001I call to order this regular meeting of the DC Everest school board. Roll call. Katie >> here. >> Ben >> here. >> Larry >> here. >> Josh >> here. E >> here. and I am here. Please stand for the pledge of allegiance. >> I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. >> Do I have a motion to approve the agenda for tonight's meeting? >> So moved. And that requires a voice vote. All in favor state I. I. >> All those opposed. Uh we have no public comment this evening. Next up is the consent agenda. Do I have a motion to approve the consent agenda? >> I move to approve the consent agenda
002with all items uh with the exception of 6B. >> Okay. >> Second. >> And that requires a roll call vote. >> 60. Yes. [Music] Yes. >> What's it? >> What's that? >> Okay. Roll call vote. Josh, >> abstain. >> Oh, I'm sorry. >> Approve. >> I'm getting ahead of myself. >> Got it. Ye. >> Yes. >> Katie, >> yes. >> Ben, >> yes. >> Larry, >> yes. >> And I vote yes. Do I have a motion to approve item 6B? >> So moved. >> Second. And that is also roll call vote. Josh, >> abstain. >> E, >> yes. >> Katie, yes. Ben, >> yes. >> Larry, >> yes. >> And I vote yes. Uh, reports and considerations. And that is me. Uh, we have some upcoming events for WASBY. The fall regional meeting will be
003held Tuesday, November 4th at 6:00 p.m. at the Holiday Inn in Rothschild. The premeating workshop will be on strategies to improve attendance and re-engaging students. Attendees at this meeting will also be voting for the WASBY region 5 director. And then we also have the fall legislative conference Saturday, November 8th at the Holiday in Stevens Point Convention Center. We will have legislators and public education advocates providing the latest legislative updates and action items. That is all I have. Next up, that would be Larry for CISA 9. >> We had our meeting Monday, August. Had a good presentation by Al Elementary. Had some new people show up uh uh who were recently elected and took over uh positions for people who had resigned. Um he noted uh that he was uh honored to present at the national
004convention of CISA's and I guess DC Everest was there in Chicago as well. He also noted a consequence that they use stutter as we do and they got a 95% rating in every category. that is that is really something for a service organization and he contends you know we continue to be what you need us to be. So he's constantly you know out there trying to change what what they do and he also comments that you know he is a destination his term uh employer that is to say that he can't really employ anyone off the street. you know, if he wants to have a a counselor there on call to help you with your finances, it has to be somebody who's worked in educational finance or managing first grade or teaching calculus. So, he
005says they have a very specific and somewhat limited pool of people he can hire. And in spite of that, they're doing very very well on Stutter. We use stutter and you know we got some 90 92s but all 95s and that puts them like in the top 5% of people in the United States because a lot a lot of service agencies hospitals schools you know police a lot of people use stutter as a rating for their and so they're really uh did well and that's one of his goals to keep that keep that going. The other thing I commented was, and we'll see this later tonight, about the fact, you know, that our employment, our headcount keeps going down very, very slowly. And that's something we have to plan for and look long term for.
006And I commented that, you know, in his situation, it's going to be the reverse. As we have less and less resources we can afford, we're going to be needing to go to the ceases for more and more help on some things where we used to have a full-time person. We can no longer afford that. So I said, you know, we're planning for the long term. We're at 5 10 years out downturn, you know, something at the board level. I said at the at the board, we need to be making sure the cease is planning for the long-term upscale of additional support that's going to be needed as all of our that's the demographics in Wisconsin are what they are. Everybody's going down slowly, but going down. So that that would be one thing at the
007board table up there. We need to make sure that they're planning for long-term. How are they going to ramp up? like he's very they just redid those facilities. They're very clearly near the capacity of that with all the new people. They've been hiring people. Said, "Okay, you going to put on a second story? I mean, what are you going to do?" So, you know, if you knew that you were going to have another 40 people 5 years from now, what what would what would that look like? And so, that that's the kind of discussion we're having there, which is the inverse of what we're having here. So, uh uh it was a was a good meeting. That's my report. Thank you, Larry. Uh, next we have the superintendent report. Dr. Nye. >> Uh, first up,
008facility study. Uh, that work has continued over the summer um with partners Somerville and Findor physically investing time on site to gather uh condition assessment data. So, more about the guts of the building. Um, lot of that happening when staff are not here. Parallel to that and really picking up steam when staff are back is the educational adequacy side of things. um that has been underway with leaders, but again we'll pick up with staff returning this fall. Uh we are continuing to post monthly updates on the district site and Michelle's putting those out on social media as well. Um so not a lot of new news right now with the exception um although Larry might have stole my punchline. Uh enrollment study really one component of um our overall uh long range facility needs. um
009our team has really recognized that there are multiple lenses that when we try to plan that long range facility use uh that we need to look through and so uh as you know enrollment trends are one of those and it led us to partner with W population labs to conduct this more comprehensive study and we've included that full information in your background. Um, what I'm going to do is I'm going to go through just some highle takeaways and then I'll turn it over to Jeff and Kelly to each offer a little bit of their perspective and then um, pause in my report because I think this is one area that's pretty meaty and you might have discussion or questions on. So be happy to uh, talk about that before we carry on. So, um, so
010again, you saw several different models, three models to base, uh, projections, especially in the midterm off of, and we know that, uh, the further out we get from this study, confidence in that data starts to fall off. But there are still some highle takeaways that we think are very solid. Uh, first off, as Larry said, we're going to we're going to look smaller uh, for the years ahead. And I think, um, our cabinet team talked about this in a comment that I heard um, I think actually from Mr. Campman, so I'll give him credit. um is our our typical grade level is going to look more like 350 and that is not the DC ever norm. So um I think we have to start to acclimate ourselves to that. Um that impact is already being
011felt in our elementary schools and it's going to lag in the experience at the secondary um as kids progress through uh K12 through the system. Major drivers uh as Larry said are really rooted in demography. So we're not unique in having families that uh in our in our community having fewer school age students. We are unique though in uh significant rise in adults over 65 if you looked at that census data. That is definitely interesting in our community. Um also of note uh losing 281 households between 2010 and 2020 of childbearing capacity. So um aside from this, we're trying to continue to look at uh more information related to future growth um on the real estate side just to get as many different angles on this. Uh, and so that's more our conversations with municipal
012partners, but um, open enrollment I would say is another, uh, significant factor and I think Kelly's highlighted that, Jeff has talked about that. And even though we're, um, on the winning side of that, so to speak, uh, that trend line is definitely narrowing between our outs and ins and that's continuing uh, to be something that we're going to need to strategize around. One aspect that we think is going to be a dominant part of that conversation is a revisiting of our virtual learning opportunities u because we know that's a contributing oe out factor. Um I'm going to pause there and maybe um Jeff and then Kelly and go from there. >> Uh so one of the things that I would probably mention is it's an an exact science. I think when you talk about an
013enrollment study um there's no more uh evidence than than the current numbers right now. So there's a prediction within the document that our kindergarten class for this current school year would be anywhere between depending upon which model 363 to 368 students. We're at as of 115 um today. Thank you Gloria. Uh we are at 332 students. So we're about 32 to or 35 uh below what they predicted for us. Uh and so uh I mean that that could be a a scenario that compounds um maybe some of the the prediction of the numbers or the errors within those those predictions. Um so I guess that's the piece that I would mention is right now we're not hitting the number that they predicted that we would hit for the fall. Uh so um questions on that?
014I can certainly take some questions around it if you like. I do think what they do is um predict housing developments. We certainly have some housing developments uh going up. Uh it's hard to predict exactly what that will mean in terms of uh kindergarten students for either this year or the upcoming year, but uh that I think that is something that goes into their projection. >> To to quote Yogi Bear, predictions are really hard, especially about the future. >> Thanks, Jeeoff. Kelly, >> I will just echo the comments on if you look at the demographic um data in terms of the age of the population. Um that also echoes some of our conversation in healthcare and some of the costs that we're seeing um looking regionally at our community um and the age of our
015community. Uh the other thing I just want to add with open enrollment, I'll probably hit that on budget as well, is that third Friday count uh in September that that is a point in time and that is how our aid and tax levy is determined. Open enrollment is actually adjusted throughout the year. Um and something we missed our mark when it came to the budget that was an area where we had a deficit um that the last few years in particular the number of students students are leaving throughout the year. So that has lost funding throughout the year. Um and this past year we stayed stable within but previous years we're having fewer come in or leaving us as well. Um both directions and the fact that there's increased um costs and revenue with that
016something we really looked at and recalculated this year to try to be closer to to hitting the mark. So definitely something that we want to think about. So think about the number of ins is is less than we're losing throughout the year. The number of outs has been increasing going out throughout the year as well. Casey, you mentioned the outs being kind of channeling toward that online environment. Is that a trend that we're seeing with that increase that you're mentioning throughout the year that students are finding that they would thrive in a non-inperson environment? >> Is that fair to say? >> Of of our outs, I think you have your front end of the year. it makes sense for my family to be in this district or this district based on employment or historical enrollment.
017But I think that during the year enrollment, we definitely see virtual as a big portion of that. I don't know that I know the exact percentage, but when we look at the number of students that are enrolled in some of those bigger statewide uh virtual charters, it's definitely a conversation that we're having about what would that look like? Should we be considering different options for partnership? It would just be good to understand for those who are transitioning to a virtual environment. What was the circumstance? Was it something personally? Was it, you know, what are those circumstances that are leading them to because that's quite disruptive in the middle of an educational year to leave and make that transition. So, it just be good to understand the rationale for those decisions that families are making. >>
018Yeah. And I I will say um a decision that we made uh that I think we're looking at in different light when we look at declining enrollment is we have not wanted our our mainstay brand to be virtual. We've always wanted, you know, even far before COVID to have options for flexibility for families, but it was more on a needs-based approach. And when it became wholesale, we felt that there were other ways for families to get that quality experience. And so, we've really dialed back from a thousand students to, you know, far far smaller. I think we're looking at, you know, again, can we blend that better and look at that with a new lens going forward? Um, because people clearly are interested in that choice. Um, and that's not going away. We know that.
019I think to compound that, uh, one of the decisions that we made when we went from, um, being a charter school, EVA was a charter school for a couple years to backing away from that, uh, was to be a gatekeeper. Uh, not every student has the capacity to learn in a virtual environment. Uh, and so we developed more of a gatekeeping mechanism through our counselors to really identify who's going to function. Well, one of the struggles that we see with uh not all students, but some students that transfer out of uh our district into a virtual setting is they're not successful and then a year down the road they're they're removed from that school, they're sent back to their home environment and the loss of learning that's occurred over the course of that year is
020something that that's significant to our our educational system. And so we we tried to affect that. Uh and in the process I think we ended up with maybe with kids that are saying well I I want to give this a shot and uh so they they will open and roll out. Uh and I think one of the things that we try to do to counter that is let's identify a class or two uh to see how successful that model is going to be for you. And then if you show success, we'll expand from those one or two courses to let's give you a full-time experience in a virtual environment, which for us right now is through WVS and and C9. >> Other questions on enrollment study? >> Larry, >> got a couple. Um, >> turn
021your mic on, Larry. >> Sorry. Y >> um I'd like to ask my fellow board members to go to the study, the enrollment study, and look at the graph on page 10. It's got the red and the blue and the black in it. Uh the enrollment study of its of necessity was run off of the the census data 2010, 2020. Well, right away it's five years behind and that's just life. But they they do that of course because that's the the data pile they have available to mine because there's all kinds of stuff in that census stuff. So that's that's why that time frame is is there. And they talk about you know the baseline or that baseline stuff is this 2010 to 2020. And if you look at this graph um in 2021 there's
022that peak you know we were going up and up and up. The black dots go up and then they turn a corner and and then they go down. And so the red line is the basis which is assumes all 10 years of data which uses that up uptrend through the first years but the blue line is the one that's the last from 2011 and on which I believe is more indicative of the reality we're facing where things are sliding slightly going down. And I make the analogy of a business situation where you might look at that the 2010 to 2020 the whole red line thing and plan your business. Okay, what am I? If that was sales, okay, what are my sales? If you just took the mathematical average and it's mathematically true and pure,
023you'd be you'd be staffing in 2035 for the red line. And when you got there, you'd be laying off and shutting down satellites and stuff because the reality is more the blue line. That's more the consistent and I think we're seeing that in in some of the other uh data in there in there. The other thing I I found of interest a couple of them table nine is now a five-year trend which is those last five years that shows over over the uh 2025 to 35 that's on page 18 but it's 509 students less over those next 10 years and the the three-year one which is the next table table 10 shows 537. the three-year extrapolation might be too narrow of an extrapolation, but the average might be in between those 530 to 500 less
024students in 10 years in our kindergarten. So, I think the the shorter uh predictions here based on what the data set was on this first graph here, I think they're more realistic about what we're probably going to see. The last item I had was the the very last page page. Here's it. The last t summary they had >> um they talked on overall f 4K12 grade enrollment 5808 in this year projected 5541 to 56666 and as Jeff says it's a it's a estimate if you took the average of all that it's an average of minus 46 to minus 24 if you took the average of that it's a minus three and a half% which on that student is 200 students over five years which kind of hits back to where I was on this another
025number, but 200 students in five years is like 40 students a year is. Now, if we have 600 6,000 students and 600 employees, that's about 10 students per employee is. So, if we're going to lose 40 students a year, we're looking at four people a year, but average, some of them are going to be administrators, some of them going to be teachers, but and I don't know, you talk about getting rid of all teachers. I don't know. getting rid of administrators might be tougher because all the reports and everything are still due. So I think those averages are probably about right um based on the two sets of data and and you know we're looking at 20 30 40 students a year less for the next five years or so. So that's that's how how
026I see the the my interpretation of all these numbers is that, you know, that's clearly what's out in front of us and it's our responsibility. You know, I see that's the administration's responsibility to figure out how you're going to handle these four or so less people every year, every 40 years. I mean, you're going to have to figure that out. I think at the board table, our responsibility is, okay, given that headcount, what are we going to look like here in in four years? who who's on first and what's on what's on second and you know who's who's on I don't know who's on third what what we what would our facilities look like what buildings with that lesser headcount what courses with this lesser headcount and the the people are your job to manage
027and our job is to look forward for the facilities and make sure that the taxpayers are getting the best bang for their buck out of whatever the facilities need to look like in four years or five years or 10 years and I have no idea but it's our responsibility to look at that part of this while the administration handles this. You can get it through retirement and attrition and all that normal stuff, but that isn't going to help the buildings. Buildings and stuff are are up to us at this table. And so that's the challenge I see for us here at this table. What what do we look like? And I get the first and second. >> And I think those two come together, right? If we have spaces that are designed for this sort
028of new model or new reality from an enrollment perspective, I think we're going to be better positioned to make sure it's a great experience for kids, for staff. And there's probably staffing efficiencies that even in the facility study we're going to that's another lens I think that we're >> actively having conversations about. And I think much of what you said I think our team has um I I think there's a lot of areas we would line up. I don't know that I would put an exact number, you know, I think your averages though and what you're working with for clean round numbers >> plus or minus long term. >> Yeah. And and I think um you acknowledged attrition. I think for staff I think it is important to say that I that has been a
029strategy that we've used when we've went up and down and I think we've been more direct about saying it's a little less of up and down and we're starting to head this way and so the experience we had this year um we are smaller uh from an FT perspective going into next year than we were and we're probably going to have a similar experience again and I think what our administrators have been really really thoughtful about is making sure that that is um aligned with where we're seeing those declines. So, again, the experience and the decline looks a little different, especially early elementary um than it might at the high school. Um but I think diving up and making sure that we create those efficiencies and reduce where we can and um protect people's jobs
030so we're not putting them on a roller coaster has been important. >> You don't want to hit blindside anybody either from the job the individual pay or the the building situation. I'm getting a little out of my depth here realm responsibility, but one thing I noted about the CISA meeting was that you know as they run the virtual school and I said you know a challenge to you going forward might be how you incorporate AI to make the whole virtual thing better more efficient I mean we know that that's not as good as face to face for most students you got to gatekeep the ones it doesn't work but that might be a dimension to help some of this downturn to keep some of our people and it's going to be definitely a challenge to
031them because they're going to get more I suspect request for virtual stuff at C9. So I'm just wondering was AI that's kind of your responsibility is that a piece of this puzzle somehow to handle this downturn keep more of our kids on a virtual basis where the virtual actually works well anyway that's all I got. I'm going to jump back in. um uh reimbursement. Um you are aware we've been working uh to address this particular challenge. And so uh just FYI, initial communication has been sent um either to email if we had one or USPS mailing uh to all current and former staff impacted by that HSA reimbursement plan that we approved last week. Uh we anticipate next steps in that communication to occur by September 1st. Dr. Kelly Strike would probably say sooner than
032that, but I'm going to manage our expectations and say it might be the first. Uh that will be followed by a 45day opt-in uh window for staff. Um so again, um although definitely an unfortunate error that we want to own. Um I do want to thank Kelly and our finance and payroll teams for their work to remedy this as well as the board's uh support of those steps. Um, additionally want to acknowledge and appreciate our our staff's patience as we've worked through, um, to take these corrective steps. So, um, we are still on track for hiring. Um, support staff positions and one certified position are still the focus in these closing weeks. Um, Canada pools have been strong. Special education support staff still continues to be in that hard to fill role for us and
033and others probably across the world, not just this part of the state. So, um, one thing new this year the team has tried, uh, has been a open interview, a walk up interview, and that yielded five hires last week on its maiden voyage, uh, which not so coincidentally led to an additional session that is happening tomorrow night where we hope we get another set of amazing people that are, uh, interested in serving kids. So, 3 to 6 here tomorrow. Tell your friends. Uh, we still have some positions. Um summer work uh across the district uh continues to be largely on track. The one area that I'll acknowledge uh senior high gym bleachers. That's our biggest area of concern with a a lagging timeline on installation. Um but uh other than that, what I've uh reported
034in the past and what Jason shared has been consistent. We're in a really good spot as we come into the start of the year. Um interesting area of exploration that we haven't really highlighted, but we saw a group come through last week is a solar project that may yield savings for the district. So, I want to thank uh Jason, Kelly, and Cody for their work to explore something that might potentially uh have some incentives attached to it and yield some savings for the district. So, um and uh you don't have to write to me. You can just thank me for the music uh to celebrate the start of the school year if you're listening to this online or hear it later. The baseline in the background is celebrating kids coming back, staff coming back in
035just a couple of weeks. So, that's what I've got. bring them on and bring on the next Kansas song for the rest of our reports. Thank you. >> Okay, next up is unfinished business. Um the 2526 budget update which isformational. Dr. N. >> Yeah, I'm going to thank Dr. Strike. She's been fine-tuning uh lots of different fronts and she's got the detail, but we're excited to present a balanced plan and she'll hit the highlights. >> Yes, thank you. Uh in June I presented a preliminary budget which you approved for preliminary spending. I just wanted to pre provide an update here in August before we make a final adoption in October. I think I have to wake it up here for a second. There we go. So first just some highlights from the year end. Um
036our transfer to 46 at the year end was just over $2.3 million. want to highlight some of the areas of savings and um notable deficits within the budget that landed there. Um the vast majority of that was in wage and benefits. Um and that comes from we have unpaid leaves. We have positions especially in the spring that tend um that may resign that we just don't fill in the spring. Um when it comes to wages and such with benefits that was largely health insurance. A couple of things. Um we have every year since we've offered cash and loo every year at open enrollment we um have had a number of staff get off of health insurance. The other thing is remember we made that big switch. We have a January one um use year which
037means open enrollments in November after the budget set. And so when people made plan selections we had to make some conservative adjustments in the end that came out ahead. So you'll see a large um between fund 10 wage and benefits. You can see that is um a considerable amount of those savings that fund 27 transfer. It ultimately is in the budget said that expense was less. That's largely due to savings and salary fringe. Again, just keep in mind fund 27 in the end we always make that transfer. So the savings and that salary fringe for the similar reasons resulted in a lower transfer. Uh 4K payments just our estimate with the number of students when we pay um our providers came in just over $100,000 less. transportation, $150,000. That is a lot, but keep in
038mind we pay almost $3.4 million in transportation. I can tell you that there were some areas of transportation we were over, some areas we were under. Um, so that is actually it's only a 4% um, and we want to be conservative as things could change. Um, uh, curriculum and assessment had some um, additional um, savings. And then interest revenue again um, we were anticipating an interest rate did drop throughout the year. Um but we came out ahead just over $230,000 additional from what we budgeted um everything else. So if you kind of total everything else all the others think there's a lot of lot of areas departments totaled about $126,000 worth of savings. A couple of areas where we had deficits. One you knew um about the pipe situation at junior high pipes or capital
039projects. We were over budget if you will and open enrollment as I mentioned before. We both budget revenue and expense on that and again just of those numbers throughout the year. We missed that between the two and about $300,000. Um we really analyze those trends when we budgeted for 2526 um to make sure that we hit that mark a little closer. So I feel like we've been doing budget updates for a while, but I want to highlight how these have impacted DC Everest and I'll um share a little bit more detail of that. So, the revenue limit adjustment um was $325 per pupil. Uh the low revenue ceiling remained at $11,000. And with no changes to law and equalization aid, that entire $325 um potentially falls on the taxpayer or the tax levy. And I'll
040explain how that will will be able to continue to keep that level because of defeasance. And I'll explain that in more detail in a little bit. um special education categorical aid. That was the late um and I'm very happy that that came in um from JFC and then ultimately changed um when that budget was approved in the first week of July. That remains some certain. So for context this year um the bud budget the goal was 33% it ended the year at 30.64. So it's always kind of a shortfall. So we're projecting or planning a 38.5%. we want to assume that we're not going to get that full 42% that still ultimately ended up with 900 about $900,000 in additional revenue for DC Everest. So had it remained 33 compared to what were um and
041again we're making some assumptions. We don't know exactly where that will end with some certain but about $900,000. Some small addition um high cost special education aid went up but again that's um fewer dollars um in impacts for all districts including DC Everest. Um, and we were able to maintain some school-based mental health services. That was in last year's budget as well. Just want to point out, um, we got some good dollars this year, but it'll drop, you can see, considerably in year two, which we're planning for. Um, I know that that's small, but I want to give you, we are always looking at that revenue limit spreadsheet, and if you can see the pink things on there, that's district entered, and those things are kind of not final yet. Um, the big one is
042our student enrollment. Um we did get a do estimate for equaliz um equalization um values for housing that's in that bottom pink on the left hand side. So we entered that on Monday morning actually how that breaks down. It doesn't get final to townships until October 1st, but gives us a little bit better indication in terms of how that split between tax and aid may um end up. Um and I don't see a lot of changes. I would say in that total revenue limit you'll see is 71.3 million. Um that is an estimated increase of about $ 1.5 million in revenue limit authority. Again, that's the connection from that 325 This is how we're projecting tax levy to end up. So if you can see in the top that fund 10 that general fund you
043will see that that went up significantly because of that 325. But if you look at the total we can see that right now um we would present in October I will present that we just maintain that the total levy remain constant. You can see that reduction in fund 39 that's where we've been been defeasing our debt. So that is still the $9.3 million that we have um earmarked there is still defeasing. It's more um that we need to but it's less than than we have. That's how we can stabilize that that total levy to to um keep it stable. You'll see a drop in the mill rate with that as well. But I like to emphasize I think that total levy amount because you may see adjustments in that mill rate. Um but that doesn't
044always mean additional dollars or less dollars. Taking a look at that total levy highlights that. So you will see um and in October I will go into more detail how we arrive at this but you will see we are currently balanced in both fund 10 and fund 27. Um we've done a lot of work from June to when I say daily changing things I literally mean daily. We're changing things. Um as as things become real and actual. Um the biggest piece is as we're hiring staff the wages may be different. We're adjusting those um benefit selections etc. And any of our renewals in terms of anticipated increase in transportation, insurance, judgments, all those things we've updated. But right now we are looking balanced in both 10 and 27 with our projections. Um and with 1580
045we are balanced in 80 and ended up with um some fund balance at year end which we're excited about and I'll share in more detail in October. and fund 50. You will see as I've shared um this is not balanced. However, we made we've limited that gap um from the June estimate with some of the reimbursements. We're still hopeful that we can end the year not balanced, but this is as close as we can get it and we still have um fund balance that can support that in the event that we would um end the year um with more expenses than revenue. Um we will continue to update revenue and final um revenue limit is determined. Um the equalized values were just released. We did an update but those become finalized for school districts on
046October 1st or third Friday count. And then October 15th is when we do get that final equalization aid. So that's really the distribution between the aid and the tax levy for us. Um and we'll continue to refine the budget. Not too many things we should have to do on the expense side between now and then. um but feel very comfortable that we'll present a balanced budget um in October. Any questions? >> I see uh Levy 2425 uh estimated projected at 673 and uh 2526 at 586. My memory fails me. What are we at now? 673 was this past year and we're projecting. >> Okay. Yeah. All right. At 586. Yep. But you'll see that total levy amount will stay. Yes. The dollars are saying I understand that. >> Yep. >> And we're we're we're dropping
047the mill rate uh based on defeasance change. >> Yeah. That's and and part of that when we get that final equalized value that will that can impact that as well. Our goal is to keep the levy or the amount of the dollars the same. Yep. >> Okay. Um Okay. >> Thank you. >> Yep. >> Any other questions? >> Uh we'll move on to new business. The Riverside Water Reportformational. >> We have a special moment and I Oh, there's a lot of activity happening back there. Ignore that. But >> see, >> Mr. Jablonsky. Uh, I want to give him um kudos for his work through multiple steps of water issues at Riverside to get us to the finish line that he's going to highlight with you here. And we're going to have a little celebratory moment.
048Um, but Jason, >> yeah, so came to the board I think probably just over a year ago about Riverside Water and kind of It's green. >> It's green. >> Okay. >> Sorry. Uh our next step was to get the PAS filtering in. You know, we made it through all of our lead, copper, uh through the referendum. We changed all the pipes and and got uh that part of it taken care of. We probably could have drank the water at that time. The DNR would have allowed us to do that, but we didn't feel as though we should at that time until we figured out this whole PAS scenario. uh we did qualify for some state aid uh for PAS. So we moved ahead with this project which is uh in addition to the pump house
049which you see in the blue and then uh all the PAS filtering tanks are in the uh green uh non-detectable at this time we have no PAS. We have some of the cleanest water probably in the area. Um but I could tell you about it or I could share some with you. So, we have today Riverside Water for everybody if you'd like to sample some drawn straight from the bubbler this afternoon. >> We couldn't use >> couldn't use them for years. We put brand new ones in during the referendum. Um, we had them bagged off during that whole time. Uh, but we are finally at a point now where uh we can drink it. We're taking the Culligan out of the building. Uh we're going to leave a couple of Culligan dispensers there just in
050case maybe a student or parent isn't comfortable with the the water, but they should be. It's as good as any bottled water you'll buy anywhere. So, uh pretty pretty great to get to this point. Um we did receive uh $93,725 toward this project. Uh total cost was about 100,000. So, got it almost all funded, which is great. It is delicious. >> So, I would do a toast to bad riverside water being water over the bridge. >> Huh? Yeah. >> I had a couple more, but cheers. >> Any questions? >> You can keep the water bottles, too. I need another >> what what uh what technology were we using? Is it resin or is it carbon or what is >> it's got both. So it's got both inside of it. It's got some resin. It also
051has it's carbon. >> Um these filters uh we have test points in between each filter. So we have to do right now in the early stages. Uh we do testing I think we have three more test periods this year just to see how they're progressing. We're anticipating to get somewhere between 8 to 10 years out of these filters before rebed. >> Oh, that's good. >> Yeah. So, >> sometimes these filters, you got to replace them every 3 months and that's a little more expensive. >> Yeah. No, it it will. I mean, it's something we're going to have to budget for down the road. Um, you know, we just at this point based off the calculations of the filter. The filters were designed by US Filter. Uh, these were one of a couple of small plant
052systems like ours that were approved by the state for use. Um, and they're performing exactly like they anticipated they would. So, >> thank you, Jason. >> Cheers. >> All right. Next, we have the health insurance renewal. >> Yes. Uh, first I do want to share that I found an error in one calculation in the table. So, we updated in board docs. Just make sure you're looking at the updated version. And I believe Ellen put updated right in front of it or if you looked at it previously, I just wanted to point that out. Um and apologize for that. Just an error was found. So uh last year we moved um the district transition to Aspirus Health Plan after our renewal came back at 27.66%. Um and Aspirus Health has two plan options. Signature is the
053narrow network and Freedom is the broad network and our full-time so a 1.0 full-time FTE pays 0% premium for the signature network. That's unique and awesome that we can do that for our staff. And for Freedom, our full-time employees pay 5% of the premium. We have always um prorated that for anyone that's working less than a 1.0 FTE. Um 62 for example is our FTE for our um schoolyear pair of professionals. Um so they would pay a prorated amount 38% for either plan. Um we do cap that at 17.5% um for a single plan. However, um in order to meet ACA affordability rules, um after following a lot of consultation and negotiations, the final renewal rates this year from Aspirus Health came back at 8% for signature and 15% increase for those on freedom. Um
054and something unique or maybe that we haven't experienced in DC Everest why different rates on different plans that's directly related to the claims loss ratios that differed on the plan. So for those of those on the signature network the claims loss ratio is 59%. That's a very good um claims loss ratio. Those on the freedom it's 140%. Um so that was significantly more and hence the reason that we saw um a divide if you will or a difference between the increases of the two plans. Um and I I have in my notes the rising cost of healthcare is an ongoing challenge I think not only for us but school districts and everywhere. Definitely that's a regional thing in our area too. The lack of um options and competition I think kind of drives some of
055that as well. Um, as you know, I think I gave an update this spring that we were going to um really explore self-unding options. We did went for bid on all of those. All of those bids came back significantly higher and not cost feasible. Something we'll continue to look at, but not an option for us at this time. Um, and I will tell you I was a little disappointed in these rates, but I also think when you look at all the numbers, the data, the number I can understand it, I guess as well. Due to the Freedom Plan's higher claims loss ratio and the significantly higher renewal rate, we're recommending it to increase the employee paid premium for the Freedom Freedom Plan from 5% to 10%. To a better align costs and just encourage a
056cost um effective plan. Um, I did pull out three nearby districts that use Aspy Health. And you'll notice in district A, they offer a 0% signature option. 20% employee pay in for freedom. District B, you can see an 8.5 and then a 14.8. A third district does offer 15% for both plans. Um, uh, and I share this because I do feel that having a 0% option is a great benefit for staff. Um, and the 10% still um allows us to consider um improving that cost balance if um if you will. And I'll jump down to our plan is during open enrollment this year that we will do our normal education updates about health insurance, but we are going to do some targeted outreach to those on the freedom plan to just explore um different options
057um how there's potential savings for them and the district um if that's the plan that's right for them. will will utilize both M3 and aspirus reps to help with those. So that is the plan. You can see that cost impact um from 5% to 10% contribution um the top that I showed if it remained 5% and increasing to the 10%. So per month for a family plan um would be about $120 a month. We have 26 payrolls on a year. Most 21 or 26, most have 26 that are on that. are about $55 a check. Um for single it would be about $49 a month or $22 and change per check. That would be the change because of the proration. Um and and actually we don't have anyone that's part-time on the freedom plan. There
058wouldn't be a change for them because they already um have that prorated amount. Um I do want to point out too, you'll see the difference in the signature versus the freedom. So, a family plan on signature, the district expense monthly expense is just over $1,900. Even with this change, the district expense for a freedom plan is $2,175. So, you will see even with the 10%, the district is contributing significantly more for those that are on the freedom plan than those on the signature with this change. I am open to any questions that you may have. If not, I I would recommend that you approve um renewal with Aspirus Health Plan for 2026, changing the premium contribution for the Freedom Plan from 5% to 10%. Do we have a motion to approve renewal with Aspirus Health
059Plan for the 2026 plan year and increase the employee premium contribution for the Freedom Plan from 5% to 10% for full-time employees? >> So moved. Second. Uh, do we have any discussion? >> Yeah, me. >> All right. Seeing none, can I >> ask a question? Can we go ahead? What What's the What's the breakdown in terms of how many people take freedom versus signature? >> Yep. About 2/3 and 1/3. >> Okay. >> So, about two/3s are on signature, one third on freedom. >> Okay. Thank you. Mhm. All those in favor state I I. >> Those opposed. That passes. Next, the summer school update informational. >> Uh so I'm happy to introduce a portion of our summer learning leadership team. Uh Britney Saskki is our our director of our summer learning program and Jamie Salsman as
060assistant director and then also from our M Pongu enrichment program. uh CIA Yang and Kia Tao. >> All right. Hello. Thank you, Jeff, for the introduction. Um again, I'm summer or summer learning director Britney Sepski, and I've brought along my friends to steal the show, but I'm just going to go over a few highlights first. Um we have continued to offer a variety of enrichment courses at our three fiveweek um programs. So 22 courses at both the elementary schools, Rothschild and Weston. And then we had 18 at the junior high. In addition, we offer um credit recovery options at the senior high which include our alt ed and our new horizons. And then our students have also been keeping busy with their fitness this summer. So, we've been continuing to offer the strength and conditioning,
061summer fitness, and summer running courses housed at the senior high. Um, just a fun little fact, too, out of the 78 teachers um at our three um fiveweek programs um schools, 68 out of those 78 teachers have continued to return to teach our summer learning. So that's I think a pretty neat um thing that they keep coming back. Um and then also we had two new courses that ran at the junior high this year our AI adventures and then geometrosity and those were very successful. All right. And then approximately this summer, we had about 1,662 students registered for summer learning. And we're just starting to calculate our instructional minutes at our schools. So Rothschild, we had 1,662 um,080 um instructional minutes. Weston, we had um one 1,623,381 minutes. And then the junior high was just
062a slight bump there from last summer. We had 1,413,645 minutes. Um just a few highlights here. Um students and staff have continued to enjoy Buddy Jack's ice cream truck every week. Um so there's a few pictures on our slide. Uh we have a growing M enrichment um program and that is a partnership with the Wasa school districts and I am going to let our elementary coordinator CIA um and our secondary coordinator Kia steal the show on that in a little bit. And then our continued strong leadership at Weston Rothschild and the junior high. We had a brand new principal that um just showed her strong leadership um Amanda Toma at Weston and then Scott Ael at Rothschild. And then I can't um not recognize Christian Ammon. He finished up his 13th year as summer learning
063principal at the junior high. So, he will be dearly missed as we continue to offer our students our our summer programs. And then our summer musical. I keep saying each year I've been director that it just keeps getting better and better, but I truly mean that. It's our largest musical to date. And they were very flexible with our senior high kind of construction updates. They were um over at the middle school this summer. Um and almost 80 students took part in this year's production. It was it was really great. And then I am going to hand it over now to Jamie Selman. She's the assistant summer learning director. So we were able to offer a hundred families in our community um meals through Payton's Promise. It was pretty amazing. We did all of the shopping,
064packing, um delivering. Students took meals home on Thursdays. Um they were meal kits. Actually, one week was a spaghetti meal with salad. We did hot dog meals. Um took a lot of hands, but our community um was definitely appreciative of the extra food. Um especially for some of the families. strength and conditioning. We somehow got our slides >> our slides are messed up a little bit, but um so strength and conditioning, we had over 400 students take part um in those programs both at um well housed at the senior high and GTCC. And um this was our first year where we incorporated Crystal Training Institute. Um, and I heard a lot of positive feedback and just the consistency and all of that with our students taking those programs. Engineering tomorrow. This is our fourth year
065using engineering tomorrow as part of our summer learning program. Phenomenal program. This year's um highlights were product engineering, kind of like the marketing and manufacturing of products. Students got to work with 3D printers. they built um had a challenge of building a puzzle and then they were given the opportunity to um create their own um design with a 3D printer. So definitely a a great program for kids. >> Oh, am I going uh Sorry. Oh, I went too fast. Sorry. It's my first time doing this. Oh god. Yes. Okay. >> And then I'm CIA Yang um the M parent part parent M parent partner for DC every school district. Um Kia Tao right here is our other um coordinator for secondary. Um as you guys heard Britney did share a little bit about how the
066program started with um it grew to 330 students in 2025. We started out the program with just 73 students. Um this is a program that is in partnership with the WASA school district. Um the highlights uh include mix of age cultural exploration community partners and support. Um we got positive feedback as always from parents, students and staff. Um and we've also successfully organized a community and disability uh fair in collaboration with our ongoing partnership uh sponsorship partner which was um the Mo American Center. Um, I don't know if you guys watched the news, but that was on there. It was great. Um, the MOU enrichment program is a great program to have, and we feel like it went it went really well this year. K, you have anything you want to add? >> All right,
067that wraps it up. Okay, >> sorry, these are a little bit out of order. Um and then lastly in August for our summer learning programs where uh we have our music programs that are running and we have approximately 348 students taking part at both the senior high and um junior high middle school um level there. Um there's also a picture of our web leaders. Those are our middle school students getting ready for our sixth grade um incoming class the first day. And then lastly, we have our transition programs, bridge, brbridge to kindergarten, which we currently have um incoming kindergarteners registered in August um to um attend those programs. So, and then lastly, as most of you know, there's lots of moving parts um to our summer learning um programs and and lots of people and
068staff and teachers and everything involved. And then the school board lastly here, or not lastly, um but in addition, we just appreciate all of your support and we just wanted to say thank you to supporting our summer learning program. So, Any questions, comments? >> Madam Chair? >> Yes. >> So, ju just a couple question. First and foremost, I just want to say a big thank you to the coordinators for um making the making summer an incredible time for our students in the area here. And I'm just very thrilled to see the amount of participate u participants in these activities here. as well. Um, in the the last few years, I've always asked for kind of like budget versus actuals for the uh as the summer uh programs here. Can I I don't need it now,
069but if I can get that in the near future here, that'll be great. Here, just so I can see kind of like what what the cost is as well to um to run these events. Um, that that's the first comment I want to make. The second part is a question here. I see that enrichment cap has grown quite a bit here. I'm kind of curious as to capacity. Has are we exceeding capacity with teachers and staff? You know, I'm just kind of curious as to the space, you know. Um uh if if um if SIA or Kia could touch base on that, that would be greatly appreciated as well. >> I can talk about that. Um so yes we are exceeding uh capacity with students to ratio to teacher. Um this year we actually had
070for elementary about 23 to 27 kids um for elementary per teacher um for classes and then with secondary it was 35 to 37 students um for the teachers for secondary. So yes, the program has grown. Um the staff has not grown and so then we try to do our best to uh make everything work. But yes, >> um I'm going to ask a follow-up question. And I guess the question I would ask is what is our plan to um you know to to deal with the capacity issue. Then I'm just kind of curious because those are those are kind of um I I'm glad it's growing. It's a good problem to have, but I'm just kind of curious about our next steps here to dealing with the overcapacity. >> So, I can jump in there.
071I I do want to say that I think the numbers were 73 a handful of years ago to 330. I can assure you we have more staff working with 330 students than we did back at the start. Um, but we've the challenge that we've seen with Mong Enrichment Camp is the speed at which with it it grows. So we we develop a game plan. I do think we added maybe a late position this year um to to support uh knowing that our numbers were higher. Uh our intent is not to develop a cap. Um however uh we value the program and we've got um um students from all walks of life that have participated and and we value that. I think that's the the beauty of the program. And so our intent is to figure
072out how to navigate through uh those growth struggles um and and still uh run a program that's open to kids and and learning uh new things about culture. So uh that's our intent. Um and uh we'd love to get to the spot where we have consistency in numbers every year. That would make it a lot easier to to plan for that. Um, but that's that's right now our our intent. >> Um, just a just a follow up to that, Jeff, here. I I agree entirely with you. I think it's a great program, so I don't want to cap it, but I guess the question I ask, and you know, we had a conversation about this a little bit earlier when um uh when uh Larry was talking about the fact that we need to start
073looking at what the next few future is going to be. We have to start tightening our belts a little bit, looking at service, etc. here. So I'm just kind of curious as to um how we would ensure doing that you know at the same time keeping good quality programs um but also making sure that uh we don't end up having one teacher per 35 students or more than that you know I just want us to be kind of um proactive and just kind of looking that I don't I'm not expecting an answer today but I'm just kind of asking for us to kind of just look at that as we continue moving forward whether that means we need to allocate more dollars to build more to bring or te and bring more summer help whatever
074whatever it is but I I'd love to just see that in the future here. Thank you. >> Great. Thank you very much for all your hard work. >> I would I would also just go along with Ye's concern. I think this is a incredible program and so you know if that's your ratio right now if it gets even a little bit more out of line the experience for everybody can be very very different. So, you know, I I think we need to look at making sure that we have appropriate staff numbers in the future and do our best to understand what we're going to be working with next year, total numbers. So, thank you. >> Just one last shout out to Britney. Um, you know, leadership matters. She's done a tremendous job over the last
075couple years getting the right people uh in the right positions. Uh we lost a principal last year into this year and Amanda to us slided very very nicely as she mentioned. Uh and we'll have that opportunity again with the loss of Christian. So uh already starting to think about what that might look like, but um Britney's done a ton of great work to to put uh a strong team together to to lead the work. >> All right. Next up, we have the updated reading plan. Is there some background? >> Um yeah. Um just one one change from DPI around how we assess uh early literacy composite work at the first grade level. Uh and our um district's early literacy remediation plan is reflective of DPI's um language. So had to make that adjustment within our
076plan after DPI made their adjustment. It's the only change to the plan. Do we have a motion to approve the DC Everest early literacy remediation plan? So moved. >> Second. >> Any discussion? >> And this requires a voice vote. All those in favor say I. >> I. Any opposed? And that passes. The approval of the idea overnight out of state trip. >> It was I'm sorry. It was a trip that um they weren't sure they were going going to take uh but after after some discussion this summer they decided uh to do that trip and so it's just approval uh a little bit later than the majority of our out of state trips. >> Is there a motion to approve the idea overnight out of state trip September 25th and 26th of 2025? >> So
077moved. >> Second. >> Any discussion? And this is a voice vote. All those in favor state I. >> I. >> Any opposed. And that passes. Approve access to student records for school resource officers. >> Standard annual um by statute need to provide them that authority. >> So moved. >> Second. >> Okay. All those in favor state I. >> I. I. >> Any opposed? And that passes. Um, and as I mentioned earlier, we have the registration that is open for the WASBY fall regional meeting November 4th. If anyone would like to attend, please let Ellen know. Uh, we have no petitions and communications this month. Future meeting dates, we have the district kickoff next week, Thursday the 28th at 11, Steam Stadium. In case of inclement weather, it will be at GTCC. and the rest of
078the meetings listed in your background materials and this meeting is adjourned. Thank you everyone.