001This meeting of the Tyler ISD board of trustees is called to order. Uh we do have a quorum. The meeting has been duly called and the notice of the meeting has been posted in the time and manner required. Thanks everybody for um coming out today. Um we have one thing. Uh well I guess we'll go into executive session real quick. Yes sir. Yep. We're going to go into executive session real quick. [Music] Okay, we are reconvening from our first executive session of the day and uh we do have an item uh which is toh consider u board approval of hiring uh a director of athletics. Mr. Washman, uh trustees, thank you for for uh doing what y'all do. Um, it's it's been a while since we've considered a director of athletics, over a decade. And
002um, I believe it was so important the last time that you hired the director of athletics before you had the superintendent hired because there the vacancies were at the same time in typical East Texas fashion. Right. So, today we have a recommendation before you for uh the designation and the promotion of our one of our assistant athletic directors in Sam Gillespie. um you've got his resume in front of you and we're in good shape athletically, administratively, there's no doubt about it. Uh the last 10 years have seen an improvement, not only facilities, thanks to our uh taxpayers, uh you know, approving um those bonds by an average of 7525, you know, they they actually voted on that, took on that debt. Um so that was part of it. That wasn't the only thing, but we've
003been able to enhance our facilities that way, but we've taken care of them and we've maximized them. Uh certainly uh not only just maximizing our facilities but also maximizing the the quality experiences that we have for our student athletes as it is one of our front porch uh things that we can uh that we can accomplish. Teaching kids how to read that's hard. It's really hard. But u you know making sure that kids have quality athletic experiences or fine arts experiences or co-curricular competitive academic experiences. if you work a little bit at it and you do things right and you want the best for those kids, those are pretty easy um opportunities and experiences to accomplish. So, I'm excited about that. With Coach Gillespie, I think you're you're getting a different um uh different approach
004on on on this hire. Uh you've got a guy that's been a head coach in a variety of team sports. uh head football coach, head baseball coach, head softball coach, assistant track. Um he coordinated defenses. Um he's also served as a as a small school athletic director. And at the same time, I think he was even a head powerlifting coach at one time as well. So, uh I think you're going to get more of a certainly a different a different speed of that than what we've had. No knock on the last one. This is it's what we've got. So, there's no doubt that uh that Coach Priest handed off a a a quality athletic program uh districtwide. Uh and there's I think we can take off. So, appreciate the work that was done and I
005look forward to the work ahead with um um with your action towards Sam Gillespie. Very good. Uh board, does anybody have any questions or comments before I entertain a motion? Okay, I'll go ahead and entertain a motion on this item. Mr. President, I move that we accept Sam Gillespie as the director of athletics for Tyler ISD. Great. Do I have a second? Second. All in favor say I. I. All opposed. The eyes have it. And the motion carries. Congratulations, Coach Gillespie. I'm I'm not much of a speaker, so I'm going to keep it short and sweet. Um, Dr. Crawford, President Washman, Board of Trustees, I want to tell you how honored I am and humbled at the same time. I think this is not only one of the best jobs in East Texas, I think
006it's one of the best jobs in this state. Uh, and and I promise you, I'm going to work tirelessly to make sure we achieve successful student outcomes like our our mission statement says, and we're going to try to enhance that through athletics. Um, Dr. Crawford, you've done more for my career and my family's career than I could ever repay you. Uh, I I want to tell you that here publicly. Um, uh, very honored. Uh, I got to meet Dr. Crawford about 25 years ago on a baseball field in Ulis, Texas at Trinity High School. That was the first time our paths crossed before he was Dr. Marty Crawford and knew at the time put a quality product on the field. Um well coached um developed a relationship with him and fortunately was able to work
007for him again as athletic director and head football coach when he was at West uh as a superintendent. And I know the day I I left he told me he said, "You're going to work again for me one day and here I am." and he's a hard guy to say no to. And part of that's because such a great job he does in the leadership role. And I know we're very fortunate to have him here in Tyler ISD. And I want you to know my family is very fortunate uh for your friendship. Um uh I've got some family here today. I do want to recognize my mom and sister are here today. Uh they've been a big part of my life. Um supported me throughout uh my career. Um my mom was one of those
008that was the first one at every ball game. um never miss one and uh uh think the world of them. Uh I grew up my dad was a cutting horse trainer and he put a work work ethic in me that uh you know I still carry on today. Um also my wife and my daughter Mandy and Annie. Uh my wife's uh works here in Tyler ISD. I know a lot of you know her. Um, I read a quote today that talked to young coaches about uh picking a spouse. And they said, "If you're in this profession, you need to pick a spouse that uh thinks as much of your profession as you do." And I hit a home run, I promise you, with that one because uh she's been a huge, huge supporter of me
009and my career. And I know I wouldn't be here today without her. So, really appreciate uh your trust in me. And I promise you, I'm going to do everything I can to make sure our athletic programs are the best in the state. Thank you. Thank you, coach. You bet. I was I happened to be on the committee uh back 11 years ago. 11 years ago in 2014 when we didn't have a superintendent, but we were hiring an athletic director and I think I was 31 and been on the board a year and it was a big committee and actually the two head football coaches were on it and hiring their their boss and everything. But um I will say something special about the last 12 years that I've been on the board or especially the
010last 11 is the stability we've had in leadership in a lot of areas including Dr. Crawford, including the athletic director position. And I feel like it's really kind of raised the platform of where we're operating from. And and I I I hope you stay a while and have good success as we all do. And I have no doubt that that that will come. So we appreciate you. Thank you, sir. Congratulations. You bet. Okay. Um now, are we going to go back into executive session now or or And there's no public participation, correct? No public participation. So, okay. I think we can go ahead and roll through the We'll roll on and then and then we'll um we'll head back in after. So, we have a cyber security update and a safety and security update. Thanks
011everybody for coming out. Appreciate all everybody here does for the district. Thank you coaches. from. How you doing? Morning. Morning. How are y'all? We're great. Well, good morning, Doc. Uh, President Washman and board members and Dr. Crawford. appreciate you guys allowing me to come and do the 2425 cyber security update. Uh behind me I have Mr. Kisa Sunday who is our network security engineer. I brought him with me in case you ask me any security questions that I don't know the answer to. Uh he is the brains behind most of our cyber security policy and and and stature. So as y'all are aware uh back in 2019 there was quite a bit of uh uh legislation passed that required us to do several things. I talk about it every time but mostly it requires us
012to create policies and to have a cyber security coordinator of which Mr. Kisa Sunday fills that role. So where do we stand today? Um we recently completed our cyber security assessment. We work with a partner uh that helps us through that each year and we scored a 3.2 out of five which is an improvement over last year where we had a 2.8 uh which was an improvement over the year before. Um we're very very happy with the 3.2 to after visiting with our partner who works with over 250 school districts to perform these assessments, they told us that we are one of only two or three districts that they work with who scored a three or above. So 3.2 is a very very good score. Um, and it gives us a nice balance between the
013access to educational resources that our staff and students need and also gives us the security we need to make sure our network is in a good place. So, we're very happy about that. Um, we also this past year blocked over 48 million spam and fishing emails. Um, which accounts for 80% of the incoming email to the district. And when I saw that, I thought I was astounded by how many emails that is. If you look there on the chart, you know, the green represents the 60 million plus emails that we get every year. And the red is how much of it is actually spam and fishing emails. Um, pretty pretty crazy. Now, most of that email is blocked before it ever gets in the district. We have appliances and tools in place that block most
014of that stuff. Um, but we do still get some through. Um, not nearly 48 million, but we do get a few through. Um, our secondary data center, you've heard me talk about that over the last couple years, has finally been uh completed and is fully operational. Um, which allows us to have a very enhanced network. It's more reliable. It's more resilient. We can uh take some outages without affecting the whole district, keep our internet operational. um and has contributed to an over 99% uptime for this past year. So, another thing that we're extremely happy about some progress we made in the 2425 school year. Very happy to say another year and no data breaches. Um happy to say that every year so far. Um and we've also 100% compliance with our cyber security training and
015we have made considerable investments in our in our district and our cyber security stance uh to just to try to make sure that the district safety net is in a good place. Increased training um increased tools um and just trying to make sure that we have a good balance between security and access for our for our users. So keep what keeps us v vigilant. If you'd asked me this a couple years ago, I would have said I if you asked me a couple years ago, "What keeps me up at night?" I would have said, "What if our internet goes down? What if we lose access? What if one of our data centers go down and we lose the ability to teach?" Because everything these days is just about goes across the internet. We feel that
016we've got most of that resolved now. We don't feel like we're that that's a threat. Uh but what keeps me up at night is someone getting caught in a major fishing campaign. Um fishing and ransomware. They're targeting schools. It's a national trend. It's probably the biggest thing out there that we have to avoid. As you could see by the previous slide where we're getting hit with 48 million emails. We're bombarded daily with these emails. Um trying to get users credentials, trying to get access to things they don't need. And there's a lot of sensitive data at risk from student data and employee ID numbers, medical information. Um and so Mr. Sunday spends a lot of his time doing pseudo fishing campaigns, putting tools in place to try to make sure that we don't get sus
017get affected by that. Um, we're constantly training our staff, testing our staff with fake fishing campaigns and then giving training to those who don't make it so that who who click on the things they shouldn't so that they're they're aware of what a fishing email looks like and so that whenever something really does come through that they know what to do to avoid that. So, one of the biggest one of the things I'm most nervous about, but I feel like we're in really good place. Um, doesn't keep me up at night, but it is something to think about. Um, other than that, you know, just trying to be proactive in our defense. We don't want to ever be reactive to a problem. We want to make sure that we are planning for things that could
018happen. Um there's always a need for advanced tools, but with budget constraints, trying to find that nice balance between having the tools we need to make sure that our network is and our data is safe and also being cognizant of the taxpayers's dollars. So, uh that's something that we we strive for. Our strategic priorities moving forward, uh we want to invest in some real-time threat detection. Um that's just enhanced tools like I was talking about a minute ago. Want to continue to enhance our Informiccast security alerting system. Um what that application does is in the event that there's a lockdown or a fire drill or any kind of emergency situation, not only do alerts go out over the audio systems of the schools, over the phone systems, but also now all the displays, the the
019interactive flat panels in the classrooms, the panels that we recently upgraded in all the uh uh common spaces, office areas, there's visual alerts that is posted there to help in the case of an emergency so that people can see visually, they can the audibly and then also we have an app that goes along with that that pushes alerts to them as well to help keep folks safe in an emergency situation and keep them informed. Uh that's in conjunction with uh Mr. Millsel and uh that's been a really good tool for us. Um, aside from that, just trying to stay ahead of risk, you know, keeping Tyler ID secure, expanding our cyber drills, um, working on some macro segmentation and then things with our network to kind of just separate it off and make sure people
020are only accessing the things that they're supposed to. But ultimately, everything that we do uh, in this space is just trying to keep our data u, and our network secure and operational. So, uh, that is the 202425 cyber security update. If you have any questions, I'd be happy to uh address those. Thank you. Uh board, anybody have any questions? Just a comment. Yes, ma'am. Um I remember the fishing trainings and all those things and we would get angry and upset, but they are very beneficial, especially in a time like this. And so to everybody out there, you need to do the fishing training because it helped me with my personal computer. Now I know what to look for and what not to look for. I'm not clicking on any links. So, it is helpful for
021those of you who haven't done your training to get on it. Yes, ma'am. That's a good point. That is a blessing on the personal level. Anybody else have any questions or comments? Just a comment. I'm I'm I'm very impressed with the improvement each year. I think that's something that you always have to look forward to and I think you're doing a very good job at, you know, making sure that we're very secure within our district, which is like that can say at this day and time, it's really something to be concerned about. I get a lot of junk at at home. That's why I don't go through my emails very much. Gina, I'm sorry. But but but it is it's important for us to know, especially as a district, that it's very secure. And I
022feel that it is very secure and you're doing a very good job. Yes, sir. Thank you. How many flat panel screens do we have and com and computer screens do we have districtwide? Uh interactive flat panels somewhere in the 14,500. Um, I mean there's one in every single classroom and then there's a lot of common spaces that have them. We just recently updated all the common spaces with new screens as well. Um, so I mean computer screens estimate everybody's got every office area. So every staff member not every right every st computer screens there's not there's not a computer screen assigned to every food service worker. Well no sir they have access to them though. 22 2500, okay, give or take. And then so we're we're north of 3,000 as far as emergency alerts and
023things like that that that could flash on there and any tornado, bad weather, u stayput alerts, whatever you want to call them this year on the back of your card, your ID badge, right, Mills? And so I it's a it's a it's intricral with us as far as keeping our our facilities safe and secure. Absolutely. It hasn't been that long ago to where we didn't have that. Um, no sir, just the past year and a half or so. And you're not even talking about your phones, your phone system that we've we've consistently upgraded as well, which the super schools can actually send an all call message to every one of those phones. Not that that's ever been done or not. Um, but my point on that is is thank thankful for the community to support
024us uh to be able to enhance our facilities, which technologies been a big part of that. There are a lot of school systems in East Texas and even across Texas that are having to play a lot of catch-up on this. We've got really good staff. Um Mr. Jax and all of his techn all of his techies that he's got, Mr. Bogue, all of his techies because we've kind of split that. And then we've got safety and security that really roll into this as well. So again, we could not do that without the community support um over the last 20 years that we've had. And um it it really does help us as far as being able to to to keep our kiddos safe and and secure along with our staff persons as well. So um
025good stuff. Um even though we can't stand the fishing training, we have come a long way. I was I was talking to a lady last night that that was a teacher in the 70s at Lee and she said that, you know, they had phones in every room but they didn't work. And so to to refer any disciplinary action, they would have to send a note with the kid to the principal's office and then they would like never get there. And then so then she'd have they they get called out, she'd have to leave the class and you know safety and security. I mean no teacher in the classroom and then but we have come so very far thanks to the public approving these facility upgrades. And I had a question about uh I guess our
026backup generator or you know our other have we had the opportunity to see it in action a few times since uh well we have one at both locations and and yes we've seen them both in action. Okay great. Yeah we've done failover tests where we basically completely shut off one data center. Okay and run out of the other one. Now we don't have every service provided out of both data centers but internet access is provided. So if if we were to lose the administration data center, all the traffic in the district automatically without anyone even knowing it, internet traffic would switch over and flow out the other one and most folks would not even know what happened. Great. And same thing with the other one. Right now we're load balanced across the two generators kick
027on when the power goes out. Yes, sir. We've tested them. It's always good to see things working when when it actually happens as opposed to scheduled test, you know. Yes, sir. It's always seems to be different. But question follow up on that. Uh, is there do we have a regular scheduled test of a backup generator? Do we do it every so often or it's just whenever you think about it? Every Tuesday at 2:30. Every week. Oh, okay. Great. Yeah. Ask Mr. Bo when it kicks off right outside his window. Yeah, that that's what my generator does. So, it's funny. Great. Does anybody else have any lot of improvement? I remember uh I remember the old uh what was that? What were the TVs inside of the old of the high schools? What were those called?
028Rojo called program channel one channel one channel one TV then it was CNN for schools that was always fun so uh glad we've uh overcome some of those archaic and antiquated things that were man I guess I was in high school when that was starting so uh little bit little bit more modern now so thank you for the work y'all done back then it was pretty modern though to be watching a a team one I mean team one in in a home room in sixth grade that you know Lisa TV every day Yeah, it's was kind of cool, but Okay. Thank you. Thank you. Appreciate it. So, that was cyber security and we talked a little about safety and security, but now we have a safety and security update by Agent Milsagel. Good morning. Morning.
029Put it in here. Uh, President Washman, board of trustees, Dr. Crawford, and of course, Miss Ore, who keeps us all on online. This is your safety and security update. Um, I've talked to you before about TEA and the new safety and security stuff down there. And last week I was fortunate to be in a meeting where two of the folks from TEA uh were there on school safety and they announced to me and then I passed it along to Dr. Crawford in March of next year. They are going to do their district vulnerability assessment. They will hit 22 campuses and we don't have the exact date but they'll be here for about two weeks and they go through a Rubik's and they use a a system called Sentinel which they took away from the FBI
030years ago. It's called Sentinel where we put in documents and I do that every week and I probably put in 2500 documents this school year. We're ready if they come tomorrow. Um, and that's a credit to not only my guys that work for me, but it everybody else. We're doing it right. Um, I did also ask them, what are they seeing statewide so we're prepared? Number one, by far and away are doors. Doors that are propped open, doors that are open, that are unmanned, and things like that. Uh, we take a very dim view of that. Um, and we haven't caught anybody in quite some time. And that'll lead into my fourth thing that we'll talk about here in a minute. Number two, uh this little item right here. When they interview any staff member,
031what do you do in a lockdown? And it's real easy. If you turn this over, it says lights, locks, and out of sight. But I was very surprised that many districts failed and findings not knowing what to do. Also explained to them what we have in the informcast, how it goes over the IFPS, it goes over phones. They like that. So, talked about that for a while. The other thing was substitutes, not knowing what to do. So, we have in place with Miss Perkins and HR, when you become a substitute, we're going to give you a packet and you come to the school. It'll have a badge with this in it, explanations on the standard response protocol. It will have a key. It will have a map. It will also have an evacuation map and
032a list of numbers if there is an emergency, what to do, how to dial 911 because you'd be surprised people mess that up on a regular basis. It also will tell you who the officer is, our numbers, and and kind of what to do in case of an emergency. It'll also be on the vector training and so they also like that. So those were the big things that they've been finding for the past four months. as bullet number two is we have been a pilot program for the behavioral threat assessments to get it standardized across the board in the state of Texas. Lori Anderson and I were part of that. They're rolling it out next Tuesday so we go live. So instead of principles cobbling it together and sending it in in June and forgetting
033about one, this will be done immediately. So if there's a threat assessment or a self harm, we put it right in and it's real easy. It's very userfriendly. Um, we've had 22 of our campuses have the intruder audits, 88%. We're 100%. We've been 100% since day one and they come each month and we have three more to go. That's Tyler High, Moore, and Woods. And that'll be scheduled not on a date in which we have testing in May. Um, the school safety center notified me two weeks ago that they wanted updates on our two new campuses, Early College and Hubard. So my team and I went out and we did the 500 questions and visited with the principles on security and safety and that will be submitted. Uh Mr. Nuome, your favorite uh subject here,
034the text dot. Uh last Thursday at this time I was on a Zoom meeting with uh Austin and four local engineers here in the city of Tyler and we passed the first hurdle. Uh, next hurdle will be if it passes down in Austin, we will do the detailed application. I will come before you like we did two years ago and get a resolution from the board, community members, and we'll send that in. Um, the caveat on this is it's about $280 million. Um, the requests that came in for round one were over a billion. Um, but here's the good thing for our project. It will be 100% funded through these transportation credits because we're part of a community under 200,000 people. So, the previous one was 20% matching by the district. So, keep our fingers
035crossed and it it's going to range at about the $750,000 range that we paid for by the federal government through text. And then last but not least, it's May and our fire marshall is coming back. He has a schedule of our testing. We will not interrupt that because this time he's going into classrooms making sure we're in compliance. We did very well last year and I hope to do the same. And that's what I have in a nutshell. Subject to any questions? Uh board, any questions or comments? One thing that does concern me uh when we start talking about the interviews that are going to take place obviously every school system in the state is getting at talked to right all because of what happened uh the focus on and rightfully so in UValdi we
036may not agree with how they're going about some of this stuff but it is severely needed the focus on the safety of our schools whether it be private charter or public that that needs to be a priority for the state of Texas Um, one thing that does concern us obviously if you've got bilingual staff that that and that that might work in food service or maybe custodial. And then you also brought up the substitute um stuff there as far as the consistencies go on a day day-to-day basis when you show up and you're part of the culture of a campus on every day. It's it's it's almost uh ingrained in you. It's almost baked in inside of your day-to-day as far as safety. But all it takes is one hiccup. And I'll give you one
037example. when we had our our perimeter concern on the south end of town the other day between Hubard and Legacy and supposedly in Rose Rdman Park, right? Correct. Which then it was like at Troop Highway, which the Troop Highway and Rose RDman's a long way from each other. So that that wasn't our intel. That was the city's intel. Um I I was there during lunch at at Legacy just kind of on that side of town scouting some stuff out. went there, interviewed some kids. I know some a few kids there. I interviewed one. She says, "Oh, yeah." She said, "Yeah, we went into which which level did we go?" It was a secure. It was a secure. So, everything inside the building is normal. Yes. Correct. So, go about your your your day is normal.
038Is normal. Nobody coming in. Right. Nobody comes in. And so, uh, at this table of freshman girls, there was talk about that. And they were like, "Well, the the sign by the door tells you exactly what all of these mean. Lock down versus threats versus whatever. Everything that's on the back of your badge. Maybe we need to get board members one of those uh to put on to put on their badge." Uh, so in It's funny though because there was one on that table that said, "We thought there was an active shooter on campus in our classroom." I said, "What?" He goes, "Yeah, turned out the lights. Everybody got into a corner, did did the X, Y, and Z of what you're supposed to do?" Because they had a sub. So, how you b a
039thousand on the interview process of this is just something we're expecting that will provide us good Yeah. good intelligence on on where where maybe some of our gaps are. And that's how we're approaching this. That is correct. Yeah. eventually did a great job at both campuses, by the way, because this guy ran eight miles in three minutes between Truth Highway and everywhere else he went. Pretty good athlete. Yeah, it was we were listening to it on the radio. So, I'm I'm That's that is a concern of ours. We've talked about that. How do you get everyone some of these intermittent staff persons that are sporadically with us or consultants or whatever, how do you get them, you know, coached up on the on the safety and security? uh strategy that we have and and the
040logistics and that's something we'll we'll continue to flesh out. I do think eventually Mills and I have talked about this that we will be receiving a safety and security grade. I think it'll be part of accountability. Yeah. Down the road. Absolutely. I wasn't going to mention this because it's not part of the slide, but I see when I'm at a meeting district improvement plan. That's really something not in my world. Well, guess what's in it now? um the police department policy, one page of what officers do at each campus and we've been blessed by the board, the taxpayers to have officers every campus and my staff. So, that's been added um and I sent it over to the folks and say here's the one page that's been approved. And that's kind of the blessing when
041you run into these guys at a sheriff's meeting uh that you sit down and just talk to over a cup of coffee or diet coke and you kind of learn uh what they're looking for because it's all subject to their interpretation and they use that word extensively. Regardless of what the Texas Education Code calls for, it's their interpretation. We've also, just a one last thing, we put this in Spanish now for our Spanish- speakaking employees. That's a new new thing in the last week. Very good. I've had a lot of opportunities lately to brag on uh safety and security at our campuses and and it's so easy to do. I mean, it is just I I can't thank the community enough for giving us these new facilities that are modern, that are easier to keep
042safe. And then I get to brag on our retired FBI agents that are heading up uh our safety and security team. And and that really speaks volumes to to where we're at as a community and where we're at as a board on keeping our keeping our kids safe. It's the best we can do. It's, you know, it's hard to do in the modern environment, but I I don't I can't imagine anybody doing better than we do. So, thank you very much. I'll pass that along to everybody. Absolutely. I you know, I have something in in relation to security. You know, we're required to do a lot of education. So, I just completed mine last night. Gina, once again, thank you for the prompting. Uh I I did notice some things that I've discovered that uh
043in regards to all that information that all the requirements that we have to do now and some of that may have ex existed before but classroom door windows you know and I've been on some campuses and I've seen that and I don't know if we checked off on that in regards to safety or not but that was on there that they should not have their doors you know each door should have a a opening so you can see into the room and they can see out and I've been on some campuses and I know that's not available because uh they cover their windows completely and they can't see out and you can't see in. So, are we addressing that some kind of way? Yes. Um I found out from the guys I talked to uh
044we've drilled about 270 holes with peep holes where we have solid doors. Okay. And they do allow that uh coverings on the windows so you could peek in and peek out. But if it's a solid door Mhm. we're drilling a hole 5 ft up right in the middle of the door. And we put we put in I think 270 right now and we're still counting. Okay. And that also includes um exterior doors uh that are like to the uh fire connections. You've got to put it in there because you could have a human being in there and not know it and somebody banging on the outside. So uh Mr. Grant's team has done a great job in in putting those in. So, so you're saying that logistically I'll answer that question. Logistically speaking, that is
045something that we do not want happening. And you know, as much as we tell principles to do so, that our preference is to at least with those windows, do not cover those windows, it still occurs. And that is not what we want. We do not want windows covered up. Now, I'm going to say this. before 2019. 19. No. When did you Valdi happen? Uh 20 May of 22. 22, excuse me. Before 22, instructionally speaking, so that you didn't operate in a silo so that instruction could be monitored more effectively. Closing doors was a no no. was frowned upon that you were to be transparent with your instruction that was going on. It was but now it's a little different and and I bring this up because I think it's also going to cause some more
046issues for school districts by having those doors closed and locked. So, I there's one thing about in effective instruction. There's one thing about safety and security and and all the things that that entail when you have your doors open. Yeah. Instruction and things that are going inside of your classrooms are more transparent and you can hear things and you can see things easier. When you have the door closed, it's a little bit different. And whenever you're teaching, you got the door locked and an administrator wants to come in and watch instruction or the superintendent wants to say hello. What do I have to do? I got to key out and disrupt the flow of a classroom. So, there's a balance there. But the windows are an effective way if those are open, you can peek
047in there and see what's going on. And we want the windows to where maybe there's a shade a shade or something in an emergency situation. Yeah. There are certain staff members in the history of having doors to close and windows to cover that want to cover those things. So, yes, sir, I see where you're going with that. And Mr. Jones is over there. Let's reinforce that once again that it came from this dice that we need to make sure that we have somewhat of an ability to peek inside of a classroom and this stuff about oh this too there what what do they always tell oh sorry what do they always tell us Mr. Loper or Mills. It's so distracting. Kids are distracting me all the time or or an administrator looking or people looking
048in. It's dist distracting. It is. Especially if you're by the bathroom. Yeah. There you go. By the stairs. I was by the stairs and every time they moved by, knock on your window. Hey, Miss Haggins. And this is live. So, it depends on where your class is. And if you're in a hall where seventh graders come over and it's sixth graders are still in class or if you have English class that's 90 minutes and you change every 45 minutes. So sometimes it is disruptive. I wasn't guilty of that but it was disruptive. Well I I know this that if Miss Atkins was placed near a restroom that means that you there was a lot of trust that you were going to handle your business near that restroom. I had to see it happen. Then just
049a followup comment about the pedestrian crosswalk at Tyler High. I really appreciate your diligence on that project and I don't mind it being labeled as my project. I that's okay. But it is a concern within the the individuals within that area and that safety of their children. And I I think the price is kind of absurd, but I'm I'm kind of cheap. know. Uh, so but I I really appreciate you staying on that and hopefully we can get that to be completed sometime in the future because I think it will be a lot safer over there in that area because so many kids walk along that street and absolutely need to get across. So I appreciate that. Thank you. Thank you. Artist Avenue. Not looking for any names. All right. Uh, thank you. Thank you
050for the update. Okay. Uh, an action item we have is to consider authorizing the superintendent to execute an agreement for retail electric services for the district. Let's not take a motion on that. Let's uh table that for after executive session because I think we've got the attorney that'd like to give you some commentary on that. Okay. So, we're going to we'll take care of that after we have a chance to discuss uh things with our our lawyer. Okay. And then uh do you want to go ahead and and and do the legislative update? Yeah, real quick. Um not a whole lot here other than it is House budget day today. So over the next 24 to 48 hours. It could go that long. Um you're going to see a lot of floor amendments trying to
051clean up a lot of a lot of things inside of um some some budget bills. Um the one thing that I think we should be concerned about is the disparity between the Senate's plan, the House plan on uh teacher compensation and some of the flexibility that allows we all want teachers to get raises and they need to and it's baked into both plans. They're going about it in different ways as far as um the cut points on what the requirements could possibly be as far as how much enrollment you have. In other words, trying to catch up rural teacher pay versus uh what they they see as big city and suburban play. And I'll talk about that here in just a second. That's certainly something that's concerning and how they're going to address that um
052on the House end versus what the Senate's already put out there is something that we're really keeping an eye upon. Um so that's something that's concerning as is the basic aotment. Just being able to have additional dollars inside of your budget that aren't just all relegated to to such a tight scope on what you do with that money doesn't mean you can't pay teachers more even outside of what they're requiring. And I think we're going to come up plan that allows y'all to consider that. But being able to buy school buses, being able to pay for gas and utilities and and other things, buy pencils, buy computers, that comes out of the basic aotment. So, u the Senate side of things didn't really have it. I think they're open to talking about it. The House
053does have plans for that. I did talk about the disparity uh between teacher compensation and there's some things that are really concerning for your for we're part of the Texas School Alliance for about 20% of the Texas School Alliance member districts which are the 50 largest school systems in the state including Tyler. When you start talking about Amarillo, you start talking about Lev, you start talking about Midh Midland and Ectctor County, which is Odessa, um you start talking about Abene, you start talking about Tyler, um you're surrounded by some of these um suburban school systems or smaller school systems. And if you look at the Senate's plan, it it allows rural school systems to supersede some of those districts as far as teacher pay goes, especially early from the 0 to 10 years to well
054supersede us because of the way that the formulas are baked in. They used to have a thing called cost of education index. Remember CI, Mr. Jones? They took that out as a as a regulator. They had the basic funding. And then they had a CI index where they took the urban areas of cost of living adjustments etc etc to live there and that's been taken out as a as an elevator on school funding because it was quote unquote thought of to it's easier it's cheaper to live in East Texas or West Texas than is in a suburban or urban environment. And it's still somewhat true. They're recognizing in some of these proposals that some of your central city districts like I just mentioned and even Long View's considered in that as well that there there
055may be some disparity there and it may not take care of some of those central city areas. So we've talked about that and we've we've we've contacted legislators even the local ones but really the ones that are on these education committees obviously Chair Buckley out of Colleen with House Pubed about maybe doing some cleanup in regard to that. Not to penalize the the the rurals, but understanding that in this grand one beautiful big bill, just I'm saying that tongue and cheek. Um that that there's going to be some consequences in there. And again, trying to protect Tyler and trying to convey and advocate for what what we have along with some of the abans and the and the Amarillas and the Luks that you're going to wind up creating some some disparity and some inequity
056in there for us as well. So, I think if you were going to ask me what by the end of the day what that's going to look like, I think you're going to get a pretty flat um teacher pay raise uh um negotiated uh plan. That's when when they finally go to conference committee, there may not be as much disparity as far as the rurals versus the urbans. And then you're going to see a bump for all teachers across the state that's pretty similar uh in number. Now, you may ask me why that I I'll tell you what what the the the proponents of the rural urban split are that rural Texas is severely underpaid as far as as far as educator pay goes. I think that's part of it. I think the other part
057of it is rural Texas usually votes a certain way and urban Texas usually verts votes a certain way and there may be a little bit of penalty. It's too coincidental uh in regard to that. So I don't want to get caught up in that jet wash because we do things in a bipartisan way uh free of politics. We just want our teachers to get paid the way that they deserve to get paid along with our staff. So, I think there's some of those shenanigans that are going on and we need to do what we can to fight that and and not get caught up in that the vortex of politics. Uh the last uh two things I'll say I think safety and security. We we've had two reports here today uh in in that realm
058that a lot of your maintenance and operations dollars uh which is basically the 85% of our budgets in personnel, 10%'s in fixed cost, 5%'s in discretionary. That's a pretty good cut. It could vary a few percentage points either way, but we sure do pull a lot out of our maintenance and operations, our own basic aotment, if we're going to use the state funding to bolster some of the things that are mandated by the state that we do, and that is in safety and security and special education. And so them pulling some of that out and increasing this the the safety and security aotment per kid and by campus will certainly some be something that we're looking forward to if they can get it across the finish line. Same thing with special education and the weights.
059Um because when they when they unleashed the was it eight and a half percent cap. Remember the remember the the ghost cap that that that you could only have eight and a half% of your your school population to be special education and there was a cap on that. Remember Miss Atkins? And if you exceeded the cap, you got popped with a plan. Well, the feds called us out on that and unleashed the hounds. Now you're you're talking instead of eight eight and a half percent or 6% is what we had uh when we first got here, Mr. Jones, uh now we're at 12%. So we've increased our special education numbers by we doubled it. So is that 100% 50% maybe? I don't know. We've got a lot more kids now that require more services and
060we're struggling on that end. So, um, if they were to fund those things appropriately, and they probably won't fully fund all of that, but yeah, if you go from 6 to 12%, I know it looks like 6% on there, but you've really doubled your kids, right? Okay. Um, if they'll do that, then I think that's those are also some dollars that we're spending out of our basic aotment, out of our M to to support those programming to to again go back into teacher compensation and pay for outcomes. So, those are things that we're looking forward to. It is House Budget Day. It's actually running on my computer back in the office. I watched about that long of it and then headed over here and then I'll probably watch a little bit more of that before
061I go do my next thing today. But, we've got folks that are watching the entire uh the entire goings on down there and we'll provide some updates once they figure out where they're where they're going to be again over the next 24 to 48 to 72 hours, probably without any breaks. I don't know how they do it. Uh, it's crazy. So, any any questions about legislature? I have a couple of of questions. So, just to clarify on, you know, in a in a town like Tyler where where we've got uh people who live in Tyler, but could easily work 10 minutes away in other districts. Um, you're saying under the current proposal, those same people could live in Tyler, drive 10 minutes, and get paid better because that district has less students than the hometown
062that they're in. Correct. Correct. Uh, yeah. The the the scale the scale maximization of a of a Tyler D being able to pay better because of that is is being chipped away at. And so the the one good thing, Mr. Washman uh is that when you go to work in Lindell, Chapel Hill, White House, Bullard, if you start thinking about the the the ring suburbs, people don't leave there. Now, so if they have a vacancy in third grade, they may try to come cherrypick one of our better third grade teachers to go teach there, but it's not like it's a mass exodus. Now, parents will tell you differently and they'll contact you all and go, "Oh my gosh, everybody's leaving XYZ Elementary. We had two retirements." And if you start thinking about 2,700 of our
063staff, 1,250 of them being our we don't want to lose any of them, any of our good ones. Uh but sometimes that does happen and you might hear that, but that might be a thing that's out there that XYZ ISD pays better, but there's also a difference in work conditions as well. Uh different in clientele as far as students go. Now, everybody's got their challenges, but that might be something that's of consideration as well. But yes, that's correct. the the the disparity may not be quite as what it has been. Okay. I would hope our um representatives see that and and understand absolutely and adjust. And then um there's been some talk out I've I've been listening to some people lately and it seems like there's this uh some people are casting a very fearful
064uh vision of our future as far as funding goes. Do you foresee any sort of doomsday scenario where we are cut dramatically in funding uh this session? You know, it's funny. My dad and I had that conversation last night. Y'all, y'all know my dad's a former school superintendent. He kind of keeps up with this. And um I had a real quick visit to Austin uh late Tuesday night and then into yesterday and back in the district yesterday afternoon and here I am today. So, we get to talk a lot. he loves this time of year or every two years because he loves to talk about school stuff and um he asked about that the same way and he said you know I probably in the 30 years I was superintendent went through he said 10
065crisis fi finance it's always a crisis and I think that that's the politics of the whole thing to be honest with you now obviously remember 2019 they improved the basic a lotment. Then what happened in 2021? We're in the middle of what, Miss Atkins? COVID. You were here during CO. You were here. Um, so in saying that, that was a thing to where the state didn't have to go back and and actually do the the finance thing. They could depend upon what? Uncle. Uncle Lester. That's right. And then you get to 2023, and y'all all know what happened in 2023. There wasn't a voucher bill that got across the finish line. And so who were who was penalized because of that? K12 public education. Yeah, you run the risk again of that happening. But we're
066set up way better than anyone else. We did not go all in on hiring a bunch of people as far as COVID goes. We're going to be able to do something compensation wise Tyler ISD is and stay as above that doomsday scenario as possible. You talk about the Department of Education, those dollars have all been are, you know, food service dollars are different. They don't they're not part of title one. So, I don't think that those things are going to be touched. Why why you kids that need to be fed? Why you would want to do that? Politically speaking, that is probably not a good strategy. You want to talk about uh title one funding, that's going to go over into the Department of Treasury, I believe. And so, I don't think they're going to
067cut that. I think that what you look at on the Department of Education is a cut of the bureaucracy. And I want to tell you, being a superintendent for 17 plus years now, I'm okay with that because there's been times when the federal bure bureaucracy has limited us on being effective. even here in Tyler ISD. Um if you can talk about our head start skirmish that we had a few years ago, that was one of the big things that we needed to to fight and win and we did. Um the DEG order u that was that that had extended its life it shelf life rightfully so in place early on but it went way too long 50 years right don't like that close. Um and then you start talking about you know some other things
068that that are that there's federal overreach on. So, I think that's going to be a positive. I don't think it's going to be a cut in in funding, per se. What I worry about with that is that money going to the state and then there is no federal oversight for the purpose of those dollars and and the state who is Austin has now seemed to have turned into DC to where they don't really care for local control. uh if they do something that's not in the best interest of students and they maybe pull all that money together and make it, you know, for special pet pet projects um etc. So, I don't think there's a doomsday scenario there. And if there is, we'll we'll be prepared to to adjust and adapt and do what we
069can to continue to provide decent compensation for our staff. Um vouchers, uh that's always a hot topic. This board has never been for vouchers. Uh what was that? Mayday. Did we have a Mayday press conference? Was it Mayday? That wasn't May. That was in March. Yeah, there was two different ones. Okay. There was one that that we did at the Career Technology Center. And then there was a separate one that the district did. I think that was called Mayday. Yeah, that was Mayday. Mayday was the one that had all the districts across like we had people in Dallas doing Okay. So, we had one in March at this career tech center. Many of y'all showed up to that. Um, yeah, we don't think it's good policy and we also don't think it's good for for
070Tyler, Texas and East Texas because right now the ecosystem, educationally speaking, is solid. We have good rapport. We have good relationships. We share kids all the time. What we worry about are the grifters, the popups, the to to take I mean, we've said that from day one that, you know, $10,000 a kid, I'm going to go get five of them just so I can say I've got $50,000. I'm going to put them on Khan Academy and call it a school. Yeah. That that and guess who's going to get those kids when it when when that private school fails or that charter school fails? Tyler ISD. So, absolutely, we're we're we're keeping an eye on that and we're concerned about it. But the way they've budgeted it, I think it initially again is what 2% of
071public school kids could be potentially siphoned off. Are all 2% going to take advantage of that? I don't think so. I think we do a good job in Tyler ISD. Um, the other thing I'll say on that is, yeah, the concern on that is by 2030 or whatever, it's going to be maybe seven billion. And that would be available dollars in public ed. That would be concerning to me as a local taxpayer or an advocate for public schools and a believer in public schools and how important it is to our republic and our and our nation and our state. Um, that that could be a dent in in any future funding for for for uh Texas. But uh yeah, we're kind of in that rut of of funding funding crises. It happens every two years
072and so it's not anything new. So anybody wants to say that that it's a crisis or any different than what it's been the last two years to four years to six years to 10 years to 20 to 30 to 50, it's always part of the part of the making of this gumbo that we call school finance. the sky continues to fall every two years. Yeah. But but you know, you got to have the right leadership to find a way to win. And so some of my colleagues, and I love them, that live in Austin, it seems like, and they're on the steps of the Capitol all the time talking about how it's just terrible. It is not good. It's not any fun, but it's the it's what you sign on for. It's what you sign
073on for as a board member. It's what you sign on for as a school superintendent to find a way to win even when the the deck is stacked against you. And uh and we're going to continue to do that no matter what happens as far as the funding goes. So, thank you. I have no doubt. Um okay, comment. Yes. You know, I I've been on the board, I guess, about four and a half years or so, and I've always felt very secure about our financial status. U especially after we got that h that three cents or two cents, whatever it was originally for our maintenance. You know, I think that TD is very stable financially and has been for a number of years. U and I think that we as a district have little to
074worry about. Did I say TD or TASD? Anyway, I'm old, so what can I say? Anyway, Tyler ISD has done a very good job on on on protecting this district financially and managed our finances very well. You know, I don't particularly like the voucher concept or the system very much at all. But I think that we as a district have managed very well and I think that we will do pretty well regardless of what happens because of our conservative management of it in the past years. And I don't speak lightly about that considering I'm very conservative in management of money myself. So, uh I think that we have little to worry about on that fun on that sense from my perspective as a board member. I have no doubt we'll keep fighting the good fight.
075Um okay, we'll we'll adjourn then for executive session and we do have two two uh items action items to follow after that. go. We have uh reconvening from executive session. Uh we do have to consider the possible action to uh propose the non-renewal of the chapter 21 term contract of uh Denise Kamuka. Mr. President, on the recommendation of the administration, I move that the board propose the non-renewal of the chapter 21 term employment contract of Denise Kombuka for good cause and that the board president and the administration be authorized and directed to send the required notices. Okay. Hey, do I have a second? Second. Second. All in favor say I. I. I. All oppose. The eyes have it and the motion carries. Uh, one other action item that we had was to consider authorizing the
076superintendent to execute an agreement for retail electric services for the district. Do I have a motion on that item? Mr. Washman, I move that we authorize the superintendent to execute an agreement for retail electric services for the district. Thank you. Do I have a second? Second. All in favor say I. I I All opposed. Eyes have it. The motion carries. There's no other action. Uh there's no other action. Uh and so I will entertain a motion for adjournment. So move. Do I have a second? Second. All in favor say I. I. I. All oppose. The eyes have it. The motion carries. This meeting is adjourned.