholes asked, maybe some injury data because I had a lot of same find as he did. As someone who's been injured on turf, uh, I'm a little hesitant as well, but even whether it's national data, but we also may

106have like you were talking local data, how we have newly revised ETH turf and without breaking any HIPPA laws, that would be great. Um, but maybe a little bit of data there to see what we what we can compare to. And then the other piece of that is maybe a cost analysis versus grass fields m maintenance versus the turf and longevity. Um because I I knew there I know they're changing the technology where less rubber is amazing because you have to turn it over all the time or refill it and it's a pain in the butt. Um, but just certain things there and if I come up with anything else, I'll email you and and everything. So, finally, go Pacers. Let's let's let's try to bring this home. It' be nice. Yeah. Um, one, I

107want to congratulate the teachers and the staff. I knew this was the meeting right after school let out and we had a very successful year. I think honestly if you looked at it in the past two years we've made more growth in graduation rates, reading achievement, math achievement, it's a universal across the field across the board in terms of just how we're doing and I think that's a commitment effort from Dr. Phillips and his leadership team um and the teachers and the principles and the staff in general. So just congratulations. I know we just recently discussed that we're not very good about celebrating but we need to celebrate because this is this is a great opportunity where we we get to highlight those those wins and um and go forward. Um I also wanted to

108say welcome to all the new teachers. I know I had a family member in one of the orientations and said it went really well and everybody enjoyed it was a great time and so welcome to the new teachers and staff to the team. I want to appreciate Dr. Stalbomb. I meant to mention it last meeting to allow us to meet with some of the pathways folks that were the transition program from staff to teacher. It was great having an opportunity to really uh sit and discuss and see their uh career vision as they were trying to figure out where they fit in this big puzzle and helping students. I think that's great. Um I also wanted to thank uh Miss Gretchen and the Book Buddies and Cam. I think that's an awesome highlight. Book Buddies

109continues to be one that we've had. I think this is my third year seeing this presentation and my third year wondering how do we invest more? How do we scale more? It's proven to work. it has a direct correlation on student outcomes and I think that's uh that's where we need to start looking at spending our uh hardearned taxpayer dollars. Um I also want to commend the food service. I don't want any of my comments to be misconstrued. Nancy and her team do a great job in making sure that our students have the best options in the state. I enjoy that presentation every year. Um, I I think at the end of the day, what this board's decision was is I had an IU or IU economics professor that said the greatest thing in business

110is opportunity costs. And what we just saw was our opportunity costs were softball fields and reserves, buildings. And I think that's where I asked the public, I think that's where we have an opportunity to learn more from you because I know I mean as my time of growing up in Taylor'sville and seeing poverty many many of my friends growing up. I know there's a big group there that don't get a lunch a hot lunch every day. And so I think we have more to learn and more to grow. Um but I think at the end of the day it's a good opportunity and we have a lot of great wins to celebrate going into this uh next school year. So thank you. All right. Next board meeting is on July 21st, 2025. It will be

111here in the administration building at 6:30 p.m. Thank you all. Meetings adjourned.