001All right. Good evening, welcome to the Fairfield City School District Board of Education meeting for August 7th, 2025. Uh, please call the roll. Mr. Begley. Here. Mrs. Birding Miller. Present. Mr. Clark. Present. Mr. Mrs. Gundrum. Mr. Napier. Here. Thank you. Mr. Napier, will you lead us in the pledge? I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Thank you. We will jump right in with superintendent uh recommendations and reports. Mr. Smith. >> Yes, thank you, Mr. Begley. At this time, I'd like to ask Mr. Hustle to cover the items listed under personnel professional and personnel support. Thank you, Mr. Smith, Mr. Begley, and members of the board. I have three items for your
002consideration this evening under personnel professional. Number one, resignations, letters A through F. Number two, extracurricular resignations, letters A and B. Number three, employment, letters A through M. That concludes all the items I have for your consideration under personnel professional. Thank you, Mr. Hustle. I'll entertain a motion to accept these recommendations. >> Second. Mr. Napier, Mrs. uh Birding Miller. Mr. Phillips, please call the roll. Mr. Napier. Yes. Mrs. Birding Miller. Yes. Mr. Clark. Yes. Ms. Gundrum. Mr. Begley. Yes. Mr. Begley and members of the board, I have five items for your consideration this evening under personnel support. Number one, reduction in force, letters A through K. Number two, resignations, letters A through BB. Number three, employment, letters A through Y. Number four, support substitutes, 2025-2026. Number five, correction, letter A. That concludes all the items I
003have for your consideration under personnel support. Thank you, Mr. House. I'll entertain a motion to accept these recommendations. So moved. Second. Mrs. Birding Miller, and Mr. Napier, before we go to a vote, just very quickly, whenever you say reduction in force, right? That can be a sensitive topic, and of course, we'll discuss this later in the meeting, right? And you can refer back to this, or whoever covers that can refer back to it, right? Yes. Okay. Great. Thank you. Mr. Phillips, call the roll. Mrs. Birding Miller? Yes. Mr. Napier? Yes. Mr. Clark? Yes. Ms. Gundrum? Mr. Bagley? Yes. Mr. Bagley, members of the board, we do have several items for board discussion this evening. Our first item is in regard to a board policy. At this time, I'll turn it over to Mrs. Hower. Thank
004you, Mr. Smith. Mr. Bagley, members of the board, I do have one item for discussion this evening, and that is district policy JFCK, use of cell phones and electronic communication devices by students. So, as you are aware, state law was recently passed fully prohibiting student use of cell phones during the school day. Um to be in compliance with this new law, which we are required to do, we will be implementing a no cell phone policy for all students pre-K through 12 at the start of this school year. Uh while this new policy does reflect the existing practices for our younger students, there are no changes for our younger students, it may represent an adjustment for some of our secondary students as they love their cell phones, and we all know this. Um but our secondary
005administrators are actively working to ensure that expectations are clearly communicated and consistently applied, and we'll continue to do so as we start the school year. Parents were given a heads-up that we believe the legal mandate was coming back in May, and then it the law passed, and since then, the principals have reached out to staff and families to outline the specific guidelines per each building's expectations, as well as the steps in the progressive discipline process for any violations of that. But in short, students who bring a cell phone or a personal electronic communication device to school due to needing it for before or after school, which we completely understand, must keep the device turned off and out of sight throughout the school day. Students will be asked to store their device either in their locker,
006backpack, or in a classroom storage device that's provided by the district. As I shared previously with you, OSBA does not plan to release a policy update regarding this until September. So the proposed policy language changes that I shared with you are a temporary placeholder until they release the updated language to ensure that our policies reflect our practices as we start the school year. Um pending any questions that you may have in regards to this, you will be asked to take action on it this evening since school starts on Monday and we want to make sure that we are all set and ready to go. Do you have any questions in regards to this? Does that include hallways? It does. And lunch? Anytime during the school day from So from the start of the school day
007until the end of the school day. Okay. And Mr. I can confirm that's that update you mentioned is so that it does start Monday, right? This is for us to start on Monday, yes. >> And uh they have any like I Apple Watches and things like that? >> So when we say devices, it is any device that's being intended to be used in the manner that a cell phone would be used for communication. Okay. So it any type of device that, you know, we don't they shouldn't be using any type of device to circumvent the intent of policy. Thank you, ma'am. >> they do, that will be considered and those same rules will apply as they would for a cell phone. Okay, good. Thank you. Mhm. Is there uh is the policy on our website?
008It is not on the website yet. It needs to be approved and then I put it through to OSBA and they do they have to do their upload into the system to then have it show up on our website. But all of the principals are clearly communicating it out to our families at the start of the year and um educating our staff on the processes and plans as we start. And is our website up, Mrs. Pledge? Not yet. Not yet. Okay. Some of the comments I saw on one of the principals that put out was their kid's diabetic. So, there are there are some very limited exceptions to this in regards to if they need it to um, like for example, to check their sugar for a health reason like that, it would be permitted.
009Okay. And all the teachers know this? Mhm. Yep. Yep. All right. Thank you. We'll see how it goes. We'll get through it. Might be a little rough in the beginning, but it will be all right. Sure. All right. Our next item for discussion, bus stops for the 25-26 school year. I'll turn it over to Mr. Perry. Thank you, Mr. Smith, Mr. Bagley, members of the board. This is an annual process to discuss and approve the uh, bus stops for the school year. Uh, this is a a requirement to be done within the first 10 days of school. I do not have a copy of these with me, but I am able to provide a copy if needed. Hopefully, a digital copy if you would prefer, um, because it is about uh, 485 pages. Um, so
010as you see, we'll be listed uh, below for under other items for board uh, action this evening. But again, this is an annual requirement um, that we go through. So, if you have any questions, again, please reach out. We can set up a time that I can get you copies if needed. Yeah. I appreciate you mentioning the copies. I know in your email to us earlier in the week, you mentioned it was a large file and bus driver, electronic would be best. And thank you for that opportunity. And there's very few to no changes from last year for >> Yeah. So, pretty consistent, which is good. Well, I and I think it has to be, right? Because every year, I'm sure there's people that say, "I want a bus stop or take the bus stop
011away from my driveway or whatever it may be, right? It's just another piece in the huge transportation monster that we deal with. >> Absolutely. Yeah, and consistency is good for the kids, too. Sure. So, yeah, we try like keep it consistent year to year to year to year. Yeah. Thank you. Thank you. >> Thank you. All right, up next is our Right at School contract at this time. I'll turn it over to Mr. Crapo. All right. Uh thank you, Mr. Smith. Uh members of the board, tonight we have the uh Right at School contract on there for discussion and action. Uh if you would recall a couple weeks ago or last board meeting, we did the MOU for Right at School, which was the company that came in as our latchkey provider to take over
012the services um instead of Fairfield City School District doing that position. Um the contract was uh drafted, uh reviewed by uh Mr. Clements, uh and it is um it is up tonight for action, as well. Um earlier mentioned the reduction in force regarding the latchkey employees. Um that was, as we dissolved our program, those employees were offered another position in the district as an educational assistant. Um they were posted positions, and they they could take those positions, or they could go over to Right at School and work uh for them as latchkey provider, as well. So, all of the positions were all of the the personnel either took the EA position or went over to Right at School. So, are there any questions in regards to the program or the contract? And again, the motivation
013was to maintain, or in this case, maybe even reduce Yeah, we wanted to reduce pricing, uh continue the resource for the families. Um it was hard to maintain the program in-house with our structure that we had. And Right at School, this is what they do. They come in and they run latchkey programs across the country. Yeah. And does this allow us to expand it to other Yeah. So, we were able to offer discounts to families that we've never been able to offer before. We were able We are able to expand to the all six elementaries, which we do not have. Um we're going to begin the school year with four elementaries, and then we're going to get the licensing for the additional two elementaries. So, the goal is by fall break to be fully go.
014Great. Yeah, a lot of times it makes sense to bring in a third party like that. I know we did it with the parks department uh with the hiring of the uh lifeguards and taking care of the pool and that kind of thing, and it was much more cost-efficient and effective to have a larger group with a bigger pool of people to pull from, and similar to more cost-efficient and cost less money actually and and uh more opportunities. So, that's it makes sense all around. All right, thanks. Thank you. All right, up next we have AP Calculus course fee, ELA and social studies course stud courses of study, Book Worms ELA curriculum and I Ready approval. At this time, I'll turn it over to Mrs. All. Thank you, Mr. Smith, Mr. Bagley, members of the
015board. I have three items for your consideration tonight. Uh first, I need to ask you to approve a change to the AP Calculus fee for this school year. Uh in the spring, the board approved a fee of 48.25 for AP Calculus AB and BC. This fee included a student test prep book. Uh when we tried to order it this summer, the company told us that it was now out of print, even though they gave us a quote for it in like April, but you know, things happen. So, we worked with the teacher to find a replacement test prep book. That book um is actually cheaper, which is an advantage for our students and families. So, we need to update the AP Calculus fee to reflect this change. The new course fee will be $33, and
016I'm asking for your approval tonight so that we can immediately update the fee in our system to reflect this change so that students and families are assessed the updated fee at the start of the school year. Any questions on that? Okay. My second item tonight is to present the updated ELA and social studies courses of study. These are the final two associated with the project we've previously discussed. There is one thing I do want to highlight in the ELA course of study, and that is our revised core literature list. So, I noticed that in the board packet, the link to the core list was not working, but if you go back to the email I sent earlier this week, you can access it through there. But last spring, my team dedicated significant time to reviewing
017and updating this list, which had grown over the years without items being removed. So, I just want to give a special thanks to Lauren Sweeney for her work with department chairs to streamline and modernize the list for 6 through 12. And then additionally, I'd like to thank Georgine Bowman and Debbie Faccina for the work they did with the K-5 library. I mean, they they put every book that we have in our for our different um programs in the core literature list. So, this update will be especially helpful for families who can now more easily reference the text their child might be reading at each grade level. Um and both of these courses of study will be on the board agenda um on the next board agenda for approval. So, they literally typed in every name
018of every book. That's that's a task. It was quite the the summer project. So, that's one of the reasons we're I've been holding the ELA one because we've been typing in all of these things for for K to 5. Yeah, wow. So, um it was it was a big task, but like I said, I'm so happy with the final product because it's something that can be useful for teachers and parents. The list had just grown Yeah. you know, out of control over the years. We never really took things away. We just added. Purging like that is not always easy and that's where it takes a lot of time, but then going forward you can remove and add more simply. >> Exactly. So, my final item is to get board approval of Bookworms as part of
019our K-5 ELA curriculum and I-Ready is our K-12 reading intervention program. Um as you right might remember from our March board presentation, we are transitioning to Bookworms as our new uh core ELA curriculum. Since we are updating our ELA course of study, um it's a good time to approve Bookworms as well and that would be on the next board agenda as well. Then, at the May 1st board meeting, I shared with you that the district has chosen to move to I-Ready assessment and personalized learning for the 2025-26 school year. Um during a May webinar with the Ohio Department of Education and Workforce, it was shared that it is best practice to have this the I-Ready um assessment and personalized learning, which is an ODE, well, ODE approved K-12 reading intervention program, board approved as well.
020Uh so, even though I told you in May that we didn't have to take any further action um on that, I would like to move forward with getting your approval on the next board agenda in an effort to comply with ODU's suggestion. And that concludes my items for discussion. Thank you. All right, up next we have treasurer consultant performance contract. I'll turn over to Mr. Huzzle. Thank you, Mr. Smith, Mr. Begley, members of the board. The district we'd like to recommend a performance contract for Amy Lee as a consultant to the treasurer. Mr. Phillips' treasurer's contract officially began August 1st, 2025. During the month of July, Mr. Phillips was able to shadow Ms. Lee and receive training in different roles, responsibilities, and platforms needed in order to be successful in the position. The district would
021like to recommend extending Ms. Lee's expertise and guidance to Mr. Phillips as he continues to transition to his new role. This will require a performance contract. Pending your approval, Amy Lee's performance contract will run August 1st, 2025 through October 31st, 2025. This item is also listed listed as an item for board action tonight due to the time frame. Please let me know if you have any questions. Not a question, but a statement. I'm glad that Ms. Lee is willing and able to do that. I know it's beneficial to you, Mr. Phillips, and I even that time August to 1st through end of October at 60 hours. So, and that can be spread out over time, make a phone call, she's not coming in, it's more remote or phone call or email or anything. Yeah, and
022she she's hoping and I'm hoping, too, that majority of the hours are August, September, and she just kind of weans herself off through the end of October, but uh yeah, so it it'll be extremely helpful, and I'm really thankful to Mrs. Lee for agreeing to do that. >> Yeah, yeah, she's wonderful. And so are you. Thanks. I think that's great. It's going to be It's going to be. Thank you, that's it. Thank you. Thank you. All All up next, um, OSBA annual conference planning. I'll turn over to Mr. Phillips. >> Okay, thank you Mr. Smith, Mr. Bagley, members of the board. You know, it's hard to believe that we're thinking about the capital conference already in November, but the capital conference is being held November the 16th through the 18th this year. And we need
023to recommend and approve before the end of August who our delegate to the um delegate meeting will be for the sport of education as well as an alternate for that meeting. So, just wanted to open it up to board discussion. First of all, want to think about who from the board would like to attend. So, I I need to know that so we can get you registered and then who would like to be the delegate and the alternate for the delegate meeting. Thank you. I think Mr. Napier went last year. >> only retiree up here, I'll go. You have some interest? Is that okay with the rest of board? Yeah, fine with me. Do we have someone who's willing to uh stand in as an alternate should need it? Should it be me? Should it
024be you? Uh I'm I'm happy to do it if Scott doesn't want to. No offense, Brian, but as we continue on this journey >> That's right. one of us should go. I'm happy to nominate myself. Yes, I second that nomination. There you go. It depends on depends a lot on the weather, too. >> Oh boy. I'll let daycare know well in advance. All right, thank you, Mike. Thank you, Abby. So, Napier's our first choice. Great. >> attending and if he can't, then Mrs. Berning-Miller will go in his stead. Thank you. And Mr. Bagley, Mr. Clark, do you guys have plan on attending the conference just so we know for registration purposes? All right. I do not. Okay. Thank you. All right, Mr. Bagley, members of board, I do have several items for your consideration under
025letter D, other items for board action, number one, recommend approval of the following board policy, letter A. Number two, recommend approval of bus stops for the 2025-2026 school year. A complete set of bus stops and routes are available for review in the transportation office. Number three, recommend approval of the right at school contract for the 2025-2026 school year. Four, recommend approval of updated AP Calculus fee for 2025-2026 school year. Number five, recommend approval of a performance contract for up to 60 hours for treasurer consultant Amy Lee, effective August 1, 2025 through October 31, 2025. That concludes the items that I have for your consideration this evening under letter D, other items for board action. Thank you, Mr. Smith. Do I have a motion to accept these recommendations? >> Mr. Napier. Second. Seconded by Mr. Clark.
026Any further discussion? Mr. Phillips, please call the roll. Mr. Napier. Yes. Mr. Clark. Yes. Mrs. Burlingmiller. Yes. Mrs. Gundrum. Mr. Begley. Yes. We'll move on to committee reports. Mrs. Gundrum's not here for a legislative update, unless someone on the dais has something to add. We'll move forward. Butler Tech, I do not have an update for tonight. Student achievement, Mrs. Burlingmiller. Um, so, last weekend, there was the uh Unity in Public Health Research Conference in Columbus, and we had one of our seniors uh receive a award as part of a team for best scientific research paper award. So, I want to give a huge shout-out to Nahar Patel. Mm. Great. Thank you. Congratulations. Parks and Recreation, Clark. Yeah. Um the normal things, the farmers market on Wednesdays, Friday night at Marsh Lake, acoustic guitars and some
027food every Friday there. Um going out a little further, we have the international celebration, which is October 4th. I know that seems like a a ways out, but um there is going to be live music, dancing, and it's from 3:30 until I'm sorry, 3:00 until 9:30. Again, that's on Saturday, October 4th, but that's going to be that's going to be a fun afternoon evening. There's performances all through the night. And the very last one is an Abba band called Dancing Queen, so that's going to be fun. Um they're already asking for businesses to sign up for the trunk or treat or trick-or-treat vendors in the in Village Green as well, so you can go to website or the Facebook page to sign up for that. And that's that's really all we have. It's been been
028a a quiet couple weeks, but uh yeah, visit the parks. We have 27. Go see them. Splash pad big hit at Urban. Kids still getting wet. I drive up there periodically Saturday during the day during the week, and and it's still uh still a lot of kids splashing and having fun. All right. Yeah. Very cool. >> Yeah, good spot. Thank you, Mr. Clark. >> You're welcome. Mr. Smith, Planning Commission. >> Yes, I have a couple things. First, uh it is anticipated that the closing of the Forest Fair Mall deal uh is it's anticipated that will happen in the next 30 days. So, that's good news for for all. And then second of all, there is a uh proposal that currently um on the corner of John Gray and Pleasant Avenue currently includes 104 two- and
029three-bedroom condominium units units. Uh there's a joint public hearing between city city council and the planning commission. It's been scheduled for Monday, August 11th at 7:00 p.m. at the Fairfield Fairfield Municipal Building on Pleasant Avenue. Purpose of the meeting is to solicit citizen input regarding that proposed project. And then the planning commission will meet on Wednesday, August 13th at 6:00 p.m. to review that project. That's from Mr. Robertson. Uh the board's designee. Very good. All right. Thank you. Okay, announcements. August 8th, in-service day. Uh number one, no students, all school offices closed for district staff meetings 8:00 to 11:00 a.m. Uh August 11th, students report, but only students pre-K through 12 with last names beginning with the letters A through L. Then August 12th, students report. Again, only students with last names beginning letters M
030through Z. Then on August 13th, all students will report. August 21st will be our next regular board meeting here in the Katherine D. Milligan Room. Board member comments. Yeah, well, I thank everyone up here for all the work you've done on the the cell phones and the the uh Alaska and all that. And I want to say a special thank you to Nina Rose for the back to school and everyone that worked that. That was a fantastic day. Mhm. Weather was perfect and a lot of people there. I just want to thank you all for that. Great. Thank you. Well put. Mrs. Burningmiller. Um I also want to echo the thank you to the administration team. Uh you guys are always on top of um all of the very quickly moving and adjusting and being
031flexible and making sure that we are compliant and that we are keeping our students safe and that we're making sure we're focusing on the students. Um so I just you guys do everything from the latchkey program versus getting another quote for a whole new program even though we thought we already had it settled to making sure that our students have stops to be picked up from the bus. Um and making sure we have staff uh to educate and uh cater to our students. So I am beyond grateful for all the work that you guys do for our district and you guys are such a amazingly strong team and I couldn't have asked for better people to help run the district. I want to welcome all the students that are about to start school on Monday.
032I'm super excited about opening day tomorrow. Uh and I'm sad that I missed the back to school bash as always. Unfortunately, I have a conference that weekend every year. Um but maybe someday they won't coincide and I'll be able to make it. Um and I just want to part with this. Um this is a quote that we've been using at my work because we just got a new software that started. So as we go into this new cell phone policy and get ready to start the new year, um every road begins with bumps and bends but each step smooths the path along the way. Great. Thank you. Mr. Clark. Yes. I echo my fellow board members with the admin team. You guys are amazing. Um everything you do and behind the scenes people in the
033community, parents, even us sometimes don't understand what you what you all do. You don't get the summers off. It's not a a 9-month job and then put your feet up and go to the beach. You guys work hard day and night every every every month, every week, and every every day. So thank you all for what you do for that part of it. Um back to school bash was fantastic. It was amazing and as Mr. Napier said, Narda, thank you so much for putting that together. You can tell she enjoys it. She gets a thrill out of it. She's very passionate about it. Just talking to her just makes you want to be there. And it gets bigger and bigger every year. And I know uh Mr. Mr. Mr. Hustle got a hot dog facial
034that that that morning from all the the the permeating smoke from the hot dogs 7:30 in the morning till literally 11:00, right? Until that time. So it was, you know, 1,400, 1,500 hot dogs and uh 2,000, 3,000 backpacks, which was amazing. We I had enough backpacks thanks to the community and some businesses that donated those. And the line kept going. It slowed down, but it kept going. And every child got a backpack full of supplies, food thanks to Shared Harvest. And it was just an amazing an amazing day. It was an amazing day. So thank you all. And thanks for all the volunteers. Uh the orientation, I stopped by there yesterday and got to see Mr. Hustle and some of the admin there and Mr. Smith and and Mr. Phillips as well. So it was
035nice to see some of those new teachers coming in. Welcome to the new teachers. It's going to be a great year. Rolling into tomorrow as as Ms. Burden said, the opening day is fantastic. The marching band, the the lights, the sounds, the people. It's it's a it's a fun morning. So uh and start to the year, it's it's here. So thank you students for having a nice safe summer. And we wish you a safe school year. So let's go. May it be the best year ever. Yeah. It seems to be a reoccurring theme. >> that again. Well, thanks. Board members have always I've hit all the highlights here. I just want to quickly say Right at School I think is a win-win for everyone, right? So appreciate your work on that, Mr. Crapo and everyone
036else involved. Uh and that was really born out of the the desire to to keep the pricing down, to keep it affordable. And this ended up being a great option that will not only keep the pricing down, but expand the program, the reach the program to all the elementaries. So that's a great thing. Uh you know, back to school bash was as magical and as amazing as it always is and it was a beautiful morning. And I And I think the number was somewhere between 1,500 and 2,000 backpacks. It's hard to know because backpacks were still showing up the day of the event. Uh, and that's again a big thank you to community partners, to the Fairfield Rotary Club, and so many others who who've invested in in our community, into our students, right? Uh,
037the needs there and and we met it again in a big way. And And I think the morning was a lot of fun for everyone, the students, but also us, right? There was a lot of camaraderie amongst the the team I I saw across the board and so many community partners came out to be part of it. So, great thing. Great thing. Students, welcome back, right? Here we are. Uh, it was fun talking to some students that morning and and uh, I'm not sure what that cutoff age is, but when you talk to the little ones, boy, they're excited. When does that stop? >> Right, I'm not sure when, but but I talked to a lot of little ones who were excited to come back and we're certainly happy to have you. There was a
038nice article in the paper today talking about uh, school coming back and Mrs. Howard had a wonderful quote in there about bringing our our buildings back to life. I've seen that. Yeah, yeah, it's very good very good. So, thank you for that and uh, and we do, we look forward to the start of the school year. Uh, with that, we have a need to recess to executive session to discuss the discipline of public employees, 121-22-G1, court action, 121-22-G3, pending or imminent litigation, economic development assistance, uh, 121-22-G8. Do I have a motion to convene to executive session? >> I'll make a motion. Second. >> Mr. Napier, Mrs. Birdingmiller, Mr. Phillips, call the roll. Mr. Mr. Yes. Mrs. Birdingmiller. Yes. >> Mr. Clark. >> Yes. Ms. Gundrum. Mr. Bagley. Yes. We convened the executive session at 7:01.
039Thank you. Don't forget