CPCSC School Board Meeting - February 27, 2023

001foreign indivisible with liberty and justice for all thank you item two on tonight's agenda is the board of school trustees resolution accommodation Awards we have two this evening the Crown Point High School dance team for being named national champion and small Varsity kick at the UDA national dance team competition and 2.02 our Crown Point High School wrestling team for winning the state wrestling championship of the 2023 ihsa wrestling state finals okay motion approve or motion for the approval of the accommodations tonight motion by Mr Smith second by Mr babjac any questions or discussion all those in favor please signify by saying aye aye opposed motion carries 5-0 when I'll present those Awards all right so the first one that I have is and I'll read the resolution the Crown Point School Board of TR the

002Crown Point Board of school trustees is honored to commend the 2022-23 Crown Point High School varsity dance team for meritorious achievement be it hereby resolved that the board of school Trustees for Crown Point Community School Corporation wishes to express sincere congratulations to the 2022-2023 Crown Point High School varsity dance team for being named national champions in small Varsity kick at the UDA national dance team championship the board of school trustees publicly recognizes this achievement and renders it permanently to its minutes to be preserved for public posterity dated this 27th day of February 2023. and first up we have Anna Gardner Marianne Girona [Applause] Elena Longoria Zellers caliope secularis [Applause] Reese threading [Applause] Grace Tiernan Avery Tebow [Applause] Aviana Hall [Applause] Kylie olowski Elise Clark [Applause] Kendall fedak Bailey finnerty Madeline Rodriguez [Applause] Grace Zamora and

003then we have coaches Chloe Hoffman and Chelsea Das [Applause] um so if I'm not mistaken I feel like this is a very common occurrence do we have a very strong history at this point of making it down to Nationals and doing very well feel um and this year was the first year in a very long time we also made it into the for our confer team also so very talented [Applause] at this time we're going to have Brooke Allen is going to take some pictures parents if you'd like to take pictures girls if you could kind of squish together thank you congratulations [Applause] thank you we have parents in the hallway okay good we got everybody treat yourself all right here we are again uh this is another one of those groups that Finds Its

004way to the state titles every year after a lot of hard work uh realize what you guys put into this and it's pretty cool to see you guys come back as back to back Champs so congratulations to you guys to the Crown Point High School wrestling team for being named state champions once again at the 2023 ihsaa wrestling state finals I'm going to read your accommodation the Crown Point Board of school trustees is honored to commend the 2022-2023 cphs wrestling team for notorious achievement be it hereby's resolve that the school board I'm sorry the board of school Trustees for the Crown Point Community School Corporation wishes to express sincere congratulations to the 2022-2023 cphs wrestling team for being named state champions at the 2023 IHS AAA State wrestling championship the board of school trustees publicly

005recognizes this achievement and renders it permanently to its minutes to be preserved for public posterity dated this 27th day of February 2023. congratulations gentlemen [Applause] I'm going to let coach lorek say a few words afterwards I'll just hand out your accommodations first Logan Haney congrats buddy Gavin gendras [Applause] congrats Sunny Sessa you guys buddy Logan Frazier good job Griffin ventitial [Applause] Anthony ball Sammy going Cody's not here Orlando Cruz Will Clark it's more handsome brother Paul Clark [Applause] coach Hawkins you're welcome coach Sessa [Applause] if you have anything you'd like to say about this group yeah Administration or School Corporation at our High School uh the amount of support we get uh you can't have successful Seasons like this especially back to back without uh our Administration in the amount of support they give us

006Mr Derulo Mr marcinic and all the administrators at the high school um yeah it definitely takes a tribe you know and uh so with our school our parents you know they do a lot for our team um I do want to recognize our individual uh if I can state champions and place winners uh we had four individual state champions this year we had um same 160 pounds Sammy going 182 pounds Orlando Cruise 170 pounds Cody Goodwin and then 220 pounds Will Clark um out of the 11 wrestlers we took the state nine of them placed um we finished the tournament every wrestler won their placement match which means no one no one left who's in their last match which is a pretty good feeling uh a pretty great accomplishment because it's hard to win that

007last match um Logan Haney took seventh place at 106 pounds um Gavin gendras took fifth place at 113 pounds [Applause] Logan Frazier took third place at 126 pounds Anthony ball took third place at 145 pounds to our lamp and then um Paul Clark took third place at heavyweight and then we also had two more State qualifiers we had Sunny Sessa and Griffin van Tito and once again I just want to I want to thank our our parents thank my coaches and all these amazing wrestlers they did a fantastic job we asked a lot of them and they they uh they they they reached the bar every time whether it's in school or in athletics so thank you guys raise your hand if you're wrestling in college please as well yeah uh if I could if

008I could do just kind of mention that real quick um Sammy going is going to IU next year Orlando Cruz is going to Purdue we we try not to talk about that too much those two guys the ball is going to IU Logan Frazier is going to Virginia Tech and then I know Anthony White is looking in he hasn't committed to a school but he uh we're working on getting him out out to a college he's definitely capable um this senior class is incredible um I don't have the the stats I posted right before state but these guys have won two state titles as a team they've taken fourth they've been runner-ups um our seniors alone have I want to say they have 17 or 18 um medals from the state finals which is incredible

009I don't think they've lost a duel in the last two years um I don't know if they've ever lost a home duel um so pretty incredible four-time conference Champions three-time semi-state champions so pretty uh pretty uh big shoes to fill but um I just want to recognize our seniors and say thank you guys [Applause] so yeah thank you all right guys out this way thank you very much thank you again [Music] okay they're all stuck it's really collection all right moving on with tonight's agenda item three patrons registered to comment on educational issues we have one this evening uh before I read his name uh just to remind you three minutes uh on whatever topic you'd like to speak about regarding educational issues Mr Smith will be our timer when you get to the mic

010I just need you to name address full address so that we have it for the records uh and if with that we only have one this evening here on the list Kyle Wilbanks they say that right yeah okay Kyle before you begin I'll try to give you a warning at 30 seconds just so not okay okay greetings my name is Kyle Wilbanks I live at 837 Schilling Drive in Crown Point um and I wanted to talk today about the district from the schools um as we watch the news and we look forward to what's going on within the school district around Point uh there's lots of calls for transparency both in elected officials government municipals Police Department I'm not seeing a lot of that transparency with what's going on with the redistrictions I've been to

011the last couple meetings I've had the opportunities to watch them on your website um moving forward with it is is that I you guys did post when your guys's schedule for what everything was going to be done when the decisions were going to be made and everything like that but I have not been aware or I thought that transparently wise would be a good idea to publish some of the findings that the gentleman or the Doctor Who you guys hired to conduct the study so that the residents School parents can have an opportunity to review that also I learned at the last coffee meeting with Dr Terrell that the board is going to vote on their school registration without letting the parents know what see my opinion that's not true you know they also call

012for accountability you're going to sit up there and represent the people that elected you to sit here and make these decisions I feel that we need to be accountable the decisions that you guys make and nobody in this room maybe somebody else does but I have not heard of what the degree district is going to be and that the redistration once it's voted upon will be published tomorrow is that correct okay so like that's what I heard so we'll just go with that so basing that I don't have any information on what the school each school district is going to be and the lack of transparency is I'm going to go off of what I've heard is where my children are going to go to school it appears that my children were possibly being where

013I live will go to Douglas MacArthur and with the current stats that I pulled and actually you know what I'll start out this way my concern which was brought up in the last meeting is not that my children will have to write a new school bus or that my kids will have to make new friends or that it may be an inconvenience for me my thought is on the education for my children okay obviously I understand somebody always has to be number one somebody always has to be last when you take children from the number one or numbers to elementary school in the town and possibly move them to the number sixth one I start to have a little bit of questions that I need to ask some of the statistics that I found is

014that obviously Douglas MacArthur has 10 students 10 students per teacher their math is at 60 proficiency and the reading is at 64. meanwhile Lake Street is at 82 percent math and reading is at 74 and also I just like to Echo because I'm not going to have enough time at the growth from Crown Point with 61 students last year with an average growth of 141 students in the next 10 years how is redistricting a viable option with those kind of numbers and to build and spend all this money on ancillary positions for all this Redevelopment within the village it should be done in my personal opinion and allowing kids to go to school where they need to go to school thank you [Applause] a lot of that will be addressed when we get to the

015action I'm on 503 so at this point move on to item four the consent agenda Dr Terrell thank you for your consideration this evening we have 4.01 which is the meeting minutes of the board of school trustees 4.02 the disposition of the stale dated checks 4.03 Grant from the Crown Point Community Foundation for AP exam scholarships 4.04 the bread milk and grocery award via school to food purchasing Cooperative 4.05 a donation from Bethel Church for free students with negative meal balance 4.06 the Personnel agenda and then 4.07 voucher registered checks as listed you've heard the recommendation from the superintendent and administration for approval of the consent agenda I have motion motion by Mr babjek second by Ms Basin questions or discussion just just want to thank Bethel Church I think this is a few years

016in a row where they have done something similar to that so where they give money to to help out those needs so thank you for your continued support yeah you beat me to that exactly what I was going to say but Heather had a question for you on on I noticed we've hired a few new parapros which I think is great are any of those working toward their certification as a teacher that you're aware of okay thank you any other questions comments all those in favor please signify saying aye aye those opposed motion carries five zero thank you action item 5.01 2023 Crown Point High School summer school programming Mr Hartman yes school program uh this will be very similar to what we've done in the past the high school will be offering for credit

017courses for students uh in a number of areas to accelerate their credits and open up spots on their schedule for next year there's also a part of that that's credit recovery so this is to engage students and that needed to make up credits and then also there's a restart program which allows students to actually improve their grades by taking summer school classes we'll also have uh elementary and middle school as well as our esy programming for our applied skills students and those will be taking place over a 12-day three-week session and those will be highlighted within our school district at two elementaries uh Colonel wheeler and that will take that will take care of their uh summer school we do take a look at and consider the the programming and I did give some info

018information on our reimbursement and how that has transpired we're expecting something similar this year as we look at the funding for our summer school program seeking your approval this evening of the 2023 summer school program you've heard the recommendation of the administration may have a motion motion by Mr Smith second by Mr Vassar question of discussion for Mr Hartman all those in favor please signify by saying aye aye those opposed motion carries five zero thank you Mr Hartman thank you 5.02 Taft middle school and Crown Point High School Furniture award Mr Reese thank you Mr President members of the board we've come to that point uh in the construction project as we prepare to open buildings for next year next school year we need to place some orders due to the large quantity orders at

019the new Taft Middle School we need to place that order now in hopes that we receive that and arrives on time and put together and in its spot ready to go August one so tonight is the night to do that for Colonel wheeler the other set is at the high school as we move the administration and counseling offices into their new space over spring break we want to get their new furniture on site and be able to move it in once into those spaces instead of moving their current moving their current back out and then moving the new in in the summer when the rest of the order comes in for the high school so trying to do it just in time change of furniture for those folks and have it ready to go over

020spring break so we can move it just once instead of moving it three times if we do it later so with that we're using a company by the name of Ki Inc to provide this service for us do the large quantity and volume as you can imagine for for filling up a new Middle School it is quite a large order and so with that we're recommending many approval the furniture for Taft middle school and Crown Point High School from Ki in the amount of 158 495 and 15 cents for Crown Point High School and for one million 365.74 cents for Taft Middle School you've heard the recommendation of the administration for the approval of the furniture for Taft Middle School in Crown Point High School from K1 Inc in the amount of 158 495.15 for

021Crown Point High School and one million 896 365. 74 cents for Taft Middle School I have a motion so moved sorry motion by Mr Vassar second by Mr babjac Question and discussion for Mr Reese Mr Reeser are there any uh Furniture being what are we doing with the older furniture oh sorry go ahead the older Furniture would be repurposed as necessary those that are not um usable will be either donated or auctioned off all those in favor please signify by saying aye aye motion or post motion carries 5-0 thank you Mr Reeves before we get to item 5.03 we're going to take a little break here with the presentation regarding item 5.03 Dr Terrell thank you so this evening we put together a presentation that is really divided into two different parts first part we'll

022deal with the numbers redistricting what that looks like the second part will work through what the transition process is going to look like for our students so I'd ask you to do this as we go through this hold your questions if you would until we get to the end of the redistricting part and then we'll answer all questions at that time and then from there we'll go into the second part and then we'll open up and if there are questions regarding anything towards the end I'll be more than happy to to answer those if you would do one other thing for me when you get when you have your questions if you'll direct those to me and then I'll direct them to the cabinet member who will be responding to those this evening so with

023that I'm going to turn it over and ask Mr Reese if he would start our our presentation this evening regarding redistricting we had some technology issues when we were doing the presentations because it's touch panels so it kind of sent the whole thing into uh a different mode but that's why we have our director technology here with us this evening restart it foreign well while we're working on those technical difficulties Mr Vassar do you want to at this time give our other business report on the legislative update okay I was going to tell a joke but I didn't think it was profit so fellow board members you have a quite a stack in front of you there of legislative bills that were proposed in January of this year in the Indiana assembly and then I

024also gave you a another handout put together a summary of all that the session there now in Indianapolis is that it's a long session ending on the 29th of April this is the most amount of Education bills that have been presented in the last six years so it's been a really active in Indianapolis out of the 218 bills prediction is about 160 of those will die in the time but death of a bill isn't necessarily death of a bill is what I'll get to in this thing the deadline for bills to get out of committee and to get past their second reading is already passed and to get past their third reading is already passed as well so a couple of things on that on that summary handout I gave you to to look at

025is the first bullet house bill uh 1001 that's an increase in K-12 education spending which is a the biggest increase since since I've been in education a long time but you look at that and that's seems like a great thing and it is But realize that that funding increase comes with more money going to voucher credits and Charter Schools as well and as there's talk of doing away with parents responsibility for textbook fees that's tucked inside the money that's going to be given to schools as well so none of these are passed yet but that's something important to understand where things get tucked in two bills have gone through so far without any opposition one is the secured safety schools Grant it's been unopposed as it moves from the house to the Senate and then

026the 21st century Scholars Program that students parents May realize their child signs up about when they're in in middle school and the parents used to have to sign them up if this passes now that would be automatically done for them so they don't have to worry about that whatsoever um there's lots of bills that I put on here I'm not going to go through every every single one of those a couple of things to to look for on the second page of my summary is Senate bill 380. which will it passed will cap the graduation waivers that you can do it at 10 percent of your graduating class which would move to five percent in the next couple of years so I don't know what our current uh waiver percentages at the high school I

027do not know that so I know Mr marsnick had to leave the next one after that Senate Bill 391 closure of school buildings basically what this is saying is when a school building is under utilized it is available to Charter Schools or universities for that's that one dollar bill does that affect Crown Point uh not at this point depending what happens with this building though wow this building is going to be used so as we move forward as we move forward on that um another thing on the last pay or the second to the last page student Mental Health Services bill has a lot of attention when I was in Indianapolis on last Tuesday in the State House a lot of talk was going on about this bill and this is a dedicated funding for

028students social emotional and Behavioral Services for trained mental health professionals which would ease the burden on our classroom teachers and something that's note there Indiana has a state ranks last in the nation in Consular student ratio of 694 students to one counselor I think we're a little better than that in Crown Point yeah and school psychologist ratio of 1 674 students to one school psychologist I'm not sure where we ranked there partisan School Board election that was a that died today where students school board members had to register as a Republican or Democrat that died today but that doesn't necessarily mean when a bill dies it actually dies because the language could be reintroduced as an amendment as it goes forth so none of these have passed yet there's still a lot more to go

029we're not going to know much more until April 29th or actually April 30th and I answer any questions just like to thank you Tim for your work put into this has been updating us on where things stand thank you you're welcome all right back to Mr Reese I think we have our resolution to the issue with technology thank you let's hope so good evening members of the board so tonight I just want to go back through you starting off the process with where we started with redistricting and some of what you heard at the last board meeting in regards to data driven the demographic report and then also the work we did with the local municipalities regarding the new home starts anticipated um with that we have I think what many people don't understand we'll

030talk about this a little bit is that we have four municipalities we work with five really but the county didn't have any uh when contacted but we do have uh obviously a city of Crown Point Town of Cedar Lake in Winfield but then also the town of St John has a small area up in our district as well in the northwest corner of the district group so we communicated with them to see where they were at with their new home starts as well one of the things we looked at was also the Equitable balance between schools and that's the efficient use of the capacity we have planning again for that future home growth so we can make sure that some when we say Equitable balance it doesn't mean everybody's going to be equal what it

031means is some maybe lower some higher based on where those new home starts are coming in with the idea and just to remind you we haven't done this since 2009 at the elementary and middle school level we had a small tweak in 2012 but overall the major redistration hasn't happened in 2009 just give you an idea what that means I'm lucky enough to know that my son is going to be graduating this year and he started kindergarten in 2010. so nobody currently in our school corporation has gone through a redistricting parent may have but no student has gone through a redistricting in our school corporation the goal with this one is to have the same thing happen we'd love to go another 10 or 15 years and not go through this process again and that's

032the goal as we stated last time also use of major roads since we did the last redistricting we've had some changes in the transfer the Bus Transportation laws we want to make sure we're adhering to those as well as some undivided subdivisions we'd rather not run different buses to the same subdivision I think the big piece before we get into this is remembering um well it's important to each individual and their family and their students um our task is as a school corporation and this is our family we need to worry about all of our students and that's who we're trying to build this around not any individual one and I can tell you as we work through this and working through the the lines uh that wasn't taken into account of what's going to

033impact this person it's all about what's going to impact all of our students and provide the best situation for us moving forward as a district so that being said here's a picture of the current K4 moving into the elementary areas the different colors of the students notate where they currently are going to school at again this is K4 obviously fifth graders we'll talk about a little bit they'll be moving on to the middle school next year because we have not had kindergarten registration we don't know where the kindergarten students are so what you see are current k-4 students that we're projecting into first through fifth grade for next year you can see the smattering of where they're at it's important to note specifically we're going to talk right off the bat about Winfield Elementary and

034really the lack of students near Winfield Elementary that building's been there for quite a while but the Housing Development hasn't gotten that far south in Winfield Township yet as we've moved through it so without further Ado here are the proposed boundaries for the 23-24 school year um I'll start off and what you're going to see through the presentations I'm going to break down each one of these individually so you can go we'll go through them with you so we can break out the lines specifically as we get down to that um one thing I do want to point out as we pointed out the number of students that were not around Winfield Elementary one of the other issues we deal with is the proximity as you'll see here of Lake Street Solon and Eisenhower and

035what you'll notice in there is that we've kind of put those in the corner and then worked our way out from there similar to some boundaries that they have now they're trying to make sure we're we're heading those schools and getting as much many students as possible into that area so let's talk about Jerry Ross I'm going to try to start the uh what's going to be the northwest corner of each of these areas so starting here this is grant Grand Boulevard right now uh the northern boundary along here is the Township Line or 101st Street we're going to come down Grand to 109th there's no Street currently or will be that runs from 109th down to 117th but all the development is going to be on both sides of this imaginary line as we

036talked to the town of Winfield that comes down to 117th and then goes to the east along 117th over to Randolph from Randolph then it comes down to just south the Lake of the Four Seasons and runs over to the boundary line which it runs over here along the eastern border of the township so that gives you a breakdown of what Jerry Ross looks like the important part talking too much already the important part to remember this is geographically the smallest area we have however what you're going to see when I show you the projected enrollments is the most populated Elementary we're going to have one of the issues as we get into this wind field we understand that this this while Jerry Ross sitting right here is really close to this intersection of 117th

037and Randolph uh what we have is a situation of where we find more kids to take down to Winfield Elementary to try to alleviate some of that pressure and frankly anybody else along here is because there's not an extension a grant from 109th down to 117th everybody else would have to run along 109th and then come down Randolph and drive right by Jerry Ross going out to Winfield that's why taking anybody else from this northern part was difficult we also wanted to keep the other Lake of the Four Seasons kids so they were all in one one area we looked at potentially dividing that and it just didn't work out from a transportation perspective so we come along here and that's why we have this line that comes 117th over to Randolph and then on

038down and everybody there will figure we'll come down from there this neighborhood of latitude and longitude that's going in right here um while we didn't we we talked about the possibility of moving some of these these areas right here are actually going to feed out onto Randolph they don't yet but they will and so what we did want to do is take a situation where students potentially to live across the street our walkway to Jerry Ross and not go to that building and head south instead to Winfield so one of the areas we know we're a little tight is going to be at Jerry Ross participate a little over 600 students there as we get started moving on to Winfield and it's important that you can see the geographical area here of Jerry Ross and

039how small it is when you compare it to the area of Winfield and the number of students that this is going to generate if you remember back to showing the numbers of the K4 students up there and how sparsely populated that is a lot of the population for Windfield as we're proposing it is right here along this Corridor where some of these subdivisions are near 117th 121st out there in Randolph so starting here in the north this is I-65 in the northern part of our district with 101st Street the boundary will run down 65 on down to the southern part of our boundary across and continue across the southern part of our district it makes it all the way over to the eastern part of our district on the Township Line comes on up and

040in this case it's actually the county line in this case comes on up sorry I'm losing my body good um I don't know where I'm pointing at I apologize it comes up to the southern border then of that uh just south of the lakes of the Four Seasons and then there it is and then on across uh to the southern portion of the Jerry Ross and then that that Western portion there along the Grand Boulevard up to 101st then so geographically our largest boundary district is Winfield Elementary what you're also going to hear a little bit it's one of our smaller populations out there majority as we looked at the growth taking place in Winfield Township though is taking place along 109th and 113th as we get into this area and I think I've got

041it right there yeah right in this area here there's quite a bit of uh development happening there along the southern portion of 109th a lot of that new portion that will transfer on down to Winfield Elementary moving on to Tim my ball so Timothy ball reaches the furthest Northwest porn of our district at the cross of the two Township lines uh here at 101st and Klein and then when it comes South down to 231 would run along 231 all the way over to 117th 113th then continue running over to I-65 and then up to the northern part of the district 101st Street and then across the northern part it's the easiest one to look at all major roads uh 231 Klein 101st over to I-65 the only small piece there is about 113th as you

042get just south of the Sportsplex complex there in the city Sloan Robinson sure t-ball's right there in the middle the little purple Apple I'd call it purple I apologize you're good okay blue okay that's what you get you let a colorblind guy do with colors let's call it the Apple in the middle how's that stolen Robinson Robinson located uh right here in the close to the center or near the edge of the of it there uh starts at the square Works its way South along Court Street on down to Franciscan drive one thing about Court Street currently the boundaries for Solon in Corpus says anybody lives on Court Street would attend Solon that would still be the case we wouldn't change that uh boundary for that across Franciscan now across the southern portion a small

043trip down nine The Nine Mile or Grant Street uh to just south of the uh the village is there Faith Drive uh all of that so we have now what we're going to have our first timer going off script other than the Grand Boulevard extension but we're going to travel through some uh non-road uh following and so we're gonna come across here uh to the the northern part of an area just off of The Nine Mile we're gonna jump jump South and what we're trying to do is grab this Stillwater subdivision so the Stillwater subdivision now would all go to to Solon it comes across here on the bottom comes up the the Smith ditch and then juts out and so then comes back up to 231 and then on down along 231 to 65

044back up to 113th to meet the southern part of the t-ball border and then along 231 back up to the square so a little bit of change there by grabbing some students in Stillwater we need to get some more students into the Solon Robbins area so we grabbed we extended their southern border essentially from the line it currently is on down a little bit to grab some of the students from Eisenhower speaking of Eisenhower so the Eisenhower we just talked about that northern border there that kind of jig jogs its way across the northern part there it runs then down uh the the Court Street to 133rd so from just south of the fairgrounds there on down past the hospital uh to 133rd across 133rd to The Nine Mile and then the Nine Mile on

045down south to the very Southern portion of our Township over to I-65 up I-65 meeting that southern border of Solon Robinson that forms a northern boundary line Verizon hour the next one is Lake Street the Lake Street similar to the situation at Solon where all the students on Court Street go to Solon that same thing happens on this little street right here called fatkey so at fat key same line as it currently is all those students on fatkey will go to Lake Street no matter which side they live on on fatkey then that comes down to Burr where it connects at Burr on down to 121st across 121st on down then uh Clark Street over to the 133rd across the southern border of 133rd and then up Court Street or Marshall all the way back

046up to 231 and then forming that northern border at c-31 where it meets with Solon in the corner of the square of Solon t-ball and Lake Street again trying to keep that somewhat in the edgier and then working our way away from Lake Street to gather some students the MacArthur also covers a fairly significant geographic area it starts here at the 231 and Klein comes down Klein through the lake on down to the southern portion of our Southern border of our district across to Nine Mile and then up to Nine Mile to 133rd 133rd and then this is the same board I just discussed with Lake Street where you go up Clark across 121st and then on up Burr to Fat keep and that gives you an idea of what that border then is of

047MacArthur is so what that looks like with the new boundaries in students you can see here um the different colors and obviously where students are in a different color they'll be going to potentially a new school if they're in that boundary and we'll talk about those transitions here in a little bit this gives you an idea a way that Maps out for the district where those boundaries are and also where the current student is and this is where we talked about the Jerry Ross and and Winfield uh situation you can see the number of students that attend K4 students we have within that Jerry Ross and trying to figure out how would you pull any students out of there given that they're going to be over 600 students and the fact of the matter is

048we just couldn't find many students to try to get out of that area because of their proximity to the building so with that here are the estimated enrollments and tied to that are the growth rates because as we talked about that with the new home starts in each of the different communities so all of our building capacities months were completed with construction will be at 700. Eisenhower we're anticipating about 500 students with a moderate growth Lake Street at 550 with a low growth rate there are quite a few developments within the Lake Street but most of them are not substantial in size most of them are smaller developments in nature 10 to 25 homes MacArthur at 475 you'll notice it's the lowest populated building but also has the highest growth rate because it doesn't encapsulate

049all of the potential subdivisions and growth out in the Cedar Lake area and does grab a little bit of what the city of Crown Point doing is doing on the south side of 133rd there is a high growth percentage that's why that building is at the lowest enrollment estimated enrollment starting next year Solon Robinson a low growth rate not much development going on about 530 students Timothy ball similar at 550 also a low development rate Winfield we're at 520 you'll notice that outside of Eisenhower and MacArthur there is some high growth going on at Winfield do those developments I talked about as we looked between 109th and 103rd taking place in Winfield Township last but not least is Jay Ross at 630 and that's the moderate if anything that we're slightly uncomfortable with or concerned

050about that we'll be monitoring closely is Jerry Ross because and you can see just because how close the number how many and how close the number of students are in Jerry Ross with that moderate growth rate um that is one thing that we're aware of and we'll be monitoring closely before we go on to the Middle School let's stop right here pause and ask any questions try to answer any questions that you may have for us any questions at all if you'd rather wait till we get further along that is fine as well but give you the opportunity here as well I mean I'd like to make a couple just general comments this passes the eye test for me so I mean I know what's going on out in MacArthur with Cedar Lake all the

051developments that are going on there and then Winfield we know that everything around the new middle school has already been gobbled up by developers and that's just a matter of time before that catches up so but you're right that's exactly that was exactly my thought was on Jerry Ross is how soon before we hit that 700 um and if it's not moderate growth and it ends up being high growth you know how do we adjust to that so that's just me that's just me thinking out loud yeah so in looking at that Jerry Ross with the moderate growth it's really on the low to moderate where does it go based off of what we know is coming from our conversations with Winfield with the town of Winfield and looking at their planning proposals that are

052out there so we feel like we're going to be fine there as far as that that number goes with the uh them being the highest just simply because of of looking at the options for additional housing there which which schools are most impacted from the elementary schools by the redistricting yeah so the easy answer that is Winfield to Jerry Ross so because just because they have the two different grade levels you have K2 and three through five so approximately 300 students that are I think at Jerry Ross are going or other all the way around or at Winfield are going to be going to Jerry Ross because they're in K-2 and they'll be moving on to Jerry Ross because they now live within that District so those are the easy ones that I can Easy

053by easy I mean they're just because you're going from a K2 and three five building they're going to swap essentially now not quite because of the the overpopulation at Jerry Ross they're going to swap more kids than everybody else right and we'll talk about the impact here yeah it's also nice to see that some of the the load has been taken away from Lake Street as well yeah if you go back to last meeting that was the big issue the wiry district well we have a building with over 740 students and we have other buildings that are a little over 400 right and we haven't redistricted in over 14 years so we've got an imbalance and we need to get it right now's the time to get it right because we have doing a middle

054school redistricting and we have the expansion of our buildings taking place Mr Reese I like to see it's very nice out of our had gone in afterwards so I know like Regency for example had jumped over a school to go to another school so it's nice to see a lot of that address the way you guys kind of took the buildings that are so close together and kind of branched outward from that so that seems to make a lot of sense we had a lot more information this time than what we did in 2000 all right thank you all right under the Middle School current fifth through seventh graders so we've looked at it and again the color coding or where the current students are currently at um so what we have is a situation

055where we have the current fifth through seventh graders and then you see the new Apple there for the future Taft Middle School that won't say future in a few months but right now it's the future Taft middle school and you can see where that's going to be located out there in Winfield Township as we look at the Middle School boundary um obviously with having now one essentially on on one side of 65 and one on the other side of 65. we really looked hard uh you're going to draw a north-south line to to separate the district and so where you move that north-south line and you can't tweak it a bit as it turned out um uh this line works pretty pretty well at the Nine Mile Stretch we started you know at 65 where's

056that look as you split it that way and then you move it over to Broadway and where does it look and when we got it over to uh The Nine Mile um as you'll hear in a second that's where the balance occurred uh between the the two buildings where we have fairly equal enrollment on both buildings and also really equal growth uh new future home starts projected as well so that this line obviously not nearly as many aligns as you're working through the elementary process but we found again it met the category of we're not dividing subdivisions and also or using a major road to divide it when you're splitting the district in two so this is where we're at with Middle School boundary this is what it looks like with students and believe it

057or not when you look at that the next step is what's it look like 1085 students are estimated at Taft the new Taft 1050 at Colonel wheeler and the growth rates equal with a little over 3 000 potential home starts on both sides so the numbers just worked out to be where they were fairly equal at The Nine Mile moving in anywhere further east than that just didn't get us to a balanced building on either one of them it offset the balances between the two so talk about middle school and I'm going to hit the impact here in just a second any questions on Middle School Russian Dr Terrell will consideration be given as I mean I'm sure obviously with boundaries just coming out transportation is probably next in the works if we can go

058back to that the size of space that's taken up for the new Taft some of those look pretty far away well consideration be given to Transportation routes for those students so that we're we're minimizing that impact for them yes we're actually working through that process right now we're probably a few to several weeks away from actually having bus routes that we can look at and roll out with that right now we believe that we're going to be able to get those the time on buses down quite a bit um but again we've got to get to the point where we can work through those transportation department has been very involved with looking at the boundaries throughout the entire process to work on what bus routes can look like because one of the concerns is we

059don't we can't get to a point where we've got to add several buses simply because of the financial obligation that goes with that but at the same time we want to make sure that students aren't spending any more time on buses than they currently are the goal is for that to go down as well as we work through it and just to follow up to that is it still feasible to to the high school combo bus with the location of the new Taft again that's one of the things we're working through um trying to figure out what that can look like and what the different options are our goal is that we'll keep those schedules as close to being what they are right now and be able to still accomplish getting kids to those buildings

060as needed most efficiently and effective way thank you foreign so quickly summarizing the impact elementary students a few over a thousand students will be changing buildings that's a significant number approximately 35 percent of our students believe had impacted by that about 400 to 500 of those students are Winfield and Jerry Ross So majority of those come from those two buildings as we break the two grade levels and put them into both being K-5 building middle school students changing a little over 900 students that makes a lot of sense considering the current Winfield Township students come into Colonel wheeler they'll be going out to Taft so you have quite a bit of change a lot of the students are on the far west side let's say the elementary students from MacArthur are Lake Street as those

061currently going to Taft will now be going to Colonel wheeler so it just makes sense there's a significant shift as you move one of those buildings out there and the students that we're going to the other one are now going to the new one so that's why we have the significant shift in the number of students both at the middle school level but also Elementary due to the changing grade level at Winfield and and Jerry Ross any questions for me on the impact or where we're at with the boundaries I have one more question for Dr Tara um do we know about how many obviously we noted Lake Street being reduced um significantly to to take the pressure off there do we know about how many teachers are impacted with the the changes that we've

062made here yeah so we're working through that right now with the goal of having that information out to the buildings um no no more than a week from tonight to be able to release that to the teachers so they know but also so then as we look at Staffing for next year what we do know right now is that the preliminary numbers that have come in show us at being able to do all of this with maintaining the same number of teachers at the elementary level in other words not increasing that number or decreasing the number of teachers that we currently have and just to clarify Dr Terrell can you speak to whether any teachers will be switching schools or do we know as far as Middle School just for clarification as far as the

063middle school goes in particular yes at this time the the plan is that wheeler will be at Wheeler Taft will be at Taft as far as the staff goes um but with saying that we always have our volunteer transfer opportunities for our teachers that they can put in or request a transfer so where that could happen is is if there's an opening at um Taft or there's an opening at Wheeler and a teacher at one of the other at the other building sees that opening and would like to be considered for that they would go through the voluntary transfer process that we have in place and that is currently open right now yep okay so at this time what I'd like to do is we're going to have our directors of education so Sabrina and

064Mark and Heather are going to take us through looking at this slide right here and knowing that 35 percent of our elementary students are impacted 45 percent of our middle school students are impacted what's that transition process going to look like how are we going to help students parents get in those buildings to begin to become more familiar with them so we'll start off with Elementary and Mr Ramirez thank you Dr Carol as we think about redistricting we know that there's a lot of opportunity for Equity I think that it's also honest to say that there's discomfort with uncertain and what I can assure you of is for the past two years we have been intentionally working to align our seven elementary schools we have a collaborative team of Elementary administer administrators that meets multiple

065times a month to focus on Elementary and District needs we have comprehensive curricula driving our teaching and learning in all seven of our buildings with ongoing professional development support the growth of our educators teachers meet as building level teams regularly we also have K-5 District level professional learning communities that meet discuss data and instructional best practices in order to meet the needs of students and to develop our network of collaboration and really aligned education across the district we have grading practices and instructional minutes that have been developed and that are in place to further support an aligned educational experience for our students irrespective of the building that they attend we also have common extracurricular activities for our students throughout our elementary schools with exploratory options that are developed based around interests for our families who

066will be attending a new school next year we will have our principals reaching out to you on March 7th and they will be communicating with you first welcome you by a message in parent Square they will also then be adding our parents for those new families attending a different school next year to their newsletter communication so that they can start to learn about the school community and about happenings within that school we also encourage our families to follow their new school on social media which really gives a great view into what it's like to be a student and a family in any one of our schools lastly with our welcoming opportunities our administrators teachers and staff are ready to welcome our new families and they are excited about this opportunity to support a transition to

067make this as smooth for our students and their parents or caregivers so we're going to start in may with principals and or other staff members going to the school buildings of students who will be attending their school next year so that they can meet their new students get to know them start talking to them about the culture of their school and what to expect and this will also be an opportunity for students to ask questions and to get those questions answered by staff that they will be working with we also want to really maintain a very social and family focused environment in August with popsicles on the playground where we will invite all of the families who will be attending each of our seven elementary schools to connect and really have some fun activities out

068in the playground as well as opportunities to tour the building learn about procedures like arrival and dismissal so that we go into the school year very soon we will also hold all of our open houses before the start of the school year this is an opportunity for our students as well as parents to meet families and again get acclimated with their school schools expectations and kind of the culture of that building what I can really assure all much as I started this is that we are as an elementary team as well as a district of Crown Point schools all in for all of our students and I know that this transition plan will continue to evolve to make sure that we're meeting our families thank you I did it thank you president board members so

069for our middle schools um very similar to our elementaries our middle school principals and administrations have been working very hard for the past few years to make sure that the same course offerings curriculum social emotional um um programming that we have during our advisory times all exist in both middle schools there's the same extracurriculars co-curriculars and very very aligned with our clubs as well so we hope that as our students and our parents kind of transition to a different Middle School they'll see that there's a lot of similarities in both middle schools so in planning on bringing our our parents to the new middle schools we we've been doing this in the spring and it's really geared towards incoming sixth grade parents it's about that really if you've never had a middle school student before

070what to anticipate from that Journey from sixth seventh and eighth grade and off to the high school but um we are going to continue to have that meeting even though the new Taft won't be ready we'll have that the meeting for our Taft parents at the current half building and internal wheel or have that meeting as well once we have that meeting we'll also be able to explain exactly what all this transition planning looks like and how the communication will go for those parents um we will also be sending out some parent messaging come March for anyone that will be going into a new middle school for next year so they'll be hearing from the principals early on as soon as these district lines have been approved um as we get closer to the school

071year it will have our traditional parent night again this was normally for uh incoming parents have never been to the building but they're going to offer that to every parent so whether you're just starting all over again or if you're staying in the same building you want to hear what's kind of new on August 10th they're going to have a parent night and obviously with that parent night there'll be a presentation from the administrators but then we'll also kind of have an open house so you can see the new buildings and there's plenty of improvements that are happening at Colonel wheeler it's still a fabulous building in great shape but there's been more things that will be we'll be looking forward to adding to that building so then for our students we'll have our Bulldog

072Rush which has been a tradition for our sixth graders when they first come into a new building they get to meet their teachers they get to get those first aid Jitters out go through and see what it's like to get the lunch in the cafeteria and just kind of meet all the folks that will be there with you students and administrators and teachers but in addition to that Bulldog Rush we're going to have one for seventh and eighth grade students as they return back for the year because everything will be a little bit different so we want to have them have that opportunity to have that structured time in the buildings kind of see the new buildings see the teachers and the administrators and then finally we'll end with our open houses that we have

073which is kind of the meet the teacher night so that all of our our students and parents can come together be comfortable for the start of the school year any questions on that are we okay good evening of course so for exceptional education our work with inclusion and that commitment we've made does not end with this redistricting we will continue to refine and improve our inclusionary practices at all of our schools and build the capacity of staff to work with students with diverse needs and this includes in academics and behavior we'll continue to provide high quality instructional supports and services at all of our schools as well as our very high quality staff we will include our new buildings that are hosting some specialty programs they've never hosted before we've already started the work of

074training staff and admin teams in those buildings to prepare for the arrival of some different programs they've never housed before next year for our classrooms with students that have emotional disabilities those will continue to be housed at Timothy ball and Jerry Ross for elementary the middle school has a switch next year the Ed program will now be housed at Wheeler and that was just merely due to where the students live so there weren't enough to have a Taft program and a Wheeler program they were almost all-wheeler Crown Point High School also houses that program exciting is that we have applied skills programming in all of our buildings next year so all seven elementaries both middle schools and the high school so more and more of our students are being educated in their home schools um

075Mrs oops my assistant director and myself will be calling several families tomorrow we know change can be a little more difficult for some of our students and families so we're going to give some phone calls to families that are impacted by a change in a different School many have had the same teachers for years and we know that that's stressful to think about having a different site in a different group of Staff members but we will assure them that we've been working with all of our staff to make sure our students get high quality instruction at all buildings so before we go into questions that you might have for the directors of Education just something I think that's important to pause here and point out over the last two years the work we've been doing

076Mr hardman's headed up being our chief academic officer and working to make sure that our elementary schools have a common language that that experience while is unique to the building is is similar in what the students experience in each building also then looking at our middle schools and making sure that what we're offering and doing at Wheeler we're doing it Taft and vice versa has really put us in a situation where now if students go to any of our buildings they're going to have a very similar quality of Education as well as programs and Ms pasquis mentioned the inclusion work that we're doing being able to have all of these different programs within the the students home school to be able to provide that and that's a big part of inclusion and looking at that

077we're able to provide the services that our students need within their school that is closest their home school as they go into that so we'll pause here before Brooke and I kind of take it the rest of the way with the last couple of slides just to see if there's any questions that we can answer for you guys about the transition and what that looks like as we move forward yes Dr Terrell doing this for 43 years now I know and I don't want to speak for any parents that are in the audience or maybe I will that I think parents want two things for their kids in education they want their kids to have a good education and they want them to be safe that sound about right are we guaranteeing then that wherever

078their child goes to elementary school that education is Sabrina said the opportunities are going to be the same you know school boards are charged with providing opportunities for students so are we assuring that all up those opportunities are equal in all schools yeah so I think that one of the things that's very important is the the short answer is yes that is going to be the case in all of our buildings um the longer answer to that is we take a great pride here in Crown Point of the schools the services that we provide the educational experiences the extracurricular experiences as you saw demonstrated this evening that we provide for our our community for our students and that is still one of those driving factors of what is making our community continue to grow as

079you talk with those coming in with you talk with people who move here those who are developing different subdivisions developments housing developments is based off of what the academic experiences here at Crown Point schools nothing will change with that we only look for that to get better okay let me ask another this has to do with special education so with the programming Miss pascus I know students are going to be changing buildings and as as a former special educator I understand those are difficult well any of these program building changes for our students that I see Timothy ball Jerry Ross Colonel wheeler at the high school as well will any of the buildings be available for these students in the summertime to come and you know there wasn't any mention about the students being at

080the schools about the parents being at the school is there a chance for the students to be in that environment well part of the transition will be um can we go back a couple of slides there for someone will be opportunities for students to be in the buildings as well so popsicles on playground was part that will include the students being part of that at the middle school level we have Bulldog Rush we're going to do for every student every grade level will be a part of that they're included in they're all included we do it all together so we'll bring them in when we bring in margin ed students go ahead if we have a special circumstance personal visit might be appropriate we've done those as well so we're happy to do that we

081typically do that for sixth graders ninth graders so that's not a problem any other questions on that I I'm assuming we'll get to communication with the communication director where parents with director that question thanks so that's a great transition into Brooke information pending approval this evening tomorrow our first step will be to update our staff we start with our front office staff all of those individuals need to be able to field a lot of questions and information will go out to them first and then we'll update the rest of our staff with some items that are very specific to them we covered a couple of those things this evening Staffing and how that will progress over the next couple of weeks we will make sure that the website page that's there now will be updated

082so this presentation will be there we'll have a map that's um more detailed than the maps you saw this evening you can zoom in and out you can type your address and you can see exactly where your house is with a new boundary I would say around noon because all of those things take a little bit of time around noon any family who is changing to a new school will receive a notice it'll remind them of the redistricting process what went into it and then it will list whatever their new school next week which is the one that I'm a little bit more excited about parents who are going to have a change in placement for their children will start getting messages from their building level principles I think that's the more important component here

083because those are the ones that you start to feel the environment of your new building and you start to really feel that new culture be a little less formal um on our website that redistricting page has a form at the bottom for questions and I can't emphasize enough that we hope people use that form if they have a need or a question or they need more information if you call a building sometimes you get put through the next person because we're trying to figure out who needs to receive that call but with the form all of those will come in to our team here and then we'll divide them out to the individual who can answer the question the best do you mind advancing it to the next one you can tight there for a

084minute so some of the questions that we're getting a lot that we want to make sure that we address tonight that we will address as well tomorrow and the information that Brooke has mentioned out of District students so our current boundaries as far as Crown Point Community School Corporation are not changing so with this that doesn't mean that additional students who live outside in another Township that still have Crown Point addresses that is not changing to allow them to come into our our school corporation our boundary does not change voluntary transfer requests these are in those situations that have extenuating circumstances McKinney vento parts that come into this with being displaced from homes for various different reasons that process will still be in place and will be followed just like it has been before again

085this is very few and far between where those voluntary transfer requests are granted grandfathering going back to the last time that we did this we had an opportunity for if you were in fifth grade to stay where you were 8th graders to stay we're not going to do that with this redistricting process and part of that is again looking at that Equitable experience for our students and what we're doing at Jerry Ross and Winfield there's no way to make that happen and make the transition that we're doing there so we are not going to grandfather students in were they because they're going to be in fifth grade they get to finish or they're going to be in eighth grade the change the boundaries are what they are and that is what's going to be their

086school start times we already mentioned we're looking at keeping those as close to what they are right now Staffing again we already mentioned and information will be going out to buildings and to teachers here within the week of the tonight so again Brooke stated this question form really is going to be very important for our community members as they have questions part of that is as you can imagine many people will have the same question and as we get that and can put the answer to that question online that way when people go they can see the same or the answer to the questions that they may be thinking about or that have already been asked with that I'll open it back up for any additional conversations about communication of the plan and how that

087will be rolled out Brooke could you just reiterate again the time frame for going on the website and be able to see where you live and find out what school you're going to be going to and then the second half of that noon noon tomorrow everybody plan on unless you're a staff member okay thank you let me jump in for just one quick one here um part of that will be a link where you can actually scroll down zoom in to where you the different addresses are streets are within each boundary and people will be able to go to their home and actually see where their home ends up being on that map we also Our intention is that tomorrow we'll also have it where you can go in like you currently do and type

088in your address to find out what school you're supposed to your students will go to next year the plan is right now if there are no glitches with that which we think there won't be that that'll be operational tomorrow as well uh one question the question link there the questionnaire form on the website is that for all inquiries related to redistricting meaning if a student has is experiencing anxiousness and a parent wants to seek out help for the adjustment you know we're a few weeks out to the question box absolutely so in that instance if a parent had a specific concern we would make sure we're following up with both buildings and then we would Loop in probably one of our directors they would make sure support staff is brought in that's a good example

089of how using the form we can involve everyone great and and the second thing I just want to reiterate I think it's important that we talked about this last month too that as students are adjusting they may have a hard time some may be anxious some may be sad we want to as a school corporation partner with the parents to meet the needs of the students and I really just want to emphasize that again so please if you need help or if you need help more support from the schools please reach out we have those resources available and happy to try to assist now on the flip side of that is also is there going to be any instructions to parents in the initial email that goes out to kind of give some breathing space

090to your principals and and not have their phones ringing off the hook the first couple days because they obviously have a very important job to do in just managing their building is that going to be addressed in any type of communication that goes out not specifically but I can tell you we like we all know tomorrow will be busy our principles included that's what it is we're here to answer questions we may not get back to you right away because we'll have more questions this week than a typical week but I think everybody's prepared to you know take it as it comes okay all right thank you bro moving on to item 5.03 approval of the new Elementary Middle School boundaries doc or Mr Reese thank you Mr President members of the board after going

091through the information that we presented uh tonight and last meeting uh we're happy to recommend the boundaries as described tonight in the presentation for the Elementary and Middle School boundaries you've heard the recommendation of the administration for approval of the new boundaries for the elementary and middle school buildings I have motion so moved second motion by Mr Smith second by Mr babjac question or discussion I would just like to bring up something um redistricting in a community like this is a necessity if you go back to 2009 numbers we had 7 610 students we're currently just a shade under 9 000 total so if you look in 14 years almost 1400 students or I'm sorry 20 almost 23 uh no that's right 1400 almost exactly so about 100 students per year in average growth this

092happens in different areas at times Middle School Elementary and high school but once again most of you that have either moved here in the last few years or been here forever stayed here or moved here for a couple reasons one that these schools are top ranked in the state and there's no argument about that no matter what level you're at elementary middle school or High School and for the low tax rate compared to where maybe you came from with that in mind I can tell you every decision made behind this decision and moving lines coming from the information provided by Dr McKibben is all about the educational purpose of each and every one of those 8 900 kids not just one or two not just three or four but it puts them all into the

093equation so with that being said if you contemplate 8 900 students you take into effect some split families you're probably dealing with 22 23 000 parents when you make decisions that are going to be affected by this so it's not taken lightly with the help of a cabinet that's experienced in each one of their areas with a superintendent that's been involved in this and other air districts he's worked this is the best plan that we've come up with and I can tell you with meeting with board members individually because you have to do that can have more than two uh three of us in a meet or two of us in a meeting I met with them last week not everybody was on the same page from start to finish on this decision and we've

094talked through some of those and not every argument has been so-called answered but I just want to make sure that the public does realize that this isn't taken with a grain of salt and there's a lot of hard work put in behind the scenes which you can tell by the presentation and just some of the information and I can tell you kids are usually resilient raising for myself each and every one of them is different the kids will be the easiest part of this yes they'll find friends at the new school between sports they play activities they're involved in the gaming online all of them will adjust accordingly what I would ask those of you parents is that you help them with that and explain to them and if there are concerns like Mr Smith

095mentioned that we work out those concerns because this is the best interest of your students sometimes mom and dad might not be appeased or applauded with what just occurred or because they got to move schools or do something like that but I just want to say just work with us because I promise you the education of your students to the top of our level that we can provide is what came behind most almost every part of this decision other than just fixing boundary lines well stated Mr angel any other questions all those in favor please signify by saying aye aye those opposed motion carries five zero superintendents discussion groups anything from uh we're still I know kind of uh cities uh Cedar Lake Winfield in the city I know Winfield hasn't done anything uh Brian

096anything with Cedar Lake nothing from Cedar Lake I know we're transitioning so it's oh typical Cedar Lake yes I have Cedar Lake okay that's okay uh interesting you know the Redevelopment commission and their Town Council are one in the same I don't know if you realize that or not but they're one in the same so it was able to go to their meeting a few weeks back two subdivisions when which Mr Reese alluded to being built in within the Cedar Lake Town limits one is just going from 133rd Street moving south to 141st that's the entire mile as the crow flies just on the other side of the lake side subdivision they're looking at maybe as many as 800 new homes there it's a big swath of land and the Old South Shore Golf Course

097some of you may have golfed on that at one time that was originally going to be taken over by the YMCA as a campsite that deal fell through so now developer has uh swallowed that up and they're looking at 200 new homes on that site as well for our transportation department soon they're going to be starting a sidewalk project that starts from the boat launch in Cedar Lake off of 100 actually be lake shore drive all the way to the town hall so our transportation department be aware of some delays going on there thank you Tim from Cedar Lake anything for the city Brian the city just the RDC just approved some grants for restaurants new restaurants coming in off 109th I think the biggest aspect or thing that event that occurred at the meeting

098was the city acquired some property the the hope is that they're going to extend the old railroad easement and a bike path and eventually complete it so as part of that project I'd acquired a piece of property to have proper access um under roads and they're going to extend that all the way down to Hebron that's the goal so that we would have a bike path from Crown Point to Hebron so that's what required there and just let the public know we're provided a opportunity to have a member on the Redevelopment commissions of these three different taxing entities hence why that this part of the discussion is for that aspect of it thank you .02 director of Elementary education anything else tonight sure thank you Mr President board members I just wanted to take a

099moment to recognize our Eisenhower Eagle Bots they have really put in a lot of hard work and dedication this year this team won the elementary school Excellence award which is the highest Award presented in the Vex robotics program and they also earned a bid to compete at the state level so we're very excited for them and for all that they have achieved and will continue to achieve I'd also like to thank the administration teachers and staff at Timothy ball with their construction project very well underway over Presidents Day weekend they moved 17 classrooms and didn't miss a beat with students returning the day after President's Day and so that was a lot of hard work and just really everybody chipping in to make that a success lastly I'd also like to just kind of share

100a great opportunity that I had last week which was to attend the kickoff event which was a convocation K-5 at Timothy ball which was filled with high energy teacher and student Minute to Win It um kind of games as well as then the reveal of their one book one school and this has really been something that our elementary buildings have been embracing and will continue to embrace which is really promoting literacy and a love for reading both at school and at home so it was just a great honor to get to see the kids excitement and the teachers um really you know kicking this off with a lot of energy so thank you thank you director of secondary education thank you Mr President board members um Mr Vassar had a question earlier about our waivers

101for our our diplomas and due to the magic of a live feed and Mr marsnik being tuned in I received a text and your answer is less than five percent right now so that is great thank you Mr Marston for being so diligent um now back to my report so I want to congratulate four students from Crown Point High School for being a named National Merit finalist um you have to have a pretty darn high score on the National Merit qualifying test to be considered that this is Lucas Johnson Andrew goldthorpe Brynn nordimir and Adam fusela and just to put that perspective 1.5 million students take this test and then they could be a semi-finalist you have a score to move to 50 000 students and then from there they narrow it down to 15

102000 students out of there so congratulations to these four and hopefully maybe we'll get them in front of you guys at some point in time because that's quite an achievement we also had some other students accomplish some some things over the course of February we had a team of Tyler Anderson and Quentin Osborne they participated in the top-notch Tech Challenge and this was another first place finish and this is through the universal technology Institute Institute school and this is Tyler's actually second year in a row so he's a two-time champ just like some of these other guys we had up here earlier and they receive a ten thousand dollar scholarship to The Institute um which has all kinds of schools cross country and a large toolbox and hand tools so congratulations to them really emphasis

103for these two guys was automotive and diesel that's the area they were competing and then one more student we kind of gave them some air time last board meeting with Tyler Hudak went on and competed in the state tournament for chess and lo and behold after eight hours of play he was the only undefeated player in his first place in the state as well so congratulations to him um just in closing I want to thank the Crown Point Community Foundation for providing they kind of annually help us with our AP testing fees and if you know anything about the AP test they're very pricey once you start taking three four AP classes so this is much appreciated it really doesn't it really helps our students that need that extra assistance so they don't have to

104turn down not having that opportunity because they don't have the fun so again thank you for them for always supporting us thank you thank you director of exceptional education Mr pasquez thank you Mr President members of the board next week is National School social worker week and I would like to recognize for staff members we have that serve in the role as school social worker last year was our first year having an Indiana Department of Ed license School social worker on staff and we've gone up to four this year I'm not sure what we did without none we could triple and quadruple the amount and it wouldn't be enough but these ladies provide invaluable support to our students our families our staff they help students navigate social and emotional difficulties that they're having at school

105they help connect families to Community Resources if they need to carry out any assistance within the community and they're just all around just very helpful ladies so I'd like to recognize Mary ree Sandy specker Tara verdusco and Evelyn Bratton also there's one more chance to catch our exceptional Learners basketball team at the high school they have one last game next Wednesday night March 8th at 6 pm so if you're able to please join us thank you Chief academic officer Mr Urban thank you Mr President we are approaching embarking on our second level of Learn Academy courses these are courses that our teachers teach teachers currently we have 21 new courses that have been applied for if you recall in the fall we had probably over 350 teachers attend these sessions learning from their their peers

106it's always a great time to see these people stepping out to be able to help other teachers to to hone their Craft on the Personnel agenda there were there's three vital people in our buildings that are going to be retiring and we are going to feel that when they retire all three are secretaries in their buildings Sherry adorowicks at Eisenhower and Anita Griffith at Winfield have been at those buildings for as long as I can remember and they will be sorely missed and just want to congratulate the two secretaries at the elementary schools for the work they've done the support they've given and I look forward to their time of retirement the other the third person is a Sherry tokoli and Sherry is a secretary that works in our office curriculum and instruction Sherry started

107at Taft and then when a position opened here at central office in curriculum and instruction when Gene Williams went to the treasurer Sherry stepped in I have been trained by two of the best secretaries that there could be and she's going to be dearly dearly missed and I just want to honor her because of the work that she has done she was a employee of the year a few couple years ago and she will be someone that we're going to miss and she is also one that works right to the final Bell so we're gonna we're gonna take advantage of that and maybe even a little beyond that so we'll see so just congratulations to those three secretaries thank you Chief Financial Officer Mr Reese thank you Mr President members of the board there's been

108some questions discussions come up regarding Tif districts and Redevelopment commissions now that we have some new folks on the board and new people and new spots regarding the their responsibilities towards us so tonight would take a few minutes just to give you a quick uh Tiff one-on-one to give you an idea when you're going to those meetings what that looks like and what's really taking place in those Redevelopment commission meetings so the purpose the simple purpose of a tiff is take an area that is either blighted or not developed and doesn't have the infrastructure necessary to maintain development in that area so what happens is an area is deemed to be a tiff District a tiff area bonds are then issued for the development of that for the infrastructure think water sewer the the roads

109the things you need to develop an area to make it attractive to develop those bonds that are used and capture the tax increment financing which is what Tiff stands for so what it does is freeze the assessed valuation of the area that they assume at that level any additional assessed valuation they capture those property taxes for that through the Redevelopment commission and those uh the those taxes they've captured are then used to pay off the bond issue that takes place so it's a it's an Innovative inventive way for communities municipalities cities towns counties to develop areas and give the infrastructure a boost to get that development to actually take place that's the prime premise of it before it's now being used as a development because when you define blighted each City in town municipality will

110have a different definition of what blighted means so that's why you see all along Broadway a significant one that's a blighted area that's due for development also along I-65 109. um the benefit and this is honestly it really is a lot of schools come across as Tiff being negative and I guess it would be if you knew that was going to be developed but what a great way to get an area to get developed so then hopefully 20 years down the road we can capture that growth and that assessed valuation an important piece of the some of this is that the taxes that are are captured the assessed valuation they don't get the money that comes from our referendum fund we actually any growth in that assessed valuation within the Tiff District we get to

111do capture those taxes the impact of schools used to be different when this first started so the last report I gave to you is back in January of 2013. we had a completely different funding structure we didn't have the operations fund we had three different funds each were impacted differently by tiffs that's no longer the case so what happens now is because all those funds are Levy controlled not rate controlled it allows for us to raise the taxes necessary up to our maximums and what that does is if it reduces the assessed value we can raise the rate to match the levy that we're allowed to raise all those funds have a maximum Levy that we're allowed to raise so we don't lose any Revenue the only loss comes from the additional tax rate we

112need to have any of those properties that are hitting the circuit breaker whether inside the Tiff or outside the Tiff raising that tax rate causes a small impact to the circuit breaker to us so in general they've set up those tiffs so that it's actually beneficial now as a word of warning if we were to get to a spot where a majority of our assessed valuation or a large piece of our SS valuation was tied up in test therefore we are raising our tax rate significantly to make up that Levy then it could cause our tax rate really to go high and that would be a problem for us that's not been the case for our entities we have three of our taxing entities that have tiffs right now it is Crown Point it is

113Cedar Lake on the Center township side and then Winfield Township also has a tiff give you an idea when I did this report back in January of 2013 the impact from the Tiff was 4.37 percent of our assessed valuation was captured inside a tiff in 2023 because we have our assessed valuations for this year that number is now 4.75 there's been very little growth now the dollar amount the AV that's been captured has been significant but so is our overall AV grown in that same period so the percentage of our assessed valuation tied up in the Tiff is very similar to what it was back in 2013 which is a testament to our entities that they've governed themselves such that they've limited the growth of those tips and not eaten up more of our assessed

114valuation so that's a brief synopsis on that so what you're looking for on these boards is when they're putting residential inside a tiff that's a problem because now we're educating students and other than the referendum fund we're not getting those dollars for them in the operations fund to educate them now some of the obviously is changing with the funding formula proposals downstate that just gives you a general premise residential inside the Tiff not so good um anything else we love seeing commercial AV inside tips because that really benefits us and I think we're willing to play the long game over 20 years to get that assessed valuation when it rolls off the Redevelopment commission and on to the other taxing entities any questions you might have for me regarding the the Tiff and be happy

115to give you more specific information but try to keep it at a high level tonight yeah Mr Rish you might be happy to know uh last Tuesday there's a lot of talk on tiffs at the state house and there's a push by is ba to have a school board members those who represent on our Redevelopment commissions as as Brian and Scott and and I do we were on the board we have no voting rights bill is being presented for us to have voting rights which would help us in this guard so we'll wait and see what happens with that yep after hearing that wonderful explanation I'm so happy out of the property tax Consulting business for the last eight years but thanks Matt uh director of communications Miss Allen One In Summer and One in

116Winter residents should see that piece in their mailboxes later this week probably maybe even early next week I can tell you it's a it's arrived in the Winfield area already I can tell you that and and thank you it's a it's well done again thank you uh last but not least superintendent superintendent of schools Dr Terrell yeah so this evening you've heard multiple times about all of the additional activities that are provided for our kids after school hours on weekends and I just want to thank all of those that are involved and for all the opportunities they provide for our students and that's everybody from the elementaries all the way through high school and thank them for the extra work there secondly just want to give you guys a building progress update again thankful for

117the Partnerships we have in Skillman and Gibraltar I know we've heard comments I was able to take Scott angel on a tour with Dion of Taft the new Taft last week and I know we hear people say as they drive by there's no way that building is going to be open I can assure you that it's going to be open and it's on schedule if not a little bit ahead of schedule when you walk the building right now lockers are in rooms are painted ceiling tiles ceiling tiles are in um it's amazing where we are with that building and very shortly here end of April beginning of May we'll actually have furniture being delivered for classrooms as well so that's just one example you heard of the teachers at Timothy ball who were able to

118move classrooms over presidents day and way ahead of schedule there actually they're going to get use of their gym at Spring break which wasn't supposed to happen until this summer so those are just a few examples of the the progress that's being made in the fact that we are at or ahead of schedule on most of our projects and given the circumstances with getting supplies in with getting people to work at different jobs in different positions just a Real Testament to Skillman and their connections here throughout our community as well as all the subgroups that work for them as we put this thing together there's 120 to 130 people working every day out at the new Taft and when you go in there I mean it's literally buzzing with activity every day so thank you

119to those people and the continued work that they do all good thank you any other uh item seven other business of the board other than uh Mr vassar's legislative report anything else that needs to be brought up tonight Diana we received an email yet and the spring regional meeting yet on what a date okay other than that I don't foresee any other calendar dates and be made aware of but as soon as we have that Diana usually shoots out an email with that we'll move it to item eight uh board statements of appreciation recognition anything for you tonight Mr basser well I do want to say I had a great opportunity to talk to one of our bus drivers a couple of weeks back we had a great conversation and he wanted to tell me

120that he was so appreciative to our it's funny because the wrestling team was here tonight to the parents Club wrestling club I'm not sure if I have the correct name there but uh he drove the wrestling team to an all-day event as most wrestling meets are and the parents afterwards the parent Club gave him a sizable tip for his services and I just thought that was really neat you know to do that so I just wanted to shout out to those folks for that maybe one man really happy thank you is Basin anything tonight uh nothing too crazy except we do have sectionals for boys basketball uh tomorrow evening and for those of you who haven't followed uh AJ Lux as a senior this year we had senior night on Friday so they recognized our

121seniors AJ Lux is I believe it's two points away from his thousandth point so if you are at all considering coming out to sectionals it'll be um should be a really good evening so um anyway I appreciated getting to kind of go and and be part of the crowd it was very close at the end and everyone was was hyped up hoping that he was going to hit it last Friday so hoping for it this week but um anyway appreciate kind of the community feeling that that gives all together thank you Mr babjac I just want to say a general thank you Todd to everybody that's been involved with this redistricting process and I know that this is something that's gone on for a while this isn't something that happens overnight there's going to be

122people pleased people not so happy about it but the job of this board is to make sure first and foremost we vote on it we approve it It ultimately ends with us but our job is to make sure that the right people are in place to make these decisions and build these processes and do what's right for the kids in Crown Point I'm 100 confident that you guys did that so I just wanted to say thank you thank you Mr Smith yes thank you just to follow up on uh Mr badjack's comments I remember six years ago when he and I came on the board together and one of the reoccurring themes back then was classroom size over and over and over again everywhere I went our classrooms are too crowded our teacher at a

123student ratio is too high you know and unfortunately one of the downsides to that that redistricting may have to occur until address that as well and it was never discussed tonight but it is true if you feel like your classroom sizes you have 700 kids at Lake Street and your classrooms are too too crowded this could help alleviate that and as we started mauling over processes and Dr Terrell was hired and we were looking at buildings and expansions and we needed to do that with the growth um you know for lack of better words this is a necessary evil and you know redistricting but it's a good problem overall right it means that our schools are good people want to be here they want to be in Crown Point they want to attend our schools

124they want to live in Crown Point we are blessed with the great Community great school corporation uh and and we're fortunate to have the problems we have and so again I I want to Echo your sentiments and thank you to all you who worked extremely hard I know Mr Reese you put in a ton of time in your presentation on this so thank you for your effort and it really is a whole whole team so I know it's hard to say that in a day when people aren't all happy but I think it needs to be said there's a lot of work that goes into this and so thank you for doing that the second thing I want to say is um Heather invited us a few weeks ago to the exceptional Learners basketball team

125at Crown Point I did take you up on your offer and I went out there I think two weeks ago watched the Crown Point little game I saw Dr Terrell and I was blown away uh both on many levels What a what an awesome experience and the the students were just so loving and caring for each other the players were so caring and I was blown away by the fan support because there was a lot of people there at that game and what an awesome opportunity for those those students and those players and I'll tell you there's some people that can really play basketball on our team we're loaded with talent I don't know we had one kid I think hit two three pointers so uh you know it's a pretty good team and um

126but what a lot of fun so thank you for the invite for the other board members and other other individuals out there if you get a chance to go watch the exceptional Learners basketball team I I recommend you do that on occasion it's a cool experience so thank you thank you um just in on that regard two weeks ago Friday one of the special needs students uh young ladies in a wheelchair sing the national anthem I happen to be there for the Valpo game and I mean if there's nothing that doesn't put Goosebumps on your arms and listen to that in the round of applause she received because she did an outstanding job so if we can get her name Diana make sure we get it in the minutes I didn't catch her name that

127evening that sounds like yes I believe so Dr Terrell was there tonight so if we can make sure we get our mentioned and then Dr Terrell kind of touched base I'd like to give a appreciation accommodation tonight to uh that accommodation more but uh shout out to Skillman Corp um walking through that building and knowing that we're supposed to have students in that building on August 17th I missed the previous tour hence why I asked for an updated tour it is amazing to see 120 to 150 workers in different aspects so whether it be drywallers Steel Workers uh Mudders tapers it was just unbelievable to see how organized that is and I'm working like for the 45 minutes I walked through that building how nothing was being interrupted um welcome back to see updated boilers

128which are basically now like scientific tubes rather than an actual boiler I mean I'm not in that line of work in by any mean shape and I wouldn't want to be knowing what's going on but it's just amazing and uh so kudos to them for organizing our projects for a long long time and making sure that um for those those of you that are listening my wife joined the tour because she's been part of this community as well and it was so ironic as we were ready to walk out the door of the side a mouse came through one of the side holes and ran by her and if you if you knew my wife pretty good that that wasn't that but she held her breath and things were okay and it ran through the

129other side of the room but just you just never know what you're going to see but just thank you Skillman for everything you've done for us I mean I know we reward you compensation wise but knowing that you're we're in your good hands knowing we need to get those kids in that building I feel very confident in our experience with them that that will happen on time uh just before we adjourn here thank you for all that came out tonight whether you be a parent one of our employees teachers administrators of that we do acknowledge you showing up and sitting through the meeting when there's information that needs to be given out to the community and all of those that have sure we probably broke a record today with those following online so thank you

130to all those that participated for the meeting and they're 230 so see I knew that number was going to be up there today so thank you to all those that stuck with us through the meeting with the technology difficulties that we fixed uh with that can I get a motion to adjourn motion by Miss Basin second by Mr babjac all those in favor please signify by saying aye aye those opposed motion carries 5-0