001You did not want to reopen with a pledge. Correct. Get logged in. All right, we'll go ahead and get the work session started. Since we already opened the regular meeting, the pledge of allegiance, we will skip that for this part. Um, this is an overview. This is the second of two work sessions. And as the board's executive secretary, I will be facilitating this again tonight. I will help guide discussion, keep us on schedule, and ensure the agenda moves forward smoothly so that our timeline is productive. This evening, the school board superintendent and business manager will provide a review of the information provided at the September 20 29th work session and they will review the discussion that surrounded microchooling, the 4-day school week in the future of CN primary. It's important to remember that no official
002decisions or voting took place on September 29th and the same is for this evening. There is no official voting or decisions being made. These sessions are meant to explore and continue discussion on options for the school board to take formal action at a later date. The board and superintendent also welcome public comment following discussion of the agenda topics. and we continue to ask those comments remain respectful, focused, and centered on the long-term success of the district. If you haven't already and you would like to speak, please be sure to sign in at the entrance. I will be grabbing that shortly. Mr. Morgan and Miss Bombgartner, you can provide a review of the information discussed on September 29th. And at this time, you may call on administrators or other staff members to add information, insight, or
003clarification. Board members, you're encouraged to take notes and prepare questions following their review. All right. So, on the 29th, we had a couple presentations. First, uh, Mrs. Lemon gave a presentation on microchooling. Um, and it was kind of a passion project based school within a school program. Um, that is referred to as microchooling. Um, it breaks down barriers for students who maybe aren't enjoying school or aren't fitting into the regular school day. Um, is there anything you want to add to that, Miss [clears throat] >> Thank you. The goal of that would be to be able to [snorts] maybe bring in some students from outside that are maybe homeschooled or already on a digital school um to plug them into schooling of their interests but be able to meet graduation pathways. Um [clears throat] we'll
004go from there. Um the second presentation was given by Mr. Stuck. Um it was about a 4-day school week. um to which we ended up the board had requested that we put out surveys. So we have that data that we'll share after we do the overview. Um and the four day school week. A couple of the main important points is savings for that would come from operations only. It would not be um from salaries. Nobody would be losing pay for that time. We'd have to do some things um creatively and maybe up some wages hourly to be able to offset those the days that they weren't working. But looking through what some other schools do, typically they don't. Nobody loses wages. I know that's a big concern >> that's employed by the school. >> That's
005employed by by the school. We do have a group that I'm not sure it's Chartwells. um they we contract our food services with them. There could be a possibility of that, but that would be up to Charter Wells and how they handle that. Um and then we uh spoke briefly about Centron Noble Primary. Um should we make a decision not to do a 4-day school week or if the state ends up not approving a waiver if that's the way we go? what we would do with the primary building. Um, we're gonna have to do something whether that's move everyone over and use repurpose that um or shut it completely down. That's those are things that we'll have to look at. So, that we'll get into here in a little bit. >> That was quicker than
006[laughter] All right. Additional discussion. Now that Mr. Morgan has provided a review, we will move on to open discussion with board members. As with the review, the superintendent or business manager may invite administrators or other staff to provide input as needed. The topics are as follows. Consideration of consolidating kindergarten and first grade from the Wolf Lake campus to the ALI campus. Consideration of microchooling option and consideration of 4-day school week model including survey data. So, we'll just start out. We'll kind of flip it. We'll start out with the data that we collected. So, we sent out a couple rounds of surveys um to community members, parents, put it on social media. Um we also surveyed our students and staff members. Um the board, you have some of these results in front of it. So we
007got eight for the uh community school or the community survey uh that went out to parents, grandparents, community members. We had 844 responses. Of those 655 identified themselves um as parents or guardians, 189 were non-parent respondents. So that could have been grandparents, community members, business owners. Um so there's a breakdown of that. So you go to the support level um from parents and guardians only of the 655 responses 65.1% were either strongly supported or somewhat support the 4day school week idea while 24.8% um somewhat opposed or strongly opposed. And then there are 10% um of those that responded that were neutral um were unsure. This is just a graph that that kind of shows that same thing. One of the big things um that we've heard is about child care. Um so from those responses,
008those 655 parent responses, 63.4% that said that they would not need child care. Uh 24% didn't respond to the question. So that kind of leaves it up. I don't know if that means that they don't need it or if they do need it or they just didn't respond. Um 6% said occasionally that they would need child care while uh 5.2% said that they would need child care every off day. So out of that 655 responses that 5.2% is about 32 families. So if you average two kids per household that's about 60 to 70 kids um that need some daycare services every off day. Again, just another graph pointing that out from community respondents. So, not those who didn't identify themselves as parents or guardians. Uh 61.4% um either support or somewhat support a 4day school
009week. 31.3% opposed, somewhat strongly opposed, while 7% are neutral. So overall, out of all 844 responses, it was 64.2% were supportive, 26.2% were opposed, 9% were neutral, 9.6 will be technical. Again, just another graph that shows that Um, the next survey that you'll see on there goes by grade. So, it's a sixth, seventh, 8th, 9th, 10th, and 11th graders. Uh, this one was interesting because I would have thought that most kids would be like, "Yeah, that's what I want to do." I would have thought we was seeing like upper 80s, lower 90s. Um, and we didn't. um you know it actually kind of aligns overall with what we're seeing from the parent and the community survey. So 65% were positive for it and 21% were negative. So uh that that was kind of shocking. I
010would have thought that most kids would be like yep four days that's but they weren't. So that tells a lot about our kids. Then staff responses was the next one. Um so all staff response there were 92 responses from our staff. 79.3% were positive or for supportive 12% were neutral [clears throat] and then 8% were opposed somewhat strongly to those. That's it for those surveys. Um, like I said, most of the the and I had sent the board earlier, I sent you a email with links to that survey data. I didn't want to put up here because it has personal emails on it with from people that could be identified with the answer and I didn't want to put that up [clears throat] on this. Um, but you guys have access to that. Some of
011the common themes that were identified um throughout the community survey was child care, which looking at those results um while it might be an issue for some, an overwhelming majority is doesn't seem to be an issue. [snorts] Um but there still are those families that would need it, which we need to work on a solution for them. Um as far as uh on the staff side, the biggest concern was about pay and what that would look like. Um, again, nobody would lose pay. None of our groups would lose any of their annual pay. The savings from this would not come from pay. It would come from our operations and things like utilities. Um, saving on fuel and wear and tear on our buses from not being ran for that day. saving on things that you
012don't think about every day, but paper towel, toilet paper, um paper just in copying, those types of things that um are maybe small when you look at it by weekly or monthly, but over a year's time [clears throat] add up. So, we're still in thinking that it would be a two to 5% savings in our operations. um looking at a four years the biggest cost um and I don't want to say savings but the biggest cost measure um that we think would be um the increased enrollment that it could possibly bring um if you look at roughly $7,000 a kid uh that we get from the state for our state tuition from the complexity grant if you bring in 50 new students to the district that's $350,000 which more than covers our our shortfall um
013that we're going to be experiencing with sea one. So any questions from how much that seven grand the state gives us is actually spent educating our students with our curriculum on the ballpark. I know it's not a known number, but >> do you have that? >> I mean, it all goes to our education fund which August gets to [clears throat] their teachers curriculum. >> Yeah. >> Jason, what was your question? I didn't hear you down here. Sorry. >> I just was curious how much that $7,000 the state gives us per student is spent educating that student. and maybe maybe not teacher pay but like curriculum and stuff like that. >> Yeah. And it goes student by student I would say because some of our students that u attend impact like we spend almost all of
014it sending them to impact. So they come back >> then for half the day educated. >> So that student cost us more. >> That student will cost us more. Yes. And just when we're thinking about pay because again that was one of the big things we've heard from our staff. So if we even look I just did a pair of professional as an example. Um right now our starting pay is 1370. Um East Noble starts their pairs at 1636 and West Noble starts their paras at 1450. So we are well below our surrounding districts. If we keep their pay the same for a 4-day week, we could increase our starting rate to 1459, more in line, at least with West um still below East, but that just makes us more competitive um to try to
015get staff, even support staff into our district. So, we we definitely are proposing to you board that we keep pay the same and just work work some daily some different daily numbers for them. >> [snorts] >> I think a benefit of that too would be making us competitive not only with our support staff and our bus drivers but also um and our teachers um making us more competitive and keeping up pace with some of the surrounding schools while they may not be quite as much but making their daily rate a little bit better. Uh and and I think it actually I don't think you can put a cost savings to getting candidates that are qualified to teach. Like we said the last time we had two positions that were open for most of the summer
016and we got zero applicants. So that is not best for our students either. So we're trying to increase the the talent pool and the people that apply would also be able. So in your example for the IIA, you're saying that their rate would stay the same, but they earn that same rate. >> Their annual rate would stay the same, but their hourly rate would increase. Y >> that's the same across the board. >> Y >> I wonder if they retook this survey and they knew that to be a statement that wouldn't turn to 100%. Because I'd make the same amount in four days as I could make in five. and their four days will be a little bit extended from what it is now. Um, but calculating I think I calculated it would be about
01780 hours less for one of our regular PAS for a year but we would want to keep that in your salary the same >> is the school date was proposed at was it 50 minutes longer. Um it's a little bit I think it's like 65 >> and the hours would be starting same the hours will be 8 to 3:45. There is a little bit of a change just to make it fit with the on the staff side we put in 7:45 to 4. It probably be 7:30 to 4. So we have 15. We still have to submit to the state, right? >> Yes. >> So what's what's the pro I mean I understand the process. >> We don't have to make that decision until they say yes or no. >> If they say yes, we
018could still say not right. >> So all of this hinges on whether or not they even allow this to happen. >> Yep. Yep. And Mr. Tiger and I had a conversation with the state superintendent Dr. Jenner and uh she told us some things that we would need to do and she said to be honest it would be about 50/50 on on whether or not the state would approve it or not. So if we apply for the waiver and they approve it, do we have to do that or can we [clears throat] ask for >> Does the state then review academic performance like >> they have they have within their waiver there are things that we would have to meet be reviewing academic performance reviewing attendance behaviors all that kind of thing. Typically it's on a
019yearby-year basis. We would be asking for a three-year trial. Um, but you can stop it at 22. After a year, you say, "No, we're going to go back." Um, so, >> and how often will the state review if we ask? >> Every year, the state would look at it every year. They would want to do a threeear review. >> So, they could pull it at any time, too. >> No, I don't think that they would pull it, but they would just want to see the data from there. >> What's the timeline on submitting paperwork? The state makes a decision. So, it's a rolling basis. Um, they're not real clear. Basically, they say you could start submitting late fall, early winter through the spring. Um, and they they review them on a rolling basis. So, um,
020if we ended up waiting, if you guys have questions or things you want answered, we brought back, excuse me, to the board meeting on the 17th, you can make a vote then, or you could wait until the December one if we needed more answers to things on what you wanted to do. Um, but I do think even if we submitted by December, we would have an answer by late February, early March. Um, maybe a little sooner if we submitted it yet here in November. So, that's not a guarantee. >> Talk to the state superintendent. >> Yeah. >> Has he had any other schools inquiring? >> She um they have had one that went in elementary and so which they did approve. They had another that they had done, but they didn't approve it. Um, and
021I think David said that it was because they were short on minutes, maybe for their seventh grade or something like that. Not sure. I looked at it. >> If we apply, we don't get it. Can we reapply? Can we change it? >> They give you like a 30-day window and tell you the things that they were that they want more information about or that didn't they didn't think fit. So we could look at it and see if we can make changes to that that 30-day window. >> Actually, I think it's a 29 day window. >> There's some concern the community that that uh this may not hurt middle school people, middle school kids and high school kids, but uh kindergarten, first grade, uh the formative time that some of the test scores aren't showing that
022well in other states. I I don't really I guess I just throwing that out there. If you have a >> Yeah. Well, I think at the last meeting David said that the research said that in rural communities where time was extended that there was like a net gain there wasn't any difference for or above >> um as far as academic performance >> and the school that's doing it is it more middle school I mean I know there's one doing it in the state are they doing like kindergarten then as well >> school I think it's a K through four Yes. >> Are they on a yearby-year basis or they do a threeear >> trial? They're year two or year three. >> I know there's a lot of concern for like busy the younger kids that
023are busy and like to be busy in the day. I have one of those that doesn't like to sit still or likes to be busy. Do you feel like the staff at that point when we make a plan for their day, you know, we would accommodate breaks as necessary and things like that for kids, we would have to be diligent in how we plan those longer days. Right. >> Right. And that's where I think, you know, good teaching comes into play and we have good teachers. So, I think they would accommodate and make sure that those things happen. Um, I know from my time at the primary building, it was always we don't have enough time. We don't have enough time. This would give us a little more time. >> And I think that is
024part of it too. Like I do feel like on days where maybe, you know, grades aren't what I would expect to be brought home, they had a very busy day. And that's to no one's fault, but maybe I guess that might benefit on those particular days where trying to get things done. And >> yeah, um, you know, I think what what we need to look at and remember is we probably we need a backup plan. The state says no. Um, if you guys decide, yeah, let's try for the waiver. We'll put a waiver in. The state says no, we still need that backup plan of what to do. I think our options really at this point, and Kim can kind of correct me if I'm wrong, like looking at coming shortfalls that are going to
025happen um would be to move everybody to one campus, repurpose uh Wolf Lake to put the preschool out there. I know there's been some discussion on what do they pay. We've had a long-standing relationship with the YMCA, like before I even came here as a principal, it was running. Um, they keep the prices low um for our community because we don't charge them to use the rooms. Um, in talking with the YMCA, if we charge them, they would have to up it. They already incur about a $50,000 a year loss on our YMCA program, keeping the costs low. Um, and so they're finding grant funding and donations to cover that. If we had to increase that, they would have to charge more, which would end up costing our families more. So, I don't I don't
026know that's good for our partnership to do that. >> Well, and also, if I'm being honest, my son probably wouldn't have gotten to go to preschool because without a central campus, I couldn't have gotten him there. I mean, it took a village already. >> Yeah. So, um, looking at repurposing will ledger, I think, is what we would need to do. Putting the the preschools out there, putting, um, the daycare out there, the daycare would be kind is self-funded. Um, it would we would have the room to be able to use rooms out there. Um, we've had some conversations with the co-op. Um, currently West Noble has the um, special ed preschool, the EI, the early intervention program. [clears throat] Um, we've had uh, conversations about them bringing that if we were to move to be
027able to use some building space out there, which would bring us some money because they would rent the room. The co-op would rent the rooms from us. Um, so there are some options there as far as the co-op goes. Um, I think we're currently sending almost 20ome preschoolers to the early intervention program so that they would be in our own district at that point. Um, I know there was concern about space in the elementary. Dr. Young, could you speak to that on what that would look like? >> Yeah. So, as of as of right now, sitting in our building right now, we have the four rooms that are being used by those groups that you just talked about. There are two rooms additional to that that are that are completely empty that have nothing in
028them. So that's six rooms. We have two special education teachers who uh have at most uh I would say a big group for them would be 10 kids. They're in full-size classrooms. We have music and art in a classroom of which could be moved to carts. And then we have uh art on carts that would go around in teachers classrooms. And then we have uh our guidance counselor in a full-size classroom. Uh she has class one day a week. So my math tells me that's 11 rooms. Now we would have to we would have to figure some stuff out. Like obviously we need a room for special ed. So we'd have to do that. But if push came to shove, we can find 11 classrooms fairly easily right now, >> which would mean most grades
029if they grew could go to four classrooms. We have currently we have uh uh three sections of fourth grade, four sections of third grade and three sections of second grade. So we have what is that five nine uh nine classrooms 10 10 classrooms right now. >> And we have a emotional disabilities room. >> Correct. And that and and again that would that would that's a co-op kind of discussion decision that actually is a double room. That's a that's a huge room. um that we could figure out maybe how to use a little bit more effectively depending on what happens with that program. And again, that's that wouldn't be driven just by us. We'd have to work with co-op on that. But so that would be 11, could be as many as 12 classrooms. >> So,
030we would have some room. Um I I think at that point you would probably get some cost savings and there's some positions we could combine or um eliminate if you moved everyone over and moving the daycare and some things out to repurpose Wolf Lake I think is probably a smart decision um in case we get some more growth and housing and kids moving in. Uh, of course, unless it would go to the 4 day week, if it would go through and everything went through, I think you would want to keep it as is right now to see what kind of out of district transfers in we got because we may need to even put second grade back, put fifth grade back, be able to create space for kids. >> Yes, we might lose some, we
031might gain some. Where does it all shake out? >> I think a lot of this hinges on the four day. I don't think we can make really a a true decision on that. We have a lot of discussion, but until the 4 day either goes or fails. >> Yeah. >> And I think the last option would be just closing primary building completely. Um but at that point, you're running a risk of Jason, you can probably speak to this, working on buildings like that all the time. U you let a building set like that for six months to a year and it doesn't get used, it starts to become you might as well not use it at all. It's just like living the car sitting the field for two years and not turning it on. >>
032And at that point, I think if you had any growth that you needed to expand, you're going to look at4 to $60 million in a building project that you would most certainly have to do a referendum for. >> And if we close Wolf Lake, how much do we think that saves a year? >> 175. that that would be kind of run operational, but we would have to factor in >> yes, different things because there could be some contingent cost there if we would combine some things. >> I mean, just like my family, I've got seven grandkids, 10 being the oldest in the one grouping, and [clears throat] they're 5.8 miles from Northern Heights, and we get letters every summer from Northern Heights in my area about, hey, come to our school and there's no transfer
033costs. ers know anything. So unless you're saving a lot of money and that's 7,000 a kid, you know, uh I don't know about that >> personally. >> That's all things to consider. >> Yeah. >> And that does what the class sizes we do, you know, no change. >> That means we have the accommodations for the classes as they are, >> right? There would be there would be some room to make some grade levels four that needed it. um the grade levels that needed that were three, we could keep at three. Right now, our numbers just fluctuate so much. We go from classes of 91 down to classes of 68. It's not really consistent. I think um as far as micro schooling goes um I think it's a great um thing to pair with a 4
034day week. Um I think it can bring in some of those kids we had. Matt I think Mr. Kipper asked how many homeschool kids we had. So Matt Neper, we had him pull the data. I think he's back there. So correct me if I'm wrong, Matt. He pulled from the last two years um students that left to go to home school or to digital schooling. We had about 60 61 kids in the last two years. So I don't know if it would help to bring some of them back or not um as far as micro schooling, but if you could bring all 60 back that would make it worth it. um on its own. Um I'm not sure we bring in enough kids to pay for it. I know there's some grant money that Mr.
035Snipper talked about, but we'd have to look into that. Um because those grants were written for specific things and we have to make sure that they fit with the micro schooling model to be able to pay for that. What kind of research do we have to do to find out how much this would cost the corporation the micro school with all the grants being accommodated and all that other stuff? What would the cost out of pocket for the corporation? >> Well, it would be whoever was willing to teach it, how many teachers you had, whether it was one or two compared to kids that have brought it. >> We can do the cost of students. I forget you told us, but I forget. >> Okay. We get what the cost would be. But then it
036would be based on does it bring kids in? Does it just take existing kids we have? because you know it's really it's a net zero if it's already kids that are going to school here. It only brings in money if it's kids that are out of the corporation already. >> We don't have any way to know what that is until we actually >> until we actually get out. [snorts] That's why I think it would be good to pair with the 4 day week. I don't know if we stay just doing five days and do some other configurations at this time. I think it's a great idea, but I don't know at this time that it will be financially viable for us to do. >> Do you guys have any more discussion? There there there are
037there are ways to try to put that micro school out there and to like have an interview process for kids in the community to like test out how many kids in district, how many kids outside of district to see if it generates money because if you have seven kids that brings almost $50,000 and combine with some of the grant money that might fit that. We could pilot it for a year to see where it goes. And if you have more kids come in, you can have a second teacher and then like to try to tap into some of those kids that are no longer here. I want to go here while still accommodating some kids that it could be a good fit for. >> Then once word gets out, I think that's the thing, too.
038It's it's going to take a while to develop. >> I think you got to try to get it to go for a year, find funding or grandma or make it a model that it's 50/50. It's 5050 industry kids, 50 kids that aren't currently here, 50% I mean to try to to offset that. Um there there are models of like an interview process like is it academically good fit? Does their family dynamics fit the model of the education system and things like that to like do like a lottery system for the kids that are in here and then to kind of interview process kids outside of the district if you come in. So if we did something like that, it could be a viable thing to at least offset that cost because we got to pay
039for a teacher who replace it and that's the biggest thing to make sure it is at least in that zero to pilot >> and that's if we can find something. [clears throat] >> Yeah. What would you say it would? Would this be a feasible thing for us to say we could pilot pilot this next year with 15 students? >> Am I crazy? Or is that something that might be >> pilot whatever number of students you would have? I mean, >> well, the goal would be no more than 15, >> right? Yeah, >> that's why I'm saying 15. If that happened, >> what if there was 30 that were you willing to put another teacher in there? I guess that would depend upon the funds available to use for that. I think if the funds are
040not there, my my personal I don't want to speak for everybody, but we could we could only do what we're feasible able to fund and I would think if we could cover 15 students and a teacher, pilot it with that instead of saying no and then potentially if we have more than that. They also have quite a list of grants that are kind of not DECO. There's also Deco, a member, that's willing to sounds really willing to help us. Um, and then if you're interested in a zero cost district, there's the Indiana Micros that will just take over that and they pay for the teacher and the, you know, the school kind of that removes the school's >> liability >> control or options or, you know, if we want to make it our own kind
041of thing. Um, that goes away. But there's also like there's lots of ways to make it zero cost even if it's 100% of the kids are coming from inside right now. Of course that's not the goal but um there are many um people are just sharing all kinds of great right now. So things that are beyond even what Jared is saying already exists here in the district but there are others out there that we can apply for including deco but others besides that too. And in that microsc coalition that way it was pay it would be it would be theirs within our school. >> How long of the was that a contract you'd have to sign with those folks? >> I don't know. We'd have to I'm I'm in contact with the guy who's in
042charge of it. Um he's a superintendent >> in Indiana here. >> So Heather I'm guessing if they take over they get the funding and stuff the state as well. nothing but maybe it does if you worry mostly about the cost. It eliminates cost too >> and also the benefit for the kids. I guess ultimately that's what we're here for. So >> realistically, how many do you think you could get for a year one pilot? >> I think we can make the 1 to5 ratio. Um I don't know. I'd be I'd be interested if I'd like Jar's idea of kind of putting it out there and seeing if it's interested. I've had families come to me personally already and and talk to me about it and kids keep asking when are they going to vote and
043did it go through or not. Um so I know there's an interest um I don't know how much >> was it ser it's in your building. What are your thoughts? No, Heather and I met today and talked about [snorts] it. Talked about some different grant opportunities. I think there'll be students who benefit. I would have the same questions as everyone else does if they're going to draw enough students from outside of the corporation. We've taken 15 of our own students. Doesn't add anything to the the total students that we have. The idea would be to draw to make it attractive to students who aren't in our school or who have gone to an online school and want to come back or who are homeschooled and want to try to you know a hybrid test schedule
044or something different. I think 15 to one is feasible. I just don't know how many outside of students that 15 will be. >> Is there any way we could reach out to the kids that are homeschooled or kids that decide to go online? We said there was about 60 of them. Is there any way to reach out to those kids to see if this would be something they would be interested in in possibly coming back to Central Mall? >> Imagine those have contacts. >> The information we would have would just be the information would be as accurate as when they left. So, it's possible that the contact will still be good, but it's also possible that 20 out of the 60 that are able to talk to you, give you an idea, >> right? Yeah.
045Yeah. I think I would add too that if we would do that I think a inerson meeting of some sort would be better than a survey just because it feels like there should be some back and forth questions and answers and >> well this is fully on your shoulders. [laughter] >> No, but I think the 60 is a place to start. They've left here for some reason. Maybe Yeah, we can put a meeting together or something. Reach out to them. Say, "Hey, we're having a meeting. another option, you know, just see if we could get some pull to maybe get them back in the building. >> I I understand the financial side of things. We also have kids that we serve currently that need something different out of school. So, we got to keep that
046in mind also. Like, is it a good thing for 15 of our kids that are here? Quite possibly could be. the added draw of possibility of adding more kids in a different section. But if we can figure out a way to pilot it with our kids and we maybe draw a couple others, I think it's a good start for a year because I just like we just make we just make too many decisions based on money and like what's right for kids sometimes gets pushed aside even though we say it we don't do the right things for kids. We're getting away from that already by talking about we can't do this without funding, which I get, but we might have to figure out a way to do it and figure out how to fund it
047in order to do the right thing for some kids that need something. So, keep that in mind as we think about it. [snorts] I want to backtrack just briefly and I'd like to ask doc why your thoughts on the 4 day week pros cons feelings I I I think the big thing to me is retention of teachers getting better teachers you know it kind of feels like we're playing Jenga here and uh we're we're losing some good building blocks so >> yeah so my my initial take on that is I honestly don't know I I will be honest with you, I think that good teaching overcomes a lot of deficiencies. I think that teachers with more time can do some exciting things in the classroom. I've seen that done in my former life. We went
048from 45minut period to block schedule and it took about six months and teachers loved it and they didn't want to go back once they figured out how to use that time effectively. So I would think there would need to be some some discussion of professional development to use that time. What what I know is that kids are extremely resilient and and teachers are really good at their jobs and given that given that effort and given that time to plan they they'll do some amazing things. Do I know that it's the beall end all to education? No. But I but I you have heard me before say there is no right way right one right way to do everything because if there was everybody in the country be doing it and no school would fail. So
049there's literally nothing that tells me that it can't work. Um, there's part of me that says it's a change in paradigm and that's a tough thing for any business organization to figure out, but I also think that it can be done if it's done right and it can help kids. And I I would agree with Jared. I think we have to go back to, you know what, having kids in school longer isn't necessarily a bad thing if we use that time wisely because kids can learn in that setting. But if we're going to just have them sit and do more, if instruction doesn't change and teachers don't continue to modify what they're doing, it's not going to help. And we we want kids to learn this. It's about money in this case, but it's not
050just about money. It's about doing the right thing for the kids. So, I don't know whether that answer your question or >> No, that's good. One one thing I talked to Robbie about is that that Monday could incent you could have like a block thing where teachers get to teach something they're passionate about or or something different that's outside the scope of the curriculum and like it could be 10 bucks ahead per week and that goes right the teacher like you pay the teacher to do that thing on a Monday, right? So you got six high school teachers that want to teach this thing 15 kids in each class that all pay 10 bucks a week. At the end of the day, the teacher's making an extra thousand dollars a month because we have that
051extra day. It's outside of their contract, outside the scope of the standards, but it's might be something kids are into or excited about. You could be cooking or sewing, how to change tires. Like, I don't know what that might be, but it's it gives some flexibility to incentivize somebody to come here because they get the opportunity to teach something that they couldn't teach in the four days, but they have that extra day to do it for a little extra cash in their pocket because we charge perhaps something like a summer school program or an enrichment program. There's other things to be creative about. So like incentivize people like hey I get to work a four day a week but like this nine weeks I'm going to teach this thing. It's going to put an extra
052two grand in my pocket because I've got people that want to be here. It's 10 bucks ahead. We decide to side a couple of classrooms where we put it on Wolf Lake. So something that nature to incentivize a different idea. So the first thing is we got to make sure that we have to decide what we're going to do if we're recommended that we're even see what the state says and then we have to kind of move from there. And the other thing is is whoever becomes the next superintendent has to have some idea of what this works or doesn't work as far as they might have some new ideas that we don't know about yet. So, um, all of this is kind of in limbo as so to speak, but we can probably at
053the next meeting make that decision on like do we apply to the state to see what they say and then from there we've got a series of dominoes that could fall because of that. >> Well, another part of the puzzle [clears throat] is with the staff responses. I'm just going to round it up. You know, we had 80% positive, so we would potentially have an 80% buy in. How do we engage and get buy in from the other 20% to ensure success? Because in order to be successful, you've got to have buy in, right? So that's another task for >> every course >> research. I would say you're never going to get buy in. Totally. >> I agree. >> So you're just you're gonna have to get the early adopters to move on and then
054drag the laggers with them. That's that's just kind of how that goes in education. Those are the official terms, right? Doc laggers. >> I don't think we'll call that. >> No, we won't identify those, but that's what they talk about in our related doctors. Yes. >> Anchors. >> Laggers. Laggers. Laggers. >> Wow. >> You guys good? >> Comment. >> All right. This time we'll move on to public comments. Um, you have three minutes. You are time. Call [clears throat] your name in the order that you signed in and remember that it needs to be a respectful focus considered on the long-term success of the district. Your input is valuable and carefully considered, but this portion is not intended for open dialogue debate. We have four people signed in. We'll start with the first one. Uh,
055Vicky Json. Also, if your questions have been answered, you can pass your spot, too. >> Hello. Um, my name is Vicky Jalison. I'm here as a grandparent, but also um as a concerned town official because when the town and the school work as good partners together, that brings success to everyone. That's what we all want. And there's a lot going on in this conversation and a lot going off my head. So, I hope it makes sense what I have to say. My my first concern is um the the results of the survey I feel like depending on the age of the students depended on how people answer and everybody knows that. So a lot of the people that are for it are most of those people who have older children that are that can be
056home alone when there's no school and mom and dad are at work. And there's no easy answer to that, but I think that is something that comes into play quite a bit on how people um answered that. My second point is until I came tonight, I was really unsure on how you thought this would save money. Um you did a good job tonight explaining that staff are still going to get the same annual pay. Um so it's going to increase their hourly um so to speak. But um my concern with saving money other than wages are um how we think that's going to save much for building for utilities and stuff. My question would be um on that day potentially saying Monday school would be not in session. is are the buildings going to be
057available for practices, games, the staff to come and go, the students to have access to their lockers and stuff because if that's the case, I I'm having a hard time understanding how that will really save on utilities and those kinds of expenses. Um, and lastly, I want to touch on um in the first uh meeting that you had, Mr. Morgan read a letter. Um, this is not the first meeting I've been to where I have heard um, staff members, administrators, schoolboard members speak from their heart and I appreciate that. Um, I think probably the reason he read that letter during that portion was because it was an actual meeting and this is a work session. However, I think this room is full of a lot of people. we all need to hear these things. And
058so I wish that that letter could have been written read to this larger group of people. Um and and I think and once again I want to thank all of you for what you're doing. I know it's it's um a very difficult decision and I just hope that the community can respect the decision. Um next is Cindy Turbridge. Hello, my name is Sydney Trobridge. I've been a bus driver for over 30 years at the school corporation and work within the school corporation as well as some of my fellow bus drivers. [clears throat] We have a couple of questions and concerns we would like addressed. First, concerning the 4-day proposal, do you plan how do you plan to compensate our bus drivers who could potentially lose up to $4,000 a year should this proposal pass. I
059know you said that you're not going to affect the wages, but I don't see any 100% guarantee on that. Also, as you know, right now we just have an interim bus manager and a current full-time bus route opening. What are you actively doing to hire a new bus manager and to recruit new drivers? As you also know, bus drivers are not offered insurance and benefits. So, what can we offer to new drivers to be competitive with surrounding areas? Thank you for your time. >> [snorts] >> Um, next we have Anna Glowinski. >> He brought up my concern. >> Okay, thank you. Um, and then our last comment signed in here is Joey Jordan. I said I wasn't going to talk tonight, but you can see that I'm here. >> [clears throat] >> Um, first off,
060I sent all of you on the board the notes of the running tally. Did everybody receive that of the information? So, I just went through and I made some notes from what was discussed earlier. And I just want to bring up some highlights. I'm not going to go over any of that. Like I said, um, I am not for or against the four day school week. I am for exactly what Jared said. We're here for the kids. I don't care. [clears throat] I'm I'm a teacher who didn't get a raise this year. I don't care because I'm there for those 28 students in my classroom every day. It doesn't matter. I Jared, you said it exactly. Let's Let's do what's right for our kids. Um, the one thing I'm not for is increasing classroom size.
061So, if we move to the elementary, I don't see any other way than our classroom numbers are going to go up. Yes, enrollment fluctuates, but that is probably and I will say most of the educators, I'm not the only one here, that is the most concern for them is that if those classroom numbers go up, it doesn't matter how much money you're saving. Yes, I know it shouldn't matter how many kids are in a room that it's the the quality of the education. Well, you can be the best teacher in the whole world But when 28 little 5-year-olds need you, you can't be everything to them that you need. Um, I'm not sure about closing the primary one because [clears throat] we already have two to four extracurricular activities a week going on there. I
062I may be wrong on the exact numbers, but there's stuff going on there almost every night. I don't know how that would affect stuff going on here if that there's stuff going on there. I don't I think that's hard to be able to say that we can actually shut our doors. Um my biggest concern is if we move all the daycare and preschool to the primary building, how that's going to affect our alg community. Because Amanda, like you said, it takes a village to get these kids to preschool. Now, I don't know that if grandoms can [clears throat] drive six, not going to be able to drive 20 minutes to Wolf Lake to take their grandchild to preschool. I don't I think that's going to be more difficult than what we think at this point.
063I have met with Deco and I will go into that with Jamie and everybody at another time, but they are 100% willing to help us write some grants, make this work, and I think our number one goal is to be just to increase our enrollment to our amazing school that we already have because the kids that we need to pull in are out there and we just need to make sure that we find them. and the amazing staff that you have are going to accommodate it no matter what it how it looks. If it's a 4 day week and our days are longer, I teach kindergarten and have for over 20 years. I guarantee you those brain breaks will be built in. We'll be able to do different things more. we'll be able to put
064back in a little bit of the side dishes because right now we're all we're doing is the meat and potatoes and we might be able to have even some dessert in there a little bit if our day is a little longer. Uh we'll be putting out too many [clears throat] fires throughout the day. I think we can break it up a little bit. Have faith in your staff a little bit. I I guarantee you we are ready to rise to the challenge. And like Vicki, I just want to say one thing about re listening to Robbie. I'm not going to get emotional listening to Robbie read his letter. I just want to say thank you, Robbie. Thank you for believing in the people and the corporation and always putting students first that I have ever
065seen and creating a place where I have felt truly valued as a staff member. And I want to know I just want you to know that I'm going to miss your leadership and the genuine care that you have shown me myself. And I wish you all the best and what your ch the next chapter brings for you. And I know you're going to do amazing things. [applause] >> All right, that wraps up the meeting here. Mr. Morgan, if you want to provide a brief overview of what was discussed this evening and verify if any more discussion is needed. >> Yep. So, we went over the results of the survey. We talked about the micro schooling. Um, talked about what to do. We heard some questions that we'll work on answering to the next time. We'll
066have all our next board meeting will be an actual board meeting on the 17th. [clears throat] Okay. Any more discussion from the board? >> I want to kind of address what Vic's concern was about saving money. If you just think about one aspect of the day, you've got a thousand kids between the three buildings going around using the restroom. Every time you flush that toilet, it takes between one and three gallons of water. So, if you reduce that just to activities after class or after school like extracurriculars, just the water savings alone will save a ton of money. We don't have to have lights burning in every classroom all day long. You may go in, turn them on for half an hour to do some studying or something, but you turn them off when you
067leave. You're going to save a lot of money and utilities there. So, that's what the board and the school is looking at as far as savings. It's not really about I don't want to say it's not about energy cost, but it's all the stuff like Robbie said, toilet paper, paper towels, water, you know, those kind of things is what we're looking at saving. It's seems like pennies. >> I do understand that. If you're somewhere for eight hours versus six and a half hours, you're going to use the bathroom. >> I was referring more more to closing the building than than the eight hour day or the 4 day week or whatever you want to call it. But so everything that you you have to consider all those pennies to make to make dollars, >> right?
068As a reminder, no decisions were made this evening. allowable work and discussion continue by will continue behind the scenes with formal action anticipated December. Is that accurate? Possibly a little in limbo with tonight's announcement, but that will be announced as required. Um I think we're ready to be adjourned. Amanda >> meeting is adjourned at 5:57 p.m. Uhoh. >> I'm good to go. >> Let's see. He right between >> I know he did. Anyone could respond.