WSD Board Meeting Regular, December 8, 2025

001I call the December 8th, 2025 schoolboard meeting to order. It is 60:03 p.m. We are in conference room C of the Fiser Administration building at 12121 West North Avenue. Miss Summers, please call the RO. >> Miss Bzinski, >> here. >> Mr. Bower, >> here. >> Miss Boach, >> here. >> Mr. Morris, >> here. >> Miss Rolland, >> here. Dr. Worley here. Mr. Wier >> here. >> Thank you. Um so and welcome to those who are here with us in the room and online. We're very excited to start this evening with um item number two um recognition of high school theater directors 2A. Dr. M. I'd love to have you that off. >> Thank you Dr. Worley. Through the course of human history, the way that we tell stories and the way that we connect is

002through the arts, specifically theater. The way we tell stories and how it enhances our lives is very important. The arts is important to us in Wal Tulsa and that comes through a lot of different ways. Um, this is the the the festival and the time for a lot of our orchestra and band and coral groups to get together, but we wanted to bring our two theater directors here and that they did some amazing, groundbreaking work, I believe, uh, with our students this fall with their fall productions. And so I was just thrilled to see how they led our young people um through what I believe is something that our entire community should be proud of. So I'm going to ask Colleen, our leader at uh W Tossa East to come up to the microphone first

003to talk about the the unique um production that they put on at Tulsa East and the wonderful job that they did. Colleen, thank you for being here with us this evening. >> Yeah, thank you so much for having me. Um, so we performed a show called Ride the Cyclone this fall. Um, which is a musical that's actually about um, six teenagers who uh, tragically pass in a roller coaster accident. Um but then they have the opportunity to kind of reflect on uh the journey that they had and um it was a really beautiful story and the kids had a really uh incredible time diving into it and I think the messaging behind it um was so powerful just about um you know what makes a life worth living and what are uh the meaningful things

004about being alive and having a human experience. Um we had over 75 kids involved from on stage and backstage and um really incredible work done by all and we are just very thankful to be in a district where we can tell stories that um give all sorts of students the opportunity to be successful and experience, you know, their talents to the best of their ability. So we're just really appreciative and um it was a really great opportunity for our kids. So, if you want to see something else, we're doing Spongebob in a couple of months. So, we'd love to have you there. Thank you. >> There's also a fall production at Waltosa West. And as we ask Mr. Stefan to come to the microphone, I know that there's a prepared statement that Dr. Worley will

005read, but um as he come to the microphone, I would just like to let our entire community know that there's such strong partnership between Colleen and Mr. Stefen. um he is a proud Walttosi East grad and and I think they both believe in the power of theater and um as we sit in this um boardroom this evening and I know this will resonate with Mr. Stefen. I I always think fondly of my time with Miss Lois Weber uh who uh was a former school board member here in Waltosa and was a uh staunch supporter of the arts and the theater program. Dr. Early. >> Sure. And I and I think board members also want to reflect out to both of you um that we're aware that in in each case you were um dealing with

006challenging and unexpected aspects of bringing these productions um and from the physical to the social emotional. And we just really want to thank you um as as dedicated staff members in our district for for working not just navigating that with our students, but the level of um compassion and energy you put into um some very challenging and difficult situations that our theater programs have faced um during the fall semester. So I think the board really wanted to reflect that. Um, I did want to also um share with you that um what's interesting with Tossa West Theater this fall achieved something very remarkable becoming the first and only high school in the nation to premier Dear Evan Hansen the high school version. Uh this milestone speaks to the excellence of our students um and I would

007say our staff too. Um uh for and to the national reputation that our Tosa West theater program has earned as a leader in educational theater. Um, the production was attended by over 5,000 audience members and through the Empowering Minds grant, West was able to offer every TOSA West student a free ticket, ensuring equitable access to a story that prioritizes mental health awareness. The production earned a front page coverage in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel and will soon be featured nationwide on CBS Saturday Morning. um a testament to the extraordinary impact this work has had beyond our community. Um in this moment of national visibility, our students stood tall, guided by exceptional leadership and a commitment to artistic excellence. Uh we are proud of this achievement and extend our gratitude to the staff, the families, and especially

008to you um Mr. Stefan. Your vision, your dedication, and your leadership really made this moment possible. So, anything else you want to add to that? We'd love to hear more. Um, in both cases, these are incredible productions that came out of incredible spaces that you um you've developed in your schools. >> You know, um, we can just continue to be grateful for the opportunity to uh to meet this moment with excellence. We talk a lot about excellence at Tossa West and especially in the theater. And we, I believe, really took this opportunity not only to present a musical, but to partner with many local health organizations and put mental health at the center. It's so important nowadays. It's something that our students deal with every single day. And we were again just so grateful and

009fortunate to be able to be the first and only high school as you mentioned in the entire nation to present Dear Evan Hansen. A testament to our students, our staff, and the continued support of our school board and community. So, thank you for your continued support. And in the spring, we'll be doing Hello Dolly, something totally different. and uh we expect to have another tremendous outstanding uh program with Hello Dolly. So, thank you very much. >> Thank you both for being here. Um any other board members um comments? Yeah, >> I just like to recognize that Max Decker is one of our students board members who's not here today um was in the cast of the Tulsa production. I don't know how you balance this all but yeah else. Yeah, >> as uh a parent

010of someone who went through the theater program in Tosa, um it was one of the places where my kid really felt at home and a sense of importance. So, thank you for making those spaces for for so many kids. my kid was never on stage and still found this this place for community. So, thanks for doing that for so many just to wrap things up, I would be remiss as I'm looking at him, I want to just say thank you once again to Mr. Kevin Lefaltton. Um, I remember vividly when we started receiving the emails from the Tulsa West community, uh, theater community specifically saying there, we have to have this production at Tulsa West. And, um, Kevin met the challenge. Um, they worked around the clock. I know we've talked about it in the

011boardroom before u, but Kevin, thank you. Uh, you deserve a lot of credit. I know Mr. stuff and in the theater community at West. Um, thank you. But I just want to say thank you again. It was just a great testimony to your professionalism and your team's professionalism. So, thank you. >> Yeah. Thank you. And and it was a challenging timeline. Um, but you met it and that meant that the that the students could get their rehearsals even though it'd be pretty be creative initially, they got their rehearsals into the space um with the opportunity to really be ready for that that first night of the show. So, thank you for um for the effort and to your whole team if you pass that along. >> Okay. Thank you so much. Um and as we

012always say to our students who come to be um uh acknowledged and admired, we do not expect you to have to sit here or to you welcome to stay. We welcome everyone who wants to stay, but also know that no disparaging looks will be given to those who need to leave as their part of the agenda wraps up. Um and that's for for everyone who's here. Um we all lead very busy lives and we know that you probably have a little work to do on those spring productions. So, um, thanks for coming. >> Spongebob and Hello, Dallas. >> Spongebob and hello Donald. >> Okay, we move to item number three, which is public comment. And I'm going to read policy 0167.3. Um, just acknowledging as a as a general meeting that is online and being

013recorded, we will pick public comment both in the room and online. We'll start in the room and then move to online. Um, public comment at school at board meetings. Members of the board value the input of students, parents, staff members, and community members. The board's regularly scheduled meetings provide an opportunity for opinions and concerns to be expressed publicly. The board values all comments and will respectfully consider this input in decision-making. The board will take public comment on both non-aggenda items and agenda items at each regular board meeting and may take public comment during special board meetings. The public comment period will occur near the beginning of the meeting and shall not exceed 30 minutes in length unless extended by the presiding officer or by a vote of the board. Individuals must limit their comments to

014three minutes. And we do typically have a system for timing. So please um pay attention to uh our board members who help with that. Participants must be recognized by the presiding officer and will be requested to preface their comments by announcement of their name. Email public comments uh are are submitted to the school board email address by those that are submitted by the school eboard to the school board email address by 10:00 a.m. on the day of the meeting of the board will be added to the online meeting documents to become part of public record. Email public comments must be include the name of the person submitting the comment. All public comments shall be directed to the presiding officer. No person may address or question board members individually or direct statements, comments, or questions to

015staff or other meeting participants. Board members are obligated to follow the Wisconsin open meeting law, which requires advanced notification to the community of the board's intent to discuss and or take action on an item. If a public comment concerns an item that is not on the current meeting agenda, board members may not respond other than to thank and acknowledge the speaker for their input. The presiding officer may a limit the number of times a speaker may comment on the same topic. B. Interrupt, warn, warn, or terminate a public comment when the statement is too lengthy directed to anyone other than the board presiding officer obscene or disorderly. C. Request any individual to leave the meeting when that person engages in conduct which is disorderly. D. request the assistance of law enforcement officers and or security

016officials in the removal of a disorderly person when that person's conduct interferes with the orderly progress of the meeting. E call for a recess or an adjourment to another time when disorderly conduct so interferes with the orderly conduct of the meeting as to warrant such action. F wave these rules with the approval of the board when necessary for the protection of privacy or the administration's uh administration of the board's business. Recording, filming, or photographing board meetings is permitted. The person operating the equipment should contact the superintendent prior to the board meeting to review possible placement of the equipment and must agree to abide by the following conditions. A, no obstructions are created between the board and the audience. B. No interviews are conducted in the meeting room while the board is in session. C. No

017commentary, adjustment of equipment, or positioning of operators is made that would distract either the board member or members of the audience or otherwise disrupt the meeting while the board is in session. Broadcasting of schoolboard meetings. The board encourages all residents to be well informed about school affairs. Therefore, regular board meetings are livereamed and recorded and the recorded schoolboard meetings are available for viewing online on the district's website. Executive sessions and inservices for board members are not recorded. So, that's the that's the policy that frames our opportunity um to do public comment. And so, I'm going to um turn to uh opportunity in the room to start with. Um, is there anyone in the room who would like to offer a public comment? If so, please approach the microphone and tell us your name and your

018comment. Okay, I'm seeing none, but I do see um a hand raised online. So, if we could go to online public comment. Um Jamie, that would be great if you could uh let the person know that this is their opportunity to make their comment. >> Chris Murky, you have the microphone. Can you hear me? >> Yes, we can. Thank you. >> Good evening. My name is Chris Murker. I'm a Wasa resident, parent, and I help coordinate the 2030 task force. For anyone in the community who wants to follow these issues or get involved, we post updates and sign up to 2030.com. Tonight, I want to briefly connect three things on your agenda. How you handle staff voice, how you handle money, and how you handle safety and trust. First staff voice and the new email

019policy. In the last week, a current district teacher with direct knowledge of the recent contract talks shared anonymously what they are experiencing. According to their report, after the district found money and changed course in the contract, the superintendent visited classrooms connected to the bargaining process in ways that were perceived by staff as intimidation rather than support. According to this teacher, some teachers who emailed the board about the contract and pay were then called into principal uh into the into principal offices to discuss what they had written. Their words were quote, "I find it disconcerting that board emails would result in principal conversations." If staff feel that emailing their elected board will trigger a meeting with their boss, that is a serious governance problem, whatever the intent. Against that backdrop, you have revised email policy 0167.5

020on the consent agenda, which routes board replies on operational or managerial issues back through the superintendent administration. This falls in the same bucket as policy 9130 on public complaints, which also needs to be reformed as we've brought up in the past if we want people to feel safe speaking up. My first ask 0167.5 off the consent agenda and publicly explain how you will protect staff who contact you about contracts pay or school conditions from being monitored or pressured for doing so. Second, money and the referendum script. On December 5th, your CFO sent staff a referendum script describing the 2024 operational referendum as a way to cover projected shortfalls, increase educator compensation, and fund curricular materials. Since then, district communications have acknowledged roughly an $ 8.2 million overspend and 11 million structural deficit this year, a

021$4.2 million health plan error initially borne by staff premiums and central office budgets that have grown dramatically. My second ask, when you take up the budget assumptions and referendum projects update, reconcile that optimistic referendum script with the overspend, the structural deficit, the health plan error, and central office growth before you move one inch toward another large facilities ask, aka $457 million. Third, safety and trust at East. The November 19th police report from East described students using the buzzer systems during the school day to let outsiders into the building for a confrontation that ended with multiple citations and an injured SRO. Neighbors and families who have read that report see a gap between what happened and what was communicated. My third ask, in the context of your strategic plan update and student parent rights policies, explain

022specifically what has changed at East Front Door and in your discipline practices since November 19th so this doesn't happen again. Finally, as you go into close session to evaluate the superintendent, I'm asking you to square three realities. Teachers who are afraid to email you, taxpayers who do not feel confident about where where referendum dollars went, and families who don't feel they're getting the full story on safety. If you want a strategic plan that means anything, it has to start with protecting speech, being transparent about money, and communicating fully about safety. Thank you. >> Thank you for your comment. I don't see any others online, but we do have one in the room. So, um, we will go back to the room now and then we'll be wrapping up. >> Hi there, everybody. Uh, my name

023is Derek Gotley. Thank you for uh allowing me to speak. Uh, I was going to talk about uh something a little bit different, but uh I would like to comment a little bit on teacher voice and power in this district. I have said in a lot of spaces in this community that I am I would highly recommend that teachers join the union. It's the best way for them to amplify voice. It will also allow or create a structural way that teachers can speak to one another. I am in favor of teachers being paid what they are worth for the work that they do. This has been a struggle nationwide. Education is in a really bad spot. 50 years ago, teaching was a middle class profession that paid what used to be called a breadwinner salary.

024Now teaching is a job that it feels like people have to afford to be able to do. That those are real stressors everywhere in this district. I have been happy to see that previous boards uh have spent into our fund balance in order to support teacher salaries. That the last board went to referendum to increase teacher salaries. that even when we had to be reminded of the commitments that we had made, we stuck by those commitments to our teachers. I would ask I would remind teachers that if they wish to make anonymous feedback to administration officials that there are routes to do that and that anyone in the community who wants to email the board that's public record and I am glad speaking personally that school level administrators who heard their staff members voicing serious

025concerns would take the opportunity to follow up with those staff members to see if there's anything that might be done. That's what I have to say. Thank you for hearing me. >> Thank you for your comment. We will now close the public comment time. >> We're going to move on to item number four. Um the consent agenda. Board members. This is the time um when I ask you uh and if no one else calls it, I have one. Um but go ahead. We'll start. Are there any items on the consent agenda which the board members would like to remove for separate discussion and action? Miss the spot. >> Um I would like to discuss one 7.5 that item. Okay. Are there any other requests on board members? All right. Miss Bach has requested that item

026C, policy 0167.5 be removed for separate discussion and action. Um, does the board concur? Yes. Okay. Seeing concurrence, um, uh, I will, uh, say that it's recommended that the school board approve the remainder of the consent agenda. Uh, I so move. May I have a second? >> Second. >> I'm going to give that to Do you want me to give that to Miss Bach? Yeah. Okay. So, uh I I moved it and Miss Bach seconded it. Um so, this is for everything but that that we'll now take a vote. Um Miss Summers, please call the RO. >> Miss Brazinski, >> yes. >> Mr. Bower, >> yes. >> Miss Bach, >> yes. >> Mr. Morris, >> yes. >> Miss Rolland, >> yes. Dr. Worley, >> yes. >> Mr. Wadier, >> yes. And that passes. Okay. So,

027Miss B, can you do it up for us? >> Sure. Um, I wanted to pull item C, policy 0167.5. Um, as a policy committee member, just want everyone to be aware that we made some very minor changes to that policy to make it more clear and define more specifically how the board should utilize email. Uh the intent was not to make our work and our communication less transparent or to have more administrative oversight over district staff. Um in fact, this policy wording has been changed to require us to copy the superintendent less often. Um as the policy currently reads, we as board members must copy the superintendent on every email that we send. Um, and the change that the policy committee made was require us to copy Dr. Means on email dealing only with operational

028and or managerial issues. Um, and another thing that this policy covers is um something that we as board members need to be really cognizant of and following open meetings laws. Um, and so this policy really clearly outlines what emails should be used for and it's topics such as scheduling and other logistical issues like creating agendas so that we don't wade into discussions of board business. Um, doing so could potentially become a violation of open meetings law and we're required to do board visits in public. So this policy guides our use of email in affiliate and legal ways. >> Thank you for framing that. I just want to emphasize your point which is one of the reasons I wanted to have this discussion too which is that um we're actually expanding access um changing it so

029that it is hopefully feeling more comfortable. Um there will be times when people will email us about things that our systems um or are better answered uh by administrative um but this is to allow a little more space. So, I'll say that. I also wanted to say that um I didn't know since we were pulling it anyway. Um I hadn't thought about this last time in looking at it and and I'll apologize to the committee for that, but we have been doing a practice um because I I wanted our um our vice president to be a little bit more involved, especially since the vice president can end up running a meeting. Um and so in in B we only mention um discussion between the superintendent and the board president about agenda items. But the reality

030is is that we are uh also involving the vice president in agenda planning. Um and I want to make sure that uh policy um going forward. I mean, it does fit under that we can email each other about board um content, but I I don't know if we would want to adapt that um one a little bit since it specifically calls out uh the president and the superintendent about meeting planning. And we've kind of transitioned, I think, to a much stronger model of having um more perspectives and diverse perspectives talking about agenda items. And I think that could be an amendment if if we want to do that. >> So are you suggesting changing that letter B? So it says possible agenda items between the superintendent, the board presidents and the board vice presidents. That

031would be the simplest way to approach that. >> So an and or an andor. >> I think andor. Yeah. So that we can so andor vice president. >> Okay. I mean, if we had a situation where the president was like not leading the meeting or was um needing to be absent for a week, it might need to be an email between um the vice president and the superintendent specifically. But typically, I just want to be really clear that we're we're doing planning with more voices um at the perspectives of the table. >> Yeah. Would it be prudent to just instead of saying vice president just saying or next ranking officer if it's the case because then >> and whoever is the next person. We almost had a meeting where you were the next ranking officer.

032>> That's good. That's good. >> I'm open to that. >> Policy committee, would you like to just Should we just do that here and >> Yeah. I was going to say it would be nice to get this >> Mhm. >> tied up. >> Yeah. >> Yes. >> So, so the proposed um just correct me um if I'm wrong, the proposed would be that B would read instead possible and agenda items between the superintendent, the board president andor the next ranking officer. >> Sounds correct to me. Yes. with a comma after board president. We we hold true to the Oxford comma. Okay, we'll do the Oxford comma. We adhere to the Oxford comma. So, let's make sure to get that one in there. Thank you. >> Any other board discussion on that? >> Okay. Um, so

033is there someone who'd like to maybe the Oxford comma specialist would like to read it as a motion? >> All right. Um it is uh >> as amended. So what the policy 0167.5 >> Okay. Um I move that policy 0167.5 be approved >> as amended. >> Okay. >> As a point of order. Do we have to vote on the amendment? >> Good point of order. Thank you. Let's vote on the amendment first. >> You have to approve. >> Thank you. Thank you to my um my special son Robert's rules. This is to my right. You've got so many rules now. Okay. So, you're right. We do. We need to um vote on the amendment. So, the the it would be just reading the amendment or the saying you'd like to amend it. >> Okay. vote.

034>> Um I move that we amend policy 0167.5 use of electronic mail um to read for do I say what the amendment is? >> Yes. So so let's do it this way. So if what you're doing is this is a proposed there's some proposed changes here. >> Okay. We are amending those proposed changes to also include um an amendment change to letter B. Do you want me to just do it? I >> Yes, you go for it. So, so what the the motion I'm going to make for this is that we take um the proposed wording of the policy committee um but amend it uh in letter B to read possible agenda items between the superintendent comma the board president and the next ranking officer >> andor the next ranking officer. Possible agenda items between

035the superintendent comma the board president, andor the next ranking officer. >> Do I have a second? >> Second. >> Okay. Mr. Wy, thank you for the second. Um, Miss Summers, please call the role. >> Miss Bzinski, >> yes. >> Mr. Bower, >> yes. >> Miss Faul, >> yes. >> Mr. Morris, >> yes. >> Miss Rolland, >> yes. >> Dr. Worley, >> yes. >> Mr. Wadier, >> yes. >> And the motion carries. Now, >> now >> we go to Thank you. we go to moving the um motion that's been offered by the policy committee as amended. >> So now I recommend that the school board approve it um policy 0167.5 use of electronic mail as amended. >> May I have a second? >> Second. Uh, Miss Summers, please call the role. Miss Bzinski, >> yes. >>

036Mr. Bower, >> yes. >> Miss Bach, >> yes. >> Mr. Morris, >> yes. >> Miss Rolland, >> yes. >> Dr. Worley, >> yes. >> Mr. Wier, >> yes. >> The motion carries. Thank you, team. >> Thank you. >> Okay, so we move on to our next item on the agenda. strategic goals, systems and structures item number five, a preliminary discussion of open enrollment. Thank you both for being here. >> Thank you for having us. We do have a guest as well online, our legal council attorney, Renee Aldana. uh we are pulling up the slides right now. She wanted to especially for our newer board members just really lay the foundation from a legal operational board governance level in terms of how that annual January um approval that both discussion and action happen in January. So

037she's going to give us a little bit of foundation and we will go from there assuming it is in here media. And while this loop, my video has been stopped by the host. So if you wanted to re-engage it, >> we are all set on our end. I think they're just trying to get your video to work, but we have your slides being shared right now, Renee. >> Great. Good to go. >> Good to go. Yeah, >> I'm getting a little bit of feedback, so I don't know if you can hear that, too. >> And we should introduce ourselves. Luke Pinion, your chief of people and family supports. >> Good. Good evening. Sarah Zelaski, chief of talent. >> She's getting some feedback. >> And can you hear me? Yeah, hearing the feedback happened in an

038earlier meeting too where >> people offsite were getting feedback. >> Should I? >> No, we're fine. You're good. You're loud and clear. Please continue. >> I think Sarah Zelazoski, you might want to mute the mic >> at the at the table. >> At the table. >> Okay. Well, good to see everybody. We wanted to bring you some information regarding open enrollment so that you're prepared for the tasks ahead of you in January. And I'm going to move relatively quickly through some of these slides. They really are here for your background information. I'm going to highlight some pieces of them. And then, as always, if you have any questions, please feel free to jump in at any time. We're going to cover several pieces relatively quickly. One is space availability. One's the selection process. We're going

039to talk about criteria. um that students would need to meet in addition to you know if you have space available that criteria students would also need to meet um what happens if somebody is accepted and then later um there's termination of open enrollment under what circumstances does that occur and then finally special education so first thing I want to say before we start with the slides regarding space determinations is that this is a significant role that the board will serve in January um we'll have a recommendation from the administration and it will be the board's role to determine whether or not to accept that recommendation come January. One important piece about space determinations and space availability is that these are all new open enrollment spaces. So they don't impact or affect students who are already

040attending TOSA schools through open enrollment. These are going to be calculations that you'll get from the administration regarding a recommendation about opening up new spaces moving forward. So that's a very very important piece. We'll talk later about how open enrollment might be terminated. But in the Tossa school district, there's no requirement that students who are currently attending under open enrollment have to reapply. In other school districts, there might be an re reapplication process. The statute allows that. But in TOSSA, if you're attending through open enrollment, you aren't required to reapply at a later time. So these new spaces are just what's new for students who are applying for the next school year. So we have in the materials um information from the statute which simply says that in January the board is going to make

041this determination regarding available spaces. Next slide talks about the um actual TOSA board policy. So, if we can flip to the next one, you'll see that it mirrors the statute in terms of what are the different factors that the administration is going to consider when they bring these space recommendations to you. And you can see there are a lot of different types of things that they need to consider in bringing the recommendations and then you need to consider um in deciding whether to approve it or not. Um you can see that it's not um there's class size ranges, there's going to be faculty student ratios. Um the key here really is enrollment projections which are based on a number of factors and um we've worked together with the administration in the past to um develop

042um formulas so that they can present this information to you. Um really important at the bottom of this slide where it mentions that um for determining open enrollment availability, the board isn't going to guarantee and then you see that word new again, not going to guarantee new open enrollment approvals to non-resident open enrollment applicants. Again, if somebody's currently attending through open enrollment, they don't need to apply. All right, next slide. Um DPI bulletin. So you can see statute and then you've got policy and then you have DPI bulletin saying some of those same things again. Um you'll also see space calculations and recommendations regarding special education to see what availability we have in special education programs. And then moving on um you'll see also that as we calculate space for special education programs that it's

043not going to be based on disability category. um and that each school district is going to have the flexibility to be able to determine those spaces in different ways. So if you have experience in another um district or you've um particularly for staff who have worked elsewhere, sometimes they'll say, "Oh, that's not how we did it in this other district," each district can decide how they want to calculate those special education spaces as well as the regular ed spaces. Okay. And then next um in terms of determining spaces more from the DPI bulletin regarding all of the different factors that the administration will take into account in making those recommendations and then the next slide um more about the same. So, just as we discussed before, um we're not going to do this based on

044category labels um or environment codes and um and and each district will um within these boundaries will make those determinations um as they see appropriate. Okay. So, that's what we're doing in terms of and that's this like I said, this is really where the board has the most significant role is is considering that recommendation in January. Then we move on to the selection process and these next pieces are pieces these are u functions that will be performed by the administration and you have in board policy I have it at the end of the slide the section that talks about the delegation um of these tasks to the administration. One is a selection process and um to summarize that all the Wisconsin statutes um require preference for two groups. students who are currently attending, which are

045usually students who are currently attending through um a tuition waiver, and and siblings of students who are currently attending, they're entitled to preference, even though there's no guarantee in your policy for those new spots that might become available. Um and then, as you can see from the next slide, that preference is going to be um reflected as well in Word policy. And then it's random selection, selecting from students entitled to preference first for any available spaces that might exist. And then if there are more spaces, new spaces available, then um the administration would go to the students who aren't entitled to preference to fill those spots. Um here's more about the preferences that are that are required by law and incorporated into board policy for those currently attending students and siblings. And then uh more

046about that process that I just talked about with the random nature of the drawings. And then um I mentioned that there's another layer also in addition to space. Space is just one piece of the criteria. But then there are other reasons that a student's application might not be accepted and those are in the next few slides. Um, so if a student's been expelled from school by any school district um, in the preceding two years before the application, that's a reason even if a space is available for that student that the student wouldn't be accepted. And then the rest of that, those are the different statutory grounds for um, expulsion in the state of Wisconsin. And then moving on to other criteria um, habitually truent from TOSA. So if somebody was um attending school in TOSA

047tuition waiver and then applied for open enrollment but they were habitually truent that's a reason uh to deny the application. If special education space is not available or if it's a service a student requires a service that we'd otherwise have to contract out for. That's a reason for denial. Um and then also there's another one right there at the bottom that talks about being referred for an evaluation but not yet evaluated for special education services. And then the next couple of slides just have to do with the parents responsibilities and what the parents need to do to submit an application. So we can go through those. Okay. So next section has to do with termination of open enrollment. So if a student is attending through the open enrollment program, um there are certain very limited

048circumstances where open enrollment could be terminated. One of those has to do with um an IEP that's developed or revised to include services that aren't aren't available in the in the district. So that's um a possibility that a student's open enrollment could be terminated under those circumstances. And then there are a few others on the next slide. Um again, if a student is expelled, so not only at time of application, but after a student is accepted through open enrollment. If they're expelled, the district may discontinue open enrollment. If they're habitually truent, they may dis the district can discontinue open enrollment and then failure to participate um in virtual charter schools which um at this point in time has shifted in TOSA. And then moving on, we switch to the next one. >> It switched on

049our side. >> Oh, okay. Then I'll just look at my screen here. >> Try again. Go back. >> Oh, I think it's going now. Oh, wait. Yeah. Yeah. Mine mine um advanced. So, other circumstances having to do with a withdrawal. If you move, then you're um into the district, then you're no longer an open enrollment student, but you are continuing to attend the district as a resident. So, then open enrollment would discontinue. If um the chain is broken, so somebody says, "Okay, I'm not going to attend anymore." and goes and attends somewhere else, then that discontinues open enrollment. Moving out of state, same impact. Um, needs to be in the seat by third Friday. Um, or if a student accepts open enrollment but then is not in that seat by third Friday, then open enrollment

050would discontinue. And then there's another one having to do with alternative app processes. um because right now we're talking mostly about what's going on during the regular open enrollment period, but there's opportunities throughout the year for students and their families to submit alternative applications outside of that period. Um in any event, there are variety of different reasons that open enrollment could be terminated once a student is attending, but again, no require if if a student none of these things happen, no currently attending open enrollment student is required to keep reapplying. Um, and there are some provisions that I won't go into detail now regarding, but um, just for your information, there's also circumstances where after a student starts attending, we find out that there's a um, an IEP that the student has in effect um,

051or there was an evaluation ongoing. So, that's another circumstance that administrative team would dig into and um, consider whether or not this particular provision applies. Um and that's more about the same. So we'll keep going. Okay. So one other topic I just wanted to talk about briefly is one of the most significant concerns um that the administrative teams not only in Tulsa but everywhere have are situations where there's a student who is evaluated for special education once they're attending through the open enrollment program um and they have a need and the district asks for the parents to sign consent to receive those special education services. And unfortunately there's um for many families there's a significant deterrent to signing consent for placement because if the if if we don't have space available to provide those services

052um then as I said earlier that could be a basis for discontinuing open enrollment. So families are oftentimes forced to choose between accepting the special education and related services that a child needs and remaining in the TOSA school district. And this is something again not just happening in TOSSA but statewide. So these last few slides go into some detail about what the law says um and what DPI says and how DPI has interpreted this. So um as you can see DPI is saying repeatedly that um a parent has to have the opportunity to decide whether or not to consent to special education. If a an open enrollment student is evaluated and determined eligible, we develop an IEP and then um after at that point in time, the parent can decide whether they're going to consent

053to services, which again could have an impact on continued open enrollment, not only in TOSA, but in in districts statewide through the open enrollment program. So, these are just some examples. If we move on, you'll see some examples of um what the statute says versus what DPI says. And then we highlight here in the next slide one case where a district started to make some we we looked at what is the statute saying what does DPI say and does DPI want to try to help to resolve some of the the tension that I've just identified. And you can see on the next slide, the superintendent and special education director um highlighted several concerns that they had about if students need special education and related services and parents decline it to continue attending through open enrollment,

054then students will not only not receive those services, but then they also don't have procedural safeguards under the law and they don't have those disciplinary protections, which is of significant concern for children who might have um emotional regul population difficulties and then are not accessing those protections because the parents are given that choice in terms of you know the way that the law is structured and how DPI is interpreting it. And then this is more of the same that describes um DPI's perspective. And then I think we've got one more slide here that talks about as I mentioned earlier the delegation of many of these responsibilities to the superintendent. So, as we go through all of these pieces, really, it's that first piece having to do with um space determinations. That's where the board's role

055is. And then the remainder of those tasks are completed by the administration pursuant to board policy, which is very typical in most districts um that we work with. All right, that's what I've got for you, but I'm happy to take questions. >> I wonder if it might be helpful for us to um complement that with what we've prepared as well for you in the community and then open it up for questions on the entire uh content. You want to start first? >> While he's doing that, I can start. So, you've we recently put together um a document that is three pages titled open enrollment, tuition waiverss, and intrad district transfers. This is really just putting the whole student movement piece into context for you. Not only is it defining sort of residency uh by the

056theory rule, but it's also explaining general information, timelines, the related board policies and the resources that exist either internally or through DPI for not only open enrollment but alternative open enrollment as well as moves and tuition waiverss connected to what attorney Aldana just spoke to and then introducer transfer. So, just kind of one place that summarizes how these things work, what policies govern them, and where parents can go to for resources um if they're considering or in the midst of some type of movement. >> Thank you, Luke. Um I prepared uh for this evening uh just general information about our process and procedure uh to get ready for our open enrollment projections which largely focuses on uh how we uh take a snapshot of our current enrollment. How we roll that forward into a projection

057for next year on including our class size ranges which mirror those used for the 202526 school year. Um and uh we'll be bringing that forward to you um in January. Uh that full enrollment projection >> and we welcome your questions. >> Is open for group members. I know we get we get emails, we get um queries. One of the big ones that comes up is you know can you accept this particular group of students? Um, and uh, we wanted to make sure that board members feel comfortable about, you know, that and how to answer that. I could speak to that. I receive those quite often, whether it's staff um, who would like their children to be accepted or specific um, groups or demographics of students and in working with legal counsel and just in doing

058this work, we know we can't make exceptions for specific individual groups like that. I don't know Renee if you have anything else to add but we do get asked quite often every year. >> I do and you'll see in the materials that um in addition to there being very specific um criteria that the district needs to apply. That the most frequently appealed and overturned uh type of error that a district can make in the open enrollment process is not applying criteria. and um policies equally. And so once you go outside of those, that's where DPI will often times um find an error. And and so, you know, that's what Luke is saying. We're we're seeing the same thing in terms of the legal trends. Um, so that was really informative as far as the uh

059the information regarding students that that may come in under open enrollment and do not have an IEP. And um, if I understood it right, that is the way it's set up. what you were explaining was that the parents you may this district may identify a need for an IEP. Uh it may be very glaringly obvious that the child needs services, but if the parents don't agree with that, there is a major a major concern that if future board or future policy makes a recommendation to change open enrollment that that student's open enrollment could be terminated. Rene, I don't know if you can explain it a little bit differently. It's essentially saying, you know, well, we'll make a determination on how much space is available for students that need um special education services and the intent

060of open enrollment is never to add costs, add additional FTE of staff. So essentially you're saying whether you have seats and you filled them in that process of open enrollment or you didn't have any seats for for students with IEPs now you've accepted say for for sake of the example 50 students general education um that then later become a student with an identified disability and a need for an IP. The law isn't very supportive in that sense because you said there really isn't extra space. This could end up creating more costs and more need for FTE in the district. So then parents can be faced with a difficult choice in those moments. Rene, am I capturing that correctly? In other words, >> right? Yeah. That's that's the problem with the way the law is structured

061and DPI's interpretation of it. >> So So as the law is currently structured and our interpretation, we could actually be doing potential harm um to to a student. How often does this kind of scenario come up in practicality? It comes up a few times every year and honestly I'm not sure how attended to it was before our team entered in 22 23. Uh I'm I would gather it maybe wasn't attended to. >> And just to emphasize Mr. Pinion, correct me if I'm wrong. It is very unusual for our district to have open enrollment seats in special education. >> Correct. And in many districts I've not quite common. Correct. because of us in this situation. >> This process is happening in many districts >> and parents are deciding not in some cases not to pursue um

062the IEP but the school is still needing to um create a classroom and education um for all the students in that classroom even if the student isn't having the support. So I think that's where it gets really really complicated for the district >> and we are a very desirable district. We have anywhere from 1,200 to,500 open enrollment applications annually. >> And I would just say, Mr. whatever the your the terminology you use in terms of who's doing harm to whom is really that that's perspective >> because a family may say it may be it may be prudent for them to deny the special education identification but to stay in a desired school system versus receiving the identification and being in a district that they do not desire to be in. So it it's a family

063choice. Then we have to navigate the process of how do we treat that student with fairness um and understanding the full circumstance. So just to be fair to the family just I I think that's how they there's I I know there's more things um that don't get thought of in that light too because in that scenario if a parent chooses not to engage in services that also can be to the detriment of depending on the diagnosis and what um what the behavioral challenges might be that could be detrimental to every other student in in that classroom or um those classroom settings. Uh, and it it's just not something I think that everyone might think all the way through that it's not a great scenario any way you look at it in my in my opinion.

064Um, so I guess I would try to look at open enrollment through the lens of of using it as a tool to rightsize our classrooms as opposed to trying to I guess, you know, carve out. Um, like you said, we're we're a very desirable district and, um, I think we should, in my opinion, I think we should try to use the tool as it was designed for and, uh, and not try to apply any sort of preference or bias or anything like that. >> Miss H, please. Um, so I understand legally um that the parent or family could have that choice, but I'm imagining that we do have students who open enroll into our district, say in kindergarten, and then maybe in second or third grade they're identified as special needs and they have an

065IEP. as a district, we don't have to give or correct me if I'm wrong, do we automatically as a system when that IEP well before that even when the student is identified as having special needs, is that when the parent or family would get that is that the decision point or or do we most more often have that child stay in our system and then provide the resources according to their IEP. >> So, I certainly don't have like the numbers by year for that. But the decision point would become and we also have a child find obligation for all students. >> A child finded obligation meaning we are obliged to evaluate if we believe there could be a disability for any of our children. Um but anytime a student is evaluated and qualifies and then

066is determined to have a need for special education services, the parent is presented then with a decision of do you want these services? And that is the decision point really the parent is faced with. They might at that point also be told if they take the services there won't be space in the district. >> Right? >> That's that's what you're getting at time is that is that they're going to be >> right >> presented with the need but they also at the same time if there's not an open enrollment seat for them and they're not planning to be don't have a way to become a resident. Correct. then they might have to make that choice and that is that's happening in many districts >> and we are obligated as well to to complete evaluations. Correct.

067But parents can also deny consent for those testings as well. >> So that's something that I did not know that this was happening at all or this was sort of part of the scenario. Um so do we have families who do have to make that decision and that do leave the district every year because >> Yes. or they don't >> leave. So if they stay then they are waving their sort of rights to those services. >> Then then do they not receive those services? >> They don't receive specialized instruction. However, we as we're building a very robust multi-level systems of support, we lean heavily then into tier two, tier three interventions and all the other supports outside of special education. And we also know that the people in the room >> are going to be

068helping the students, but it creates a a more of a a not a case load because they're not on a case, but um work and and burden for delivering the education. >> It's a professional challenge. >> Sure, it is. >> It's a professional challenge because what what Mr. opinion stated is that in in that completed IEP uh referral process at the end of the process it states the family denied access to services and so then you have that student who remains in the school and you know the families reg uh refused the services but it's back to Mr. Wier statement they made a choice that remaining in our case in Walto Tulsa was more important than accessing the services. >> Yeah, thank you for that. I think that's an important piece when we have to

069make the decision in January because I think we want to be able to serve all of our students and all of their needs and I don't I think that's kind of a risk that we take then as a district to not be able to fully >> do that uncomfortable position for everybody. >> Yeah. I don't know how our decision would be would be able to impact that though because it's it's really the it really comes down to >> how much space we have. >> Yeah. I mean >> the family choice. I mean because you're not going to we cannot choose a special education student who needs that space and say yes, we're going to make a space for them. That would go against the state law. >> The more open enrollment students we have, the

070higher chance we have at a of a student needing an IEP down the road. That's the >> the only control mechanism we have would be to >> recommend that we do the minimum >> right >> amount of new open seats which could be zero >> which then >> you in a way I mean I'm not suggesting this I like that we don't make people reapply but that would be the other condition where then >> right potentially >> that would be a policy change the law allows boards to have one reapplication period at a future point in time >> right so it wouldn't be every year it would be that that might that might become clearer at middle school or Yeah. So, there's not a lot of fixes what we do and what we vote on,

071but it's important for the board to understand that um what the impacts can be. Other questions or comments? It's very helpful information um as we rev up towards needing to to make those decisions. Um and board members, if there's other things that come up um part of why we have this is because I wanted to make sure all of you had as much knowledge as people who served a little bit longer. Um but be really willing. I mean, Mr. Pinion and Michelle and Dr. M have a lot of knowledge on this. Um, if there's something else you think of, please feel free to ask. >> I know it's defined on here the um tuition waiver situation, but can you talk through a situation where a student is a in a tu tuition? >> Sure. it's

072uh most simply put they moved out of the TOSA boundaries and depending on that date of the move they either get to finish the current year tuition waiver meaning they finish the current school year or if it's later and DPI releases a matrix every year with specific dates um that I lean heavily on to when I'm signing tuition waiverss and it might be an additional year if it's like in the summertime. Um, so there's very clearcut uh timelines for those, but it's essentially you're moving outside of the boundaries. >> Okay. >> And you were a resident. >> So with open enrollments, you don't reapply every year. But with a tuition waiver, it's it's that's a limited time period. It that's >> there's a sunset coming, >> right? If you want to stay, you have to

073try to get an open enrollment. You can try to get what Mr. Pinion is saying is you can't just say, well, you move during the year. there are that there are certain dates and there's a whole matrix that is used >> and I would add this is where the board had made a very conscious decision and in aligned with past policy where boards have a decision to say do currently attending students andi and students who might have siblings here already get a preference which the law requires meaning they're drawn first out of the 1500 applications or do they get a guarantee meaning they are just creating really extra open enrollment seats beyond what the board approved and they're guaranteed to become open enrollment after that move and after that tuition waiver expires. Our policy is

074a preference meaning they would have to apply to open enrollment when their tuition waiver expires. >> And what people might remember is that our policy was always preference but there was a practice happening that created basically a guarantee. um when I came onto the policy committee that's something we were discussing and one of the things I realized in going through that and if if you know it's it's something that we could create a guarantee I know we've had some requests for that it has to be a guarantee for everyone not just a specific group of people who are on tuition waiver so everyone who qualified for tuition waiver at that point what we found with that practice was we as a board then have very little limitation over open enrollment. So one year it might

075be 70 students, the next year it might be 20 that have moved in and out and make the qualifications for tuition. >> I would add to that that was something I brought to the board very intentionally because I was uncomfortable about a year or so into my time here finding out that what the policy said was not what was practiced for two decades. And when I ran a 5-year average, we were inadvertently creating 73 open enrollment seats in addition to what the board had been approving, which was a high number because they were guaranteeing it. So, I intentionally brought it back to the board said, "This is what I found was past practice. Do you want us to shift the policy to align with what's been practiced or do you want us to follow the

076policy as it's been written?" The board at that time said, "Follow the policy." We are. We had over a 100 tuition waiverss last year. I think the fact that we have such a high volume of open enrollment students makes this adherence to the tuition waiver language important to Mr. Pinion's point. >> Some districts, and I think Miss Odonna can speak to this, some districts do allow their tuition waiver students to remain in their district. They don't have the same volume of open enrollment students that we have here in the Waltosa School District. I would add just for sake of understanding knowledge, we also have an increasing amount of residency falsification investigations every year where there um is quite a significant amount of families we find falsifying residency documents to be inosa. >> Thank you for

077the cander. Yes, >> just I'm just putting it out there and being open and >> Mr. Pinion lives it. I mean, so he deals with it and his office deals with it, but yes, we we're seeing a frankly we're seeing a spike and Mr. opinion in his office and let's just slow down and and explain this and unpack it of a number of families who are falsifying their residency status in the district. And so what happens if they are eventually identified as not being officially in the district, this tuition waiver clause does then it's is it kicks in and and so we we have to protect the district and your investment from a residency standpoint. We also have a tricky situation in that um the city of Wawaossa has places has there's streets like there's

078a street near me where four of the houses on the street are waosa and the rest are Milwaukee. And so sometimes I think there is also and streets are right next to each other. There's there's intentional, there's also unintentional. Someone sees an apartment um they can't they have to leave the one they're in and then they find themselves moving out. And these are difficult situations um for then the the office to go through. It's not just the volume of open enrollment. It's I think it's the volume of in andout movement um of of students like residency. We because of where we are we have a probably more than many of our um peer cities around us um people moving moving into >> if you will. The first is our immediacy and our proximity to the

079city of Milwaukee. To your point, there there's there's some neighborhoods that part part of the neighborhood in Walto Tulsa, part is uh the city of Milwaukee. So, that's the first. The second is there there's a higher volume of apartment opportunities within Wal Tulsa. So your ability to establish residency for a period of time, a temporary period of time and then move out is higher. And we can't ignore the fact that from a pure number perspective, uh there are some school districts that have a higher percentage of students who participate in open enrollment. But in terms of in terms of the high the the actual number of students in our district uh we have been the state leader in open enrollment not not one of we have been the number one district in in participating in

080this program. So those three factors are are as a as a is a is a reason why we're paying attention to >> absolutely for newer board members. >> Um it was a bit of a shock then for people last year when um based upon the numbers that were presented to us we opted not to open any open enrollment seats. So some of what you're hearing as feedback um at this point is a reaction to that a big policy or big not practice change really the policy's been the same um it's more the practice change yeah just kind of explain briefly as we can the financial impact of how the state helps to pay for students versus uh resident students versus tuition waiver students. >> We all looked at this your high level speech of open

081enrollment financial exchanges. >> I'm not getting a light so just checking. Um I think the the most often way that I hear it explained is kind of like seats on an airplane. Um, so our open enrollment students are um I think the wealthiest school district we could have would either be every every student in open enroll or every student we have open enroll in. Um the the least effective way to run a school district is have only residents. So um that's the quandry of the state funding formula. um we don't get as much money per student uh for open enrollment students as we do combined property taxes and state aid. An open enrollment student, however, is zero property taxes. So all of that money comes from the state. So depending on how someone evaluates what

082is the best type of revenue, I it it's kind of eye the beholder. Um, our average cost per student ballpark $14,000. Um, the average regular education student, we receive about 10 thou a little over $10,000. So, overall, those students yield less money. >> Open enrollment. However, the marginal cost, and I've talked about this last year, the marginal cost of adding one student, whether they're resident or non-resident, unless that one student tips, let's use third grade as an example, unless that one student tips a third grade from having one section to two sections, which would be rare, but I could happen with a res. Well, since we don't do that with non-residents, could only happen with a resident. Um, the marginal cost absent that is almost nothing. You know, if we add a student, they move

083into the district, we don't the cost doesn't go up to our district by $14,000. In fact, if someone moved in tomorrow, we wouldn't adjust our budget at all. Um there there'd be no additional teaching costs likely no additional paper costs. Software is already paid for. Um so that that's when someone says is open enrollment a winner or loser? That's the honestly my opinion is if we're not adding staff and we truly have open seats like on an airplane if they have open seats that should not cost anymore and should be pure revenue. >> And that's where the formula comes in to make sure that we >> um are checking that we won't >> that we have that we don't open every single seat available to the classroom. We have to save enough seats that someone

084could move in. >> Exactly. That's >> on August 31st. >> We have a lot to move in. >> And I think what Mr. is stating academically makes all the sense in the world. What we have, and you've talked about this, newer board members, welcome to the conversation. What Miss Elliski will have to try to navigate is that we're dealing with decades of us not taking students at a marginal cost. We were legit. We had an unspoken policy where we were filling schools. So we were creating more sections. So what Mr. Ecker just stated to you is if he was teaching school finance 101 that what he just said makes all the sense in the world. I want to go back to what I stated to you earlier. The Wall of Tulsa school district in terms

085of the number of students we have. Now a lot of those students have metriculated through the system and that's why over the last few years you've been taking less students because Miss Zelazoski through the formula that Miss Eldana helped us create is trying to rightsize where we are financially with open enrollment. But at our middle school and high school level in particular, those students metriculated through our system and we were creating sections. We were creating a I would say a policy where we were filling our schools in the name of we need to keep the schools full. >> So so that financially we're trying to even things out. Is is that a fair way of putting it? >> Yes. So your challenge moving forward is do you want to continue to try to balance it

086all out understanding that the and you'll see these you've seen the numbers the vast majority of our open enrollment students are now metriculated through and they're at the secondary level. So, in many ways, the work that Miss Delazoski has done is really been complicated and difficult because we've created these elementary schools where we've we've filled the seats and we were filling the seats based on what Mr. Eker just stated with you with about a $4,000 gap of of what we received from the state versus what it actually costs to educate students. Um, so just one clarification question. Uh, does the administration have the ability to pick the physical school and or grade that level that we would make for an open enrollment seat. >> Uh, so the answer is yes. Um, so what we will

087do uh is to bring forward to you in January uh a recommendation for open enrollment seats by grade level in the district. Um so uh one of the additional challenges that we had as an organization is that um in that January approval specific schools were identified for a number of students they would get but that wasn't taking into consideration uh additional enrollment and interd district transfers that would come in the spring and early summer. We will approve them now as seats by grade level, but we won't know which schools those seats will be assigned to until a little bit later when we can look at our overall class sizes and do our best to uh not um add sections at specific schools. So, we'll be able to pinpoint ex those seats um and and which

088student or which schools students would go to to try to minimize that impact on staffing. In other words, we're we're waiting longer to have a clearer picture of where seats are filled across all schools versus lock not locking it in in the initial board approval in January when you don't know and you don't have that clarity. >> So So we're able to kind of hedge and and say, well, it it based on this year, it looks like next year's enrollment probably will look like X, but we don't know. We won't know for a little while. um and and we can say okay there this seems like there's a lot of wiggle room there uh for that grade level and we know that and what I what I heard back from you was that the open

089enrollment seat if if it needs to be placed at a different elementary school depending on where the enrollment is. You have the ability to do that to make sure that we don't have to open up a second section. >> Correct. the board will lock in grade levels. >> Paraphrase, I'm going to try to practice a norm of collaboration since we're having a good conversation. >> I think I heard you say, "Does the school system have the ability to identify where the seat will be made available once you have more information?" >> Correct. >> And and if I may then jump so we all understand your question, the answer is yes. What Miss Elazoski will bring a recommendation to you to say we can identify let's just say 10 seats at grade level the second grade

090level she will bring that to you in January by April she can then identify or later she can then identify and say well of the 10 seats we have three at Lincoln we have four at Madison and we have three at Eisenhower. So the the challenge, Mr. Audier, did I capture that correctly, Miss? >> You did great. >> Thank you. That's good to know. Um, and so the challenge, Mr. Audier, is that the open enrollment signup process starts in February and and it ends in April. Correct. So families have to make the decision on where they're going, where they want to go. Now, the way that the application process works is that they identify the school system, but it helps them if they know which school they're going to apply for. So, even if we

091identified the three the three schools in January, we wouldn't have the ability to tell a family which of the three schools they would have access to because then it there's a a lottery and there's all those different situations. So, what we would need to have the ability to communicate to families is that we want you we want you to uh uh to sign up for Waltosa. We can't tell you in February which schools you're applying for, but please know that we are open to you becoming a student in our district. >> Well said. >> Thank you. >> No, that's good. Um so, I'm going to open up one more idea. Um, I think I prepared you for this that when we looked at this, um, a couple years ago as a school board, maybe even

092last year, we we did find we did find out that sometimes school districts have a second round of looking, but we so far have opted not to do that. Um, but I wanted our um, board members to be fully aware of that. And I guess the question would be does that is that possible in our current policy um and is it something that um we would want to put on the consideration this year? >> It is certainly possible policy-wise. Our policy requires a weight list which we have done historically which is a part of that when when it comes to drawing from it. So it is certainly something we could entertain. Uh the practical application side of um reviewing our seats would be to take another um enrollment snapshot and apply the same um the

093same calculations for class sizes that you ultimately will recommend in January to see whether or not um more open enrollment seats may be available once we have a better idea of actual registrations and enrollments. Um so we could do that at any point in time. And I think in our preparation meeting with Miss Eldana and Mrs. Zelazoski and Mr. Pinion, I I stated that this is the part where what Mr. Ecker stated earlier is 100% right. So if we create a waiting list, we can be extremely strategic and identify where we do have low class sizes and we can take a number of students and according to the way that he described it, he's 100% right at the at the state reimbursement level of $10,000 per student. If we have a low class size and

094Miss Elazoski identifies we could take three students um at a certain grade level at a certain school that is an economic boom for the district of $30,000 because we shouldn't in we shouldn't have any increased costs as we understand it. Um and we have the space to do so. So use utilizing that airplane analogy that works perfectly. Um, and so we do uh anticipate bringing a a summer weight list to you. Um, we believe that um we we continue to be a desirable district for families and that even making that decision in the summer is something that will be appealing to to some people um in joining the Waltosa school system. People do see value in what we we provide to them educationally and we think that they would be very anxious to join us.

095Thank you. >> Anything else? Okay, seeing no other questions. Thank you for spending the time with us and helping us to get the wheels turning as we go towards the open enrollment season. >> Thank you. >> Good to see everybody. >> Thank you, Miss Delana. >> Mr. >> Dr. Worley and and at some point I know that uh you you and Miss Roll will give me some direction, but the process that we are planning we we spent a lot of time on this this evening. Our goal was to have this conversation tonight, have another conversation around our recommendation uh and then place the the recommendation as discussed at the first January meeting on consent for the the second meeting in January. If you want to pull that, you can um and make that an action

096item. That's some type of direction we'll want at some point, but that's our initial thought right now because that would be it's up to you. >> Yeah, this is our only December >> meeting. So, it would really the next meeting we would get the recommendation and I think that's good practice. That's what we've done. That gives people a chance in the community um to see it and and board members to think it through. So I would I would stay on that schedule. I think it's a good one. >> We have to decide by the end of January. So that how we've done it. >> Those those slides are those available to us? >> Yeah, we just received them but we will make them available. >> Okay. There is a lot of information there. Highlight. You

097don't have to have it all memorized either. Just present just so you know that. >> All right. >> Okay. Thank you. So, we will move um Ben to um 5B, November monthly financial report. >> As he makes his way up, he'll have 5B and C. Um and so, Mr. Eard, thank you for joining us this evening. >> My son is very upset that I have a meeting tonight. Sorry for that. >> He'll be fine. He's watching uh Paw Patrol or something. >> Um it I think I wanted to talk about our November budget update as more of a macro level. Uh on on the agenda is the actual PowerPoint as well as the video. Uh we'll be going through it uh step by step at finance committee next week as well. But there are a

098couple things that have come up um over the course of the last few months I just want to hit on from a general budget standpoint. Um, and I I I really appreciate the board and community members that are seeking to understand more about our budget. Uh, we're trying to be to make the budget more accessible. We're trying to be transparent and I I appreciate it when people have genuine um questions where they're seeking to understand um so that they can be hopefully advocates of the district or even even give us feedback on, you know, ways we might do things differently. Um there's also times where where it's easy to look at a budget and um jump to conclusions or make assumptions and and I think part of that is because we're on this continuous um

099improvement journey with our budget. I think we're in a much better place than we were a couple years ago. We know exactly where the money is going. Um, one example I'll give is, uh, you might remember at our our budget hearing when, uh, we presented, um, the digital budget book and there was a lot more detail than had ever been there before. And someone noticed, uh, a significant increase in the paper budget at East High School. Um, we had never shown the budget at that level of detail before. um nor had the business office asked the schools to budget their supplies by a particular type of supply. So the board had asked me to look into why did the paper budget go up and what we discovered was they weren't actually going to buy more

100paper. They had just moved their budget from a general kind of miscellaneous supply account to actually account for the paper in a particular paper account. I like that because when someone says, "How much did we spend on paper?" I can quickly find that by a code instead of having to sort through kind of a conglomerate code. So that would be one example you you might remember. Um some other things that on a global level um our elementary budget as approved on the budget hearing uh at that time we had not yet allocated exactly where each of our elementary teachers would be. So, from my um office, from a budgeting standpoint, we knew who was going to be elementary teachers, but we put them all into a standard elementary account and didn't allocate them by building.

101So someone could look at the budget booklet at that date and if they were looking by, it's called location. It could appear that the budget had gone down at every elementary school, which it had by location, but we had a large salary pot for all of our uh teachers at the elementary level. So that's something that when the board approves the updated budget, we now know exactly where those people are, so it'll be updated. um some similar things like that as we work through um one thing I really wanted to work through is getting the budgets al aligned with who's actually overseeing them. So, uh in our academic department, we used to have um kind of I'll say a bunch of hands in the pot that then Dr. Marble was trying to um track down

102who who is in charge of this budget and who's in charge of that budget. And what we did is we I'm gonna a little bit inside baseball. Um we we put them in a code where Dr. Marble could see them all and yet each person still had individual authority over it. But when you look at the we call budget category, if you looked at the budget category booklet, it would look like her budget went way up and others went way down. And an example would be instructional technology. um that that budget appears to have gone way down and in reality the category shifted even though um the the functional area still exists. A final one would be the superintendent's budget. What I discovered for years um we use a software called Qualrix uh for um

103our student data. essentially the the the data team uses qual that that's their tool. Um that who was paying for that has gone like it's been a hot potato which department is paying for that. So I finally just said we're putting this in Dr. Means's budget so that I know every year where it's getting paid. Um that might be another area where someone could look at the budget and say why is this you know kind of changing so much. Um my hope year to year now is that we now have things aligned, but I I can guarantee you there's going to be adjustments made over time. We um a a few years ago we the district decided to kind of split instructional technology from I'll call it backend technology or like ser server rooms and

104stuff. And so there was a time all of that lived under Jamie Price's house. Now part of it lives with Jamie and part of it lives with Dr. Marble. Who knows? In three years maybe we decide let's put those back together. I it some of these things um you know progress over time as you decide on new best practices. Uh, another thing I wanted to kind of talk about briefly because um, a teacher brought this up um, a few board meetings ago and and I've heard it a few times now about how the board found some money uh, in order to be able to give teachers a raise. I thought we had a pretty um, open dialogue about what money was going to be used for that. And I just want to repeat that so

105the public knows. We had budgeted um a surplus for the year and in large part so that we could start building our fund balance back up, keep our credit rating through Moody's and that was that that that surplus was something approved by the board. It is on every budget document. It was very purposeful. And then when we um honored the commitment to the teachers, we were also very at least I thought I was very deliberate in saying this money is coming from that surplus. We are not going to have that surplus anymore. It was not magic money. Um and when I bring the new budget to the board in January, we're going to see, as I've said before, that surplus is essentially gone. So, I'm glad we had it so that we could honor um

106the commitment, but it didn't appear out of nowhere. Um that's generally the comments I wanted to supply for the November budget update that and then um just to remind you uh we are this is um acting backtrack the board approved uh raises for everybody. I was at the last meeting or the one right before that I can't remember. first November meeting. >> Thank you. Um everyone, back pay is coming this week, so we're celebrating that. Um our first two regular payrolls are coming up and in January then the board will be approving the new updated budget reflecting those changes uh since then. One other thing I wanted to talk about because it's been in the news a little bit recently is the special education aid um that the state uh is giving us. So, um,

107uh, it's still it's still good news. For decades, the special ed reimbursement rate was, if you had asked, depending on which legisl legislator you asked, um, if you said what is the percent reimbured, you would get an answer somewhere between probably 29% and 33%. And the reason you would get that range is because um the way that the state has um talked about state aid forever has been it's a some sufficient uh uh some certain amount which is going to equate to about x% for each school district. And so it for a long time they've said well the it's 33%. But that some certain amount has never equated to 33% or at least not 15 or 20 years. So for instance last year I budgeted like 29%. Uh even though if you'd ask some legislators

108or other business officials or superintendents or board members or a lot of people would probably say oh yes it's 33%. I budgeted 29. A lot of the experienced colleagues I have budgeted 29 because what that's what it always was. Um it was a some certain amount not some sufficient. This year the legislature approved or the the yeah I guess the the state uh approved an increase much needed. Um it's still a some certain amount and they were saying that some certain amount will be 42% or about 42%. I didn't budget 42%. The same way I didn't budget 33% in the past. Um the school districts that did budget 42% um those are the ones that are scrambling right now. So I don't anticipate um when I run all the numbers and I have the budget

109update from the board. I will be reviewing special ed aid again. Um I'm going to make sure that I still hit within that range I expected. There might be a non-material change. I mean, I would still have the board approve it, but I don't expect us to have to make any drastic uh or or unforeseen budget adjustments due to uh that that allocation. Uh essentially, we we budgeted what I figured we would get. >> Yeah. Comments or questions on this particular item? Okay. And thank you for the also the informative video that went through um the numbers for the month. >> I have to track the hits on that. >> Um I think we can move then on to uh letter C discussion of budget assumptions. Okay. I think it's best practice, so part of

110our budget calendar has me bringing a five-year forecast to the board in January. And I think it's best practice to review with the board what those major assumptions are going to be before I plug them in and say, "Here you go." Um, and so, uh, this is a review of those assumptions. Um the the main revenue drivers uh um this is again the second year of the bianium. So there isn't a lot of whatifs this year. Um I guess even more so given that we have the same governor um at least under current law. We're going to receive an additional $325 well beyond my retirement every year. Um the next 400 years or something uh until that gets changed again. But that is fairly locked in for now at least for this bianium. Um I

111was just mentioning uh special ed aid uh if you look at the percentages the DPI would say it's 45%. I'm recommending we budget 40% given that kind of some certain thing I just talked about. Uh and I'm not anticipating any other material new revenues. Uh on the enrollment side, um I I think we are we've really flattened our enrollment from a resident standpoint. Um in fact, the thing that I am a little worried about now is for so long we were declining. And when you decline, you essentially get grandfathered. You get some a grace period with some money. You get what's called a declining enrollment exemption. Um, what a lot of districts aren't aware of is the worst thing that can happen to a district is if you when you come out of declining enrollment,

112you don't get a grace for coming back up. So, all of a sudden, you could lose in our case could be like a quarter million dollars if we end up with like three or four more students. So, um, we do want to level off, but just like you don't want to you sort of don't want to grow too fast either. So, I really got my eye on that because I don't I'm hoping we don't lose that declining enrollment exemption really fast. Um, so just let you know I'm on top of that. Uh, we just had a discussion about open enrollment. Uh, on the personnel side, um, our our recommendation or the the plan is to adhere to the conditions from the referendum. So that would be the uh uh 3% step increase for teachers plus

113a 1% plus the allocation of the $8 million. Uh and I can cost out what that is, but that's what we'll be uh doing. Um so you can see that their salaries. Uh I'm recommending a 10% health insurance increase. Hopefully it'll come in less, but I don't want to underbudget and be scrambling like we were a couple years ago. So those are really the highlights. Um and we will be building the forecast to present to you based on uh those assumptions unless you know you this is up for discussion. So unless you I hear differently that that's not a good starting point. That would be the starting point. >> I think it's a good starting point. I just want to reiterate though that 8 million is over a course of four years and total. So

114it might not be two two two because there's some costs that grow each year with So you'll be figuring that in. >> Yeah, I've got um something planned for whenever the finance committee wants it um to articulate the the role how the roll forward of some of those costs um could be articulated. >> Thank you. Anyone else? How do you feel about these budget assumptions or questions? Yeah, >> feel good about feel good about Mr. record. One thing that came to me in the last couple of weeks was something I had to look up. I wasn't sure about uh to be Mr. Bower in our next uh legislative advocacy, but it was something that's coming up AB think it's 644 that's talking about consolidation of school districts in there and they >> there's money for

115it. Um, and I kind of looked at that as the same conversations we have here in Watossa talking about what's happening at the common council level with the fire department's consolidation or potential consolidation between West Dallas and Watsa in the school conversation with the money that's there. Dr. Means, what does that mean, Mr. eard when they talk about consolidation to, you know, potentially reduce that 421 districts in the state to fewer or a community like ours that again is so adjacent to Milwaukee, not necessarily our other ones, but even maybe even West Dallas or other ones there. >> Do you mind if I start? >> You go ahead. I haven't looked at it at all. >> I'll start and maybe give you some uh runway here. I I That's a great question, Mr. Morris. I

116I believe that our proximity makes us it's hard to say virtually impossible or ineligible, but I think we're virtually impossible to be eligible for this because we are surrounded by three of the other Let me back up. In the state of Wisconsin, there are something called the big five. And so there are five districts that are identified as the five urban districts of Wisconsin. That includes Milwaukee, Racine, Kenosha, >> Green Bay, and Madison. I may have added Kenosha, but maybe they don't. >> Kosha >> that maybe they shouldn't be in. Um, no, it's those five. It's it's Green Bay, Madison, Racine, Milwaukee, Kenosha. >> Those are the big five. And then there are 15 other districts that are considered the other districts that make the top 20 or the largest 20 school districts in Wisconsin.

117We are one of those districts. Most districts in Wisconsin are much smaller than Wal Tulsa. Our proximity is really unique in that we are surrounded by two other of the 15 districts that are not of the big five. So Elm Brook and West Dallas West Milwaukee are also part of those 15 and then we also are adjacent to Milwaukee. So I >> who we match with it would be difficult >> corre I just don't know how we would consolidate and then become a larger school system. So whoever um we would connect with it would make the immediately one of now you would have to start utilizing language like the big six. Um, so if we combined with you pick one of those either El Brook or West Dallas districts, we become very large almost to

118the point where you're in that group of five. >> And then if you are annexed by Milwaukee, I I don't I don't know if that's even clear, no one's no one no one's offering that becomes if you remember a few years on social media that was not >> I don't think that's possible, right? So, I I just I don't think we're eligible. I I think they're looking at um trying to get to rural districts that are really small. I think they're also trying to >> suburban >> or like a lot of the K8. There's a lot of K8 both in the western suburbs and also in the Northshore suburbs. I think they're trying to encourage that type of consolidation. Mr. >> looking at some of their K8. Exactly. Yeah. Yeah. So there are some situations

119where it might make sense like Arrowhead has this cake. >> I just don't think for from a proximity standpoint it makes sense for us. >> Got >> technically we could qualify but it makes >> Yes. >> It came up in there because being in the you traveling with sports teams and meeting other administrators and parents and teachers. Uh we were in Sussex. I had conversations was listening to people from but the village of Butler which I was not super familiar with until I came back to to that direction down Silver Spring. I was like realized I was right next door >> and it's a small one but you don't think of that in proximity to to like it'd be nice if we could be a part of the west side of your town. I'm like

120I don't even know where you are. >> We should we do little league. >> Interesting. >> I would um I would just I would conclude I I always I I covet the opportunity to go into social studies teacher mode. I would just say in the state of Wisconsin the the the spirit of Bob Lefallet and the independence that um that we have fighting Bob Lafallet is something that is very strong. That's why we have over 400 school systems in Wisconsin. I think local control is something that people really value. Um and so not to um stir the pot, but I'm so far away from it. I'll stir it. I That wall that you recommended is to encourage perhaps maybe the citizens of Whitefish Bay, it surewood to say maybe we should combine and become one

121district because those are not large districts and together is still a manageablesiz district. what I know my brief time in working in Sherwood and knowing those two communities I don't think they would ever consider it no matter how much the state puts on in terms of money on the table because our communities across the state coveret independence. I'll conclude by saying, however, and and Miss Elazoski is our resident rural school system expert. Um, but there are a lot of rural school systems that are struggling and consolidation would be advantageous for those those communities. Um, and and so I think that is where that bill is going to gain a lot of uh traction. And and and I'm going to pivot because Mr. Eer has experience. I think you're from the Green Lake area and you

122you you know that that part of the state as well. >> I I comment on that. >> Take the fate. >> No, no. Um the only thing I would I would add is or maybe and so a little bit of a sidetrack is uh we do believe in in shared services as government and we we work with even though different from consolidation to work with other districts on shared services. We we continually do we work with CISA and I'm really excited about at least the relationship um that we that our district has always had with the city um to explore ways to share services, share spaces. I don't know probably a lot of people don't know that our vehicles are serviced by the city at the city garage. Um so those are right now kind

123of easier ways to um make the best use of of government. Uh, and at least I wanted to highlight that while we had the floor here. >> And just so we don't create a >> Yes. Uh, unex unexpected media. Um, I think that Butler is part of Hamilton >> Hamilton Sussex. >> Yeah. >> So, I mean, it's I'm not sure they're looking for a dance partner, even if the parents might be, but we do share some little league. Um I know that it's very popular in Wawaossa to go to Butler Little League >> and is one of an award. They're they're a fast growing district. So >> yeah, butler district. >> Yeah. I I don't think it's and it would only be like a one time. The other thing came up when I was reading

124is it's just I think a one-time incentive so you're not like growing your budget perpetually. We should probably move on. >> Continuation digress. Yeah. did that very well. So I as Mr. Edgar is transitioning um I I believe madam president we are going to the next agenda item which is 5D. >> We might need >> Do you want to take a break first? >> Brief special break. That's great for two hours. >> Is that okay? >> All right. While you're setting up for me. Thanks for >> Hi everybody. Um, my name is Ted Martin, director of recreation here in WASOsa. Stepped into this role in July. I'm going to be honest, love this gig. Uh, it is absolutely phenomenal. I I'll just tell you why this job is amazing. Okay, last week I got to

125hang out with three-year-olds. Loved it. Then got to be at LEA for a special ed meeting. Love that. Stacey and I kind of meetings. Love it. >> What's an LEA? >> Uh, that is a Oh my gosh, the acronym >> local education agency. So, I got to serve as a district leazison for those. I I love it. I then got to go to our senior centers, which we do senior centers in Watosa Rec. And I got to do lunch. Uh they had garlic bread and everything like that with a bunch of 80-year-olds. Found one who does reviews of local uh senior lunches. Uh she said we were near the top. We did good. I got to do that and then I got to go and train senior citizens, active older adults on how to work

126with kids in our libraries. And then I got to go and work on a uh report for our youth commission on how we can bring more activities for our youth in our high schools related to wreck. This is just an absolutely ridiculously fun gig. It is I love it so much. And one of the reasons why I love it so much is the team that we work with. I am so proud of these hair bears right here. Uh this is from our trunk or treat event uh which we uh do here in the Fisher parking lot every year. Uh it is a uh project that we collaborate with to cares. Uh if you got to go buy it, it was packed. It was so cool to see. We had hundreds of people to come and

127it is a collaboration effort with the police department, health department, city works. So many people are coming to help and support this. I just want to give a shout out to that entire team. They are absolutely amazing. Diana, our admin assistant, celebrated 35 years in Tosa Wreck just two weeks ago. 35 years doing like she is such a historical knowledge piece. She is amazing. Uh and we just absolutely love her. Our team is small but they are mighty and the diversity that they do is just it's it's just so cool to see. Kristen, our aquatics director, is also our social media website designer and does everything like that. Jenny Cotum, if you do you if you do summer adventure club, you know Jenny Cotton, she runs uh Twist and Cots as well and so many

128other clubs. She she is Miss Wat. Uh everybody in this community knows Jenny. Uh when we talk about Steve Bernie, Steve Bernie has been through Tossa Rep since high school himself. Everybody knows him. Jenny started in Tosa in high school. Kristen Murphy started a Toasta wreck in high school. We have Abby Meek, who is uh so sweet and quiet, but if you want a wellorganized toasted uh basketball league, she's going to do it and she does it so stinking well. Chris Johnson, our facility scheduler, he is he knows everything that's going on in these buildings at all times. It's absolutely amazing. Uh and then Kosa, our senior program. Holy cow. Like he like everyone knows him in the fact that like we went uh just to lunch together and it was just amazing how people

129just stopped and said hi to him and like he is such a connected person when it comes to our active aging adults that they rely on him for so much information. It is amazing. He also started at Tossa Wreck in high school which is so cool to see. our number of participants uh over the last two years. You'll see that in the fall we had a little bit of a dip uh uh when it comes to participants it kind of makes sense. We weren't able to do gymnastics this year. Uh we weren't able to find an instructor uh and that stinks. We're still on the active lookout for one and we were also struggling to find some uh uh instructors for some of our younger swimmers. Those are really really uh busy and really active

130events and so therefore it makes sense that our numbers dip down a little bit. We will bring them back uh when we are able to find the qualified instructor for it. I can say that since I've stepped into this role in July, exciting stuff is happening in the TOSA rec department. First I want to talk about our STEP program. Our STEP program is a a program that we are starting this year. Did uh some interviews today where those that are 65 and older that live in Wawaossa have the ability to earn $750 as an independent contractor to work in our libraries to read to kids, have kids read to them and just be a mini celebrity in those spaces. The cool thing is is this is the first year the program's actually going like to

131happen happen. And when Kosa and I were designing this, we're like, you know, if we get 10 people, that's good. That's that that's a success. We're now, this slide isn't even up to date anymore. We're at 54 uh senior citizens who will be stepping into our schools starting the week of January 20th, reading the kids, working with kids. It is absolutely amazing and they are eager to be here. So many retired teachers, retired nurses, and it is quite the age range. The cool thing about it is uh we have told our participants we believe in equity here in Wawaossa and so we are going to be able to put about four to five people in every single school and it's amazing. In January we're going to be sending out some information on a new thing

132an advisory committee for the uh for the rec department. We've never had one. Uh and so one of the questions that we've had lately is how do we know what our like community actually like wants? And so we're creating an advisory committee. I'll be sending out email blasts, a lot of information on how to be part of that committee. And our hope is that that committee will start in July of 2026. Uh we are pumped to have that. We've already kind of like talked to some people about uh just in random conversations and there's a lot of people in TOSA that know the rep world and who want to share and who want to contribute. The other thing uh one of the other things that we're really excited about is in the fall of 2026

133we are going to go back to a paper guide mailed to every house in Wawaossa. Our postcards are really nice, but there's a couple like pitfalls with them. One, we have trained our active older adults so well not to scan QR codes that they don't know that they don't scan our QR codes. We've done a really good job. The other part is that not everybody has access to the online guide then and it's really struggle. One of the things that I learned when I was stepping into this role was our team said I don't know if a lot of people know we fully exist in what we do. >> Well, how do we do that? We advertise. We send it out to everybody. We are the only rec department right now in the area that

134only does just an online guide. I have worked with Jesse Tuttle on like how do I make this pretty? How do I make this like look nice? One of the things that it's interesting, this is not a knock on our systems or anything like that, is when I looked at some of the guides from 2016 when we were still doing paper guides, some of these same stock photos are in the guides as of today. And our team's like, "Well, let's let's let's mix this up." And and they're pumped for it. Uh we showed Jesse a little Canva that we were making already of like how does this look? And it's great because she has such great expertise that she gives us feedback on like okay that looks great. How about this? We are pumped to

135do that in the fall of 2026. Other things that we're doing tots we are having some great conversation about TOSSA tots. Uh one of the things that we want to do is talk to our JK teachers and we have that planned to be like what do you guys need them to have before they get to you? We want to create a system that where a JK teacher goes that that right there's a tots kid. I can tell they're set up for success. And so one of the things that we're looking for that is a couple things. One, creating a shared vision. Right now it's a little bit of uh every state has their own little vision for it, but having the shared vision and then end of the year targets. What do we want ours

136to accomplish for by the end of the year? And then also having because it's a rec program, we've never done this before, parent teacher conferences so that we can communicate with our uh with our um families their progress and we're really excited for that. The other thing that we're talking about is okay, we have it in our four sites right now. What does it take to actually expand other places because it is an in demand CL that thing like sells out quick. It is also one of the things that is just really great when it comes to being a true partnership with the school side. Uh we have 10 spots for community members and we reserve five spots uh for those that qualify through an IEP. Uh and it's really great because it is inclusion

137at its best and we're we're so pumped to see where to expand it because the community wants it. Other things that we're doing is we're expanding partnerships. the ability center which is a non for uh a non forprofit that's locally uh we are uh signing soon anou with them to give them w status when it comes to their leagues what happens is right now because of community organizations they often times get the short end of the stick uh where it comes to uh access to our gyms we feel as if this is an organization that we like we can help support they match our mission our vision our core values So, let's create an MLOU so that they have access so they don't get bumped. This is our most vulnerable group. They do adaptive sports,

138wheelchair basketball, and we're really excited to expand that partnership with them. I also serve as the first ride at school liaison uh for the district. Uh and so I meet with Max who's the head of right at school uh for our local area once a week. I do site visits with them. I look at their survey data. I get to see like and that's just been also fascinating because we have different ideas on what our expectations my principal card comes out a lot here when it comes to like oh that might be great for like right at school but like here at Tossa we have we have some bigger expectations and those conversations have been wonderful in helping uh kind of make it so that there hasn't been many conversations about right at school in

139a negative way this year it's been really proactive It's been fantastic. Other things that we're doing, uh, some of you all have seen it, seen this, we have the rec connect. A lot of our educators didn't know that the wreck department was part of the school district. So, we wanted to, uh, connect with them, let them know that they pay residential rates anyways. So, let know what we do. There's also so many opportunities for collaboration in it. We are also starting in the spring of 2026. Uh I am meeting uh tomorrow with Miss White over there uh to talk about end of the year survey end of the season surveys. Again, we don't we don't have a map on how we're doing on things. Uh and so we need to have surveys to be able

140to talk to our community. What's working? Did you actually find this activity like useful? Did it uh would you recommend this for somebody? That is something that we're really pumped for. starting soon. We are also have a huge responsibility because we are most people's first jobs and we need to help educate these indiv uh young individuals who this is their first job on how to do work. Uh, and so one of the things that we've noticed is that with our younger population, going to a spreadsheet on a Google Google sheet is not the most easy way for them to figure out when they work or communicate how are things going. So we are going to pilot in January with just our store monitors starting off uh a program called connect team so that their actual

141schedule will be sent to them through their phone. uh which will be nice. They'll also then be able to check in uh like how are things going? Uh and it will be streamlining communication. We're really excited for that. Uh the other nice thing is that we can set it up so it isn't active during the school time because we know policy. The other things that we're doing toast has had a mission in their guide since 2003. And when you talk to Diana, who's our historical knowledge of TOSA, she we've asked like, how did they get there? Like what how did they come up with that? And she's open with the fact that she goes it just appeared in a guide at some point and it's just stuck there. Uh and so we've had the conversation

142of should we probably have the conversation about who we are, what our values are, and what our core values like are. And we've had that conversation and this team has like I have been like moved with how dedicated this team is in like developing on the ambition of who we could be and it has been amazing. We created a draft. Uh if you read the rec connect this week, it was in the rec connect. Uh but uh we have a draft and we're excited with the idea of uh examining that more, sharing that with the community to get feedback so that we can make sure that we are setting up the rec department not just for now but for the future. With that, we are also creating an updated long-term plan when it comes to

143the recck department. Uh, and that has just been uh really fun uh and really engaging and quite the learning experience coming in from the non-rec world. Uh, Scott gave me the uh the uh kind of the the mission pretty early on of like create a long-term plan like look at the financial like uh like the financial elements of the rec department. Look at the uh the uh the use of the buildings. Create a long-term plan. Uh and so we're doing that right now. Uh and uh the the Kevin as I call them. Uh the Kevin and I go about every other week. Uh Kevin will take me to see our spaces and just say what are we doing? How how are we using these spaces? And then just let me ask like uh questions to

144figure out like okay how much does that pool cost to uh use each month? How did we like plan for that as a recck department? The other thing and I'm going to speak on this more later is our provider network. There are so many people in Wawaossa and our neighbors who have similar services and so we're going to get together uh and I'll expand on this later uh a team of about a hundred of us together to just talk about where are our overlapping services and what gaps do we have because there are some in our community that we're not serving. So before and after school JK Rat cost I have been uh uh tasked with looking and researching this and it has been fascinating. So of schoolbased w departments about 75% of schoolbased rec

145departments do their own JK uh wrap and before and after school. uh only 25% contract out. When you look at recont controlled uh cost, it costs the family on average $3,74.70. Contracted out forprofit companies, uh it goes to almost $5,4,896. and nonprofits come in even more expensive than the wreck controlled programs. I've had the opportunity to go observe some of these programs. I went to uh uh El um where did I go? Uh Burli uh in uh Elm Grove uh and I got to see that. It's great what the YMCA is doing there. It's fantastic. Don't get me wrong. Uh and they have uh different opportunities for families. Uh, but I've also got to see some rec controlled ones, too. They're also really great. I've got to see like Monomy Falls. I got to see

146Mewan. I got to see White Fish Bay. And I got to see West Dallas. They're doing great things, too. This is one of those things that I think is going to have to be like I'm going to plant this seed uh to have a conversation more later because I know there's also some demand in this community to have a conversation about this. Uh, could the recck department take it over? Absolutely. We could. Would it be a heavy load? Absolutely it would. Uh, everyone has told me when I've talked to them, you're thinking about 23 uh full-time staff at least, including another admin assistant whose job is solely before and after school in JK RAMP. Uh, and you're thinking about a 100 part-time employees. It would be a huge undertaking. And it would be work that

147we would want to start like July 1st for the following year. Uh it would be it's a huge uh I'm excited at the possibilities. Uh but I also will take direction uh based off what is what what is decided is the best option provider network and our on net meets. This is what I told you I was going to talk about a little later. There are so many people that do wreck based things. uh our hands are in a lot of pots. Uh and so in March uh uh we are going to get together uh we haven't found the space yet, but we're going to find the space uh with nonforprofits, for-profit companies, uh government agencies, other w programs to to discuss where are our unmet needs. It's never been done in WASA to have

148this conversation. I've asked our health department like, "Hey, that would be really nice for somebody to do that." And they said, "Yeah, it would be nice." I went to the YMCA and I said like, "Hey, it would be really nice if somebody did that." Uh, and they're like, "Yeah, it would be nice." What I've decided is that it's going to be us. Why wait for somebody else when we can do it ourselves and do it well? Uh, and one of the things that we're looking at with that is not only just unmet needs, but where are there redundancy? Where are there things that like other people are just doing better? like let them let them do it. Uh and we're really excited for those conversations. The other thing that we're really excited with them is

149just the pure networking. Uh what I think what I would my hope for this is that this turns into like a yearly event where we get together. Uh and then we can network and certain groups that are have common needs or common interests can get together on a quarterly basis just to form those relationships and start having those conversations. Uh, also this kind of goes back to my conversations with the uh with the coins of how do we use the spaces that we have. I part of my job is explaining to people why like certain spaces isn't available. Whenever I go to the senior center, I always get a conversation about Longfellow Pool every single time. Doesn't it doesn't matter. Uh, and a lot of people will say, "When when are when are you uh

150Ted going to open up Longfellow Pool?" And I have to explain like, "No, that's not that's probably not going to happen anytime soon, if ever." And they and I uh I get asked, "Well, why? That was the good pool. That pool was like 88 degrees. It was perfect." And I have to explain it was perfect because it was broken. Like that that that's why it was 88 degrees. Right now, we don't have a pool that uh can uh meet the needs of the um arthritis uh conditions for uh active older adult activities. We can still do um activities in there, but it doesn't meet the the um the arthritis um threshold for it because it has to be 88 degrees. These conversations are really important, especially as we look at a long-term plan and I

151know the conversations everybody else is having because they impact us. uh they impact the spacing that we have. The other thing is some of our uh spaces that we rent like our gyms, there's a lot of demand for those spaces, a lot of demand for those spaces. Uh and a lot of our community partners want access to those spaces. Uh and so we need to then make sure to have conversations on like are we pricing things right when we have a rental? Uh are we actually uh making sure that uh this economically makes sense to rent this as a a wreck department? And so we're having those conversations. The other things is we're going as a team to every space just to walk around and see like, oh that that would work perfectly for a

152babysitting class. Let's use that space. Um with that uh rental part, we're also creating a rental facility rental handbook. Uh it's something that we don't we don't have. Uh and it's one of those things that's super important to have because we can't expect people to follow rules if we don't have them written down. Uh again, this is probably my principal card coming out. Like this is clear as kind. Expectations are really helpful. Uh and so we're creating this uh facility rental handbook. Uh our facility scheduler uh Chris Johnson is helping with that. And our game plan is to come up with a draft, share it with our community organizations, get their feedback on it. And then also then having that ready for July. Um with that as well, we're also develop we're doing a lot.

153Uh we're also developing a financial sustainability strategy. So uh a lot of times people will say well like it's rack I pay taxes it should be like completely uh like it should be like it should be free or it should be really really cheap and and yes that that that's true but we also need to look at like is the program truly aligned to our mission. Is the program truly like does it make sense to charge that rate? Uh and so part of the conversations that we're having then is looking at our programs, looking at how much it actually costs to run that program, which is a newer conversation as a rec department to have and then also then saying like, okay, does this meet like threshold that we're looking for? Does it match our

154mission, vision, core values? Is it cost effective? Uh and is this actually like meeting a need in the community? uh and having those conversations. We're pumped for that because it will then also give us uh an opportunity to present those findings to an advisory committee and then say, "Hey, this is a program that's like some people are interested in. It doesn't meet these thresholds. What should what are your suggestions?" Uh and it gives us an opportunity to have those. This is everything I kind of talked about what we're doing this year. It's a lot and I love it all. uh our team has really risen to the occasion to like step up in these areas. They're also really excited uh because they're being kneede in these conversations as well. Uh as I told them from

155the get-go, this is not the Ted Martin show featuring the rec department. This is the rec department featuring Ted Martin. Uh we we need to do this together as a collaborative effort. Uh I will always do a good job quote, but it's the little details that are vital. Uh and we feel as a rec department that this year we are going to build on that strong foundation to become even more connected, data driven, community focused as a rec department and we are so excited for where we're going. I just spoke a lot and I know there's probably some questions and I will gladly take any questions you all have right now. >> Thank you, Mr. Martin. Board members, comments, questions? I'll ask a question. Martin in here the you know off the top of your

156head and was here but the ratio of the percentage of participants that are in there that are >> school age versus seniors >> Mhm. >> or or I guess guess it could be in between but >> yeah. So I I don't have it off the top of my head but what I what I can tell you is that when we kind of just look at our numbers uh we have 762 seniors that are members of our senior clubs. I believe that's it's around the 760 numbers. Uh we do really well when it comes to senior activities. We do really really well when it comes to like kid activities. Uh the the 20somes still like not having kids yet. Uh participants it's not high. Uh and so one of the things that we want to explore

157especially with the fact that we know as a toaster rec we part of everyone here especially as we are getting more professionals move in that don't have kiten what are how are we meeting their needs and servicing uh like g providing them activities as well uh and so I think that's really important for us to have a conversation about as a department on what are we doing to meet the needs of all of watosa >> second question there when we talk about meeting those needs and uncovering these things as we we have all these learnings. Do we have the capacity to fit those people? So, if we said we found a way to meet these needs Yeah. >> and we're going to double or triple in size over the next 5 10 years, can we

158is that sustainable to even have and fit that here in >> No. Uh to be honest with you, no. There's a couple reasons for it. One, most of our programmings when it comes to spaces can't be run during the school day. they can uh and that and that limits things. Uh our community rooms are used during this the school day in some of our spaces uh but not but not in all of our spaces. Uh and the community rooms are not uh conducive to certain programs like you're not going to do um pickle ball in a community room, right? And we have community members who want pickle ball during the middle of the day. Uh and we can't do that. Uh our pickle ball is on Saturdays. uh on Saturdays uh and we have one

159week night that we do it. Um and so to be open with you, that's one of the conversations we've had even when it comes to like aquatics like Kristen's talked about like is she going to be out of an aquatics like position at some point because we just don't have the pools uh and the capacity to do those things. Uh and so the the short answer is no, not in this current capacity. And then last one as far as I like the partnerships and all the other uh groups that we're talking to in there. Do we have and I say the senior center and I think about the curling club and all these other things that exist outside of recre department. Are there other facilities within the city or other partners that would allow us

160to expand into their spaces? >> Uh yes. So we have uh interesting relationships with some of the uh the situation. So, for example, uh we uh right now uh well, we we did uh rented the softball fields over by um Heart Park, for example. We and we pay about $8,000 a year to rent those those those softball fields. Okay. Uh when the city of Watossa for our agreements uh rents from us, we charge zero zero dollars for the city. Uh but yet we get charged by the city if we want to use their spaces. >> That's always been really annoying to me. So hopefully your location. >> Yeah. Uh and so uh uh there are times where if it's at our senior center and it is related to senior programming, we don't get charged. But

161um but I the softball field for me like this this pretty early on when I was looking at my line items and I was like what what what is that? Uh when I found out it was rent uh for a softball field when we have softball fields here that are also busy, uh it it did cause some pause. Thank you. What other questions? >> Yeah. >> Um, so something I'm super interested in and hope that our district um gets here eventually is the before and after school >> care. Um, I would like and I've said this to everybody who will listen. I would eventually like um like daycare offered for our staff potentially members part of our staff at you know at a reduced affordable cost while also um being a revenue generator for the

162district. >> Yes. >> What do you think um what do you think you need other than what we saw here um more staff? >> Yeah. um to make that happen. And have you been um looking at or staying um looking at the secondary ad hoc committee and all of the facilities that we do have knowing that especially um our secondary buildings aren't fully utilized. Um so I don't know what thoughts do you have on how to increase your capacity with the the the space we do have? >> Yeah. um to go for stuff with the child care. Uh Plymouth, uh Wisconsin, my where my wife grew up, actually does child care. They are a schoolbased rec department uh and they do child care uh and it's working very well uh and they like it. So

163there is a model there. It is also one of those things that we're having conversations. I when I stepped into this role, this is one of the things that I uh am also passionate about. I I have a six-month-old at home. He's cute. He's adorable. Childcare is expensive. >> Uh and if uh I can say that if there was a opportunity to have a child care uh that was connected to Watosa school district or the rec department, it would be an incentive for a lot of people. It it would be huge. Uh and so I love the opportunity to explore that and it we'll continue to look at that actually on our team agenda uh every week on where we're at with that. Uh when it comes to the uh conversations about our secondary schools,

164uh to be open with you, our as a rec department, we're kind of just sitting back and letting people have some of those conversations. We see that those spaces are there. Um but it would be also um for a child care, for example, if we would use a child care uh let's say it was at one of our secondary schools. Uh for a child care, you do need for a before and after school program. You do not need to be uh a state child care uh facility because you are part of a rec department. For child care, you do need to u uh be register registered through the state. And with that comes changing bathrooms, uh changing entrances, uh and having the space to actually like to be able to do that. It would be

165a large upfront cost. Uh however, it would be something that would be a revenue generator for the before and after school programs and the uh childare. Every district uh outside of one uses it as a revenue generator for their recck department. Uh the school then charges rent for those spaces and that is a revenue generator then or that is an opportunity for revenue for the school district. >> Is that what we're currently doing with right at school? We charge um rent >> we get a uh a uh a little bit of the profit sharing that we have profit sharing through right at school. Am I correct on that? So, >> I really hope under your leadership that we switch to having our before and after school care at least um under our control and something

166that um like you said align with our >> what we're doing during the day with our kids so that can just continue after school with a lot of fun and play because they're still kids. >> Um but then also as a revenue generator for us. I think that that if you could get that one thing done, I would be your strongest. >> One of the things that I didn't speak on this as well is the fact that if you have a before and after school program through the recck department, you are you have the opportunity to share IEPs at a glance, which is not an opportunity that we have with right at school. Uh and so therefore, you are able to more meet the needs and services. The other thing that one of the things

167that I would want at some point I would like to have in uh TOSA Rec which we currently do not have but a lot of rec departments do is a specialist for inclusion and accessibility uh which a lot of rec departments already have. We don't have that uh and so we have to lean into uh some experts uh who are not part of our department uh when it comes to meeting the needs of individuals. Uh and so some of our aids uh during the school year will work as substitutes one-on- ons during the summer uh to meet the needs of a student and they don't even know exactly what those needs are. >> Yeah. Any other questions? >> Yeah. One last one was both the JK and the the AM and PM summer programming. >>

168Yes. >> This is probably the hot one through I think all sides of the town. Yeah. Uh but how do we increase that or find ways in the planning uh for our magical summer adventure club especially? >> Yes. >> Um we have been highly well we've been completely unsuccessful in our household to even >> navigate or figure that one out. Um and we're not alone. No, >> but I know a lot of people um expanding that somehow to as many places and have the opportunity because we do when we talk about revenue generation we have and I'd be curious that in your studies and the research there >> surveying and finding out how much money walks out of Waos in the summers that goes elsewhere because we have been a part of that that let's

169serve and YMCA we used for years >> the last couple we've used the right at school camps that have been >> something they're here >> y >> but when you ask the kids you go new things. We lack some of those things where it's like if we went out to Walkashar, if we went out to the one that we I know we're losing a lot of of our resident students going out to Brookfield Walkaw to that good good times >> good camp good times. It's all that talk now because people can't or have to figure out those things so so early in advance for Minani and these other ones that also fill up and the rec department becomes kind of that last ditch effort hope. >> Yeah. >> If you know that you're not going

170to get something. Yeah. or you opt out like we did, you know, for half the summer. We did summer school and then it becomes >> we'll just do nothing because adults have to work. But there's no other programming unless you're going to send your kids outside of your community, which I'd love to see ways where we could keep our our students or youth of all levels >> in the district. >> So, one of the ideas that I that I have that I' just been floating with our team is if we did do a before and after school, we took that over, those would be full-time staff. They need something to do, right? Uh and so therefore we could have those uh before and after school employees uh work during the summer at more sites and

171they would be adults uh who would be trained in being able to provide those services for summer adventure club and expand uh and which would also be able to increase our numbers at those sites or go to more sites. Uh and so that is definitely on my radar for that too. uh there's so many possibilities that could come uh with like the work that we're doing right now and and we'll have more data and information to be able to share on like where we want to go. Thank you for asking that. Any other questions? I >> think it's really exciting what you're doing. I mean I grew up in Watossa. I also worked for Sel as a young person and and Ser's own benefit, but it feels like you have really really cool ideas that

172you're just like breaking it up like um I really hope that a child care thing can also happen. I think that would be wonderful for just so many people in the community. Um, but in the meantime, I'm also grateful that you are um overseeing the right at school program. Um, my experience has been that the sites were very different and what how things were going at every site. So, if things can be more consistent at both sites, I think that will be helpful. I know some families would even pick up their kids from one site, one school, take them to a different one. I think that's really important until we can get something that we can do on our own. >> Thank you. >> I'll stop there. >> Yeah, no problem. I'm I'm really passionate

173about it and I'm really excited with the work that we're doing and it is so cool to see how energized the team is about it. uh where um it is a team that uh as I said they're small and mighty and there's a lot of times where they feel a little bit forgotten and I I I keep on being like do you know how important you all are like how much this community loves you and all the work that you do every single like single day for our kids. Uh and the nice thing that's happening is through our mission, vision and core value work uh and our um um strengthbased leadership, they're really realizing like oh we are we are different difference makers. We are we are a huge impact in the community. Uh the

174next edition of the uh next summer or next school year, the game plan would be the reconnect would be a once a month for actually families to understand uh learn what's going on as well that communication going. >> I was going to say that's that's really helpful and um knowing that well a lot of community members aren't reading the weekly emails from the schools because they don't get them. There are a lot of parents investing time in that. So just thinking about ways that you can hop on that when you do have programs that are you know could use more enrollment. My experience is that typically it's hard to get into the programs but >> but the more people know like what's the date and you know what are some of the things coming up.

175One of the things that besides the summer venture club is the school days off. >> Yeah. >> Um and the the recck department has done great um with this this leadership, great great um opportunities. >> Um but you have to remember >> um that they're there. I mean, it's not just the time signing up. There have been times where we had signed up. Um my kids are older now. We had signed up and then they actually questioned whether they're going to do it because they didn't have enough >> Yeah. >> kids. So I think we just that that system of getting the word out and if if parents are reading those newsletters weekly maybe just getting I mean I don't think I've seen it in the ones I read just the by line that says

176here's our link check it out. >> Well even just I think I live in Monomy Falls and one of the most exciting things is when we get our wideeyed my wife and I go around and we circle whatever we want to do. >> Glad you're going back even though I'm very much an environmentalist. I I think going back to paper has a lot of advantages. It's been really hard to read the online one. >> You know who's been the biggest pro uh supporter of it is our health department. Uh they shared early on that 25% of Watitosis 65 and older uh and so therefore they don't have access to it. Uh and they said like uh they told me my first time I met with them they go if if you bring back a like

177a a guide you will be a champion in this community. Uh and I said I'll don't know much about anything right now. This is like day four on the job, but I will find out what I can do. And then when I brought it to my uh to our team, our team's like, "Yeah, we we want to go back to that." Um and uh we're excited. Any other questions or anything I can help you all with? >> Well, thank you for this very very comprehensive report and a lot of exciting news and uh moving forward with this with this position. We wish you the best for the next couple months. We look forward to a future update. Yeah, thank you. I appreciate the opportunity. >> Okay, it's night of of updates. So, we move on

178to E referendum 2024 referendum projects progress update and thank you for being here and for quite a while you've been waiting. Thank you. >> Yeah, thank you. Good evening. Good evening everybody. Uh just quick introductions uh with me today plunket race architects. I am the managing architect and project manager for the 2024 referendum projects. >> Kurt Weeble House, uh owners representative for the district. >> So, uh last time we presented Doug and I and uh and Kurt uh was back in July. Um and we would like to start out to sort of set the stage uh just a little refresher for the group on items we discussed, terminology we used. Um and at that time you might remember we talked about the 2024 capital referendum scope of work matrix was essentially a list of problems

179right and part of the struggles we had was were to um you know our charge is to design solutions around those problems and what would guide us in that. So we explained that we were following board policy uh and there's many examples of that board policy. We shared this document with you back in July uh to essentially make sure we're supporting education. We're doing things in an efficient manner. We're accom we're providing accommodation where we don't have it now. Uh thinking about energy efficiency, uh safety improvements, um and maintaining and being fiscally responsible with the referendum dollars that were assigned. So, that refresher will lead us into a refresher in some terminology we used a lot. uh SD, DD, CD. You'll hear a lot of that as Doug and Kurt go through their portions of

180the presentation. We've talked before SD simply is schematic design. We have this list of problems. Let's combine all these problems. Have some schematic concept of how we can approach this. And then through schematic budgeting and further design development, we can uh ensure that we're reaching our target budget uh of the amount of money that was um associated to the projects. So with that um phase one progress up to date, we remember we've talked about phase the phases of projects that will occur over three years. Uh the construction documents for phase one have been completed since we last met. Uh bids were received and we're actually under in the process of analyzing those bids now so that VJS, our construction partner, can award those bids. You may have noticed that the three of us stepped out

181earlier in the meeting. It wasn't to prepare for our presentation. Uh we were actually still doing some bid last minute bid analysis. Uh so that's where we were and we apologize for vacating um phase one. A lot a lot of that work is for replacement security improvement and ADA accommodation at various schools. Currently we're targeting a majority of that work to start in the summer and be completed in time for next school year. However, we are able to identify some doors at both high schools that won't have an immediate impact on operations during the day and we could we could um begin those doors in the spring of 26. So that all lays that phase one progress update with that. I'll uh lead to Kurt I think and go over phase two. >> All right.

182So phase two projects is Eisenhower, Madison, Roosevelt and Washington. So we're focusing on those four schools for phase two and just wrapped up the design development the DD level uh in the last month and a half or so. As part of that a lot of discussions uh with with P from the and architect side working with and talking to principles as Kevin said the referendum was a list of problems to find the best solutions. we need to get into the buildings and understand how they use the buildings. Talking to the principles, getting input from staff um is all a very important step. So that that process uh we actually just had our our wrap-up meeting with principles of those schools last week to to say here's what we heard, here's what we've drawn, uh does

183this look good? So uh things are are progressing well there. Um throughout the process as P designs our construction partners VJS they put together cost projections with the goal of we want when we ultimately do bid this out we want to be on budget right if we're going to be if we're designing something that is greater because there's more needs than we have dollars for we want to know that up upfront so we can tweak uh conversely we don't want to come in We we know there's more needs than we have dollars for. So, we want to make sure we're taking advantage of of uh the efficiencies of being in the buildings and trying to use that criteria that Kevin pointed out at the start as far as how we make decisions. Um be able

184to include as much as we can to improve these these buildings. So, that progress is going well. Um there's uh in parallel uh we are working with a roofing consultant to design three major roof projects as well. So that is uh um out or close to being out to bid. Jefferson, Washington, and Madison uh is having those roof projects designed. Uh if all comes in right, we'll do all three of them this summer. Uh but we'll we'll make the decision after bids come in whether we do two or or three of them this summer. Then the last note is uh a big portion of this project, big focus of this project was ADA um enhancements. And so, uh, as P with their expertise in codes and the ADA, um, standards, uh, reviewing and and making

185sure we're hitting those goals. And they they provided a nice deliverable as part of this first, uh, this first or second phase of work that, uh, has a map of the of the schools and shows in a graphical format that at any given building that we're going into, we'll have ADA accessibility regardless of the floor you're h you're on. So that's a a piece that we keep in the front of uh in the front of us. Phase three then uh those projects are East West uh Fiser and Jefferson. So we strategically put those projects as as phase three. So that work will primarily be 2027. Understanding and knowing the district is going through uh a planning process with their secondary schools allows us to buy a little time as that secondary schools discussions happen and

186the the various different uh options. I think we're through option K right now on those secondary schools as far as different variations of what's going to set the district up the best long term with the secondary schools. it gives us time for that discussion to happen and we have designed or we're going through the process of designing um that work. So our design development level drawings uh are expected here in February March but uh we're going to hold off on actually bidding all that until until uh late summer beginning or fall and which will allow those parallel discussions to happen. So if we if we have to adjust a little bit we can adjust along the way. So the bottom graphic just shows uh a graphical of about a third of the way through our

187our process, right? So um the planning on the heavy on the front end and we'll be getting to the fun stuff, the construction here uh coming up here in spring and summer. This slide is our financial snapshot. So, as a team, as ERRA is designing and VJS is pricing, we're constantly updating this financial snapshot so we always know where we're at. Uh, the lefthand column is our referendum number. So, um, that was at the start we allocated dollars. We knew we had a list of problems, so we didn't know exactly what those dollars were by school, but we it totaled up to 60 million. And so that was our breakdown in the lefth hand column. The right column is where we are at today. Uh so as VJS updated and progressed their uh uh budgets

188and cost projections, uh this is where we're sitting at today. This will continue to be updated. Um big milestones is bidding. So bid uh phase one has been bid uh which is a smaller package. Phase two and phase three are the larger packages. And so that's where it matters as far as where those bids come in. So this budget tracking tool gives us the decision making information uh to make adjustments. Two things I want you to take from this slide. Uh one is the dollars allocated to each building. You'll notice some of them went up, some of them went down, which is in line with the original matrix that was prior to referendum that was on the website. uh one of the things in there indicated that here's the list of problems and some of

189these dollars that we have allocated will go higher and some of them go lower by school. The second thing I want you to take away from this slide is on the overall budget standpoint, we're in really good position. U we're less than a percent off. Typically at this phase of a project where we're haven't bid it out yet, we're typically higher percentage. In fact, about a month and a half, two months ago, if I were given a presentation, it would have been we would have been closer to 10% over. Right? So, uh, you can understand that as we go through this process, we're making those decisions going back to that criteria that Kevin shared at the beginning to, uh, provide that, uh, that best information. But very pleased and this was an updated budget last

190week that we are we are remarkably close to budget. Uh, like I say, usually we are, uh, higher than that. So, be less than a fraction of a percent, we're in really good shape budget wise. Uh, last thing I'll note is on the bottom section, the funding sources. uh referendum is the major funding source of the 60 million. Uh I noted two other items out there and that's just to acknowledge that they are out there. It's too early to allocate dollars to them right now, but they are there that we'll be tracking as things progress. The first one being interest earnings. As the district borrows dollars from the from a b bond precedes, those dollars get put into a bank account that receives marginal interest. But big dollars with marginal interest ends up being something

191uh that we track and and um that we will calculate as time goes on. And then focus on energy, we're trying to take advantage of all the rebates that are available for putting energy efficient uh equipment in the buildings. And so we'll get rebates from Focus on Energy. They'll be able to reinvest in the project as well. So to address some of the questions about why are some of the projects over and why are some under um from the architectural side we look a lot at this policy 6220 the is it fiscally responsible and good for the long-term solution. So listed here are some of the examples from some of the schools on why some things are over or why some things are under. So, for example, um Eisenhower, the storage trailer that's outside the

192building, that was not noted in the original facilities report because it wasn't there at the time of the facilities report. That's obviously something that would be fiscally responsible to do something about. So, that is an ad at Eisenhower. At the same time, at Eisenhower, we found ways to make the classroom entries into all of the classrooms more efficient than tearing out walls and doors and frames and rebuilding everything just to accommodate accessibility. Um, we looked at ways to modify the existing frames and replace the doors and replace the hardware so everything is still code compliant and new without completely tearing everything apart. Um, some examples at Madison, we're doing a little bit more at Madison with windows and doors. We're completely replacing windows and we're completely replacing doors. So, that one's going to be a

193little bit over. Uh Roosevelt and Washington, both a little bit over. A lot more accessibility modifications there than originally listed in the facilities matrix. So, the facilities um matrix for the referendum had listed putting in ramps to get up to all the bathrooms that are at different floor levels. From the architectural standpoint, just not fiscally responsible. That's just a band-aid on top of a band-aid to solve a problem. The right way to do that is to remove the floors, level out the bathrooms, and provide true accessibility into those bathrooms. And we found ways to do that and to keep it within the budget. Uh Fiser and Jefferson are both a little bit over. Uh Fiser is a little bit over. There's more mechanical work in this building than originally anticipated. And Jefferson, there's a little

194bit more structural repair than originally anticipated. And again, a lot of these overages um are coming from just more efficient ways to do things. Uh I just wanted to point out that nothing is being cut because it's um just being cut. We're finding ways to do things more efficiently. And everything that's in the facilities matrix that has anything to do with ADA um or safety or keeping the occupants of the building warm, safe, and dry, that's all still included. The only things that are being even considered to be omitted are things like bleachers that aren't needed in the first place. And then at East and West high schools, um the major savings at East and West are just the economies of scale. Um I looked quick before the meeting here. East has 11 items on

195the original list and West has 25. Of East's 11 items, four of them are about bathrooms and four of them are about doors. So that's 8 out of 11. And there's 600 doors between East High School and West High School. So by finding a more efficient way to reconfigure a door to provide accessibility, multiply that times 600 times, that's why there's a significant savings for doors at East and West High School. And then the same with bathrooms. Instead of completely tearing apart a bathroom and rebuilding all of the piping just to make it because that's easy to make it accessible, um we've really dug into the existing plans and measurements and we've found where the pipes are and we've figured out how to make the bathrooms renovated using the infrastructure that's there. So just finding

196more efficient ways to do things to pay for things that um make fiscally responsible sense to do at all buildings. So, just as Doug explained, the design impact on budget, either positive or negative, there's a design impact on the classroom. Uh, a lot of good stories to tell about this process. So, the graphic I have up here right now, the photo to the right is an existing photo of a maker space at Washington Elementary. That room behind that window and those two doors is what they call a cubby room. And in those older buildings, that's most of that building, students put their quotes and their belongings on hooks and little shelves and cubbies, so to speak. So, the matrix called for replacing those cubbies. Our design process looked at, well, what if we looked at

197this differently and put lockers and cubbies in the corridors if we have room like the newer buildings have? Um, and then what that'll do is free up space in those classrooms or more, I don't know, one-on-one learning, uh, breakout areas for students and teachers to work in where you might traditionally see that in corridors happening sometimes. I I don't when I walk through I see desks with little two chairs out there. Um so we're really excited that we can provide this design solution accomplish the scope and matrix line item and make the classroom space better for the people that are in there. >> And by the way, we've talked extensively with the building principles and they're on board. Their staff's excited. it it really was a a big hit uh and a win for everybody.

198Uh lastly, um deliverables and communication in we've talked before about the referendum website has a a site that Scott Ecker uh set up for tracking expenses. You can track what was spent on what. Um there's a solutions report that will be enhanced. Right now, there's a current uh listing of all the scope of work matrix and dollars associated to it or spent on it. We're going to enhance that list, provide more columns, and this is an example of what that list will look like. So anybody from the public can go to this site discover as this document it'll be a living document as it uh goes on through the through our progress uh what year the work's occurring and and what phase it's in. And then what is our design solution? So if someone says

199I'm particularly favored for E018 on this list, I can go across the list and identify where was that project accounted for. You was it combined with another project or done solely by itself. Uh and lastly uh as we talk more and more about ADA and accessibility, when we looked at our ADA compliance strategy and how we how we attack providing compliance in an equitable way throughout all the buildings. We're we keep a document right now um that if asked we can show the strategy of how we deployed accessible restrooms throughout a facility. And that's important because we're not just saying, well, if you're at this end of the building, you have to go to the other end for your accommodation. We've distributed that accommodation throughout the facility and we live by these um floor plans

200that can demonstrate that >> and that's all we have for the update today. >> Great for questions if anybody has any. >> Very comprehensive. Thank you so much for being here and giving us the most recent update. >> Welcome. Thank you. That's pretty impressive that 32,000 on a budget of 16 million. That's that's that's impressive. Yeah. >> Nice. >> This team meets uh weekly. >> How often do you meet? >> You know, I've seen them on. >> Yes. >> Every time. >> You meet often. Let's just put it that way. say on an average I'm in a meeting with either Doug or Kirk or BGS team at least eight hours a week some some correspondence >> I've been they keep Mr. Eker and I up to date um I I we made it a point

201because we heard a lot of feedback from the 2020 or the 2018 referendum of people really wanting more information online. Uh, I think Kevin referenced Scott's uh, site where you can legitimately track the spending as it's moving on. The feedback we received from the community was people wanted to they wanted more transparency. We've provided them. Um, and but I just want to thank the diligence of this team that's in front of you because um, these gentlemen, they're here often. they're they're keeping us all up to date and uh people should feel comfortable and really secure about how their funds are being spent. The last thing I would say is that I know leading up to the 2024 referendum, there was a lot of concern from our community that we were going to live up to

202our commitment to do the ADA work. Um and I hope that you saw a lot of follow through on making sure that that's happening. We just we want to make sure that what we're doing you are aware of. Thank you, Miss Bzinski, for just highlighting. There's a lot of information here and we'll come back to you and continue to give you updates. >> Thank you very much. >> Thank you. >> So, we move to item F under this heading. action to appoint an expulsion hearing panel and alternate board meeting for the second semester >> of the 2025 2026 school year. So we have a sitting yes group but now we need to figure out who >> so this is for those that are maybe newer we do this twice a year once we do it

203in August along with the resolution for the expulsion panel and then again now for second semester we've had Jason Chris and Philip serving as semester one with Sarah as the alternate knowing there's a board election I think it would make sense to ensure the three standing are those that are not up for election >> good good suggestion so maybe not a lot of creativity here, but the alternate could be >> could be anyone. >> Okay. So, those who are not standing for election, is this something you're prepared to do? >> Yes. >> It's a heavy heavy burden. You may have forgotten that. I would I would remind everyone as well although the three individuals serve on that panel it does come back to the full board not to rehab the entire scenario but for the

204full stamp of approval from the board as well. So you're not absent a decision here. >> Thank you. >> Uh I'm just it just struck me yeah through what the selection year could mean. So >> great. I like working with you guys. But yes, I'm fine being on there. >> So, we need a fourth >> alternate. I can >> I'll be the alter. >> You want be alternate? Okay. So, now we need uh Jason, your name's next to it. Um would you like to >> Sure. >> read the motion. Uh, it is recommended that the school board appoint an expulsion hearing panel of Sarah Brzinski, Chris Bower, and Heidi Bach with an alternate of Liz Hammer Roman for the second semester of the 202526 school year and ISO move. >> May I have a second?

205>> Second. >> Thank you, Mr. Bower. Miss Summers, please call the role. Miss Prosinski, >> yes. >> Mr. Bower, >> yes. Miss Bach, >> yes. >> Mr. Morris, >> yes. >> Miss Rolland, >> yes. >> Dr. Worley, >> yes. >> Mr. Wadier, >> yes. >> The motion carries. >> Okay. So, school board members, it's a long night. We still have um a closed meeting. Um but we want to do the the second readings. I did have it recommended that um under the first readings, if there are ones that we have a need to get done, we should do that. Um, so Mr. Pinion may have a opinion on that when he comes back, but we have our second reading to do first. I'm just queuing it up so you can think about it. Um, so

206the second reading, uh, we have one item, um, which is policy 5460, graduation requirements. You had, um, some updates based on requests or discussion at the last time this came up on our agenda. And then there's a second document with a rationale for changes in the middle school. Um, is there anything before we have discussion, is there anything that those who prepared the documents wanted to say policy committee or Dr. Marvel? >> I'll go ahead and jump in. um uh a couple aside from um the mathematics conversation of um why we would be looking to not no longer have middle school students attain credit. Um, I just want to also point out for the board the small additional detail um underneath the physical education credits um when we're talking about um students participation in organized

207activities um to be able to utilize the um opt out option that's in board policy and so that we can have greater breath of um students that might not engage in an organized school-based activity um but they are engaged in like speed skating or gymnastics or things of that nature that aren't sponsored by the school that they have access to um go through the process to be able to opt out. So, I just wanted that was something that hadn't come up in conversations before and is a is a recommended change. Um, in light of the conversation around removing the opportunity for middle school students to attain credit, you have the accompanying um, document that has the three most salient um, rationale for that. one being um right now the way that we have it structured

208a lot of I shouldn't say a lot but I should say about 35% of students that are accessing our accelerated pathway are quote unquote getting math out of the way and not fulfilling um a full high school careers worth of mathematics when they have demonstrated a um a a a high a higher interest or desire in mathematics. Um, one of our other opport or one of our other requirements as a school district is to ensure that our students are set up for post-secary success, whether that is on post um on entric exams or fulfilling their math requirement once they get to um a college or a university level. And by having students remain in a math pathway until they graduate, we set them up to better successfully not be a part of a remedial math

209course at the university level. Um, and despite continued um, communication with families, there's still lack of clarity for our students and our families that they are um, accessing uh, high school courses in the middle school. And by removing that high stakes um opportunity, uh removing that high stakes, we can still support our students that are accessing high school level courses in a safer space where there's um opportunity to learn from mistakes and continue to mature um and there's no high stakes repercussion for not performing as optimally as possible. Um I would just want to also say that with our revised pathway that the board approved uh two months ago now um we we have shifted the acceleration point from making that decision from fifth to sixth grade from and now that acceleration point is shifted

210from 10th to 11th grade. Um, and I want to also reiterate that um, we will still have earlier acceleration options when a student's data suggests that their math learning needs to be supported differently and that will be from fourth to sixth grade and then seventh grade to integrated one. So, we'll still have those different opportunities. um yet I don't anticipate it being as large of uh of a need because we have shifted that choice acceleration point from that sixth grade to 11th grade. So the and something that stood out to me is this idea of students we have a number of students who stop taking math after 10th grade. >> Yes. Yes. >> And and We want to encourage students to be take and they can do that because they're getting one of their high

211school math credits currently at the middle school level. And so then when students are taking some high high assessments, they're further removed from math instruction. and in fact at a disadvantage. >> Yep. I will also say that we also have students that are done after their freshman year because they have earned um high school credit both as a seventh grader and as an eighth grader currently. Now, this proposal is not going to interrupt any student that's currently on a >> right >> in a on a middle in currently in middle school or high school. Um but yes, that is currently happening or we have students that are completing their math requirements at freshman year. Um and our students that are accelerated have already skipped over a lot of really strong foundational learning with middle school

212math. When we think about um Miss Weber was here a couple months ago talking about the importance of middle school mathematics because the ACT is composed quite a bit of the pre-alggebra and algebra learning. So they would be far removed when we start thinking about taking the ACT as sophomores or excuse me as juniors. Any other comments or questions? Okay. >> Okay. So, >> it is recommended that school board approve policy 5460, graduation requirements, and I so move. >> May I have a second? >> Thank you, Miss Buff. >> Uh, Miss Summers, please call the RO. >> Miss Bzinski, >> yes. >> Mr. Bower, >> yes. >> Miss Bach, >> yes. >> Mr. Morris, >> yes. >> Miss Heimer Rand, yes. Dr. Worley, >> yes. >> Mr. Wier, >> yes. The motion carries. So, from

213a time standpoint, um committee andor, um staff, uh do you have particular ones that we should um focus on tonight? Because there's upcoming need for those policies to move through the system a little faster. >> No urgency on any of the policies in the 5000s from my perspective. >> Okay. With the pleasure of the board, would you like to move through a couple of these so that we're not pushing the entire group off? Um, so maybe we do five unless takes too long. Sorry. >> I would suggest that we do five and check in. >> Okay. Yeah. Policy committee, um, what do you have for us tonight? The first policy, policy 53 10.0 1, um is the emergency nursing services plan. Um >> I can help you out. >> Yeah. And it's been done along

214with our >> Yeah, this is a new policy required by law. um it does reflect our current practices for emergency nursing services. >> I just had one question. I wasn't able to find this. Um I couldn't find I found a lot of comments but not a lot of agreement online and that was whether um an APN or an APRN advanced practice nurse to serve as a medical um advisor. It might be that it's our state that's not possible. Um, I saw a variety of different um, practices, but just putting that out there that if if that was an option in Wisconsin, it might be something that um, we might want to consider. Many of us go to see advanced practice nurses um, for medical. >> I'll have our nursing team check. >> Yeah, it's worth

215checking. I I just I could see that there's a variation on what states allow or not. >> Okay. Okay. Anyone else comments or questions? Okay. So, um I guess just with I put that comment on there. Um it'll go back to the committee. Um and I mean again I have to follow the legal guidance. So I think if it's clear than the legal legal guidance that we couldn't do that um then it seems like it would go to consent. Um but if that's unclear then maybe it comes back for a second reading. >> Okay. Okay. Next is letter 5730. >> Yep. >> This is access for non-dist sponsored student clubs and activities. um made some minor grammatical and language changes to this and um it's basically about um blogs or activities that would be happening

216during the school day that are not sponsored by the school. Um these are kind of rare cases. they would have to be happening during non-educational hours. Um, and students have to get parent permission to go to these activities. In our schools, if it was like a split lunch period, would that be the half that someone was in there assigned to? That would be their non-educational. Okay. Comments or questions? Seeing none, uh, it should probably go to consent agenda unless something comes up. >> Yep. >> 5751. >> All right. 5751 is full age parent and married static of students. This is just kind of a replacement and um update. Going along with Wisconsin state law. >> Again, I remind you those who don't come very often, what's crossed out when and it says the word option

217is not something we're taking out. It's something that we are opting not to put in. >> Correct. >> Language items. Yeah. All right, that's three. Um, the fourth one, parents, student parent rights. Um, but, uh, this had some, it's a new policy. We change some of the language to reflect our district values. Saying that parents have the rights um students have right to the education and parents have rights to know what's going on in their students education. This is also guided by state statute. >> What do we legally need to have in place? Yeah. Any questions or comments or recommendations? Okay. Seeing them >> five830 student fundraising. This is also updated for legal compliance. Make any changes to it. comments questions. So again, this would go for to the consent agenda unless something comes up

218or we can All right. Okay. Okay. Can we stop there? >> Yeah. Three left. >> You want to do three more? >> A lot of these were tied when when policy is tied directly to state is not a lot. There's there's less. >> It's good for us to know and for the community to know that we have these policies. >> Yeah. >> Okay. So 5840 um 5840 new policy about student groups. Um students have the right to organize but the those boards those groups need to be recognized by the school. Um, again, this goes to some some state statute legal precedences, legal stuff. >> One question I have on this student group one, it just popped on me and I had to look it up really quick. There >> approved by the administ the let's

219see, school administration needs to be an approved group here and I think is there are there any guard rails or this is new in there on the types of groups in here? I know we have some things left in here, but recently hearing this news here with the Turning Point, the high school program over at Arrowhead has drawn a lot of different things of of people just thinking about other things that they might want to see at our schools. >> I I think that's a benefit of all Tulsa. I think that's a hallmark of who we are. I think when children, young people say they want to organize and become a group, there there's a process. I see Mr. P. I have to add and um there's laws governing this as well from a standpoint

220of what you can and are not allowed to prohibit. I could use the example of 10 years ago Germantown refusing to have a GSA that was violating law. So it is also not only how to find in policy but there's guidelines for us to follow >> but there's an approval structure and that's what we're outlining here. >> Good question. >> Okay. production of goods and services. The section at the bottom that has to do with student intellectual property is an addition or the title student intellectual property is an addition just to highlight that. that that part exists. We're not just talking about physical goods. We're also talking about the ideas. >> Thank you. >> The last one is 580 public performances by students. This is an update of an old policy. >> Yep. Just outlining

221specifications for students putting on performances. >> And how timely that we had our our uh directors here this earlier this evening while they're doing Spongebob and Hello Dolly in the the spring. I would say I'm really proud of our theater programs for taking on some really challenging topics this fall. Um, and this policy govern a lot of the conversations that Dr. Hansen and uh the social emotional health specialists at West and Mr. G worked with um Mr. Stefen at West. >> Don't see any questions or changes being requested. So, so I can wrap up reads. We have just the one that needs a little bit of potential research. >> Legal will be >> I know you are. >> Okay. Thanks for taking the time to get through that. >> Okay. much anticipated group back there

222gets >> for governance strategic plan update number one. >> Well, good evening everybody. I'm Jenny Foch, the director of strategy and continuous improvement. And in accordance with board policy 0123, the board adopted a strategic plan in August of 2025, which stamped our vision, mission, values, theory of action, and goals for Wawaossa through the 2728 school year. Tonight marks the first of three presentations designed to give the board and our community an update on the strategic plan. This update is aligned with the board's accountability and oversight of the strategic plan and in accordance with its policy governance structure. And tonight I'm joined by my colleagues who comprise the executive leadership team here in TOSA. >> They're here. >> Still here. >> All right. We'll begin with just a brief overview of the plan itself. Uh the

223vision for our district is to ensure an exceptional and equitable learning experience for all. The board's mission lays the foundation for how we can approach the work. While our theory of action places the onus on the adults operating within our system to engage in continuous improvement so that our students achieve better outcomes. The strategic plan itself consists of the three priority areas of systems and structures, instruction and leadership and culture. And there are two goal statements aligned in each priority area. Okay, we are using the same process logic model format as our Wawaossa school growth plans and each priority area and its goals were fleshed out in terms of the resources, activities, outputs, and metrics that support the goals. So, for example, in order to support the priority area of instruction and leadership, time for

224planning and professional learning are the cornerstones of that work. This allows for our educators to engage in collaborative structures such as pace and improve their instructional practices. The interim metrics were identified as measurable student outcomes that correlate with the end of plan measures. The area of systems and structures is supported by our academic and career planning efforts and our operating budget. And the area of culture, like previous areas, is also supported by professional learning and our staffing plan. The response to the academic and career planning audit and our commitment to maintaining low class size will help our educators to respond to student data and improve the overall employee experience. The outcomes aligned to this area represent a mix of both student and staff data. And at this time I will turn it over to our

225chiefs who are going to go through how each of their divisions are supporting the plan. So academic performance aside from uh curricular materials the greatest resource that we allocate to the organization in the division of academic performance is time for professional learning. We gather as professional educators for three different purposes to build capacity to build coherence andor to build community. depending upon the purpose, capacity, coherence or community also depends upon the specific activity that is leveraged from instructional coaching to PACE as we've heard um a or to specific learning events as a result of the merit of different activities accessed by educators. For example, the read plus framework is alive and well throughout our elementary English language arts classrooms supporting student literacy development. Discourse is an instructional cornerstone that is prevalent in ele elementary through

226high school classrooms, ensuring that students are carrying the cognitive load and small group instruction that focuses on targeted differentiation to support the unique learning needs of students is also visible in classrooms. While there are many more visible outputs as outlined on these slides, these are three of the most omniresent in service of continued student growth and achievement. And as it relates to the division of people and family supports within the goal areas of both systems and structures and school culture, we'll leverage the named resources you see on the slide to further advance our ongoing ACP goals, which were framed and really structured out based on the ACP audit we had conducted last school year out of our office. As a result of the named activities you're seeing here, um there will be increased clarity and

227consistency of academic and career planning services, supports, and opportunities for all students. Of particular note is the support and services resulting from a position that was added in 2223 to further support our students with disabilities post-secary planning. Specifically, the transition coordinator is attending every IEP for 9th and 11th grade students to support post-secary transition planning, connect to community resources, and ensure thoughtful planning and preparation for students goals. The identified interim metrics and end of year outcomes that that we monitor are complements to the academic data to present a more robust picture of student growth. >> Mr. Eker had to leave this evening, but I'll be taking his slides and spot. >> You're up. >> Thank you so much. I think board members in the community should uh take solace in that Mr. Eer has demonstrated

228a level of transparency uh that we have not seen in our school system. The updates that are happening at the finance and resource uh meetings that are then followed up here at the board level uh has given the community would like to track and get accurate information about our financial state uh in real time. Um the updates that you've heard this evening around the recreation department and our updates around the referendum are uh are really guided by the feedback we've received from individuals who want to see greater transparency. Um we want to thank our our committee uh that leads um the finance and resource committee at the board level. Uh I think they have really allowed us to sharpen what we are able to do. I would like to also rec uh just recognize and

229remind the board that we are still being audited self audited u by CISA 5 I believe it is um that they're checking our our internal uh work and in addition to the statemandated um audit that will be produced to you at the second January meeting for all by all indications we are in a very healthy place financially. Thank you, Miss Fch. >> Miss Alzas. >> The work of the division of human resources is focused on maximizing impact maximizing the impact of our largest cost center staffing through the systemization of our operating budget and staffing plan. Intentional alignment of our employee salary systems. Development of thoughtful enrollment projections. Application of consistent class size ranges. effective hiring practices and employee feedback structures like our WA negotiations, meet and confirm meetings, human resources, building visits, and continued engagement

230of our compensation workg group all contribute to the outputs that we are looking for in the areas of salary investments, empowering and informing our employees. Y next, we're going to move to the interim metrics and these are metrics that we have available at multiple points in the school year. They were identified to be indicators of progress towards our endofear outcomes. Not all of the data points are yet available given where we are in the school year, but nonetheless, we still have a pretty good pulse on where we are at this point. In terms of instruction and leadership, sorry, this is not slide deck. In terms of the instruction and leadership, we are seeing a strong start with respect to students literacy skills, particularly in terms of the low percentage of students at risk on oral

231reading fluency and the percentage of students at or above the 50th percentile on um oral reading fluency, letter naming fluency, and the letter word sounds fluency. Educator effectiveness observation data reflects the highest observation rate we've had in the last three years. So that means our evaluators are in classrooms and engaging our educators in the cycles of ob observation and feedback. It should be noted that grade data and intervention data will be available at the February report. Grades are also posted at semester. So they will be available in February as well. And the first cycle of intervention is wrapping up just before the winter break. So that's why those data points are not yet available. With respect to systems and structures, we are on track with our referendum work and you've heard about a lot more

232in detail about that tonight. And our budget having adjusted for the increase in cost of benefits and the recreation department's winter season registration numbers reflect an increase in participation as well. And I know Mr. Martin gave you a much more thorough update tonight in terms of our culture metrics. Sorry, I'm trying to center this. In terms of the area of culture, our employee attendance, student attendance, and retention of effective teachers are truly celebrations. Student attendance has increased over the last year thanks to diligent efforts to adhere to policy and procedure, and our retention of effective educators already exceeds our goal of 90%. As we transition to the end ofear outcomes, I just want to ensure that we're all on the same page with respect to what we mean by end of the year outcomes. These

233were outcomes identified as goals to be achieved really at the end of our entire plan, but we know that we can measure them on an annual basis. And as a reminder, our plan ends in the 2728 school year. The populated data in this report represents the 2425 data, which is our baseline data. So we know where we're starting from. So those these are meant to be just the starting points. They're not indicative of a measure as a measure of progress at this point. It's simply our baseline. When we review 2526 data in August of 2026, we'll be able to determine whether we're on track to meet our goals and what adjustments might need to be made moving forward. And the board can expect to see every August updated data for the end of a school

234year. The metrics here represent data aligned to instruction and leadership. It's worth noting that while the goals related to academic and career planning are aligned to our systems and structures and culture priority areas, the student-based outcomes are also indicative of academic and career planning efforts. Systems and structures also has a mix of student data, operational data and ACP work. And our last set of culture data represents student and staff behavior such as office diff disciplinary referrals for students and attendance for our students and staff. And I know before uh the board engages in any discussion or poses some questions for our team uh Dr. Means wanted to offer a few closing remarks. >> Thank you Miss Fch. Before we conclude I want to pause and acknowledge the extraordinary leadership and the coordination behind this work.

235Uh want to first start by thanking Miss Fch. Her thoughtful and tireless leadership in guiding this development in this uh strategic plan and the corresponding school growth plans has been remarkable. Her academic rigor, the strategic thinking, attention to analytics, commitment to coherence across all of our schools has been instrumental in building a structure that I believe makes your governance of the district stronger. I'd like to also recognize Miss Lindsay White in the back. uh she waved earlier. Why don't you wave again? Maybe you weren't in the room when that happened. Uh but her data analy analytics team has really been unsung. Uh I think many of you receive the monthly updates that I provide to the board. I think the the level of complexity and sophistication and the data that allows us to have this

236type of strategic plan um in no small part goes to Miss White and her team. I want to thank their team for their timely, accurate and actionable data that um is also provided to school principles to make sure that the the running of our schools is really strong. Uh this first update reflects a transparent, strategic and highly disciplined approach to district improvement. Uh what you see is not a collection of disconnected initiatives. is a strategic framework that aligns classroom instruction, leadership development, operational planning, and organizational culture around a clearly defined outcome for students and staff. Simply stated, the strategic plan and school growth plans again you'll have the second half of those school growth plans presented to you this Wednesday uh have been built that have been built in a way that represents a comprehensive

237analytic coh cohesive continuous improvement instructional structure. We should be proud of the progress that this structure already represents not only in the early data that shows progress but also the organizational clarity, coherence, and accountability it brings to every level in the system. I invite our community to visit our district website to review school growth plans and to continue to follow the the goals and the the progress that we're making with the strategic plan. Our next strategic plan update takes place on February 23rd uh when we will be able to share deeper instructional data including grade and intervention metrics and further refine our understanding of how our collective efforts are translating in measurable gains for our students. We're excited not only for the progress that we've been seeing and achieve, but also the opportunity to continue

238to share the meaningful growth in future updates as this plan enhances student achievement, strengthens our organizational systems, and elevates our excellence across the district. Thank you for the partnership and again, Miss Fotch and our entire leadership team, thank you for your leadership. I appreciate you all. board members comments or questions is incredibly comprehensive. >> Yes. Yes. And yes, Dr. M, you said three words there and I'm just curious uh the level of data, complexity, and sophistication that goes into this. Do you see this level amongst our peers in other districts that have I know they don't have Lindsay White, so because I'm a data person, I like that stuff really that it's pretty. But when people often ask all the money that we spend and all the money we invest and all the things that

239we do and Fiser and administration when we have this other districts don't have this this is not a standard this DPI doesn't have this the state doesn't have this I just want people to understand like to have this the outcomes that we're working toward the strategic plan that the work that goes into it that this team is doing this is not a normal this is somebody this is what districts that are as you always say the the lighouses out there. This is what they do. This is not status quo. This is not everybody has this. We're just spending a lot of money on it. >> Miss Botch and I in preparation, you probably could tell we were we're reading from our script and and uh as we were preparing our script, I had a I

240had a comment in there. So, I'm going off script now. That's why Miss Fouch is looking at me the way she is. Um but I wanted to say that I haven't seen this anywhere else. What I would just encourage anyone who is interested, go out to other school districts websites and you can look at their strategic plan and then look at ours. And I I would just stop there. Um I don't want to be disparaging towards other districts, but I would just encourage people if you want to do the research, do so. The other thing, Mr. Morris, if you don't mind, I I know you didn't go down this road, but I'll I'll I'll go there. I think there has been a lot of talk about what the board does and what the board doesn't

241do. I believe our job is to position you to be the very best board you can be. So I would encourage anyone to go out to their other neighboring school systems and see how often school principles are bringing their school growth plans to the board on a semianual basis. That happens here in Wal Tulsa. So you do have governance. You know what's happening. Um, when I considered your your walkthroughs in our buildings, your your you've drilled down to each school growth plan and we're giving you interim metrics on our strategic plan. Um, I I'm proud of the people that are in the room. This is um, yes, there's a lot of talk about Fiser and what Fiser is. And when I consider where Fiser was when I arrived and where we are now, it is

242light years. So, I'm I'm very u humbled to work with the team. >> Okay. Thank you very much. Thanks for your time. >> Thank you. >> Okay. our uh legislative advocacy committee um brought brought this to uh uh discussion last meeting and there were some comments from the community um and from the board that led to some requests for changes and now the um LAC has worked on that and has brought it back for us to take a look at. So you have it how it would read with the changes integrated and you also have it redlinined. >> That's correct. >> So thank you for for all that work. Do you want to share anything? It's part of our discussion. Should we have the discussion and then put it >> on? >> I think technically

243I we should put it as a motion first. >> Do a motion first. Okay. >> It is recommended that school board approve the resolution on cost of vouchers in the local tax bill. And I so move. May I have a second? >> Second. >> Okay. >> Excellent. Thank you. Um yeah, so uh as Dr. Worley pointed out, you have the dirty version, the red line version, and then the clean version. Um pending all of the conversation that we had uh from the community, the a handful of interested constituents who offered various uh suggestions. I took most of them uh and integrated them in some way, shape or for or form in that um and passed uh uh by Mr. Morris uh to make sure that um we were in alignment. Uh and then that produced

244the clean version. Um we have not heard from that group of individuals uh this time around. So I assume that we are more or less in agreement. Um, again, I appreciate them. Uh, they did not come out and say, "I don't like this plan." They said, "I like this plan. Let's make it better." Uh, which is exactly what I would hope. Uh, that's the type of engagement that we should all hope for. Um, this week, uh, as the clean versions were promoted, we got some engagement from, uh, the people that this will go to, which is excellent. Uh again, not saying that uh this idea is bad, but um either pointing out some of the tactical challenges that the city will face, which is great. Happy to work with them on that. Uh happy to

245figure out what sort of solutions exist. Um or other ways to even improve it even more. Um that said, I think it is fine as is just to get into their hands so that they can start working on it in 2026. I have no intention or expectation that they have it done this year. That would be absurd. Um that said, uh very likely if we were to have passed this today, um I would expect that we would start working on it in January. like I have no intention of giving it going at this point um this for this year. Um I think that captured all of the things I needed to point out. Mr. Morris, if you have anything in addition to that room, lovely. Um so I'll stop talking now. >> Where's questions? So

246what you're saying is this this will tee off a conversation. That's right. Right. So, so if we're comfortable, even though we've had a couple other suggestions come in, if we're comfortable with how it is now, we understand that the city might >> end up writing it somewhat differently. We're trying to kick off the process. >> Correct. So, I mean, this is just a resolution. This is a statement of our belief. Uh, so this will go over to uh city hall and it'll be like, "Hey, the school board thinks this. They can do anything they want based off of this, right?" Um the our shared constituencies can do anything they want with this. Um this is just a statement of our belief. So how this will look in the end, I have no idea. I mean

247I have the tax bill from or an example tax bill from Green Bay, which is the only other district that I'm aware of that has accomplished something like this to date. Um so I have that example. happy to uh share it with our friends over at uh city hall or any of you for that matter. Um it might look like that. It might look totally different. It's all going to be an interesting conversation. >> Well, um not seeing it. Is that a sound question? That's okay. Just checking as a teacher. This could mean things. this community. Um then uh I would ask Miss Summers to please call the role. >> Miss Brazinski, >> yes. >> Mr. Bower, >> yes. >> Miss Bach, >> yes. >> Mr. Morris, >> yes. >> Miss Rolland, >> yes. >>

248Dr. Worley, >> yes. >> Mr. Wadier, >> yes. >> And the motion carries. Thank you. um to the LAC. We now are um at that long anticipated moment of the evening where we are going to offer um a adjournment. The um time is 9:42 p.m. May have a motion to adjourn into executive close session. It is recommended that the school board adjourn into closed session pursuant to Wisconsin statute 1985 PRES one closed PR C closed PR consideration of employment promotion compensation or perform performance evaluation data of any public employee over which the governmental body has jurisdiction or exercises responsibility specifically to consider and discuss the superintendent's midyear evaluation and ISO move. >> May I have a second? >> Second. >> Thank you, Mr. Bowers. >> Miss Hmers, please call the role. >> Miss Bzinski? >>

249Yes. >> Mr. Bower? >> Yes. >> Miss Faul? >> Yes. >> Mr. Morris? >> Yes. >> Miss Hammer Rollins? >> Yes. >> Dr. Worley? >> Yes. >> Mr. Wy? >> Yes. >> The motion carries.