001meeting to order. Has this meeting been posted? >> Yes, it has. >> All right. Roll call will show that all five board members and both student board members are present. We'll stand for the pledge of >> allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands. One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. >> All right. And then we'll uh start off now with commendations. Thank you. We have a number of accommodations to present tonight and we will begin with DECA. The Greenell DECA business club had another successful competition season this school year with membership of just over 50 students. Roughly half of the members took part in the DECA Wisconsin district's competition this winter. Seven Greenell DECA members qualified for the Wisconsin DECA
002state conference in the Wisconsin Dells in February which included which uh included Ava Sula, Noah Thompson, Jack Grunsky, David Achamovich, Leah Gamboa, ZG Cardahhena, and Casey Lamb. Um these students competed against just over 1500 other business students from throughout the state of Wisconsin. After state, Jack Grimsky, Leo Gamboa, David Achimovic and Casey Lamb all moved on to uh the international composite competition to represent Greenell in Atlanta, Georgia with nearly 28,000 students from throughout the world. So, they really made quite an accomplishment and represented Greenell well. Uh coached by Jared Galante this year. Um I'd like to welcome them up for recognition. And Mr. Galante, if you have something that wanted to share, that would be awesome. Sure, I'll take a picture. Uh I don't >> you got to push the Yeah, there's a button. It'll
003turn green. >> There we go. A student led organization. So these seniors have really kind of been the backbone of our DECA program for the last number of years. a lot of the leaders we had last year as well. Um, so they've definitely kind of led a lot of our underassmen now and are kind of passing the baton here in the next couple of weeks to them as they take over. Um, but kudos to them for all the work that they've put in. They've had a number of different adviserss over the years. Um, and have been very successful no matter who is running the show. So, great job to them. Congratulations on a great season and best of luck to all of our seniors in the future. Congratulations. Next, we're going to recognize a number
004of students for excellence in music. Each year, students have an opportunity to prepare music and perform for judges at WSMA's district solo and ensemble. They are critiqued by certified judges using a performance rubric, earn scores for how well they performed the piece, and then receive constructive feedback to help them grow as mu musicians. If a student's performance score is high enough, they qualify to perform again at the state level, which follows the same process. Through their preparation and execution at the district festival, the following students qualified to perform a state solo and ensemble. Um, and we'll start with we have two middle schoolers this year that qualified for state. Um, Liam Liam Rifenberg on trombone and Ruby Garcia on cello. So, we'll recognize them first. Congratulations. Good job. All right. Next, we have our high
005school musicians. Uh, starting with choir. Lexi Elhorn for musical theater. Fiona Glorioso for classical and musical theater. And she also won an exemplary soloist award. Noah Griffin for classical and musical theater and also won an exemplary soloist award. Emily Nelson for classical. Sky Persik for classical and Clara Zabota for classical and musical theater. Who are how many of them are here tonight? So, we'll do choir next. Do you have any I saw Fiona in the parking lot. Come on up. Um, and then We have band state qualifiers with Ethan Bowie, Col for flute, Colin Greg for marching snare, and Shayla Pavle for Alto Saxs. Come on up. And finally, We have our orchestra state qualifiers. Uh the chamber orchestra won as a group uh with an a large number of members. And I'll let Mrs.
006uh Bowitz talk about what they performed. Andrew Banman played cello. Emma Gunderson viola. Phineia Lee piano. And Laurel Zy a cello duet. So Laurel, how did you play a duet by yourself? Did you play with a Andrew? Oh, that's very fun. All right, come on up. What was it? There's great picture. >> Okay. On behalf of the chamber, >> uh, congratulations to the chamber orchestra on a job well done, they performed two movements. Yeah. They performed two movements of Benjamin Britain's Simple Symphony. Um, and they're going to perform one more of the movements at our concert coming up next Thursday. Um, so they put in a lot of hard work and uh, it paid off. It's been a great group to work with this year. Congratulations, guys. Then we have then we have one more
007that we typically do in the fall, but we did not. And I don't know if you have drum majors here tonight. Okay, awesome. So, our the Greenell High School marching band uh performed Snow Angels for their fall show and they received the highest score across all four classes at the Wisconsin School Music Association State Marching Band Championship. And that marks their 20th consecutive year winning first place in Class DoubleA competition at the Wisconsin Marching Band Championships. Then the reason that we did not continue is they had some other business to take care of and we waited to we held their commendation for that. Greenell High School march marching band is the first high school band ever to perform two times in both the Macy's Thanksgiving Day parade and the tournament pro of roses parade over
008a 10-year period. Marching band students and families volunteer to support local fundraising activities and give back to the community. So we would like to present them with a commendation. Do we have that? No, no problem. Okay, we'll take a picture and we will send the commendation over. So, but we wanted to recognize them for outstanding achievement and that's quite an accomplishment after 20 years. All right. And those are all our accommodations for this evening. Congratulations. And you are all welcome to stay for the remainder of the meeting. But if you do not want to stay for the whole meeting, now is a good time. >> Thank you. There you go. And in terms of communications, I just have one donation to recognize. The district received a $300 donation uh to the reading buddies program from
009the Greenell Lions Foundation. >> All right. Thank you. And then uh we will move on to the student updates. >> Um tonight is teacher appreciation night for boys baseball and tomorrow May 19th is their senior night. JV boys golf won their conference tournament in Wanuki and the varsity boys golf had their last mini today and Brown Deer with conference tomorrow in regionals next Tuesday. DECA has arranged for their officer team uh for the 2026 27 term with prospective candidates meeting with Mr. Galante to order their roles together. Robotics had their last practice today with seniors adding their handprints to the mural on the workshop wall. They prepare for their season end banquet this Wednesday, May 20th. >> The track team had a meet last Friday setting school records for the boys 100 meter, girls 4
010by 100, and boys 4 by 100. Cheer triyouts were last Saturday the 16th and the team for next year has been announced. All AP tests are over and classes have started working on their final projects. NHS hours for juniors are due this Friday. NHS students have been working concession stands and community events like the clean and green event Saturday the 16th. Today is the start of prom spirit week based on this year's theme Rio prom. The grand march and the election of prom court will take place this Friday. >> All right. Thank you. Uh looks like we can skip citizen comments and we'll move on to approving the meeting minutes from May 4th. Looking for a roll call or a motion. >> I move approval of the May 4th, 2026 regular meeting minutes as presented
011in agenda item 1.1. >> I second. >> All right, we have a motion and a second. We'll do a roll call. >> Yes. Yes. I'm >> Yes. Motion passes. Moving on to the monthly financials. Yeah, I'm struggling a little bit with the link for that. So, I'll bring that up on the screen for the board to review. We've got um monthly financials for the month of April that we wanted to present and we did review those with the um board finance committee last week. See if I can get that up here. Yep, here we go. So, we took a look at um revenues and expenditures. We're tracking where we would expect to be for revenues. We're slightly ahead of previous year. Um, and that's basically variance from additional tax collections at this point in the
012year through the operational fund. Our student donation and special education revenues are what we would expect. Um, fund 38 referendum debt, we've collected all the revenues for this year. And then fund 39 referendum debt. The only remaining dollars are some additional interest receipts that we would expect to receive um between now and the rest of the year. Uh we reviewed the um food service fund um which is a little bit um behind where it was last year. And then the community service fund is already at revenue budget. and the cooperative fund which is the Woodland Conference is ahead of budget based off of fees that are charged to the participating schools. So it's on the revenue side. On the expenditure side, the operational expenses are a little bit higher year-to- date. And we've talked in
013previous month that that's due to salaries and benefits. Um as well as textbook, utilities, bus transportation, and facilities maintenance services. um other areas within that expense um budget um uh we reviewed that food service fund. So while we were behind a little bit on revenues um we're also tracking a little bit better year to date in terms of expenses as well. Uh there were no concerns from the board finance committee uh last week. Um but would be happy to take on any questions that the board may have about monthly financials for the month of April. >> Any questions? >> I think we're good. Thank you. >> All right. Thanks. >> All right. Then we need to approve the checks and dispersements. Looking for a motion. I move approval of checks and dispersements in the amount
014of $1,763,45149 as presented in agenda item 2.2. >> I'll second the motion. >> All right, we have a motion and a second. We'll do a roll call. >> Yes. Yes. >> And I'm yes. Motion passes. Uh moving on to approving personnel. >> There is one appointment. Uh you previously approved a resignation of a school psychologist and tonight you are voting to approve a contract for a new school psychologist. >> All right. So we're looking for a motion. >> I move approval of the school psychologist appointment as presented in agenda item 4.1. >> I second. >> All right. We'll do a roll call. >> Yes. >> And I'm yes. Motion passes. Uh moving on to proposed 2026 27 budget. >> We've been working since November to plan for the 2627 budget. Um and tonight we are
015presenting a preliminary budget. You've seen an iteration um in January February time frame and we are presenting the proposed budget which you will take action on in June. So, we're presenting information so that you can review and provide feedback before we bring forward the preliminary budget in June. I'll turn it over to Jonathan to present. So, the three things we want to make sure that we cover, talk about an update on the preliminary budget for next year and the impact that that'll have with projected tax levy and then the next steps for the 2627 budget. Um, I think we've had similar slides in all the presentation since I came into the district in 2019 that the budget should be a reflection of community values and how we're allocating resources towards priority areas. And we'll talk
016about how we're making that alignment and what we've proposed in the budget. And so, we want to spend resources on things that are going to make a difference for kids. And it's also really important that we demonstrate that we're good financial stewards um of community resources. And so one of the ways we're thinking about that alignment is the community came together and helped with creating a strategic plan and aligned mission and vision and the leadership teams present out on a regular basis. And so these investments that we're making within the budget should align and helping us to move forward in those four priority areas. And as we go through process of a new strategic plan here in summer of 2026, um we will continue to have those conversations to make sure that we're still aligned
017and how we've allocated resources. Right? So we're thinking about how that's going to have a direct impact on the classroom and programming that we want to have in the district. And so we've talked about it in the past. We really try to simplify to four a four-step process. There's a lot of detail that we share in terms of the different tasks that we go through to develop the budget, but really we are um specifically starting with needs identification. So it would be easy within a budget process to say here's the money you have available. Let's start refining it and cutting things until we have a budget that works. But it's really important for the leadership team to understand what needs we have currently and really what needs we have going into the next budget cycle
018and starting the budget building process with that. And then we'll go through the rest of prioritizing, refining, and matching that up with revenues that are available. And that strategic plan like that focus goal should always be the center of making some of those decisions. So, we've identified a lot of different steps that we've completed, but the work really began November 14th. We started doing an initial uh budget model projection and workshop on November 14th. And the last big task we had um last week was meeting with the citizen board finance committee and talking about the budget that's being proposed here this evening. So that means it's about a seven-month process and we'll continue to have additional information that'll come in as we bring back um the preliminary budget in June. And so the community, the
019board, the citizen finance teams, administration leadership, we've talked about values over a number of years. And um this was really a focal point when we talked to the community regarding an operational referendum in spring of 2024. What are the values that the community has for budget building? And so we have a list of those and some of those are listed here. In terms of making decisions driven by data, we're investing in the curriculum process. We're setting class size expectations. Um, and we definitely are confronting challenges that we have in this budget development process. And so one of the biggest values that we have is understanding what those target class sizes are and building a staffing model that's reflective of those values. So trying to set those bands of where we want those class sizes to
020to fit. And so at this point we've developed a staffing model that's reflective of that. And in the assumptions that were shared in the background item, we did share that at this point we have one position of contingency at K5 depending on fluctuations in class size that we could have throughout summer. And then on the special education side, we have $60,000 of contingency should we need modifications to staffing or services based on the complexity of student needs. But at this point, we feel we've designed a staffing model that reflects those board values and those community values they asked us to uphold in the prior referendum. So staffing is going to make up the bulk of the budget for the district, but there are also some other investments that we're making to ensure that we're meeting
021needs just operationally and also aligned to those budget values. So here you see um areas the curriculum and instruction. We have funds that are set aside for K12 math adoption in next year's budget. We're thinking about capital projects and the two main projects we'll take on this summer are um the Brinkman parking lot replacement and that'll be tied to work that's happening on Southway as well as a ramp for the upper um gym balcony is the I think the way I should have that phrased, but the gym balcony area so students have better access to that space. Um, from the tech side, we're going through replacement cycle every year to try and keep up our network infrastructure so it's reliable and consistent. So this summer that means network switches, cameras, classroom tech, production servers, and
022UPS batteries replacement. And the one area that we're looking at there is um production servers are impacted a lot right now by uh the availability of RAM particularly when you need servers that are at a commercial level and the pricing is kind of going all over the board um at the moment. So we're aggressively trying to quote that and try to lock in pricing. We may have to move the budget a little bit um to meet to meet that need for equipment replacement. So the budget that we've presented to the board is in balance at $39,393,934. That budget utilizes the full $2.5 million operational referendum authority. So that was granted for five years. So that would go through the 2028 29 school year. We've also done an update on projected fund balance and we would
023expect that we would be going into next year at just over $6 million in projected fund balance. And so as a percentage of those expenses for next year, that would be a 15.4% fund balance level. So we've brought forward a budget that's in balance, which is one of the main goals. And another goal that the board has had is some of the financial stability after making some investments to sustain programming coming out of the pandemic. And so here we have about 10 years of operational fund um fund balance history. And you can see for a number of years that fund balance hovered between 7.2ish and 7.6 six uh million dollars. In the 23 24 year, there was a significant spendown of that fund balance to sustain programming. And at that point, um the district went
024out and asked the community and operational referendum question. So, a focal point for the board has been working to uh restore some of that fund balance uh because we sit about $2 million below that fund balance level that we would have had a decade ago. And so, this is just kind of a visual of that. uh there were a number of years that the district carried cash uh reserves of about 25% meaning at July one those fund balance reserves as a percentage of expenses at $39 million of expenses for this next year. That would look like the board needing to increase fund balance around three to four million to hit that 25% level. So near-term that's likely not achievable. Um but uh the administration continues to work on a regular basis to figure out how
025we can um restore some of those reserves and minimize as much as possible any cash flow borrowing um that we need to take on. But really that drop off that you see in the 23 24 year that was the point at which we needed to start um cash flow borrowing to pay bills based on the timing of revenues that we get during the year. Uh 2627 special education budget. So that's required to be imbalance and the amount of expenditures that are not covered through state and federal aid need to come through an operational transfer from the general fund. So it becomes kind of a subset of that general fund. Um there were discussions here in the last week with the state legislature about a significant um increase to special education aid and that would have
026had an impact of $6 to $700,000 on that transfer amount um for next year. Um but the budget that we've brought forward assumes the current budget allocation that was done at the start of the bianium and we've worked with a team of business officials from around the state to figure out with um inflationary costs for special ed what we think that reimbursement rate is. So we're sitting somewhere right between 39.6% and 39.8% 8% as a reimbursement level for next year. And that's based off of a maximum of 45 in the the state budget, but it's based off of a fixed pool of money. So, if the expenses are higher um then districts get a smaller share. And so, we believe that that's going to hit somewhere um right above 39.5% next year. So, as we
027talk about that, um, when the, uh, administration and board talked to the community about an operational referendum and having that approved on a, a non-recurring basis, so it just be for a temporary period of time. We talked about the opportunities over the next two to three budget cycles to continue conversations with our elected officials. And so, we've done that. We continue to have conversations with other districts throughout the state so that we can better align messaging so it's clear and actionable for our legislators to um uh understand the needs locally and also to understand what those two to three priorities would be within the budget. So there was progress that was made there in terms of special education funding. There certainly were some um bigger conversations here in the last week about that and the
028potential for a record investment in special education categorical aid funding which at this point hasn't come to pass. Um, but we know that the elected representatives for Greenale were in support of that additional special education funding and we want to continue to have those conversations because it ties back to um those conversations with the community about referendum and what we may need longer term um if there isn't significant structural change in the funding amounts. I want to touch on some of the other funds. So fund 38 is a debt fund that is nonreferendum debt. And so there's two issuances that exist right now. One is a trust fund loan that was for the CKLA curriculum as well as the renovation for the reset space at the middle school. And currently there's principal of 565,000 remaining
029on that. And then there was um an athletic van, 10 passenger van that we purchased and there's 36,000 remaining on that. Um we approached the renovation for reset and asked DPI to consider something outside the box. So when we went to do that project, we asked if the funds to make annual debt payments could be run through our federal entitlement flowthrough grant and then we could take out staffing costs that we would run through that federal flowthrough grant and gain additional categorical state aid on those funds. So, that's a strategy that sometimes doesn't work because you can end up in a cliff where um you don't meet specific rules the state has of continuing to match your local contribution minimum from year to year. Um but the way that this was set up with DPI
030is that it can be processed as an exemption. So, when the debt is fully paid off, um it wouldn't penalize us under that model. So, it was something that was a creative idea. Um, and I put in the notes in the presentation, there's the potential of up to 47,000 a year in additional state aid that we can receive on an annual basis um based off of the way that that was structured and being able to switch out some staff out of those flowthrough funds. And so, that has the ability to offset a lot of the debt payments here. So, I know that's been a priority of the board is understanding um what interest payments we are and are we thinking creatively about minimizing costs the community is taking on. And so, the strategy that we
031have here um is able to offset most all if not all of the interest costs that we have on that fund 38 debt. And so the other thing I went back to look at is I started in my role in 2019 thinking about non-referendum debt issues that we had in that time. There was quite a bit there um that were energy efficiency projects at that time as well as some prior debt that goes all the way back to the mid 2000s. And so there was about 6.8 million at that time. Um we've reduced that now this year those two issuances I showed 601,000. So, we've decreased the debt um 91%. And so, that fund is controlled under the revenue limit. So, if the district's able to manage costs year-to-year without utilizing um non-referendum debt, that's
032certainly beneficial as a tailwind in terms of how you utilize your revenue cap for programming in the classroom. So, that's one area. Fund 39 is can sometimes be a little bit confusing because it's 3839. 39 is specifically debt that is referendum approved. And so when we're thinking about that, the debt that we have right now is related to the um uh refer capital referendum for upgrades districtwide. And within the um budget that's proposed here, um we've set aside 1.8 million towards that fund 39 levy. The actual debt payments that we'll have for next year are $400,000 higher, 2.2 million. And so one of the strategies the board has had to be conscious of trying to keep things as stable as possible to tax levy is to set aside um some additional funds. uh within that
033referendum debt fund when possible. And so there's about $881,000 for us next year and there would be $400,000 set aside for uh covering those debt payments. So that's something that the board can definitely give feedback on, but I'll talk in a second of what we'd be looking at for projected tax levy. So, another area where we take a look at where we were when that referendum in 2018 was approved and all those new debt issuances were taken out, uh, we were at about 41 million. That included the full 33.8 million of the 2018 referendum, but it also included some of the debt that was still owed from the 2007 referendum. I think was like a mostly the high school um, investment at that time. So, I think uh something that the board has been really
034conscious of is trying to manage that debt load and um by utilizing some ability to prepay um debt and make some additional tax levies within fund 39 that there was a prepayment of $3.6 million in June of 2024. and we look at overall over the last seven years, the board's already been able to pay down about a third of that debt. So that 26 million will be going into next year. Uh, another fund is fund 41 and those are for capital projects. This is another fund that exists under the revenue cap, but then these are specific dollars set aside and approved at the annual meeting if there are specific projects that the district wants to take on. And so I think I had mentioned these two projects earlier. There's some additional dollars that are there
035for contingency on those projects, some architectural services to get to a $250,000 budget, and that's allocated out of the revenue limit for next year. Um, another fund, fund 73, our other postemployment benefits, or we'll refer to it by the acronym OPEB. Um, so we went back and took a look at that outstanding cash liability. If we go back to 2019, there was about a $1.4 million cash liability at that time. Um, we just had the board approve some additional budget transfers this year based off of retirements for staff that are eligible for that benefit. When we look at that going forward, there's we're down to 237,000 in that um cash liability outstanding. Now, those are funds that haven't been preunded and so we're setting aside $100,000 in the 2627 budget. Once we can fully fund
036those remaining cash um liabilities um then we would no longer have to make those transfers um going forward. And so the reduction in that liability you see there over 80% and we're quickly over the next couple years going to tackle the majority of that remaining cash liability for benefits for staff that would um that acred that as of was this 2011 I believe. Yeah. Okay. So then we get to overall budget tax levy projection and we're looking at a tax levy increase of $662,941 which would be a little bit over a 4% increase. So, I tried to um go back and take a look at some historical on that overall tax levy and where that 15 we could say like 15.9 million fits versus the last 15 years of um funding and taxes for the
037district. So there are two high points when we look at the last 15 years where the tax levy was just over 16 million. That was in the 2011 12 year and that was right when the legislature was making significant changes to move away from the old uh model of funding where there were planned revenue limit increases each year. Um and then in 2018 when there was an increase for capital referendum after that was approved by a vast majority of voters but there was a significant increase in 2018. When we take a look at um the last five years uh the board has had some modest decreases in the overall tax levy. uh we were impacted this last year with the freeze in general aid in the state budget. So if there's a freeze in general
038aid then the pie is going to get divided amongst all the districts within the formula but any increases in the revenue cap would need to come through property taxes. So overall statewide there was about a 7.8% 8% increase in taxes. And through some dollars that the board had previously set aside, we were able to modify that and manage the tax levy to keep it flat to where it had been the prior year. As we look at that going forward, the board can certainly utilize additional funds that have been set aside, but it'd be much more difficult to manage that $15.2 $2 million tax levy. This is another area that's been part of the ongoing state budget negotiations in the last week and there was proposal to add additional dollars to that general aid pot for
039next year that would give the board more flexibility on what that tax levy would look like. Um but we've presented a um a budget that assumes that there's no um increase to that general aid amount. So this is historical on what those total dollar figures have been over that time frame and what those increases and decreases have been. I think what's interesting is there's been nine times over those last 15 years where the board has actually reduced the overall school tax levy. There was one time where there was an increase over 1% to that school tax levy and that was in 2018 and I think that was fully expected in the conversations that the um board administration had with the community if they improved that investment in buildings in the district. Um, but as we
040look here with that additional funding we'd utilize from fund 39, um, we would have about a 4.3% increase. Uh, if the board didn't want to use those reserves in fund 39, then you could add an additional $400,000 to that projected tax levy number and that would be going up, you know, a little over a million dollars then into next year. I think I might have skipped over one or two um slides. So, some of the things that we continue to do in managing the budget. So, we think about um things we do to control costs. So, thinking about cooperative and state contracts, we share services with the village of Greenale. Um we have a partnership with the Franklin School District in terms of fiber um lines for our internet within the district. our work in
041self-funding health insurance. Um, I talked about some of the ways we've done prepayments and refinancing of debt. Um, and we continue to have other conversations with the village to do future planning and think about the best ways that we could collaborate. Um, let me just skip ahead again. Uh, areas that we need to continue to monitor would be those state budget negotiations. um district health insurance. So, we've shared with the board that that plan is running um hot, like it's running at a higher percentage than what's budgeted for this year. And so, the self-funded plan could end up um ending the year above what's budgeted. We're continuing to monitor student enrollment and we'll have additional updates for the board on that in June. and then thinking about overall investments in capital projects. Um, oh yeah,
042so then this slide too I wanted to hit on because I think another big area when we talk to the community about getting additional funding is we got asked frequently like what else can the district do to find alternative revenue streams to manage the budget? And so the last few years we've written over a million dollars in grants and we've received uh right about half of that total funding. And so here you got a breakdown of different grants that we've sought. I think even when we've written grants that we've not been able to capture, right, I think it's really important that the community understands that that works ongoing and the only option isn't just to ask the community for additional funds. We have to think creatively about what may be available. So, one that I
043would call out there, there's a school violence prevention grants, a federal grant. We wrote that last year. If that's available here in the spring, um we'll proceed with trying to submit that again for some of the physical upgrades we could make to our buildings. Um talked about this just the increase in fund balance to begin to restore that above that $6 million level and then some of those uh liability decreases that we've seen over time through some pretty prudent management that the board has had. um regarding debt and liabilities. And so here's kind of that summary of where we're at with budget development. Hits on all the points that I've already talked about that this is reflective of our budget values. And hopefully this shows that we continue to be good stewards of funding for
044the district. That operational budget would be in balance at 39.4 million. And then that projected tax levy would be about a 4% increase into next year. Um and this is without uh any further re um resolution between the legislature and governor and finding um compromise regarding state budget investments. Uh we'll continue to have a budget that we can move forward if that's delayed further. So with that, I'd be happy to take questions the board may have about the presentation or those background documents that I shared. >> All right. Thanks, Jonathan. Does anyone have any questions? >> Not seeing any. >> Okay. So then we'll bring back the preliminary budget on June 15th and probably touch on uh some of our auxiliary services a little bit further because we'll have the opportunity for Mr. Kums to
045present in June regarding facilities and what he's doing with his team. So I can hit on some of those areas a little bit further on June 15th and bring that back for board approval. >> All right. Thank you. All right. So we'll be moving on to the annual library plan update. >> Turn this over to Dr. Olsson. >> Oh, thank you. Um librarians, if you guys want to come up if they have any questions. Um this is a update as part of a multi-year effort designed to continuously evolve our district's library resources. Um the current cycle of our library plan is 2025 through 2027. Um the library team um is committed to updating the board annually and um giving progress on these goals. And following the completion of this cycle, they crafted two goals. Um
046one the first goal is really about um ensuring by the end of 2728 that they'll anal um analyze and continue to update their library connections um to ensure their connections dynamically meet the needs of all learners and um act as windows and mirrors to that larger world. Um and then also really goal two is focusing on expanding that partnership with the library and school staff. um and then really communicating and talking about what's happening. They both have um these amazing resourcefilled um newsletters that they're giving out every month. They also have a lot of success this year. Um we are the in nationwide we're in the top 20 um schools in W Oh, no. In Wisconsin. Nationwide. >> Nationwide in the state of Wisconsin. nationwide in the state of Wisconsin. Uh we're in the top
04720 for our um digital engagement with Sora. And Sora is an online um you can listen to books, you can read books. Um and we saw a huge increase of uh 2200 hours. Um and that means that kids can be listening while they're working out and they can listen to books on tape or they can um access books that our physical libraries don't have. um as well. >> It also has a lot of accessibility features for students who need like a dyslexic friendly font or um a different color background or a larger font size or spacing. So those that's what we talk about a lot too at the people's services department. >> And then also they had a huge increase in collaborations from last year from 86 to um 92 this year. So those are
048some of the successes and some of the different things that they've done is leading STEM activities, bringing in community speakers and um really trying to um support the curriculum um in both um in all three I mean all five of our schools. So um that's where we are with the library plan. Are there any questions for me or the team? >> Any questions? These brief updates usually do not bring the librarians to the board meeting, but they are here for our next agenda item. So that it is just helpful that they this was on the same. >> Thanks for scheduling them on the same night. >> You're welcome. >> Well, I'm not seeing any questions for this. So I think we can jump to the uh policy on AI review. >> Yep. So before we
049jump into the text of the AI policy, which is a replacement of a previous one that we were rescending, uh we put this one on hold when we did the policy review a couple months ago in February uh because we still had not done some work with our staff and our students around um appropriate use of AI. So that has happened over the last several months and they're going to share with you some of the things that we've done to talk with staff and students about responsible use of AI before we review the policy. Okay. Sure. Do you want to start with the elementary? >> I don't think so. I think I have it. Um you start with >> Okay, great. We're going to go top to bottom. So starting at the high school um
050we have done a lot of professional development around AI literacy with the staff. So um last year and this year I think I've done a couple I did a couple presentations last year and a couple presentations this year at both the high school and the middle school level so that staff just have a better understanding of AI. I didn't prepare a presentation because I didn't know what questions you were going to ask me so you don't have to look at the screen. Sorry. Um so the staff have been um brought up to speed. I think we have a pretty good common language around what we talk about when we talk about AI and what tools are available and what what are the best practices. Um and this year our focus for the edtech team which
051includes um Tara and myself as well as representatives from teaching representatives from every building and special education representatives and representatives from the IT department. Um, as an edtech team, we talked about the importance of getting our students more informed about um, artificial intelligence and teaching AI literacy. So, at the high school level, we uh, worked with several staff members um, to put together a presentation. Oh, there it is. Um, to put together a presentation and then um, we had input from different teachers. So, it was presented to the students during their advisory class as a video. The slides were also available. So depending on the comfortability of the teacher with sharing the information about AI, either teachers could present the slides and talk with the students independently or they could play the video. Um and
052then the video included voices from like Mrs. Henzy and Mrs. Havvis and Mr. Guyger. So we had a few different teaching um opinions and kind of thoughts uh shared with the students. And then at the middle school level um AI literacy has been taught in a couple of different ways. So the students who had info techch at the beginning of the school year, like in the first half of the school year, they had lessons in their infoche classes. The students who had info third quarter had lessons directly from me and then the students who have infoch fourth quarter will have them from Mrs. Walsh in the fourth quarter of the school year. And it will be a regular part of the curriculum at the middle school going forward and actually was a part of the
053curriculum last year. So our eighth grade students um ha heard the information last year at the middle school and then again this year as freshman in high school and then I'll let Tara talk about elementary. Okay. At the elementary level, >> who's who is um >> It's a mystery. You never know who's touching >> who's touching the slides. Okay. Sounds good. >> You want to take control? >> No, no, no. Okay. >> What you're doing, it's all good. So, >> at the elementary level, um we took kind of it's kind of a different approach obviously from middle school and high school, but one thing that we thought was really important was that our te that our students receive some sort of educ education about what AI is. they know, but but also the kind of
054benefits and cons that come with it. We're really interested in safety issues. So, all of the elementary students have received the same AI introduction video that they did at the middle school and high school. We found that it was um useful and appropriate for the elementary level. Um at the elementary level, every month we have a character strong trait, right, that we we talk about responsibility. um in May it's creativity and creativity sounded like a good time to talk about AI. So instead of the character strong trait we really foc um the teachers really focused on introducing AI to them where they got they gave their students the introduction video and also introduced um a lesson. This lesson was through Wisconsin PBS. Um Ruff Ruffman was his little dog, really cute. Um and each grade,
055and this is grades three through, um third through fifth grade received a different lesson. So third grade, um they got an AI voice assistant lesson, fourth grade AI robot helper lesson, and then fifth grade creating an AI masterpiece. Again, this was all through the PBS Wisconsin um sort of rough ruffman curriculum. Um and that happened this month in May. So, you can see that the goal is not to hide AI or pretend it doesn't exist that forces kids to go underground, but to really help them understand how to use it responsibly um and to continue to use their brains in tandem with any AI tools that might be there. So, um, and that is that brings us to the policy that we are looking at. Um, you have had a first reading on this before,
056but we're bringing it back in context with a larger discussion about what we're hearing about AI. So, if you want to have a broader discussion about AI and then any specifics on the policy that you would like to address, this is your opportunity to do so. Would anyone like to take advantage of their opportunity? >> I have one question. Are we utilizing or teaching like closed AI models within the school system? I know that's >> a generation cost um the databases etc. Are we teaching that for them? So we are only using Gemini and we have a closed system for that and um through one of the things that we've had a lot of talk about in our tech team is when are we going to open that up for students so that teachers can
057utilize notebook LM which is also a closed system and then also Gemini um which is not used it's it would be just within their Greenell schools and our student data will be protected. So would they be able to write their own bot per se? >> Yeah, like they can write a gem. Yeah, they would be able to, but we would have access to exact like and they can't erase anything. >> Um, we've also blocked chatgpt because of some of um so kids cannot use chatgbt on our um Wi-Fi on their computers either. >> Nor can staff. Um, >> yeah, >> chat GBT changed their policy to allow the creation of adult content by users and when they made that announcement, we decided that as a district, we were just going to block it for everyone.
058>> Can they use like Claude Perplexity? >> Um, I don't know. Do you guys know if students are able to access those? >> You can use Claude. Yeah. I don't know about the other ones, though. >> Okay. >> All right. So then I guess the follow-up question is Claude regulated by you guys then. >> No. No. >> Okay. >> Gemini is but when they log in through their school account that is through us. So some of them we have not yet um cert if it's something that we purchase and we provide students we have to review it that is in the um draft I don't know if it's in the draft policy but it's in our student privacy and student protection policy um where we talk about the fact that we it needs to be
059compliant with data protection around student data um and >> you can get to claude it sounds like Noah Right. >> But it's not something that we provide. So as we learn about things um we have not blocked AI as a complete genre. Um and so we would need to block individual ones. And so that is something that if we know of some that we need to review for student privacy and student confidentiality like what we've had to do with chat GPT to block it then that is something that it says in the policy superintendent and in your definitions of policies superintendent with the capital S means or designate and so the tech team and um Ryan Jonas is the tech director is responsible for reviewing sites to make sure that they're compliant. So then can
060I ask if we would take a look at Enthropics terms of use as well if Claude is not blocked? >> So yeah, this is probably a better question for Ryan, but what I can explain is that as a district when we filter things for students, we don't block AI as a as a um like subject heading, which is why they're able to get to other websites in the same way that we don't block like or we do block um social media as a subject heading. and they wouldn't be able to get to websites that are cataloged that way. Um, so because we don't block AI, but we do block chat GBT because of what I just mentioned, they would be able to get to other websites. They wouldn't be things that we would recommend or
061promote as a district because they're not safe and they don't follow the privacy policies in the same way that it would if they logged into Gemini with their school account. Um, but the business of blocking or blocking like website by website is sort of like a 247 job, you know, as things pop up. So, it would just kind of be a conversation about how we would want to go about doing that or if if we want it to be like a classroom management strategy where we ask um for monitoring and teaching appropriate use and encourage students to make the best choices for themselves or if we want it to be a strategy where we think it's safest if we just prevent them from accessing specific URLs. >> So, what are the the concern is anthropic
062and they have a complete open share with certain companies >> um and business associate agreements and one is they'll share all data to the government so it's like a complete open share um so that's just a concern >> we can bring that up to the tech team Brian and then report back >> I'll put it on a list for review >> because it just got it got flagged for HIPPA compliance so that was one that we just looked at so looking >> that's super helpful >> well and we also want to like Danielle's point One of the things that why we are teaching about it and one of the reasons why we want to like bring kids towards Gemini and um notebook LM is because the the it's out like pend it's Pandora's box is
063open so we want to give kids tools that we can show them how to use it how to use it responsibly I mean also kids can go on chat GPT if they turn off Pantheret and they have their phone like they that's just they can we can block claude and can just turn or not use their um or not use their computer. So I think um those are all available to our kids. So to Danielle's point like of blocking, we really want to give kids the tools to know, hey, why does it matter that that isn't a that's an open source versus a closed source and try to support kids that way. So, do you give them um aside from the tactical, do you give them learning lessons, understanding that what they are putting into
064AI models outside of school goes everywhere and that it it you are feeding this mass machine that will continue to learn and share data. Is that part of the strategy? >> Yeah, that was part of >> this is one of these flew by. Sorry. Oh, no, no, no. We're just highlighting right now. We're not like we're not like how did you not see this? No, this is an example of what we used. >> Okay. >> Yeah, >> that was definitely part of the lesson at the middle school and high school level. I don't know if it was part of the lesson at the elementary level because it might not be age appropriate for third through fifth graders yet, but um definitely 6th through 12th grade. >> That concept that free often means you pay with
065data, right? And so you're giving away personal information. >> And then as they're as they're typing in, are we are we teaching them about good prompts? I mean, I saw the slide about, you know, don't tell >> we haven't really gotten to that step yet of teaching about appropriate prompting prompting at a school level. There are individual classroom teachers who are having those conversations. Um, but step one was really more of like the safety and security. That was what we wanted to focus on first. So then are we also teaching students when they're using AI about confirmation bias and the idea that um if you keep asking them around a specific topic or a specific thing, they're going to tell you what they think you want to know versus maybe challenging you or something like
066that. >> Confirmation bias has been part of the info tech curriculum for the past three years because that's been true before AI, right? That's true in social media and on the internet. So that has definitely been part of the conversation prior to this. but is it also a part of the AI conversation? Um, at the high school level, we don't have the same kind of info tech class or curriculum. So, I can't say that all students are receiving that that lesson. Um, I'm hopeful that it's part of a lesson in our computer science courses, possibly in our business courses, possibly in our social studies courses. Um, but it's not in the same way that it is in info through infoch at the middle school. Okay, >> this is a slide from a staff presentation. So,
067um, staff of >> You just have everything handy, Dr. Mits. You're welcome. So, great. >> Um, so this tells you how we're working with staff about building prompts in a way that, um, elicits what you're looking for. And so, that'll that'll be something that moves into work with the students in in the near future. And then how are we addressing the littlest to get them interested in playing in the sandbox when they finally are allowed to in third grade? >> Ah interested in playing in the sandbox in third grade. What we've been talking about with like Gemini and the access to Gemini is not available at the elementary school level. So at the elementary school level, our focus or say our focus the the focus of the edtech team is to focus on safety and
068having making sure that we're starting that foundation of understanding the issues that you're talking about. Um I think this is also like very new to the elementary schools and to the teachers um of >> it's new to all of us. >> Yes, it's new to all of us. Correct. Um, but I think like explicitly addressing AI in the classroom, this is very new. And so we're starting here with this month with these lessons of um, everybody in the building being on the same like plane and um, showing well for third grade through fifth grade and talking about AI show everybody getting the same information and the same video and then diving into some more detailed lessons. Um but at this level from third to fifth grade they're not um getting on >> it's and some
069of that is really around saying like Alexa is AI we use AI you know so kind of giving them some background information that this isn't just something that this has been around you might have it in your bedroom what does that mean you know like those kind of safety things is kind of what like your friendly robot like this is what it does and this is why it's good this is why it's not so good so that's kind of how them elementary. It's more of that jeez. It's more of like the broader like AI exists. Here's different ways that it exists. >> Yeah. Because as we're as we're engaging these native learners, right? These are the the natives of this um getting them interested in using it and using it for various purposes versus just,
070you know, some of the evil purposes that we hear about. >> Yeah. right now they're just saying Siri play my song. You better be kidding me all of a sudden. >> I might too that um Tara and I are in a CISA1 library networking group. So that's with other librarians from all over the CISA1 area. And based on that and also our experience at the WEIMA conference with librarians and technology teachers from the whole state of Wisconsin, I think we are ahead of the game here in Greenale. Um, I don't think a lot of other districts are at this point of having taught their staff on multiple occasions about AI and having taught students about AI. And actually, a lot of other people were looking to us to say like, well, what did you guys
071do? What resources did you use? How did you decide what you were going to teach? And when it comes to the the youngest learners, it was really hard to find something that we could share with them. And we were really excited actually at the WEIM to conference, we talked to the people at the PBS Wisconsin booth about Ruff Ruffman. They were the ones who told us about it. We were really excited to find that and it is appropriate for for K2. So we certainly could um bring that lower next year, but also of course as we go forward there will be more tools available. Just a matter of the edtech team like really evaluating them to decide what we think is best and appropriate. >> Thank you. Library day is my son's favorite day of
072the week. Just so you know. >> Good taste. >> Oh, uh Kathy has one more. >> Um first of all, thank you for coming in on this topic. I I had asked about it. Um, and it's something I think we probably need to have updates on, um, at least annually as a school board. Um, I'm going to talk to you from two angles here. One from the student angle and one from the staff angle. Um, you touched on some of it with the students. You might know I'm an educator as well. So, I know we have some ways in which we're incorporating this. My question um to you on the student, is it mainly being um talked about through their library courses or are the the core home room teachers also engaging them in these
073conversations? >> How is it elementary? >> Um I would at the elementary level in terms of library what we provide are not necessarily lessons about AI. We provide resources and information about AI and that is one thing that I think we we did a really good job um of in terms of our collection development with updating our collection with information about AI that's available at the elementary school level. The lessons that we talked about um today the rough ruffman um um the character strong lesson that is something that's being done by their teacher. Now the library supports every month whatever the character strong trade of the month is. um we talk about it in library. So this is no different either since they're talking about AI um in their classroom as a character strong trait.
074We also talk about it in the library in a way of um here's our display on AI materials. You've been having um conversations about this in class. You might be interested in these materials. Um, sometimes we'll pull up a book to do like a little book talk on it, but not like a formal lesson. More of like supporting what is being taught in the classroom that the teachers are doing. >> Okay. And then at the middle school level, the lessons are being delivered in their infoch classes. And I Emily Walsh is the teacher of that class right now and will be next year. And she's on our edtech team. So we work together with her um to develop the lessons that she thinks are most appropriate. And then at the high school level, I made
075these slides with help from the edtech team that you're looking at. This is what was delivered to the high school students during their advisory class. And then at the middle and high school level, there are some teachers who feel really comfortable with AI who have a lot of background knowledge and have been to the summits in the summer and things like that. So they're probably doing more in their classrooms with AI. Um, and then there are some teachers who have asked for my help and support at both the middle school and high school level when they've seen students using AI, but they don't feel comfortable enough in their knowledge base to deliver a lesson on their own. So, like I worked with um seventh grade math and eighth grade English to create some slides about
076um why it's better to use your brain than to use AI to do your homework um in a way that students would understand. And I'm happy to share those slides as well. Um, but that's just kind of as it comes up at the different levels. If a teacher feels comfortable, they're sharing more. Um, if they don't, then they're seeking out help from a member of the edtech team or the library staff. >> Noah or Maddie, do you want to share anything about what you've seen in your classrooms as an expansion of what Mrs. Brandon's saying? >> Um, I can't like speak personally to the presentations in like advisory. I don't know if that's something where it's like some advisory teachers are more um active in giving those presentations. I think uh in most of the
077classes I'm in it varies between teachers explicitly mentioning using like AI and just like having that be something that you use as like a referral like this is what I used it for. Um and then kind of treating it like a source similar to how you would use like articles as a source. And then some other classes it's more implicit where the teacher doesn't make a mention of it. Um, but then if they like notice it, they might like bring it up to a student privately. >> No. Are you taking any business classes this semester? >> Not this semester. No. >> Okay. I think Mr. Galante does talk to his students about AI and when it's appropriate to use it in terms of business and creating things. Um, and then do you have AP Lang?
078>> No. >> Okay. >> I think Miss Hassa and AP Lang also um did like a continuum with her class. So she also teaches at W Wisconsin and had a lot more background knowledge on AI from there and so brought that into the classroom as well. >> I'm only here for half a day so I don't have like a ton of classes but I we had the one presentation in advisory but none of the teachers that I'm with have mentioned it at all and we haven't been able to like apply what we learned. So >> my question going because I was gonna double double over to them as well. Um do you guys understand had you had a chance to look at the policy as it pertains to students and does that make sense if
079you did have a chance? Um it's basically saying that um uh basically that um the use of AI must be properly disclosed and cited in accordance with the established guidelines and so forth. Are do students understand that at the high school level? Uh, I would say like it depends on like the AI. Like I think a lot of students would know to mention if they used kind of like those brainstorming ones with whether that's like anthropic or Gemini or chatbt, but then for some of like the like photo AI programs that students can have on their phones, they might be less, you know, like either willing or knowledgeable to bring up that they would use that for assistance. Okay, >> it was part of the advisory slides. The I shared the board policy with students
080that was on slide six, Kim, if you wanted to pull it up. And then the lines from our handbook are also in that presentation. And then just kind of a slide that said, "If a teacher hasn't said yes, then it's a no." >> And Noah and Maddie were in my office for board meeting prep the day the lesson was delivered. So sorry. What timing >> do we teach how to um identify AI components like AI videos like how to look and see the tags that are in the pictures or >> that wasn't part of the lesson yet. I would love to do more lessons like that and like prompting. I think it would really benefit our students to give to deliver more of that instruction. I'm just not sure at the high school level the
081best way to do that because we don't have a class like infoch. Um, so I'm not sure the best way to deliver that content to all students, which is why the focus has been a lot on like professional development and teaching the teachers. Um, and so that they can incorporate it into their class when it feels natural instead of it just kind of being an extra thing. >> And then coming back to the teacher part of it, um, that was the other end. Dr. Amidzik and I spoke earlier today. There are a lot of resources out there for educators, but we're limiting right now to Gemini. um are and and maybe I didn't ask this fully of Dr. Mizik before today, but like there's Brisk, there's diffit, there's there's all different kinds of um educational
082resources that are done through AI. >> Our staff still able to use those resources. Absolutely. We're not paying for them. So, they're required to do that on their own or some of them are free to a certain extent. I know like Diffet >> Brisk used to be Yeah, DFIT's great. Um, so I'm just wondering, you know, I don't want to discourage either and to only limit us. Um, I will say I'm happy um, in talking to other regional directors for WSB and so forth. Some districts don't have any policies in place and we're we're heading into that. I know Maggie, we talked to the to you about this about a year ago, but um, I want to make sure that we're not limiting, you know, to just Gemini. No, aside from chat GPT, we are
083not limiting staff access to any AI tools. We did pay for Brisk for two years. It's not until this year that they gave us a quote where the price uh the annual cost went from, I might be wrong on this, but it was around like $3,000 for last year to $13,000 for next year. And that $10,000 price increase wasn't something we felt we could justify with all that Gemini and Notebook LM can do now. But Brisk still has a free component that teachers are encouraged to use. and we we either put that in the last newsletter or it'll be in the next newsletter that we're um ending our our agreement with BRISK but that teachers can continue to use it. Um and then I do also in my professional development to staff recommend additional tools
084that are free to use. I just always make sure that staff um remember the um personal personally identifiable information guidelines and not entering any PII into those um tools that we haven't paid for that we really focus on. Gemini is the one that is safe when you are logged in with your school account. It is copa, furpa, and hippa compliant. And we can't say that for the other tools that you might be accessing for free. And so just to be really mindful of that, >> right? And you're saying in terms of student data and so forth, >> well, I think any data. >> Yeah. Look over there as an example. >> You can always learn about AI if you come stare at the TV in the library. No, I think it's great and I want
085to thank both of you for your work and I also um Noah and Maddie too for just your input on this as well. It's it I think it's good in maybe in future meetings to even hear from some of the students or showcase some of the things that they're doing with AI because it I mean the sky is the limit, you know, and obviously we got to teach responsible use and that's what we're about in our schools. >> Yeah, Mr. Kaziki and Mr. Gger would love to talk to you about some of the things that they've done, I'm sure. And then I will also just mention that we have invited Eric Curts to come. Jonathan just signed the contract with him. So he's for sure coming now um in the fall and he'll be talking
086to our staff but also providing a community information session and we've asked him to talk about AI and invite parents and community members to come in and learn about what is it, what should I know about it, what should I know if I'm parenting a student. So I'm really excited about that. I I recall back in the day when we had the internet safety and all that. >> Yeah, basically same idea. >> I think it is the same idea and I think it would be of interest to families because I would say Noah and Maddie probably your parents don't even know as much as you guys know about AI. Would would you agree with that? >> My parents send me videos on Facebook that are like clearly AI and they don't know that it is
087and it feels bad to tell them cuz they like like it a lot. Yeah. >> Oh, yeah. >> Absolutely. They're thrilled. >> That's great. >> Thank you guys. >> Oh, thank you. >> All right. Well, thank you for coming in tonight. >> We'll bring that policy back on June 1st for approval. >> All right. So, then we'll move on to board professional development if uh anyone has anything. >> Summer leadership. I don't know if you want to I I know I'm registered. I I don't know if the rest of you are interested, but July uh 10th and 11th is the summer leadership academy. It's going to be up in Stevens Point this year. So hopefully we get some people at that. There will be a thing for presidents like the whole session for you guys.
088>> What are the dates? >> Uh the 10th and 11th >> 10th and 11th. >> I will uh I'll check my calendar. >> Did you have anything? I do not. >> All right. So, then we will move on to board calendar. >> So, we have prom this Friday as mentioned by Maddie. Um, the grand march is at 5:00 in the gym and you can see everyone all dressed to the nines and ready to go. So, there might be a number of board members that are there. Hold on, let me look at my calendar. There are concerts next week um for elementary. Looks like is it next week? Yes, it's next week. Um, nope, this week. Sorry. Starting tomorrow are the elementary concerts. Why am I looking at this wrong? >> Thank you. So, tomorrow is
089Highland View. Uh, Wednesday is College Park and Thursday is Canterbury. So, next week or this week, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, there are concerts at the high school auditorium for all of the um elementary schools. Outdoor Ed is this week, Wednesday, Thursday. I don't think you're going along, but it is happening. And then um we have a PD day on Friday. Um Monday's Memorial Day celebration in the community. Board members may be present. And then we have the employee recognition dinner for both retirees and people who have been in the district for 25 years. And if you haven't RSVPd um and you would still like to come, we'll see if we can squeeze you in. Uh respond to Julie and let her know if you haven't. Some of you have. And then next week are the high
090school middle school concerts. And then we'll have a meeting again on the first. >> All right. Thank you. Uh we can skip um comments from visitors and then we are going into close session. So we will have to do >> we do not have a close session. >> Is that not this >> we canled because there's no money to talk about. >> Oh no one >> safety projects. No one. >> So we're going to hold. Sorry that was one of the things that I was like do we need to talk? Yes we did. >> Yeah I didn't get the message. All right disregard can go home early. Uh we will adjourn and come back uh what is it next two weeks from now? Two weeks. >> June 1st. >> Yeah. And now you don't have
091to sing close.