Geneva Area City Schools Board Meeting - 1/21/26

001meeting of the Geneva Area City Board of Education. Roll call, please. >> Mr. Andress? >> Yes. >> Mr. Cooper? >> Yep. >> Mrs. Cyolski, >> here. >> Mrs. Craig, >> here. >> And Mr. Pearson, >> here. >> Madame Treasurer, are we in compliance with meeting requirement rules? >> We are. >> This meeting is a meeting of the board of education in public for the purpose of conducting the school district's business and is not to be considered a public community meeting. There is a time for public participation during the meeting as indicated in the agenda. If you're able, please stand for the pledge of allegiance. >> 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

002all. I need a motion to wave the reading and approval of the minutes, please. >> So moved. >> Second. >> Any discussion? Roll call, please. >> Mr. Hendris, >> yes. >> Mr. Cooper, >> yes. >> Mrs. Cyolski? Yes. >> Mrs. Craig? >> Yes. >> And Mr. Pearson? >> Yes. >> Motion carries. At this time, we'll have student recognition. All right. Good evening, everyone. Good evening. Really appreciate all of you being here. Um, I love the start of our board meetings because we're going to be honoring some students as well as some staff. Um, and this is why we do this. So, uh, thank you all for being here. We are going to start with, uh, Austinberg. Uh when your name is called, please come up. You'll be getting a certificate, but please remain up here

003because we want to get a picture with you and the board president and myself. Okay. So, Austin Eagles consistently exceed expectations in all they do. They consistently demonstrate kindness, dedication, hard work, positive attitude. So, we are really honored to um to share these four students who we are proud of these accomplishments. So, Robert Bernardo, please come up. All right, Daniel Greg. All right, come on over and get your certificate. All right, Reed McNeel, Canade Navaro. All right, let's get a picture. be honored by that. >> All right, so Cork Elementary School, uh Sharon Griffiths, you come on up. Sharon is a celebrity. She set in a response to NewsDept an educational program involving current events and her response was chosen for the show. So, congratulations. And she couldn't make it tonight. Uh, Elise Jones, please

004come on down. So, Elise works hard every day in class by following directions, participates in class discussions, is a kind friend and role model. She has earned points in class by reading books across a wide variety of genres, and has stellar scores on her AR quizzes. So congratulations Elise. Okay. Xander Astabberg. Xander Xander has a strong work ethic while being compassionate towards others including both peers and adults. His concerns from others others well-being makes him a positive role model. Congratulations and Madison Stalls. Congratulations. Madison is a student that doesn't allow challenges to get her down. So, congratulations if you want to get your certificate. And uh she makes corrections on her paperwork in order to take the second chance and learn the material. Madison comes to school every day with a bright smile, making her

005teacher feel happier when she enters the room, providing joy. Her joy is contagious. So, great job, kids. All right. for GPS. We had two students that were building spelling B. One was an alternative and one was a spelling B winner. So, Journey Ice, please come down. She was our spelling bee alternate. And Sydney Verant was our building spelling bee winner. Congratulations All right. And then we have uh Geneva Middle School. We had three students who um placed in our Patriot Pen competition and won prize money as well. Uh so the first one is Jared Bowers. Nora Gregory and Lauren Libert. So, these three students were local finalists for the annual Patriots Pen essay competition sponsored by the the VFW Post 6846 Auxiliary Geneva Middle School. Uh, we submitted 77 entries this year, uh, grades 6

006through 8, and these were the three winners. So, really congratulations. And I wanted to recognize our district spelling bee winner. This is a great accomplishment, Alyssa Miller. All right. And finally for our students, um the high school, um all of these students are part of the Astrabula County Smash program. This is students making a safer highway. It's a teenled initiative where high school juniors and seniors educate peers about dangers of impaired and distracted driving, speeding, and not wearing seat belts. The program aims to reduce traffic teen traffic fatalities through student centered safety campaigns in local schools. And this was launched in Trumbull County supported by safe communities in the Ohio State Highway Patrol and includes students from all uh Ashila County, Kia, Jefferson, Edgewood, Geneva, Grand Valley, and Pimatum Valley. So if these students would

007come on up uh Grace Andress, Riley Andresses, Kayn Surgeon, Max Cochran, William Dashnney, and Adeline Shepard. All right. Right. Now for our staff. Austinberg Elementary School. Cindy Regski. Yes. Come on down. Cindy is a phenomenal teacher in college. She often shows her kindness to our staff through thoughtful gifts and gestures. She is always willing to pitch in to help as needed. Cindy is also retiring soon and she will be so sorely missed. So congratulations Cindy. Okay. All right. Cork Elementary School. We have Terry Grimmouth. Grimit, are you here? Terry. So Terry is basically the glue that keeps our building together. She's always there to do her job and if you need anything, she has it or an answer for it. From mowing the grass to shoveling, she keeps our building beautiful. She's our union president,

008which is a full-time job. She deserves recognition. And I will tell you, when I first got here, Terry was one of the first people I met. She couldn't be a kinder, more invested individual. So, congratulations, Terry. From GPS, Mary Dudik. Mary goes above and beyond for students, staff members every day. She's incredibly passionate and cares deeply about our students. She is a joy to work with and brings so much to our building every day. Congratulations, Mary. And at our middle school, Alice Kawuchcci, one of her colleagues colleagues, says, "I absolutely love Mrs. Kawuchi's enthusiasm for teaching her history class. She keeps the students engaged while learning the material by having fun and playing and creating games. She meets the students needs in various ways by accommodating them in a way that they learn best. She

009is compassionate, caring, and loves to share her knowledge of history in an exciting way. Our district is lucky to have her and I enjoy working with her. So, congratulations, Alice. And at our high school, Nancy Barau. Nancy is kind, compassionate teacher who always has the best interests of her students in mind. She is patient with her students, meeting them where they are and working to get them to understand the importance of doing well in school. She always sees the best in her students and makes them know that she cares about them, not just as students, but as people as well. Great job, Nancy. And last but not least for our staff is central office transportation bus garage Bobby Horvath. One of her co colleagues writes, "I would like to recognize Bobby Horvath for exceptional knowledge

010and unwavering dedication to supporting our school community. She's always willing to help when asked, consistently taking the time to work one-on-one with parents and staff to ensure understanding and accuracy. Her patience, professionalism, collaborative spirit makes even the most complex processes feel manageable. Beyond providing support, she freely shares her expertise with others, strengthening our team, and promoting best practices across the district. Her commitment and willingness to go above and beyond makes a meaningful difference for our students, family, and staff. You do a great job, Bobby. Congratulations. All right. So, in case you haven't heard, January is board recognition month. Yes, you guys are being recognized, too. So, congratulations. Each January, we join with the Ohio School Boards Association to celebrate and recognize our local board of education. As citizens who serve children, represent their communities, individual

011school board members face complex, demanding challenges. Their love of learning and concern and caring for students, staff, and the community drive board members desires to lead so students can achieve. It's my pleasure to recognize our board members and to thank them for their service to the district. Now, I know I haven't been here that long, but I can surely tell you the dedication that these board members bring to this district is a blessing to this district. Uh, Mr. Steve Andress beginning his first year of service. Come up and get your certificate, please. Mr. Joseph Cooper, beginning his first year of service. Take a picture. Yeah. Uh, Miss Elizabeth Cibolski, this is two years of service with two years of service. Miss Michelle Craig, two years of service. And Mr. Brock Pearson with two years of

012service. One, two, three. All right. At this time, if um you were if you were given an award and you don't want to stay for the rest, we do give you time to uh to lead, but you're more than welcome to stay for the whole meeting. Thank you everyone for coming. All right. At this point of the meeting, it's time for the public comment portion. You will have five minutes to come to the microphone and speak. If you so wish, please state your name and address, and you're welcome to come and speak at this time. Yay. Okay, >> that's a good point. >> So, we're going to move on to letter J on the agenda, which is the athletic high school wing transformation presentation with Miss Jennifer Crossley. >> You can assist her, >> but

013you are welcome to assist. It's black. Just Okay. All right. Uh, good evening. Um, I'd like to, uh, thank you for allowing me to come in and speak to you tonight. Um, I've had several people ask me about why the school is paying for hallways to be painted, um, when there's other things that could the money could be spent on. Um, talking to different people about the the levy for the stadium and so forth. Um so therefore I want to take the opportunity to present to the board and the community about all the great upgrades that have taken place in the athletic wing um of the high school over the past 19 years. All these upgrades were donated uh funds from the community and donated labor. The upgrades to our facilities were not just about

014improvement or appearance. They are about creating a space where students feel valued, supported, and proud of where they learn and compete. Incorporating our school colors helps enforce a sense of identity, unity, and belonging for everyone who walks through these doors. For our students, especially those who spend countless hours here, the environment matters. A space that reflects school pride sends a clear message. You belong here and what you do matters. It honors the effort, dedication, and commitment our students and staff bring every day. and it helps build confidence, morale, and respect for the space they share. These upgrades were made with care and intention to create a welcoming, uplifting environment that supports the student well-being, celebrates our school community, and inspires pride in representing our school both now and for years to come. The first item

015was removing the old gym centerpiece from the high school on Sherman Street before it was torn down. a booster member uh removed the gym floor with permission from the school. And then Paul Drowski, which was a custodian at the time, um and Jason Dalton, uh one of the past wood shop teachers, built the frame around the floor, uh using leftover pieces from the new gym floor here on at the school on route 84. Sponsorship packages. Geneva athletic booster spell sell packages for sponsorships which include banners on gym walls and some packages include ads in the various programs. The funds they use from these packages uh helped buy uniforms, awards, patches for the jackets, etc. Then they try their best not to ask these businesses again for donations throughout the year. main gym entrances. Funds for

016the door wraps, the PVC board, which is the Eagle Territory section there, and rugs donated by the city church. Door wraps and the PVC boards were installed by a few coaches, teachers, and myself. The quotes on the beams were picked, and then Mrs. Uner made and installed them. We have various ones within the hallway. Inside the main gym doors, windows of the doors were removed and replaced with wood by the wood shop teacher Jason Dalton at the time. So the doors were wraps would be a complete look. Uh Bobby McCoy's classes designed the inside window wraps and installed them. Um I saw the graphic that is above the door on a parent's t-shirt at one of the volleyball games and I just thought it would be a it would look perfect above the doors. So

017Mrs. Uner made the design um with the Cricut and installed them above the doors for us. Mouth is a dry inside the gym doors going down the um Fizzad hallway. Um also uh had door uh door wraps um put on the windows. We kept the windows there so you could actually see in and out. Baseball and softball dugouts of the varsity fields um were a gray cinder block from the time they were built in roughly 2008 2009 until the spring of um about 17 years. A group of teachers and I were talking one day about how they should be painted. I explained that it was not that maintenance did not want to paint them, just that there were not enough hours in the day. Somebody said we should paint them. And so at the next

018athletic booster meeting, I asked if they would donate the white paint. They did and a group of teachers and I painted all four dugouts white. We painted for a few hours each Wednesday for a few weeks. Once it was completed, the athletic boosters, baseball, and softball teams donated a portion from their fundraisers to pay to have the graphics painted on them. JB baseball and softball dugouts. The only thing missing out there on those fields were dugouts. The athletic boosters purchased the materials for four dugouts. The athlet a athletic booster spent one Saturday at August to install all the pole dra poles and Raymond builders donated the post hole digger for the day. Then once we got back to school, J Jason Dalton's class went out and finished building all the dugouts. It took them all

019fall to finish them. Very timeconuming when you're going in and out all day with different classes and telling everybody where you're start and where you're uh taking off again. Uh, but the students really enjoyed seeing what they built um and the finished products when it was done. Weight room window wraps. So, the weight room has windows on two sides. Um, Olivia Reese uh designed the wraps and installed them as part of part of one of her final projects for one of Mr. McCoy's classes. She also did the same for the PE athletic storage doors um which are shown here. the main gym wall mats. Uh the previous mats came with the building when it was uh built and they were a solid red um and they take a lot of wear and tear um when

020you have phys classes in there every day and also all the sports. So with the help of uh Mr. Barb um company Box and Ashila Dairy Queen and Geneva on the lake Dairy Queen donated the funds for the new mats with graphics. So this is the visitor side, Eagle Territory, and the home side that has Geneva Eagles on it. Okay. Uh the digital display. Uh over the years, I've had several people in the community talk to me about the old trophies and what we did with them or what we do do with them. Um our current trophy cases are overflowing. Coaches have trophies all over the rooms because we just do not have enough storage. I spoke with Mr. King about the possibility of digital wall display. He was on board with the project if

021I could secure the funds. Funds were donated by the classes of 2018 through 2024, the Geneva Letterman's Club, and Ellen and Larry Cumsten. Uploading the past material is a daunting task. Uh but yearbook, uh some coaches and myself are working on trying to get the past items of history loaded as fast as we can. Concession stand. The red wall in the athletic booster con stand was very blah. Uh the boosters had tried to run several contests um several times to pick an artist to paint a mural on it, but due to various reasons, it never would get completed. Um I asked Mrs. Monahan if she'd be willing to oversee a group of students painting in the concession concession stand. She took her planning period and some of her students out of study hall and painted

022away. Tffy now struts proudly with his popcorn and drinking hand to the game. weight room upgrade. Many coaches had been stressing the need and still do that the weight room is too small for all the teams that need to use it at the same time. Some of the equipment that was purchased when the building was built was outdated and the need for more racks was crucial. John Barbara took the lead on this project. He ran the Goodwill fundraiser for the project. All the athletic teams that use the locker rooms donated money to the project from their fundraisers and the school used some money as well. Since this room is used as a physical education classroom throughout the day, we purchased three more half racks with all the weights and equipment that come with it. We

023had upgrades to the old three to the old three full racks and a new complete rack of dumbbells. Then the football coaches and a few football players moved all the equipment, deep cleaned the floors, and added a fresh new coat of paint on the walls. The class of 2024 donated the funds for the PVC board um which is that stronger than yesterday sign um with and then also an entrance rug. And now to the GHS main event hallway upgrade. Boring brown. That's about all I can say. Everyone always talks about how blah is and no school colors in the high school anywhere. As I travel to so many games at so many schools over the past 19 years, I'm always amazed at all the school colors and school pride that meet me as I enter

024the buildings. Geneva is very limited in that feeling when you enter the high school. So I kept asking past superintendents if he could paint the walls of the main hallway. Finally, Dr. Lombardo embraced the idea. He loved what was being envisioned and gave me the blessing to move forward. Many people helped to come up with what uh with the theme of the gray with the red and white uh stripes. This is a work in progress and has taken a whole lot more time than I expected. But the excitement we have seen from the students and community will be worth it. All the funds for the painting of the main hallway uh the hallway to the uh locker rooms and behind the auditorium have been raised. People have donated their time to paint. I've learned more

025than I probably ever will need to about painting uh tricks and painting brick. Um but we have a lot more work to do. Um but I'm optimistic we'll get more volunteers um to keep painting and get this project done. So these are the other three hallways that we will soon be working on. We are currently working on a word wall which I envision will be the entire length of the wall between the two bathrooms. The vision is to have the students of Janeeria City Schools help come up with our words for the wall. With school being cancelled yesterday, I did not get a chance to pitch my thoughts to the principles of the district, but we will be doing that next Tuesday. The words that I would like to use are words that represent what

026it means to be a Geneva Eagle or a good citizen of Geneva. This is an example of what it will hopefully look like. Uh, using our school colors and our logo, of course. the OSAA champions wall. Um, we plan to put the OSAA champions back up on the wall between the auditorium door, main auditorium doors and the digital display. Um, we have five total champions. Um, we have four frames because two of them are together on one frame. Um, and then there will be room to expand with other champions to come. Um, between the digital display and the end of that hallway. Um before you get to the band room section, um our plan is to uh do kind of a current season slashtheater band choir showcase. Um so the plan is to rotate the

027teams of each season. Um so for example the f in the fall there's nine sports um let's see theater um rotate them with their several plays marching band, jazz band, choir and gis. Um we're looking at silver um or white frames on the walls and then having signage above them as well. And then we'll rotate the athletic ones for the winter and athletic ones for the spring and so forth. Um the entrance hall uh since the wall is brown and then we'll turn to red gray and white just after after the cafeteria. The goal is to install a type of entrance way with signage above and down the walls to make it more visual appearing. So Bobby McCoy added that for me. Um it won't quite look like that. Um it'll match the colors. Um

028the the company's actually working on the graphics and that right now uh for us. Uh with the help of the high school PBIS group, we ran an announcements about the entrance and offered a chance to turn your idea uh in for the turn your idea for the entrance in right before Christmas break. I also sent it out to the staff of the district to let me know if they had an idea. We settled on welcome to the nest. where legend legends take flight. So that will be our entrance way. Um then our don uh donations to this point um the Worooster Brush Company um actually donated all of the uh brush brushes um rollers um painting trays um large uh rollers to paint the brick um buckets um poles um a lot of stuff. Um,

029somebody gave me a lead on this and I thought, who in who down in Worcester is going to, you know, help out a little school up in Geneva and I thought, well, what do I have to lose? I they're just going to tell me no. So, I did call and the lady was very nice and she said, "Absolutely. What do you need?" And I said, "I don't know what I need." And I sent her pictures and then she came up with what we need. So, um, very nice to have them. um Sheran Williams and they gave us on this main hallway um they called it like I can't remember what they called it but they ended up giving us about 50% off the paint on just this main hallway. Um Great Lakes Valet they uh

030purchased all the tape and plastic uh for the project. Uh Raymond Builders, we have a verbal on them to help with our word wall. Uh Geneva Grid Iron Club gave us funds for signage. Matsson and Donuts um gave us uh funds to help with the project as well and Trice Back in Net Clinic also has given us a verbal um with help on the word wall. Um individual donors um these are just uh the people that have donated money um and Craig uh Georgian and Randy Harts, Michael King, Joan O' Conor um Kevin Hutchkins which is one of the athletic booster members and a dad um to our athletes. He drove all the way to Worooster to pick up the supplies for us. Um game bucket donations. I just set out a bucket and asked

031people to donate um telling everybody about the project, show them in the pictures. We raised about $148. And then we had two anonymous donations toward the paint cost. Our volunteer painters, we started on December 27th. Um these were all of our painters that showed up that day. We had two different shifts. Some stayed all day, some just came for a couple hours in and out. Um then um Mr. Barbo and Kevin Hutchkins came in because we didn't quite get the red done and they wanted to get some red on that wall before people came back in January. So they worked um on December 28th. A few of us worked on January 3rd to try to get a little bit more done. And then on January 7th, we brought um the girls basketball team stayed after

032practice and they uh worked on a lot of the touch-ups that needed to be done. And then our last paint was uh Martin Luther King Day and we came in and started on the uh PE hallway um to get that done. So, looks like we're going to have another paint day this Saturday. Um so, if anybody wants to come out and paint for us, we're going to put that one on social media and see if we can get more people out here to get these walls finished up. So, thank you. Any questions? Nope. Okay. Thank you. All right. Um, for the report of the superintendent, I recommend the board approves a letter of understanding between GADA and the board of education for 2526 as presented in the attached summary. I'll move. >> I'll second. >>

033All right. As far as discussion, so um this is a agreement between GADA and the board of education. We've been working with the teachers union on providing an opportunity for what's called a teacherbased team. So an opportunity to collaborate with each other. Um, and we found a time uh before school um with what we're calling a late start. This will be for middle school and high school. It'll be 20 minutes late start, but students um who ride the bus will not be affected. So students will be able to come at regular time will have supervision. Um but this will allow our teachers to work collaboratively. Um we made the agreement just for this year through June. so we can kind of figure out if this is something that we feel is effective. Um, Jen, do

034you want to come up and just talk real briefly about TBTs? So, teacherbased teams or PLC's they're called, it's a really collaboration time for teachers from basically it's action research. they learn from one another on what the best instructional practices are for our kids. So, every district has students that differ. And so, in Geneva, we're hoping that we have expert teachers here that we can learn from one another on what works best for our kids. So, that time is great. we can look at some common formative assessment data to see what students are performing at grade level or at standards at the standards we want them to and then which ones are not and what can we do to help support those students. So that's what the time is for. Um it's going to be

035well once a week, but um the teachers are going to do every other week for a while until we see how the um supervision goes because I'm we're hoping well we're not hoping, but hopefully we can get every teacher collaborating every week, but it might be every other week at first. So, we'll see how it goes. >> Any questions? And uh the elementary schools do have these collaborative teams on a it's a weekly basis already. So we didn't need to make any adjustments there. Again, it'll be a 20 minute late start on Wednesdays for middle school and high school. But those um that are riding the bus can come regular time. We did not want to disrupt the bus schedule. Roll call, please. >> Mr. Cooper, >> yes. >> Mrs. Cyolski, >> yes. >> Mrs.

036Craig, >> yes. >> Mr. Pearson, yes. >> And Mr. Andress. >> All right. You may recall last meeting um we had our first reading of board policies. There were three of them we were updating. Uh our district practices two readings before we make a um final decision. So, I am recommending approval tonight for the following new revised replacement policies the that the board um that I'm asking the board to adopt. The first one is 5122 entrance to requirements policy 7440.03 small unmanned aircraft systems that's drones and policy 9700.01 advertising and commercial activities. Need a motion. >> So moved. >> Second >> discussion. >> Yeah. So the first one we wanted to make sure that our policy and our administrative guidelines um matched up with preschool entrance as well as kindergarten. Uh that's August 1st. Uh

037the small unmanned aircraft systems. We did not want to fully eliminate drones because of technology. Um but we do have parameters around using drones in our district and the 9700.01 advertising and commercial activities. Um this is going to be used when we go through our naming and sponsoring initiatives for um our athletic facility. This will give us um uh some ground rules on doing that. So I will ask the board to um to vote on these three tonight, please. you questions? >> I do. Um, so the the uh the second one uh 7440.01 um that won't eliminate us from having a class on drones eventually if we choose to. Correct. >> Right. Our original one did eliminate us from using drones at all in the district. This will allow us to use them during class

038periods or during specific times that that we um that we approve. >> And uh does this not allow our opponents on the football field to fly their drones over top of us? It'd be okay if it does, but >> yeah, we don't want them doing that. >> We don't want them doing that. No, >> they would have to request it. Correct. >> Yes, they'd have to request it and both teams would have to do the same. Yes. Okay. Thank you. That's all. Yeah, that's all. Yep. Thank you. >> All right. Roll call, please. >> Mrs. Sibilowski? >> Yes. >> Mrs. Craig? >> Yes. >> Mr. Pearson? >> Yes. >> Mr. Andress? >> Yes. >> And Mr. Cooper? >> Yes. >> Motion carries. >> All right. I recommend approval of the enclosed last chance agreement uh

039between the board of education and one of our um staff members. >> You need a motion, please. >> So, move. >> Second. Not much discussion here. We just made We just came to an agreement with one of our staff members for a last chance agreement. >> Roll call, please. >> Mrs. Craig, >> yes. >> Mr. Pearson, >> yes. >> Mr. Andress, yes. >> Mr. Cooper, >> yes. >> Mrs. Syosski, >> yes. >> Motion carries. >> All right. Number four. I recommend the following personnel actions for the 2526 contract year. You will see we're going to take all these down from a we are we are hiring a tutor. You'll see our extracurriculars are being approved for the upcoming sports uh substitute secretary. We do have some other substitutes. Couple leave of absences and a retirement.

040Uh Cindy Regski is retiring after 29 years. It's amazing. Um, and she is going to be missed. >> Do we do these individually or are you asking for >> No, we're doing them all together. >> All together. >> Thank you, Mrs. Rogowski. >> Thank you. You will be sorely missed. >> Yes. I need a motion, please. >> Motion to approve. >> And a second. >> Second. >> Any other discussion? Roll call, please. >> Mr. Pearson, >> yes. >> Mr. Andress, >> Mr. Cooper, >> substain. >> Uh, Mrs. Syolski? >> Yes. >> And Mrs. >> Yes. >> Motion carries. testing. All right, we now have two of our our students from our superintendent advisory group to come up and talk with you. We have Amelia Arington and Bradley Hedgeek. I always say your name wrong and

041I apologize. So, if you guys go ahead up to the um mic here and um tell us all kinds of good stuff what's happening here in Geneva. >> Okay. Um so, starting off, the National Honor Society is hosting the spaghetti dinner that's going to be February 10th. Um tickets are being made right now and then they're going to be sold uh momentarily. So, that's coming up. And then tomorrow night is the wrestling team's senior night. So that's kind of the important stuff that I have. And then I just wanted to say that the school Geneva schools to me means it provides lots of opportunities for students especially with um like field trips and everything. So, I think that what we're doing here at Tuna is very inspiring and it inspired me when I went to

042my first uh field trip. I there was a lady there that was talking about being a pilot and um that inspired me to actually start flying. So I now fly at Northeast Regional Airport in Jefferson and that just kind of goes to show how the school can provide opportunities and is very impactful for everyone. Um, I just wanted to say the school means a lot to me, not just because of the education I've received, but because of all the friends and relationships I've made with teachers and coaches and all of the skills and knowledge they've taught me. Um, some recent sports things, uh, basketball has been happening. Uh the boys varsity record is 8-4, the JV is 6-6, and the freshman is 9-2. For girls, the varsity is 9 and5. And the basketball senior night

043is Friday the 23rd. Um and the girls swim team has won the CBC and the boys finished second. >> All right, thank you guys so much. I'm so proud of these students. I have 17 in this group and they they just do an amazing job. All right, the next thing on our um presentation is the school calendar. So um there's a lot of words testing one. Can you hear me? Okay. There are a lot of words on this. Um but when you adopt a school calendar, we have uh policy and we do have administrative guidelines. So policy talks about at least 30 days prior to board making an approval on the school calendar for the next year that we hold a hearing. So tonight is the first reading or the hearing of the calendars. Uh

044the administrative guideline also says that I shall annually recommend to the board of education a school calendar that complies with the following information. Now some years ago um the state moved towards hours for students. So if you look um students for half day kindergarten has to have 455 hours for the year. uh grades one through six, all the elementaryaries have to have 910 hours and then 7 through 12 have to have a thousand1 hours. Um what I have here is I have two recommended calendars and I'm going to show you them. I'm going to put them up here in a second, but the first calendar has the students first day on August 25th. This aligns with what we've done last year and in the past. Uh Thanksgiving break is the same with the Wednesday prior

045will be a day off and the Monday after will also be a full day off. Winter break falls within the time of the holiday. Spring breaks at the end of March and students last day is June 3rd. Now, the calamity day 15, that means those are days that we can call off um for for inclement weather um up to 15 days a year um before we have to make up any days. And that's quite a bit. So, I'll show you this one real quick. So, what's going to happen? So, this is the first um calendar that I'm recommending and then I will send this PowerPoint. This will be on the superintendent's page. So, you can um take your time and go through that. Our second one is different and and maybe the district hasn't had

046this type of schedule before. I have talked with um uh some of the board members. I've also talked with some of the teachers and a couple things that are interesting about this one. Uh the students first day would be August 18th. So this is a week or so earlier than you've ever had here. Uh Thanksgiving break would be the same, winter break would be the same. Spring break would be the same, but students last day would be next year prior to Memorial Day. It would be May 27. Now, what makes this uh calendar um I think what makes this calendar a little bit well, I'll just say it a little nicer because I've heard a lot of comments is in January, you'll notice that Oh, wow. There we are. In January, you'll notice that prior

047to the break, there's always this week and a half or two weeks for exams, right? you come back in January and you take your exams and that seems to be a little bit of a hassle. What we've have done when I what I'm proposing is that at the end of December before we leave for break, that's when your finals will happen. This way when students come back, they don't have to remember throughout the break what's going on. And um they could start fresh on January 4th. This would in turn get us out in May um which is a second um option. So the next steps and I will take questions here in a minute but the next steps would be I'm going to be sending out a community feedback survey. Um so both of these

048will be out there. It'll be a real quick survey. Give us some feedback in the next 30 days and then I will be sending out a staff survey. So all the staff will have an opportunity to give us some feedback. I'll compile that information. I'll bring it back to the board in February and then at that time the board can choose to um to vote on a calendar. Okay. So you have any questions or comments over the two proposals? >> Uh a comment number two is what uh I'm currently experiencing and I love it personally. So >> Okay, I think it's great. But Paul, I don't know that you sent this to us. I I think the one you sent was getting out June 10th or something like that was your second one. So, you

049just may want to check that. I don't know. >> Yes, I um this this one is new. I uh I put this together last night, truth be told. >> And I knew we had 30 days, so yeah, I did not um >> that other one I didn't I didn't propose. >> Okay. Thank you. >> Talk to Mr. about this. >> I want to pick a fight with any >> I don't know. I did. I'm I'm throwing this out there. while you make your work, they're'll find you. >> Yeah. And it was told to me um >> that the later the better because of what's happening um how kids are out working on the right. >> So that's why I presented too and um you guys work it out >> and I think I would encourage

050filling out the community survey and maybe even sending that to Mr. Caesison and asking him to fill that out or business owners at the lake because that is a concern obviously. But then on conversely they get them long and they get them June 1st. >> They get them June 1st. I mean you can't have it both ways I guess. So which way is better? Um and I also think at some point we have to take what's best for our students into account. >> I think and that that's the other piece of it too. I think we have to consider um I think looking at the high school schedule as far as testing and when midterms fall and if we can we can acknowledge that and what's better for our kids. And then although we don't

051want to be a slave to state testing, we have to consider when we need to have our kids in school to have enough time to prepare them for that calendar. Um, we did look at county fair, which is that week, um, which is the second week, I believe. I looked it up. It was the 18th. This was a conversation we we had yesterday with Dr. Lombardo, Beth, and I. Um, but there's a lot of things to consider and we are aware of the lake piece, but again, we have to we have to think of our as a board of education, we have to think of our students and their needs. Um, I think something to consider and I think the survey piece is going to be a good way to gauge what the community thinks

052and we can take all of that information and make you know a good choice that will will serve everyone and then bring some things to our attention that maybe we haven't even thought of or considered yet. So again, we've got time throwing it out there and we're thankful that you know Dr. Lombardo listened to our >> stays up late at night. >> Yeah. Stays up late at night and listens to our requests. >> Yeah, I try to listen. That's a That's the number one thing I need to do. So, I got to listen to the board. All right. So, again, we're not making any decisions tonight. This will be on our website and um anyone could log in our website and I will be sending this out to all the uh the families uh tomorrow.

053All right. You may have heard uh I have talked at the board meeting about our family resource center. So, we are up and running gathering information. Um, so we're doing a needs assessment. Um, I did send out um unfortunately the first one I sent out had the wrong dates. These are the right dates and I resent it out today, truth be told. So, Wednesday the January 28th and then Tuesday, February 3rd at 5:00. Any community members are welcome. We are doing some listening sessions. Uh, I know Mr. Speisha who's running these were we were with the student uh advisory committee today. They did an amazing job giving us some feedback. We've already talked to counselors and administrators and you can see we're going he's going to all the buildings to gather feedback. He's going to

054compile this feedback and then this will be the needs assessment for our family resource center. Every family resource center needs to listen to their community and provide what that community needs. And in order to do that, we need to um hear from as many community members as possible. If you can't make the meeting, there's a QR code. You can do the survey right there or there is a link. Um this was sent out to everyone and I will have this um on the superintendent's report on my uh on my website uh and you could take advantage of that. But real excited uh to get this project up and running. Um really really excited about this. I tell you I'm really excited about this. I maybe not sound like because I'm tired right now, but no,

055I'm super excited about that. All right. And it's my pleasure to present to to you Melissa Dherty. Now, I do have to say this because I hear it's your birthday today. >> And and I I I'm just saying she picked today and I said to her, you could pick any board meeting, but this is her actual birthday. >> Why I picked today? >> So, happy birthday to you, Melissa. >> Happy birthday. >> So, come on up. Or you could stay there and you can use this here. Whatever you want to do here. Just press this. >> Okay, it's gonna be I don't know if you guys need to look at me or what, but anyway. Um, we've been asked to share our building level action plan, which is what we want to work on. Um,

056we looked at our state report card of course and found some areas that we do need to work on. And so there are three areas. One, we looked at our measurable growth in math. Our math scores just are not going up. They're going up and down, up and down. And of course, it's I have according to the MAP assessments, but of course, it's also our state report card um our Ohio State testing uh scores. The second area we looked at and just really popped out was to increase increase our grade five science. Ohio did I was the capital science Ohio state test proficiency rate for students with disabilities. Um we really do need to close that gap. That's where a lot of our for our report card where we're losing some of the stars and

057some of the points because of that. So we got to look into that. And then of course absenteeism. Um I know Mr. King talked about attendance at the last meeting, but we really do need to bring that percentage down and decrease chronic absenteeism. We're currently at 22 22.7%. We need to go to the state report card goal of 16.4%. So, a lot to work on, lots to work on for us. So some of our strategies especially for the this is for if you look on the top our focus number one are math. Um we and I do have TBT up there. We do meet weekly for our TBT meetings and sometimes if our teachers get together and they discuss and look over data and that a lot of times someone might be absent or we

058might not have a substitute for something. So they don't always get to meet but they do make a point of meeting before school, after school. They're constantly talking and working together. So that's fabulous to see. But we're really what we're going to do and we are doing is analyze past Ohio State math test scores from third grade to current grade. We want to compare them to the MAP scores and I'll show you that in a minute. Um January 20th through the 30th we're start we're just beginning to administer our MAP winter math test. So I can't really show you progress on that because we haven't gotten any data yet. We're going to work on that. Um we're we're also analyze and compare projections and growth. I'll show you that in a minute. And use map

059has where you can go in, it tells you exactly the weak areas or the strengths for each students. Teachers can build lessons upon that, group students certain ways. Um, so they do that at all times and helps support that as well to give them some practice. And of course, we're going to use discuss formative assessments to monitor progress. And again, TBT, they're sharing what works. And that's what we want to do. We don't want to waste our time on strategies that do not work. And of course, we want to reinforce teacher student conferencing practices. In the past, we've done that before. You especially with our STAR quizzes um that we used to use. It's so nice to sit down with that student and have that discussion with them. Helps them have that ownership. And so,

060we really want to push that. And also reinforce simple goal setting. It doesn't have to be a huge goal for the kids. Just I mean I showed some examples to teachers. We're trying some of those and just so they have the feeling of I did this, I did this, I did this and give them that confidence and that ownership. Again, very important. So this I just this is some of the TBT conversations. Um I won't go over all of it, but that first section that is what they have put in their TBT form. So they are looking at the math. I didn't want to give student names of course. So they're looking at what each student needs so that they can then create small groups to work on th those specific needs and help them

061and give um possibly exit tickets and that so that they can check their understanding. So this is what teachers had given as just conversation. I wanted to share that with you just so you know that they are having valuable conversation during their TBT time. it is not a a waste of time. Um there and one of them is reading. It's not just all math, but they're looking at their RIMP students. Those are students that are at risk for reading. Um we really need to focus and help them. Um just end units. I just put that second one in there because students were given paper assessment instead of digital and they performed better. So that was interesting I thought. Um and then last just finishing up just just some ideas for you and they want to

062work in small groups to re remediate students who are struggling to order fractions. And then of course then they're sharing when there are more than two choices and using charts and the 1/2 as a benchmark has been an effective strategy. So there they're sharing strategies as well. So I just wanted to throw that in there to share that a little bit with you on the hard work that they're do just the conversations. That's what's really important. and narrowing down for their students. Okay, here's some data that was given to the teachers at the beginning of the year and we still go back and look at it, but I've focus focused on math at the at the end there. And this is tracking third grade into fourth grade for their math test. And it is, if

063you can see up there, the one the first column that is highlighted, that's the map projected math score. So that just projects if they are going to be proficient for the Ohio State test, accelerated, basic. Um, and then I gave the actual spring math scores from the Ohio State tests and the highlighted the orange ones are the accur accurate predictions that map did have. So they do have some accurate predictions for us and I wanted to share that. And then the at the end is just the projections for math for fourth grade. Um that was the fall map test. Again once we are able to use that winter assessment I will adjust some of this data or add to it because that is very important. I did note under the ELA which is off to

064your left. Um, if you know the pink highlight fuchsia, they score that's third grade fall ELA OST, which I know we're not we're talking math right now, but it they scored an eight. I can't see it from here, but like an 810. But then if you look at their spring score, it went down. So, it just goes to show there could be a lot of things happening with these kids on those days. And um you you just never know. or they know that they scored that well that okay you're making me take this test again I'm just going to do what I need to do but you just don't know and that's what we're always doing and I think that's why TBTs are so important because we're always chasing this moving target so that I

065just wanted to point out there and then our special ed for the ELA I did um highlight over there too that just again this was discussions with teachers the other highlighted is improvements from fall to spring their scores that were improved if you're looking at the ELA. So, we are really I share I'm sharing this with you to show you that we are digging deep and using our data and making sure that we are um using it to drive our instruction and make our decisions. Again, this is I track third to fourth and then the fifth pro projection. This one I really wanted to look at the special ed improvement. I know our one focus is specialed with science, but it's always a focus for us. Um and just so in the green is our

066special ed students that did improve from the fall um from the third grade OST to the fourth grade OST. So we are making a little bit of a headway with our special ed students which is very important and then the light blue is just improvements but again I just wanted to share this with you because we are using this data very important and then this is just a picture from it's an individual student growth chart in map. So this just shows a projection there as well. teachers can go in, they can shut set a goal for their students. They can, like I said, there's a lot of data in there. There's a lot of data in EXL. Those are programs that students go online and they can work on. Um, so I just wanted to

067share that with you just to show you that there is a lot of information in the system for us to help us guide our instruction. And then this is our focus number two. Two, we want to increase grade fives on the science Ohio State test proficiency for students with disabilities. If you take a minute to really look at some of this, especially the bottom one, the blue bars and the red bars, those are through the years. It's starting with 2020 to 2021. It's going down through the years. And if you notice, the red bar is significantly lower in percentage than the blue bar. and that is our students with disabilities for science. So that is a problem that screams out at you just looking at this um chart and it'll compare like the last two

068years we've I think in the 2023 2024 in the red we had eight students testing one passed with being proficient. The 2425 we had six students testing and one passed being proficient. So we really got to get that one up. We want more than one so our red bar grows. So that's what really stood out for us that we did need to focus on that. Fifth grade is our only grade that does test science and um you know we've made some changes with that too. I'll share that with you. So our strategies in progress for our second focus, we really want we reviewed and adjusting student inclusion schedules to ensure students are exposed to the science content firsthand from the content teacher. And down a little bit lower, I did add that um we are

069the teachers are um departmentalizing. So, we have one teacher that's teaching science to both fifth grade classes, which I think really helps, especially for our intervention specialist, which is what the IS is because that's just one teacher they are working with on one schedule and that does help them as well. Again, there's that TBT. The IS is the intervention specialists work with our teachers during TBT sharing ideas. We really want the intervention specialist to frontload information so that the students are understanding of the lessons coming up. Also, we want to set student growth goals outside of the IEP goals for science. I'll admit it, we're kind of weak in that area. We got to work on that one a little bit more. We've been just focusing on their IEP goals and that. So, we want

070to work on that. And this is the big one, I think, with our special ed students. We really want to practice and simulate the test taking because when it comes to looking at charts and typing in extended time, if they're not allowed that accommodation or any accommodations to help with that, it really undermines, you know, we they're really not getting a true picture of what our students know. So, we're really focusing on that. Our intervention specialists are making sure that they're taking time to do that, especially with extended typing. um they it it's just difficult. It's difficult for all students. So, we are trying to really work on that. And then really using our reading intervention time because a lot of them we do have that reading specialist teacher now. She is pulling out science

071topic books for them to go over and read just to really immerse them even more. So, um we want to focus on that. I was just shocked by that previous chart and I think we do need to do something about that. So, and then our third focus is absenteeism. This is our chronic absenteeism percent and this is our gap closing indicator on our report card. We've gone up and down. I don't know what happened in 2223 of 31%. That's really high. Um, but last year's was so much was better than this year and we are really trying to get that down. I did include pictures on there just so you know the kids know we do have fun at school and you kind of want to come to school. So, you know, it's it's fun

072there some days. So, anyway, and this is there's really two when when we did some research on this, there's two major issues with students not wanting to attend school. It's anxiety, just fear of failure, fear of judgment, social anxiety, and then engagement. they just are not interested in, you know, what's happening or, you know, what we're doing. So, and that spirals the anxiety and the engagement. They don't want to come to school. So, with them not coming to school, they're missing the content. So, they're getting more further behind and then that just creates a vortex that, you know, is hard to get to. Um, but we do um we are really looking at our percentages. Now these percentages here um Dr. Lombardo shares with us and they he makes sure that we're looking at them

073you know gives us this data. So we were go went from 5.2% to 6% in October to 7.4 in November to 8 in December. That's a problem. So we need to be going the other way. So and to be quite honest this is our New Year's resolution. It just was something that we've been talking about trying to figure out what we want to do. So, and then it it felt silly to start in the middle of November. So, we started and used it as a New Year's resolution. And we have a bulletin board posting of the percentages so we can keep track. And I do morning announcements. We're going to announce our perfect attendance and um those students because we do have some. And of course, we always have an assembly at the end of

074the year that we recognize that. But that just has not been enough for us, as you can tell by the data, to get these kids here. And also, of course, there's been that flu going around that I know nothing about from last month. But, um, it just it it, you know, that's, of course, when they're sick, we don't want them at school. They need to be home. So, it's it's a catch 22. It it's difficult, but we're going to try to entice them. And then this is um what we what we're doing is we do warm welcomes. We greet we greet students with smiles, positive words. Um it says special handshakes in there. Mrs. Ball, our fifth grade teacher, she has a special handshake for each of her students and she remembers them. It's like

075all these steps, a kick, a tap, a turnaround, and she remembers them. And then they do them at our end of year assembly as well. So that means a lot to them. Mentor. We pair students with staff to check in. Um, we use morning circles or morning time. A lot of teachers will use morning meetings and there's there's social emotional topics on there just to help them. And we just want a culture of kindness, respect, and we want them to feel safe and and that's important. Safe to make mistakes. And so we're working on that. We have our school counselor. Thank you very much. We have someone there almost every day. So important. And then we are preparing to incorporate the district MTSS vision and plan in there. Um, we are posting our weekly attendance.

076It shouldn't be weekly. It should be monthly. I'm sorry. I wanted to do weekly, but we're going to I'm going to try and announce here and there, but monthly. And again, morning announcements. Hopefully, they're listening to me, but we do shout outs all the time on a lot of things. So, we want to make sure we're doing that. Positive notes home, free homework pass. We really toyed and talked about to begin with, you know, all these rewards and give and we really didn't want to start off going down that path because just we wanted to create a culture of just wanting to come to school and be to school and really we want to focus on parents too. And I do have handouts and I do make announcements with this information but the parents need

077to see when a student misses two days a month they'll miss 20 days of school. I mean that those are big numbers out there. 30 hours of math per school year. That's a lot of time. Six 60 hours of reading and writing per school year. So the more we get that out to parents hopefully then they'll understand that yes, you know, we need we need to be at school. We need to schedule vacations hopefully during the summer. Um so we do have a lot of that too. So, we're we're looking at each student, digging deeper into who um we really need to focus on at this time. So, and that is it. Hopefully, I didn't bore you. Any questions? >> Um your when your IEP kids are taking your state exam, are they allowed to

078have their their adaptations during the state exam or I've misunderstood? >> Have their what? >> Their their their their adaptations. >> Yeah, they have. Oh, yes, definitely. We give them accommodations. We try, but the state has pulled back a lot on accommodations that we can give. And that's that's kind of frustrating because they do need it and they do so much better when they have stronger accommodations. >> So, you're giving them more accommodations in the classroom. They're allowed from the state of Ohio. >> No, no, we're we're Well, yeah, but the state tests have certain accommodations are allowed the classroom. We can do Yeah, we're trying to Yeah, of course. More. We want We want them to be successful. Correct. >> Yeah, >> they would probably test better if the accommodations that they had in

079the classroom were allowed on the state test as well. >> Oh, we've Yeah, we have data to prove that because they've pulled back on some, you know, scribing and things like that that our students were scoring much better with that help. So, and there's strict rules. It's not I mean, it's it's what you you know, it's not giving them the answers or helping them in any way other than to level the playing field. That's what accommodations are all about, just to make it level. So, >> thank you. >> Okay. >> You're welcome. Anything else? >> Thank you for your attention. I appreciate it. >> Thank you for your hard work. >> Thank you. >> Come to Cork. Thank you for my birthday. Thank you. >> It's fun getting old. It really is. >> All right.

080And I think I'm done. Thank you. All right, it's time for our athletic facility discussion. Every time I look, I feel like >> Good evening. My name is Russell Gayard. an architect uh project manager GPD group were the architects, engineers, and planners that you uh got to work with for the athletic uh master planning portion of uh this project uh in its infancy. We got a chance to meet with the committee and present to the board in December. We really wanted to kind of put that out there, but then say we're excited to come back in January and kick it off to the new board members. Um, so for tonight, we just wanted to really give an update on the athletic master plan. Share that plan that we shared in December with some very minor

081tweaks. Um, share those costs, both hard costs and soft costs. I'll explain what that means in a second. We'll talk about the project schedule, which is really the exciting part, like how can we make this plan uh and turn it into a reality. I've heard from the district that there's there's been highs, there's lows, there's been hope, there's been no hope. And so it's kind of really exciting to get to a point where we feel the project is really achievable. And so we're just looking uh to the district and to the board to really kind of make that make that next step. And so I'll talk through a project or proposed project schedule uh down on the agenda. And then we'll talk about fundraising which I know Dr. Lombardo has uh started the resolutions in

082order for the district to be able to start to reach out to community uh fund raise, friend raise, and start to rally that uh those funds to make this uh a reality. So, really quickly, just to show the committee, um I I I mentioned this in the December board meeting, but you know, parents, uh administration for the district, um volunteers, um athletic director, um principles, there's so many people that got involved and it's really special to just be the voice that shares uh you know, in some ways I was just the pencil that put all their thoughts onto the the master plan and renderings which Dr. Lombardo uh has presented over here. I'll share them virtually, but they're also there to take a look at too at your leisure. Um, so what so what does

083the master planning uh uh effort look like in terms of the master plan? A lot went into the plan pre-bond. We revisited that entire master plan, rolled up our sleeves and said, "What is what does this district need uh um at a minimum?" And so we obviously have a budget to contend with and district dollars that they have. And so what we really tried to do was start from scratch almost say what could we do now get everything we need and what does that allow us to afford with the dollars we have without asking the community for additional funds. And so we're excited to share where the master plan ended up. I'll walk through some of the highlights uh and then I'll show the rendering on the next slide. And then Michelle if you want

084to kind of piggyback that topic feel free to. So, so with the base bid master plan and I call it base bid because with the committee there were so many options. Do we need additional practice fields? Do we need a band shell? Do we need all these things? And so we started to just record that and say, well, let's focus on the base bid and then start to think about an alikart menu. If funding became available, what would we pick off first? And I can't determine which priority is more important. I'm, as Dr. Lombardo said, I'm a listener. So, I just started to inventory that and identify costs. So, as every dollar comes in, maybe it chips away at a certain line item that the district finds is the most the highest priority. So, so

085as the base bid that we'll talk about in terms of costs later, uh a new football stadium and soccer stadium, uh there'd be 1,700 seats for bleachers. There'd be 1,200 on the home side, 500 on the away side. This would be artificial turf. Uh and it'd be striped for multiple sports. That would give band an opportunity to use this. They would give football, soccer, um, and really it gives you a chance to use the field 50 times every week instead of on a grass or turf field or I'm sorry, a grass field. Maybe you only get one and you really can't even use it during the shoulder season. So, extending that life and getting so many kids the ability to use the field is why the committee decided to uh elect to to go with

086turf instead of grass or sod. Um, the the bleachers would have a press box. Uh there's new lighting and sound and so we even dove into different options on what lighting could be uh the Cadillac version or the Honda. Um and so this is kind of the midlevel um in terms of quality of light. It's going to provide enough foot candles at the ground level to be obviously used at night and the shoulder seasons, but a lot of those lights can do some amazing things now. And so the committee kind of settled on what do we absolutely need? And so that's kind of what's included in the costs when we break that down. And then lastly, a new scoreboard. Uh the board mentioned it was missing from the rendering. So I just made it sure

087that that's really the only change from the December meeting until now as it shows the scoreboard. It's included in the costs and included in the rendering as well. And this is kind of how that looks. Uh obviously we're showing um the existing high school to uh to the west or at the bottom left of the screen, the existing parking um and then that would serve the football facility. Um, in the costs obviously we show a press box. We show the lighting. This is the fencing that surrounds from a safety and security standpoint. This includes shot put and discus. This includes uh the the the pull vault. This includes the high jump. All the activities that would be associated with the track. Um, and then this would include obviously the the soccer striping which doesn't really

088appear on this rendering but you kind of get the idea that both sports could use that facility. Um, with that, um, Michelle, do you want to comment anything about the committee or or the work that kind of went into getting to this plan? >> So, once we reconvened again after the bond issue, as Russell said, we started pairing things down again to see exactly what we what we needed um to provide our students with the facility. Um, as we had discussed at December's meeting, the voters had spoken and we wanted to to heed what they told us at the polls. But we also are aware that Spire is moving forward in a direction that is not going to allow us accessibility to their facilities in the way that we are going to need accessibility for

089our student athletes. And our job as a board of education and as a district is to be planning forward and thinking forward of how we're going to provide our student as a athletes um availability facilities um and options so that they can have access to all of these things that we have been using Spire for up until this point and to do it in a way that's cost effective and fiscally responsible. as a school district. So, we started having those conversations and, you know, pairing things down. Um, Russell was wonderful because we have literally built it up and tore it down many, many a time and we ended up getting to this point. Um, and it is very much bare bones. I will point out to you there are no restroom facilities. Um, there are

090there is no ticketing area. There is no band shelter. Um, when I say to you this is very much a barebones facility, it is very much a barebones facility. But we are looking right now at getting three sports out of Spire as quickly as possible. And what we have done is priced out some different options to meet the needs of restrooms. Um we have we're working again we we approved policy tonight that we can start moving forward with fundraising fundraising and our we have uh our committee that has been working on um this athletic piece is also going to have a spur which I'll let Dr. Lombardo talk a little bit about that's going to have a fundraising piece. We cannot move forward with that until we have board approval of this project. So this

091evening we're going to start talking about the dollar figure that goes with that project and we want to do that in open session. And as I had stated in December, we were not going to put our new board members in a position where we were approving something that they were not part of that approval and make it look as if we were trying to hurry up and get this done before we had two board members, new board members sworn in and on our board. So um I will say that Dr. Lombardo and Mrs. Mcderma did took take the time to talk with Mr. Andress and Mr. Cooper so that they were aware of you know the facility the conversations we wanted everybody to be aware of what had discussions that have been had so that

092they if they had any questions that they could ask and they were in the know before we all came together to have this conversation this evening. So please know that this is very much a barebones facility. Um everything that is being proposed tonight is student centered and student driven. This is not for the grown-ups. Now I will tell you that we had said before you know will the community have access of course to the walking track to the things like that. Absolutely. But please know that the decisions that we made to bring this facility to our students and our community as quickly as possible were done so by cutting out those frills. And when I say frills, I mean restrooms, ticketing, all of those pieces. We're looking at fundraising and and grant writing and all

093of those pieces to put in those like the frosting of this facility. So, we come to you tonight to have that discussion and talk a little bit about where we're going from there. Um, but yeah, so that's kind of where we are right now. And I'll let uh Dr. Lombardo talk a little bit about the the fund fundraising piece and then you can go if you want to talk a little bit more about the hard and class maybe and then we can do that. >> Yes, sure. >> Um, and by the way, bare bones doesn't mean not exciting because this is an incredible facility. >> From where we were, I know that's what you meant, but yes, >> there's some really exciting things happening on the the campus and that should be celebrated even if

094it's bare bones. It's what it's what the funds and that's what we heard from the community. So, >> we and we just again when I say bare bones, I mean from where we were, this is huge. This is an eight lane track, all-weather track, turf field, and we have a lot of opportunities that are going to be presented by having this facility for our students. The saddest piece of this for me is that my kids aren't going to be able to enjoy it. I'll be very honest with you, that's the saddest part about this that I feel, but you know, even my grandkids will. I don't know. So, we we shall see. But it's just it's these are exciting times. But what I want the what I want the community to know is that the

095decisions that were made were student centered decisions. We looked at what we could bring with the budget and the funds that we had that would serve our student athletes and that's what we what we did. So >> great. Um this is the cost breakdown and obviously with any number there's a there's a lengthy uh document and spreadsheet that breaks down all of these numbers to every dollar and cent. Um what I just wanted to show you is a diagram um of what the total project cost means. And so this is a big fancy pie chart and you can't read the text and that's okay. U just take my word for it that the dark green piece is the cost of work. And when I say cost of work I mean the bricks and sticks. So

096like the cost of the turf, the cost of all those physical items that go into it including labor. Um and that's the 4.40255 sorry 577 number. The soft costs are all the things that go into it to make it happen. So that might be the construction manager, the architect and engineer to design it, the survey, the geotechnical, the construction material testing to make sure the soils are in good compacted shape to put that turf down. And so there's a lot of components that go into the soft costs. Uh it includes contingencies, too. So, what what often happens in a construction manager at risk project, which we'll talk to the board about at some point, um is that there's contingencies in place to to guarantee the price that we give. Um, and so while this is

097just an estimate, um, eventually we'll get the documents into a good enough shape where we can almost bid it and have a guaranteed maximum price, excuse me, where the owner will have a contingency, the contractor will have a contingency. If they need to escalate the schedule to make sure we get done for kickoff in August of 2027, they're going to have those funds in their um, bucket and to accelerate that schedule. Um, and so really it's the modern way of doing these sizable projects, especially when you need to buy long leadtime items in advance. So the bleachers and the lights, some of those lead times are about 10 months. And so if we want to hit this perfectly, and I'll show you the schedule in a second, um, you really want to have a player

098at the table that can buy or solicit bids for those long leadtime items so that they show up when the project is ready. Um, and so I'll show you that schedule, but just um, this is the pie of kind of what all those costs mean. This includes, by the way, the the total 5.746 is like the permitting, the storm water management, uh, plan reviews. Uh, it's kind of everything that could go into a project with our best estimation uh, with with kind of the estimating that we have in house. That includes inflation, too. We don't know where the dollars are going to come in when we bid this, but we do our best to try to put a percentage on the unknown. And so we feel very confident about what we're presenting to the board

099tonight in terms of cost and feel comfortable that it's all inclusive. Um we try to avoid surprises. No one likes surprises and so we did our best to to put to put these numbers together to move forward. >> Excellent. >> Yeah. I'm sorry real quick. I didn't see high jump. Were they in there and just notic it? >> And my laser doesn't work. But it's all in the hard cost numbers. The answer, the short answer is yes. >> Just wasn't pic depicted on the >> correct. >> Yeah. >> And actually Jen Jen brought that up during the committee meeting that it so we made sure it was in there. >> Do we have a real number though on actual cost of doing concession, locker rooms? Yeah, I think I think honestly if um the project

100kicks off and the fundraising is amazingly uh successful, we would certainly be able to add an allocart menu for the restrooms, ticketing. Um we even talked about maybe doing a gate and ticket booth as part of uh I could miss it's about $250,000. That would be kind of an opportunity to highlight those that have fundraised and identify their names on that plaque. So, this is kind of, as Michelle mentioned, like the bare bones, but there's there's more we can add to the project. Certainly, we just wanted to halt at kind of the base bid and then talk about alternates. Uh, because everything within the eighth lane of the track and in is kind of in this project. Anything you do can always be done later. >> Just when you go to do that, if you

101can, try to look and see what guidelines are for fire suppression. See if we can stay underneath those guidelines. >> Totally agree with you. >> Yep. and Russell in the in this plan this um it has it has worked into it like infrastructure for if we put a building up or if we correct >> um that would be an alternate and so that that infrastructure would be as part of that alternate. >> Okay. >> Do we have electric and plumbing tie-ins that will be in somewhat conduited there? That kind of doublev tales off of Beth's question. We we certainly can. I mean, I would actually encourage it and I I use the example if you're a vetting person and you're going to potentially build a building in five years, I would do the infrastructure as

102part of this project. If it might be 10 years or 20 years down the road, we would recommend probably to do that infrastructure, electric, water, potentially gas. If you're going to have a heated locker room or wait room in that building in the future, to do to do it then. No matter what, you won't um jeopardize the infrastructure that you've built with the track and turf because we're not going inside of that. >> I was gonna say everything everything >> that now just the bare bones. Are we running any of that just to >> that would be a part of an alternate that we'd be happy to put into the base. >> Perfect. That's I didn't know if it was yet. >> Well, electric has to go over because you can do lights, right? Or

103>> correct. >> Okay. So, electric will be >> Yes. Just not for the BU building piece of the restrooms, the concessions, >> but like the um uh press box and that stuff will >> correct. Absolutely. Yep. >> And everything within the eight lane track and the turf that will not be disturbed. Once that's in, it's set. >> Correct. Okay. >> So, Shel, do you want to talk about the costs or do you want me to keep going and then maybe we go back? if you want. >> Okay. >> Excuse me. Um, so we put together a project schedule. We we kind of were excited and we wanted to kind of see what this looks like. So, um, if we have the opportunity to kick off the project in terms of like a design with an

104architect, engineer really, we we've we've already done survey work. Um, we'd start to do some geotechnical work. Um, if that kickoff started in February or March 2026, we would obviously continue to meet with the committee. they've been instrumental in putting the plan together. So, we'd keep that uh cadence going, meet every month or every two months as the design progresses. Uh we'd start to cost estimate, excuse me, cost estimate in roughly October or November of 2026. We'd have our bid documents together in November, and then we'd be ready to start construction shortly after the new year after the board um approves a GMP, a gross maximum price. Uh that would all mean that starting in January 2027, a year from now, we're breaking ground. Um and that would mean that substantial completion football obviously is

105what the goal is to have it ready for the first kickoff game of next year. So it in some ways this is a it's very simplified here, but there's a lot of work that goes into all of this. And so we we put it together kind of simply, but there's a lot of work that goes into this. And we feel confident starting the kickoff in February or March, we're going to hit August 2027 with construction Q&A. >> Just to go >> from your experience when you design different uh like the grand stands and stuff, is there usually like a certain like I know you had with 1700. If we go, 1900, is about the same price? I mean, is there >> um it >> what threshold? >> $320 a seat. >> Yeah. 320. >> So

106So if you scale, we It's just a multiplier. >> So yeah, to answer your question, it's it's not the same. It It's a >> I know what tier system it was. You know, 100 seats or whatever. I think the committee originally had 2,000 seats and it went down to 1,700 meaning 1,200 on home uh 500 on away. Um and so you know districts have decided maybe the away gets put off for a season. Again you can locate that thing those bleachers in the future. This was kind of where it landed in terms of number of seats and if you have a certain number of seats and accommodations you can offer the field you know to other youth sports community events. um other sports for playoffs. I mean, there's a lot of things you can do

107once you have the infrastructure in place and number of seats is obviously a variable that the state playoff and OSHA looks at. >> Does this number qualify us for that? >> It it would be uh dependent on the division. >> Oh, okay. So, so not D1 for instance, but >> yeah, >> like what's our our local schools like Conott and Grand Valley where we're going to be writing the same parameters as them? >> Yes. Like when Dr. Lombardo and I we went around and looked at some local um facilities just so we could gear, you know, what would be right for Geneva. So, um, you know, we took our what we had seen to the committee and kind of talked about, you know, scaling it down from the large amount that we had at the

108first original, um, and what would be sufficient for our district. >> I ask you a question just to put on the record. Would this have any chance of over encumbering our dual 8 in sewer lines that run out to the street? wasn't prepared for that question. So, say it again slower. >> Do you think the runoff from this would have any chance at over encumbering? >> Yeah. Okay, I'm ready now. So, the uh the project is going to uh um disturb over an acre of land, right? And and so with that, we'll have to do storm water management on the site. We'll we'll make sure we manage it from a quality perspective and a quantity perspective. So, all that means is we're going to have a detention basin, a dry detention basin that will manage

109the water of runoff from the turf, the track, and any other um uh impervious surface for the concrete that the sidewalks. It'll hold into that basin. It'll slowly release into the existing storm sewer um or creek, whichever you have here, which I know you have a creek. And um so we'll make sure that it doesn't overwhelm the existing system. that that might mean that the bowl for instance is a little deeper but but it'll all be calculated in a way that doesn't overwhelm the existing system. >> Thank you very much. >> Yeah, you're welcome. >> I do want to speak on behalf of the naming and the fundraising. So, we've been working extremely hard um behind the scenes uh creating an initiative for the naming and sponsorship. We understand that um the original plan was

110a lot more um I mean it was just huge. Um and this plan we really scaled it down. But that doesn't mean we aren't looking to do a ticket booth. That doesn't mean we're not looking to do um uh tennis courts. That doesn't mean we're not looking to do a band shell. There are so many things and so many needs. Um we thought if we started with what we can afford and that's the basic model, we have two years to fund raise for all those different items. Um we are putting together a tiered list of opportunities for people to donate and have naming rights. Um you know I have had people reach out to me anonymously and and is looking to give to the project. Um I'm really excited about that. So, if it is

111approved, um we do have some people that say, well, you know, I want to give so so much money towards, let's say, the band shell. Well, then we'll be able to start that band shell. Let's put money towards the uh you know, the uh the locker room or the wait room. There are so many opportunities within our sports complex. I mean, if you want to give us money for baseball, we will do what we can to do what we can to improve the baseball stadium. Um, and just we approved the board policy tonight, which will allow the board an opportunity to say with any kind of fundraising funds. Um, if people want to tell us where they want to, and that's the best thing if you ask me, is tell us where you want your

112money to go. If they say we just want it to go to whatever you think, then we're going to bring that to the board and we're going to propose different priorities within that project. But again, we have two two years to get this project going. Um, we are going to be ready at the beginning of February to start our fundraising. So, from February for the next two years, you're going to see um us advertising it. It was really exciting. I I was telling uh the student uh advisory group because I tell them everything. They they just love it. Um and they said, "We need QR codes and we're going to put it on everything and we're going to go out in the community and let people know this is what you can do." And and

113Chelse will tell you as well, um Katherine's doing a great job getting this all prepared. We also have our online donation uh piece ready to go. Um, so if it does get approved, we are we are ready to go with the fundraising and we are super excited. Uh, and I have a lot of confidence that we're going to get we're going to get people that are going to join in. I really do. >> And so we've worked um with Katherine Beal who was our communications guru. Um, so with our fundraising platform, we will be able to for the first time I think in ever um accept online donations. um not only for this but um I know that Mrs. Cybolski was also interested in setting up platforms when we want to sell tickets to the

114spring musical. We'll be able to accept credit cards online going forward prom tickets >> fees correct. So um you know we will be able to allow the adviserss to make a page up for the specific event. Um, we're trying to, you know, again, welcome to the 21st century. Um, for us to, you know, get us to make it easy. It's easy to donate. Um, you know, obviously the people who want to do naming rights are not going to let let me charge that on my credit card today, right? But, hey, I want to make a $100 donation towards this. I can go ahead, we can accept that through um through the site. Um, funds come right into our bank account. Um, make it easy. again can be credit carded. Um so it it's it's a

115great advancement that we're making, you know, not only for the facility but for all the other options that we have out there um instead of taking cash all the time. Um so this will actually just help us collect the money um and all avenues. So >> yeah, I and I don't want to be uh I don't want to leave out grants. So there are a lot of grants out there. I know Miss Chavei is is working on a a turf grant for us um through the NFL. So, we are going to continue to fund raise. We're going to find grants and we're going to continue to do everything we can to um in two years to have a spectacular It's going to be great if it's just this, but it'll be spectacular in two years.

116>> And I know the conversation came up, you know, again, we're not having restrooms right now. Um, you know, we do have some we do currently do portaotties, which, you know, is going to be the only option we have right now. Um, we do have those over at the baseball fields. So, we figured, um, we will probably move those over to the football fields. Um, and then add more, you know, for the um, probably starting in July, at least August through November. Um, so we will add more to that collection. uh just kind of looking at some extra costs. Um you know, we're talking probably about 5,000 more dollars for those portaotties uh for those months compared to what we're paying today. Right now, I think we have two portaotties and one um handicap facility.

117Um so if we double that, bring that over for eight months, um you know, we can have that. I know, um in talking with actually Mr. Andress, we were talking about the food situation. Um, so he brought up the great idea of we could have uh food trucks out front um and maybe have different ones that rent the space or, you know, make some kind of contribution to to the district for that. So um and still have the boosters, you know, sell underneath the tent. They'll be electric out there. You know, we can still have them set up hot dog mach, you know, try to make this, you know, is accessible that people can still have that. So, you know, we've looked at all those avenues. Um, you know, and that's why the committee will

118still meet as we go forward, you know, for ideas of, you know, how to have the things that you want at a football game. Again, you want your popcorn, you want your nachos, you know, we need a restroom. So, you know, we are definitely all that is still on our minds. Um, and getting the costs in there. >> Yeah. I just think it's important to remember, as exciting as food trucks might be, that our booster group makes a lot of money off of concessions. So, we don't want to take their profits that buy our uniforms away from them. So, that would just be a caution that I would >> I would keep in mind. >> And you bring up an excellent point. We have not made that money since we've been spired. We just have

119not made the money that we were making when we were at Memorial Field. There were times we were making 25 30,000 a year in concessions and I think it's down to do you have that number what what the boosters were? >> I don't have that number. >> So >> that was one of my main points I wanted to make too is without running water concessions become very hard. So, from a standpoint of people donating in the community, if that's something that you'd like to see, um, you know, there's not really a good way to sell food, even if it's not necessarily what you see normally in a commercial area, without having a sanitize, rinse, and putaway system. Um, and and that's a state law. It's not something we can just skirt. So, it's not us

120being picky. But, if we get dinged on that, there's a fine that goes with it. And it it holds the hands of the booster groups, which have done concessions. I mean, when I was in school, I know Gamber, I think, ran one or two booths and the athletic boosters ran the other two. And that was that was a pretty good stream of revenue. So, for those who may want to donate, that would be my biggest concern is is running water being something that goes out there. >> You get a hard price on a brick and mortar facility. >> Yeah, I agree. Yeah, because that's the last thing we want is someone thinks they donate two buildings and the next thing we are out asking for more money so we can get water to it. I

121agree. That's a good point. >> Okay. So, you know, uh Russell has presented the cost. So, we have a project cost of 5.746792 um as as the cost. Um, as you might be aware, um, in June of last year, we did transfer some funds over to a capital improvement fund. So, um, at the current moment, we have 7.4 plus million in that capital improvement fund. So, um, you know, this this whole project would come out of this capital improvement fund. It would not come out of the general operating fund. Um, it would not change my forecast numbers at all. um as we go forward with the project um everything again would come out of that 070 capital improvement fund. >> So I I think at this point if we don't have any other questions I

122would like to make a motion for I'd like to make a motion for 5.8. >> You want to do 5.8. 5.75. >> Um, >> you know what? Let's do five. Let's do up to 5.75. The total project cost is 5,746,792. I'd like to make a motion for 5.75 mil million to go towards this project to start moving forward on it. I'll second it. >> Any other discussion or questions about it? >> Is is there a set amount that we need to set aside to move this forward with? >> Well, currently, so last year we moved money into an 070 account which was for capital improvements. Currently in that account, we have 7.432 and change >> and change. >> Correct. >> So, this is not going to come out of our general fund and this is

123money that would go towards capital improvements. So, we would still have $1,686,000 and change in there to spend on permanent improvements such as repairs, buildings, buses. So, that's not that's not going to empty that account. We could allocate the 5.75 million towards this project to get moving towards the stadium project and still not empty that account and have that out of that fund, not affect the general fund and still move forward with the fundraising, the the fundraising, the grant writing and start moving forward with the project. Yeah, we don't have a pull five though out of it. There will just >> none of that will come out of the general fund. None of that will come. >> Okay. >> How do we feel about that, >> Brock? How do you feel? >> It's it's the

124path of least resistance. You know, my frustration isn't with the board in this current iteration, but I I'll be frank. I I went back and I looked. We've had this money. We had the money. >> We had the money for years, guys. We could have built that facility that we put on the ballot. It's it's mindn numbing. $2 million for an annex at the time for administration and I'm still beating my chest about that. I have a hard time spending 5.75 mil. The only issue and and the reason that I I am even advocating for part of it the way that it is is I've also talked to anonymous donors who seem interested and that's why I asked the questions that I did. I'm not personally saying, you know, we have to have running water.

125you know, >> um, dual 8 in sewers. Also, for the ridiculous inquiries we got, that could a two 100 home, median 1500 foot home complexes could run off the dual sewer pipes we have to the streets. So, for those people who are very concerned about over encumbering the sewer, I promise you the sewers are in good hands for the next few decades. Okay, knock on wood. Um, but the bottom line is we can either do what we've done historically on the board of education in Geneva and wait for the train to hit the wall and then come to you guys for money and say sorry no place to play or we can do it now. And and so my personal thoughts, I appreciate you asking are I think this sucks. I think this amount is

126ridiculous. We I thought this problem had been solved, but if other people aren't going to pick up the gauntlet, then we have a job to do and we have to do it. >> Go. Mhm. >> All right. >> I' I'd like to add the issue of the board office. At one point, we could have solved that for $600,000. >> Yep. >> And we kicked it down the road and kicked it down the road and construction costs exploded and now we're into 2.8 million for that facility. >> It was 2.4. >> 2.4 um >> before change orders. >> Yeah. >> Before change orders, >> which by the way included sewer pipes, >> right? Right. So, I'd love to have that 2.4 four back and put it in this facility, but we can't cry over spilled milk.

127And if we if we sit here and debate it for three more years, that >> 5.7 is going to be that 20 million that our our taxpayers clearly said that they did they didn't want. >> Pretty much talking to everybody, they wanted something similar to >> Kany. >> That's pretty similar to Kanye. >> Yep. Not not all the We don't have the uh I'd love to have the restrooms and maybe that could be worked out. >> Yep. We'll work on it, >> but we can't I don't believe we can wait because we've seen what's we saw what happened. >> You know, it it cost us $1.8 million more to get into uh what we're over there next door. So that that's why I'm you know I I took a big gulp when I heard this,

128but after I thought about it, that's exactly why I'm I'm supporting them. >> Thank you, Jeff. We good? Roll call. >> Mr. Andress? >> Yep. >> Mr. Cooper? >> Yes. >> Mrs. Syibolski? >> Yes. >> Mrs. Craig? >> Yes. >> And Mr. Pearson? >> Yes. >> Build a football statement. >> All right. Report of the treasure. >> Okay. Um, I need a motion in a second to approve the financial report. >> So moved. >> Second. >> Okay. Um, and I apologize if you don't have access. Correct. You did not see the financial report then? >> I I did not. No. >> Okay. Um, >> so again, uh, I will make sure tomorrow morning you have access to the share drives. We did just so a quick followup call or a quick followup. We did meet

129today with our new online platform for our board docs. It actually has changed a little bit which was the holdup um that we were having when we first inquired. Um they told us it may take two months to get it up and running and Dr. Lombardo said how about the February 18th meeting? Can we try to have it up then? So >> we are trying um again it'll be a easy platform. You'll have access to it. All the documents are attached to the board docs. um it'll be a great thing. So, just quick monthly financial package. Um looking at where we're at um as compared to our cash balances, it kind of compares where we were last year. Um it's kind of hard to look at last year's because again, we did make the large

130transfer at the end. Um right now, based upon the forecast, we are a million dollars higher than what I projected in August. Now remember when I tell you that we they changed the forecast um submission dates. It used to be October. So I had a few months of salaries. They went to August. Um and so what's going to happen is is that at that time I wasn't aware that we had five open uh tutor positions that aren't filled. So right now um that money is being saved. Um, so our our expenses aren't as high based upon that. Um, our revenues are a little bit higher. Um, based upon um the property taxes to this date, again, it's only about $100,000. Um, our difference in estate revenue is is down, you know. So, some of the

131things that you'll see on the report when you have access to it tomorrow, um, are fluctuations of month-to-month timing. Um, some of them will be permanent. Like I said, staffing um was not aware when the forecast was out. Forecast you will get an update next month uh because they've changed the forecast date to February. Um and then you will probably have a a unmandated one in June. So you can um have you know be totally updated because again the state has played around with us on when they would like reporting and when when the treasures of the state of Ohio say hey we've got some really good numbers here. Um because next month I will be presenting the forecast that will not include our staffing conversations that we're having today that won't be finalized until

132after the February board meeting for next year. Um, so again, where we're at right now, um, ending cash balance is a hund is a million dollars higher than was projected. Again, that number will be updated. Um, in the report, you do have the cash summary for all of our accounts and what is in them. Um, just so you know, in the cash in the packet, um, also includes, um, every check that was written in the month of December. Um and then where we're standing our budget wise and our general fund. Um we do have our investment um breakdown. So Red Tree currently heads our investments. Uh it's a agency that most of the school districts in Ohio do use. Um it also takes into consideration the funds that we also have at Andover Bank. We

133have funds at um Star Ohio. Um and we have funds at US Bank and that's kind of like a wash in and out with payroll. Um so you will have a investment register on those um and a breakdown of of where those securities are. Um and then also um at the last minute I did add my um the lunch report. Um again we did go C. Um the forecast will probably go to reflect that um we are not making money on going C. So C is free breakfast and lunch to all students every day. Um but the advantage of going CP is the additional million dollars in disadvantaged people impact aid. It's a restricted funding. So I'll kind of touch base more on that next month in the um presentation on the forecast. Um those

134are restricted funds. Um things that we can use those funds for are Dr. Lombardo's um community resource center. So you know something social emotional wellness. Um these are things that we are using these funds to for like again these are restricted funds extra funds that we are getting forgoing this uh community uh C. So um again she will show when you get into the file I've added it to theformational items you know that we are operating at a small loss. Um again it's hard we do collect we do submit to the state after the end of the month. So if you think you know we had all our expenditures for September we are not showing any income from the state until October for September's expenditure. So, we're kind of always a month behind um when

135it comes to time in June, which is why we have a later June board meeting. I know where we're at financially so we can approve a transfer um to cover because we cannot end a fund in a negative fund balance with, you know, so we have to be at a zero balance at least in those funds. So, um again, that's what the financial report is. Do you have any questions? I just want to say thank you for keeping track of all the things that have been happening the last nine months trying to figure out when things are due and every day changing. So well done. >> Yeah. the new budget bill that went through. Um there'll be changes on on state funding and I will showcase that uh at the at the forecast meeting next

136month on on the funds because of the property tax reform um what the district will be losing because of that um and how that will affect us. So good times good times. But >> also I'd like to thank you for reigning in the codification. I know that that that no one really cares in the larger scheme of things because when you talk about like actually qualifying funds, it doesn't seem like it's that big, but one of the big things that Shel's done is every dollar that comes in and out of here has a tag associated with what it's for, where it goes, why it goes there, how is it historically trended, and we're making really, really good data sets. And that allows us to make moves of money much more clearly. and she has been

137the only source of stability through House Bill 186 and other pieces of legislation where I'm like, "Hey, like what are we going to do about this?" And she's like, "Oh, I'm glad you asked. This is what I'm going to present to you at the next meeting." And that goes a really long way, Shel. So, thank you very much for that. >> I will have to thank the software that when I came on here, we did change our forecasting software. Um, we have webinars almost every week, especially with all the house bill changes. um you know we build different scenarios all the time on on what it's going to look like. Um so you know meeting with these with these webinars again once a week going through looking at your forecasting how to kind of really

138fine-tune where you've been at your spending for the last six months what it's going to look like uh you know compared to the last five years. Um, so I I'm telling you, you know, the forecasting software is is a big help. >> I didn't realize I could pull it online, too. I don't know if people know that, but the there's the five-year forecast and the historic 5-year forecast if you want to go online and see them, especially the new report with that modeling software. You can do that on our website. >> The state of Ohio actually has all the forecasts of of every place. It's just it's lovely to go and read. Um, and it's it's different. We had someone present a forecast kind of and their board likes a lot of words and so

139you know when she was presenting again just had blurbs of of words and words and words and I know I from what I've gotten from from the board that was before you know we like the graphs we like to see it's easier to read you know sometimes numbers and words feel like you know Charlie Brown's teacher wamp wamp wamp right so you look at a graph you can kind of say okay that's you know how things are made um makes a pretty picture. It makes it easier for the common everyday person to read um and and understand a little bit more. So, >> next month will be fun. >> Are there any questions? >> Mr. Cooper? >> Yes. >> Mrs. Syibolski? >> Yes. >> Mrs. Craig? >> Yes. >> Mr. Pearson? >> Yes. >> And

140Mr. Andress? >> Yes. >> Okay. I just again want to give quick recognition um to some donations. Um we did receive a $1,000 scholarship in honor of Joe Herrisco. Uh it's for students to use towards the cost of higher education. Um I will be working with Mrs. Debbacher and she is working with the the um individual who founded this scholarship. This is a brand new scholarship this year um for the qualifications and for the awarding of the scholarship. Um Mrs. Chabi did receive a Ohio bure bureau of workers comp safety and security grant. I know we had talked about this. It is valued at $5,928.56 and it is to purchase a walkbehind disc scrubber for the high school. So, thank you, Mrs. Chavey. >> Um, like uh Mrs. Crosley had, we have a list of

141the hallway donations of, you know, of the people who donated funds or items or time. Um, so we do appreciate all the donations we received in the past month. Um, the next item number three, the treasur recommends the following funds to be appropriated according to the adopted budget. Um, I need a motion in a second, please. >> So move second. >> Okay. So what this is as in the fall in September, we do permanent appropriations. So that's how much we can spend in each fund. So, a lot of times during the year, um, we get more money as income. And so, if we get more money as income that I'm going to spend, I need to appropriate more. So, what this is doing is is basically stating that I need to spend more money in

142these different fund accounts. So, um, we did for like unclaimed funds, this is a fund 22. Um, we did move a check into unclaimed funds that wasn't cashed. And I know that it was a stale dated check. It was over 90 days old. We moved it there. It was from 2024. Um I know that we're going to have to cut that check this year. So I needed to increase the appropriation for that. Um termination benefits. Last year we we did move some funds over to termination benefits. Um I do need more funds to pay um for termination benefits. So that's going to be um people who retire their severance. Um and people when we pay out their vacation when they leave is coming out of this 035 fund and no longer coming out of the

143general fund. So again, because we had more people retire in the past year and paid out that I need higher appropriations, auxiliary service funds. Um so the school does accept money from the state for non-public schools. uh it was passed a few years ago where these non-public schools that lie in the district could actually take their own money and and doesn't have to come through the school district anymore. Um just recently in November I did receive auxiliary school funds for Spire. So we are basically kind of a holding house for these funds. They actually have to come through us to spend the funds. Um we do accept or deduct a fee. It's normally a 4% fee which is customary um on auxiliary funds. So they are going to bring in about $30,000 and again there

144is specific guidelines that has to be spent for these funds through the state. Um so obviously what I get in from them they're able to spend. So I should get in about $30,100 and we'll have to be able to spend $30,100. Um when we passed the budget in um September, the whole federal um grants were kind of in an upheaval as we know. Um but in the end, we ended up getting a new grant that we never received before, title uh five. It's a rural um so we should be get in $67,000 that we can spend this year. So that again was a new grant. I was not aware of it at the time. So I I do want to appropriate those funds. Are there any questions on that? Okay. Mrs. Syosski? >> Yes. >>

145Mrs. Craig? >> Yes. >> Mr. Pearson? >> Yes. >> Mr. Andress? >> Yes. >> And Mr. Cooper? >> Yes. >> Um, the treasur recommends the board approval of the disposal list that's attached of assets that are no longer of use to the district. Some items will be traded in or sold at public auction using public surplus. Um so we >> so moved. >> Thank you. >> Second. >> So what this is is um as we came across the house on the hill which will hopefully become our new uh student resource center. >> Um it is loaded with outdated desks and computer tables. >> Um so the maintenance department spent some time. We are actually cleaning that building out. We are um actually running a what is that? A semi what are those storage? Not a

146storage unit. >> We bought two storage units >> but they're on site. They're going to be at the transportation. So they're what are those? What's the word for that? >> Rolloffs. >> A pod >> like a big pod, right? Like a >> So to store some of this >> should be a rolloff. >> Yeah. >> To store some of this. The items that are on this list again there are computer tables and media desks. These are things that um are not salvageable for our use to save for the future. So again, either these will be disposed of or they'll be on the public surplus site. So we wanted to get those on real quick so we can dispose of them um and not put them in the storage unit >> for a rainy day that

147we're not going to have. So >> any questions? >> The house has its own sewer line into the street that's un >> Oh my goodness. not to encumber either of our two 8 in sewer tieins. Right. >> I'm I'm not positive. I would have to get back to you on that question. >> We should look into that. >> I will look into that for you. >> U Mrs. Craig? >> Yes. >> Mr. Pearson? >> Yes. >> Mr. Andress? Yes. >> Mr. Cooper? >> Yes. >> And Mrs. Syolski? >> Yes. >> All right. Legislative report. Well, in true government fashion, um, our very busy state, Senate, and House of Representatives has been getting ready to run. So, unfortunately, not too many laws have been passed, although some some have been tabled. Um, there's a really large

148amount of of bills that have been put into the public light in order to make headlines that are probably going to expire. um things like the Charlie Kirk bill um are sitting without action in the 136th uh house now. So essentially what we're waiting for are any signal that we think that these bills are going to move forward. We do know that there's going to be property tax adjustments we believe um will be worked into some of these other bills now that we know that the calculations for inside millillage will change. The language is ambiguous. Um according to Lake Countyy's Mr. Pletchnick and our very own David Thomas who I believe are um really really gunning for Dave Joyce's seat. There is a host of changes that may occur although I haven't seen any pens

149to paper quite yet so I don't know how much of it will will be there. Um in good news and this is kind of cool I met with a small group two months ago about AI and just today probably about eight nine hours ago we got told that we have to have a committee that looks at AI products which we have already done ahead of the schedule. Um we already have safety implementations in place. I was actually really really impressed by Mr. um Bard already had uh certain keywords that would look be looked at. So for instance, if someone starts communicating with a chatbot such as Gemini AI built in and says I don't feel safe, I don't like this. What are the best ways um to do something nefarious? Um that would be reported.

150The most of the time it will go to someone um for them to look into. for instance, even if someone puts like a joke and searches something relatively inappropriate online, I've seen that it's a pretty uh pretty sensitive system. And other areas where I've talked to because we've also included um people from from the sphere of health for for HIPPA compliance and FUPA compliance. Um that's a big gray area that no one really has the answer to with AI. So, as the state keeps pushing out the recommendations as they have today, we're going to stay up to date on it. What I intended to later on show all of you in an open session is having a roadmap where we talk to these stakeholders and propose something for all of you to read where maybe

151we use a singular area of AI that's extremely locked down and say if if a teacher approves it and it falls in line with our our policy, let's unify it. That way we don't have any personal use of AI or personal external data from our district getting fed out. But we have to really make sure that the guidelines from the state come in before we start aggregating that to your point Shelley of coding. We need to kind of make sure that if we do have something like that a LLM a language model that we are not training it on data that children are using. So I would imagine that that will be a a pretty prominent conversation for the state. I know it's really exhilarating stuff but it is really important for our kids and

152for their safety. Um I I've never seen anything rolled out that fast. Um other than that, I don't think on the legislative front there's too much to look for besides the calculations and the upcoming um credits for what we'll be looking at for funding. Um they keep ping ponging the dates because they're trying to make the data look a specific way. Um, but so far as close as they get to repealing taxes, it seems like that guard has kind of lowered their guns and stepped away from that and are now looking to alternate funding and potentially income tax offsets. Um, so until we know what those numbers are really, there's not too much to report. So that's all I have. >> Thanks, Brock. >> Thank you. >> Um, the ATE report. Um, let's see. We

153have on January 12th, the ATCH held their budget hearing, organizational meeting, and regular scheduled January board meeting. Uh, three vacant board seats were filled by two members from the ESC, and one member from Conat, which were all returning board members. Uh, one was Dr. Wade from the ESC, Mrs. Klingan Klingan Smith from the ESC, and then Mr. Nesbbit from Conot. The sophomore showcase is tomorrow for sophomores and freshmen, which would be I think that came today. Yeah. So, tomorrow uh Thursday for sophomores and freshmen and ninth graders will see the CTE exploration labs. Uh good turnout is expected from all the districts. Career night and open house is scheduled for January 29th from 5:00 to 7:00 pm. Attendees will meet the staff, tour the facilities, and learn about the college and career competitive advantage. So

154that's all from a tech and board member reports. Anybody have any they'd like to share? >> I have a few quick items if I can just go through the list. >> Oh, right. Um, so first and foremost, I just want to say before I I lost access to my email, um, I did receive a correspondence talking about our mixers and the ability for us to capture the meetings and that some of them have to be like volume up so high you still almost can't hear it. I just wanted to bring that to everyone's attention. I'm sure it was already brought to your attention. >> Um, the next I wanted to thank Cindy Rowski for 29 years and wish her well. um going to Austinberg with everyone there. It's always I I like those guys a

155lot and I know that um that was a school that my brother was raised in and it's strange to see people that you think will be in the school forever finally take their welldeserved break. Um three I wanted to go over. People have been very concerned about snow days. We have 15 of them as you heard today. So if we have 15 snow days or more well sorry more than 15 then we'll have to make them up. But I think we're under that. >> Yes. >> By a few. Okay. So, we're in good hands. >> We're in good hands. >> We're We're in good hands. Um, and then I want to talk about attendance really quickly. I I really love the fact that Mrs. Dohy talked about the fear of failure because for some of

156these students who are missing school, I get that the cheesy photographs might not be something that seems sincere or people say, "What are you doing to incentivize this?" But when you look at systemic causal failures where people not just they don't don't just fear failure, they feel that they have failed and there's nothing they can do about it. That's where you get people that don't go to school because it doesn't matter because I've already failed. Who cares? No one cares. And the inclusion of people in school, not just as a we're we're happy you're here, there's fun stuff, but like we miss you. It's better when you're here. those conversations that I've seen shifting, those have been making the most dents in it. And I want to say thank you to Paul and and thank

157you to Missy and just everyone in general because I know I've even heard of this from um some of the preschool parents about how their kids are excited to come to school and what a great experience they're having at Austinberg and that puts a huge dent in a in a pretty huge problem we have. Um, I think I touched on the dual 8 inch sewer lines that go into the sewer system and so we should be good. And then the last thing I wanted to is if with the QR codes that we're going to roll out, if we can just take a look at security, a lot of people have been making fake landing pages with AI that look identical to normal pages and then if we're doing fundraising, they're going to say, "Put up

158a fake one that looks identical and fund raise it." So, if we can just have some type of, "Hey, check who you're sending money to." Um, I I feel bad some of these great-hearted people who may not be super wellversed with technology, they get rad over the coals with that stuff. And, uh, that's my list. >> Well, tomorrow, uh, me and Paul are going to be torn around. We're going to check out the bus garage and, uh, by a few other facilities. I'm going to look at the maintenance, um, that's going on at the different buildings. Um, we are going to inspect 8 in double sewers. >> That's on the agenda, right? >> I'm glad to hear it. So, I should wear a suit. Your suit accordingly. We'll check your rubber gloves. >> But, uh,

159yeah. >> Oh my gosh. >> Things are going good. >> We had a um our first board retreat. >> I think it was the first is it the first one we've ever I think it's the first one that has ever had. >> The other ones got cancelled, I think, cuz the school got cancelled. I think there was one before this we were all going to go to and it was a snow day or something like that. >> Was it like a full-fledged retreat though, like was somebody else coming to do it? I don't know. >> Maybe it was more like a surrender. >> Maybe it was. I don't know. But it was really good. And it was it was really good. We it was on, you know, boardmanship and we got to talk and it

160was after um Stephen and Joe were sworn in and we got to, you know, just we all brought food and learned a little. We're going to work on a uh board member handbook >> and it will be up on our website. So, if anybody in our community wants to run for this glorious position, they will be able to pull that handbook down and know exactly what this position entails and we're kind of all marketing it up and and adding what we would like to have in there. Um, so it'll be updated and ready to put in, you know, candidates hands if they so desire and then the community can see too. Um, but it was great. It was a really good event and we're going to get another one on the books to work on

161other things. Um, I'm my world is swim right now. I haven't been to many other I know basketball is doing well. Try to talk about all the things, but swim has been like knocking it out of the park. Um, boys and girls swim won all county. So, first place all county. Um, >> boys were second. >> Oh, were they? >> Yeah. >> I thought they were I thought they both won. Oh, I'm so sorry. I'm used to I'm used to the boys. It was like three points going into the last two events. >> Oh, >> Madison beat us. >> That's right. It was second. You're right. So, girls won all county and the boys got second. And then, uh, we had CBC championships this past weekend and the girls won the CBC Lake East and

162the boys were second CBC Lake East as well. So, we've had a lot of swim, a lot of chlorine in our house. Um, but they they've been doing fantastic. And I know wrestling I'm going to try to pop in and see wrestling tomorrow night, but um kind of missing my my oldest wrestled, so I'm kind of kind of missing my wrestling meet days. So I'm going to pop in and see what that's all about tomorrow. Um but yeah, a lot of great events. I did get to see Academic Challenge on Channel 5. >> They did awesome. So they great job. This is Mark and John. Kind of saw you on there. Um so yeah, all kinds of great things going on in our district. So kudos and yeah, yay for snow days. >> Use them

163all up. >> We have 11 more left. >> Big big fan of the snow day at the Craig House. Big fan. Big fans. >> I'd like to uh complain about our retreat. It was >> It was in It was in the board office. I mean, when I think of a retreat, it's like Las Vegas or Bucking Hills or >> You will be extremely disappointed. I I had to laugh though because do you remember that story on the news where the Cleveland Metropolitan School District went on they had the money this money they had I think they had to spend it on a retreat and they went somewhere it was really expensive and I said I'm waiting for somebody to say well how much money did you spend on that I'm like well zero dollars when

164we brought our own food >> but I I would like to thank our our our former board members unfortunately they're not here tonight um to get us to where we are today. I think we're working pretty well and hopefully we continue to do that and I think we've made a big step forward tonight to uh heal some of some of the problems in our community. So, congratulations. >> Thanks. >> I don't really have I just want to welcome Joe and Stephen and look forward to to continuing the work we're doing. It's been um it's been a journey so far and a lot of great things are happening. So, I'm very excited about where we're going and what is ahead. >> All right, we good. All right, best motion of the night. I need a motion

165to adjurnn. >> So moved. >> Second. >> All right, >> Mr. Pearson. >> Yes. >> Mr. Andress, >> Mr. Cooper, >> yes. >> Mrs. Cyolski, >> yes. >> Mrs. Craig, >> yes. Motion carries. >> 856. >> Have a great night. Thank you. >> Thank