001e thank you I did get an email that I just opened looking to see for the agenda why we didn't recognize that October was National dyslexia got oh just I'm just checking Berney I I know you're a lottery player so all right I'm g go all at 505 we got about 45 seconds I think 10 seconds not 45 that was a quick second meeting of the board of education on October 9th 2023 is now called to order at 5:05 p.m. can we call the RO please I can Godfree here penel here here motor here P here youman here Scher here we are still all here so um please join me um at this time in a moment of reflection um which will be followed by the Pledge of Allegiance thank you very much all right
002we do have a few announcements and Communications um to get to so following the adjournment of the regular meeting the board will convene in an executive session to discuss negotiations with espa and to confer with legal councel with respect to litig litigation as provided for in Wisconson statutes 19.85% October is gifted Education Month the encl enclosed Proclamation from State superintendent Jill underly celebrates gifted education and declares October as a gifted Education Month to recognize the impact of supporting our gifted Learners October is keeping kids safe online month this year's observance of keeping kids safe online in Wisconsin reminds us to remain steadfast in our pursuit to engage in the use of digital tools without sacrif icing their Safety and Security the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction along with the Department of Justice continue to work
003together to help create awareness and provide resources to support safe and healthy online choices then enclosed Proclamation from State superintendent Jill underly promotes Online safety and digital citizenship education October is National principal Month celebrated every October National principles month is an opportunity to celebrate and honor our incredible School principles for their Visionary leadership and tireless pursuit of success for each student national school lunch week is October 9th through the 13th 2023 this annual observance promotes the importance of healthy school lunch in a child's life and the impact it has both in and out of the classroom and finally national school bus safety week is October 16th through the 20th held during the third full week of October each year national school bus safety week is an active and evolving public education program and an excellent
004way for parents students teachers motorists School Bus operators school administrators and other interested parties to join forces and address the importance of school bus safety thank you uh next up we will have arrived to our first opportunity for public comment as a reminder I'm going to reference 01 67.3 public comment at board meetings I want to remind our participants that the presiding officer is Guided by these following rules letter F all statements shall be directed to the presiding officer no person may address or question board members individually and letter G the presiding officer will interrupt warn or terminate if the participant statement is too lengthy personally directed abusive obscene or IR revolent the presiding officer will request any individual to leave the meeting when that person does not observe reasonable decorum the presiding officer will
005request the assistance of law enforcement officers in the removement removal of a disorderly person when that person's conduct interferes with with the orderly orderly excuse me progress of the meeting and finally the presiding officer will call for a recess or an adjournment to another time when the lack of public decorum so interferes with that orderly conduct of the meeting as to Warrant such action with that being said um we are ready uh for anyone who wants to address the board in public comment Jim H Eden pray for the Peace of Israel and for the us because Hamas is already in this country USA Today did a story on school teacher that said it's hell out here referring to students having fallen three grad grade levels behind and because a teacher shortage are and their uh
006levels and and they're looking for to handle this school bus drivers interesting I don't know how many of you would want me in the classroom according to the Friday fin like reporter there were hearings last Wednesday in the state capital that would have banded gender transition treatments for minors and prohibit transgender women and girls from competing on women's sports teams board members who have daughters would you want them competing against men lgbtq community's Advocate Advocates testified the proposals would harm transgender mental health superintendent Jill underly citing 2021 data found that more than half of the lgbtq youth seriously considered suicide attempting suicide she also said these anti-trans proposals will kill children but can we believe on underly data or her comments remember Jill is the same state superintendent that altered data in 2021 to mislead
007parents into believing their children's scores were above X expectations when in reality students grades were below expectations the truth is when children are told lies that they can change their sex by taking and altering hormone and removing body parts a guilty conscience emerges that eventually leads to depression all because of greedy Health Care Providers and public schools that promote mutilation of students sex Parts last week judge Mike Maxwell in wershaw Ruled The Kettle Marine School District staff can no longer address transitioning students with preferred pronouns without parental consent what does secretly using preferred pronouns in school teach our straight and gender dysphoria students that that lying and crookedness is okay and that it's okay to deceive your parents and lie to them in order to get the lgbtq propaganda into every kid's head at the
008same time concealing the homosexual child grooming program Wisconsin schools are supposed to have policies put in place to describe operating rules and regulation but according to the current Kettle Marine superintendent Steve Plum his district never had a formal policy on the use of pronouns in place so staff including a middle middle school principal a counselor and a former board member acted on their own not concerned about parents' rights or input so I can't even ask you board members if we have a policy concerning the use of pronouns in place since many Wisconsin school districts have decided they don't need one the Personnel or Kettle Marine that acted on their own accord used the excuse of federal title act n but according to the 10th Amendment of the US Constitution individual states do not have to
009follow Federal mandates when the states never gave the federal government the authority to make laws concerning sexual discrimination cases board members the federal government and the Wisconsin DPI are making Liars out of our kids and it's up to you to put an end to it thank you thank you Mr s is there anyone else looking to make public comment during this first session seeing none we'll move on to the approval of consent resolution agenda excuse me the board members have been provided background material and information on each item or have discussed it at a previous meeting these items will be acted upon with one vote without discussion any board member May remove an item from the agenda this item will be discussed and voted on separately under the agenda item of individually considered resolution Solutions
010I move to approve the consent AGA as follows uh approval of minutes September 11 2023 Board of Education regular meeting workshop and executive session as presented uh September 25th 2023 Board of Education regular meeting and executive session as presented uh B chief of finance and operations approval September financial statement accepted and its publication authorized number two current expenses to approve bills of the Board of Education the amount of of 11,839 3.96 and to have orange drawn for their payment number three retirement Deborah M M molich M M thank you Linda library media specialist at savish and Tyson middle schools effective January 19 2023 with 31 years of dedicated service number four resignation Stacy matusi that is all right English was it by specialty math was special education teacher at Waters Elementary effective August 18 2023
011second we have motion by Mr henchel seconded by Mr Godfrey to approve the consent agenda can we have the role please yep Godfrey yes henel yes hor yes motor yes Pau yes yelman yes shrider yes thank you carries 70 we're now on to individually considered resolutions to consider the approval of the request to apply for educational flexibility program labor I move the Board of Education approve the request to apply for an educational flexibility Ed Flex program waiver Second Use Your vet language on that one Antonio motion by Mr Godfrey seconded by Mr henel I will turn this now over to Mr gerlock to uh for discussion thank you Mr shrider um the district as we just talked in our budget hearing uh receives a variety of Revenue sources among those are federal sources uh particularly
012uh federal grants although they make up a very small percentage of a District's operating budget budget they're nevertheless important um and one of those federal grants uh Federal Title One funds uh and there's like many federal funds some pretty particular requirements related to managing that even though it's a it's in the scheme of it a relatively small budget it's still nevertheless a very important budget that serves uh District students and we've we've budgeted those funds uh relatively conservatively here in the past and as a result if you have some carryover of those funds meaning unspent funds from a prior year uh meaning you were too conservative with them uh you you only get to request a waiver uh from the state once and then the next time you have to request from the from the
013federal government which is what is before you tonight and as part of that string attached a board has to allow us to request for that Ed Flex from the federal government and so um Mrs renberger and I are working with our staff to to Really deploy those resources um a little maybe less conservatively a little more aggressively uh but in order to get to that in that carryover amount in the amount of of you know about $250,000 we've got to apply to the federal government we need your permission tonight so can for the public can you just give an example or two of what some of the uses of those funds might be yeah I'll defer to Mrs renberger that's uh she's that's in her wheelhouse yes so this this funding is for Title One
014schools so our students who uh are uh lowincome uh families so we usually use a lot of the funding to pay for the um like reading specialist list and title on Services provided the salaries okay is this uh is this is this different than the special ed is this title what does it roll for three years or just as one year well these are Title One is is different than special education these are in our general fund and as Mrs reiken bger said they're related it's formulaic driven and driven by students and low-income students and so uh there are times with school that the the assistance the funds flow between different schools depending on student need that's the intention of the funds and the Ed Flex specifically is this waiver is to use our carryover
015from last fiscal year it's it's not in perpetuity it doesn't it's for a onetime use of the unspent funds from last fiscal year in that Federal grant is really the point of it so it doesn't qualify the district uh for the fure future uh we are as I mentioned going to be less conservative with this particular Grant budget uh and try to make sure that we we get to this point where we don't have to ask you for this permission to spend unspent funds from last fiscal year so and is the understanding too just for um a clarification uh you can't pay for the same position that other schools have corrected it has to be beyond what other schools have so for example if one school had a reading specialist and a title school had
016a reading specialist you couldn't use those funds it has to be something beyond what a school without title has Isn't that correct it has to be beyond what the district is paying for correct okay thank you so when you look at I remember M was going to py we had to sign paperwork and that how many um how many distri or how many schools do we have that are Title One schools um I think there's seven seven I was gonna say I thought there was a good number of them yeah and they like this year changed so it depends upon the formula we use so every year it's a little bit different and based on the enrollment numbers that it changes this year it changed again one school that was on it last year was
017not so so as we look forward with the 200,000 uh that adds on to the budget that we have for this for this next year and are we looking at position supporting what we have or above Beyond programs going forward with that or yes all the above yeah it's yeah it's trying to yeah we're trying to get a handle on what the schools need okay awesome and also thinking about um Staffing I mean we're struggling to fill teaching positions let alone hire someone beyond that when we can't fill teacher positions any other comments or thoughts all right can we have the roll call please yes henel yes hor yes motor yes panau yes yelman yes Godfree yes Sher yes motion carries 70 and we will now move on to board and administrator reports I'm going
018to turn it over to Dr flag thank you uh president schrider um this evening I I I would like to talk to you a little bit about an A A acknowledge a donation typically I do not bring donations to the board to share with you but I think given this the the unique circumstances for this donation I think it's very important per policy I can accept donations uh on behalf of the Board of Education and this is and tonight I'm pleased to announce this is no longer an anonymous donation a National Exchange Bank foundation and the Barbara and Peter Stone Family Foundation are donating together $1 million to uh for us to have nine new playgrounds at our elementary schools one at each school so um this as some of you know uh parents have
019spent some of you that have worked in the district know that or had kids that went through know you've been donating for playgrounds over the years I think Mr henchel your first year I think you gave your board part of your board salary to the P playground a couple years ago um so I'm just very thankful for Eric Stone I'd like to on behalf of the Board of Education and and as well as the school district thanks Mr Eric Stone he reached out to me and we had and we have plans in place plans have already been established in collaborate with BCI Burk so I've been spending most of the last probably four to five weeks on working with them and really as well as John Williams who's not here tonight really working to get
020this set up so we're very pleased there is going to be a cost to the district above this but um talking to Mr gerlock we're com comfortable we can cover that of around 250,000 more to really make make nine playgrounds this is probably a 20 to 30 year investment and collaborating with BCR Burke so on behalf of the district I will course I'd like to just say thank you to Mr Eric Stone for his leadership and collaboration as well as to the National Bank Foundation National Exchange Bank foundation and the Barbara and Peter Stone Family Foundation so just wanted to share that bit of good news with you on that this will thank you thank you and I think one more thing it's this is going to standardize the plane experience across all nine elementaries
021and right now that is not the case and depending on on the PTO depending on how how your playground was so this is really a attempt to level the playing Ground for all of our elementaries to have a great place for their kids to play so thank you Mr Stone it's a game changer y so I just want to share that with you can I I just follow can I ask a question regarding that or um I'm curious um as we're planning I know there are some schools and some parents that are looking how we can make playgrounds accessible for every child including those in wheelchairs and so forth so um I'm sure they'll we'll be thinking about that as we move forward it's already been thought of and we're going to be so just
022so you know that we are not going to be putting rubberized surface in on any of our playgrounds for this reason they do not last long and we get and they are very expensive to put in and repair and under this current dollar of 1.2 million is what it's going to cost we cannot afford to do that so we are going to go with wood microfiber chips and that is considered to be handicap accessible because it packs down and John and I have I've learned more about drainage than I care to learn okay of how that helps this settle well so it can be used okay but we will not be going with the rubberize surface okay do you bet so great news one it's great that BCI Burke I'm sure is being very generous
023on what they're doing to make those dollars go further too yes very yes y they've been great and they've given a a pretty substantial discount also so to stretch this out so thank you to both organizations y absolutely okay uh next uh literacy task force this is just information for the board this want to give you a little bit of a some background here is um um you know our literacy our reading achievement has been improving over the last three years and um one of the challenges I see it's not accelerating at the same rate as our math achievement and um our math achievement is really starting to take off so as a result I have assembled A literacy task force to review our current approach and resources for teaching reading so on this task
024force it's 20 some people it's one teacher from each of our elementary schools plus one teacher teacher from each of the middle schools plus roughly six principles and of and some representatives from uh District administration so we are going to be engaging in a review of of of resources and looking at how we teach reading and and given the recent act 20 that was passed bill that was passed at the state level which is really the Wisconsin reading bill um which as I shared with our local representativ is really the first time the state of Wisconsin has taking student achievement seriously a at the government level that they are really dictating what they want us to use K2 to ensure all students are reading and I wanted just applaud Mr OK Conor and Mr fine
025for their work on that bill and I had and I conferred with them numerous times about my concerns about it they were very uh receptive to to the concern and it and the concern I addressed was the required um uh retention at third grade if they do not pass the test that is no longer in there they in and they were very supportive of that but I really think the time is right for us right now to review how we teach reading and um we're going to look to go pretty aggressively here to Pilot some resources second semester and hopefully come to you with an adoption early summer but I will say there's a butt coming if it's not ready we won't do it meaning we'll push it out of ways so I think we're
026going to let have the teachers dictate the pace here that are on the committee of where we end up here we may end up going into next year still piloting some resour es I do not know on the pace of this how this will roll so I'm just being honest with you but I think the uh there is a a little bit of of urgency around the reading and um why we continue to uh to at least be up to prepandemic levels um still not accelerating at the rate I'd like to see so I will keep you posted on that and eventually we will be coming to you for to share that out the output from that okay so thank you any questions on the literacy task force all right we're going to go on
027to board member student staff activities I usually start on my right so I'm going to start on my left tonight since I've been gone Mrs panel um I met with Mrs Bowers um principal at Waters and the purpose of our meeting was simp to discuss evaluate and explore operations for um how the lerson function between waters and myself will will go forward okay that's it good meeting very awesome slow couple of weeks for me um I did the have the opportunity to go to the high school for uh baderin YFC um where they had they raised money uh one of the programs that they helped support is teen parents and ensuring that teen parenes have the resources and continue to work towards graduation and then um achieving goals over and above um so uh I
028it was great to learn more from them again Mr G um I got a chance to uh to to attend the walk with an athlete at Riverside last Wednesday I I want to commend our our our student athletes from over from um our high school to that that participated and that we had there was well over a hundred student athletes that partnered with um kids from Riverside and if from my understanding there was also other elementary schools and middle schools that participated in it I don't know their numbers but for Riverside alone there was well over a 100 student athletes that partnered and and they spent the morning morning with th with those kids um engaging and just giving them the life of a student athlete from their experience and to all of all of
029them and who all the all the Min whoever put this on kudos to you guys that was amazing um I've attended multiple um football games um attended the heartbreaker uh Friday night um but it was kids played they played with their heart they put their hearts on the field so we got nothing to complain about about that but I also wanted to make a statement there was a I was at work today and uh two parents came in and they had just left Chuan Elementary School um this is not a bad thing this is actually an amazing thing and I want to commend Nate and his staff over there at Chuan um the parents didn't know who I they know me but they didn't know I was a school board member until after we finished
030and they were just they they gave Nate and his staff Praises on how they they individualized and helped that family to get to their child to the desired outcome for their child and they work together as a team to get that desired outcome and I just want to say that is com that is amazing and I want to commend Nate and his staff over there at checkman for that thank you thank you Mr Cy Mrs H um um I have been attending a lot of fourth grade volleyball games between waters py roseno and Lake Shore um are you coaching I am absolutely not coaching I'm just a spectator um so that's been fun and exciting to watch um I participated in the Lakes Shore uh walk to school morning to celebrate National walk to school
031day um I got to actually watch the band and practice I think that was last week Monday um I was at softball practice um at the varsity field so got to enjoy the band while I was watching that made softball practice a little more enjoyable that night um I think that's it are you coaching softball I am absolutely not Co are you coaching band no oh all right I am not built to be a coach not at all life coach probably not that either well it's good the band's been practicing on the tennis courts too late at night which has been kind of fun to watch um multiple sports events and uh yeah Frozen and wet for Last Friday to watch that but it was amazing to see that new school that Nina's got and
032walk around uh in the facilities they have um when you got that kind of money you can build something pretty special so uh they did a nice job there the other thing we we talked about announcements Communications about all the uh gifted education I also want to bring out a lot of us been touched in this way of uh October is also cancer awareness month so if people can remember that I think that's important to also throw out there uh a lot of our families been touched by it so thank you so yeah um I just did the homecoming parade and game and um the band competition this past weekend and Milton was really nice um I actually had double the pleasure because I got to watch fondy and then also ashkash Titans so Milton's
033still grass though isn't it it is yeah I remember that was interesting trying to get some of the smaller wheeled equipment out there and things like that but yeah anyway uh yeah so that was fun and then I it's always um heartwarming to me how many of the alumni really still stay connected with our Band program so there were six of them that were on the Titan Thunder uh group and then they connected with our kids and it was really great we we did throw a lot of candy out at the parade and Antonio survived going off the back of the truck so uh I was a little nervous there I didn't didn't hear about that all right was a controlled fall he jumped or pushed he jumped on and and I'd like to thank
034Holiday Auto for they did a nice donation with all the vehicles for all the different uh you know um homecoming court and the board members they did a nice job from providing all the vehicles for the names and everything on names on yeah they did an incredible job uh really making it classy for the uh parade you know for me I you know when you talked about the athlete and walking the kids to school that was by far always Steven's favorite event to do throughout his high school um he absolutely loved that I've been out of the area for about the last three weeks to a month um up in chip wall Falls helping put the new Festival together but my Kudos is going to go to our uh communication teams to uh Mr Maran
035with the social media and everything and even though that I was out of town for pretty much close to three weeks every day I could keep up on everything that was happening in our schools and and all the amazing things going on so I think we've taken a great leap in terms of how we communicate and and the things we put out there so Mr Maran a kudos to you and your team for um for keeping me up to date um and for keeping all of us up to date on what's going on around our district and I'm excited to watch the twofers so too yeah that's that's going to be really good so um I just wanted to give you a little little shout out today for that so um with that we will
036close the student and staff activities and move on to our second public comment session those of you that like to come forward um please follow remember the rules from the first comment um session and uh we will go good afternoon good afternoon Bob Rundle 36 Greenbrier Court Fondulac Wisconsin I've got like three issues I'd like to address you uh probably won't have time for all three so I'll go on priorities number one and number two uh first and foremost I see he's not here uh today but I'd like to congratulate John Williams on his retirement I worked with John prior to my retirement I always found him to be very professional very dedicated he always looked out for the school district the students and and the community so I wish him a a pleasant retirement
037and and many many years of uh a good life secondly I'd like to address another issue that bothers me ticks me off and apparently it does a lot of people in the community because I've had a number of phone calls because of my affiliation and ass association with the community Aquatic Center I don't know this Administration and maybe you the board you must stay up at night trying to figure out how to PO people what on Earth are you changing the name of the community Aquatic Center for do any of you have any background or any history as to how that came about Let me refresh you 35 37 years ago the school district had a it was latter part of the 80s I believe 19 8888 but they had a referendum and the referendum
038was a major Capital Improvement uh uh program for the district and as part of that uh it included a community Aquatic Center that was voted down by a substantial amount and if I recall it was somewhere by uh 75 to 25 there was an interesting group of within the community parents primarily that felt that there was still a need for a community Aquatic Center they worked with some of the school board members they then got the board to have a second referendum about nine months or a year later that was for The Aquatic Center only that passed and I think the Figures were something like 6535 or 7525 because the community got behind it the school board sold it to the community as a community facility yes the final School District budgeted for it they
039spent 20 years paying back the referendum but it was always a community facility the school district by way of the high school uh always had first priority they were scheduled in first and foremost and it worked very very well the community had a lot of access and a lot of opportunities to use it now I understand you want to change it from a community facility to fun laac School District facility everybody knows that it was built by the school district to me that's like if you want to change the name why don't I would petition you to change Fruth field it's in the same situation Fruth field is a finac school district facility always has been probably always will be but yet it's Fruth field I just don't understand why you're looking to the to
040change the community aquatics into a School District facility and apparently a lot of people cuz I've been getting a lot of phone calls uh but it just makes no sense it it's almost makes about as much sense as moving the recreation department from their building over to the central office and that would be my third area I'd like to know if and when uh there's enough confidence in the staff that you can move back uh the recreation department to its legitimate facility over at the recreation department behind Woodward School uh again everybody I see why is the recreation department closed a lot of the community think there's no Recreation Department anymore because they're not where they should be people go there yet and they say oh there's a big not a big a little sign
041in the building oh you got to come to central office and again especially the new board members have you been to the recreation department lately I mean there's there's virtually no room uh I haven't been there recently cuz it just irritates me having to go there but when I did go and see there was virtually no room uh your Recreation uh Supervisor has a closet for an office I don't know how they can do any interviewing of people uh there's just just a terrible facility citizens don't want to come to the central office to sign up for a recreation program I would hope that they would figure that out by now but again please consider moving that back it's not a good situation whatsoever and certainly don't don't change the community Aquatic Center to the
042fondel school district Aquatic Center we don't need that thank you thank you excuse me Daniel Ireland Final Act Sally Avenue um page 209 of Betsy's book Freedom of Education agenda in Milwaukee Betsy visited Marcus Lutheran School September 2019 cross the way were protesters mostly all white just like I am africanamerican father was dropping off two daughters two daughters to the school he turned to the protesters and said to them you're debating someone else's children I bet he would have liked to for them to walk a mile in his shoes for a while inside she talked to the students and the teachers and the parents they formed a circle the children were really curious about her and what she was there for the dedicated teachers were very interested in talking to her all of the students
043primarily were black and brown in this school it should not be controversial to experience hope expectation and achievement in our our education system these families received vouchers to attend this school what bothered divos most wasn't the protesters because she'd been through that many many times what bothered her most was they were there to advocate for blue politicians unions and bureaucrats and not for the children thank you Charlotte troter Fondulac um I'm here to invite people on the TV and people here tonight to come to the boys volleyball game the fondy boys volleyball game they're 21 and n and I haven't heard much talk about that team so that's our last home game tomorrow so if people can get out that's at 700 p.m. um at the Fieldhouse and actually um it's funny we're talking about
044the aquatic center today because I sent a text out because you know I'm always um making sure all students are included and I remember for years I was asking um the school district this was years ago when Riverside students used the pool for a gym class um I was always asking if the black students had the caps for like their braids um because they're a different cap and I never would get a response I actually at one point people were thought it was funny I was asking you know um so for some reason I thought about it today and I actually text somebody in the district to ask if Riverside still has kids that have to participate in the Aquatic Center pool water do they have the right swim caps for their hair because it's
045very important and if it's for a grade or participation or mental health good health then the school district should be providing those caps for those students thank you thank you any other public comment at all during this session see none can we get to the motion for adjournment please I move the Board of Education adjourn a regular meeting to it to conven an executive session to discuss negotiations with the educational support professionals Association espa and to confer with legal counsel with respect to litigation as provided for in Wisconsin statute 19.51% deliberating or negotiating in purchas purchasing of properties the investment of public funds or conducting other specific public business whenever competitive or bargaining reasons require a closed session confer with legal counsel for for the government body who is rendering oral and written advice concerning
046strategy to adopt by the body with respects to litigation in which it is it is or likely to become involved I'll second a motion by Mr cofre seconded by Mr zelman can we have the roll call please hor yes motor yes panau yes yelman yes Godfrey yes henel yes schrider yes motion carry 70 the regular meeting October 9th adjourned at 5:48 p.m.