6.16.25 Board Meeting - 2025-06-16 22:01:42

001Becky will now call the roll. Steve. Here. Jessica? Here. Tom? Here. Angie? Here. Tucker Here. Kat Here. And Cam here. Thank you. Okay. As Quo was present so we can proceed. We'll start with approval of the minutes from the May 19th, 25 regular board meeting. Have a motion to approve the minutes. I will make motion. I'll second. Okay. Just shall And we'll do a voice vote. All in favor say aye. A Aye. All opposed, nay. Aye. All right. Motion carries. We'll now, um, open the floor for public comment, but there is none. Okay. Um, so we are moving to recognitions and accommodations. Sounds good. I'm gonna jump in there. And I have a very special, um, alumni with me tonight at elementary, um, Kathy Luther. And she is asked to come and present as, um,

002part of our district. 'cause she had some great things going on, um, within her school, uh, classroom experience as well as the junior generosity. So she's going to give a fantastic Closing. Well, I'm gonna try my last official act. Um, I'm going to start with something that, um, I don't know if Tucker can see me or if I'm in a good place for him or not, but, um, I'm not exactly sure when it started, but, um, the first time I started keeping track was the school year of 2022. And we were talking about, um, being casual. And so the, the idea came up to wear jeans to school on Wednesdays and also on Fridays. But Wednesdays what we would do is if you choose to wear jeans, then you would donate between three and $5

003to, um, the faculty lounge in your building. And then we would take that money and we would do things with it for people in our community. Um, I'm not exactly sure where the name generosity came from, but, um, jeans and we were being generous. So, um, I have a sheet for you to, um, look at all of the, oops, Sorry. Just like in the classroom To show you the last three years on where our money went. There you go. Family can have one too. Thank you. Um, we, we just did a variety of people and groups. Um, I, I'm just very proud of what we've done for the last three years. I have the total there for each year. It's strapped off a little, but we also have a few less faculty members. But I

004think it's pretty good when, um, we shared $7,372 and 35 cents in three years. And it's all just our faculty and staff being generous. And because we wanted to wear jeans. So, um, you can see some of the families, some of the groups, um, which tried to help out as many people as we could. There was a few months where we would, we didn't have a particular place or something, so we kind of put that in the slush fund. And, um, I found a place for everything that I collected in three years. So, um, I hope that someone continues to do that. It's, I think, a neat thing to show our community that what we're, we do what we do and that we care about people. So it's called generosity. Um, the next thing Joy

005and I kind of did together, I'm old school here with my trifold. I can leave it up for you. But, um, this project started back in about 2000, 2002 or 2003. Um, I was at a coaching clinic down in the Dells and I met a gentleman and his name was Brian Kinney. And he does, um, he now has his own business called Team Extreme. He does team building and, um, he goes around to schools. He does faculty and staff. He does colleges. He really likes, um, to work with kids of all ages. Um, in my own hometown in Pittsville this year, he was there on, um, Wednesday afternoons for their afterschool program. They wrote a grant to have him come in and he participated in their afterschool program. And they just did team building and

006fun activities that kids didn't realize, probably that they were learning how to be better people when they were doing the activities. So, um, we wanted to get him to come into our school. So I actually had him for my volleyball teams probably since 2004. So he came in every year, a half a day, and he worked with the girls and we had a lot of, a lot of fun. And now he's a family friend and he always came the Friday of the fair and he really loved being here on the fair. So that was our, our standing date. I think the Athens High School is probably one of his longest customers. Mm-hmm. Um, so I'm proud to say that too. He's a phenomenal person. Um, if you ever need anything for a workplace or anything,

007he, he does a great job with working with people and, and building, building your company and building your people. So he would be great for an in-service as well. Um, so what we did decided to do is, um, take some of his activities and he started building kits. Um, they all come in a, a tote of some type. Some don't have totes because they don't need them. And we decided to, uh, use them for our check and connect. Check and connect is every Wednesday at Athens Elementary. And, um, Bridget takes all the children kindergarten through fifth grade and she divides them up. There's probably 12 to 13 groups or so run by an adult, a faculty or a staff member. And we have about 12 to 13 kids in each group of all ages. And

008we just do little activities with them for about, uh, 12 to 15 minutes maybe. And so we are always looking for ideas 'cause sometimes we run out of them. So we said, let's, let's get Brian to make some of his cool games and put 'em in totes for us. And then when a teacher wants to do one of his activities that can go to the library, grab the bin, or whatever they need for that activity. So, um, these are some of the pictures of his activities and the bins and some of our students. So, um, joy and I wrote three grants to help purchase all of the activities and to have Brian come in two times this year and work with our entire building. So we were awarded money from the Beyond Pencils and Crayons

009grant, sponsored by the Community Foundation of North Central Wisconsin. We were awarded money from the Athens Area Credit Union, and we also received, um, some money from the Marathon County area Retired Teachers Association. So, uh, the end of May, joy and I went to their meeting and showed them how we used their money. So, um, with their money, we bought 12 kits and they're all stocked ready to go. So if a teacher needs to use them or wants to use them for check and connect, she or he can. You can also just use them in your classroom as well. Um, just for fun, team building activities. The focuses of the team building activities are to promote problem solving, communication skills, trust, perseverance, affirmation of members, resilience, responsibility, just to name a few activities and to

010have some fun as well. So, um, this game is called the paper play activity. This works best with some of the high school students. We did, we do it with the volleyball team. Every year they have to write about something about each of their teammates and we pass it on and, and it's a great way to learn things about your, your, uh, teammates. Um, there's, let's see. This is a, this picture has a variety of balls and gizmos and gadgets. And you play this name game where you kind of have to toss it to a person and say their name and it, it just keeps going. It's, um, if you've ever played the name game, um, it's, it's great fun for them. They have to pay attention, they have to stay focused. Um, it's called

011the speed circle. The pipeline is one of their favorites. Um, he takes, and this, these are the pipeline content contents he takes, um, PVC pipe cut it in half. And then he has an assortment of, of small balls, golf balls, marbles, all kinds of different things. And the object is for the kids to make a circle and figure out how to get that ball around the circle with their, their half pipe. Um, when you're working with kindergarten through fifth graders, it's quite a challenge. Um, but sometimes the big kids will insert themselves in between the little ones and they'll help out. And we're just, we're just having fun with that one. But they, they really do work together. Um, the fishing game is always a lot of fun. There's magnets on the fish in the

012pool, and they have to catch a certain amount of fish in so many minutes. This one is, um, called the egg carton game. He did this with all the kids when he came. He has several egg cartons with ping pong balls in them, them, and they're all numbered. And he uses the swimming pools again. And he dumps the, the pools would be scattered throughout the floor and he dumps the, the, the ping pong balls all over the place, all mixed up. And then the child gets their carton. And then out on the outside of the carton is a set of numbers. So maybe mine says 100 to 200. So I have to go running around trying to find ping pong balls between 100 and 200. And it's, it's kind of fun because you, you hear

013them start working together and they'll, they'll start yelling out, well, here's 100 or 260. And somebody say, oh, that's one of mine. So they're communicating and they're having fun. And, and then as, as kids get their cartons filled up, then they go and help each other too. So it's a lot of fun. It's, it's really good teamwork. Um, that's the speed circle game. Oh, this is one of my favorites. And I'll finish up 'cause I know we have lots of things to do. Um, he took pool noodles and he cut them into little pieces and there's like ice cream buckets and you have to, if you snap it, you wanna try to get it into the ice cream bucket to your partner. Maybe sometime the all should come anyway. It's a lot of fun. Um,

014they could, they could say they're, you know, favorite, uh, ice cream or something like that. You can be generating ideas while they're playing these games where they have to communicate with each other. So it's not just for playing games, but, but we're learning how to work together and especially when it's checking connect to work with children of different ages. So, um, those are our check and connect, um, toolkit bins and, um, they're just ready to go. And just very, very helpful for the teachers as well. How Did teachers learn how to use some of those Kits? When Brian came the two times, um, to work with all of the elementary kids, he stayed after and we played with them. We, we just took out the kits and we, we used them and he talked about

015goals and things that we could use, um, when doing that activity and, you know, to, to make it meaningful for them as well. So, and to work on some of these skills. Anything else? No. And I think, um, as teachers, you guys also took turns teaching, like during a staff meeting. Yes, yes. Occasionally we dig out a game, um, at a staff meeting and play that as a warmup. So that was always a, it's a good icebreaker. So when you talk about the pipeline being difficult with children of sizes, you should try it with teachers. Adults are not always as accessible, but it is a lot of fun. It's, it's, you know, it's team building, it's, you know, kind of, sometimes it's putting people in uncomfortable positions and kind of learning what that's about too.

016So, um, I'm very proud to be a part of this and it's something that's gonna be at Athens Elementary. And, um, I've left a few things behind. Thank you for Luther Legacy. Yeah, thank you very much. Um, any other recognitions or accommodations? I'd be remiss if we did not mention our track team that was, um, down at state, um, just little over a week ago, breaking some records. Um, some new names are gonna go up on our board. That's pretty exciting stuff. Um, yeah. Records that haven't been broken for over 25 years, so that's amazing. Um, again, kudos to the whole track team, um, and their continued progress and, and personal goals and all of those kinds of things. So that's, I don't think that's lost on any of us, right? Those things don't just

017happened. Um, that's a lot of hard work on behalf of the kids and the coaches and the parents. So we greatly, uh, appreciate the community support. We have a nice send off for 'em. We had 'em going down to state, so that was nice. I always feel bad when they come back because they come back in the middle of the night, so it's difficult to do a formal reception of them coming back. So we'll have to work on a creative way at some point in the future to help do those things so that we can make sure they're getting the, the credit they deserve. So big shout out to them. I just wanna give a shout out to the committee, um, who help plan the playgrounds. Um, the playground is complete, um, so if you

018get a chance to drive out there and see, um, see it as you go by. It is, um, it is really beautiful. Um, but the committee worked all year planning it along with being in stock and, um, the end result is wonderful. So we are just waiting for the sod and everything to settle before we let kids go and play on it. Um, and we're looking to do a grand opening in September when they come back. Nice. Cool Water. Yeah, I don't have to worry about water in anymore, so Thank you all. All right, we're moving on to the board members reports. We have the Marathon County special education minutes in the packet To acknowledge. Are there any questions or comments on that report? Alright, acknowledged and we'll now hear the administrator's reports. Wonderful. So

019I will begin. And this is gonna be a team presentation, uh, with Julie, joy and Robin. Um, this is a time of year where we appreciate time in front of the board and our community to celebrate, um, the goals that we set for ourselves, our action steps that we achieved. And tonight you're going to hear about the successes that represent each of our building, not only in our classrooms, but for our staff and others. So, um, this is our school math and strategic plan and a GR reduction achievement gap reduction presentation. I'm operating I you to mad at me now. Thanks. So, um, we are just in the process of concluding the third in a four year, uh, process for our strategic plan. And when we began the process, we identified and updated a vision

020and mission statement. So this is familiar and we try to incorporate this. Um, we do presentations, we have, um, our vision and mission also, um, posted in our schools and around our community. So again, we highlight, um, our athletic school community. We will cultivate and promote a positive inclusive culture of respect with equity, integrity, and dignity. Students will be empowered to thrive emotionally, socially, and academically within a proactive and compassionate and nurturing system of support. Kathy's presentation illustrates very clearly what our, so thank you Kathy for that presentation in the beginning of tonight's meeting. And our mission is to promote a safe, inclusive, engaging learning environment to promote critical thinking, citizenship, student empowerment through strong school and community relationships. So tonight we focus in on pillar number one, which is student and staff engagement under

021each of our pillars. As a gentle reminder, we have different purpose statements we'll highlighted in the first purpose statement, um, really the grounding of what this presentation is all about. So we provide a rigorous and relevant curriculum that's in pre-K or K four through grade 12, delivered by high quality educators who use innovative research-based strategies. You'll hear about some of those this evening to prepare students with the skills necessary to contribute and create value to our ever-changing diverse world now and in the future. So the goal in particular that you're going to hear us talk about tonight is implementing a guaranteed of viable curriculum in grades 4K through grade 12. I've highlighted some information around core instruction as the board is aware and you approved last month. Um, joy and a team of teachers from

022Athens Elementary went through an extensive vetting process for new elementary ELA curricular resources called open court. So we wanted to draw attention to these are absolutely research based and sectional resources, which are now available for our teachers to use to guide that teaching learning process in their classroom. We maintain the EL curriculum in Maple Grove Charter School. We're currently using Reading Street and Language Network at the middle school and expert 21 at the middle and high school levels. And you'll hear more about a vetting process at the middle school when Julie presents a report later. So we align our action steps in particular to data or assessment analysis. And we're drawing attention tonight to two types of assessments. There's formative assessments which inform instruction. For example, um, we're utilizing the AIM web plus assessment at

023that early literacy stage, so in 4K through grade three. Um, and then we use the diagnostic assessments to better understand unfinished learning through some of our students who are not progressing. We're using Fast Bridge as a screener, um, in the other grades, so grades four through 10. We also use Fast Bridge as our math screener across the district. We also utilize an iReady diagnostic assessment tool for a student who may not be progressing or meeting standards in a certain grade level in math. And then we have summative as assessments. So a summative assessment inform the mastery of standards and content. For example, the access test, which we administer to our second language learners, the forward exam and the A CTI turn over to Robin to talk about Maple Grove Charter School's data. So in this

024first slide, what you are gonna see is the, um, new screener that we did this year, the k um, kindergarten through third grade. And the AIMS web plus this screener came out of Act 20, which we have talked about all year. Um, and from that, um, it's a little bit different. Um, in that our kindergarten take, um, they all take multiple, um, subtest, but in kindergarten those sub tests are all put together for composite score. So that is the score that you are seeing under kindergarten is that composite score. And, um, the first, second and third, um, comes from a score called the orf, the Oral Reading Fluency. So that is a screener that is administered. There's two reading, um, passages. They get a minute for each of 'em, and it's based on, um, the

025speed that they read those and the number of errors, um, or lack thereof errors that they get on that passage. And that's where that score comes from. So just keep that in mind when you're looking at those. It's not apples to apples, it's a little bit different, um, on what's what you're seeing there. Um, even though we don't, we take the, just the or the oral reading fluency for per second and third, we look at the other sub tests. Um, when we go to look at diagnostics or what groups to place them in at Maple Grove this year, you've heard me talk about how we did the Walk to remodel using, um, a program called You Fly, which is a direct instruction, um, based program that focuses on the phonic skills. And the Walk to

026Read model, for those of you that might not be familiar, is we took kindergarten, first and second graders and we do, um, a core phonics diagnostic to see where they land. And if students, um, are performing at a higher level, then maybe the kindergarten classroom, we shifted them into different groups based on their, um, skillset in those, in those grade levels. So there was an hour block of time each day set aside, and we really held that time sacred that we were going to use it that way every day. And the kids moved in between the different classrooms at that time so they could really, um, get instruction at the skillset they were at and what they need at that time. Um, and then there was also, it was a half an hour rotation and

027then, um, the other half an hour was working directly with a para on the skill that they had just learned. So there was always that, um, that instruction happening at those levels. Um, we found the Walk to model, um, successful at Maple Grove, um, along with paired with the U Fly curriculum. Um, but moving forward we have already, um, have things in place to revamp and change it for next year, um, just to make it even tighter and better. And that includes, um, breaking those groups into three groups. Instead of, um, two half hour groups, we're gonna do 20 minute groups and that way we can even move those kids closer to where they exactly are. One of the, um, one of the things that, um, opportunities we found from it was that we couldn't,

028some kids needed to or ready to move up, but not quite that far up. So now with having more groups, we'll be able to, um, move them more fluidly within those groups. So looking, um, on, um, the well below average, we were able to move 22% of the kids out of that category, um, through different diagnostic testing. And then, um, our intervention groups, which were set up from the diagnostic testing, 41% out of our below average. And then, um, you move into, um, the different categories, and this is where Joy and I broke this down, um, a little bit more this year, um, where we moved the 26th through 49th percentile, um, and broke those down 50th to 74th, 75th to 89th and 90th to 99. And so looking at those categories, um, the percentages

029are below where they stayed up. Any questions on this one? Again, this is just kindergarten through third grade. We are also looking at like some learners who may have not finished the Youth Life curriculum because in second grade they maybe, um, were working on standards that weren't quite there yet. How to continue that work in third grade, even though they don't use the Walk to Read model. Um, how we are gonna continue to make sure they get all those skills as well. This is fourth and fifth. Fourth and fifth continue to take the FastBridge a reading screener. And that's what you are seeing here. Um, again, the numbers are smaller 'cause it's just two classes mixed in here. Um, but I am happy to report at that. Um, at that level in fourth and fifth

030grade, we really wanna see numbers like this. We wanna see kids less in the red, in the orange because we've intervened for them early on. So we've already hit that intervention in K three. So we have, um, lower numbers at our, um, high risk in some risk, which you can see here. Um, this also includes all our special ed population. So, um, just showing you the movement of even students in special ed questions on that. And this is just all of 'em combined together. Um, so we went from 56%, uh, in the, in the fall to 69% proficient, um, or advanced low risk to college pathway. So that's an increase of 13%. Now, ultimately we wanna keep on growing with that and we're hoping, um, curriculum usually takes about three years of using that curriculum

031and using it well, um, to really see the advancement in the growth. So we're hoping from here we'll only continue to grow from there. And this is math. Um, we continue to take, um, fast bridge math, a math, um, and that's what you see here except for kindergarten, first grade, um, takes FastBridge, but it's called early math and that is given on a one-to-one basis with a teacher. So, um, second through fifth grade is an online component. Um, kindergarten and first grade are one-to-one. So we moved 67 out of high risk, 14 out of some risk for math and then continue to see that solid numbers, um, up at the low risk to college pathway. And with that we had a 73% in the fall and um, ended the year with 84% of our kids

032were, um, low risk college. So with this, um, one of the things that, um, we talk about are PLCs. One of the changes we made this year is we are a one, um, one track school, meaning that we just have one kindergarten, one first grade. So, um, the question sometimes lies how do we, how do we have our teachers work together and um, do professional development, look at data. Um, and that was one of, um, I came from a district that used PLCs and so that was one of the things I really wanted to push. Um, and we have our kindergarten first grade teacher, second and third, fourth and fifth working together, um, once a week and they meet to talk about different, different parts of data. Um, also maybe some of the learning that

033they are doing in their classroom and how to make it, um, better or how to advance it. Um, and then one of the changes we made this year is there was big conversation around, Hey, we wanna meet with our K one two team because we do so much work together, especially with the walk to Read and you fly model. Um, and then our 3, 4, 5 uses something called All Block. And that is during their literacy, um, time, which is an hour block of time and that basis on some of the skills that they need to learn. So with that, um, we scheduled in A PLC time, um, every other week for them to meet as those teams and to collaborate. And from those, we had, um, meetings talking about direct data that's coming from

034our youth li weekly assessments. We also, um, talked about some UDL universal design learning and how we are diversifying our learning for our learners and making it more engaging. So, um, that was really popular and the teachers, um, seemed to really appreciate that, um, and do that to moving, um, wanna continue with that moving forward. And this is, um, one of the things that Maple Grove has is, um, we have something called a work plan that we develop throughout the year, and that's where our goals are established off of. Um, the first one is, I'm gonna lose it, talks about data. Can't think of the exact name of it right now. But, um, then we have character in the second column and high quality work protocol at the end. And these are, um, examples of

035high quality work. Over the last three years we've been really focusing on, um, writing and bringing more writing into our, um, daily curriculum and not just during our literacy block of time, but at other times. And we, um, didn't have a solid way to grade that writing. And so this year the staff worked to create rubrics, kindergarten through, um, second grade created rubrics that are based on, um, the different types of writing, informational, um, informational writing, narrative writing, and I'm drawing a blank right now too, sorry. And so, um, they created those rubrics along with some samples that are on there so they can use those comparisons. The teacher will use this, it'll also be a good talking point at conferences, um, on where their student is at and just shows how they can move

036on that continuum. And now they also have like kindergarten has first grade rubrics so they can use those if their student is more advanced and ready to move on to that level. Um, then our third through fifth grade picked, um, a couple areas that they have really seen, um, students struggle with. Um, because there are so many writing standards, they're starting with three main focus areas and working to, they have a one point rubric and moving them on the scale of that one point rubric. They have also developed student based rubrics where students, um, reflect on their rubric work and are able to, um, self grade or self-reflect on those to make themselves better writers. Any questions on the rubrics? And so this work was done, um, it was finished towards the end of the

037year. Um, one classroom was able to use the rubrics with their students, but this work will move. Um, we'll use it now going forward. And then our PLCs will be based on this and we'll start collecting data. So next year will be our first year of that baseline data we'll get from these rubrics. And, um, at one of our staff, um, principal meetings that we had with Andrea, when, um, after school was out, she um, gave us a diagram. I don't know if you have it with you today, but um, do you, I think I have it. So it has a plant on it and it shows a seedling growing. Um, and she asked all three of us principals to, um, it's right there. So she asked all three of us principals to, um, find

038one success that we are really proud of this year and things that move forward. But with that, on the bottom of the diagram, it talks about obstacles and different things that we had to overcome to, um, get to that success. So, um, after some thought it was, um, it was our walk to read model, um, we were able to see success moving kids from, you can see the fall results on top to the spring results on the bottom. And that is that 25th percentile. The reason we have the 25th on there is because that's the act 20 cutoff line for 25th and below. So, um, you can see in the fall we had 54%, lemme make sure I can't read that exact date there. 54.8% were below. And then, um, 32.8 were below at the

039end of the year. So we did see success and growth with that. So continuing to tweak that and make it even better. And hopefully to close that 32 even more next year. Questions growth. I have one that I, how many years, how has, has Maple Grove been using the el? So, um, I came on, um, four years ago and that was their first, um, full year of, of implementation with all staff. They had, um, piloted it the year before, um, through the past district and there's only two staff that were there at that time. So this is the fourth year. The first year. Um, we didn't have the coaching with IT in the second. So they've had three years of coaching, um, with el. Okay, thank you. And so, um, pretty staff are really solid

040around EL now. Um, and it definitely is a rigorous, um, program, but they've really grown to love the program as well and seeing results in deeper level thinking. It's all about critical thinking. I wonders and I notice this, I have a question. I guess it's also, it'll put the same question for everyone, um, when I was looking through this presentation, but like for the students that are in that lower, I mean this is one example below that Act 20 level, how much of that is like structural, like they're coming in like as English learners or they're in special ed? Like how much, I mean, 'cause I feel like that part isn't really broken out and I feel like that that is a different thing. Like students that are gonna need ongoing support within that for,

041I mean EL like learning, learning English is different, but kids that come in with no English clearly like in a year, it's hard. Um, yeah, I don't know. I mean, just, I guess it's your own opinion of that unless you have it broken out. Yeah. Um, I have also being a special ed teacher as well at Maple Grove, um, we, there is, um, quite a few actually special ed learners that are in that 25th percentile, um, as well. So, um, I can't give you those numbers right off the top of my head, but, um, I would say it's, it's really a mixture of Maple Grove, um, really a mixture. And we had, we, um, didn't have many students with EL Okay. Background at Maple Grove either. So anyone else? Okay, you guys. All right. So

042I'm actually gonna start with your question in that. So, okay. So we have both learners in our goal, um, unless their IEP specifically stated that they would not take this assessment, um, for some for, and that was very, very few, um, students. So yes, we have all populations within our numbers and f and elementary does have a higher percentage of, um, EL students and SP student. Then, um, just giving you a little background in, in our, and I don't have it broken down 'cause that would be a little bit identifiable, so, um, but yeah, so we have the same type of goal that, um, Robin did at, and we use the same assessments, um, pre-K through three and four through five. So this graph is a little bit more condensed because it is, um, pre-K,

043um, through grade three. So we have all of those. And this year we had two first grades and the rest were singletons. And you'll see the, in the total students column, um, those three numbers represent how many students took the test in fall, winter, and then in the spring. So you'll notice in this category we had a decline of four students within, um, the test taking season and looking at our orange. Um, it's exciting still me, I'm a pretty raw data person, so when I met with Andrea and then I met with Robin and then Ryan with CISA nine. Um, not that I am Debbie Downer or do say, but that's what I look at first until you start to pull out some of those. And it is very exciting. 'cause like Ryan, um, from

044the, came from csun, I said 20% of those students moved out of well below. And, you know, my heart wanted to say yes, but I wanted all 30 of 'em out. So, you know, um, but, but it's, it's breaking that down and, and really taking a look at, um, what we were able to move and how we were able to move. So, uh, it's been a great learning experience for me too and trying to break some of that down a little deeper. So it, when I looked right away at our students below, let see 25 and 25, it's like, well, we made no growth, but that's not true. Um, because we pushed some kids from the orange to the yellow and the yellow to the green. So, um, it, it takes a little bit for,

045for me to digest some of those growths. Um, 'cause I want to see leaps and bound growth. Um, but there actually was, and to be reminded that this is one measurement on the multi measurements that we have. Um, so that's exciting too. So yeah, we broke down the two green columns and, um, because they put them all 26 through the 74 percentile together. Um, and we wanted to see more so where kids were at, um, as we broke down that data and had our data days. So it was exciting. So we moved 20% out of, well below 22% remain at below average. 30% of our students are at average. Um, and then 11% of kind of the higher average and then 8% above average, and 2% at well above. So while it's not the strong

046growth, um, having numbers on the right, we are moving and that is exciting. So, oh, sorry. Do you have any questions? So this is our fourth and fifth grade. We use a different assessment right now. We use the Fast bridge yet. And so you'll see that, um, we had a growth decline of two and 8% moved out of high risk. 22% are at some risk, 29% are at low risk, 24 at low risk in the higher category, and 2% at college pathway. So those are pretty strong as well. Up on the top, let's see, the average we have 72% of students are in the low risk to college pathway. So when you break it down like that, that's pretty good. Um, Is there work to do that there? It is that, um, it's helping us

047drill down to where that work needs to happen. Um, on my chart here, you'll see the fall, winter, and spring percentiles of growth. And this is pre-K through three on the top with the AIMS web and then fourth through fifth with fast bridge a reading. So one of the, the bonus here is, um, we moved from, in the fall, 22% in the zero to 19 percentile to 21%. We did drop, um, percentile there, which is good, a good drop and 6% to 1% in our 20 to 29 percentile. And then we jump over to our eight, um, sorry I forgot a number there. Um, 99 percentile. We went from 6% to 11% percent. So we had nice growth there. So math was very similar to Robins, um, at Maple Grove. So we used a ES,

048we used, um, pre-K through fifth grade. We use fast grade for the whole, um, grade levels, but they have different, um, tests along the way. So while it is using the same program, they do have different assessments that they take. So looking at, um, our growth, you can see that we had seven student decline from when we started in the fall to the spring. So 16% of our students remain at high risk, um, 16% at some risk, 24% are at low risk, 37% at low risk with the higher, and then 7% at college pathway. So we have, um, overall we had a decline in percentage. Uh, 81% of our students were a low risk to college pathway in the fall. And then we had in the spring 68% of students in the lowest to college

049pathway. So starting to identify, um, some gaps that we have and the need for continued identification and interventions in our math. Um, as well as continuing to push our students at low risk, um, higher. So we've had a really, we are having good strong focuses on our lower learners and trying to get interventions in place, but now we need to, um, continue that focus at our low risk and above because some of those need to move just slightly or have bounced, um, slightly. Any questions there? It's a big overview. So we did not dare scores, um, grow it. We would like to as a whole unit. But, um, later on I get to show you, um, some of the successes and these break it out. So our PLCs are similar. Um, same four questions that

050Robin had talked about. So what we found was our data has shown a need for ELA change in our curriculum at the tier one, which is the very universal, everybody gets level. Um, and it needs to be explicit and cohesive. So we all need to unify and teaching it the same um, way. And that is happening because we are taking on a new curriculum, uh, open court this fall. Our PL schedules need to include our gen eds, that and title. So we're looking at ways to incorporate more, uh, of a unified team when we're looking at our data and looking at our interventions. Because because we are small and we have several shared students, um, finding that time to communicate and to have that follow through is really important. Best practices must be implemented with

051collective efficacy. So we're working right now with, uh, DPI through a grant. So we already met once this summer, and that'll be an exciting time to look at bringing all of our, um, staff together to ensure that we have, um, collectively, um, put things in place, strategies in place, and putting our curriculum into, um, place unified. So we are taking, actually tomorrow we're having a, a little, another district come and pick up our old curriculum. So there's no, um, temptation to go back and go, yes, but I really liked. So, um, so we're just going forward together, um, and continue that our intervention and support systems accountability. So this year was definitely a year of growth with implementing ACT 20 and knowing how to track and, um, it was a lot, it was a lot

052this year. So, um, which brings us to our success story. So on the right hand side is a roadmap of what ACT 20 is, and you've heard us talk about it for a long time, um, this year and last year coming up. So, um, that's the roadmap on the, the right hand side and on the left hand side, um, it's not even inclusive of all the things we've done, but these are all related to our Act 20 work over the last two years. And it's a lot. It's a lot. And that's just act 20, um, responding to. So, um, so while it seemed very heavy sometimes and, um, we kudos to our whole staff, we, we went the robot to get to, um, the growth that we're, we were able to show this year and

053looking forward and kind of excitement like, okay, we got one year, I'm really good grounding under our feet. So we've had the, the law changed. We needed to put a, a literacy, remedi remediation act, uh, or plan into act. And so that goes for both of our schools. It's not just ours. Um, so when I'm talking about a lot of these, it is combined shared efforts that all of our teachers have had to do. So our teachers are science of reading trained. So several of our teachers had extra 40 to 80 hours of training that they did on their own this year. Throughout the school year, we hired a new reading teacher. We've had, uh, reading three 17 licensure support from CSUN nine and Amy McGovern supporting. We've learned our new AIMS web tool, we've

054learned new diagnostic tools and how to start reading some of that data. And our PLCs have shifted, um, still have some shifting to do, but it's, it's a great roadmap to get to where we are. Our wing schedule, what is, um, map Grove has what I need. We have what I need to grow at Athens Elementary. And so we kind of had to shift kids around. Similar to her walk to read, we do, um, kindergarten and first kindergarten separate, first grade separate, second grade separate. And then our third, fourth and fifth had a similar model where kids were, um, integrated according to what they needed. So we have already some improvements that we wanna do next year. And, um, progress monitorings our personalized reading plans where we did the, the assessment, we did the, um,

055diagnostic assessment. We talked with parents, we reported out, tracked that for nine weeks and then reported back and, um, shifted kids if needed or continued those interventions or started a different EMR assess process. So lots of stuff happening. Um, kudos to Lori, uh, our reading teacher for, um, continuing our family engagement evenings. So that was her, her first year of experience in our district with continuing those evenings. And she's got some great ideas along with our staff for trying to incorporate parents and families more so into their reading, um, journeys. So a big one was our tier one data was, uh, doing the curriculum vetting process that took a lot of time, effort and a lot of communication and um, great learning process there with a McGovern as well. So, so holy buckets. Um, there

056was a lot. Um, and that's just, that was just one part. So this I feel is our success story because looking at our first data, I'm like, man, there was a growth. But when you put it in a picture format like this, this is our third grade reading. So you see in the fall, uh, the red triangle is our tier three and then our yellow is tier two, and then the green is our tier one, our universal. So you'll see that from fall to spring we shrunk the red triangle. And those are the things that, um, are very, it is, yeah. So when you break it down and look at that, it is fantastic. So in fall, our third grade data showed that 12 students were eligible in third grade for a personalized reading plan.

057And in the spring only five students were eligible for that. So that is a celebration forum. Any questions about that exciting topic? No, it's good. Alright. So as Joy and Robin opened with, um, they had to split their, um, testing into between AIMS web and FastBridge for middle and high. We use only FastBridge screeners three times a year. So like my colleagues, we've sorted that information out in the chart. Um, and us were, my chart is a little big, so it's kind of fallen off the bottom, so hopefully you can see that in yours. Um, one of the things, so for, okay, so the first one is, um, representing the a reading portion, which is our ELA measurement here and fast bridge. Um, and the goals are up on the top to see what we

058wanted to do. You got your, um, so, um, we did one of the things that when we were looking through the data, um, I know I, they work with Ryan McCain, I work with, um, Carrie, Joe, um, out of cisa. And we were looking things over a couple weeks ago and I noticed that even though the numbers you'll notice kinda, um, hold steady or they go down, I mean, you see that winter dip in some of those. Um, although some of the numbers, like the top numbers that we wanna see go up, they tend to maintain. So what I will show you later too is that all of the students, um, 60% or more of our students actually had an improved score from beginning to end. However, those raw scores and what qualifies in each

059of these levels changes throughout the course of the school year. So I could have a student that changes a score even as much as three points. They stay in that same level because it's not enough growth to move them to the next level. I had some students maintain at a high level at the college level in the fall, that same score in the spring knocked them down to the green level. So just some things to be aware of, some nuances. Part of of that, um, testing and the data that you get from that is those numbers, even though they appear to look better, that categorization then at the end, you know, moves them along, like they should be progressing upwards. So even though we didn't make the full progress that we had wanted to, um,

060and again, as they spoke to two, it just means tightening up some systems, making sure we're providing better interventions, being more strategic with our time spent with our students. We too use iReady for math and we use corrective reading here for, um, ELA. Um, so this was high school, high school. We only do the ninth and 10th grade. Um, by that time, if we haven't caught them at this early phase, we're, we're probably way behind the eight ball. Um, our student data also includes students that, um, are second language learners as well as any students with IEPs. Okay, one, one fun note that I came across with one of our EL students, our second language learner is she had a 90 point jump from the fall to the spring. To me, that's a success, although

061she still landed down there in the red, but a child does not make a 90 point jump by accident. So we're making some gains somewhere. So now I'm curious to know like where did she get that progress from? Um, what was working for her and how can we continue to drill down to make even more progress for her? 'cause that's huge. Um, and I feel like the math shows a little different picture because it's more numbers than it is the, the language component. So then I also ask myself questions like, is it a language barrier or do they even struggle with their own language and those concepts in that language where now it becomes perhaps a special ed evaluation. So all of the data as, as we drill down into that and we come across

062these numbers, and again, the numbers look fairly similar I think across all three of our schools in terms of where we start and where we all hope to be. Um, we're always excited when our numbers are bigger on the far bright side of the chart. All right. Um, so ELA achievements, you'll notice we dropped from 78% at the low risk college pathway in the fall to 77%, um, in the spring. Again, we kind of went way down, um, during the winter. So I really pay attention to about like what is going on and when are we doing that testing. I also wonder too, like is it a time of year for us? I'm not sure what causes such a gap there, but something for us to definitely keep an eye on. Um, from middle and

063high school, you're gonna see we took a jump, we went out from the right, did you see that with like last year's two Julie, like the 10th last year? Yep. Yeah. So every year we do this, which I can appreciate too. And as we look at that trend over time, right? Like what is happening in that winter timeframe? What month is your testing on January after winter, right? End of, Is it like the elementary test where they introduce like, does the test change? Are there new concepts that are on the test that they haven't learned yet or something like that? It a password to just Yeah, to The student. Oh, to the student. Okay. So it would, okay so that, so it shouldn't jump them. I mean your numbers are gonna change as far as

064how high they have to grow at that time of year, but the test itself adjusts to the student, okay? The screen. So one of the things we talked about there too, then even assess period, Joe, and even talking with Mr. Check on his way out was just goal setting with the kids, right? Because at that age level for them to set themselves a goal, um, and at the beginning they do have, um, FastBridge will calculate a goal or a target score for 'em. So then it's a matter of working with our kids, giving them that visual and bringing that practice back because all of us think and you know, right, if we can chart our progress, we're feeling really good about that. And so if they can set those goals, so that would be something

065else that we will incorporate, um, as we talked about with the PLC model and having those conversations with staff. And then is bringing back how do we chart that progress with our kids so that they can set a goal and strive for that. And then of course, what interventions do we put in place or what practices are we zeroing in on to make sure that they're finding that success along the way? Great questions. Um, so action plan. This was very much indicative of what we've been doing, but again, to tighten that up as we go forward. Continuing to use the corrective reading, um, I would be looking to work with another staff member to get trained on that this year. So some of our ELA responsibilities will be shifting to Mrs. Brewster then, um, and

066away from mr. But we're gonna work on again making sure our right people are trained to provide those interventions with the kids during that flex time. Um, our a math data, again, some of those numbers I, you know, it's always great when we have more than, um, 60% of our students that are from the middle to the top trying to really shrink the bottom. But I like that, you know, even though we went down to 20, right? We ended up at one. So again, it does get a little progressively more difficult throughout the year. And yes, it will adjust for the kids, but they still have some benchmarks that they want those kids to. They're expected to meet some of that growth as well. Okay. All right. So here, um, math is gonna show that

067when you did go down, you're gonna notice we tested five more kids in the spring than we did in the fall. I will tell you that our EL learners, again, being among them, sometimes that trajectory is impacted due to some of our students and how well we've been able to, um, meet the mark for them as well. And in high school, um, again, we dropped here as well. Um, from 81 to 75, I'm just gonna say that math is hard. No. Um, just making sure again, that we're meeting the needs for them, we're aligning that flex time, any of those interventions for any of those students that are really struggling a lot better and tightening up on what is it that they really need to help build the skills that they're not currently getting so

068that we can continue to have an upward growth at the end of the school year. So, and this one was an anomaly, right? It went up in the winter, right? So now they're still doing stuff that they knew and in the spring, you know, they adjusted and oh boy, yeah, I'll have to pay attention to some of my dates for some of that too. I'd be curious because in the spring we have a testing window when they're doing those. So point of reference for me too is like, what date did we pick for that and when did the teachers decide they were going to do that FastBridge assessment for the kids? So, and right now today we went through an assessment calendar as a team. So we're trying to find good solid dates, not only

069just for internal planning purposes, but then we communicate out with our families too so we're not sitting, alright, action plan again using iReady. Um, very similar to what we've been doing all year, but tightening up on those systems and making sure that we are doing those things with, um, fidelity and making sure that staff know what they're doing and that kids are coming in and really getting skill sets that they need. So, um, PLC, again, the ELA changing curriculum at the tier one level, I kinda, I did copy that from Joy, but here's the why. The why I did that is 'cause now it's our turn up in the middle and high to vet for new curriculum for our ELA going forward. So the reading street and um, the expert 21 will, you know, be

070looking to sunset as we align with our elementary partners to make sure that that transition up here becomes more seamless and that we are adjusting with the times to make sure that what we're giving our kids also aligns back with current standards. All right, and then I'm ready for math will continue to be in place. Successes. 100% of our seniors received their high school diplomas this year. That's a big celebration. Am miss all the other test scores going on there, right? At the end of the day, we want, our main goal is always to get 'em across that stage in some form or fashion. Um, and we did that this year and that's due to the support of, um, families and reaching out and good conversations, um, use of some alternative paths that Mr. Noack

071helped implement a few years ago where it allows us to use some work, um, hours in place of elective credits if indeed our kiddos fall short there, but they still aren't held to the same number of credits, um, at the end of the day, as well as all of the required things like English, math, science, social studies, all of those things. So they have to meet the core there. It just helps us help them make up any elective credits by using a set number of work hours to help make up the difference. So, and that made all the difference, you guys for a couple of our kids this year. So thank you for supporting that change a few years ago. 'cause that was huge. Um, so this goes back to, as I was looking at

072the data, um, students that increased their a reading score, um, 76% at sixth grade, 54%, 77% at eighth grade, number of middle school math students that increased their math scores. Um, 67.5, that was an average. Um, sixth grade one student went up two levels. Okay. So that's, so that's another piece to all those numbers that it doesn't show you that, it doesn't show you that. We had one kid that worked really hard that was down in that summer risk for high risk category, and moved themselves up out of there with some help. So they did the right thing. Um, and four others moved up one level. Um, at ninth grade, a reading one went, another student went up two levels, um, and two students went up one 10th grade a reading. Um, again, one student

073went up two levels. I just, I had to highlight that because I can't point that out to you guys in that other graph or that other chart just doesn't, those numbers don't show justice here. Um, and then three students went up that one level and then in a math, four students went up a level. So again, we're making progress in the right direction. So we're gonna drill down, make sure we capture that data, work with staff on a regular basis to continue to have an impact. Any questions? I got a couple. Yes, sir. So does the state mandate what, I think we kind of answered it, but what, uh, months or a window timeframe that we should be taking these tests For FastBridge as a staff, we can determine those timelines for when we need

074to do that. Elementary folks are more aligned now with their Act 20. We've got some other things and dates in place for them to do that. Um, but as a local team, we can decide at what points we do those. So that's a good question. I'm just curious. And then the, the next question is, do we know how, is there other schools using the same stuff or is everybody, all schools use the same or Not? They don't all use the same. I have to ask what, um, some of our friends do. And then there's also local decisions that are made with regards to how often, you know, if it's me, do I take the winter test out because it's, maybe it's not the best accurate measure for us, maybe. Um, I will tell you that

075as a screening tool, our students that have IEPs generally will still use this testing as a, um, as a mark for where they're going and their progress, um, that they're making their square. But, um, we, we can do a set those things locally as far as the school goes to do that. And Sharon, you can add to that or if I captured that correctly. I think you Did a nice job, Julie. Um, I would just add that, uh, for validity purposes, there have to be so many days of instruction between different screen periods. So it's very common to have that follow during spring. And then we're looking for above the same number of instructional days in between save that opportunity for the instruction and the teaching learning to occur. Um, that bridge, I would say

076is probably extremely prevalent as the screening tool in and around the state. Um, and now with that is a new, obviously requirement at that early level. So that is across the state, uh, for KINGERGARTEN breakthrough. Okay. Great questions. And keeping in mind that this is a screening tool. So whether it's AIMS web or FastBridge, it's intended to inform instruction. So we use it to help us monitor that growth over time. But it's true as intention is to inform what's happening in the classroom. So the teachers and the principals that become very proficient at understanding how to analyze that data, that's why you'll hear each of them, and specifically at the elementary school talk about this is one piece of the data to determine how to group our students or whether it's intervention because they need

077something more or, and or enrichment those students that are already progressing at a high level, how can we continue to challenge them as well? So, um, it's intended for that piece as well. So, you know, part of my question is also how does it compare? I mean, is there a DA database that this all goes into that, you know, throughout the United States or these companies that are building this stuff? You know, where's the documentation that it's working or not working? Is it legit? That's a Good question. Um, there are national norms of which, and that's how they set the benchmarks in these type of streaming tools. Um, I know that the i-Ready, um, product that we use for math, that's when we need to do an intervention. They capture, um, national data to set

078national norms, um, as well. So I'm not sure if I'm answer any questions, Steve, but, um, there are parameters that has really indicated the cut scores continue to rise each of those seasons. That's based on national norms. So you can use the norm data, we can also use the benchmark data. So we have to determine which is most portable for us at what kind of season for the testing. Um, but they are research based vetted and that our fast bridges, I would say pretty prevalent across the us, um, developed by, um, it was psychologist out of the state of Minnesota several, several years ago who actually were on the forefront of the response intervention or instruction I model. So that's how FastBridge can be developed. Okay. So it's not like it's like a random, like

079there's a lot of schools using the tools that we're using the FastBridge and the AIMS web is the required, and then a lot of schools also choose To use FastBridge. Yes. Okay. So they don't do anything with it. We, it's the districts that have to do something with it. It doesn't go back into some database and, and actually, Right. And so Steve, can you talk about that data points? Like I think we've all mentioned it, like this is one point of data for us, us and yes, it a lot, it informs our instruction using that PLC model. How do we figure out which kids aren't getting what they're gonna score down here? Right? Which kids are, what I'm gonna do with in between. Um, so that's one data point right up at all of our

080billings grading in the classroom for various things and how the kids are progressing there. But then the other one is statewide testing, right? Which is their forward testing. Um, and then a CT for our juniors and then pre a CT for, um, freshmen and sophomores. So at a state level, right? Like that's the big one. Um, but then these local assessments and um, help us to determine okay, internally what we're doing. Gotcha. Yeah, good question. And to add to that, I mean, it's research. So it shows that we should be triangulating that data. So we don't wanna just take that score for what it is. We are also taking, um, we're doing that diagnostic, we're digging further down. We're giving a letter spelling assessment, um, that goes along with that. We're doing weekly monitoring. We

081have assessments at our, um, base level. So, and those scores really do align pretty closely with the scores that we're seeing on our screeners. Um, there is those anomalies that we do find, and that's why putting that data up there, sometimes we're like in the back of our minds, we're like, we know this kid didn't really score there. Um, it was just a fluke day. Or, you know, so yes, we'd like take that score out of there, but, um, but we have to compare it to the other piece of data. That's why the screener that gives just that one test, that's one subtest. The, or oral reading fluency is a good, um, test or a good screening of how well a student, um, is progressing and how they're able to decode and comprehend, but it's

082not the end all be all. Um, and so taking those other sub tests are really important to be able to determine how well a student's doing So that these, uh, percentiles that isn't necessarily where that kid falls. So this test, they don't get a grade on it. So I'm that kid that is trying to get that test done the fastest I can. It doesn't make a difference. So I'm sure there's kids like that. Yeah, but I was that kid, you know. But we also, I mean, 'cause we know our kids so well, we're trying to pinpoint that too. And we know that kid might need a different setting or that kid might have to come up to the teacher table because they are just gonna blow through it. Um, I always have. So, and we

083also try to make, make it an engaging time or something to look forward. I mean, not look forward to, 'cause the testing isn't looking forward, but something that they're like, yeah, I wanna do, well we goal set. Um, and we tell our kids in Karen through fifth grade of April Grove, where their score was at, you know, where we wanna see their growth score. And some kids really like internalize that and they wanna do well. Sure. Some kids, it brings 'em so much anxiety, it's not good for them either, right? So you really have to feel that out with the different kids. But goal settings, if they're go-getters, they wanna achieve that. They wanna work hard through it. Got it. So Steve, I will say my own kids, especially like, 'cause I feel like Maple

084has been through it, it's been more prevalent than like with the older boys, but I feel like her, like she's probably on the anxiety level around it, but I, I mean she takes, I'm always like, tone it down, like, I care more about your math grade than I do about this. Um, you know, it still matters, worry, no worry. But I think a lot of kids, I mean, the language around it I think is like, this is a serious thing. This is important. So I think, you know, I think that there, of course our kids are probably don't take it seriously, but in my experience, my kids that have been through more Fast bridge from the time they were littler, it seems like it's been kind of imprinted upon them a little bit as just

085like one of the things of the year. I'd also give credit to our teachers. They take advantage of during our fall conferences, especially at the elementary level, bringing out the parent report or the student report and using that as an open conversation to talk about where a parent's child or children are actually performing. And then what are we going to do to help them meet their goals. So it's really strengthened, I would say, communication between school and home. Those are short periods, 15 minute periods of time. The teachers are very good at communicating not only some strengths, but then giving the parents some ideas of then what can we also do at home? So we're using the data in that way too, to communicate between school and home in a very positive way. Great. So,

086and another example of teacher frustration sometimes. So, um, you say, okay, we're gonna read as much as we can as one minute. Okay. So we say this book's about attractive. Oh my gosh, my grandpa, how a tractor do you like the red tractor? Like that's you, was that you that, Um, up, up here is what you've seen in the past. Our A GR achievement gap reduction. Um, so we do receive additional funding for, um, maintaining smaller class sizes or having one to one tutoring. And this year the, the only class sizes or the one that we had split class sizes is in our first grade. So the rest of 'em received one-to-one tutoring, which is our wing time. So the information that we just went through in the presentation has been submitted, um, in this

087format. And, um, to show that what we, what we did for our a g Auditing And to support our students. So I know it was brief, but I know you've already seen that before and we just went through all the data as well. But I'm happy to answer questions. To wrap it up. I'd like to recognize the work of Robin and Joy and Julie. Um, you hear them talk about data very seamlessly and that because they take a lot of time to not only learn about it themselves, but then to lead that instruction at their school. So thank you for all your leadership around this work this year, um, and success stories all around. So we appreciate it very much. So thank you. Thank you for the report. That achievement gap production report will be,

088um, an action item for later. Joy had had mentioned, uh, and now we're moving to the information discussion items. So the first item is the budget forecasting and referendum planning. Uh, we'll hear presentation by Elise and Debbie brunette, You're Handing it over. So, um, Elise, familiar, I ladies are doing a sub friend. Um, Ali has been with us in the past as we were preparing for a referendum in November of 2022. And again in April of 2023, her colleague Debbie Burnett, um, one of the first colleagues at Bard that I met, uh, shortly after, um, joining the school of the Athens is also joining her. So it's a joint presentation. Um, and we're looking forward to hearing what you want to share with us. Tony, thanks. Thank you. Um, good evening. I'm Debbie Brunette and

089excited to be here tonight. I've been with Baird and starting my 17th year, so quite some time. I used to be on the same team as Elise now as support the team in banking role, but supporting school districts. Prior to, I was a business manager myself in a school district, not too far away. And I was an elementary teacher choir, so I still say I teach every day. I just teach quotes about school guidance. So second graders about math, And I'm Elise Burn, happy to be back and see some familiar faces. Um, but as I will echo Debbie's sentiments and it's so good that we started this conversation with teaching and learning outcomes because really what we're gonna discuss tonight helps those wheels turn. So, um, good to see everybody again, This is allergy, so

090I apologize, get without a snee off. Um, so we wanted to start by, um, ensuring that everyone has the same baseline capacity. So some of this will be reviewed for those of you who are newer to school finance. Hopefully it gives you some foundational knowledge and terminology. We will be circling back to these concepts again in future meetings. So we aren't expecting you to become an expert in it today, but hopefully it will create, again, that foundational knowledge as we continue to build on it in the future. So, just a reminder that as a K 12 school district in Wisconsin, we're governed by state formulas for a majority of our financing. That financing formula that we reference is called our revenue formula started back in 1993. The worksheet went 32 pages to four pages. But

091essentially it works in a similar way. It's driven by our district membership, uh, times up per pupil amount that is increased or indexed by the biannual budget, which is why we're watching it so closely. And why this one was important is that for typical school district, it generates between 75 and 95% of the district's operational budget. So the revenue available to pay our teachers and our support staff and run transportation and pay for the curriculum and all of the services and things that we need in order to provide the educational program here in Athens, you're a right, right around 75%. The balance of that would be up by grants over enrollment, um, and other state revenues independent of this formula. That per pupil amount is really important. And there are, there are several different visuals

092that tell the same story. I like this one because back in the Act 10 era, that terminology may be familiar to you. Some maybe didn't know, or I had forgotten, that the per pupil amount via a al budget actually decreased. The first time in history, the per pupil amount went down. And it's the only time in history that it went down on a percent basis. Typically, the biennial budget comes forward and says, districts get a $264 per pupil increase, or it's zero, or currently it's due 25. In that year, it decreased five and a half percent, which on average was about $553, I believe for people here in Athens, I believe you would down $587 per people. Coincidentally, in that year you passed your recurring referendum. And so at the same time, the state took

093away your per pupil amount. You implemented your recurring referendum, which helped this red box identifies the typical district, the amount of time it took for their per pupil amount to get back to their pre-ACT 10 levels. You got back to your level sooner because that recurring referendum existed. And this visual helps demonstrate that. So this 1112 bar, the dark blue is your base revenue. That's the state per pupil ties your membership. The colors are the exemptions on top purple being your non-recurring referendum authority, of which you have now the light blue is that recurring authority. So I know in the, in your past operational referendum conversations, there was a lot of, there were, there were questions, I don't want to say a lot. There were questions about what happened to that recurring referendum money, and

094it still is with you. But if we go back even a few years, the year that implemented because of what the state did to the bilingual budget, it really just brought you back to where you would have been had they not pulled it back. I added this, the orange or or yellowish dotted line to really trace the base revenue limit authority from oh 7 0 8 to 10 11. In the first two years, they were still indexing the per pupil by CPI. They detached it starting in nine 10. And then of course we saw the decrease in lower increases thereafter. I just found it interesting to know, or in this visual format, if we would've continued that base per pupil, extended it on at the increases we were seeing in the early years of this

095visual, it actually would bring us to where you are now with your operational. So I think it puts into perspective the ask that you have right now adding on, it's really, it is, as I would describe it, not above and beyond. It's really bringing you back to where you would've otherwise been. And this isn't uncommon in other districts. Every district's visual looks the same, but those who need operational referendums, it's, it's for most of them, not above and beyond. It's just making 'em whole. If I, if you're okay if I use that terminology. So finishing the, the thoughts of our formula, the revenue limit formula isn't our only formula. So one we start with because it determines how much revenue we have for operations. The state does agree to share in some of it. And

096that comes through what we call our equalization formula. Each district is different in how they fit in the formula Here, about 50% of your revenue limit authority is covered by the state. So they calculate how much you get. They take care of about 50%, and the other 50% then, uh, can be assessed in the local taxpayer. Is that normal for like a rural school this size? Is that like about average or are we like somewhere outside? Yeah, you, you're average. So it's based on property wealth per member. And so property wealth, you, it, you, you not, you farm, you don't have lakes. Um, it's a rural area. Um, I grew up in el, the center, so similar, uh, area as well. Uh, and they calculate it too, per people. And so when your membership is

097low, um, it, it doesn't help you. But in terms of aid as a percent, you are, you are property poor than average, which means you're treated more for or better in the formula relative. I dunno if I answered that. That's right. Um, so for you this year, we're still in 24, 25, even though I, I know it feels like we're nearing 25, 26. Um, we don't have 25, 26 until October. For those of you going into the board, it comes well into our fiscal year when the state provides the final numbers, and you can certify that. So last year your revenue limit authority was approximately 7.2 million. The state covered about half of that. So what was left for your, your local levy was about 3.6 million. In Wisconsin, we can have up to three

098main components of the school levy. One of them is our revenue limit, which we've been talking about. You can also levy for community service. These are, uh, dollars allocated specifically toward C use. So common examples might be a community rec program. Um, some districts have a daycare program that would fit into that category. And then referendum approved debt would be the categories you asked and pass the facilities referendum, borrow money in order to do the projects. That's where the le would go in order to repay back the, the loan or the debt related to you currently in, uh, 24, 25 didn't have levees in either of those other buckets. The only way you can get a levee in this bucket is if you pass a referendum. This one is set in October. If you have

099community eligible projects that you are addressing. So for 24, 25, you just had your revenue limit levy, which was assessed to your local tax payers. Um, because that levy amount is, is difficult to, uh, compare from district to district because of size, it would be difficult to compare our $3.6 million one here to 11 Merrill, for instance, being sizeably larger. We do equate that to a mill rate. It also helps individual taxpayers estimate what their impact may be specific to the school. That mill rate is calculated, uh, by taking our total levy and divid dividing it by our equalized value. So, um, not assessed, it's on, on your tax bill, it would be labeled as fair market. Those terms are synonymous. Multiply it by a thousand and we get the, the, um, mill rate per

100thousand dollars of property value. So this year your mill rate is $8 and 62 cents per thousand. And how we convert that to a more relatable figure, if you had a property worth a hundred thousand dollars, that would've been $862 approximately for the school portion. I know there aren't a lot of properties valued at a hundred thousand anymore. I just, I've been starting to hear that more and more. We use this for easy math. If it's 200,000, you can go ahead and double, um, or triple et cetera. So this is, these last few slides are really important foundational concepts as we talk in general about school finance. But later tonight in the future presentations, we'll talk more about the referendum impact on the for instance or on the levy. And we'll come back to some

101of these, um, thoughts and formulas. So before I pass this on, knowing we're going to come back to this, is there, can I explain this? Okay. And is there anything I can elaborate on Or you have any questions? Okay. So, um, w is, as you mentioned, regrounding and kind of the concepts, the formulas. Now, we'll take a few slides to kind of step through now what that looks like in Athens specifically. So we just grabbed, you know, the last 10 years in order to kind of help, uh, remind or inform those of you who are newer kind, what, what has happened historically in Athens. So that historical levy, uh, you can see most notably in the last two years has increased largely as a result of that non-recurring operating referendum. Um, so because Athens has

102really just that revenue limit component of the total levy, this, this bar essentially moves in with whatever is happening to the revenue limit in Athens. So, uh, as, as enrollment was changing, as biennial budgets were changing, those types of things, you can kind of really see that reflected in, in the total levy. It's also in Athens, those, those last two years, right? Or three years kind of being the anomaly. So this is a 10 year snapshot of the historical equalized value. Okay? So as Debbie was explaining, the mill rate concept, total levy divided by equalized value times a thousand, um, notably, uh, 21, 22, uh, Athens, total equalized value grew by about 30%. Now, a large component of that was the acquisition of the village of Hamburg or the acquisition, uh, in, in more totality.

103Okay? So that represents a good reason for that jump. Um, but also in the last three to four years, there has been historical statewide growth largely related to inflation. So, um, these, this is an important concept as it relates to the mill rate, but also, um, thank you for asking the question about the, the aid because that property wealth per member piece, if you grow 30% in your property value and your membership stays the same, that will have an impact on your aid. So we think about, um, the property wealth component, the membership component, and it, it did have an impact in Athens. And we'll see that on this slide. The historical mill, right? Yes. So when you were talking about the equalized value, so like we're in counter palsy, they like barely met the

104state requirement for like the number of years between assessments, the equalized value. I mean, when we're talking about messaging maybe in the future about referendum, part of the reason you see a big jump, tell me if I'm wrong, in that equalized value is because there was a lot of reassessment because that value is only determined when the reassessments happen. Or is that determined separately? Like the property that would be like on my property taxes. 'cause we had the, the boom boom, that's the thing that a lot of people were complaining about, which is like, you know, their house was worth way more 'cause it hadn't been assessed in far too long. Right? Right. That's a great question. Yeah. Um, and um, so as Debbie was kinda describing that the equalized value is the state's attempt

105to equalize property values, um, because assessors can't come to each municipality on an, on an annual basis, right? So some of it can be related to reassess. Okay, But it's a separate value. Correct? Correct. But then the Rest Was the one got the negative ity cover that. Got it. I'm just trying to Get, so if you, well, since you're curious, you might have fun going back. I have fun. I would buy fun. Um, But if you, if you look at, on the top of your tax bill, we have a slide that include in the next presentation actually, you're curious and it'll show you assessed value and then it'll have an assessment ratio and then it'll have the fair market. The further your, um, assessment ratio gets from one, one means the state feels that you're

106assessed where they feel you should be, the more likely it is that you are nearing a reassessment. But most often from a school standpoint, the state has already recognized that you're under assess. So if your assessment goes up, let's imagine 30%, it's, it's unlikely that your fair market value, unless you've done a, you've added, you've done an addition, right? That's different. A home improvement separate from your whole neighborhood, getting reassessed is different. Um, but typically when you get reassessed, um, and your property value goes up 30%, for instance, the state already recognizes that you are under and your fair market value might only go up 10% or they've already accounted for that. So, um, good question. And we've actually dove into that for some municipalities 'cause uh, it shifts with between municipalities can impact you

107as well. Mm-hmm. Question. Great question. Oh, It comes up a lot. Um, and because we, you we calculate mill rate based on equalized value, a k fair market value, kind of making sure that, that, Especially As people try to understand their tax bill, that it's very, very clear as well. So I think when, when we communicate that, because eventually that is going to come out pretty soon, you have to make sure that those two are the ones that are synonymous that not that they're misunderstanding, that would be the assessed value versus something, because I think that can kind of obviously Confuse people as well. Sure. Yep. So throughout this period of time, um, as I mentioned, you know, that that total levy divided by the equalized value is how we arrive at these figures. Uh,

108so Athens has kind of been on a slower decline, but this was the, the initial ask, um, the two question ask in the fall, uh, and then, um, to come back that following April, have that pass, have the new authority authorized for the 2324 year. So that's where you see that, that, um, increase. I will note that it, it came in lower than it was communicated at the time because you always communicate your tax impacts based on estimates. So, um, I think at the time it was something like 1113. Mm-hmm. So to have nine 50 I think is, um, is, is good news, right? And then since then has, has come down and as equalized property values go up and or the levy stays the same, you know, that trend will will change as you

109look ahead as well. So, um, moving on then, actually before I move on, any questions about Athens specific, um, numbers? I'm just gonna take a picture of that one really quick because that one comes up with the a lot and I just wanna have it ready. Yes. Accessible. I said I was, I was, uh, as the team prepares for some preliminary budget conversations, annual meeting conversations, it's good to kind of have this as a reminder Version of this that can be shared out afterwards, right? So yeah, we have the slides as well. And I think the reason is important, right? Is because people are like, well, we're paying so much more now. Well in 2016 you were paying way more than you are now, Actually went back. Yeah, right. Your mill rate peaked. Now people's,

110we have to acknowledge that people's properties have Right, right. Still your mill rate peaked at 23.02 in the 99 1 school year. Yeah. What year was that again? I noticed. So in, um, the 19 90, 91 school year. Uh, so this, my chart only goes back to 84 85. So only, only like it peaked at 23.02 in 90 91. Now that was before revenue limit. So this, that's a statewide trend. That's why revenue limits were put into play because the rates and were increasing, we wanted to control that. Um, but, and property values are worth a lot more now. So I think those are important to make. But 2302 and this year's levy, you know, we talk about this mill rate coming down. I think it's also important to know, so if the mill rate

111came down, 'cause you had more property wealth to spread it over, but the levy itself was over a hundred thousand dollars less this year than last year as well. So the district asked for a hundred thousand dollars less. Sandy had more wealth than part, both of those compounded into that decrease. So good, good talking points because some like to focus on the levy and the district is asking for a dollar amount and others like to look at the impact this year were positive. So kind of going back to the referendum basics, this may, as we mentioned, be some of a reminder for some of you. Um, but when districts go out to referendum, um, they are going for one of two types, either a capital or a debt referendum or an operating referendum. So an

112operating referendum is what the district currently has in place. It's non-recurring, which means that it has a sunset and, uh, it goes away once the years that it's been authorized are, are done once those expire. The debt referendum is named as such because districts are issuing debt, they're taking out a loan in order to cover the costs of borrowing. Now occasionally there is some confusion about what the district is asking for, what they're looking to accomplish with these. So, um, we've included some general bullet points that now these don't, um, apply as a blanket for everybody. There are some outliers of course, but in general that operating referendum is to operate the general functioning of the district. It it's supporting salaries and benefits, it's it's programming. Um, occasionally it's small ongoing or one-time maintenance projects

113that fall on the, on the cheaper side, we'll just say, right? Versus those capital referendums are larger in size as we mentioned, you're, you're going out to borrow money in order to cover the cost of those projects. And that's where you kind of get into the, um, deeper conversations about interest rates and the size of the loan and those types of things. So that is exclusive to capital or that referendums well as operating is simply voter approved authority to increase your revenue limit capital's voter approved authority to issue debt. So both need voter approval. Any questions on the two types? So, so a little trip down memory lane since we're going back to 84, 85, 85, 86, uh, this is just Athens referendum history. Um, so, and this, the DPI goes out to the early

114nineties, but just for the sake of ease of viewing for the last 20 years. Um, so Athens has, you know, roughly, uh, passed and failed about half of the asks that they've gone for since 2006. Okay. So some of these may be, um, some of this may be new to all of you or some of this may be new to some of you and say, okay, so an issue debt question for a hundred thousand dollars failed back in 2006. But then an issue, debt question for $300,000 passed for various other maintenance projects. So not the asphalt repair, but the, the alternative, right? Um, asphalt repair, maybe jogging, some, some memories, uh, non-recurring had passed back in oh six. That was temporary. And then as Debbie mentioned, uh, um, that recurring referendum passed back in, uh,

1152011. And then most notably the most recent non-recurring operating referendum, um, that will be expiring here soon. So something that just struck our team as we were reviewing, 'cause we do, um, we do this type presentation statewide, uh, was that in the district's 20 year history, only $300,000 has been to, to issue debt for projects for the district. Mm-hmm. So just imagine what then the district has been doing, uh, in order to, to take care of things since that time. Uh, and or as these things have started coming up over the last handful of years, and we talked a lot about operating over the last couple of years as well. You know, at some point those, those, uh, the useful life of some of those things are just kind coming to great. You're not alone.

116Do not, uh, um, so in your area, um, so these are, um, a lot of C nine districts, but most notably the ones that are, uh, close in size, Athens, and then the ones that are close to you geographically, you can see that a lot of districts in the area are going not only for operating, but also capital, sometimes multiple times, sometimes returning, um, if, if having failed. So this is a statewide issue. Um, and I say issue just because, you know, the funding isn't available to schools to kind of keep both of the, the wheels moving, the ongoing and maintenance items, and then the ongoing operations. So, so many districts are relying on referendum in order to increase their revenues in one way or another. Um, so now we've gotten to the point where,

117you know, less than 15% of the state has not asked a question, a referendum question. So that is the minority again, less than 15. And how many, yeah, I'll have to double check my numbers for sure, but I know it's less than 15%. I think it's a even smaller, I just couldn't remember off top 4, 2421 school districts in the state and, and very few of them now we're almost getting to the point where we say, you haven't gone for an operating question or you haven't gone for that question, you know, that's rare. Yeah, yeah. Probably how they make it, right? Right. Uh, so we dive into that piece too, right? What's happening in this specific district? So it's a good question and Angie, I'll be sure to get you the exact number. Yeah. That

118number of districts who have not gone for operating or debt, right? So I'm gonna speak to the operations piece and then Debbie's gonna speak to the debt piece to help like very clearly delineate what, um, you know, what's, what you're typically going for, what you're looking for, what you're, um, analyzing, um, because it can get confusing between the two, especially when you have so many needs. So, um, Athens used a wheel similar to this one back, uh, years ago to kind of help determine how much to go for when to go and for how long, right? There were multiple scenarios to answer specific questions, you know, how are we going to address these needs? What's best for us and what's our, you know, which of these matter most? Okay? So at the time, really fund

119balance and cash flow was a huge component of the way your last question was structured, right? It was structured almost explicitly to buffer that fund balance to get it back to a place where it was, you know, getting the district done from financial footing. So, so happy to, you know, watch the growth over the last couple of years. Um, but now, which other pieces of this wheel are going to weigh most heavily as we look ahead, okay? Um, you know, are we making adjustments to, uh, one time revenues or expenditures? Have we accounted for inflation in the way that we need to in our forecast? Um, enrollment was also a component back in the previous referendum. You know, you had the acquisition of Maple Grove and how that ran through the revenue limit and EQA

120formulas. So that was a very unique and important piece of the previous referendum. Now that things are, you know, those numbers have filtered through the three year rolling average, um, it may not weigh in as much, right? Maybe you're more focused on levy management, or what is the bind a budget gonna provide us that we don't then have to ask taxpayers for. So we like to reground, um, the district in these, um, in a wheel like this because certain priorities may matter more to Athens than another district down the road road. So it just helps the board guidance conversations, and you can affect, you can check this box because districts really need to be looking not just from one year to the next, like, can we, can we make it through the school year? It's

121what is coming down the road, and you guys are in such a great position to be discussing this now, you know, thinking ahead proactively instead of reacting to the reality at the time. Um, so I include this slide here because the, the next slide really speaks to the output, which I know you all have seen before. Um, but I think this helps also to demonstrate that there may be some needs that come up and that were included on that wheel as a onetime expense that still may live in your operating budget. You may be replacing, um, um, you may be replacing carpeting or lights or, um, freezers, uh, in as a part of your operating budget, right? That may stay still live there. But these, once we start talking kind of bottom of the triangle

122and really, really the, it's kind of like the bottom seven eighths of the triangle. That's where you start talking about much larger ticket items. Um, and also depends on, on when the last time that new roofer HVAC was say new, when the last time those items were evaluated for their useful life. Do they have the CSA 10 report? I do not. So, and, and tied to, yes. So Andrew shared the, the, the CSA report and that, that's why we put in this slide. And when we're speaking to it, another way I say it is sometimes we can fit in our operational budget, new carpet square to the library, uh, for example, when you see tiles, but sometimes those items in compilation add up to a amount that just don't fit in the operational budget, or

123it makes more sense to group them together, do them all at once. If you're going do the ceiling tiles, you might as well ship out that might as well. It makes sense to also do the networking and everything that's above along with the lighting, that's then when those grouped projects tend to trickle more into the need for facility referendum. Mm-hmm. So why, we'll talk a little bit more about this later, but, um, you have a list of items that have been identified as needs. One of the tasks would be identifying which one of our priorities and then how do they fit in terms of dollar amount and timing into possibly fitting on the operational side, whereas is capital component. So yes, that you're, you're, you're right on in how that fits here and why this

124is important. So I know some of you have seen this before, but just outta curiosity, has everyone's seen a, um, a version of the output one so far this year? Maybe not these exact numbers, but like this, this, uh, visual specifically. I see some nodding Heads. Maybe not. Okay. Okay. So this, I do like to just help ex, it's a lot of numbers. It's very visually overwhelming, but it has so much good information. We do include it in some of these conversations, um, again, to kind of help reground us in how are we funded, but then also now as we look ahead, what are the pieces that, that we really should be paying attention to? Uh, looking down the road here. So we include that, that top line, that's that September membership or FTE. So

125that's the third Friday in September, um, the historical and current year are verified against the DPI and then the casted forward years, the five years forward are entered by the district, kind of based on assumptions, right? So if we have 50 seniors graduating, they're being replaced with, um, 25 kindergartners, right? We're gonna have some natural attrition and um, that's some of what's accounted for rolling forward. So it's not exactly like we lose five students each year. Um, the next two lines are related really to the biennial budget. Okay? So the per pupil increase is on the revenue limit, 3 25 per pupil for the next 398 years. And that's still standing. So we rely on it, we can cast that forward. Um, the per pupil categorical aid of 7 42 has not been adjusted in

126the last four years, and there hasn't been a suggestion that it will be in this biennial budget, but, um, I don't know if you can see it very well, but the, um, each two year period is demarked by a different color to help demonstrate where that biennial budget shifts over. Okay? So the 27 29 UAL budget could provide a different level of funding, but we haven't, we're not assuming that, right? Um, and then the equalized property growth, uh, in the future is at, at zero. You could argue it's fairly conservative, but it really gives that mill rate then some space to be on the more conservative side once numbers become actual. Um, so really for the purpose then of this operating conversation, we are looking at our surplus deficit heading into the future, our fund

127balance percentage because it's been a focus. Um, and then really kind of looking too at the, the timing as it relates to the next two years. The, you know, we've got 1.2 million for the next two years, how does this line up then with the next, um, opportunity or a district's opportunity to go to referendum? So how that gets billed in is to be determined and to be discussed in subsequent slides. Um, but as it stands right now, this authority sunsets and yes, taxes would drop, um, levy would drop, funding would also drop, bond balance would drop. So, um, we have this, this is, uh, absolutely going to change, especially because this, this final budget is hopefully close being finalized soon here. Um, not making any premises, but, um, we use this as a springboard

128to kind of think about now, now what, what's next. So, um, from there we can kinda move on to that facility side. I'm just going to come back for just a second. Um, one thing I'd like to note on this. So a couple of items with your current operational referendum. So we talked about it being non-recurring, meaning it has a sunset. So you can clearly see here where it, it concludes at the end of the 26, 27 school year. Notice how the surplus deficit goes from being a, a balance or a surplus budget to a deficit right away the next year. That is a direct result of the, the access to the operational funds going away. I, I think an important talking point is because of the work being done since that referendum was approved,

129a part of this referendum was designed to rebuild the fund balance. You needed to rebuild your fund balance, at least said it kindly. Um, um, but it needed to be rebuilt and you've done a really nice job of doing that through your decision making as a board. Um, but, uh, so good talking point is as projected, your fund balance could be, uh, neither 20%, which is for a typical district, a healthy fund balance. Every district is unique. I'm not saying that's the ideal number, um, at least, and Beth will do work on that, but it also shows that as that 1.2 million falls off for a lot of districts in the 27 28 school year, they would see a number such as 1.4 million or 1.6 million as a deficit because the 1.2 million goes

130away and then the deficit continues to grow because of the decision making you've done through all of the referendum process so far. 1.2 million is falling off and the projected deficit is let, let's again not get married to these amounts, but around 600,000. So if you did need, if you did choose to go, go back for operations, you may not need to go for the 1.2 million, which is a really good thought right now. A lot can change in the next two years and that's why we're here talking about it now. But, um, we don't see many bottles like this, so I well done. It's old. Can I ask a question about that? Does that give you like a buffer a year for, not that you want to fail referendum, but to what extent does

131it create that situation that there's like a, It could give you flexibility in terms of, and we do have a visual that talks more about this maybe timing when you go back, maybe if you, if it doesn't pass the first time you have a little flexibility, maybe you have facility needs and you want to also ask the facility front them, maybe you do 600,000 for operations and maybe you do, uh, levy toward repaying that for facility side as well. And when we talk about an impact over the community's used to the levy impact of 1.2 million, maybe it's being replaced in or part by different components too. And that's part of this conversation that we're, we're starting tonight. So great question. More flexibility and a little more cushion inside. So I just have a couple

132of slides on the facility planning part. This is where I most support the district. Um, if you were to move forward with the facility planning side, so when we start talking about facility planning, and Elise talked about this and, and I added in a few slides ago, there are three main ways we fund facility leads. One is with just an annual budget item in your operations operational budget. If you allocate $20,000, I'll just use the the carpet again for new library carpet that fits within your operating budget and you completed in that one year and next year, you to tackle something else that, um, is an option. It's competing for dollars for curriculum and staffing and, and insurance and transportation and such. Um, there is the option for non referendum debt. So school districts in

133Wisconsin are able to borrow money without going referendum. There are some steps to it, depending on the dollar amount. The reason you're able to do that is because you have to use revenue limit dollars to pay back. So you can't tax more to pay it. You have to reallocate dollars that you would normally use for staffing and curriculum and such to debt instead. So those are the, the two ways that districts can go about funding. When the projects either individually are so much that they don't fit in the operational budget such as a million dollar section of roof or in compilation gets so large that it makes more sense. Like I said on an earlier slide, that's when we often look at the debt referendum in order to address it. The benefit with the debt

134referendum is we can advertise up to 20 years. So you're spreading out that cost a little longer, which can bring the annual impact. Um, so I wanted to touch on two common questions that we get asked if a facility referendum is on the horizon. One is, can we borrow and if so, how much? So in Wisconsin, you are limited by how much you can borrow for K 12 school district, which you are, it's 10% of the equal equal value. Now this is t in equalized value for the mill rate we use T out. So if you look at these amount side by side, they would be different. Um, and it's not an error, it's accurate. Um, so your, this year's equalized value t in value was 441 million. 10% of that would be $44 million.

135So your debt capacity is 44 million. Your cashflow borrowing does not count against this. The, the items that count against this are those true loans that are either non referendum referendum for facilities or other projects. Currently you don't have any of those and so you have all of that capacity each year. The to end value is re re-released by the Department of Revenue. So this will change between now and if you do go toward a facility referendum, and if you borrowed, most often it increases as property value increases. So your, your parameters right now are 40, it's 44 million. Technically you can ask for more. You could go to referendum for 60, but sometimes you borrow, you only borrow 44. So I don't know if a district that's ever done that, but, um, little nuance.

136Another question we get asked, um, especially if you are attentive to what's happening at the federal level right now with the markets, is, is now still a good time to borrow? We've heard interest rates have gone up. They aren't as low as they were during the pandemic. So we like to build some perspective into that. This is a 30 year look at the, um, borrowing rate for a 20 year borrow. We said 20 years is the most per issue of the school district can do. Um, for the highest rated of debt, this AAA is the highest. You're probably an a plus, which is about four nots below this. So you wouldn't be borrowing at these rates. This is the benchmark that the market uses to show that the movement and the takeaway from this is

137that we're borrowing today about where we were back in 2013, interestingly enough, and we're borrowing less than we were 30 years ago. So when you went to your last referendum in oh six, which is right about here, you would actually borrow it similar. If you were to borrow today, you'd likely borrow it. Similar rates to that 2006, um, referendum. The upper right shows just this year and the volatility you've seen, the market has been very responsive to what's happening with the tariff talks. Something comes out, the market adjusts, tends to settle in, and then something else, um, occurs. So this increase you've seen is a lot of that conversation. Why I like to bring this visual into it is that if you do choose to move forward with a facility component, we never use today's

138rate like the client rate. Uh, we would always use our conservative, what we would, what we view as a conservative client. Maybe we add a hundred basis points to today's rate so that as the year progresses, the rate can move and we can still plan to come in in the targets. We communicated on the day of borrow, you walk into the lowest interest rate available that day, and then your payment schedule is set. So the wiggle happens and the planning stages, once you borrow just like a a typical loan, your schedule is set that you pay. And then this would fit in that referendum approved debt bubble for repayment. The other notable thing on this is that, um, we will factor this in more later. When you borrow the, when you go to referendum, the

139community approves the authority for the board to let you order to pay it back. You have to let you at least minimum in order to make your payments, but the board on an annual basis can choose to let you more than that if it fits within your overall levy plan. And you can prove pay that to reduce interest costs. So you, we, we factor in conservative estimates in the planning and then through annual levy decision making, the board can improve that, um, outlook. And also you're of course eligible to refinance it if interest rates come in more favorable. So all of that comes in as you move forward if the debt becomes a component of the, mm-hmm. Okay, so here's where we leave you. I know this is a lot tonight. Um, but we wanna

140just start by reminding you of your operational referendum authority. So here's your existing authority. In 2324, it was 1.67 million. You have 1.2 million this year. And as we saw on 1.2 million in the next two years, come 27, 28, the board, if you do nothing that let the authority goes away, leading up to that, you'll, you're going to be having conversations continuing the next month of what do we want if to do with that? You can choose to replace, you can choose not to replace this bar. You can choose to replace it in whole or in part with operate another operational referendum. You could choose to replace it in whole or in part with a debt referendum, you could choose to replace it in whole or in part with a combination of the two

141or in combination, it could extend higher. You aren't limited as to what you ask up to the community's appetite for the impact of. So this is, this is really where you're, you're speaking to, you know, something's coming. It's making sure you have a plan in place for when that happens, that that is best for the district. With all the information we have, we, um, we tried really hard for a better infographic on this. Mm-hmm. We even asked, um, check GPT. Yeah. Co-pilot, not check GPT co-pilot. But yes. Um, but in our minds, as we were picturing you, you, you really are, are going to be looking your operating needs and your facility needs and how much do you need in each and where do the projects fit. And those are the, the conversations yet to

142come and we'll be back to help with some of them. And it's all leading up to knowing that we have specific referendum dates where we can ask the community for that approval so that we have that plan implemented, whatever it is when the time comes. So our last slide is leading you with the upcoming election dates. So two important notes, especially if you're new. Uh, the board is the one that puts the referendum in action. You approve a resolution, uh, for the referendum, and then you approve to put it actually, you approve the language and then approve to ask the referendum. And some of you remember that that has to be adopted and certified to the municipalities at least 70 days prior to the election date. So we note the election on here and then

143when it needs to be approved by import. The other, uh, thing to note is that you can ask or have no more than two board resolutions per year. And that is important in our planning. So for instance, I think operations is, is critical for you. We need to make sure the momentum you've had so far doesn't end up going backwards, um, in the next five years. Continues at positive momentum. I need to say that more positively. So making sure we have that operations in place. If you do an operations and facilities, let's say here, and you can't go back if either of them don't pass. So that two questions becomes important when facility facilities can be a part of it. And the other thing that's important is that, um, we are now, we used to

144be able to have special elections, those who had history or could determine when the best time to go was and go and ask. Now they have to be tied to a regular election and we don't have regular election in fall years. So that's why these are boxed out. And those opportunities wouldn't be there. So this will, will come to shape then the timeline that will work backwards from as you then do, we can marry what your needs are, what the plan is, when the date is, and maybe, yes. So to what extent do you, or should we take into account like what's gonna be in the ballot? So we've got a governor election, I don't even know when that is that 2026 potentially? Or is that later? 26. 26. So anyway, like let's just say

145like we, we know what kind of the things that are gonna be on the ballots, does that shape when it's a good time? So for example, like if a bunch of people are turning out to the elections because they care about the governor, but they really don't care if we pass like a school district referendum. Is that something that we should consider? So you wanna go when you're ready. That's the most important part, right. From there, we have tracked the statistics for the elections. Gee out on the data. Yeah. Um, so historically speaking, again, that's so indication of the future. Highest passage rate has been November and the highest within that has been presidential election. Really Turnout. Turnout actually gets more, it gets More for interesting Theory is that if you are against it, you

146are making sure you go correct. Yep. If you're against it, you're applicable no matter what. Making sure that you're voting. Okay. It's the belief is, and there's no hard data behind this, but that higher turnout election brings all the voters to the poll to cast vote. Okay. Um, but we do have that and we can share that we have a handout that has all the years and eye type and such. Great question. Okay. So much fun. Well, what's our last chance to like, keep our operations above, like, above board? Like when do we need to have it passed by? Just assuming that that's a goal that you decide is a shared goal. Yes. So you're allowed, Well, so Depending right On that, Just assuming that everything stays the same, How about you just say that?

147Yes. Okay. Assuming all stays the same and assuming that We want something in place to replace it. Right, right, Right, right, right, right. That way. Yeah. It Would be that, that 26th, 27. So that would be the 27, 28 fiscal year, Which Then is The 27th. That would be your last, your last chance to get approval in order to have something in place for the 27th 20. Good question. Most like two opportunities just in case the first didn't. So you could go here and here. Um, hi, the reason I'm pointing to the fall and the spring specifically, not the August and February, August is really difficult 'cause you're communicating over the summer when families aren't here. Um, so fall, again, highest February's just tricky as well. There's that what's on the ballot tends to be

148light. So you'll get more people at the polls than spray February. Yep. And you said you can do two per year Calendar year. Okay. So if you did fall 26th, you could do, uh, February and April in 27th. Um, unfortunately you could, you could do one question at each. Right. But unfortunately, you have to have the resolution passed before you would know the, out the outcome of that one. Oh yeah. And we, I actually used to think that you could, the board could approve it and then decide not to go. Um, but that was true when this used to only be 45 days. And so board could. Wow. Now that it's 70, it takes that away. Gotcha. Gotcha. Yep. Good question. I have a quick question. Yes. Um, can you ask for future dates on

149a ballot question, you know, for rep finals to be effective down the line, like say next year, just hypothetically, Hey, in 2028, we want, we wanna redo all of our furnaces or all these deferred maintenance that we have in a really big list. Hey, we're hoping that in five years from now when all of our air conditioning units are gonna probably expire or are expected to, we're asking for this money. Yep. Is that a potential possibility? Yep. So I can answer to the operating side. 'cause I know there's limitations of projects on the debt side. So we could ask, um, so it's 2025, so there's no more opportunities to go this year, but you could ask in the spring of 26 for operating referendum funds to come on the books in 27, 28. So from

150an operating standpoint, it's essentially the authority that the, the resolution outlines for the years, the dollar amount, et cetera. You could vote on it early. The only concern would be, you know, are those numbers the best numbers based on the timing, you know, the closer you get to the actual date, those funds will come on hand. You have better figures typically at that time. Um, so that's just to the operating side. And then on the debt side, It's, there are other considerations. And I actually know the district, Arlington, they had some facility needs, but they wanted to make sure their operations were in order. So they went to operations earlier, got that approval so that now they can have a little bit of a gap to come back to the facilities. And so I think

151it was, um, two fiscal years, I believe, between when they asked it and when they'll actually start utilizing the funds. So it isn't, it isn't uncommon either. So that's a great question from the facility side, uh, from once the facility referment passes, the board has up to five years in order to borrow the funds. So you wouldn't have to borrow 'em right away. But in your example, um, if the project was five years out, we'd really have to watch that, that timing. But that doesn't mean once you borrow the funds, you have typically have three years to spend it. So you could borrow it in years two or three and then wait. But you would be incurring interest costs in the meantime, unless we're in a positive arbitrage environment and in that case it might

152be more favorable. All of those things we kind of factor in as we move closer. Great question. These really aren't that far away. If So, as we wrap up and conclude, uh, first and foremost, thank you to Debbie and Elise for joining us this evening. Thank you. Um, they have alluded to that they are going to be back right now tentatively. Um, we have a second presentation scheduled for August, uh, in between now and then. So in July at the board meeting, um, this is the 10 partners who were here last month presenting the facilities audit. We'll be coming back and providing some additional information, uh, from the facilities side. So, um, kind of a comprehensive view of referendum planning, breaking it down to be manageable as we move forward. So that's our plan at

153this point. Awesome. Next time It won't sound like this. Did you watch Marvelous Missing? Yeah, I feel like I'm Jo, um, Joel's mom. Oh Yeah, course I'm the one person Husband and I watching it. I, anyway, I was walking around the house quoting some for things the other day. It's like, oh my gosh, you need to get better. Thank you both for, okay, wait. Okay, so we're moving on to the preliminary budget for 25.6 bucks that You'll present that for us. Uh, so yes, in the word packet you'll see a preliminary budget, um, for 25, 26. And I just wanna emphasize that this is a preliminary budget and we know that the numbers will change. Um, but it's, uh, extremely important to have this approved by the board so that we have a budget in

154our Skyward system that we began working off of in July one, um, for cash receipts, invoices, purchase orders, things like that. Um, in the budget you'll see, um, some, some notes to, to take consideration on is that the charter school implementation grant does end June 30th and that does not roll forward into the new budget year. We are in the midst of a state al budget. There are still some grants out there waiting for approval, um, applications, things like that. And also the 24 25 actuals are still being processed. We're still working that out and those numbers have not been audited. So those are several factors that can change the budget. Um, in the past, the board had, um, previewed a preliminary budget in August. This budget is replacing that August, August budget. In September

155we'll have the annual meeting with the community and then the final budget will be adopted in October. So are there any questions on the budget that was in your packet at this point? So you're asked the budget would be about a hundred thousand, 150,000 roughly less than this last year. Total expenditures I should say. Um, Or maintain more Yes. Expenditures themselves, yes. And fund 10. Oh, revenues are higher. Yes. Yes. So that does, but do remember there are grants out there that may impact that as well, but that would bring in revenue as well as expenses. Is line 1 27, is that the charter grant for DPI Special projects? Grants For revenue For, are we already talking about revenue for revenue and other financing sources? Yeah, No. Okay. Um, that is our, um, oh, it's

156got lost right now. Title, we do not have the title grants finalized yet. Those are still pending. Oh, it's just not pending. Finalized. It's not then will go. Got it. Right. Correct. How much do we have as pending? Um, title grants are not approved yet through DPI. We have an A ODA grant out there. Um, A GR is not, um, finalized and that's another one. One more I would say. I mean, title total is probably roughly 225,000 between all of the titles. Mm-hmm. And title is federal? Correct. So then actually it would be higher than last year. Yes. The revenues would be as well, right? Right. Yep. And to build this preliminary budget, we worked with, um, athletics to kind of gather their data, what they would need, they foresee, um, principals took into account

157their buildings and supplies that they needed. Um, Andrea and I worked with transportation and gathered that data, as you remember a few months ago, we approved, um, salary, um, increases for the new year as well as health insurance. So those things keep evolving and we keep updating as we gathering that information. One quick question. Line item, 1 49, other special needs, it's under expenditures and other, uh, financing issues. There's like a budget item for 60,000. Is that just being conservative as far as, because I see it as the special ed curriculum's much lower expected for next year. Is that just a budget item to make up for? That is. Thank you for that reminder Tucker. So, um, we're also waiting on the special ed federal grant funding as well. So that's not in here. Um,

158the other special needs is very specific to students who need, um, services outside of the district. Okay. Okay. Thank you. I have a question on the support sources expenditures. So Line 69 decreased from 702,000 to 234,000. Was that the charter school grant? That would be decreasing. We don't have like that support from Yes, that is charter school grant as well as, um, federal grants as Well as federal. Okay. And then in that same area, central services went down quite a bit. Um, central services is part due in part to coding, um, the expenses. So that primarily makes up our, our phone, our internet. Oh. Um, got it. Just some of those basic needs. And then other support services, that line item 76, what does that all like? I saw that that one increases a little

159bit or Quite a bit. Yeah, so that one takes, uh, I would say the, the largest increase in there is also due to coding. And our technology needs are primarily technology. Anything else that sticks out to anybody? So a line, a line item 85 or at that area, special project funds, help me understand what that's category, what that, what falls under that broad category. Um, what our district has is a fund 21. Fund 21 is we refer to it as our student activities fund. Um, primarily made up of donations, fundraising efforts. That one, to be honest, the budgeting is primarily based on if they raise the money, they can use the money. So, um, upfront it's just a guessing game. And then after the fact of what they, what they plan on using. Good question.

160Beth, are there any other things that you wanted to point out as far as like major differences or things that we should be aware of? Um, just to keep on the forefront, our fund 50, our food service fund, um, we've been watching that extremely close. Um, we're still finalizing some of our 24, 25 expenditures. Um, Heather's been doing a great job working on how she can, you know, the things that we can control such as the cost of food is going up. Um, trying to collect those, uh, payments for food service from families. So not a major change right now, but just something that is on top of our radar. Just speaking of that, just trying to collect where are we at with our negative food balance right now, our food service. Um, I can

161find that out and bring that back to you. It's just the overall total. Is that Okay? I'm good. Anybody else? Steve's Good. Okay. I'm gonna just continue with food service. Question. Um, is our district, is that the total, is that revenue or that's the total cost to us. Where are you looking at the ending fund value? The total revenues and other financing? Oh, it's even, nevermind. It's even, I was like trying to find the Rest of it. Yes. So I know it has to be even Yes. Or some districts, yes. Like Abbotsford make money. We cannot have a negative belong in that fund. So our fund 10 has Yeah. Um, filled that void By how much Right now this year we're looking at 40,000. That's why it's over the top of the radar. Is there,

162I mean that's I guess maybe a larger question for us to talk about because I mean, we work with a lot of school districts and a lot of them make money. And so, and it's not, not districts that are, I mean, it's districts that have higher, some higher free and reduced lunch rates than us too. Um, so I feel like there is probably space to talk about that because $40,000 is, we should talk about that. Quite a lot of money. And I do think strategically supporting that or finding ways to, because it's not just about food. I mean as you know, it's not just food costs, it's like Right. Staffing, Everything. However, Um, we submitted our food service contract today actually, and the both Athens Elementary as well as Maple Grove, their, uh, overall percentage

163for free reduced lunch has changed. I wanna say they're around 35% and now they're in the 40 to 45%. So that does put them in a little bit different bucket, um, for, especially for breakfast reimbursements. So, um, still a lot of learning to do with what's coming ahead with that and a lot of pieces, um, just being put together yet. So in the action items, it is on the list to approve the preliminary budget tonight. Um, and then when will we get another, like the more finalized numbers after we do that, do you know, In, so in September we'll have the annual meeting with the community. Okay. Yeah. And then the board will adopt to the budget in October after all of those final figures are. Okay, Sure. This is the first run through. This

164is, yes. Very, very preliminary. Okay. Any other questions or Comments? Is there a cheat sheet where we can like see what things are allowed to like, borrow from each other and aren't allowed to like, can like fund 10, fund a teacher? They can't, I know that can't happen. But like, is there like a cheat sheet for that? Like where we can see which things can and can't move between each other's categories? Um, What about, what if I gave you a cheat sheet to say what, what those categories? What's in those categories? Sure. Would that help? Yes. And Then like if they're allowed to move or not, that would be Good. Yeah. Like we're, um, I'm just trying to understand. Yeah, yeah, no, like we work off of funds. So Fund 10 is our general fund.

165That's the biggest one that we always talk about. Fund 27 special ed fund 50 is food service. Um, and each one has their own rules and has their own things that they can yeah. Pay for. And um, these, the board, so DPI requires school boards to approve by the function, which is essentially, um, the function is what is the purpose of the funds. So everyone seems to be more familiar with like salaries and benefits and transportation where DPI has us approved that, what is the purpose? So yes, I can definitely get together some cheat sheets Because I'm like, Based on what our district Fix food service, is that another teacher or is that not Never because Fund 10 has teachers in there. So like that's a big deal in a district this size when we're

166talking about things or like, yeah. You Know? Yeah, absolutely. Great question. All right, last call all. So next is, um, Andrea is gonna present the Fisher Transportation contract for 25 26. Thank you Angie. So in the board packet you have, um, the example of the transportation contract for 25 26. Uh, then meeting regular routinely with Mary Ann from Fisher Transportation. Um, we negotiated an overall increase of 4%, uh, little less than last year, which was 4.5. And previous to that it was five. Um, recognizing that similar to our class as a school district, she too, um, as a business owner is experiencing an increase in costs and she has an interest in increasing the pay for our bus drivers, um, which I thought was admirable. So, um, I appreciated the time and the conversations over

167the last several months. So, um, that's the area where, um, in our conversations I have some of voice and advocacy. So we will see a 4% increase next year. Um, the other costs, um, they start at the top actually, the routes per day will remain the same, um, number of school days, um, that we employ are also the same. Then the other costs are based upon her information that she received. So you don't necessarily have input on that. Um, but do you have a input on the whole increase such I'm asking the board to review the contract, um, for consideration of approval moving forward for the upcoming Questions. Is there really any other options then Fisher, or is it just what we have? Fisher is our best option in this area. Um, there are other

168busing companies, um, in and around Marathon County. Um, but I feel for, um, the price and what we receive for service, um, it's a local business which we like to support. Um, yep. Edgar Marathon also use Fisher. So sometimes we can negotiate as three districts, maybe a little larger in size as in one. Um, sure. But I feel that, um, it's a fair, it's a fair contract and what was offered this year. Okay. That's a good question. Thank you Tucker. Thanks. Okay. High cost transportation aid going up at all? I suppose there a budget. We don't know. We didn't know that. Yeah, Actually budget, it's not gonna be a survey. Okay, good. Alright, so again, this will be on the action items. All right. The next item is, um, Athens Middle and High School co-curricular

169Code For 25 26. Julie. Yes. So no big changes at all, but I do wanna draw your attention to page. Oh gosh. And of course there's no page number on here. Um, it is about where the, um, um, it talks about academics and quarter grades. Just in last year's there was a timeline that was to be determined that had been determined. So I updated that to say that the fourth quarter of the school year, those fourth quarter grades, which actually I was just writing those lists today, students that, um, ended up with an f at the end of the school year, that gets, um, put into play in the fall. Just as a point of reference, it wasn't, um, the old one just said to be determined internally. We knew that to make sure that

170we're communicating that out ahead with you guys, um, just to make sure that that is what we are following is that fourth quarter grades will impact fall eligibility. The other thing that I, um, talked to Todd about, and I noticed it does say in here that, um, students and parents would sign off on that. So during our fall sports meetings, we will be printing off a page, and I know that they acknowledge this in the enrollment, but there's that, we're gonna go back to that signed piece of paper where folks are held accountable not just for acknowledging that they've seen it on the online enrollment, but that we've got paper, you know, that we've got a signature on file. So if for some reason we need to go back to holding our, um, athletes accountable

171that we've got something on file and there is, um, some space in campus where I can work with Mrs. Young to put those things in there as a documentation placeholder, um, just to make sure that we're collecting those from coaches at the beginning of each season. You know, so if it's a student that's in three seasons, if we've already got theirs, they don't need to sign it every season, but if they're, um, starting a season or an activity. So this will apply to coaches and advisors to make sure that we just cover that base a little more solidly. So you're not gonna see a signature page on the back of this right now, but we will have what we have had one in years past. Um, when we went to an electronic version, we, it

172took, it came off of there just because we thought we were taking care of that through the acknowledgement online, but, um, that's really the biggest things that have changed on there. Okay. Questions for Julie. One question on the overnight trip, I'm assuming there's special exemptions because of, say we qualify for the state baseball tournament and the games at 9:00 AM our kids are not gonna be in their hotel room at 8:00 AM anymore. They'll be at the field already. So I'm assuming we can assume a case by case basis will be Handled. Yes. Yes. We have authority to do that and adjust accordingly as needed for those various types of trips. Good question. Thank you. Any other questions? This Is gonna be a item four. One Last quick one Oh, ahead. Eighth grade into freshman

173year abs by and eighth grader that, how does that get handled for Freshman? They have a clean slate freshman year. Just wanted to clarify. That's question. That is a great question. And I did compare ours to and Marathon for similarities. So we're, we're pretty much right in the middle, but in our own ized way as it pertains to us. So we're, we're following all the same guidelines that our counterparts are putting into place as well, including the freshmen starting with the Clean slates. And I would suggest if we start seeing issues with eighth graders in the spring semester starting to show, I don't care anymore because it's a clean slate, we would've to re-look at that, not at that point. And the thought process of creating some sort of, um, some more coach conversations down

174the road, and even advisors where we can do a little bit more, some academic probation. Um, we base right now their penalties or suspensions off of quarter grades only. Other districts are a little more stringent. They started immediately at mid quarter grades. So I I wasn't gonna change that arbitrarily right now. I mean that Biggs a whole bigger conversation, but when we think about all the data we presented before in terms of what are we doing to put in place so we don't have to wait till the end of a quarter to have to implement those suspensions or that in eligibility. I mean, it's all, it's a lot more about putting in the time on the upfront with the kids and making sure that we very clearly communicate what those expectations are so we don't

175find ourselves in Those positions. So Absolutely. Okay, we're gonna move on to the WIA senior high membership renewal application for 25 26. This is also Julie. Yep. Um, so this is just an annual renewal process. Um, Todd wasn't able to speak on behalf of that tonight. So we're, we are requesting annual membership act, um, within the WIAA, um, as we have done for many, many years. So, and again, WIA membership, just so you guys know, um, we follow a lot of their guidelines with our middle school as well, except our middle school is not WIAA affiliated, just that you're aware, just our high school, just reference Any questions And that'll be an action item. Then we're gonna move to the athletic Training service agreement with Health Motion, Andrea. So this is the time of year

176all I to the board and ask you to consider, um, continuing our athletic training service agreement with Health in Motion. This Lizabeth Athens partners with the Colby, um, school district and we share, um, Maddie, our athletic trainer. She's very valuable, um, both for our student athletes and our coaches. Um, and something, um, just for you to consider is that, um, when we started this agreement from financial perspective in year one, $20,000, um, year two, uh, 21,500 and the upcoming year, uh, 23,000, again, I asked when I talked to Ben Han from Help in Motion around those costs. Uh, he to indicated that, um, we would like to continue to increase the salary for Maddie. Um, she's been in performance goals, um, he did suggest in the next one to two years that that will potentially

177sunset. So he is suggesting, um, that there might increase one more year. Um, but each year I come back to him and ask where we are with that. So again, I also spoke with Ed Julie and with Todd. Um, very positive views on the work that Manny does with our student athletes and she is a part of our community. So, um, bringing that forward tonight for consideration and potential approval, please Thank You. Questions for Andrea? None. We'll move on to the Human Resources report. Um, this is the time of year, um, where we're quite busy, um, with hiring. Um, we have a variety of, uh, vacancies either due to retirements and or resignations. So I'll start at the top. Um, and I'll just share with the board and our community that the process we use

178through hiring is to, uh, bring together a team of individuals, whether it is a teaching vacancy or a central office vacancy, um, for those to have a voice in that process. So our first, uh, new hire, um, is a replacement for Chris Check. Um, and that would be a potential for Seth Co to join our school district. Uh, Julie Love this interview process with a team of individuals, um, and Seth entirely recommended, um, by that team. Um, the next is a new position, um, and this is, um, providing more time for De Brewster, uh, to be the middle school teaching ELA classes. So in response then, um, we have asked the board to consider, um, a part-time library media specialist across the district. Laura JE is, um, the individual that our team, um, is recommending

179for hire here. Um, Jamie, as you know, attended his resignation. Um, and so we have been interviewing and we're suggesting, um, Jonathan, our John hire for the maintenance operations supervisor. I'll pause for a moment. This is really a key leadership position in the school district. A team of individuals came together. Um, we had five quality candidates that we screened for interviews. Um, in round one we interviewed four. When I say high quality, we had high quality candidates. So much so that our team determined we needed the second round of interviews. So then we invited three candidates back for a second round of which they all accepted. Um, and Mr. Higher was to the top. He has the strengths and the skills that we feel will continue to register forward. Um, and I wanna recognize, um,

180that team of interviewers as well. It was a nice representation of, uh, different individuals representing both the maintenance department leadership and other areas. So, um, that was a comprehensive process, um, but we feel that the outcome is very impressive. Um, we have some additional resignations. Emily Shikowsky, um, grade five teacher has resigned from Maple Grove Charter School. Um, this is already a posting on the weekend site, um, and Robin will lead that interview process during the next several weeks. Uh, Michelle Markowski has stepped up to take on the sophomore class or class of 2028 advisor role. Um, Krisa Denton has, um, resigned. Um, she is pursuing another job opportunity outside of the school district. Um, we have also posted this position as well. Um, then we have some summer help, um, to make sure that

181our buildings are in good shape to reopen the doors in September. Uh, we're requesting, uh, Dakota and Acki, um, be approved for, um, a summer position. Um, and then we have, um, three teachers, Alyssa, Michelle and Adam Rebel at the secondary level who are providing some summer learning support and credit recovery courses for students who need that support this summer to start the year strong in the fall. And then starting with Sean Stankey and moving on to the second page of this report, our coaches, um, and I want to appreciate, um, both Julie and Todd di Tom on the meeting with them. Regular, routinely has been very proactive working with our head coaches at both middle and high school to identify coaches earlier. Um, prior to our season's beginning. This provides a variety of opportunities,

182um, for our student athletes and our families and our communities. So, um, beginning with Sean standing and going through, uh, the second page, you'll see coaches that are coming as a recommendation through athletic. There are still some positions, uh, to be filled. Um, and, and Julie are working on those. Some questions be asked to take action on that later. And then information board of education meeting dates for 25 26 R in the packet. Um, keeping the start time of 5:00 PM these will be, um, action items as well. I don't know, like Andrew, would you mind talking to the April 27th meeting? That one's a little bit different than Actually, if it's okay. Angie, I'm gonna start with October 27th. Yes, go ahead. So there are two dates, um, during the year where instead of

183being on the third Monday, we meet on the fourth Monday. Um, the October 27th date, um, very much aligns with the presentation we heard this evening around school finance. Um, so in October, variety of important dates and things occur October 1st, October 15th. So as a board we would want to wait to meet to be able to set our levy based upon equalized values, which are released on October 1st. General school aid is also confirmed on October 15th. So, um, it gives the business office, myself and the board time to reflect on those informational pieces that are released and certified by the state. Um, and so we moved that May October to the fourth. So that would be the, um, reason why for October, April. Um, there are a couple of things that happened during

184the month of April. Um, the first is around, um, contract renewal or non-renewal for certified staff. Um, and there are state statutes which indicate conversations that would occur not only with, um, a teacher or certified staff member if they were gonna be non-renewed, but there's a specific timeline of which then that individual would have to process rights. So sometimes we host the book board meetings still on the third Monday if we need some, um, time, if you will, before the end of the month. April 30th is a very important date in that process. We could call a special board meeting if necessary. The other thing that occurs in the month of April is school board elections. So as we, um, had happened this year, we had our school board elections, we had our meeting on

185the third Monday. So our new members, uh, took the oath but could not actively participate until the next month. We also could not see from our new officers. So, um, I recognize and thanks who served as the vice president in that role until May and when we could, uh, elect our president. So In talking with Angie and kind of weighing the two choices, so again, as a board we could choose to meet on the third Monday or the fourth Monday. Um, we're making the recommendations, um, to return to the fourth Monday because if necessary, getting back to that non-renewal timeline, if we needed to have a special meeting, we could call that and I would, um, ask the assumption that be able to do that. So we felt it was in the board's best interest

186to move that back to the fourth Monday. Okay. Thank you. You're welcome. Okay, so again, any comments or questions on any of those dates or ideas? 5:00 PM still not an issue for anybody or, okay, so that will also be action item. Okay. So now we're gonna move to action item. The first one on there is revenue and expense reports presented by Beth. Um, yes. So I guess the main thing on this one is May is a quiet month for revenues and our primary revenue came in for the reimbursement for the charter school grant. Um, expenditures are pretty normal compared to other months. So are there any questions on either of those reports? Okay. So is there a motion to approve the revenue and expense reports as presented? I will. What's the, can give an

187official thing we can say that's like, there I move or I shall move. Is the like there's a specific motion I make motion. Okay. You want me to say, okay. Okay. There is a thing there. Probably introduce it and then you can say a second thing that's like, you can say, I, I so move. Moved. Do I have a second? I'll second. Okay. Cam, will you do a roll call vote Steve? Yes. Jessica? Yes. Tom? Yes. Angie? Yes. Tucker? Yes. Kat? Yes. And Cam? Yes. Thank you. And then I'm, the next is approval of checks and cash receipts. So Beth, again represent that, um, it is in your packet. Yeah. Are there any questions on any of those? Um, anybody care to make a motion to approve? I'll make motion. Okay, Steve, I'll second. Jess.

188Becky, you roll call, vote please. Steve? Yes. Jess? Yes. Tom? Yes. With an abstention from 8 1 6 9 6. All right, Angie? Yes. Tucker? Yes. Kat? Yes. And Cam? Yes. Thank you. Okay. Um, the next item is the preliminary budget, um, which was presented earlier. Is there a motion to approve the preliminary budget as presented? I'll make a motion. Yep. And again, a roll call vote please. Steve? Yes. Jessica? Yes. Tom? Yes. Angie? Yes. Tucker? Yes. Kat? Yes. And Cam? Yes. Thank you. Okay. The next one is Fisher Transportation. Contract for 25 26. Honor. Motion to approve. Tucker. I'll second. And again, we'll do a roll call. Vote for that one. Steve. Yes. Jessica? Yes. Tom? Yes. Angie? Yes. Tucker? Yes. Kat? Yes. And Cam? Yes. Thank you. Thank you. Alright, the next item

189is the Achievement gap reduction board report as presented by Joy. Um, motion move. Set that as recorded. I'll Make that motion. Okay, I'll second Ka. Alright. And that one is a voice vote. All in favor say aye. A aye. A All opposed nay. Motion carried. And next is the Athens Middle and High School. 25 26 co-curricular code. I make a motion. Makes a motion to approve. I'll second. Second. That was a voice vote. All in favor say aye. Aye. Aye. All opposed? Same. A Tucker hit you off. Alright. Am I behind or is there There's a, There's, there's a leg. Just normal Tucker for, You'll wait for you. Okay. All The next item is approving the WIA senior high Membership renewal application for 25 26 as presented. Motion. One second. See if we'll do a

190voice vote for that one as well. All in favor say aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. I don't know what I, I'll oppose na. Okay. No thanks. That one passes as well. Okay. Um, the next item is the athletic Training service agreement with health in motion for 25 26. Um, as presented, I'll make a motion. You can, I'll second Yes. And then we'll do a roll call. Vote for that one please. Steve? Yes. Jessica? Yes. Tom? Yes. Angie? Yes. Tucker? Yes. Kat? Yes. And Cam? Yes. Thank you. All right. Um, thank you. We are going to then, um, look for a motion to approve the human resources report as presented. Sure. I'll do that. Steve, I'll second Jess. Okay. Thank you. Um, a roll call, vote please. Becky? Steve? Yes. Jessica? Yes. Tom? Yes. But abstain from

191the middle school football coaches and Mandy Becker. Okay. Angie? Yes. Tucker? Yes. Kat? Yes. And Cam? Yes. Thank you. Last item, action item is, um, to, um, approve the Board of Education meeting dates for 25 26 as presented. I'll make the motion Will, one second Jess. And it looks like we'll do a roll call. Vote for that one as well. All right. Steve? Yes. Jessica? Yes. Tom? Yes. Andy? Yes. Tucker? Yes. Ka. Yes. Cam? Yes. Thank you. Thank you. Do we have a motion to adjourn to executive post session under Wisconsin statute 19.851 CF for the purpose of considering employment compensation, performance evaluations and personal information of specific individuals which if discussed in public could have, would have substantial adverse effect on the person's reputation? I'll make a motion, make a motion to Adur. We'll

192do Tucker and then we'll do Cam for a second. And then, um, all those in favor say aye. A Aye, Aye. Any opposed? Okay. We are adjourning into closed session at 7:53 PM.