001[Music] Okay, it's now 6:30. I'll call our meeting to order. Miss Brandom, did we notify the media? We did. Thank you. And I do declare that we have a quorum with a total of six board members. We have Mr. Jenkins is joining us via Zoom. their his laptop. We will need approval of the agenda to move forward. >> I make a motion to approve the agenda. >> Second. >> Any questions? All those in favor of approving the agenda, please say I. >> I. >> Any opposed? The agenda is approved. Um, so I do want to do what we have done before is start our meeting with tell me something good. So Mike, I'll start with you. >> I survived y'all. barely. >> Um had a good weekend at the conference in Charleston this weekend. Um
002glad school's back in session. Me and the girls are getting settled in and getting used to routines. >> I'll agree with the weekend. You know, it was um a lot of rain, but um safe travel. So, that was something to be very happy about. >> And my something good is I got to move two of my girls into college last week. So, that was fun. and a little sad at the same time. So, Mr. Carver, >> Mr. Jenkins, I've got a bittersweet uh this year. I've got my three and his kids in college. We moved our youngest to myst. So, it's an exciting time for our family. >> That's fantastic. Let's get >> I got my car back. finally after a month. >> If anybody didn't know, I hadn't had one for a month. It
003was great. I can go places now. >> All right. Well, I'm glad everybody could be here with us tonight. Um, unfortunately, we have another situation this month where we've had we've had some young deaths this summer and several hit. They really have hit very close to home. um including some of our staff members, young adult children and um two just very dear graduates of LDHS. Um so I would if you don't mind taking a moment with me for a moment of silence for Abby um Davis, Chandler Davis, and also Michaela Zork's family. time if you would. Thank you. And as um you go through your next few days, keep these families uh in your prayers. if you would join me in the pledge of allegiance, please. And we're actually going to have uh one of
004our students from Hickory Tavern, uh Brantley Brown, who is the student council president, lead us. >> If you would all please stand for the pledge. I pledge algiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. >> Thank you, Miss Brown. And um Dr. Pinland is going to lead us in our prayer tonight. >> Let us pray. Dear father, we just thank you so much for today. Lord, I thank you for um giving us the um system of Lawrence 55, but also a mission field. Lord, I pray that you'll just be with each one of our teachers, our staff, our um administrators, and everybody that um touches the lives of our kids each and every day.
005Lord, I pray that you'll just be with us tonight as we have um this board meeting. Lord, I pray that you'll just open our eyes um to the wisdom that you would have us to have um for the betterment of our system. And ask all these things in Jesus name. Amen. >> Amen. Thank you, Dr. Pan. We will need a motion to approve our minutes for the June 23rd work session and board meeting. >> I'll make a motion to approve the minutes and board meeting. >> I'll second. >> Thank you. Is there any question or discussion? All those in favor of approving the minutes for our June 23rd work session and board meeting, please say I. >> I. Any opposed? The minutes are approved. And now we're going to hear from Miss Robertson for our
006Hickory Tavern School report. Good evening. So, I have had um our students and staff and one of our special students, Kinsley Simmons, who prepared a little story to tell you about our first three weeks at Hickory Tavern. Is there not an audio file? >> Okay. Well, then I will adore you. >> All right. All right. So, our focus for building a fivestar culture of excellence is moving forward, taking pride in our work and being fully invested. And as we focus on the fivestar culture of excellence for Dr. Finland, we're going to talk about how we are addressing those and how we have done so in the past three weeks. Okay. So, as far as academics, you'll see our teachers and our staff doing hands-on learning. We're working in our weekly clusters and PLC's. Our students
007are setting goals and working together. Mr. McKenna has already started an afterchool tutoring program that includes not just students, but also the parents and they're coming in to be able to help their children. Um, we have created posters of our current and former students and they are now in the hallway to celebrate their academic successes. >> Arts. >> Yes. For the arts, we have students that are practicing on their own time. They're creating masterpieces. Um, they are really putting forth the effort. Miss Plowden has written a grant. She is our new chorus teacher. So she has written a grant to get new uniforms. So that our course looks like a group of distinction. Her teachers are really um building this the STEM program. Miss Lewis has been really invested into creating scientists. She had a
008student this morning that said it is so cool to be a scientist. Um so they are really excited about that program. For athletics, um our groups are working on team building, but we have also created posters with our athletes as well as our former students who are now athletes at the high school. Um so they're They're promoting academics, but they're also promoting their athletic success. Um, we are using GoFans to allow that option of electronic ticket purchases, but we are also sharing our athletic schedules as well as the high school athletic schedules with our families so that we can build that support for what their future will be like. For attendance, um, we are really focusing on um, you know, it matters and the importance of being there. So even during conferences this week, we're
009already having those conversations with parents and getting that set up so that you know they understand the importance and putting forth some things that we can do to help to provide that stability >> with um >> atmosphere. So we have been promoting the success of academic as well as their actions. Um we've been rewarding those. We have started our safety patrol. So, these students have built relationships with the the younger students. Um, they're really being hands-on. The top picture is a a picture of a STEM project that a student went home and had their parents replicate because they wanted to see if they could do what they had learned in class. So, they're really bridging that gap between the school to home. We have um SCA in full swing. Um, we're doing lunch and learn.
010We have built fivear panther commitments throughout our building. So this is what you know we expect from a fivestar Panther student. Um we have a staff newsletter, we have a parent newsletter that goes home weekly and we've created staff shoutouts that our co-workers as well as our families can do that we share weekly with our team. Um, coming forward, we have a fall for learning event and a spooktacular literacy event where we're inviting our families and our parents to really get involved and showcase what our students are learning school. And what we do know is kids go where there is excitement. They stay where there is love. And maybe this will um but what he does tell you in this video is that he likes coming to school strictly because of the people that are
011there. And so we know that with being said and our investment into our school that that is what improves all of the five. Thank you. Any questions? >> Thank you so much. >> Thank you. >> And now we will call up Dr. Falner to give us a report on Lawrence Prep Academy. >> I should never have to follow that ever. It was better if I wasn't talking. >> It was better if you weren't talking. Thank you for the opportunity to talk about Lawrence Preparatory Academy. Just remember that we are not a school. We are a program. So we are um we serve Clinton School District uh grades 6 through 12. We serve Laurens K through 12. So we are quite the program on one hallway. Um, we, um, tonight I'm going to talk to you
012just a little bit differently than Miss Robinson did. I want to talk to you about our anchors of accountability. In keeping with the district theme, we have three major things that we're accountable for this year. Um, at the prep academy, is that me doing that? Okay. Um, so first of all, we had a spring visit, a monitoring visit. Every five years the state monitors schools and alternative programs. So this past year was our monitoring visit. That is one anchor of accountability that we're complying with. The second thing we're going to look at is our end of the year evaluation for 2425. We do that every year. And in that evaluation, we have to uh talk about the goals we met and the goals that we will have for the next year. And then finally, our
013three-year plan was due this year also. So, I have quite the anchors at Lawrence Prep Academy um this year. First of all, and all of my PowerPoints not showing, so that ought to make it feel better. First of all, teacher certifications was one of the things they were concerned about in our monitoring visit. Secondly, the placement of special education students at Lawrence Prep Academy without the interventions that should be taking place prior to that. Um and the third thing that they uh discussed with us is the lack of parental input. They felt like the parents were not getting enough input um in the placement at the prep and then while they were at the prep. So to comply with these things, we put three things in place. We are having our teachers seek dual certification
014where they can. U my science teacher has already done that and so we're looking for dual certification. HR is working really tight with me trying to get certified teachers there. Um we are collaborating with the special needs directors in both districts to at least have students um have their behavior functionally assessed and then have behavior plans in place prior to putting them at Prep Academy because it's such a more restrictive atmosphere. And thirdly, we are having parent pickup grade days for every grading period. We are going to have parents come in to Prep Academy if they will to pick up grades. Um, we served at the end of our year report and that's available if anybody wants to see it. I didn't break it down too awful much, but we served a total of 121
015students last year. Um, to break that down, we had 76 high school students, 35 middle school students, and 10 elementary stu school students at Prep Academy. Now, we did meet all of the end of the year goals that we had. One of the things that we created has been nicknamed the tank, but it is actually an independent learning setting so that we do not have to give ISS or OSS these students who are having behavior problems or are behind in their lessons can go to this independent learning setting and get the tutoring they need and just a cool down period in that setting. We also beefed up a little bit our monitoring testing for online students. They had to come face tof face with us last year. They were not allowed to test online. And
016so we're doing a little bit more with that this year. And then we worked with a transient middle school curriculum. What what we found out with our middle schoolers is that they would go back into the same classrooms either way ahead or way behind. So last year, our teachers followed the same curriculum guides that as the their middle school teachers so that they went back pretty much on on pace when they went back to the middle schools. Didn't always mean they were passing because they come to us not passing a lot of times. We do the best we can. So we have new goals for this year. One of the things that we plan to do and and this was in our monitor I mean our excuse me our end of the year report. We
017are planning to try to create our schedule based on the staffing that we have and make that more legitimate. So, and we are also going to include some co-artnerships with the feeder home schools with co-planning with our teachers so that we give more fidelity to that. And our prize possession that we're going to start this year is we're going to structure in within the grading calendar a a period of time a week, two weeks for recovery, reinforcement, andor enhancement in the classroom. And what we're hoping to do is that they can we're'll have the teacher sign off on whatever their grade was and then they can either recover material, they can reinforce material, or if they did well, they can go on and enhance that material. So we do have those goals for 2526 for
018the 2526 year. Um then our three-year plan that was quite the booger. It took a while to do that three-year plan because it is something that they we have to do every three years. And what our goals are for that plan is that we could create schedules that um to to work with students who are behind in school. One of the things I think we don't we want to utilize more at Prep Academy are students who have failed one or more grade levels and really concentrate on those fifth graders, those eighth graders, and the ninth grade repeaters. We also said in our three-year plan that we'd like to have more online help programs for disciplinary issues in working with the whole student and then creating partnerships and hire staff to look at the whole students.
019they come to us with so many social needs um you know all kinds of different needs that we look at the academic pieces of it we look at the behavior pieces of it but we'd like to have more partnerships where we would um be able to do that some opportunities that they get at Prep Academy we get to do have art every two weeks we get to have flexible schedules there because we can we can utilize that independent learning center or whatever we need to do we have multiple elective classes class for them. It's a smaller class size, one-on-one behavior intervention, one-on-one academic interventions. We have guest speakers who come in. They do community service with the sheriff's department every year. So, they do have some opportunities with us. I told Miss Robinson, it's hard
020to get my students to take pictures. They don't like pictures. So, I'm going to show you a few pictures. This is certainly the entrance. Um, one of the things that I think I have thanked Dr. Harris for in public about three or four times was the walkway. Mike, if you'd had this in Charleston, you'd have been set right. It has been wonderful to be able to get our stuff in under that walkway. So, it goes from the parking lot all the way down. This is our garden of hope. We call it our garden of hope. Miss Birch Moore really tins that garden every year. And the students once in a while will make a wish and plant it in that garden. And and so they do a lot of different things with that little garden.
021We do science, too. Um, STEM. This is one of our students in the science class. This is us coming back from lunch at Sanders. This is winding. They have independent winding every single day. Um, we don't have metal detectors at prep, so we have um so a staff member wands them as they come in the door. Um, this is just a history class. We have a virtual history teacher. Um, this is math. This is um science. And this is fun Friday. One of the things that we like to do with our students is to celebrate their wins. So if they meet their academic goal for the week, they're on pace and they meet their academic goal and they have had no um unexcused absences or no disciplinary referrals to me, not classroom. Then they get
022to do fun Friday. And this is fun Friday cornhole. So this is just another shot of that. Any questions? All right. Thank you. >> Thank you, Dr. Falner. Uh, now we will go straight into our superintendence report with Dr. Penland. >> Good evening. Um, and you have at your desk, I know um, Miss Little has already mentioned um, in memory of Abby and Chandler um, Davis, once a Raider, always a Raider. We did give out these um bracelets at the beginning of the year um ser mean ceremony that we had and um also had um some time to talk about Aby's challenge and we just kind of pushed out Aby's challenge to everybody in the district to say I will use my words to build up others. I will serve others when it's not convenient
023for me and I'll try new ways of kindness for 30 days. So, it was really something that we could just kind of set the stage of not only um remembering um the impact that they had on our lives, but also the impact that we can have on others as we move forward with their um and especially Aby's challenge as um we kind of went forward. So, um you have bracelets at your um table that um we gave out that day. So, just um wear those with um in memory of them and um and pride of our Raiders. So this year we are um building a five-star culture of excellence and continue with that. I'm going to share several of the slides that I did at the opening ceremony just so that you um it makes
024sense to you now what that um Tina and Jennifer have shared about the um five stars the anchoring of accountability and I'm really just kind of um pushing forward as we um take the building a fivestar culture of excellence to the um next level. So 2.0. So why um am I um coining as 2.0? know well um you know last year or this year at the beginning of the year we started with my word um my one word and this was John Gordon's thing and it was um difference and my word is difference and so whenever we're looking at how we can take a five-star culture of excellence and then start judging all of our systems you know if if you find part of our system that's a twostar what's the difference that we can
025do to make it a three to make it a four to make it a five so how in every area that we look at How do we make it better? And that's the difference that we're shooting for. So last year we started with a star. You know, we started defining the star as a visible energy of outstanding excellence by being that beacon of hope. And really what are we there um to be that visible beacon of hope for our kids, for other staff members, um for our other um for the students that we're there for. So how can we be that visible energy and be that hope um that we need for all of our kids? And so why are we still doing 2.0? Um well we know that we are still in a school
026um that really are in a district that by um defined by SNAP, Tana, Foster, Medicaid, Miger and homeless. Um our pupils in poverty rating is at 79.9 which is up from last year of 78.8 I mean 78.5. And so you can see the top four schools are within a um percentage and a half of each other. So Waterlue, Sanders, EB, and Ford are all 88 and 89% um pupils in poverty. So whenever you walk in a classroom of 20 kids, you're basically looking at two kids that are not affected by um SNAP, Tana, Foster, Medicaid, migrant, or homeless. And whenever we're looking at that, you know, that's not saying they can't learn. That's just telling us that there's another um level of struggles that they may have and we may need to provide some additional
027services and what we need to do to um help all of our kids. But I always say our richest school, if you want to call it that, is Hickory Tavern. Um, but that's still 73%, you know. So that's still one out of four um kids um has the means that to not be um classified as poverty. So still three out of four kids um at Hickory Tavern um following that poverty rate. Um we did receive a shout out by Ellen Weaver at I3 um this summer. Um and this was on our third grade um read to succeed scores. you know, we have um SC ready scores about to be released and Amanda will talk a little bit about those in a few minutes, but this was one that we could go ahead and share because
028this was um data that was relayed to students that needed to be retained or not. And this was the do not um does not meet category. So last year we had 49% of our students no sorry we had 42% of our students um that did not meet in 2024 and in 2025 that was down to 20% and that's in that lowest category and so she we were part of that recognized group that saw at least a 20% or greater decrease in the percent of does not meet for third graders. So, whenever you're looking at that in numbers, um at the spring of 2024, we had 155 students that were um in that group that could have been retained for read to succeed unless they met some type of exemption or met another level of um
029passage rate with MAP scores. Um and that was reduced to the does not meet for 2025 to only have 79 students um this this year um that we just finished up. So that was a huge success for our um teaching and learning department and where we were headed and how while we're continuing with our 2.0 because we know what we're doing is working. So how are we going 2.0? So um we've been looking at Hadtie's book a lot um on visible learning and um in one of the his first big idea is climate and whenever you talk about culture versus climate you know that's one and the same and so whenever we talk about um building that fivestar culture we have to look at his number one big idea which is climate and climate um
030is fostering that learning community it's developing social emotional and academic skills for kids and it's maintaining high expectations for all students So whenever we're looking at classroom and school climate, um you really start looking at um where that starts with expectations and what we're going to do and generate in our classrooms. And whenever we start looking at climate first and that's what his first um area is, then you can offer the learning and then the kids will achieve. And so that's where we're focusing is climate first, learning second, achievement third. And that all cannot happen. None of that can happen unless you have a system where you can provide that trust, belonging, and well-being for our kids in each one of their classroom settings. And so that's really why we're focusing on climate and the
031culture and really starting to look at those high expectations um for our teachers in our classrooms. Um a lot of the work that he does, he puts on a scale. And so on this is the um the red is the best. And so whenever we start looking at that it's it's talking about high expectations get the bigger bang for the buck um other than having low expectations you have um teacher student relationships um is um also a very high thing. But really whenever we can start embedding those um internal intrinsic um rewards for our kids and kind of help them have those student high expectations that's where you get the largest bang. So building a culture where they can start trusting themselves to have those high expectations, meet them, and when they don't, you know,
032how do you learn from those areas? So that's really where we're focused on our climate. And then we're looking at anchored in accountability. If you look at the logo, um it did kind of change into an anchor. And so um Ashton Burns did worked on this for me, but we also have each star inset with an A. And so the five A's for the five-star culture this year is going to be anchored in accountability, but the first one is going to be academics, which um Jennifer's already talked about, and that's really talking about the rigor and mastery that we're after in each one of our classrooms and how we're going to set that up through our teaching and learning. Then we have the arts which is creative and excellence and really trying to build that
033innovation which um art provides for that um expression and empathy and identity but really provides those kids um another um outlet for their creativity and um being able to excel there. Then we have athletics where we're always going to focus on character and competition. you know, so much of what we um get out of our athletics, and I'm glad Tommy's here today to be able to share about our athletic programs, but um really working in that teamwork and that discipline that you have that the coaches have those high expectations that we play in um with honor and lead with heart. The attendance that um was also mentioned earlier, you know, if you're not there, you can't learn. If the teachers aren't there, they can't teach. So, that attendance is not just for students, but it's
034also for our staff. So being present is definitely that foundation that we have to have um for an expectation that you've got to be there not only in person but also um as much mentally as you can be for those um for those kids and for our system to be able to be there whenever you're there. Um atmosphere, the belonging and respect, you know, that kind of ties back to the culture, you know, that climate matters and what are we providing that safe and welcoming environment for our kids. And so all of that is the anchored in accountability, the five A's. And again, they're academics, arts, athletics, attendance, and atmosphere. And where we're really focused on um building our goals and looking at everything that we're doing in our schools. If we do something, we
035tie it back to one of these areas to say, okay, how is if we do this, what is it going to affect? How is it going to build one area of our system that really needs to grow? And so that's what we're doing with our goals. Um, also with the beginning of the year, I set um the seven commitments of a great team and gave that to our administrators and really started to kind of look at what we're going to commit to um as our administrative team with our um principles, assistant principles, and cabinet. And we came up with the um and this is also listed in the book, but the seven commitments that we are going to commit to. And that's valuing each other, the vision and mission of the team, staying positive together,
036giving your best, getting better, connecting, and that bottom one is each other. So, if we can commit to each other and doing all this each and every day, you know, that's how we can build a team that trusts each other and can grow as we um build this system. Um Vince Lombardi says, "Perfection is not attainable, but if we chase perfection, we will catch excellence." And that's really what we're after um there. And in John Gordon's books, it says, "Excellence doesn't care what the score is. Excellent doesn't care what our record is. It cares are we getting better." And whenever we're looking at the five stars and looking at how we scale everything and looking at how um we're expected to grow, you know, where are we and are we better today than we were
037yesterday. Um and that's what we're looking for um in all of our systems. Again, the shout out there. Um, and this was um something funny that um was done by Clinton Chronicle and just kind of shout out to them. They put out a coloring page. Um, if you see that it's got a lapel on the left on that says 55 and the one on the right says 56. But this is what it looks like colored. So if you throw that in, it's it's a little bit better. But I still go back to that first picture of I really just look like burnt, you know? And so, um, really just kind of looking at that and kind of, um, looking at how we're building that fivestar culture of excellence. And just watch this short video with
038me. learnations for all the founder. excellence in rigor and mastery academics emphasizing creativity and excellence. They focus on commitment and responsibility and respect in any and all These are the five. We must anchor ourselves each. All right. Um, so that was um the video that we ended with the on the the um opening of school. Um, and it was really a great day to have all of our teachers back and um very appreciative every all the work they did to get ready for the school year and also um what they've done over the past month. Um do want to put this on your calendar for um next month and the next couple and week and a half. Um we'll have our ribbon cutting for the wing, the new wing at Sanders. um that has um
039been a great facility um and new facility for our um students at Sanders this year. So, it'll be um September 4th at 10 am and we'll have a um brief little ceremony and then we'll have the ribbon cutting. But I wanted to do it while kids were there so we could see the interaction and the use of actually um the wings while we're there. Um and just always remembering we're striving for fives and 55. So any questions that you have for me? Any questions? >> Thank you, Dr. Penland. >> Now we will move forward to Miss Lacaros to present on assessment results. >> Good evening. I just wanted to um talk to you a little bit about our MAP assessment. Um our state assessment results are not available yet. I would love to tell you
040them. I can't. Um we get official results tomorrow and uh you will be able to see them on September 2nd. Um but what I want you what I want to talk to you today about is our map um assessment that we use and and the memo that I provided for you talks a little bit about MAP map. We use MAP growth um and it is an assessment for both reading and for math. Um and it's administered to our students in grades K to 8. It is a nationally normed assessment and we use it for two primary purposes and this is why I want to talk to you about it today so that I can focus on other things when I'm here in September. But this is the precursor. So um it does primarily two things
041for us. One, it helps us predict state assessment performance. So, our students take the math assessment in March and April, which would be a spring. We also give it to them in the fall, um, August, September. We check again in December, and then we give it again in March or April, and that tells us what we can anticipate will happen in May. Um, so there's that prediction piece. Then it also informs our classroom instruction. So, for example, our students will be taking uh the MAP assessment within the next few days hopefully. Um it's there's technology glitches throughout the state with with the rostering. So, um when they take that, the teachers then get a report on each individual student and it tells the teacher this is what the student has mastered. This is where they
042should go next. Um this is where they're on grade level or where they're not on grade level. if they're not here are the things that you need to focus on in order to get them caught up. So it helps us to inform our classroom instruction. So we do that at the beginning of the year in the fall. We check again in December so we can see okay all those things that we tried out because of the information we had in the fall. Is it working? Are we seeing growth? And if you recall last year Kelsey Brown Kelsey Brown was one of our master teachers last year. Now she's an assistant principal was up here with her big chart. That was MAP and those were MAP scores for the students and we graph them every year.
043We put them in their categories and then we work to move them up from does not meet to approaching to meets expectations or exceeds expectations. So I know that you had asked to see kind of the spring to spring. So when I show you this next slide, it's it's a lot. There's a lot of information, but I wanted to provide it for you. I want to talk you through how you would look at that if you're trying to use it to predict because that's what we usually do in March and April. We look at the scores so that we can predict how they're going to do in May and then we can then do something about it before they take the assessment in May as well because we still have some time and we have
044instructional time. Um some of our schools did a phenomenal job with that in the spring and we'll tell you that. Um, so we am I flipping? Um, okay. So this is really tiny because we have district scores, we have kindergarten scores, we have first grade, second, third, fourth. And what I did is I took the 2425 is orange and then the I'm sorry, 23 24 is orange and the 2425 is green. Ideally, we would like to see more greens that are higher than oranges. This is reading achievement. So, how did we compare to where we were the year before in March? Um, and so you'll notice that some of our grades and some of our schools have some pretty high grains going on there. Um if we for example took a look at Waterlue um
045which we all know has been doing fairly well the past few years in both reading and math. So we can take a look at them and if I look at their third grade um have a little I don't know if you're going to be able to see it but their third grade is in here and they're the really tall green one that's right there. The year before when they were at about 60% proficiency in reading, that was their orange line. Now they're at that green line. So we can predict there's the potential that they're going to be even higher than 60% proficiency. Okay? So next Tuesday you get to find out if that's true or not. Okay? And so that's kind of what map does for us. It helps us to predict those things. Um
046we also have growth. I'm sorry. Here's our growth. Um, how did I'll show you the math growth maybe. So, how did our students grow compared to last year and the year before? So, once again, I'll pull in I've got Waterlue's third grade math is sitting there. Yeah, right there. Yes. Where you're a little arrow. Thank you. Their third grade math. So last year they grew pretty well and they got some points for growth. Now look how high that green is. So we can then predict chances are we're going to see some big growth in water math this coming year. Okay. Um what this also does for us is there may there are some other grades in there where they actually went down and we're thinking that's not good. What can we do? So we had
047a number of schools that starting in March took a look at that information. They took a look at the students that did not score where they thought they would or um would have liked to see them do better. They pulled intervention groups. They pulled small groups. We had principles teaching small groups between March and May. We had assistant principles teaching. We had master teachers teaching. and they pulled small intervention groups for a short period of time to really target in on those key concepts and skills that the students were going to need in order to demonstrate mastery on the state assessment and also to set them up for success for this school year. So we use this primarily more as anformational tool than a achievement tool saying here's where we've mastered here's what we've done.
048We know we're on track or we know we need to do a little bit more in the next two months to get them there. So um the last slide and all of the charts that go with that and the graphs are all yours. If you want them just send me an email. I'll send them to you so you can dig into them if you want. But here are the release dates for the um the state assessments. So SC ready, which is grades three through eight, both reading and math, EOCC, which is the high school scores, as well as SC career ready at the high school is all going to be released to us tomorrow. We have some preliminary data. Um we will find out what the final things are tomorrow and then there is a
049public release on September 2nd. So that is next Tuesday. So we will certainly provide that to you all as the board plus we'll do a press release um so that people can see where we are at. Um and then the other big piece of course is the school report card. So as you know 70 of the hundred points that are in the report card are directly tied to SC ready and EOC. Um the career ready numbers at the high school also are a significant part of their report card. So the largest chunk of the report card will be released September 2nd. And what that translates into the report card ratings will have to wait until we find out um on September 8th and the it will go to the public on October 15th. So just
050so you know what to expect and when to expect it. Um we do have a embargoed site with card information on it, but it there's not a whole lot of information on there other than our preliminary SC assessment SC ready assessments scores. So, um hoping those are what they are. Um but we'll find out for sure tomorrow. So, um, the biggest thing I think to keep in mind is our MAP assessment is designed to give us as educators more information about each individual child to help them progress to be better than where they were when they took the assessment. So, I don't know if anybody has any questions about that or what's coming. I did want to bring out what you had said earlier about the um map assessment not working currently and that's due
051to a statewide swap over to class link and so we just have not been able to assess our kids so we won't have that information for parent teacher conferences this week um and so we're working on that we'll push that out to parents as soon as we get that. Uh, thank you, Miss Lacarose. And if you would please email those that slide deck to the board because from my position here, all the lines were yellow. So, um, yeah, but thank you very much. >> Green kind of went together. >> Yeah, I appreciate it. >> All right. Up next, we have an athletic update with Mr. Spires. >> All right. Good evening. >> Good evening. Thank you for having me. Uh, I don't have a slideshow. Uh, didn't have time to put one together. Working for
052Mr. Compton, there's not a whole lot of downtime to put a nice PowerPoint together. So, I'll be talking through most of this. Uh, but Raider Athletics, uh, you know, talking about last year, last year was an outstanding year for Raider athletics. We saw growth and improvement across nearly all of our programs. Uh, two of our major highlights that stand out is our wrestling team advanced all the way to the state championship, following by one point short of the title. Uh, we're very proud of our boys tennis team who made history by winning the first region championship in school history and reaching the third round of the playoffs. Uh, and with the majority of that team returning this year, we expect big things from them again. Uh just to recap some of our other accomplishments, uh
05313 out of 15 of our sports last year qualified for state playoffs or state qualifiers. Uh 32 athletes earned all region honors. Two athletes were named region players of the year, being Zay Pulley for baseball and Zoe Young for girls basketball. We had three coaches who earned region coaches of the year. Uh, Coach Lawson Jordan for wrestling, Coach Todd, Lyn Todd for tennis, and coach Arar and Flood for boys basketball. We have five student athletes who were selected as North South, excuse me, all stars are named all state. We have 15 student athletes who signed to play at the collegiate level last year. And perhaps what I'm most proud of is our athletic department GPA last year was a 3.76. So our kids are uh competing hard on the the court or the field, but
054they're also getting it done in the classroom. And that's a testament to our coaches who all uh put academics first and push those kids to to do well in the classroom. Uh our fall sports for this year are currently underway. Our coaches and athletes have worked tirelessly throughout the summer. Many of our kids and our coaches give up their summers for fall sports. Uh right now, a lot of our teams are putting in 10 to 12 hour days with practices and games. Of course, uh football kicked off last week. Uh volleyball is getting going this week with uh cross country getting started Saturday and other teams getting started kind of after Labor Day. But our fall sports teams include, of course, JB and varsity football, JV and varsity volleyball, cross country, girls golf, girls tennis,
055and competitive cheer. Uh, I'm truly excited about what we have accomplished and even more excited about where we're headed. I feel like our coaching staff is more dedicated now than we've ever been. It's a tightnit group of people and we all have the expectations of wanting the best for our student athletes. Uh, and this will be your second Vince Lombardi quote of the night off of Dr. Penllins. But in my office, I have a quote from Vince Lombardi. It says, "The measure of who we are is what we do with what we have." This saying reminds us that success isn't about having the most resources or the perfect circumstances. It's about maximizing what's available through effort, discipline, and commitment. By that standard, Lawrence District 55 athletics has been a success story. Our coaches and athletes
056work very hard to overcome challenges, many of which happen behind the scenes and go unnoticed. To some in the community, the expectation is is to simply win every game. But the reality is that excellence takes far more. Takes resources, facilities, and support. While our churches, businesses, and community members step up time and time again with fundraisers, donations, sponsorships, there's only so much they can do to push our programs along. That's why tonight I want to ask you for your support. And as we move forward with athletics and this year and begin planning for next year, I want us to be in intentional about increasing funding for athletic programs and working together to develop a three-year facilities improvement plan for both middle schools and high schools. Athletics are not just about competition. They are at the
057heart of the school culture and pride as well as in the community. Athletics builds our community. These events bring students, staff, families, and the broader community together for the Raiders. Athletics promote school spirit. People take pride in wearing school colors and cheering for their teams on for pep rallies, game days, and even our traditions energize our student body. Athletics also enhances student engagement. Students involved in athletics, whether it be an athlete, a manager, cheerleader, band member, or a fan, feel more connected to our school and our community. Through athletics, we provide positive role models. Our student athletes often serve as leaders in the schools and examples of discipline, perseverance, and teamwork. Their success inspires our younger students. Athletics also fosters healthy competition and sportsmanship, teaching that winning is great and that's what we like to
058do, but there's also a lot that can be learned from losing or failure. Athletics encourages teamwork and collaboration. Many things that were mentioned in Dr. Pinland slide tonight. Athletics teaches cooperation, responsibility, commitment, and get this, values that carry over into academics and the school culture culture. Athletics also creates and carries on traditions. We all hear how great the 80s were and how great the 90s were. We want to be great now. Back then, our facilities and our school was rather new, right, Mr. Hughes? He was a young man back then being ready. Okay. But things get to where our kids now deserve better facilities and they deserve a better place to train and compete. Athletics also carries your school reputation. Athletic achievements often receive community and media recognition highlighting the school in a positive light.
059If you remember several years ago when our baseball team u made a run to the state championship, there was pride in our school, not just for our baseball players, but all the students and the administrators and the teachers because we were seeing our kids on TV just about every night being interviewed with special things that brought pride to this community through athletics. Athletics also supports diversity and inclusion. Sports provide opportunities for students of different backgrounds to unite under one team and one school identity. Celebrating a variety of sports ensures that all students feel represented. And lastly, athletic events provide uplifting moments in times when things are not going well in the community or in school. They can boost morale during difficult times. And in closing, athletic events are the most well-attended gatherings in our district.
060Athletics are the truly the face of Lawrence District 55. Yet, our facilities are outdated and in need of upgrades. You can travel in any direction from Lawrence and you'll see neighboring districts investing in their schools and athletic facilities. I'm old school. I'm not asking for a $30 million football stadium that one district unveiled last Friday night or even a 10 $10 million fieldhouse that another district 30 minutes down the road unveiled last week. I'm just simply asking that we give our kids a fair chance by remodeling, refurbishing, and improve what and improve what we already have. I truly believe that will make a difference. These improvements are not just for athletes. Better facilities help us retain quality teachers, quality coaches. They give all students, athletes or not, schools and programs that people can be proud
061of. In today's world of school choice and transfer rules, this is critical for retaining both students and our athletes. I invite each of you to come visit and see firsthand the areas of need of improvement and together let's make a commitment to our kids and let's be intentional about making Lawrence District 55 a five-star district in athletics. Once again, thank you for allowing me to speak. I look forward to working with you to make us the best we can. Any questions? >> All right. >> Thank you, Coach Buyers. >> Thank you. Uh Dr. Pinland, I'll turn it over to you for booster club registration. >> Yeah. So um on the booster on the outside organizations for registration, um there is a state law that we provide um this update for the board to approve the
062organizations um so that they can utilize and spend their funds out of that. We only have four that we're approving today that have um requested approval that and these are the funds that do not fall within our school accounting system. So this would be not the school accounting or the district accounting system. So these would be the PTOs or the organizations that have a checking account outside that. So once that um is approved, if there's anybody that's not um already background checked, we'll have to do a background check on their president and treasurer, whoever has financial records. Um those um being submitted is EB's PTO, Lawrence Middle PTO, Waterlue PTO, and LDHS band booster. So this would take um board approval to allow um these organizations to utilize their funds. >> Okay. Thank you, Dr.
063Penland. Um, so we have this request on the table from Dr. Pinland if we could have a motion to approve the booster club registrations as proposed. >> I'll make a motion to approve the booster club. >> I'll second. >> Thank you. Are there any questions or comments? All those in favor of approving the booster club registrations that Dr. Pinland presented, please say I. >> I. >> Any opposed? All right, they are approved. Thank you, Dr. Pinland. And then now we'll move into board operations. And you have some um >> policies to work through. >> So we have these grouped in two different um groups. So 1 through 11 will be um for first reading. So, I'll go through and just kind of describe what those are and then on the second set of um policies,
064I'll be requesting that these are um that we'll put those up and wave first reading and go ahead and approve those at the end. So, the first one is the organizational chart um that we are submitting for um the 2526 school year. This does align um four departments under um Dr. Harris um a department under um teaching and learning and the rest of the departments would fall under me. So that will be um exhibit CCE and that since it's an E, it really doesn't need um approval, but we'll bring it back next month for approval. Um the next one is the drug and alcohol free workplace and schools for work um for first reading. that is GBEC and um that one is a strike out of um one um sentence at the end of the
065first paragraph, last paragraph on the first page um which takes out the at the discretion of the board because that is also stated in another paragraph that the board will take additional action and we're adding in there that the superintendent will notify the board of any violations of this policy and then we'll take up the additional action as necessary at the following board meeting. >> So on these, Dr. Pill, on some of the first readings, um >> I know I have a couple of comments. Um >> so we can add these, talk about them, or just kind of move through them quickly if you want. on that particular policy uh where the superintendent will notify the board of the violation of this policy. I'd like some sort of time frame associated with that whether it
066be same day or same day as the occurrence. Um so just as long as there there's a >> a time frame there time frame that we can put in there. >> All right. Perfect. >> Anything else on this one? >> All right. The next one is the exhibit that goes along with that which is GBEC notice to employees. And the only thing that we struck there was that at the discretion of the board which is basically notifying them that they would be um eligible or would be up for non-renewal suspension or termination and then that would come to the board um based on the previous policy. Okay. Our next um policy is GCR. Um this was was in the past non-school employment of professional staff. We've added dual and non-school employment. So this will be
067a dual employee policy that was recommended by the IG report. Um we have added the dual employment section there that goes down to um even including that that it needs to be approved and renewed every year that um just because you start dual employment does not mean that you would um continue that it goes through the no additional fringe benefits um which would be like you can't get double the vacation, you can't get double the sick days um and that type of thing. So any questions or comments on this one? Okay, the next one is DJ purchasing. Um, this one was also um kind of stemmed a little bit from the IG report to add um the disciplinary actions. And this policy now adds a statement that says to see the discipline um policy for
068GCQF um based on not adhering to purchasing policies. on this particular one. I know we have a policy and a rule. >> Yes, ma'am. >> Um it it would it would be my recommendation that that we actually combine all the information into the policy and not actually have an administrative role. >> Okay. Um so the AR DJR um which she was referencing the purchasing authorities and approval levels um is currently as the rule and so we'll work on that. Does anybody have any questions on the current policy or DJR um rule combining those? Okay. >> Well, that will come back as a board vote, right? >> Yes, sir. Yes. >> Yes, sir. So yeah, we'll just make these um changes um for consideration for second reading. Um policy DB, the annual budget, um we did
069some strike through and some added some um verbiage there um which does consider the state law that the board um post or the district post the September by September 1st the annual budget. We also um put in there about any net deviations from the board approved budget must be reapproved by the bud um board and also put in there um the goal of maintaining a general fund balance of two months which is 16%. Um also in there the notice um of the budget adoption um also puts in there um that it will be printed in the local newspaper which is already there but also posted on social media platforms. on that one under the notice of budget adoption where you added in the red kind of just restate that it's going to be stated in
070the newspaper. It already states that prior. >> Can we just add the sentence that says notice will be posted on district website and all social media platforms. >> Yeah. Anything else on that one policy DGD? Um what used to be called credit cards will now be purchasing cards or in other words PECard. That one basically cleans up some verbiage on that one um to um basically swap everything that we referenced as a credit card to a card. That one also has um administrative rule um which then pulls in um referencing back to the purchasing card program internal operating procedures and adhering to that and those procedures were set forth um after recommendations by the IG report >> on this one. Um under program overview it says the business operations department is responsible for complete oversight.
071Who is that? because that's not in the organizational chart they just presented. >> Okay. And so that would fall under gym which falls under procurement which is um Brian Gresian currently. >> So could we put that terminology that matches >> okay >> that kind of matches the the or chart versus the business operation department. >> Okay. We'll do anything else. Okay. The next um policy is DBJ budget transfers. Um this one adds the paragraph after the board approval of the yearly financial budget, the superintendent or chief financial will not transfer money out of the fund balance unless additional approval of the board is made. And so that will kind of go back to making um sure that we're keeping a check on how much we're running and if we're looking like we'll run into the
072fund balance um toward the end of the year. Anything else on that one there? Okay. Um exhibit DKC, which is travel distances. Um the travel um policy references a mileage chart and so this mileage chart will be put in there for um exhibit and that's basically from school to school so we don't have to calculate that each time. So that'll be added there and we'll change the landscape. >> One um box is empty. >> One box is empty. Which one? Oh, I see it. >> Yeah. >> Okay. We'll pull that in. Thank you. All right. Policy GB, sorry, GCB, professional staff contracts. Am I? Yeah, I'm still there. Okay. This one is um basically adding a statement that Lawrence 55 will not rehire any employee who has been terminated or resigned in lie of termination
073due to failure to comply with district policy. Um we added that for professional staff contracts and compensations. Okay. Policy ADF, district wellness. Um, this one is updating um for our wellness plan some um inclusion of some statements that we do not provide um smart snacks. We don't provide non-smart stacks during the school day. Say that real fast. Um so that includes all school activities, fundraisers, cantens, and vending machines. And that is um applicable until 30 minutes after school. And so after that, so like um athletic cantens and that kind of stuff don't have to adhere to the smart stacks rules of the federal government um there. So this would just basically be there. Um also on the next page, any fundraisers on sale of foods that are not smart snack must comply. Um and there's
074also a fundraising tracking form that basically a school has 30 exemptions, 30 days to have exemptions. So, like the candy bars, you know, if they're selling those on site, they can do that 30 days out of the year or something that's not adhering to the um smart snacks rule. All right. And that's a long policy. Then we get to bea, which is board meeting notification. Um we added or designate and also posted on there um on social media so that we would be posting our notifications um on the district website and on social media. >> Question. >> Yes sir. um board member, the superintendent is now a board member. >> Um so this is where um Candace normally post um all of our meeting notifications and send that sends that out to our media. >>
075This is strictly come from the board chair, not the superintendent because the superintendent support to the board and the board meeting is a public meeting held for the superintendent to report to the board. >> Okay. If you don't mind, I don't mind um contacting the schoolboard association to get their model policy pulled back out and see how that says. Okay. >> So, I'll check to um see if that should come from the board chair versus >> the the verbiage in that one. It had previously stated the superintendent will distribute since 2016. So, it just hasn't been looked at. I in a while. So, >> so, but I'll pull back out the model policy that the school board association and see how they um address that from coming from the chair or the superintendent. >> Okay.
076So, all those were for first reading. Any other questions or comments about first reading documents? All right. So, the following we're requesting um board approval to wave first and to be um accepted for um board approval tonight. Um the first one is ACCE sorry it is GCLE unencumbered time. Um this was a policy that we already had in place but state law this year added nurses to unencumbered time. So the only thing that was added was to add nurses and we added a couple of um sentences in there about um leadership may only withhold or reduce a teacher or school nurses unencumbered time in a given school day as a result of extreme or unavoidable circumstances. And the same with the nurse is if a medical emergency, a school's unencumbered time may be reduced or
077withheld. Um any questions on GCLE? >> Um can we so that it lines throughout the whole document we put school nurse in front of put school in front of nurse. >> Okay. If we make that change, um, how do we do that for procedure? >> Does, well, >> do we vote on that? >> Yeah, you would have to because this one they're wanting a second reading, the first reading waved and to read the second. Um, >> if we need to move it to a first reading only, we can do that and bring it back fixed next time. That would probably be the easiest thing to do. Or you could, if you just want to um when the motion is made that you make the motion to approve it with the insertion of the word school
078in front of nurses. >> Okay, I can do that. >> All right, you can do that. policy ACE, service animals, and we have policy GBG AAA and policy JLC DD. All three of these have to do with service animals. The first one is um if we have a service animal relevant to public um or a public issue, then um that's basically the only thing that we're changing here is who they would report to. This one dates back a few years, so it still references Ed Murray and the Department of um public relations. So for the public, we are referring that to the assistant superintendent. For the staff um section, we're referring that to human resource department. And for any student issues, we're referring that to the um student services department. And so those are just
079um corrections on that last page of each one of those three policies. Any questions on those three? All right. And the last one is um is administrative rule. So, this doesn't actually have to have um approval, but we'll go ahead and run it through with the rest of them. Um IKA-R test and examinations. This basically adds the line that says schools have the discretion to allow students to exempt final exams if they meet the following criteria which takes out the students in all grade levels may exempt final exams. Um we wanted to make sure that that was clear that the high school is putting in um a little bit more stringent um activity to enforce and kind of ensure our kids have taken a cumulative um exam at some point in time. So, um, they
080will be doing that and that just wanted to clear that up that they wouldn't accept expect to always be able to be allowed to exempt. >> So, on that particular one, I know we've talked about this one a couple of times. Um, I thought the expectation there was that only second semester seniors would exempt at the high school, but the way that it is listed still If coach Compton chose to say, "Hey, everybody can exempt this semester," then they could still exempt. >> Yeah. >> Because if it's at the school's discretion. >> Yeah. And I was trying to leave it up to the school's discretion. So if we need to take out that whole Well, not take out the whole section, but to um kind of go back I can definitely go back and talk
081to them about >> Do you think that one's some since it is an administrative rule anyway and doesn't require vote, can we >> we can bring that back next? >> Can we talk about that one again? Why would that be an administrative rule? I mean, instead of a district policy, >> I thought that it actually was part of a district policy. Um, exemptions. >> It's just tied to um IKAA. Um, and so that's just been the administrative rule. Um, so last time it was updated was 22. So, but yeah, we'll bring it back. So, we are looking at now I'll bring to you the four policies which will be GCLE unencumbered time with the added words of school in front of nurses so that we're consistent with school nurses throughout that policy. We'll also bring
082Do we want to vote on that one first and then do the three? >> Yeah, I was about to say I think it would be easier if we had we'll um do a motion for policy GCLE because there is an adjustment in it and then we can bring about a second motion and vote on the other three policies together since the changes were all the same. It's just really who we're contacting. Um and again, this motion would need to be uh that we are uh waving the first reading with the change that is proposed um and passing it as tonight the second reading. I make a motion that we wave the first reading on GCLE and approve the changes by adding school in front of nursing. >> Thank you. >> Have a second. >> Second.
083>> Any questions or comments? All those in favor of approving policy GCLE with the change of school in front of the word nurse and waving the first reading. Please say I. Any opposed? >> Okay. policy passes. >> Okay. >> So, the next three would be policy ACE for public service animals, um policy GBG AAA for staff, policy JLCD for students requesting change for um who to contact if there are issues. Okay, this we would just need we could have one motion for all three of those policies uh to approve the policies and wave the first reading. I make a motion to wave the first reading and approve policies AC ga and JLCD. >> I'll second. Thank you. Is there any question or discussion? All those in favor of approving the following policies and waving the
084first reading for policy Ace E GB G A and J L C D. Please say I. >> I. >> Any opposed? >> Okay. So, do we need to do anything with number 16 policy IKA since we're bringing it back? >> No. >> Okay. All right. >> All right. Now, we'll move to our finance and operations with Mr. Jim Wallace. >> Good evening. You should have received a copy in your packet of the new expanded financial report for July of 2025. Uh in addition to the information that you have received in the past, we will now be providing you with additional detail on the general fund revenues and expenditures on the same basis that is used in the budget that you passed. Uh and as well as information on year-to- date revenues and expenditures and how
085they compare with the budget that you approved. The July report contains a lot less activity than any other monthly report because of the much of what we pay during the month of July is actually attributable and acrewed back to the prior year especially with salaries and benefits which is the lion share of our general fund budget. Several of our revenues also we don't start receiving until October or even later. So, uh there's not a lot of activity on the July report, but as the months go on, you will begin to see the financial year taking shape. Uh the intent of all the additional information is to give the board the kind of relevant and timely information uh that that you need in order to make wise financial decisions for our district. It should also give
086you a better idea of some of the challenges that we face and allow you to provide feedback and counsel uh on that on how we should address those. Uh and hopefully we will occasionally be able to present you with information on opportunities and how we can best use those uh to the benefit of all of our student. Our balance with the treasurer as of the end of July was $8,659,415. Our fiscal year-to-ate revenues uh for the first month were $3,289,728 with expenditures for the same period of $1,74,790 for a difference of $2,214,938. And the tax collections for the month of July were $550,695. I believe you also received information from Dr. dependent on where we stood as of this past Friday in closing out the 2425 fiscal year. That close out is still very much
087a work in progress. Uh there are still quite a few revenues that are outstanding to include reimbursements from Lawrence 56 for common programs. Uh some additional funds that are related to Medicaid and insurance and FEMA uh funds related to the costs associated with Hurricane Helen. uh we we'll we believe we'll wind up in a much better position than what's been presented to you, but Dr. Pinland did want to keep you in the loop on where we currently stand. Hopefully 2425 will be the worst year that any of us experienced. Uh between our original budgeted deficit, the loss of the learns grant, the reduction in state revenues below the state projections, the error that was made in our fee in lie of tax revenue and the added cost of cleaning up in the wake of a
088storm that was unlike anything in our area in modern history. Uh we faced significant headwinds last year and now we're tasked with the re rebuilding our financial house and it won't be easy. It's going to require cooperation from between the board and the district and school level administrations and several of the policies that were presented here this evening are geared to make that happen. Uh in just a bit we'll be presenting you with a general fund budget um that it will be lean but also addresses those realities. We're also we've made a lot of changes in how we operate that will help a great deal and I'm sure we'll end up making more changes. Uh but if we all work together I'm confident that we can get this district back where it needs to be.
089I'm presenting to you this evening um also a bond resolution uh for our annual general obligation bond. >> Mr. Lawless. >> Yes, ma'am. >> Before we move on to the bond resolution, I have some questions regarding the budget to actual that you sent out to close out the 25 2425 school year. >> Okay. So the, you know, we we talked at length in June about board approval for any monies that would come from the fund balance. And the board approved for the 2425 school year, the board approved two draws off the fund balance. One was at the beginning of the year so you could provide a balanced budget and the second one's for the learns grant. those um totaled just over $1.4 million. So my expectation was that I would see a number that shows
090that our projected change in fund balance was just over $1.4 million. >> The document that you've provided to us shows that the projected change in fund balance is $3.3 million. >> Yes, ma'am. Well, again, now there's a lot of re several revenue items that have not been recorded for 2425. That was where we stood as of Friday. So, we will be narrowing that gap between that 3.3 and getting closer to what we had projected. There were revenue shortfalls that we were not aware of. For instance, the $722,000 that was taken retroactively earlier this month. Uh we were not prepared for that. Um and that also affects our budget going forward because we were assuming that the agreements that were in place uh would be continuing the following year. Uh so that's a significant and major
091portion of it. >> And when do you expect to have these revenues? >> Ma'am, >> when do you expect to have received these revenues that you say are outstanding? >> The FEMA revenues. Uh Brian Gresham's been working that process with FEMA. uh we we have thought to be in the final stages of wrapping that progress process up for quite some time. Um but they keep coming back with additional information that they want. Um so I mean we've never really dealt with FEMA previously. It was kind of an unprecedented at least as far as any of us are concerned type of a situation but hopefully we'll have that wrapped up in the next month or so. Um, >> and what's the amount that we're expecting from FEMA? >> We don't know that. That's FEMA is valuing
092it to determine what we're eligible for. So, >> but you've put a number in here >> that's affected the fund balance. Is that not what you're expecting? >> Well, not there's not necessarily a guarantee that we'll recover everything that we spent related to the storm. Now, we have received insurance proceeds from Schisbet related to uh insurable property losses. Some of that being uh lost food, which would affect our federal funds for food service. Uh and then a lot of our some of our cleanup items. Now, where FEMA steps in is for things that were above and beyond that as well as um some future looking costs that could help us to mitigate future occurrences if another storm of that magnitude came through. There are certain things that they're offering to possibly be able to assist
093us with. So some of that, so say we receive a pot of money for from FEMA, some of it will be to reimburse us for costs that we incurred. Some of it would be incur to give us the funds to take on pro projects that would uh lessen the damage if we were faced with a similar storm. Uh but we really don't have the number until FEMA comes to us and tells us what percentage what they will cover. So, but you just said that the the amount in the fund balance change over 1.4 million was due to not receiving some revenues and you said that included FEMA. You mentioned the county. So, what portion of that have you attributed to FEMA? >> I haven't I haven't valued the revenues. I'm saying that the difference between
094the 3.3 that was in the schedule that just shows everything that we've received attributable to 2425 to date and the expenditures that really shouldn't change between now other than to go down as we will have some funds that we're able to utilize where we were able to reclassify some expenditures from the general fund over two other funds. For instance, with the with the insurance proceeds, we paid using our general fund for a lot of those cleanup efforts, we will once we go through those claim process, which all that's still in motion. I mean, it's a it's a very long process, but we will be able to take some of those costs that we already incurred and move them to a different fund that will accom. So, right now, you're looking at a worst case scenario
095where every bit of that is still sitting in our in our general fund. and we're saying that we're going to pull some of that out, but until we have the final claim settlements, we really don't know what that amount is. We incurred a lot of costs associated with that storm. Be it uh extra man hours in our maintenance department, uh just the cost of sometimes renting equipment, sometimes the cost of um having tree work done and and we paid for all that stuff with our district resources. and some of it we've been reimbured for and it's just a matter of identifying those costs going back and fig finding where we paid for them and moving them. So that will dollar for dollar do a have a positive impact impact on our general fund. Um some
096of it will be you know part of the process with FEMA is that they don't cover anything that's also covered by insurance. So you know they look at it in a in a bigger picture and say well you got this and so we're going to reduce it by that. It so It's all still in in flux until we wrap up the FEMA process. I don't know. >> So, the difference between the 3.3 and the 1.4, what are you expecting to be able to recover? >> I mean, I'm that I don't have that number. I don't I mean, I hate to just guess because again, with FEMA, I mean, it could be $100,000. It could be more or less. We just don't we don't know that. You know, the what we have provided FEMA is information
097on things like what tree fell down, where did it land, where did we what did we do with it, did we grind the stump, did we relocate to a, you know, did we relocate it elsewhere on our property? Now, how they how they go back and assign a value to that. It's not necessarily dollar for dollar for what we incurred to make it happen. >> So, how much was the expenses that were incurred for all this? I would I'm I hate to just spitball, but I'm going to guess somewhere in the half million range. You have um other um revenues that you mentioned um go through. I think you have approximations on some of those that you felt like you would be getting from like um Medicaid and ESDAC and that kind of stuff. >>
098Yeah. So we still have um we still have our the programs that we have in place with with Lawrence 56 for adult ed and the Joeair center that's 46,000 per program that we have budgeted. We should receive all of that um ESDAC or that's a acronym that we use. It's a administrative cost associated with um Medicaid. We should receive 20ome,000 associated with that. Uh we have some additional our our special ed department is working with some of our uh contracted therapists to try to get their Medicaid claims submitted. If you notice our the budget that we put in place for Medicaid funds is significantly lower than it has been in prior years. just haven't we've had some difficulty in getting some of these individuals that service our children to uh submit all the proper documentation
099in order for us to complete our claims with Medicaid and Medicaid will reimburse us if we're able to uh to prove that. So, our special ed department, particular Francis McIntyre, is working with these therapists and the surgeon uh the services that they work through uh to to get that information so that we can submit that claim. And that that's based on what we're able to to get out of them. Um but, you know, we're hoping for you know, I would guesstimate say 20,000ish more. That's that's just a wild guess, but it's just a matter of however much we're able to get claimed with Medicaid. Um that that that is most of what we're looking at as far as revenues, but the rest of that I mean, not all of that difference is going to be
100found just in short in revenues that haven't been posted. And I don't I don't mean to I did not ever intend to make it sound that that was the only difference. Uh you know, we had certain categories that were over spent. You know, I know we went to uh we had mentioned previously during the work session that uh we had significant budget overspend in the area of those contracted services for special ed uh with OTP and physical therapy. I think what concerns me is that at no point was anything ever brought to the board to approve additional spending above the budget and the approvals that we had already given to come out of the fund balance. >> Yes, ma'am. And that's why we were addressing that with these policies that we're presenting tonight and the
101additional financial information. >> But that's something that has always been in place. So it it's not just about addressing it with policies, but >> well, the intent is that we, you know, on a going forward basis at least, we're providing the board with every tool necessary for you to be able to do the work that you need to do. I acknowledged a month ago or two months ago that we should have communicated additional information to the board as we went through that repeated u what I call gut punches. You know, where seemed like every week we were discovering either something else was going to go over budget or some revenue was going to fall short. Uh and we didn't I did not do a good job of presenting that information to you so that you
102could make uh do the the work that you needed to do and I acknowledge that. um planning to you know through the information that you're receiving now to make sure that we don't ever fall into that position again. Mr. Laugh, what is our expected fund balance if this in fact is what we pulled off of it for the 2425 school year? U Madam Chair, I it would if we hit if we landed at 3.3, it would put us below the 8% threshold, but I don't I don't have last year's fund balance memorized to to do the math in my brain to that's not the information was presented to you. That is not where we plan to end up. >> Okay. Well, I I did do the math after I got this and it it would
103put our fund balance at around $3.1 million. >> Yes, ma'am. We need to be about 2 million. >> That's less than a month of expenditures. It's certainly less than the 8%. >> Um and so another year like the past two that we've had, we would have zero fund balance. >> I mean, that would wipe us clean. So, >> no, it's it's definitely not an option and and we we we're acknowledging that. Uh and that's why we're working uh to present you with all the information you need. I mean, this is not something that that I can certainly fix by myself. I'm actually responsible for very little of this district's spending. Uh you know, we budget and then sometimes we're going to we're going to miss. >> With all due respect, you're the CFO. You're responsible
104for all of the spending. question. >> Council, >> how much did you move from? >> Uh, are you talking about the recent adjustment that was made? >> It was $722,000. Um, and it was it was a it was an accounting error um in that the county had uh double counted what they had received in fee in lie of tax on certain agreements and it didn't just affect district 55. Uh I know Lawrence 56 was affected even even greater than we were. Lawrence County themselves were affected by that. Lawrence County uh Development Corporation was affected. Um and and so basically we had just been credited with 722,000 more dollars of revenue than we had actually received. Um the reason that that did not necessarily raise a red flag, although it did a a little bit, but
105inquiries were made uh to the treasurer's office on hey is this right? This was uh seems significantly higher than prior year. Um and they they did not have any response that it was incorrect. And also by if we had received actually the $722,000, it would really just be restoring us to where we've been in previous years. Uh when we were reduced back in 2021 uh to a lower percentage of certain agreements and all new agreements, uh the the thought was and and Madam Chair, you were in the meeting where I was uh and they said that, you know, one of the reasons that they thought that they could do that would be that that we had so many new agreements coming online that the school districts would not actually come out less. Uh, and we
106and even with that, we were really, if we had received the 722, we would have only been getting close to back to where we were uh prior to those changes in those agreements. So, um, that was certainly a massive blow. it it it hurt us for 2425 um and and then by virtue of the fact that we counted on those same revenues in the budget for 2526 it it hurt us again. So it's a county council positive they can take and place that one where they want to is there a possibility that can happen again? >> Well, it's certainly possible. Um and that it's it's legal for them to do that. I think that Dr. Finland has received some assurance from the chairman of the county council. Is that correct? >> That they have no
107intention of going back and and and and doing that. Uh but this was not this was not an active county council taking money from school districts. This was an accounting error on the part of the county um that where they had just double counted certain revenues and distributed those out to other organizations including ours. >> Mr. Wallace, I know that you say that a red flag did not go off and that it was on part of a county or on the county. At no point in time did you think to question why we had an overpayment of $722,000 that wasn't a red flag? >> Well, and that that's kind of what I said. I know that district 56 was also included and I know in my discussions with with their CFO he had had direct
108conversations with the treasurer's office over that um what they thought was a higher amount and Lynn communicated to me that they did not think that it was erroneous at that time. So, uh, like I said, really with that 722, the assumption was that those that was the new agreements coming online that we had been told that would be in to be expected. Again, we even at even at $2 million, we we used to receive more than that in PL. It's just over the course of years, it got less and less and less. So, uh, we were informed that we would have new agreements coming online. So we thought any revenue was coming from those agreements but it was actually an error. >> So have have we have we addressed county council issues and how it's
109affecting our budget? >> Well I mean again this was an error. It wasn't it wasn't an active county council. I have been invited to um meet with one of the committees this week or ne this week or next week that I'll go and kind of address and kind of talk about some fee in lie of agreements um and some benefits that we could have out of the new ones. So we are going to go and kind of talk um and kind of promote ourselves in the new agreements. I contacted a county council member that's my representative uh when we got this information and he was not even aware of it. So county council wasn't even aware that the county had made a mistake and pulled monies back in this particular case. Any further discussion on
110that? Or Mr. Lawless can move on to the bond resolution. >> Thank you. All right. I'm now bringing before the board a resolution for our annual general obligation bond. Uh like we have the past couple of years, we will be doing a taxexempt bond issue rather than a taxable issue like we were able to do or was a favorable situation during a lower interest rate environment. This year's bond issue would be for an amount not exceeding $7.6 million, which is the same amount that you approved last year. Uh the amount would not in uh require an increase in property tax millage. Uh the purpose of this bond is twofold. The first is to pay the payment of the lead corporation bond. And secondly, the remaining $4.1 million would be used to cover the cost of
111issuance and to fund the district's finan uh capital projects that are approved by the board as part of the budget process. Uh this bond issue would be repaid using debt service funds before the end of our fiscal year. and the lead corporation bond, which is the large majority of our district's long-term debt, is currently scheduled still to be paid off in 2030. Uh, this resolution does require board action for us to be able to proceed with the issue, and if approved, the bond sale will occur on September 4th, and we would receive our funds on September the 18th. And again, this resolution does require board action. Um, so in order to move forward, we would need a motion to approve the bond resolution as Mr. Lawless has presented. Um, if you need more information on
112what that bond pays for, if you'll turn to page 30 in the approved budget, um, that gives you the kind of breakdowns of how the 4.1 is going to be spent based on, um, >> it's the capital projects list, >> right? It's the capital budget projects list. Um, and like you said, the first four million goes or how much do you say? something goes >> be $3.5 million goes toward paying the payment for the lead corporation >> lead. >> Thank you, Mr. Carpenter. Do we have a second? >> I'll second. Thank you. Any questions or discussion? All those in favor of approving the bond resolution as presented by Mr. Lawless, please say I. >> Any opposed? >> Thank you. The bond resolutions approved. >> At the June board meeting, this board approved the general fund
113budget, but with a request that it be presented again this month with a reduction of $400,000 uh that had been included for a millage increase. Since then, the information other information has come to light that requires the budget be reduced by significantly more than $400,000. We're now presenting a budget that is balanced with the general fund revenues and expenditures of $59,771,000. And I'll go over uh most of the bigger changes and the reasons for them. And then we will be requesting board action to approve this updated budget. Uh you received a pair of schedules. One was, this is outside of the the bound copy, but you received a pair of schedules, one for revenues and one for expenditures, which shows the amounts that were presented in June, what we are currently presenting, the amount of
114the change, and how that new amount compares with the 2425 budget. Some of these changes are attributable just to the additional clarity that comes with having a few additional months of information. Uh remember when we prepared our budget originally, it was based on information that we had back in April and May. So on the revenue schedule, we're looking at a $300,000 decrease in advorum taxes. Um we had valued the potential millage increase at $400,000, but when we look at a full 12 months of actual collections, we believe that we should still be able to make that $14 million number. Um earlier this year we received information again we as we just discussed on the accounting error that had been made in our allocation of fee and l revenue uh which reduced our 2425 revenue but
115also by $722,000. Uh but we also used that as a guide on how what to expect for 2526. So we're lowering our fee and loo revenues uh projection by $700,000 in our state revenues. The only projections that we show an increase for are just a couple of transportation related revenues and those are revenues that we don't actually receive until after the fiscal year closed. But based on what we received in 20 July of 2025, we are revising our estimate of what we expect to receive in July of 2026 by a total of $177,000. Uh the other revenues that were revised are driven by the education funding model. We originally pred uh presented an amount that was just a rounded version of what this uh was projected to us by the state department of education. Uh
116but since the creation of the funding model, our district has always ended up receiving significantly less uh than the amount that was projected. So we're reducing our projections uh for model related revenues by about one and a half to 2%. Uh, and of course we will have to, as we had kind of mentioned earlier in the budget process, we'll revisit those revenues again, present you with that information after day 45, which is when the state gives us a revised estimate. Uh, if we don't if we're still if that revised estimate comes in under where we are budgeting, we'll be having to come back to you again on how we expect to address that. Uh, but again, We have our original projections. If you recall, we get those back during the state's budget process. We prepare
117our budget based on that. But just depending on how the student population moves within the state of South Carolina, they adjust those numbers at day 45 or after day 45 and they process that enrollment data and they give us our final projection. Uh our final numbers, we really don't have until after they process day 135. uh which doesn't really give you a lot of time to adjust. So we will look at the pay 45 numbers very closely and adjust our budgets accordingly. On the expenditure side, all of the additional reductions are coming out of the salary and benefit amounts. Um originally we were extremely conservative in our estimates and the expectation that uh when our actual expenditures fell below budget that we would be able to use those excess funds to build our fund balance.
118Uh with the reductions we are left with much less room uh for any kind of unexpected increases. Uh we moved a lot of our positions over to federal funding sources and unfortunately we had to eliminate a lot of uh a lot of positions. Uh many of the eliminated positions were occupied or being held by working retirees uh which frankly carry the highest cost of any employees in our workforce. Um but while that helps our bottom line, we also have to recognize that when we lose a lot of our retirees and a lot of our more experienced that we're also we're losing a lot of valuable experience u by not being able to keep those individuals in our workforce. Uh there are no other changes in the document that we're presenting for your approval. The salary
119schedule, supplements, and capital projects information are not changed from what was presented in June. uh the final document only reflects the changes from the prior year and not the ones from the more recent version of the budget and that was so we can have a clean document that uh we have to that we will post on the district website and again as Dr. Pinland mentioned earlier that has to be done by September 1st >> on salaries. We know salaries equals people. So of this 875,000 that was reduced from the original budget that was presented. What people >> um that was included in that list of the four million positions, $4 million worth of positions that we had cut earlier in the year. And so once we actually got the budget running and everybody um allocated
120to the right account, we were able to notice that um and recognize the move of those um we were able to reduce the budget in those areas. >> Okay. >> All right. So I know we need board action on this. Is any further discussion before I do that? >> So if these items had been looked at prior carefully like requested by the board, would we have not known that we could have reduced the budget by 1.8 million earlier in the year? >> Um I'm Can you ask your question again? I'm sorry I didn't quite follow that. >> So in June this budget is 8 million less than what it was in June. >> Yes. Yes. >> If we had not looked at each of these expenses and revenues more carefully prior to that June meeting,
121would you have not been able to find that this could have happened then and we wouldn't be having this discussion? >> Well, there were changes that were be that were made to the >> and I understand the county has I'm not asking for that part. I'm just saying these expenses particularly, could they not have been looked at better then? Well, again, I I'll go back and say we knew we knew when we were presenting the budget previously that we were being extremely conservative uh in that with the hope that once we and again and there's also been a lot of staffing movement since then. those original uh projections are made based on who we have in place and how we're staffed in in April of, you know, going into the budget season. So, some changes
122have been made, a lot of changes were made to move people out of the general fund that were paid with general, you know, their salaries and benefits were all paid with general fund dollars. Uh, Dr. Penland and and Mr. Lac Rose and I sat together and went through a lot of these positions to determine who she could absorb in some of her federal funds. And so you're eliminating a lot of uh potential expenditures for supplies and professional services and things in order just to absorb those salary dollars. So we we knew we had we knew we had room a lot of wiggle room in the budget. Uh but the hope was that we would come in again with with more numbers more like these and that those additional dollars would flow directly to the fund
123balance which we know we need to build. Unfortunately, once we, you know, start adjusting our revenues down to what we think are more conservative estimates. Uh we really don't have that kind of flexibility now. We really have to watch um how we how we staff our our schools. Um, you know, I don't think that u, you know, and Dr. Finland can certainly speak more to it. I I think that we're kind of bare bones on our on our educational staff at this point. I don't think we can really handle any additional cuts. Um, but you know, we only have the dollars that we have and a lot of difficult decisions have had to be made on where we could shave expenditures to make this budget work. Uh we know that this district's financial health is
124has been damaged significantly the last couple of years and we have zero option on continuing that path and we have to build it back. So we were hoping that with that using that conservative uh budget and and and still making the the cuts that we thought we could get away with that we would be able to start building back on the fund balance. But you know where we are now is based more on because now we're we're operating our schools are staffed where pretty much where we expect them to operate for the remainder of the fiscal year. So these numbers are a lot more concrete and you know more tied to specific individuals in specific locations. And it still will require us to to do to encourage certain behaviors to minimize additional costs above the
125base salary, particularly in overtime and things of that nature. Okay, we have our updated budget in front of us and we Need a motion to approve approve the changes. >> Can you tell me how many positions I know um with the budget for how many at the district level was cut again? >> I would have to at the district office. >> Yeah, I might have to pull that number because that was on that list and I don't remember off the top of my head. Okay. because there were several parts and pieces, you know, some were reduced and some were um eliminated. So, I'd have to go back and pull that. Thank you, Mr. Carpenter. Do we have a second? >> Second. >> Any further discussion? >> All those in favor of proving of approving the
126general fund budget update as presented by Mr. Lis, please say I. >> I. >> Any opposed? >> The budget's approved. Thank you, Mr. Lawless. >> Thank you. And finally, our district's procurement uh policy, which mirrors the state's model code uh requires school districts develop a minority business enterprise utilization plan. You should have received a copy of the district's MBE plan with your packet this month. That plan, which is identical to the plan you approved last year, details the district's goal to ensure minority businesses are offered the opportunity to fully participate in the procurement process of the district, as well as the types of actions the district will undertake to encourage participation. In large part, this consists of reaching out to businesses that have been certified by the South Carolina Division of Small and Minority Business
127Contracting and Certification when the district is seeking quotes or bids. This plan is not a guarantee to utilize any particular business, just our efforts to solicit quotes and bids from minority businesses. Awards will still go to the lowest quote. If two or more vendors are tied for the lowest quote, minority ownership would serve as a tiebreaker factor in awarding a contract. Uh the board is required to approve this plan annually at least annually uh and receive an update every every six months on the district's efforts and results of those efforts. Uh I believe in July you did not have a meeting for us to present that information. So it was just included in your packet. That information required no action. It was really just for your information. So uh just this evening we are requesting
128your approval for the minority business utilization plan as it is presented. >> Is there any discussion? >> Yes. >> That would have been in the information that you received back in July. Um we I know we exceeded our targets but I don't recall the number. It's not with your information in the packet. >> It was sent out in our July. >> I saw it end of the year. I mean, end of the month update. >> Say it again. >> I think it got it somewhere. >> Yeah, it was in the update. >> Since we met, I'm going to make that. >> I'll second. >> Any discussion? All those in favor of approving the minority business utilization plan, please say I. >> Any opposed? >> The plan is approved. >> Thank you, Mr. Lis. Now, we'll
129move to public participation. Uh, individuals who submitted the required form for public participation portion of the meeting are strongly, excuse me, are strongly encouraged to maintain appropriate decorum while addressing the board. Please remember that this is a meeting of a public school board and children may either be in attendance or watching via liveream. Please use this appropriate language. Please use appropriate language reflecting the nature of the meeting and its audience. In pursuant to board policy BEDH, speakers may not offer objective comment or may offer objective comments on school operations and programs that concern them. The board will not permit any public discussion in any public session, any expression of personal complaints about school personnel, nor against any person connected with the school system. We have two individuals that have submitted forms to speak tonight. And
130the first I'll call up is Miss Julie Edwards. And you do have three minutes to speak. Go ahead, Miss. >> Good evening, >> Madam Chairperson Little 55 School Board Trustees, Superintendent Dr. Pinland, and Assistant Superintendent Dr. Harris. I am here this evening to respectfully ask for you to reconsider your decision to allow Milestone Towers to lease land in Collier Park for the reason of constructing a 230 foot self-support wireless communications tower. In April of this year, I received a letter in the mail that that I assumed was just another one of those pieces of junk mail that I get in my mailbox every day. Upon opening it, I learned about Milestone Tower's desire to build a cell phone tower and call your part. My first thoughts when I got the letter were, why would they
131want to put something we that we know admits radiation radiation adjacent to two schools and a science center and inside the grounds of a park? I then grew concerned about my neighborhood and the other neighborhoods surrounding this area. Not only would hundreds of children and Laurens District 55 teachers and staff exposed to this radiation, but also the people living in the neighborhoods around the tower and the many people who enjoy the outdoors in this area. There was a QR code included with the letter to sign up for an online town hall meeting in May. I signed up for the meeting and attended on the designated day. I was shocked that there was only one other attendee on the call in addition to Dr. Pinland and Dr. Harris. I expressed my concerns about the health effects
132of the tower at this time. school official on the call also me mentioned a concern about the tower being within the vicinity of the fields at the park. The conversation was mostly squashed by the cell phone tower representative as he said the radiation is monitored annually to check and make sure it's at approved levels. The call ended shortly thereafter and the response I received regarding my concerns has plagued me ever since. After the call, I began researching the cell towers further and these are a few things that I have found. There are no long-term studies to show what the effects of the exposure to this radiation may be. There are some short-term studies outside of the United States. One most recently in Germany released in 2024 that found residents who live closer to cell towers
133were therefore exposed to higher levels of RF radiation and had significantly more breaks and disruptions to their chromosomes. Also, some previous studies from Germany and other countries have leaked proximity to cell phone towers with a potentially elevated risk for cancer. Another article states, "Specific absorption rate limits set by the Federal Communications Commission nearly 30 years ago are outdated and need to be revised. These limits from 1996 account for only 30 minute exposures to radiation. RF waves can potentially interfere with several types of medical devices including pacemakers and insulin pumps depending on the strength of the waves. There are numerous school district school districts across the country that have passed resolutions to no longer allow cell towers or cell tower or cell tower antennas on or near schools. Children are more vulnerable to RF radiation as
134they absorb it deeper into their brains and bodies. A child's developing body is more sensitive to environmental stresses. There are no studies on the effects of 5G networks. I've got another page, but I guess I need to stop. U Thank you, Miss Edwards. If you have the information um that you can email, you can email it to Dr. Penland, you can email it to myself, and we'll make sure that the the board can see the other information that you have. If I could just add one thing, I did have a petition signed by more than 50 people in the surrounding areas who are also in agreement with um what I've spoken about today. >> Okay. >> Thank you. >> Next up is Mr. Robert Whitmore. Uh to the to the members of of the board,
135I want to thank you for allowing me to be here this evening to u listen to my complaints. Um I have been employed with the school district 14 years. Uh I attended high school here. graduated in the class of 78. So once a Raider, always a Raider. But um I have um enjoyed working here. Last year uh things began to change. uh we got a new transport transportation director and um he didn't care uh how he talked to employees uh young or old it didn't matter and so I just I got tired of seeing some of the older workers being disrespected and uh so I uh u turned well I talked to HR about the situation. And so immediately the next day um he uh gave me a a fake I call it a fake
136uh evaluation. I mean he did it and I did nothing to observe to uh deserve a bad evaluation. Wasn't even time. And um so also he had a bad habit of telling people there's the door you know just you know if you don't like it there's the door and so um but he told me one day that if I quit chasing this woman uh I could do my job and I had any problem doing my you know, I don't know where that came from. And u I reported him a second time and this time uh he told me that I was going to have to be uh to go through reertification and that you know and and I couldn't do it. was happening. Um, every time they would plan, uh, schedule me, um, it wouldn't
137happen and and it began to be like a game to them. They would just, uh, well, um, you need to go and do reertification next week and and next week coming never happens. Um, the secretary, one of them was a problem, is a problem. Uh, she emailed me uh at uh well she called me at my house and um and said that u next week you got to be re you got to go through reertification but she you know and then finally she she emailed me said the same thing and u so she you know it was just a game she called me one day to tell me again I told her I said don't call me on my personal on my phone again when I'm off the job. Don't call me again. And and
138and you could hear laughing in the background. It was just a game. >> Sir, was any of the others going through reertification or just you? >> Well, at the time they started with me. Um, nobody had heard anything about reertification until they told me they're going to send me. Now, everybody's got to go through reertification. We got guys up there now, but people like up there now who are driving but haven't >> Well, for some reason, you were hurting. >> Exactly. >> Yes, sir. >> Well, Mr. Whitmore, thank you for coming to speak to us tonight. I believe you have shared some information that Miss Franom left in our packets for us. Um, and you're we're only allowed to let we only allow three minutes for each speaker. Um, and it's not it's not customary
139for us to provide a response or an answer while you're standing here, but we will um make sure that your concerns are followed up with and uh we will be in touch with you. >> Okay. But they'll tell you they'll tell you the story. >> Thank you so much. >> Thank you very much. >> Thank you. >> Now, we do have a executive session on our agenda. So, we will need a motion to move into executive session. move in executive session. >> I'll second. >> Any questions? All in favor say I. >> I. Any opposed? >> All right. We're now in executive session or moving to [Music] call our meeting back to order. Um, from executive session, we do have board action to take. Um, if we could get a motion for our certified contract
140employees for list A and B. >> I'll make a motion we u we pass A and B, certified contractors. >> I'll second. Is there any questions or discussion? All those in favor of approving the certification list for certified employees for list A and B, please say I. >> Any opposed? >> All right, the motion carries. And now with no further business on our agenda, we will adjourn. Thank you.