001let's get started then let's get started this evening first up on the agenda is the Pledge of Allegiance and Mr buckler has the pledge tonight good evening everyone my name is Craig Buckler and I am the principal at Center Grove Elementary and it is my pleasure to introduce Ellie Mae Shepard to lead our Pledge of Allegiance for this evening's meeting I have just a couple things to share about her before we let her jump into it Ellie is the daughter of Samantha Harper who's here this evening and is a fifth grader and Mrs woodhouse's class Ellie is an outstanding student at CGS and in January was nominated by her teacher for the knight in shining armor award to recognize her positive attitude at school Ellie is a member of the ukulele club and the choir
002she is also a member of the student safety team who's meeting tomorrow with Mrs Rawlings Ellie is the lead catcher on her travel softball team and her free time she likes to paint she is hard-working and responsible and she always has a smile on her face and brings joy to everyone around her I am proud to have her represent Center Grove Elementary School this evening [Applause] I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all Ellie if you'd come up this way [Applause] thank you all right next up adoption of the agenda do I have a motion Mr President go ahead Mr President garyson thank you all those in favor signify by saying aye
003aye all those opposed motion passes five zero and except this evening is recognitions sorry I was getting a look for Mrs Kelsey and Mrs McMahon is going to introduce our Rising Stars are rising stars for Center Grove High School rising stars of Indiana is a non-competitive recognition program designed to honor High School juniors for their academic achievements each Indiana high school was invited to recognize up to four students in the 11th grade based on their current academic achievement by allowing schools to identify outstanding Scholars during their junior year iasp hopes to increase their visibility and scholarship opportunities it is my pleasure to introduce Center Grove's four Rising Stars RAV agrawal come on up please and we'll give you your certificate Ellen Nguyen Lillian Spite and Taylor word we're very proud of these students for their
004accomplishments you're not done yet thank you thank you [Applause] yes a big congratulations well next up for recognitions is Mrs Rodman for our Indiana statehood Day essay contest winner we have a student who placed second place from Turkey Grove did you spend a lot of time each year learning all about Indiana's history and part of that there is a Indiana statehood Day essay contest that our fourth graders are encouraged but not required to participate in in the state of Indiana this year there were 1200 applicants that wrote an essay centered around the theme of living in Indiana because there were so many applicants they actually narrowed that down to 108. at Sugar Grove we had 30 that participated in that initial 108 there were eight in Johnson County six of those from Sugar Grove so
005that of that 108 they then picked their winners and we are very honored to have Nora Jansen who's sa-1 second place in the Indiana statehood essay contest out of 1200 entries which is an awesome honor so not only did this allow her and her family to be able to attend the state house for a special special recognition on December the 12th but her entire class got to join so Mrs Franklin and the entire class was able to attend they got a special tour of the state house and just really got an opportunity to to celebrate Nora for her accomplishments it was really neat when we got to find out when Mrs Franklin announced to the class that Nora had won the tears of joy of the students in that room it was just really cool
006to see the excitement for everybody so Nora is going to take a minute and read her second place essay for everybody awesome fantastic hello my name is Nora Jansen and I am a student in Miss Franklin's fourth grade class at Sugar Grove Elementary my essay today is called Indiana's food whether you are in your home or in a different state you have to appreciate the food of Indiana on any night corn pork tenderloin or sugar cream pie can sound so good you can go to state fairs and get salty and buttery corn the Indiana famous pork tenderloin sandwich or the Hoosier sugar cream pie for dessert there are 5.27 million Acres of cornfields in Indiana I love looking at my great grandpa's cornfields he says he loved working with them the fields are a beautiful
007sea of green stalks The Buttery juicy and salty corn on the cob is the most delicious side dish for a Fourth of July dinner tenderloin sandwich is one of Indiana's most famous dishes the beautifully breaded sandwich is perfect for any night with your family I love watching my family make the tenderloin just right with the perfect outside my Grandma makes the best pork tenderloin ever it is so much better when you make it yourself though you can get lettuce onions and ketchup on your sandwich as well lastly the official state pie of Indiana is the sugar cream pie I wanted to know what it tasted like so my grandma and I made it together it is so buttery and Rich The Filling is more of a pudding but the taste is delicious this pie creates
008Nostalgia for every person that eats it I will definitely have it again these are some of the best foods of Indiana if you haven't tried buttery corn the crispy pork tenderloin or rich in buttery sugar cream pie you should try them they might become some of your favorites too thank you you think it's Mom right no thank you all done all right next up for recognitions Mrs Fisher is going to recognize the the girls high school golf team thank you anyone else hungry after that essay that was very nice essay good job to that young lady I'm Katie Fisher assistant A.D at the high school and it is my honor and privilege to be here tonight and to introduce our head girls golf coach Mr kale Hoover as he brags a little bit about his
009team and the awesome season they had yeah [Laughter] I'll make it quick we have another meeting that a couple of us have to go to um thank you for having us uh outstanding season uh we got off to a bit of a rough start early but uh we have a really short season too so it was really important that we kind of got things uh headed in the right direction highlights uh we won the Johnson County tournament won the Bloomington North uh Invitational and then sectional Regional and uh finished his State runner-up we were actually we had to lead after the first day of state and uh weren't able to to hang on to that but uh a wonderful season we have uh four of the four of the five players here and um four
010of those five will be coming back next year so maybe we can come back with the the bigger trophy next year so do you want me to do the introductions too okay we've got I'll go and order so Rowan pfeiffel Junior Abby rich Junior Sage parsettich who's a senior and Camille short who's a junior and then uh one Lexi Stewart was our our fifth player she's also a junior she wasn't able to attend tonight thank you I can see you later okay okay you're welcome thank you great job [Applause] so as everybody can see with the recognitions tonight we've we've got quite a array of talented students whether it's academically athletically um very impressed with the young fourth grader who stood up in front of everybody and read her read her essay so I might
011have to have another pork tenderloin before I call it a night after that all right next up uh reports we have a report from the teacher retention committee work Mrs Nelson well good evening thank you for allowing me to talk about the great work that are started out as a retention committee um has done over the course of the school year we formed this committee back in August to really look at retention as we were looking at data not only in our district but across our nation and what is happening in education right now so I want to kind of give you some background our work is really done looking at John Hattie's work and we know that the new number one influence is that student achievement really starts with that Collective teacher efficacy and
012if we don't have a great group of teachers we are not going to see student achievement and that's not only academically but also personally socially and emotionally up here on the screen you are going to see a 2021-2022 exit data from teachers who left our Corporation starting in August of 2021 to July of 2022. you can see that quite a few are leaving education altogether others were of course retirement moving out of state and mental health was a big big part of that exit data as well so as we went through this data and looked at and I'll talk a little bit more about that background we did put a timeline in prep place because we wanted to put a task force together we wanted to be in partnership with our teachers to see what
013really was it that why why teachers were leaving the corporation but also education in general so as of right now we've been able to meet four times over the course of the school year of course it will be six times because this is just the mid-year update and we do still have uh quite a bit of conversations and work to do in our summer 2022 exit interview data I was able to sit down and speak with those teachers who did leave our Corporation and it was also qualitative and quantitative through a survey it came down to five different areas the reasons why they were leaving us is because of collegial working conditions in the schools they also wanted to look at restructure of pay and benefits a teacher mentoring programs and then also looking at
014the professionalism and support that they're getting not only within the schools but also through our White River Township community looking at that data the task force was formed in August of 2022 we had 27 certified staff members we actually had over 70 70 certified staff members that wanted to be a part of the committee but we needed to pair it down and so 27 were on that committee as well as two District administrators up here on the screen you're going to see the different topics that we were looking at and that was working conditions professionalism and support and then that financial needs all of these items over to the side the influence items were kind of those side categories that we were looking at as well our collective bargaining and benefits Community Committee um which
015is Head Up by our utag also working with our district committee with Mr Taylor and Dr arkanoff and myself we wanted to make sure that when we talked about collective bargaining and especially with the payment or restructure of pay and benefits that that was inclusive to that space and so our work was parallel was parallel and in tandem with the collective bargaining talks that were going on in August September November December and of course into January um when you look at that these are the four areas that we we focused on and that was the collegial working conditions we wanted to look at leadership roles recruitment efforts and teacher mentoring and that's where our teacher retention committee turned into teacher recruitment retention and recognition because all of that came out of the survey data that
016we were looking at with our current teachers on that committee when we looked at the current task force data and again we took this from our teachers that are still in our in our classrooms right now um the recruitment part was the community reputation reputation salary and benefits came through that as well and then that national and local PR when it comes to being in the classroom and then education in general and retention the group wanted to look at workload they wanted to look at Subs how those are being used and supported throughout our schools that morale and that collegial team building and mentoring and then recognition you know we have wonderful ptos and wonderful parents who recognize our teachers throughout the year but what can we do to make sure we have year-long recognition
017programs and it's just not inclusive to one week in May so our team developed developed these pipelines for improvement they were the ones the teachers were the ones that narrowed those pipelines into these three areas and then also looking at these more Focus areas under each one and I'm going to talk just a little bit about that tonight so in recruitment we have a wonderful Community who they pour our teachers pour their hearts and their soul and their life into these students every day and that was you know evident tonight when we are looking at the beautiful writing that came from a fourth grader wonderful academic programs and then also our academic programs so that um we need to make sure that we are growing our own and so we are going to actually Implement
018just like our um our Athletics do we're going to have a CG future teacher signing ceremony coming up in May and as of right now we have 15 seniors that are going to be going uh into education and so we're hoping that we can get them back here into our school buildings because we know that their hearts are within this community as well another possible solution and something that we are working on right now is we have some strong Partnerships with local universities and programs but we are building that up um as as we speak to Market our cgc Center Grove rules to teach your candidates and that is getting into those classes talking to Future Educators telling them about the great things that our Corporation has but also supporting them with just the job
019search in general also with recruitment is student teachers we are fortunate to be a place where our student teachers from Central Indiana schools want to come and learn from the best because we do have a wonderful teaching staff and so welcoming those student teachers into Center Grove our HR department has been pushing out to them and having meetings with them going in and observing helping with resumes and just where they're at in their job search hoping to keep them within our school buildings and identifying those strong student teachers another recruitment possible solution that the team talked about was just marketing CG again we are we are looking at Partnerships more with our universities um Stacy Conrad has done a great job getting video series out there about what makes our schools great and our teacher
020is great we are in talks with some of our Cadet teachers to do a future teacher Camp possibly which that would we would look at student leaders from third grade to eighth grade and just kind of teach them about what it's like to be a teacher in the classroom and then looking at a career pathway maybe for Education starting that career conversation earlier at the middle school level must pause there any questions about recruitment stuff that's going on we did yes so we had um a recruitment Fair last night we had 102 job um positions filled like for them to interview and it ended up being 91 that showed up for the career fair last night and definitely interviewed so see we got some great candidates so retention challenges um again came with substitute teachers
021and I have to give a shout out to Michelle shealy in our HR department she has done a wonderful job of going out and seeking out the best substitutes that we have are possible solutions that we came up with at the recruit with the re retention committee and task force she's been able to bring it to fruition and so back in November we celebrated our subs with national substitute day we've been able to incorporate them more by you know making sure that they feel like they're a part of our CG staff family they are receiving a monthly newsletter we're giving out surveys just so that we can make sure that their experience with our schools is positive we've increased subpay so we are one of the highest if not highest in the county right now
022and then also giving sub incentive bonuses so we're hoping uh doing those five things that will be be able to fill those classrooms so that our teachers are not as stressed when they don't have a sub in their room or when our aides are out sick and so we don't have to pull them to cover somebody else another Retreat retention that we're looking at in recruitment is that teacher onboarding process that comes down to that collegial mentoring our instructional coaches do a great job meeting with our new teachers but we definitely want to come up with a coaching calendar and kind of make our we've got great mentors but make that Mentor program take it a step up as they support new teachers not only during the first year but also the second year and
023we heard that a lot in the feedback is they felt like they had a good Mentor the first year and then they got to the second year and they just didn't have the collegial or the mentorship that they needed we're also looking at um the workload and I know we whoops we know we hear that a lot um there's a lot that teachers have to do outside of the non-instructional day that they could be using for planning um and also looking at great um you know practices that they could use not only in their classroom but across their their grade level and their school and so this group right now we're in the middle of that is looking at what we can do to lessen the workload and create more time for our teachers to
024play in and be together and then recognition uh the team came up with some some again wonderful ideas on what we can do we're hoping to implement these during the 23-24 school year with the help of our community as well just monthly and yearly morale boosters for our school and districts so that we make sure that they leave every day feeling loved and respected uh when they're in their classroom so our mid-year summary again we still have a couple more times that we're going to be meeting what this team has generated looking at data also getting feedback from current teachers in the classroom is that we need teachers that are effective but they also need to feel supported by our district and our community and also we want to make sure that we're growing our
025own teachers because we have some great people that live here that we know would do wonderful in our classrooms with our students and we're also being very proactive right now just in our retainment efforts so that we can support our teachers any questions or I guess more more of a couple of of comments and I have questions so a couple things for everybody to understand if they ask why the committee did not focus on paying and benefits those are really Bound by the collective bargaining laws in the state of Indiana and can't really be talked about outside of those parameters that are set forth by the state as the board approved in January Mr Daniels and I will continue our roles on the collective bargaining team and we have begun talking about that process with
026our internal team that's what we spent some time talking with the board about today during our executive session and we're starting that process earlier than we have ever done before and the results of the teacher come in teacher retention hang on I've got to get the whole committee name right you gave me a mouthful to say um recruit recruit retained and recognize and recognize thank you the three R's R cubed yeah um is very important as we have those conversations and begin you know the conversations as a board you know for how can we add it correctly and adequately recognize our teachers so I look forward to the additional recommendations from the committee and it sounds like at least we have a good path forward and please think the 27 on the committee currently for
027all their hard work on behalf of the board thank you yes yes a wonderful job honored to lead this lead this group and they they've come up we've had some really great conversations so wish everybody could have been at the table but we'll report back to you in a couple months on our final report fantastic nice job on the fair too oh yeah it was great yes that was a collective effort that wasn't me that was everybody so I've got to give a shout out I don't even know if they're looking tonight but shout out to the HR department uh they did great so it was a lot of fun and thank you to our admin because I know they put a lot of time in after school to interview and and make sure that
028we do have the best and the brightest in front of our students every day well I'm close to double to what we had last year wasn't it it was yep it sure was so and I'm excited here we are in February and we're already we're already starting that recruitment process so it's the earlier we can start that the better the better off we are yep and we had some great candidates it's positive thank you I turn my mic off all right next up is public comments just a reminder each person who has signed up for public to speak to the board via public comments has three minutes in which to do so Mr Daniels will be the timer this evening um just a reminder for everyone please direct all comments to the presiding officer of
029the board and please make sure all comments are exclude names and all those kinds of fun things those are as our normal rules um first up this evening is Angie lingman wants to talk about the Stu start time survey and can you state your name and address for us please yes sir my name is Angie langman 5753 Somerset Boulevard Bargersville 46106. and Andrew I'll give you about a 30 second warning when okay good go ahead hi my name is Angie Layman and I have two daughters at Center Grove Middle School Central I'm an active PTO and participant participant volunteer at the school for various activities and events tonight I'm representing a large group of concerned Center Grove School District parents who share the same opinion on extending the start time for our middle school and
030high school students our group has reviewed and discussed countless sleep studies on vital importance of proper levels of sleep for teens and tweens at the end of the day we are not sleep experts with this in mind please remember that I am borrowing heavily on a talk by um sleep researcher Dr Wendy Trexel Dr Wendy Truxel PhD is an internationally recognized sleep expert she's a licensed clinical psychologist and a certified behavioral sleep medicine specialist in her Ted Talk Dr text Trexel highlights the research and this solidifies the importance of sleep and the consequences of sleep loss I know that I'm depriving my children of sleep that they desperately need as rapidly growing teenagers I also know that by waking them up in the hours before their natural biological clock tells them they are ready that
031I'm literally robbing them of their dreams the type of sleep that most associated with learning memory consolidation and emotional processing but it's not just my children they're being deprived of sleep sleep deprivation among American teenagers is an epidemic only about one and ten and or get the eight to ten hours of sleep per night recommended by the Sleep scientists and pediatricians now I know you're thinking Chu you're doing good my kids get at least eight hours remember eight hours is the minimum you're barely passing eight hours like getting a c on your report card there are many factors contributing to the epidemic but a major factor preventing teens from getting sleep they need is actually a matter of public policy no hormones social lives or SnapChat across the country many schools are starting around 7
03230 or earlier despite the fact major medical organizations recommend that middle school and high school start no later than 8 30 A.M these early start policies have a direct effect on how much or how little our American teenagers are getting they are also pitting teenagers and their parents in a fundamentally unwinnable fight against their own bodies around the time of puberty teenagers experience a delay in a biological clock which determines when they feel most awake and when they feel most sleepy this is driven in part by a shift at the release of the hormone melatonin teenage bodies wait to release the Melatonin around 11 pm this is two hours later than we see in adults and younger children this means that waking up teenagers at 6 a.m is a biological biological equivalent of waking up
033at 4am on the unfortunate days I wake up at 4am I'm a Zombie functionally useless and I cannot think straight probably shouldn't be driving a car and this is how American teenagers feel every day in fact many of them they say are unpleasant characteristics we chalk up to being a teenager moodiness irritability laziness depression could be a product of chronic sleep deprivation and now I will turn this over to April McCracken three minutes on this on the spot by the way thank you thank you Mr flingman next that signed up to speak was April McCracken can you stay here April McCracken 4083 Brockton Manor North Drive all right going on with Dr troxel's information for many teens battling chronic sleep loss their go-to strategy is to compensate with caffeine so they have lots of coffee
034drinks energy drinks and we now have an entire population of tired but wired youth she goes on to say that Advocates of sleep-friendly start times know that adolescence is a period of dramatic brain development particularly in the parts of the brain that are responsible for those higher order thinking processes like reasoning problem solving and good judgment so in other words the very type of brain activity that's responsible for reining in those impulsive and often risky behaviors that are so characteristic of our teenagers they know that like the rest of us when teenagers don't get the sleep they need their brains their bodies and behaviors suffer with both immediate and lasting effects they can't concentrate their attention plummets and many will even show behavioral signs that mimic ADHD and they are more likely to make bad
035decisions in this time of life the consequences of teen sleep loss go beyond the classroom contributing to many of the mental health problems that Skyrocket during adolescence including substance use depression and suicide in one study that Dr troxell's team did they found that teens with sleep problems were 55 percent higher more likely to have used alcohol in the past month in another study with over 30 000 high school students they found that for each hour of lost sleep there was a 38 percent increase in feeling sad or hopeless and a 58 increase in teen suicide attempts and if that's not enough teens who skip out on sleep are at an increased risk for a host of physical health problems that are plaguing our country like obesity heart disease and diabetes so then there's the risk
036of putting the sleep deprived teen with a new driver's license behind the wheel of car and that's never good Studies have shown that getting five hours or less of sleep per night is the equivalent of driving with a blood alcohol content above the legal limit Advocates of sleep friendly start times and researchers in this area have produced tremendous science showing the tremendous benefit of later school start times and the findings are unequivocal we have put a lot of value you've put a lot of it on the website if anybody is interested in looking at all of that it is a best practice to give teenagers enough sleep to be productive in our classrooms Mr McCracken next step to speak is Mr John langman thank you my name is John langman and Angie langman is my
037boss and I'm going to present the third part of our three-part series here on the later start time studies that we've been able to research on our own teams from districts with later start times well they get more sleep to the naysayers who may say that if school starts later teens will just stay up later the truth is their bedtime stay the same but their wake up times get extended resulting in more sleep they're more likely to show up for school apps has dropped 25 in one district and they're less likely to drop out not surprisingly they do better at academically as well so this has real implications for reducing the achievement Gap standardized test scores and math and reading go up by two to three percentage points that's as powerful as reducing class sizes
038by one-third fewer students their mental and physical health improves and even their families are happier I mean who wouldn't enjoy a little more pleasantness from our teens and a little less crankiness even their communities are safer because car crash rates go down 70 percent in one District given these tremendous benefits you might think well this is a no-brainer right so why have we as a society failed to heed this call often the argument against later start times goes something like this why should we delay start times for teenagers we need to toughen them up so they're ready for the real world that's like saying to a parent of a two-year-old don't let Johnny nap or he won't be ready for kindergarten delaying start times also presents many logistical challenges not just for students and their
039families but for communities as a whole updating bus routes increased Transportation costs impact on Sports care before or after school these are the same concerns that come up in District after District time and again around the country as school start times are debated under legitimate concerns but these are problems we have to work through they're not valid excuses for failing to do the right thing for our children which is to start middle and high schools no earlier than 8 30 A.M in additions around the country big and small we have made this change they found that these fears are often unfounded and Far Far outweighed by the tremendous benefits for students health and performance and our Collective Public Safety think about the tremendous power of sleep I think about what a gift it would be
040for our children to be able to wake up naturally in harmony with their own biology in closing we want to thank you for the opportunity to express our opinions on this vital issue good night thank you Mr langman all right next up is the consent agenda item seven thank you this evening I'm recommending the board approve the consent agenda as presented Mr President I was going to ask for a motion Mr Daniels go ahead Mr President I move that we uh adopt the consent agenda as presented we have a motion in a second any questions on the consent agenda this evening all those in favor signify by saying aye aye all those opposed motion passes five zero thank you this evening we had uh about eight eight retirements this evening then I don't know if
041you want to list them all but we really do want to thank them for their many years of service to the district and I don't know if anybody's with us tonight not no okay but that's a a big loss for the district but you know when you get to that point where you want to retire it's time so we wish them well thank you Dr arkanov next up 8.1 1028 preliminary determination hearing for the wellness center construction and multi-facility construction renovation Improvement projects and I will turn this over to Dr arkanov thank you this evening's board meeting has been appropriately advertised as a 1028 preliminary determination hearing so with that Dr long will present some information and Mr Taylor as well so let's see I think we need to turn it over and over to
042you to go ahead and open up the meeting it's going to say hang on you read my part I did okay all right let's yep sorry I don't know if I did say this okay I now open this public hearing I like to turn it over to Dr long and Mr Taylor to present the project the financing of the project and the actions we're taking this evening thank you go ahead tonight we're going to talk about two of the major projects one is a wellness center for the our employees we're currently in the old house of your old like Mr Robinson and I have as coach Moore's house when he first moved here we're looking at we've kind of outgrown that so we're looking at Building A New Wellness Center that would also have a
043fitness component to it for our employees we'll expand it to make it a little bit larger and you can see by the Red Dot there on the west side of of the high school is is our proposed location the other facility that we're talking about with the yellow star is a a building for the girls softball team and the boys and girls golf team which we just had here tonight it's just a really basically a pole barn building that we're going to have to give them a place to to continue to practice indoor similar to what the baseball team has just directly south of that go ahead I talked just a little bit about it we'll have some mental health consultation rooms some dedicated space for physical therapy uh really some just better overall patient
044privacy better insulated walls and everything so people feel comfortable in there talking about their needs the our goal is obviously in Ms Nelson talked about a little bit um sorry Dr Nelson about our our bill are trying to retain and attract uh teachers and employees we feel like having an improved fitness center uh in a classroom for other Fitness classes is a positive for all of our teachers and and you know it's one of the things that Dr Nelson talks about when she goes out and talks to uh potential candidates they want to know whether or not they we they have thing we have things like this our other goal is to have an outdoor walking path to promote Fitness for anybody in the community to come and walk around that and have a location
045to do that the nice thing is and and Mr Taylor will talk about it a little bit later is that we can do this project with why we're maintaining the current tax rate go ahead so that's uh the uh the architect's conceptual drawing of what the facility will look like really fits in nicely with the main campus uh what we're trying to do with the entire campus here go ahead seeing just see there's kind of a floor plan that we've laid out on the left-hand side is the fitness space and the workout are in the classroom instructional space and then on the right hand side are the three exam rooms space for storage and doctor's office and then some mental health provider space as well so the heading facility we talked a little bit about
046it's a multi-use um gosh I'm not that fast [Laughter] trying to speed me up here I'm like let's go here um so so uh we'll have space for the the softball team to have three uh hit three heading cages uh three Bays for the boys and girls golf team where they'll be able to be in there year round to to work out the same with the softball team again it's a great project because it helps it's good for lots of kids and we can do it with while maintaining the current tax rate so that's a a kind of a an artist or the architect's rendition of what that could look like too and this the floor plan on the right hand side are the open hitting space for the the softball team to either hit
047or throw or or um in there and then on the left hand side is the uh the hitting Bays we'll have bathrooms in there but we won't have locker rooms and we'll have office space for the coaches if they want to talk one-on-one with their their players as well so great job Dr Long thank you um I just want to add one thing before we go to the project financing um the space for physical therapy that is one of our largest reoccurring expenses in our health plan and by offering that through our Clinic it'll be something we're able to offer at a much lower cost we are already working with Community Health to discuss Staffing that position um probably with even some of our existing PT people to help our students so be a great
048way to offer that and bring down those health health plan costs so as we move into the money part of this I just want to share so this is uh these are two projects uh go ahead Miss Howard to the next slide two separate building projects and they're going to have two different bonds that are attached to them for the sizing of the bonds we've positioned these to be right at the the limit allowed so we could ensure that we could get some of these other projects off our list as well Dr longshared the two major building projects that are attached to these bonds but there are some other things we're going to do with this money that we want to take note of um we have been studying the concept of purchasing our school
049buses out of out of bonds we've done this since 2009 for our technology and maintenance Hardware something we had to do back then when the funding funding changed locally and frankly our operations fund couldn't support our technology and maintenance equipment but we are hitting another limit where it is very difficult for operations fund to support everything that we need to take out of that that includes bus drivers custodial staff the purchase of school buses all of our utility bills all those things are increasing and frankly our tax rate in that fund is not keeping up and so this is an area that we've identified as we could purchase a portion of our school buses out of these bonds much like we did it's a way to keep sustaining and keeping up with what we need
050to get done and so that's listed up there and then some extra just the soft costs loose Furnishings of these these spaces are included in both bonds and then in the second series there um series 2023 C we also have identified that the the turf on the varsity football field is reaching its end of usable life and so that will be included in that that's one we're also still searching for outside sponsors on and that could change it could stay the same but we wanted to make sure it was funded um we do need to tear down and raise the old Maple Grove building now the PRC now the academy it's had a few different names but it will finally be raised that is to make room for expansion of the high school parking staging
051for construction as we build the new academic Pavilion there is also a possibility of the a stoplight at Pennington Morgantown some we've we've been looking at it from a safety perspective that we'd like to try to fit into these bonds and then again just miscellaneous soft costs facility improvements land acquisition if needed just kind of a catch-all category of if there's anything remaining um these bonds will be paid off um in a shorter period of time this isn't a typical 20-year building lease on these I believe the first one's sized at about six years and the second one is seven or eight so these will be paid back pretty quickly which will help us keep that interest cost down as well I believe oh I've got a couple other supporting slides um it's Howard if
052you go to the next one just just kind of show and remind what we said earlier on the slide that this is not an increase to the tax rate the board's been very diligent in maintaining that level tax rate since 2009 you'll see for 2023 it landed at a dollar O2 which is still two cents lower than our tax rate was in 09. these projects are factored into that and looking towards the future and then the next slide shows how our tax rate Compares in the county and um Edinburgh schools passed an operating referendum this last election and they've now moved back above us and so Center Grove is at that dollar two positioned forth in the county and really the three above us all have operating referendums which push them up over that or
053they've had very large building projects to keep their their tax tax rate that much higher so get a good bang for your buck here in White River Township and Center Grove schools and we like to show that and that we're trying to be fiscally responsible but still adding these facilities that our students and employees need and real quick the last slide is just a schedule we do plan to tonight's the first hearing on this there will be a second Hearing in April um where the board will actually take action at that time we'd ask for an additional Appropriations to spend the money out of the bonds that are being approved um Dr long would get bids submitted for board approval as early as May We Begin work in the summer and we'd make our first
054payments in tax year 2025 . and on our last slide this is a public hearing and therefore there is public comment allowed and Mr Alexander I'll turn that back over to you thank you Mr Taylor this is the appropriate time for members of the public to comment on the wellness center construction a multi-fill multi-facility construction renovation Improvement projects and the information presented this evening are the members of the public who would like to comment and if anybody would like the comment please come to the Podium and well teacher teachers the wellness center yeah not currently however if we have like custom specialized classes taught by an outside instructor that's something that we've we look at we've actually visited some other school corporations that was the model they use but the equipment itself will be available
055just if we've got some outside instructor costs and that's still fluid we're still talking about it Mr poor hello Keith poor 5186 cave Court Greenwood uh this is news to the taxpayers of the county that we're going to spend 12 million dollars here approximately on another facility I think it's uh from this report that we just received from the uh teachers you know that you had tonight uh I don't see that that this will support that report at all I think it's 12 million dollars that will be spent on a facility that will very few will take use of and if you tell me that a hundred percent of the teachers will be over there all the time and use it that it might be worth it the softball hitting State uh area I thought
056we just built a activity or a another gymnasium I call it a gymnasium but I can't recall what the official word is to do this now we have facilities and time in the school right now we have weight rooms we have some pool we have other facilities for them teachers to take advantage of to use so why do we need to spend 12 million dollars if the if our Township would get rid of the debt that we are paying almost 60 percent of our tax dollar for we're paying 60 over 60 percent of the tax dollar approximately let's say 60 percent of the tax dollar to pay for the bonds if we got rid of some of that then we would have money to buy buses we would have money to do the other things
057that we need to do thank you Mr pork any other members of the public sure I'm sorry I should never come to these another question with the golf base are they would they be open to the public for rent not that I care about that but just well that might be an idea for fundraising your point I think all right any other questions or comments on the bonds okay I now closed this public hearing are there any board members who have any comments or questions I guess the only one comment I'll make um about the Wellness Center um as part of that initiative to talk about teacher retention and those types of things we are self-insured and one of the ways we keep our insurance costs down is by providing those medical facilities on our
058campus for the teachers to go to during the day and as our staff has grown we have outgrown the current Wellness Center that we have and and for some patient privacy types of things it's not the best equipped and well suited for being able to have those private conversations as I understand them from sitting in on the insurance committee meetings um it is something that is available to all staff members and their family who are on our insurance plan um and we encourage them to take use of that because it helps reduce our insurance costs and if the teachers can stay on campus it also helps us reduce the amount of time they're out of the classroom so unfortunately as we grow and we've grown a number of Staff who use that facility we've outgrown
059the current one so Mr Alexander just I don't remember the exact number but we utilize the current Wellness Center at almost a 90 percent rate um something close to that so our teachers already utilizing it and it's also where they get a lot of their prescriptions taken care of and and those types of things so yeah I think it's the important thing is multifaceted everything that it's going to do is really important just like that equipment there I mean that's going to be a big use too of the physical therapist we'll probably use that as well when they're providing physical any other questions no action required this evening we'll take action in March is that correct April sorry thank you thank you Mr Taylor next up 8.2 take action on bids for Sugar Grove Elementary
060phase two Dr Long thank you tonight is a little bit unique I don't know that I've ever brought a situation like this to the board um tonight we're going to ask the board to reject bids one through six and then accept bits seven and eight and I'll explain that a little bit in detail tonight from AECOM with us is Chad Peters so Chad's in the back but on January 12th we opened bids for phase two for Sugar Grove based on the review of these bids the D scope meeting and the project budget we are recommending the rejection of the following bidders listed below the bid packet one for General trades uh bid packet two for structural steel bid packet three for roofing bid packet four for mechanical and plumbing bid pack at five for fire
061protection and bid pack at six for electrical and lighting the the reason why is this came in over our budget and so we're doing some value engineering that would allow us to bring still get what we want out out of the building but bring it back to within cost however we are asking the board to to approve the bids for a bid pack at seven the access control and security to ERS Wireless in the amount of 268 195 dollars and 30 cents and bid pack at eight kitchen equipment to C T design and Equipment company in the amount of six hundred and forty seven thousand three hundred and sixty dollars mainly this is due to escalating costs even as we're doing the d-scope meeting the cost of the equipment and and the ability to get
062some of the security equipment in kept going farther and farther out those prices won't get any better in fact we stood the risk of them going up and and the value engineering we're doing with the rest of the project did not impact what the the kitchen equipment that we needed in the access control and security so we're recommending the board approve those two bids bid packet seven and bidpack at eight uh as I mentioned we'd been working with the architect and AECOM hunt to Value engineer the project to get it within budget our goal is to rebuid the project in open bids on April 4th and have the board approve them at the April board meeting and and start construction in May that what's really critical about this is because of the work we need
063two summers to do that so that's why we're pushing the architect to turn around the drawing things fast enough that we have one summer in the administrative area to do and then the other summer we'll spend getting the rest of the classrooms in place but that's that's our recommendation I do know that's a little different than what I've typically brought but times they are changing and well first I I guess I think the folks from haunt and and Bill you're working with them and bringing it to us and telling us that there's ways we can save money and finding that out how tight are we I mean are we going to be able to rebid this and still get it built within those two summers are we pretty confident of that so uh on a
064schedule yeah no it'll be a couple months a little bit a couple months later than what we had originally planned um but we we met with the architect and and with hunt and did an estimate on what the the items were that we were going to Value engineer what we what we recommended would bring us well below what our budget was so we feel pretty confident that when we re-bid this we'll hit our budget numbers and and still be able to do the work that we wanted to this summer the areas that need to be done this summer Chad am I missing anything okay just want to challenge you a little more Chad you know your job's too easy in building buildings we just want to condense the schedule unless we can be sure and
065then with seven and eight I guess the ones were being asked to recommend approval of are those I mean are they going to hold their bids are we going to go ahead and buy the materials what okay oh wow okay it's definitely needs and some of the security equipment that if they can get it in they can start doing that it does not impacted by the delay they'll go ahead and do some of that work anyway yeah so who stores the kitchen equipment is it just going to be delivered later are they going to store it do we have time that it would sort their warehouse so it's not going to be an issue for us then appreciate it thanks good questions do I have a motion Mr President I move that we reject bids
066number one through number six and accept the bids number seven and number eight for Sugar Grove Elementary phase two thank you do I have a second you have a motion in a second all those in favor signify by saying aye aye aye all those posed motion passes five zero thank you next up we're approving a new high school course uh Dr Hoover yeah um sorry about that um each year the high school makes course requests from proposals to add courses which may be available to students in future years typically these come in the fall because of course books come out this time of year and they're already starting scheduling processes but as a reminder during the implementation of Next Level programs of study approval for additional courses may be requested in spring and summer as
067the doe is pushing out new things all the time and so this is a response to that and so to what I'm asking tonight is that flexibility and Grace you offered back in the fall here's a new course so the course requests are vetted through Department chairs and the high school admin team this additional proposal um well is another course to support those Next Level programs and it's in the technology education department um the chart there summarizes the course the department and the grade levels of students that this could impact the description below but also provides more details at this time this High School would ask and request if you allow them to be able to offer this course for next year um it matches the course descriptions through the idoe um and the course
068is in general carpentry it's an entry-level course um in future years um assuming we have enough students who want to take this in the interest and we have a great new teacher we've added to that already great Department who can teach this course so hopefully we'll come back next year for round two with the next so it will be determined on the number of students who want to take that whether it will be offered but this gives us the possibility with your approval of offering it if there's student interest excellent it was one of my favorite classes in high school I actually built a barn awesome well come over and help me all right any other questions from the board for Dr Hoover I'm I'm excited about the class when I read the description I'm
069assuming from talking to Mr Warner there's already quite a bit of interest in the class so I just need a motion Mr President I move that we approve the high school course titled construction trades General carpentry thank you Mr Russell do I have a second thank you Mrs counts uh we have a motion in a second all those in favor signify by saying aye aye all those opposed motion passes 5-0 should we have added an addendum to allow Mrs counts to audit the course I guess I think guests speak guest career speakers thank you all right next up 8.4 approved school start time survey Dr arkanov uh this evening I just want to recommend to the board approving a survey for all uh staff students and community members on the um including parents on the
070start times as you know the district has been working for probably 20 years on looking at making this shift on start times there's much research out there that supports making this change so committees have been working on this on and off over the last several years and right before we dealt with covid we were leaning and moving in this direction to make a change uh the committee that at that time came to the board and laid several options in front of you um the administrative team worked through those options and basically came up with just one and that is to flip our start times we believe that's what's best for our students so what we're going to do and what we're recommending is asking our parents more so about and our staff more so about
071the um early release time in professional development so when you look at that survey you'll see here we'll collect a little bit of data on who who the person is as far as whether a student parent or staff member and so forth then we'll um also get the grade level that's impacted and then finally we're going to ask them how they uh how they are affected by or how important it is to have a five day week that has a consistent end start time and end time versus having the early release or late start Wednesdays and so we'll get some feedback with that from all folks we'll also discuss this with our Teachers Association through our discussion process as well we will bring this information back to you in March at the March board meeting
072for you to re to see we'll share it out as well on our website we do have a start times website out there it's been there for many years and you can get to that on our main website um if you just go to the home page and go to start go to uh I think it's under the hours and and calendar area then you can just drop down you'll see start times as a sub tab much much data I will say this over the years as the board knows it's been a it's been a constant recommendation that we make this change it's what's best for kids and over the years all the data has done nothing but make that even more more and more uh obvious that it is good for kids and I
073I think the folks for coming out tonight to kind of share their thoughts on it so we will um we'll start the conversations with all the players involved and we'll get this data this survey will probably go out next week any questions for Dr arkanov I just need a motion I move that we approve the school start time survey thank you Mrs council do I have a second I have a motion and a second by Mr Daniels all those in favor of approving the school start time survey signify by saying aye all those opposed motion passes five zero thank you all right our last action item this evening is 8.5 this is a first reading of a revised attendance policy so there is no action required this evening no action required this evening we're bringing
074this to your attention tonight uh because our attendance policy right now has a couple of things in there that we would like to delete all about virtual learning and covid-19 related absences so we think it's time to strike that and get rid of it so uh this is first reading everything else would stay the same it matches our handbooks it would just get rid of those last two paragraphs thank you Dr Nelson any questions from the board I mean we've had this to review and then after tonight's meeting this will get posted on the website where this well it'll be part of board docs so it'll be posted in the board doc tonight once once this meeting's adjourned it becomes live uh tomorrow sorry thank you yeah you don't want to stay up all night
075so uh tomorrow she'll get that taken care of and then the public will be able to see the changes all right yeah good awesome thank you all right announcements um March 23rd 6 p.m we have an executive session in the conference room March 23rd we have a regular board meeting at 7 pm also on March 23rd immediately following the board meeting we're going to do our first good for the Grove we'll follow a very similar format that we do for public participation beginning of the board meetings um members of the community will be given three minutes to talk to the board about any topic doesn't have to be related to an agenda item um and we'll start with blocking 15 minutes and if we have more people that want to speak the board at their
076at their uh discretion thank you it's been a long day the board did their discretion can um extend that time which I suspect we probably will um next item July 27th the executive session and the regular board meeting have been moved to July 20th and on April the 20th or April 20th are April 20th meeting executive board session has been moved to April 11th both those moves are due to some scheduling conflicts that we didn't anticipate when we set the board meetings back in January so we will get those posted immediately uh board member comments this evening Mr Russell [Applause] April 20th second 22nd sorry 22nd they had a very successful trivia night first time they ran that and uh sounds like plans are to do it again next year so they're doing a whole
077lot and scholarship uh sign ups coming up soon thank you Mr Russell Mrs couch and our Sunday best Robinson anything this evening um first of all I was there at the trivia night Center Grove Educational Foundation it was really fun and uh great turnout number two blessing's been a backpack I want you to know that it was going to be moved to Sugar Grove and the neat thing was with the help of Dr Long Jake Short assistant principal and Jeff Henderson at the high school we were able to keep it uh blessings and backpack to be done at the high school and why that's so important is when I went over there twice there were 12 students that would walk over from the high school to put the backpacks together and uh I appreciate what
078they did because I didn't want to lose that piece of the high school kids helping the elementary kids so that was a neat thing and then yesterday because I'm retired and I can do these things I went to the teacher I went to the teacher recruitment Fair because I taught 43 years wanted to see and 91 people were there and it was so cool that there was young people there because you hear all this stuff I mean there's a lot of young people there and it was so well organized so I want to give a shout out to Jason Taylor Kristen Nelson and Nora Hoover and all the their staff because it was very well organized and uh as I text the board was very uplifting I was CG proud so good stuff thank you
079and no fair answering all the history questions that trivia night we did pretty good we were hurting up some others Mr Daniels I don't think I can top that so I don't have anything to fight um I I don't know that I can top that but um uh Johnson Johnson County Redevelopment commission um they are on the non-voting advisory School Board member they are moving forward and proceeding with several projects along the I-69 Corridor um several several exciting projects through there so keep an eye out for um new developments and in construction along there and what that's going to have to come some Road improvements and infrastructure improvements all along through there in an area that's probably been neglected for quite a while so I do have one other thing um Dr how long you'd
080like to share a little bit about the tall cop coming the seminar yeah yeah on March 2nd uh we have a we're very fortunate to have a a nationally recognized speaker he goes by the uh the nomenclature I guess the tall cop says stop and he's going to work with our staff during the day and then at night have a a a work session and really with uh with any parent or anybody in the community we've opened it up to all of Johnson County he'd love to have a full house in in there and and just talk about current drug drug Trends and and all the stuff that's going on with the vaping and and different drugs that are available to our our kids and and in the and in particular the community he'll come
081early and walk drive around the community and and and kind of get a sense and so he gears his presentation towards our community but he'll be here March 2nd Stacy's done a really nice job of putting something on our website he would like to have us RSVP so it's important that to use the QR code in RSVP I think last time Stacy told me we were over 125 or we're over 200 now so that's really good and I know we shared that when we went to the Johnson County school safety commission we shared that with all the representatives there and we're going to share it with the Indiana Department of Education the safe schools Academy so we're going to try to get the word out and this is a great opportunity for us and we're
082really excited to have him come here I I was excited about this when I heard about it as well this is a continuation of Dr Long's efforts to ensure we're a leader in in School Safety and Security and this is kind of the next evolution of our Safety and Security practices so I want to thank Dr long for that effort I want to thank the board it's been a long long day we started at two o'clock today so um with that we are adjourned