001e e e call the meeting to order please rise and join us with pledge I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all all right welcome we are going to start with the good news report Dean good evening uh four years ago you likely all know we were developing our district priorities that guide our work in the areas of academic achievement staff and student well-being Community engagement staff excellence and the use of Community Resources effectively um out of that work another tagline was was born if you will we call it the sual school district experience and we Define it as the intangible gift of a quality public school education where from the first
002time we come in contact with our students our community our parents we will strive to exceed expectations with all with whom we come in contact with so we've been living that workout for several years but uh there was sort of a chance interaction in May that inspired the elevation of the sual school district experience and in early August um we partnered with louder than I it would be we we partnered with one of our our vendor vendors I'll [Music] just there we go it's quieting now a little bit but we partnered with one of our valued vendors AP to create professional learning for our Frontline staff so we had invited our clerical and some of our 12mon uh Specialists to a presentation um under the title of setting the table transforming the power of hospitality
003and business and the author there is Danny Meyer and those clerical and Specialists were greeted at Murphy's Cafe at Lincoln high school did you know Lincoln High School had such a fancy name for their uh Cafe and that was um a great way to kick off our beginning of the year professional development and so um by talking about the sufal school district experience we're talking about elevating all of those interactions we have with people and how can we provide uh great interactions and customer service with with um every interaction that we have so with that we introduced that concept of the sfsd experience a little more clearly and then ironically um as I was talking about that chance interaction that inspired our our work uh a our Child Nutrition employee by the name of Lonnie
004meno uh we found out that he had done some pretty spectacular interaction with a student um and I will show you the beginning of that video [Music] this is Lonnie all right Lonnie menow is a retired marine and a Child Nutrition Services employee for the sou fall School District it's almost Showtime today Midsummer he's serving lunch at Terry Redland Elementary yes chicken fries nope and bread sticks yes during the school year he's seen doing the same job at Rosa Parks Elementary that's how we do it Lonnie would never admit this all right but he has a bit of a reputation oh man what am I doing he's got high energy he plays music and you can tell he just loves what he does he high fives the kids has a special hat every day that
005he puts on uh he he just goes above and beyond uh what's expected and it makes the kids feel really special something I really like about Lonnie is when the kids go through the lunch line uh he knows their names which is incredibly awesome he makes a point to make a personal connection with many students if not all the students at Rosa Parks but that's only part of Lonnie's job Lonnie delivers meals to other schools before serving at Rosa Parks Lonnie drives this truck I would guess that with the food that he takes out with his truck every day with breakfast and lunch included he's sending out and delivering over 300,000 meals a year this is Michael Michael is a student at Rosa Park Elementary today he's wrapping up summer school at Harvey Dunn Michael
006is an amazing student that I've had for the last 3 years he has made so much progress since I've known him as a kindergartener he's had amazing interventionists and teachers his whole educational career and it's just been so fun to see the progress he's made but also to see his personality really Blossom as he's been able to communicate what he knows and what he thinks his thoughts and opinions about his passions Michael is a second grader going into third grade at Rosa Parks and um Michael has um uh a love of vehicles and he really enjoys telling you about certain Vehicles explaining vehicles to you um he also has a really great memory for people and for vehicles and he puts them together he will meet a sub um and remember them and what they
007drive color make model how many doors like he knows cars he is going to be a mechanical engineer because he's going to design cars Lonnie drives a truck Michael loves trucks it was bound to happen and he loves Lonnie's uh food truck and um he can hear it when it shows up and he loves to watch it pull in he could tell you where the engine is he can tell you what kind of tires it has and so he'll ask Lonnie questions or he'll tell Lonnie I don't know that he asks questions he's more about hey Lonnie I can tell you about your truck this summer it just so happened that Michael is at Harvey Dunn and L is delivering some of his meals there Michael how you doing how you doing where's your hot
008carts my hot carts are inside the truck so we're going to leave you on a cliffhanger there um if you haven't seen the rest of that video we'd encourage you to go on to YouTube and find that but I wanted then to en to draw your attention to the fact that the story is uh featured on the back side of the ignite Magazine with a QR code to allow people to um take a a screenshot of that QR code and get in and watch the rest of that story but Lonnie and Michael definitely epitomize the soual school district experience and what we want for all of those we come in contact with the ignite mailing will come out to all postal customers in the next couple of days so we encourage people to pay attention
009to Lonnie and Michael's story on the back but also find good information about some of the work that we've been doing here in the sou fall School District it is the one-time mailer that we send out uh to all postal customers every school year um further in order to effectively showcase what we mean by the sou fall School District experience we have posters ready for our schools about what it means uh for students and then also what this means for staff and so each of our schools will have these color posters as a reminder about the sual school district experience and what it is that we'd like to deliver um each day as we're interacting with our our families and then of course if that wasn't enough those t-shirts that we are so lucky to
010have from our partners um we are coupling our ey show up for kids campaign and then on the bottom of that you see the sou fall School District experience so um wanted to highlight those things that are happening and also let you know that throughout the school year uh we will be highlighting a lot of different special memories special people special events where the sou fall School District experience really shines and um becomes the way that we do business here in sou clubs awesome thank you and it wouldn't be a video without Ben's calm voice love it me too um and I I you can't really underestimate the importance of those customer service skills I think we've all been places whether it's a restaurant whether it's a store whether it's getting your you know tires
011changed whatever and you can tell the people who enjoy your presence and appreciate that you're there and you may not know them you may not ever see them again and our people we do see frequently we see parents we see students we see community members and so um I do think it's so important that all of us have that contribution and that um commit to that experience that we all and you know these are things that are happening every single day and until someone else puts visuals and voice to them um they go unnoticed many times and and yet they really are um things that that make the soual school district special and Lonnie could be doing a lot of different kinds of work with his his background but he loves driving that truck and
012um we love having him yeah yeah I'm excited to see the the additional stories and the people and the students that are highlighted because I think there's so many great examples I think there's going to be a competition of people trying to get their stuff in we've we've gotten several that are coming coming your way in the future awesome very nice thank you very much for that report thank you can I get a motion in a second for approval of the minutes of the meeting held on August 26 please so moved second I have a motion and a second although in favor signify by saying I I po same sign that is approved we have one person who would wish to speak to the school board on a non-agenda item uh you want to come
013up Chad give us your address and five minutes and Don Marie will have your time for you good evening my name is Chad bishop and I live at 7405 South Valencia Drive here in sou Falls I'd like to take this opportunity to once again request that you make George Orwell's 1984 and Animal Farm required reading across the district for all Juniors and seniors these works are not just literary Classics they are powerful tools that help us understand how language can be used to control and manipulate in 1984 Orwell introduced the concept of new speak a language designed to restrict thought and enforce Conformity this is not just Fiction it's a warning today more than ever our students need the ability to recognize when language is being used to limit their thinking and to challenge ideas
014that undermine individual Freedom this brings me to my concern about the influence of the American Library Association and its Affiliates on our local school libraries the Ala under the former leadership of Emily dubinsky has strayed far from its promoting a neutral Community centered approach to libraries derbinski who identifies as a queer Marxist authored the paper queering the catalog queer Theory and the politics of Correction this work pushes an agenda that seeks to reshape how information is categorized and presented often with the specific ideological slant the ala's agenda under dubinsky leadership is not about promoting literacy it's about reshaping the moral and intellectual landscape of public spaces including our schools through the content of their libraries you should ask yourselves what does it mean to queer something what is queer Theory when we accept book recommendations
015from organizations led by individuals with with such agendas we must ask are these materials aligned with our community values or are they pushing an ideology majority do not support we need to recognize the Ala as an organization that has been ideologically captured promoting ideas that do not necessarily reflect the values of our community I ask you how are we ensuring that the materials from these lists reflect what we believe and what we want to teach our students if the administration doesn't read every book that's recommended which is my current understanding how do parents and community members have confidence that these resources are appropriate we cannot afford to be passive consumers of content especially when our children's education and understanding of their culture is at stake in 1984 the reduction of language and control of communication
016were strategies used to suppress descent and control the population today we see similar tactics through redefinition of words and Concepts like diversity equity and inclusion which can often obscure their true intent this is why I'm urging that 1984 an animal farm be required reading they are critical to teaching students about the dangers of ideological control through Language by not teaching them about new speak you are literally participating in new speak every time I hear the words Equity or Equitable in this room I hear Carl Mark's phrase from each according to his ability to each according to his need history shows that efforts to engineer quality of outcome don't lift people up they often bring everyone down to the same common denominator we have seen this play out in real time like San Francisco removing algebra
017as an option from eth grade in the name of equity where the Minneapolis teachers union openly discriminating based on Race but hiding it behind clever language these policies do not Foster success they penalize Excellence erode individual initiative and stifle achievement Beyond these literary works I would again advocate for the inclusion of lessons on propaganda and critical thinking within our social studies curriculum our students should not should be equipped to discern when they are being manipulated whether it's by the media our government corporations or even educational content this is isn't just about protecting them it's about empowering ing them to be thoughtful informed citizens by intentionally incorporating the study of propaganda into the social studies curriculum we prepare our students not just to be passive consumers of information but active thoughtful participants in our constitutional federal
018republic I urge the board to consider this important addition to our curriculum even though not required by the state standards to ensure our students are well equipped to both navigate the complexities of the modern world and Thrive I'm happy to contribute to this curriculum if there's an opportunity to do so thank you thank you for your time can I get a motion and a second for approval of the agenda please so move second I have a motion and a second all those in favor signify by saying I I propose same sign the agenda is approved can I get a motion oh I don't think we have any conflicts today um can I get a motion in a second for approval of the consent agenda 9 a through d second I have a motion and a
019second all those in favor signify by saying I I I close same sign consent agenda is approved for the supplemental consent agenda approval of claims to Sanford Health A1 and two 10 A1 and two can I get a motion in a second please so move second I have a motion in a second all those in favor signify by saying I I oppose same sign that motion passes with one abstention for myself next move on to the reports of the superintendent y we have a few things on the docket tonight the first will be our initial enrollment Report with uh Doug Morrison as a reminder this isn't the final just the initial and then we'll follow that with a budget wrapup from uh fiscal year 24 with Todd beak and then we'll have yet another public
020hearing for some application waivers so with that I'll turn it over to Doug all right good evening School Board uh superintendent stavam and business manager veek my pleasure tonight to present the fall of 24 initial enrollment report um the purpose of the report purpose of the report tonight is to give you the initial enrollment FTE numbers based on the active enrollments at the end of the fourth uh day of school that's been our traditional uh preliminary uh measure that we've taken just to kind of see uh directionally where we're uh going um things will change and things are changing out in our schools now as we're trying to uh figure out enrollment but uh some of the highlights uh that you'll see as we go through some of the specific numbers our current K through2
021enrollment as it sat on business day 4 was 24335 FTE which is about 71 less than the same time last year when we did the Census count uh again the count is based on the fourth day of of school uh and kind of some of the highlights that we're seeing is the kindergarten class preliminarily is uh was at 1,778 which is about 127 thou 27 students less than last year and that's really where we're seeing the biggest difference in year-to year um if you look at grades one through five we're up about 102 students uh Middle School um were down a little bit and and high school were up and that's just the way the cohorts we had a large eighth grade cohort that's moving on to high school and so we see a little
022bit of a dip in middle school and a higher amount in high school um all of that was predicted um and enrollment projections uh and an open enrollment of 1,065 into our district uh pretty flat or up this point up about 15 students so if we look at some of the specifics again K through enrollment 11,250 uh down 26 again most of that uh being a kindergarten uh cohort uh and then six through eight down 131 uh and again pretty much what we predicted and then 9 through 12 up so all total were uh down about 71 students versus last year if you exclude the Karden class were up about 50 uh so um and then prek that kind of bounces around a little bit uh you know that's that starts later in the school
023year so we'll see where that ends up um nothing specific to note at this point and then Junior kindergarten uh 41 students versus 42 last year so um nothing significant there uh we look at preliminary versus final enrollment historically so what generally happens is that our final enrollment will go down versus what we're seeing now uh and that's really the case is because we have a lot of students uh that just haven't shown up for school yet we're waiting for uh they may have transferred and we're waiting for enrollment records and so um typically we see uh at day 15 which is a key day for us which is this Friday then we're allowed to start dropping students if they haven't shown up we haven't received their records uh requests they're just uh at that
024point we can drop them from our enrollment but right now we have to hold them when I looked this morning uh we had about we were up about 50 students versus where we at preliminary but if I look at the enrollment of kids that had missed 10 days versus enrolled 10 days that there were about six 76 of them so we'll kind of see how that plays out um so again lots of moving Parts um and so uh right now we're at 24 335 which is about 14 students more than we were at the final enrollment last last time so um we'll just kind of see how the rest of uh next few weeks plays out on that uh looking at each grade kind of across um it's easier if you look at this probably
025horizontally because last year's uh kindergartens are now this year's first grader and so when you look at it that way uh things are very predictable and uh and and pretty much where uh Todd and his projections said they were be other than the kindergarten class which is the hardest to predict because we're probably looking at some live birth uh forecast from 5 years ago and how all that shakes out and uh we just don't have much as much insight into that otherwise it's just a retention of those cohorts as they move to the grades so not seeing anything really uh that's surprising here on a grade level other than a kindergarten level uh kind of looking at um at the building level I would say again there's nothing really if you if you look at
026the flow of where enrollment was last year to this year and how the cohorts kind of moved through there's really nothing uh that wouldn't be predictable I would say uh the one thing on the kindergarten class is we still see a lot of pressure in the core of the city so when you think about 127 kindergarteners um being less than last year between Laura Wilder LBA Terry Redland and uh Susan B Anthony that's accounting for 94 of that so I would say in that case these probably aren't kids that are open and rolling or maybe homeschooling it's just something it's with the core of the city perhaps and so we'll be studying that more uh between now in the final enrollment that but that's kind of what we're seeing now um otherwise there's not nothing
027uh too concerning you can see the elementary immersion uh number up about 38 kids at this uh point so we're seeing uh just more pressure there with kids coming into our our community um and middle school again nothing not predictable you'd see Ben rifle and Whittier down but again we know that's because they had eighth grade cohorts that moved on that were larger than the incoming sixth grade cohorts uh and high school tends to have the most um you know variability between now and final enrollment uh it's just traditionally the way it is because we know even if we're Gra graduating 90% of our kids we have 10% that are in some various stages of maybe uh dropping out or or moving on so um then finally looking at Open Enrollment uh into our district
028uh that stayed pretty constant uh at around 1,65 again at this point we're up about 15 but we see the same uh patterns we see big open enrollment in Brandon Harris B uh T area Tri Valley West Central and then of course the schools that they're going into uh you can see schools like Sonia sotoor um with our Spanish Immersion program and then of course they go on to a lot of them to Edison and then Lincoln so you can see some of those are our bigger schools what an open enrollment uh into and then probably on the uh on the west side over by Jefferson we get you know West Central and some Tri Valley some of those kids kids coming into our district um we don't get a lot of information on students
029open and rolling um out of our district uh I can tell you last year we had a little over 500 and the year before that we had about the same number we haven't seen at least uh growth and in substantially in that number um they the state will not provide us any student level information on that so we're kind of looking at macro de uh data we can kind of look at the other school maybe to see what their enrollment is doing but it's very hard for us to measure and I would say the other thing that's very hard for us to get um any scientific data around would be the homeschool kids the kids that are home schooling so the the requirements are so minimal as what as somebody has to if they want
030to homeschool their kid um so that's another thing that is very hard for us to to get a handle on but um so that's kind of where uh we're at at this point so the next steps uh for us is final enrollment will be as of the last Friday in September that'll be September 27th of this year and that will also uh be our uh funding number there's uh that will uh that at that point that will be taken so we'll be back to you with a final enrollment uh board report on October 15th and then we sign off with the doe on October 31st with our final fun funding number because we're reconciling ing every student they have versus what uh we have they have a complete view so they can see students that
031are in other districts and so and then the other key date as I said is September 13th which is this Friday which is the 15-day drop date so um we'll probably see another shift um around that time and and kind of have maybe a better idea of what our uh final enrollment U so I would sum it up as saying at this point uh very predictable um other than the kindergarten class at this point and we did see uh I think our current fourth graders um we saw a small kindergarten class that years too otherwise for the last 15 years we've been in that 1900 to 2,000 range uh from a kindergarten cohort perspective and uh the fourth grader fourth graders this year and this kindergarten class have been probably about a 100 less than
032we've traditionally seen so we'll continue to monitor it and uh and report back to you so with that I would ask for acknowledgement of the Fall 2024 initial enrollment report and St by for questions anybody have any questions like you said the um September date will be important from a funding perspective um for us to know exactly where we're at but this is always a nice preview um I always like to look at the open enrollment too because I think it's it's um good for us to know that what we're offering is appealing to people who are not in our district so much so that they want to provide their own education or their own transportation and things like that so um I think we just have a lot of really great great programs sometimes
033it's we have a lot of great locations and people are driving to work or they're doing other things but um we don't have a lot of options for growth in our district as far as the land that we have and so um it's nice when we can have other people um come and join us and help us out um and get a quality education and RB in our schools too so nothing else can I get a motion in a second to acknowledge the fall 2024 initial enr enrollment report so second I have a motion and a second all those in favor signify by saying I I I oppose same sign that is acknowledged thank you good evening um it was uh almost two years ago that we started the 2024 fiscal year 24 budgeting process
034in November when the board laid out the uh guideline and timelines or the guidelines and time the timeline that the budget makers were supposed to follow and then uh we went through the budget last year and this is kind of the final report on that so kind of wrapping it up two years later uh first thing is uh to look at the revenues of our tax supported funds our general fund uh our we budgeted $230 million we came in at 235 million most of that was Esser funding that you know you had several years to spend that money and we budgeted it throughout but you carry it over from year to year and so you it has to be spent by September of this uh this month we're in right now so it all got
035spent in in this final year so that's kind of what was driving that capital outlay u valuations were higher than we expected so that came in 1.8 million to the good special education was about you know uh within 1% of what we budgeted about right right in tune with where we were and uh Bond Redemption that was a actually the some of the tax payments are just a little late and usually that's made up for by prior years tax payments that are then paid but it was it's about that amount short there $50,000 so that that's that that's the uh difference there then we'll go to the expenditures in the general fund um we came in a little low we always like to we you know we came in at 99.2% but that with the
036size of our budget that that means about $2 million but you want to come in low you don't want to come in high if you come in high you'll hear about it from our Auditors so that that's good news there um Capital outlay fund we came in uh quite a bit low there about uh you know only at 76% it's basically in two areas of the budget Jeff kryder's uh building projects um if he kind of budgets summer to summer so and our fiscal year cuts off at June 30th or work that's done through June 30th so a lot of that will get carried over there and then we had a transfer out to the general fund that we obviously didn't need based on what we just looked at so those two make up the
037vast majority of that $8 million that we were under and like I said Jeff's uh Jeff's money will be carried over to next year to finish those projects in the fall that is happening right now special education um about uh they came in about 98 .7% or 755,000 to the good and bond Redemption you know that it's a pretty easy number to to yes there so it's uh it's kind of the fees and whatnot that that might vary a little bit but that came in at basically 100% if you look uh then below it's the net we had budgeted $1.8 million of of uh spending into the fund balance we actually ended up $5.2 million to the good there so um the variance is $7 million now that that's a big number but if you
038remember the budget we just prepared we uh said we'd have a a fund balance of uh well it was 10.8% at the end of this year it's a little bit higher but but essentially that's going to make up this will make up for we were going to be at 5.2% in 2028 we always want to be around 8 and a half this this is a 3.2% difference this net here so it will actually actually Keeps Us on where we want to be five years out from now we were below where we wanted to be with our our projection for next year's budget um the capital outlay we talked about that most of that is is going to end up in Jeff krider's budget this year and then a little bit of it will go to
039uh an additional transfer to keep us flat this year in the general fund special educ a million they actually the variance is a million3 but they still spent into the fund balance by $155,000 and bond Redemption it's about 47,000 different than we thought it would be so if we go to the next slide um so this is our this is our unobligated fund balances as of the end of FY 24 general fund about 13.2% um the state average is 21. 2 so we're quite a bit below that we're a little bit higher than we usually shoot for but we were shooting for five years out and that's what I just Tau about um so we uh budgeted 7 point I don't with no more Esser funds or federal covid dollars we budgeted $7.1 million of
040cash in 25 so this amount that we came into the good this year will essentially wipe most of that out um Capital outlay our Target plan A couple of years ago was to it was for the end of 24 to be at 16 million we're at 19 million we do a little bit better there um sped they're at 17.6% their fund balance the state Max is 25% and nowhere near that um in bond Redemption it looks like a huge fund balance of 54% but it was 6.6 million and we had a $6.1 million Bond payment that was due in August so we don't get we hardly get any Revenue in the bond fund until November so basically that was wiped out in August to pay off that that Bond debt and then finally we like
041to look at where we stand on our average teacher compensation accountability and of course next year the stakes have been turned up by the legislature so this is the kind of last year before that new requirement hit in but uh we are we ended with an average teacher salary of 6,216 that's up 5.8% over the prior year a total compensation and that is 81 136 and only went up only went up 5.4% kind of that some of that variability there is driven by do or do we have young teachers who aren't on Family Insurance or do we have more experienced teachers that are on Family Insurance that's what kind of drives the variability and that number vers relative to the teacher salary the targeted teacher salaries at 596597 state aid went up seven one thing
042that uh ever since kind of the new new well it was 1998 it was new the per pupil state aid formula is you have low years of increases where sometimes you get zero sometimes you get a one and a half% we have a flexible floor and a flexible ceiling so when state aid is low we tend to beat that with the with the the salaries because we're if if we get a 1 and a half% increase from this State we give a 2% increase to the on the employee groups and uh sometimes 2.75 so that keeps it but when it's High We tend to not give quite as much and that's what's going on there this is with this High inflation last three years we've had we've been a little bit lower than them with
043with that um and then we also gave out 570,000 in shortage stiens so that's another close to 6% that does not those don't count towards the average salary so if you threw that on there it would have been 6 point but basically 6.4% uh that was kind of fast but uh that is all I have for you the recommendation is to acknowledge the report on the district's FY 24 budget wrapup and I would stand by for questions anybody have any questions comments no I think it's um it's good to see the progress that we've made on our teacher salaries um every year that's been a focus that we've had and when we can give we we give what we can um because we appreciate and acknowledge the work that our teachers and our other staff
044members do as well um and so when we look at what the state is doing um we're not always I mean we're we're not behind we're leading but when you look at the entire State it's hard to kind of pull that out of there for where we're at so um having also been on the insurance committee I can tell you that we have great benefits and so when you look at that compensation as a total package um that's that's a really huge benefit that people I think sometimes underestimate so we're very fortunate in that area as well um next year will'll be interesting with covid dollars gone and looking at what we need to prioritize and um what's working and what's not and where can we maybe have to cut some Corners um but still
045provide the best education that we can with the funding that we're given so stay tuned for that right all right can I get a motion in a second to acknowledge the report on the fy2 24 budget wrapup second I have a motion and a second all those in favor signify by saying I I same sign that is acknowledged thank you finally Becky Dorman will lead us through a quick public hearing for application waivers good evening um I am back once again um we're working with our Spanish Immersion teachers um who come from countries who do not have teacher licensing agencies um however they need to obtain a teacher's license when they come to the state of South Dakota so we are completing the waiver process to enable them to be properly licensed in South Dakota
046so this is the the first step um in making that happen so tonight I'm here to ask for your permission to uh complete the waiver process for these teachers I will open up a public hearing for anybody that has any comments or questions I have a question so once they show up which we're excited about how long do they have to acquire uh full-time or full license to be educator in South the they actually start applying um while they're still in their visa process and we get a once they've submitted all the things to the Department of Ed we get a letter from the Department of Ed that says yes they meet the qualifications to be a certified teacher um and then once they're physically in the United States they have some paperwork that they
047have to send off to the state and then they are issued a teaching license from there they um have to take two practice tests um to prove they know what they know and then they're able to obtain the proper Elementary endorsement and they have two years to get that test passed just like all of our other teachers who might be teaching outside their subject area um and need to pass a practice test thank you you're welcome all right with that I will close the public hearing anybody have any other questions or comments no uh can I get a motion in a second to approve the application waivers from administrative rule second have a motion and a second all those in favor signify by saying I I oppose same sign those are approved thank thank you
048anything else before we adjourn can I get a motion and a second for adjournment please second I have a motion in a second all those in favor signify by saying I I post same sign we are turn