2026-1-20 Board of Education meeting

001Good evening. I'll call the Germantown School District Board of Education meeting to order at 7:45. I apologize for the delay uh as our finance meeting welldeservedly uh went over. Uh some great content. Please check that out if you're interested in school funding. Um, at this time I'll ask you to rise for pledge of allegiance if you're able and a brief moment of silence. >> To the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Item 1 A, official meeting notification. Dr. Reutder. >> Public notice of all meetings has been given by communication from the superintendent's office to the public to those news media who have requested such notices and to the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, Northwest Now, Express News,

002and Westbend Daily News. Public notice has also been posted in schools throughout the school district and on the Germantown School District website. >> Thank you. B roll call >> here. here. >> Brown >> here. >> Barney is here. Loath >> here. >> Pollock >> here. >> Tig Botham >> here. >> Voyer >> here. >> Thank you. Item two, approval of agenda. >> Motion to approve the agenda. >> Second. >> Uh that is second. And any discussion? >> Hearing none. All in favor? >> I. >> Any opposed? Hearing none. The agenda passes. Item three, reports. We have a district administrator update. Dr. Reutder. >> Thank you, Mr. Eward. Uh January has begun. We're back in uh finals week this week and the semester ends at the conclusion of this week. Friday or Monday we had off

003an observance of Martin Luther King Day and Friday we have a grading day for all teaching staff. No student day. Um please uh those viewing at home and in the audience just uh still continue to look for district communication even though we don't have school. there are wind chill advisories that exceed the uh the limitation for schools being open which could impact our Friday night um co-curricular schedule. So please be aware of that um and continue to look for communications as other schools might be cancelling school entirety uh as they have school. Um this evening I'd like to recognize as it is the start of second semester next week we will have early graduates at the high school level. So, I'd like to read those names for um public recognition as they will also most

004likely be a part of our commencement ceremony at GHS this spring. Um Kaylee Kunits, Jonah Khan, Nora Balls, Sydney Wagner, Zachary Gasper, and Janica Walker. Congratulations on early graduation and um we look forward to hearing about what you do this second semester in your the workforce or or college. So, congratulations. Additionally, I've asked Mr. Bell and Mr. Stone to uh present next month about the Spain trip to uh for the band to Madrid. I don't know about you as board members. I know a few of you have been on emails I've received from uh family members just what an awesome experience it was. I've heard from Mr. Bell and Mr. Stone as well as students um here at GHS. It sounds like it was a great trip. So, they will uh representatives of obviously our

005teaching staff and the band as well as parents are going to come and talk about that experience. As you're aware, there was only a few hiccups with travel back with delayed flights and I think that's become a customary when you travel now. Anyway, so more about that next month. Um, tonight we have many presentations and I apologize to our presenters. As we said, our finance committee went long this evening. Um, Amy Bell is here. Miss Chandelia has brought some teaching staff and students to talk about the great things going on at Amy Bell. Uh, Mr. Marian is here in the audience. He'll be presenting a communications update and some of the work that's going on there. And then uh Mr. Shriber and Mr. Gascal are here to present with Mr. Mizak and I on curation

006of our library and selection of materials. So a lot of great presentations about the hard work going on [snorts] um from our staff and students this evening. And then the only other thing is u those viewing at home as well as the board you're aware um and Mr. Marion will touch on this in his presentation this tonight. There's a lot of great social media posts going out promoting um not only the good things going on in our schools, but um as far as educating our financial series, which was part of tonight's fi uh finance meeting, that a reason it went long. Those clips have been um curated and are out on our YouTube channels and pushed out through social media to learn more about how school district finances are operated and run. as well as

007we put out a uh a flyer with general information and social media that can be linked back to our district website for all taxpayers on how to read your tax bill to better understand where your dollars are going to from a school and a municipality standpoint. And then my favorite pieces are our Gtown Today series. We have teachers interviewed. We have a lot of kids being interviewed as well as we've done uh updates around act 20 and the work the district's doing related to um the reading bill that passed and our work getting ahead of the curve on that work our social workers are doing as well as um other roles within the district. So those are pumped out every Thursday or so. Mr. Marion will speak more to that but a lot of great

008things going on in the district and we're trying to show that as well as educate along the way. So tune in. That's what I have this evening. >> Fantastic. Thank you. 3B student representative report. Welcome. >> Hello. Um, nice to see you guys again. My name is Uma Gradi. I'm the senior class president. And I'll just get into it. So, Germantown High School students start their semester 1 exams today. Following two more days of exams, students will have a long break while teachers wrap up grading and prepare for the start of second semester. Winter sports are in full swing and we are seeing tremendous growth and success from our student athletes. We are also excited for the next National Signing Day in February to celebrate all of the Warhawks who intend on continuing their athletic

009careers at the collegiate level. We want to congratulate our very own Marcus Harris, a Spanish teacher here at GHS, who has been recognized by the Wisconsin Education Association as an outstanding educator award winner. He will be recognized during the Wisconsin Badgers men's basketball game versus UNCC USC, sorry. Lastly, congratulations to all of our students who were able to participate in the band's trip to Madrid over winter break. Thank you to Mr. Bell and Mr. Stone, as well as all of the parent volunteers and chaperones that helped make this trip a reality. It was awesome to see our students skills displayed on a global level. Kennedy students are scheduling for next school year already. This month, sixth and seventh graders will be selecting courses for the coordinated arts elective classes, and eighth graders will be selecting

010for all 9th grade classes. We have had high school teachers and students come to KMS to share their awesome programs to start getting our eighth graders excited. Teched and German are both coming this week. KMS, where the K also stands for kind. We are always focused on being kind to each other. At the end of every announcements, Mrs. Gearan says, "Here at KMS, the K stands for kind. So be kind to each other. Keep your hands to yourself and listen to your teachers. Make it a great day, Crusaders. The choice is yours." to support our goal to be kind. Last month, we had a guest speaker come talk to all our grade levels about being kind and reaching for your goals. His message included a challenged a challenge to be that a special person who

011stands up for another student being bullied. While he teaches, he also shows us tricks on his BMX bike. He's super cool and the kids loved him. Matt Wilhelm is a BMX flatland rider and motivational speaker. He is known for his fast spinning and aggressive riding style. He is a three times exgame medalist, world championship silver medalist, twotime United States national champion, and Guinness World Record holder. At KMS, we have so many ways to get involved. Research shows that getting involved in something outside of regular regular classes can help students improve school skills, learn a lot, and make new friends. Just this week, we have Lego lunch with Mr. Seventh and eighth grade girls volleyball triyouts, student council, future city, hosa, forensics, musical rehearsal, homework club, basketball, wrestling, math counts, ski and snowboard club, young writers

012club, FBA, media club, yearbook club, Midtown AC capella group, and woodwwind choir. Wow, there's that's a lot to get involved in. Crusaders County Line has had a busy and exciting month. After returning from winter break, our students jumped right back into learning. Here are just a few highlights from around the building. Second grade students are working hard on applying f phonics to decode and spell words, including vowels, prefixes, suffixes, and irregular spellings, and they are showing great growth. Fifth grade students are wrapping up the DARE program and celebrating their graduation from this important learning experience with Officer Locks. A big thank you to Officer Locks and the Germantown Police Department for their continued support. Please save the date for March 6 for our byianual county line PTA action event with our board and community members.

013This is always an exciting event and we hope to see many of you there. Check our Facebook for more information. It's been a full month and we are so proud of our Comet students and staff and the great work happening every day at Countyline. As Amy Bal returned from winter break, we beca we began our Ames web reading testing window for students in kindergarten through third grade. This assessment helps us better understand each student's reading progress and allows teachers to plan instruction that best supports continued growth. We are also excited for our fourth and fifth grade students as they prepare to take part in the battle of the books. This activity encourages a love of reading while building teamwork, comprehension, and critical thinking skills. We look forward to seeing students engage in this fun and

014academic challenge. We completed round one of Battle of the Books on Thursday, January 8th, and round two will take place within the next month. As Rockville students return from break, we are wrapping up our first semester of the school year. 4K to third graders will participate in our universal literacy screeners to monitor their progress toward growth in reading. This year, students took the MAP winter test in December. Results get will get posted in Skyward later this month. Overall, students have made considerable growth. We have a lot to be proud of. This month is all about perseverance. One way to think about perseverance is pushing yourself through challenges and obstacles. We all experience challenges in our lives. We all have moments when we feel like we can't do it or that what we want or that

015we want to give up on a big task. Happy New Year from MacArthur. We hope you had a restful and joyful winter break. As we head into January, our schoolwide theme is perseverance. And we kick things off with an all school assembly that had students fired up for this month's perseverance challenge. From now through the end of the month, classrooms will be naming, noticing, and celebrating persistence in action. It all leads up to a fun student inspired bottle flipping tournament. We're also excited to roll out new 3D printed items in [clears throat] our school store thanks to a grant supporting STEM at MacArthur. We can't wait to see what our students create in the future using this incredible new resource. In the classrooms, students have jumped right back into learning after the winter break. Kindergarteners

016are exploring the different jobs people do to help a community. First graders are finding their musical voices as they prepare for their winter concert. Second graders are digging into non-fiction texts, asking thoughtful questions using photos and captions. >> [clears throat] >> Third graders are studying the solar system, while fourth graders are comparing tenths and hundreds in math. Our fifth graders wrapped up December with a guitar and singing unit that brought 2025 to a close. Alongside all this learning, our teachers are working closely with students to complete winter assessments, which helps us understand where each child is thriving and where they may need more support. As always, we're grateful for your partnership and excited for all the growth to come in 2026. Thank you. Are there any questions? >> I don't think so. Thank you for

017coming. Thank you for providing our report. >> Have a good night. >> Uh 3C Amy Bell School presentation. Miss Chandelia and friends. >> Good evening. I'm Lizzie Chandelia, principal at Amy Bell. And with me I also have Mrs. Hearning. She is our literacy specialist. We also have u Mrs. Trish um Benston. She's one of our fifth grade teachers. And I also have Avan Walker that are going to be speaking tonight about our wind time. So I'm going to do a little bit and then you guys will be up next. Okay. All right. So um wind time which wind stands for what I need is a dedicated 30 minutes of instructional time that we have set up throughout the course of our day. So all students get a chance to experience this. Um and it's really

018a time where students can receive targeted small groupoup instruction. Um, so within uh the end of last school year and starting into this year, that's really the work that we've done as a staff is really determining what does small groupoup instruction look like within our building. So how do we look at our data? How do we provide that small group instruction? So it's really targeted and help ensure that students that have met some of those targets are ready to exceed their learning, enrich their learning, but then also look at what are some of the gaps that we're still seeing to ensure that students have the ability to get further instruction to meet those those gaps that we currently see so they can meet those standards. So when we walk into our classrooms at Amy Belt

019during wind time, one of our big goals is to see that small target group instruction throughout the day. So the teacher meeting with that small group, but then you think about when you're a teacher, you don't just have a small group with you. You have a whole classroom. So then also thinking about how do you plan for that wind time accordingly. So when you walk into wind time, again, you'll see that small targeted group instruction, but you also might see classwork or you also might see, you know, a student that might be revising something that they got some feedback on and they're ready to continue that learning. You might see some partner group work happening. You might see some technology through wonders. We use the adaptive um learning quite often. So students are working on

020that. And then you also might see some student directed learning. So again, we really look at enrichment as well. So opportunities where students if they've already met those standards, what are additional learning that they can do during that time to really um expand on what they're learning hopefully um enrich their experience um within their classroom and also within a small group. So kind of to talk about the planning of wind group. So, um, when we initially look at our schedule, and as you guys can all imagine, planning a schedule for an elementary building is it takes a lot of effort and a lot of collaboration. Um, so when we start to plan for a schedule, if you take a look at where our wind blocks fall, it's very strategic on where they fall because we

021don't want them to overlap with other wind blocks. So, if you look at kindergarten, they have a different wind time than first grade. And that's done strategically because not only during when are there things happening in the classroom, but we also want to make sure that students that receive um intervention support through reading or math or also speech and language support, they also can have that time dedicated so they can you or they can be um receive those services during that time and they're not missing out on classroom instruction. So we plan our our schedule very strategically. So the four non-negotiables of our scheduling really are our specials blocks, our lunch and recess, and our win times. just kind of give you a um the scheduling that T goes into, but also the strategic planning

022and the buildingwide support that we provide during win time. So when we look at wind time, because obviously we're pulling resources from wonders or various other curriculums that we utilize, we really have to look at our data first and determine what are the needs of our students so that we can use or we can use that data to really support our small group instruction during win time. So um we use a lot of data and we talked about as web, you kind of have a preview of that that we utilize. We utilize maps sometimes forward from previous years and also just classroom instruction. Um when teachers are teaching um throughout the day, they're always collecting formative data that they can use to to guide their instruction as well. But I wanted to kind of select

023one just to walk through the process. So this is based on our MAP assessment from our winter block that we took right before winter break. Um so when we kind of look through it, there's a lot of lenses you can look through with map data. So the first thing I want to show you is that school profile. So, it really allows us at the school level to really take a look at our grade levels and determine what are some trends we're seeing across grade levels. So, um this is um just a blip of fifth grade, but it kind of shows you we can we can dial down into each grade level and look at trends, whether it be that maybe um we saw some gaps in the beginning of school year, but there's some big

024growth happening and what caused that growth to really get into more conversations based at that at that 30,000 foot view. And then also, we can look at the class profile. So, if you look down, this is a class profile example. So this is what a teacher would see after their their students take the MAP assessment they could really look into how did my class score as a whole within craft and structure and then as part of our PLC work which happens once a week our teachers can really talk to each other and collaborate around did you see some really great growth with vocabulary acquisition and use what did you do to do that what did your small groups look like and what can I borrow to kind of do with my students too because I

025have some work that I want to do in that area so it really allows for a lot of collaboration use utilizing this data all right Mrs. Hernie is going to step up and she's going to talk a little bit more about data. Hello. So like Lindsay said, we are very strategic in what we do. So we look at the school profile, we look at the classroom pro profile and then we can also look like a grade level. So I took a specific example from one um classroom and we can look at the different areas where they are. You can look at math and reading at the same time or you can just look at one subject area and then each one you can go into uh grade level band of what is suggested that they

026would need at that time or what they would be working on and then you can go for the enrichment part we can go above it or we can go below it. Um we also have to work collaboratively because we share kids throughout the day and especially during that win time we have to be collaborative. I also put a mock schedule on there with some fun characters. Yes, it's just a fake one. Um to show you that it does take some planning for who gets seen when and also like how many times per week. And then this map work and yes, some other assessments also help us guide our reading plans. And technically, yes, the state does stay we say we have we need reading plans, but really technically any student in a in an informal

027way is going to have a reading plan. If I would see that a student needs something with craft and structure to me as a classroom teacher or as a reading specialist, we would work together and we would say, hm, how can we help that student get to craft and structure a little better? So technically, it's not like a official document, but it's still a reading plan nonetheless. And then if we need to we can also click on each individual student and we can click on the different CA categories on the left hand side and we can see and it gives map gives us some ideas of things that they are ready for things that they would definitely need with some support and things that they could do independently that when they're not meeting with a

028teacher they could also do those things independently because they've already mastered those skills. So, as we're stating, teachers jobs are really, really hard and they do a lot of hard work together. Um, but also knowing that our building goal and our district goal this year has been PLC. A lot of the the work when it comes to looking through your data and not just MAP, but obviously the the trove of data that we have along with the resources that we have at our disposal through the new curriculum wonders that is in our second year of adoption. It really allows during our PLC planning, which happens once a week. Um, teachers have an hour dedicated to PLC planning with their grade levels where they can really dig into what are the standards that we're trying to

029meet, how do we know that those standards are met and then if students aren't ready to meet those standards, what targeted small groups do we need to provide in order to meet those standards and then also if we have students that have already met those standards, what kind of further instruction could we provide them to make sure we're extending their learning also. So, our PLC also plays a really important part of this so they can collaborate with each other across grade levels. And just to kind of give you an example, um, Miss Bangston is here. She's going to showcase kind of how she plans for a win and what that would look like in her classroom. And we also [snorts] want to share some student experiences [clears throat] with you as well. So in my

030classroom, I use an example of this slide. So I keep it as a weekly slide first of all, so kids have common expectations every day. Um you might see like I have group one, group two, group three. those lets kids know what days they're going to be meeting with me so that they can kind of plan their um extra activities because in my classroom I let them do some passion projects um they're doing things in um with the announcements they're doing um battle of the books and so it just kind of helps them to be able to plan their week. Um, when I'm picking groups, I look at that map data that they showed, but also I have some of um, interest grouping as well. So, I'll do like novel study groups with my kids

031to work on some vocabulary. Um, and that'll be whole class instruction like every every kid in my class will be in one of those novel studies. So, it's not just limited to kids who might um, be struggling with vocabulary acquisition. I do extension as well. Um then I pick um strategic small groups through PLC. Um we look at map data, we look at wonders, we look at oral reading fluency, we look at bridges, all of those things to determine what kinds of kids might need some reteing, what kinds of kids might just need a little extra practice and what kind of kids um need extension. And with those then I plan my small groups and when and then I put them up on the slide so they know what day they're going to be meeting

032with me um and what they might be doing. Um I have Ava and Walker here and they're going to talk to you a little bit about that made part at the bottom of the slide um because win time is actually one of their favorite times of the school today. Welcome. >> I really like working on my passion project during win because there's a lot of things you can do such as coding or researching. I really like really enjoy making my own video game. I also like the time to do homework because if I have a question, I can get help. I really like that you can sit by friends and not sit at my seat. And if you meet with the teacher does not take the whole win. Any questions? [laughter] >> I'm not seeing

033any right now. Thank you. >> Hi, my name is Ava Schneider. I am a fifth grader at Amy Bell. One of my favorite things about Win Time is that I can do announcements. Announcements is a video that has all the events and information going on. My job is graphic designer and I help with video editing. A graphic designer is a person who makes all of the slides. Also, video editing makes it look cool because there's video information. You can also get unfinished work done so that you don't get behind. That time lets you do any of your work. Thanks for listening. Does anyone have any questions? >> I don't think so. Thank you for sharing. Yeah, I don't think I did any creation of video [clears throat] games or video editing when I was in

034in elementary school. >> It's a different world. >> Whole different world. >> Do you have any questions for me or for our staff here as well? >> No questions. Uh but just thank you for coming and thank you uh to the students also. Uh you students did a great job. Um I often comment that when I was your age, I remember it well. I would have been terrified to come and speak to the school board and you did a really nice job. Thank you for that. >> Yeah. Thank you for the students. Thank you teachers for coming and it really helps us get a glimpse of, you know, a little insight into your day and I know it's outside your normal schedule, but we really appreciate it. Does very much so help. Thank you. >>

035All right. Thank you so much. >> Thank you. >> Uh 3D Germantown School District communications update. Mr. Mary, one of our newest members. >> Thank you. It's a pleasure to be here and looking forward to sharing a little bit of what's going on uh to start the school year from a communications and marketing lens. So, the purpose, you know, our goal here is to support all six of the schools and the district priorities. Our work centers on timely, proactive, and consistent messaging. Our efforts promote our district positively while supporting school level storytelling and assisting leaders during crisis and sensitive situations. Communications is a shared responsibility that amplifies the people and the work already happening. We talked about our district goals. From a communication standpoint, community relationships is at the center of our work. Communications is

036a key driver of trust, transparency, and engagement. as well. We support academic achievement by highlighting learning, instruction, and outcomes. We support growth for each student by showcasing pathways, opportunities, and student stories. We support workforce engagement environment by elevating student, staff, voice, belonging, and impact. We do this together by empowering, inspiring, and succeeding. So, where have we been over the last few years? communications position, the role and personnel has changed. So, we're at a place where we can move together with a solid foundation. We've done that already with a number of wins. We've had an increased digital We've had an increased digital presence and we've worked to unify our system, working towards one unified voice while supporting each other. We have some opportunities yet though. We need to continue unifying our visual and our experiences across

037all schools so that no matter where someone enters our our system, they get the similar experience. We have some next steps that we'll hit on as we go forward here. So, where are we now? Again, we're a collaboration of school leaders on promotion and crisis communication, working each day to be a voice of seven collectively as one. We have some channels. Obviously, Facebook is our primary family-f facing platform and we're very active on that both from a district level as our number one district as well as the schools in producing uh the stories that are occurring at their schools. Other platforms include our GSDWI.org website, YouTube, Spotify, and Apple, as well as Instagram, a high school student favorite, and LinkedIn for our job seekers. As I talked about, the role has changed. So, let's take

038a look back all the way to 2024 and kind of where we've been to help show that story. You can see that we've had a yearly average of 716 content interactions, 187 link clicks, 300, excuse me, 3,450 visits, and 24 follows. 2024 started off the first uh 6 months a little stronger than the second half. Fast forwarding then to 2025, our average uh views was at 46,859, 15,864 unique viewers. Both of those categories are new data points on Facebook, so they were not referenced in 2024. And then our similar like or comparison points would be 822 content interactions, 130 link kicks, 2,729 visits, and 30 followers. First half of 2025, uh it was a good foundation moving forward to the second half of 2025 where we've had tremendous growth with our increased effort and attention

039in that area. So again, a recap of where we were in 2024 and where we are in 2025 for the board. Anyone listening, the complete data picture is linked uh in the data story if you want to see the full data point, but those are some highlights there. [clears throat] What are some wins and impacts that we've had? So we've as Dr. Reuters stole a bunch of my thunder in his superintendent report. We'll have a conversation with him later on that. [laughter] Uh but we've launched Gtown Life. Uh it's a bi-weekly [clears throat] uh podcast series. Um it's a alternating between district features and school spotlights. On Thursday, we do launch our seventh episode. GTown today is our daily real series. And then we do have some uh timely video series. We did a little

040preview on the Madrid uh trip for our band, a little bit on academic awards night, national uh honors society, etc. So, as those pieces come up, we are able to respond in a more timely fashion, be proactive in telling that story. Um we're working on a future project to talk about the collaboration with our tech uh department and the theater on some of the things that they're doing uh working together and putting real world practice in for co-curricular connection. At the bottom there, you can see our 2025 uh in the time that I've been here. So, this school year, our top five social media posts, starting with the school's school calendar, always a highlight. Uh the construction outside of Kennedy, you want to get some voice, uh impact the drop off and pickup of a

041school, and we had that. Um our volleyball team, state runnerups, our district report card, and as Uma mentioned, uh Mr. Harris and his outstanding award were our top five uh views and content interactions. So, moving forward, what are some opportunities that we're still faced with? Germantown is not alone. Enrollment as uh birth rates uh hold or decline. It continues to be a challenge. So, from a Germantown standpoint, we want to ensure that those uh families and students that are in Germantown and seeking Germantown come here and understand all the opportunities. of protecting our Germantown school district borders is a priority and how can we help from a communication standpoint. Our focus then on raising awareness, connecting and community support. Communications acts as a strategic partner in collaborations with schools, departments and community partners by attracting

042families and staff to Germantown, connecting [clears throat] the community to the work and the people in our schools and strengthening collective support for Germantown as a place to live, work and grow. We are all shareholders in that as we co-own the outcomes whether we are internally teacher staff students externally or partners and community we [clears throat] all share in that responsibility. We can ensure that we have strong perception and unifying message support long-term stability. So where are we going? Facebook will continue to be our family-f facing public communication. We'll have increased consistency across schools and working towards some efforts on developing clear brand guidelines and shared tools. Working as well to continue with our our school leaders and our district team to ensure that we are strengthening internal alignment and shared messaging. We will continue

043to be proactive planning around key district moments. Example, we've had good success in starting a Gtown community leadership think tank and we're working towards some efforts on intentional state sendoff with community involvement. Going forward, we'll provide a report semiannually to the board and talk about where we've been, where we're going, and what are the key wins, opportunities, and next steps. We'll look at the last six months versus the most recent six months as we look to learn, adapt, and model. We're going to ask ourselves, what are the trends? Communications is a strategic function enabling success while inspiring, empowering, and succeeding. Any questions on the work that's occurred to date? >> I don't think I'm seeing any right now. Um I know the the leadership think tank that I think you've been part of um for

044sure spearheading had a couple questions I've seen out in the community. Maybe you can explain that a little bit more. >> Yeah, absolutely. It's an opportunity to get uh the community again we're all shareholders in this process and to get some like-minded um it's a leadership opportunity and partnership with initiative one uh to bring people together uh continuing to uh grow in their leadership ability and understanding how we have an impact in that together. So we've had great success uh in those people and and and bringing like minds together. The original invitation list um started with elected officials within the village and aligning areas of this district as well as um business owners in the community. I know Mr. Barney and Mr. Polla have attended [clears throat] those sessions as well. >> I've heard really

045good feedback from it. I think that was one of the questions I heard is how do I get on the invitation list? Uh and I'm guessing the answer is give Justin a call. >> Yeah, >> certainly reach out. We're happy to connect and and talk to those that may be interested. Thank you, >> Mr. Low. >> I have a comment as far as uh selling our district. Um I'm the selfappointed board teched guy and uh I'd like to see some videos, maybe 60 seconds in length on our website um featuring various teched classes, you know. So, we've got uh you know the machine shop, we have welding, we have woodworking, uh project lead the way, we have digital digital electronics, robotics, all of these things. So, maybe an area on the website where you know

046you can click on a thumbnail and see one of our HOS machines uh machining a part you know automatically. you know, we I think we've got the best teched department and facilities in the state. Uh if another school district disagrees with me, I'd like them to email me and show me what you got. But I think we're number one in the state. And there's nothing on our website that shows this, you know. So, we really we really we really need this, you know. We've got I think I forgot autos so I'm rattling all the all these things off and I forgot autos. So we should have our autos shop uh featured also students working on something. Um you know a lot of school districts don't even have an autos shop anymore. You know we've got

047a great shop. So we we need to show what we have and I think uh uh parents will be happy to know, taxpayers will be happy to know. Also, you know, a lot of this we added as a result of the referendum, and I I think there were some citizens that toured the schools that might not have voted yes for the referendum, but they were happy to see what their tax dollars went to um after they toured the district. >> Thank you for that uh that statement and certainly there there's work already being done and more to be to come. Uh Dr. Reutder was kind enough to put up our district website and we've had uh in the last few weeks some updated pictures of different spaces as well as we'll have some video work.

048Um we had a partner come in and and do a lot of shooting. Um so we're working and I should say uh video capturing. >> Yeah, there you go. I kind of knew what [clears throat] [laughter] >> video capturing of some of the things occurring in particular in in the technological education space and there's work to come on profiling in fact uh Uma is one of our featured who spoke earlier uh featured interview subjects and in the next few months we'll have a lot more information and I think you'll be pleased to hit on a lot of that. >> Perfect. Thank you. >> Any other questions? See now Justin thank you. >> Thank you all. Thank you Justin. >> Uh 3E village of Germantown leaison reports Mr. Pollock with parks and reccks. >> Uh the

049December meeting was cancelled and tomorrow's January meeting is also cancelled. >> You are a lucky man. Mr. Voyer with economic development which has not been cancelled. >> It was not. So, I was able to get there after building and grounds and teaching and learning on January 13th at 6. Um, it [clears throat] was a frustrating meeting to be honest with you. We had to table about five different five or six different agenda items. Um, the three main pillars were the explore Germantown marketing initiative and the biggest question kind of came up. Is it economic development or is it tourism? So, we'll wait until February 10th to see where that goes. Um the next thing was called operation storefront. Basically our open buildings that are not being occupied. We're not commercial real estate agents. So is

050this economic development or where are we going with this? We'll see where that goes on the 10th of February. Um but on a positive note, we welcome Flamingo Marine. And if anyone wants to donate a beautiful pontoon boat to the school board, we're welcoming that. So thank you um about that. But there's career advancement technology work readiness that could be partnerships with the an industry like marine boat building. Um that will partner or pair well with what I have to talk about. So planning commission met on the 12th. Uh unfortunately I was out of town for business and was unable to attend. I did watch uh the meeting take some notes. Um the primary driver that would infect or affect the school district is the Holy Hill Gateway District uh master plan consultant was recommended

051and ultimately approved last night at the village board meeting. Um this is the neighborhood uh if you want to think about north of uh Fryat south of the village border uh primarily affecting the Rockfield Elementary KMS in high schools. Uh this process will build a guide to feature for future development in this area of the village and will take place over the next nine months. There is going to be opportunity for community members, business, residents alike to participate um in this. I would recommend checking out their outline plan and time frame for that. Um [clears throat] the the contractor that they are going to work with is MSA professional services. Uh this is an important thing for the school district to monitor as development comes in and we learned from the uh uh finance committee

052meeting and revenue. Uh there's going to be development in this area. There's land owners there. I know some of this might be a little contentious for some community members, but the land owners do have rights as far as settling and developing their land. Um and the this village is looking at the best way to guide those those residents um into a a outcome that is best um not only for themselves but the village as a whole. Uh we will be seeing um increased um taxing revenue come through as that development continues. Um obviously the goal will be to do it outside of a TID um as as that can come onto the books and deburen our current taxpayers a little bit. Uh and then I just want to note this wasn't discussed at that meeting

053but was discussed at prior meetings and I had made mention to it here. The full board last night approved um the next steps in the Faith Lutheran Church development. Uh this is the 5.4 4 acre 36 family rental-based units that are going to occur um just south of Meccoin on division. The church will remain as part of the property there. Um but the portion of the property there said the 5.4 acres will come back onto the tax role. Uh they're projecting uh currently $130,000 in a uh um annual tax revenue that this project will generate for um all taxing authorities involved in that. Um I'm not quite sure what our percentage of that's going to be. It'll also produce 300 projecting $300,000 in one-time fees um for the village uh which is which is a

054good thing. Uh the primary portion of this project in Sirius Property Group that's developing it um is selling this as uh rental space or rental units designed to allure um downsizers out of their homes and into into a little more maintenance-free living. um as well as providing a potential um uh family units uh that are looking to move in but can't quite crack the purchase of a home uh within Germantown. So that aids us in two ways, right? We have new families moving in. It's going to assist with enrollment. But and I think that the key driver in this is going to be the downsizers because as they leave their house, they're opening that that up to inventory which allows new families to move in and we know from the roofers report creating that churn

055is a is a great way to help stabilize and reinvigorate um some of the the areas that have been a little more stagnant in our district as far as enrollment uh goes. So I've been a proponent um um with with positive recommendation and thought in regards to that development. It's a type of property we don't have in the village and I I think it's going to be interesting to see how this works and if it does generate those avenues of especially for the school district and increase enrollment and tax revenue. Obviously, it's done without financial assistance from the village um or any other taxing authorities. Um other than that, I don't know if anyone has any questions. >> Um for all members of as liaison is I just have a clarification because I've been asked

056this question. and I haven't dug into it yet. Are the videos for each of the different um subcommittees as well as village board consistently displayed or put now on the village website? they are for the most part being more consistently put on. Um, initially it was the full board planning commission was generally >> on. Yeah. >> EDC is definitely there's more concerted effort to get that up and parks and rec >> starting last November park and wreck started to stream >> and just like us you can look at the YouTube. >> Yeah. I've just been asked by some uh parents in the community in passing. >> Yeah. I will say if you go to their YouTube click live it would seem counterintuitive because >> the playlist doesn't function the way ours does. >> Yeah. It's

057the videos are [clears throat] archived under live for some reason. That's just how they're uploading them, I'm guessing. Okay. >> Um but you'll find them there. If you look at their other playlist, uh it's old meetings which actually have some good content, but >> yeah, it's more archived. >> Yeah. Um so other than that, that's all I have in regards to to that. Um if no one has questions, moving forward, we can go on to item four, citizen comment. I currently have none signed up. I don't know if that changed. Going once, going twice. Looks like we'll stay at none. And item five, consent agenda. A, approval December 16th, 2025 meeting minutes. B, approval teacher contracts. And C, approval of donations. >> Motion to approve consent agenda. >> Mr. Barney, with the motion, Miss Higinbotham

058with the second. Any discussion? >> Yes. Can I hear a highlight of the donations, please? >> You sure can, Mr. Bernie. Uh, tonight's donations, gifts, and bequests are anonymous donor for $3,000. Cost to Coach Bust to O'Hare for band trip to Spain. Germantown Area Chamber of Commerce, $2,000 to GHS band, $1,000. Choir, $500, and Waricks, $500. Kren & Company, Ryan Peterson, $1,000 to GHS robotics team. an anonymous donor um in the amount of $5,000 to GHS boys varsity basketball trip to Minnesota. GHS PTA $1,348 for the price of two new refrigerators in the staff lounge at GHS and Rockfield PTA $3,900 skating for Rockfield Elementary School. >> Awesome. Thank you. >> It's excellent. >> You're welcome. >> Thank you. >> Any other discussion hearing? None. All in favor? I any opposed hearing? None. That passes.

059Item six, negotiation committee. Um that is myself and I don't have my notes on that. U Mr. Ryder, can you remind me when we met on that? Yeah, we met December 15th um for discussion of time frame regarding um the district uh the the pool amounted of money and what that looks like um with and Mr. C Dr. Castro I apologize I'm putting you on the spot because I don't have my calendar in front of me. We're meeting again with the GA the 28th of January um to start preliminary discussion around CPI. >> Perfect. Thank you for bailing me out on that. I just found my notes on it. Three clicks away. >> It was a It seems like a long time ago. >> Three. Yeah. Three clicks away. I will say uh much appreciative

060of the GA and the members of of this board that participate in it. Um we continue to report back monthly. Um in you'll see it in closed obviously because it's negotiation based. Um which does increase our closed sessions. Um but I can attest to you that it is specifically in regards to that and keeping a positive relationship moving forward. um and in information sharing to all and that is really a a necessity um that we've highlighted. So thanks for everyone's commitment on that. Um >> can can I just ask for verification of the date of the negotiations? >> We are meeting the 29th >> not the 28th. >> That Thursday, not the Wednesday. >> 29th, right? >> Okay. Thank you. >> Yes. >> Um >> yes, 29th at 4:45 p.m. >> I have it right.

061There you go. >> Yes. >> At 4:45. >> I think I had it right last time, too. >> See you there, Eric. >> Um, buildings and grounds. Uh, item seven, buildings and grounds. Mr. Bollock. All right. Buildings and grounds met January 13th. Uh, covered a few different topics. We uh we covered our usual work order completion report highlighting all the work and effort that's gone into maintaining and and repairing different areas of our district buildings. Um as always, this this report should be evolving with some new information and and additional information for us as as uh we've requested or administration has requested, including maybe a couple new pictures here and there. Um, we also talked about or got an update on the dreams dream field dugout. Uh, all the work has basically or the construction

062portion of the project has been completed. Uh, the only things left are a couple of punch list items, but also uh adding the different logos uh to be painted on the dugouts themselves. That'll be done in spring to ensure proper curing and lasting of the the different logos. So hopefully for for uh first pitch in the spring, we'll have all new beautiful dugouts. Uh and lastly, we got an update on the GHS teched roof debris uh situation as as some roof deck debris had fallen into the teched area at GHS during uh the roof replacement project this summer. Um we we were assured that everything has been taken care of that all the equipment has been uh inspected, no problems, no issues. Obviously is if if something comes up, we'll we'll address it at that

063particular time. That's all from buildings and grounds. >> Thank you. Item eight, teaching and learning. Miss Higentham, the teaching and learning committee met on January 13th after the boards or the grounds committee meeting. Um at the district office we discussed two items on the agenda. First Jake Miziaak gave an update and led a discussion on the K5 science and the pilot proposal. The science review committee completed an evaluation of materials from open sied my smithian science using a resource screener which determines if a resource aligns with Germantown science vision and Wisconsin science expectations. The committee chose to move forward with Smithsonian, it's hard to say, Smithsonian Science due to its high marks and usability. Jake then provided a pilot timeline for the selection of classrooms in January, a pilot launch in February, March, and to

064conclude in April or May. Um upon completion, the science review team will analyze pilot evidence for implementation readiness, professional learning needs, and leadership supports and develop a recommended implement implementation plan. Finally, the review team will present its findings and recommendations to the teaching and learning committee in May. The committee and board would like to thank all those involved with the selection of resource materials and all teachers, students, and parents involved in the K5 science um pilot to make it a success. The second item on the agenda was a discussion in the IEP development process. This was led by Katie Cole. The IEP process not only ensures a district meets its legal and instructional obligations to students with disability, it also outlines the district's commitment to every student to close achievement gaps in order to achieve

065success and the best outcome for each individual student. Katie outlined the five-step process to develop college and career ready IEPs. The first step identifies the strengths and weaknesses of each student in accordance with grade level standards and expectations through comparison to peer and map and forward testing and classroom performance. The second [snorts] step identifies how each disability affects academic achievement and functional performance. Step three includes the development of ambitious and achievable goals specific to the needs of each student in order to close those achievement gaps. Step four supports student goals and ensures access to curriculum through a specially designed instruction and services such as PTO and individual transportation. The final step analyzes student progress and closing achievement gaps. Progress monitoring identifies what does or doesn't work and what needs to be done differently to continually

066work towards student success. This process is completed and repeated annually or as needed on a per student basis or until an IEP is no longer required as a student has closed achievement gaps. There are no items to vote on. Sounds good. >> That concludes. >> All right. Thank you, Mr. Gatham. >> Uh item nine, personnel committee. Mr. [clears throat] Brown, >> personnel committee uh held our meeting on January 13th and Dr. Castro began with the first report of teacher resignations of which we had none. The last res resignation prior to this report was at the beginning of August when a teacher took a promotion to a dun dean of students position. Next was teacher contracts which at the time of the meeting there were none but that may have changed by tonight. We discussed that

067so we'll add that update as is customary. Uh staffing update was next. Dr. Castro detail detailed two teaching positions that are now filled. One of those positions was that being filled for just the first semester as to give time to the right fit and we did find that right fit in a licensed teacher from the content area that was in we were looking for. The strategy paid off and worked out nicely. The second position was for a special education position at Kennedy. Martine then covered the special education assistance staffing of which there were four filled of the openings of the four openings. One of them was uh from a student teacher that went on that got her licensing. >> Yeah. So she got her teaching license and she was moving into a building sub position

068>> with with us still. Yes. So she moved up with us. Um, another was uh because somebody had left for a short period of time due to scheduling but came back. Uh, Greg left to move to Florida and Caitlyn was marked as a vacancy then added back as she moved uh into the full-time position with us. That leaves three vacancies of which one of those is a half part-time position. >> Yeah, that's an added position. >> Added position. Great. Next, Dr. Castro did a fairly deep dive into the newly created GSD mentoring program when uh when onboarding new teachers. Bartine then covered a timeline into the three phases of developing, design, and implementing the process. It's nicely detailed and the plan starts around the six minute mark on the video if you go online to

069to watch our meeting committee because it was uh very detailed. So, I'd suggest you log on to view that. We then covered the substitute fill rate update and that starts at about the 20 minute mark and last till the 36 minute mark. We recently switched from two edges staff from teachers on call. Again, Martine covered a lot of content and positive attributes that we're currently experiencing with our new service provider, such as response time, more proactive approach to covering our needs, ensuring organized, relevant, real-time data and depth of reports to help dive drive and f fulfill our needs and to achieve a favorable return on our investment. As Dr. Reutder had pointed out, this is a big undertaking that Dr. Reutder initiated and identified as a priority that let Martine run with it literally from

070day one. Dr. Castro acknowledged that this would not have gotten done without the help and heavy lifting from Mary. Uh Mary has joined uh the human resources staff here at Germantown School District about six years ago I believe from Cedarberg. So thank you Mary for your assistance with this task. Uh this is another initiative that we are seeing benefits from almost immediately. The last order of business was new business um at the Kennedy Middle School hourly position being for the remaining 22 hours of the best buddy advising position which the committee approved and we bring to the full board tonight. So the recommendation is with a positive recommendation to approve Jenny Holst to take on 22 hours for one of the hourly best buddies advising positions at Kennedy Middle School. >> Thank you. That comes

071forth with a positive recommendation. Does not require a second. Any discussion? Hearing none. All in favor? >> I [clears throat] got you, Mike. Thank you. And any opposed? [clears throat] Hearing none. That passes unanimously. And that is I believe it for personnel. >> That is it. >> Perfect. Uh just a quick note on um building teaching and learning personnel. I was also unable to attend those, but I did get to watch them and I just want to commend everyone involved, staff and board um for for the level of conversation, the information you were bringing out to the community was fantastic. I think there's a lot of topics that were touched in there. Obviously, these are cliff notes. Um but really, I encourage anyone interested in any of those topics, go back and watch the meetings.

072It was really, really well done. So, thank you for that. Um policy um I believe apologize was also that evening um and same goes for them and that is going to be Mr. Barney. Yeah, thank you. Uh policy committee also met January 13th and closed out the marathon committee evening. Um we had two items on our agenda that were discussion only. The first was policy 7510.02 which is the PAC facility use policy. This discussion was around selling beer or wine at specific adultoriented PAC events. Um, we talked about a lot of different aspects that we'd have to consider such as insurance, licensing, uh, obtaining the product, storage, cleanup after the event, and so on. Um, we did give the administration some homework to check with our insurance carrier to see if it's even an option

073because if insurance is a no-go, then obviously so is selling at the PAC. Uh, there was no formal action from the committee and we'll bring this back at a future event or future meeting. Uh, the other discussion only item was policy 8310 regarding public records. Uh this discussion was around open records requests that are received and if a board member or district employee is the subject of that request, should the employee or board member be notified? Uh the current practice is that anyone that is the subject of the records request is notified. However, that isn't required per policy. Uh the committee agreed that the current practice should be included in policy and the administration is going to draft some language for updating the policy and bring that back to a future meeting. Uh any comments

074or questions before I move on to action items? I >> think it's important at the open records uh request side. Uh everyone just has that transparent, hey, there was this request. Um, some of it from a staff standpoint, I believe they have rights in regards to what can or can't be released and they could appeal it. So, we have to do that naturally anyway. >> Uh, that's based on personnel file. Yes, they have rights. Um, and there's timelines related to that. So, when um there's push back from a requester, we're following our due diligence under under law [clears throat] when it comes to personnel finds. >> Yeah, I think that's a key point because we have seen that, hey, why is this taking so long? And then they have a due process, right? um with

075the ability to potentially block it. Correct. >> And that wouldn't be an administrative or board decision. That is up to the the employee themselves um in a in a process. So um thanks for that. I think this is like you said something that's already been happening. But just to codify it, it's never >> right. Just to make sure it continues to happen, we'll add some language to policy. >> Absolutely. Thank you. >> Sure. All right. Moving on to full board item 10B. Uh that's policy 5113 open enrollment program. Uh the proposed changes come from a consultation with the district's legal council regarding open enrollment status of students and also clarifies reasons why an open enrollment excuse me [clears throat] might be terminated. So policy committee brings forward a motion with a positive recommendation to approve

076the revisions to policy 5113 open enrollment program interd district. comes forward with the positive recommendation. Does not require a second. Any discussion? Hearing none. All in favor? I. >> Any opposed? That passes. All right. Next item. Uh full board item 10C, approval of policy 4140, termination and resignation. This policy is recommended for revision based on district consultation with legal counsel regarding employees ability to resign before termination by the administrator. Policy committee brings forward a motion with a positive recommendation to approve the revisions to policy 4140 termination and resignation. >> That comes forward with a positive recommendation. Go ahead. >> It does not require a second. Any discussion? >> I just like to clarify it's in the 4000 series. That's for support staff. It's not for non-contract or it's not for contracted employees. >> Thanks for

077that clarity. >> Yeah. So it's at will supports that >> at will employees. Correct. There are other state uh statute provisions related to contract employees. >> Thank you. Any further discussion? Hearing none. All in favor? >> I. Any opposed? Hearing none that passes. >> All right. Full board item 10D is approval of district policies 100 through 9800.01. Uh this is mostly the the packet that we get from Niola. Um I'll give you some highlights. Uh one item that was in the committee's packet that didn't come forward out of committee was policy 6152.01. That's waiver of school fees or fines. This item was tabled and we'll come back to a future committee meeting. uh policy 0144.5 uh is regarding individual board members and to make them aware that board members other than the president do not

078have the authority to act on complaints or investigations. Uh we had a group of policies uh uh 1210, 1230.01 01 and 1240 all related to the board's relationship with the district administrator and the authority of the administrator to develop administrative guidelines as well as the evaluation of the district administrator and the board's ability to make decisions regarding the administrator's contract renewal. Uh policy 2131.01 is for reading instructional goals and kindergarten assessments. that's being revised based on uh act 20 uh policy 2431 intercolastic athletic policy was revised to adopt NIL or named image and likeness compensation standards based on what WIAA has released. Uh policy 5514 use of personal transportation devices and this is different than automobiles. Um there's been changes here to establish guidelines for the use of personal transportation devices on district property that

079uh are related to uh safety, liability, and privilege of operation. Uh policy 5515, student use and parking of motor vehicles. Changes here include uh only being able to bring a vehicle onto district property that is owned by the student or for which the student has expressed permission to operate. Uh the proposed changes also point out that school officials may search a vehicle that is located on district property in accordance with policy 5771. Uh also updated in the packet uh policy 58.95 for student employment. This is rescended because school districts are no longer authorized to provide work permits. Uh policy 7540.02 digital content and accessibility. This was updated to ensure that the district's web content adheres to uh title two of the Americans with Disabilities Act. Uh policy 7540.08 is our artificial intelligence policy. This was

080completely replaced uh rewritten to be legally compliant based on several different state and federal laws. And the last one we discussed in this group, policy 0155 committees. Uh the change here is to strike the requirement for policy committee to meet quarterly. Instead, policy committee shall meet as often as necessary. This isn't about less meetings for policy committee. Our normal cadence is based on updates that we receive from Niola and there may not be changes for a specific quarter. Um then again there might also be multiple packets in a particular quarter because policy committee will probably meet again in March of this year. Uh so with that background committee brings forward a motion with a positive recommendation to approve the additions, updates and modifications to district policies 100 through 9800.01. 01 >> comes forward with a

081positive recommendation. It does not require a second. Any discussion? Um, I did have conversation with um, village president Bob Solderberg regarding the village recently passing um, the use of UTVs within village boundaries which are um, I'm not an expert on these acronyms but um, OVs which is which are identified in the policy are offhighway vehicles and UTVs according to my quick search fall under that category and we have prohibited those in that policy. Um, so I don't know if um the board this evening would like to amend the motion to possibly bring that policy back or we move forward but then would have to review that um given that there is the ability now to drive UTVs as vehicles in the village. Are we aware of um students that would want to drive something like

082this to school? I >> at this point I don't have that data. So it could be something that has approved the language this evening, but it could be brought back for um discussion after I gather more information or we keep the policy as existing. >> Obviously if they were operated if student was coming it would have to be parked in a parking spot. Correct. They would already have to have a pass permit for. >> So they would have to register with the [clears throat] office that I've changed my vehicle from my SUV or whatever it is to my UTV, >> an additional vehicle or something. >> Yeah. I mean, there would be process through that and I'd have to work with the high school administration and secretaries. >> You also then have citizens attending events

083here that are now legally allowed to drive them here. >> Mr. Soderberg said that you cannot cross a county road with them, but they can be driven within the village road. >> I would say, >> well, one one of the notes that was in our background is that it uh disclaims board responsibility for damage, theft, or accidents, shifting the risk and liability to the students and their parents. I wonder if we pass that just so we're proving that yes, we are not responsible for it, and if we need to amend it in the future to maybe allow it, then >> Yeah. as and I shared a policy committee will be coming back in March with other policies, financial policies that we didn't want to bombard this policy committee. So, we can bring that back and

084I can get more clarity. >> As I say, my recommendation would be is to keep it as is and uh uh just a amend it in the future as needed to put on your punch list for for the committee. >> We'll bring it back to committee. >> That sounds good. I just wanted to bring that up as a conversation related to them. It's Yeah, I Yeah, I'll say this out loud and I don't want to, but play the devil's advocate. If that's someone's only means of transportation, >> we would figure that >> we would figure it out in a one-on-one basis um in the intern. [clears throat] >> For sure. >> Perfect. >> For sure. >> Sorry. >> All right, that's that's all from committee and you have the recommended motion. >> Uh that does

085come forth recommendation. We've just had discussion. Any more >> hearing? None. All in favor? I. Any opposed hearing? None. That passes. >> That's all from policy committee. >> Thank you, policy and top. Um on to tonight's committee meetings. Mr. Pollock transportation committee transportation ad hoc transportation committee meeting or committee met earlier this evening uh regarding the 2025 2030 transportation contract itself. Our only topic of discussion only tonight was to review the the two parent surveys that had gone out to all all elementary school families with students in grades 4K to the fourth grade. Uh so couple of things. One is I would encourage our community once published to review the videos to hear a lot of the discussion because that's what tonight was all about. but also to to take a look at the packet

086itself that we were provided because it does have all of the different uh uh results from the surveys. Uh both survey one and survey two where everyone can see the the first survey was more general in nature. The second survey was more elementary school specific to see all of those different results that came in. The the surveys themselves pertain mostly with satisfaction of current start and end times, proposed changes to uniform start and end times, and then the allocation of district resources in relation to start and end times if we were to make modifications to them. Uh we will be discussing this again uh in February with a likelihood of taking action at that particular time. That is all. >> Thank you. I will echo uh if you have any interest or stake in that,

087please watch that meeting. I think it was covering the topic from all angles for sure. So >> yeah, and I I mean I would encourage folks uh if the if they either somehow didn't see or respond to the survey. All of our emails are open. People can just email me uh to limit the number of emails that everyone else gets as the transportation committee chair. Um, if you have any thoughts, if you have any ideas, if you have any questions, I'm be more than happy to help. >> Perfect. Thank you. Uh, item 12, finance committee. Mr. Lo. >> Yes. The finance committee meeting met here this evening in the PAC at 6:05 p.m. Full board item 12A updates. Uh Britney went through uh vouchers with us and answered a few questions and we approved the

088vouchers. Board item 6A GSD financial series uh number four revenue limits. Um this was the was presented by uh Sarah Vera of CISA1. This was what took uh the most time of the meeting. It was a very good discussion. Uh I suggest uh viewing the video once it's posted if anyone is interested in that. Item 6B was uh Britney Altonorf's variance report. She covered that with us. And then full board item 12B, 2026 mileage and meal reimbursement rates. It's something that we visit uh once a year each year and we bring forward to the board of education with a positive recommendation to approve the 2026 mileage and meal reimbursement rates of 72.5 cents per mile and meal perdm reimbursement rates equal to the GSA standard rate as of January 2026. comes forward with a positive

089recommendation. Does not require a second. Any discussion? I would just like to offer an apology to my fellow board members. And Miss [clears throat] Aldenorf, I was stuck in dollars while you were talking cents, so my decimal point was in the wrong spot. Uh my my brain kicked in eventually. So, thank you. Uh any further discussion? >> We accept. [laughter] Thank your apology. Thank you. You're welcome. >> Hearing none. All in favor? I >> I >> Any opposed? >> Hearing none that passes. >> Okay. Next item was full board item 12c 2025 2026 budget adjustments. [clears throat] Uh Britney Alton Dorf went through those with us and uh this is what I called they were all in the good direction meaning that uh expenses were not going up but we got some credits that uh

090we weren't necessarily expecting. So, the uh overall budget actually went down a little bit. Thank you for that, Britney. And we bring forward to the board of education with a positive recommendation to approve the 2025 2026 budget adjustments. >> Comes forward with a positive recommendation. Does not require a second. Any discussion? >> Hearing none. All in favor? I. >> Any opposed? hearing none. That passes >> and we adjourned at 7:38 p.m. >> Thank you. Another fantastic meeting. >> Um we can move on to item 13, new business, a discussion, action to approve overnight travel training requests. Dr. Ryder, >> thank you. We have four overnight travel requests um in this one report. And you'll see that one um from GHS for uh Health Occupational Students of America or HOSA is um asking for in advance

091as they're they're looking to if their students which we believe will advance to nationals um would also get that approval um in a timely manner. So tonight uh the teachers the adviserss to these groups are asking for approval for KMS HOSA 30 students and one adviser to travel to Barabou Wisconsin for the HOSA state leadership conference April 8th through the 10th. GHS HOSA up to 95 students and two adviserss to travel to Barabou for the same state leadership competition April 10th through 8th through the 10th of 2026. And then ghs hosted students who advanced to state from state to national competition and one adviser to travel to Indianapolis, Indiana from June 16th to 21st of 2026. And then the ghs choir is asking for um 60 students and eight adviserss to travel to Camp Whitcom

092Mason in Merton, Wisconsin February 28th through March 1st, which is an annual um trip. It's a new business item. I'll entertain a motion. >> Make a motion to approve the overnight travel request for KMS HOSA in April, K GHS HOSA in April and June, and uh GHS choir in February, March. >> Second, Mr. P with the motion, Mr. Voyer with the second. Any discussion hearing? None. All in favor? >> I. >> Any opposed? Hearing none, that passes. 13B. discussion only. Germantown School District library materials review process. Dr. [snorts] Reutder and team, thank you for hanging in there with us this evening. Um should be an interesting discussion. >> Thank you, Mr. Eward. Uh this is in new business and discussion only might look different than um being in a report. I've given um it's not

093an action. It's [clears throat] something that um has been in conversation in the past through presentations on our school library plan as well as conversations with myself and the teaching and learning committee. Um so we wanted to share with you some actions that will be taking place and by putting in new business it allows for much more dialogue and conversation from the board back and forth versus just a report andor update. So as uh you're aware this evening Mr. Mizak uh Mr. Shriber and Mr. Gascal are here to help um myself with this presentation on the Germantown School District library creation process and development process. Um outlined here is the purpose of why we are going to be looking into across our six buildings um for elementary, middle, and high. Look at our material all

094materials and we'll speak to that in a minute. The scope of materials within our um library system. It's good practice in general to always review as you heard Miss Higinbothan's um report this month this evening from teaching and learning um as well as Mr. um Brown's report from personnel. We're reviewing processes across the district whether it's our mentor process or our science review process. Right now, you've seen the fruits of the labor come out of the um reading review process from the presentations this evening from Amy Bell um as well as we review our communication work and how to how to improve that. So, it only makes sense to do the same um from a curation and development process when it comes to our school libraries. Um, additionally, um, this work does happen, um, at

095maybe a smaller scale by our two great librarians in the district as new material comes in. But like anything with uh spring cleaning, you continue to collect. We need to make sure that with our new our advent of our new programming K8 and literacy that we have crosscurricular connection um of the materials in the library to Wonders um materials and what the teachers are needing for as you heard in wind time extensions or intervention. Um and additionally our multitude of courses we have at middle and high school that the library materials whether in print or digital or video are applicable to what the teachers are asking the students to whether it be research present or or dig deeper into. Um, additionally, back in 2024, we did receive a complaint from the Department of P, we

096received a letter from the Department of Public Instruction that a community uh Facebook group um the Germantown parents for public education were um issuing a formal complaint against the district that our materials are not representative of um all students in the district. Um and I know the board has seen that letter as I shared that back in 2024. And if you [snorts] would need me to resend that, I'm happy to. Um, Mr. Mizak did re re uh per policy reach out to the uh signed complaintants um and we have uh record of that email um to try to rectify the complaint. Um the signed complaintants did not respond. We Mr. Mizak and I have met with DPI multiple times in 2024. We provided them all the dune information to show that we are in compliance

097curricular as well as our library plan. You as a board approved uh Mr. Gascal, Mr. Shriber's um comprehensive library plan that's on file with DPI last year. Um they they agreed that it it meets all the requirements. However, this complaint has not been rectified because DPI has had o turnover um in multiple positions at DPI. Um I I send out a regular email asking about the results of the information that our um our our principles, our librarians as well as district office staff had to spend additional time to show [snorts] um that we do everything under legally under statute. Um and we have not gotten um the okay because the on constant response I receive from DPI is that we've had a change over in personnel and um that case has been moved on to

098someone else. However, um they have just not responded as well as the complaintant never responded to our email to have a face-to-face conversation about the concerns. Um so that aside that is another reason that um it's just good practice to uh look at how we can strengthen our collection um by identifying any gaps prioritizing distribution of of common school funds in the future for acquisition of new content and new ex uh materials as well as expanding resources to h enhance the educational process and experience as well as engagement for all of our kids. whether it's curricular connection or just we want kids just like we want everyone to read for fun or consume content for fun as well [snorts] and enjoyment. So the guiding principles are really outlined by the governing policies set forth by

099this board related to selection of instructional materials and equipment and library media centers. These policies have both been reviewed in the last 3 years with modifications made to that to meet all the legal requirements for non-discrimination as well as um content and process for uh dissemination as well as challenge of content within the district. So with that, I'll turn it over to Mr. Mizak and he's going to speak through the scope of the materials that will be covered and I believe Mr. Shriber and Mr. Gascal are going to talk about kind of the in the weeds, the nitty-gritty of um where they're going to target first and the timeline of what that will look like with then a final report back to the board at the conclusion of this whole process. So, Mr. Mizak, take

100it away. >> Yeah, as outlined here, the scope of the materials that are covered here is really all the materials that are in the collections at all of our elementary libraries, our middle school library, and our high school library. So all print materials, digital resources, and media and other resources would be covered by the review process that we're going to outline. Uh and as outlined by the cycle and the timeline here, Dr. Dr. Reutder and I were able to work with our librarians to uh create a timeline that would be workable so that we could review all of the collections and do a thorough job of that. Uh as well as maintaining um the opportunity to to review the information that we got so that we could make sure that our our materials are what

101what they should be at each one of the grade levels as well as um opportunities to expand our collection. Um, and I can let the librarians jump in when when they need to. Uh, really the piece of this process that is going to take the most um time for for our staff is going to be the inventory verification, which is going to require us to to note every single item that's in the library. So, to scan in every item just to make sure uh that it's a part of our collection and recognize that it's a part of our collection. And once we have all of those uh resources documented and pulled into our system, that's going to allow us to have that full scope and picture of all the resources that are in each one

102of the libraries. Uh and then using some of the digital tools that we have available to us, uh we use these tools during the audit that Dr. Reutder described uh that we performed for DPI. it can give us a pretty good indication of, you know, the representation that exists within our library collections. And this is one of the main tools that we can use to identify to see if there's any gaps in our collections or any areas within our collection that we need to strengthen or add to. Um, additionally, it's going to provide us with um the ability to flag um for different indicators so that if there was material at one of the levels that was placed inappropriately, those indicators would help us identify that so that if it needed to be moved to

103higher grade level band, we would be able to do that. Or if it needed to be removed altogether, uh that would uh allow us to do that. Uh so once we have all of the materials documented uh and pulled into the system at that point in time that's when we can start doing the grade grade band alignment review which would take place between October and December of a school year or the materials could be reviewed and then uh we could confirm alignment with the appropriate grade level. uh in fe January and February of the school year uh we would create the selection and waiting list our librarians would document and recommend any kind of removals, replacements or relocations that would need to take place and then from that that would be submitted for administrative review

104which would include myself and principles so that we could take a look at the results of the audit at each sites uh per their recommendation. Then in April um the curriculum and instruction cabinet review. So this would be the directors uh would ensure consistency across all the schools to make sure that um there's alignment with our district expectations and then there would be reporting in May which would be a highle summary to the board of the process that we um went through throughout the school year. So this is a full school year process that would take place and then working with the librarians we identified um the elementary level is the place that we would start. Uh it would be one of the largest collections to do because it's actually four collections separately to look

105at. Um it's also one of the ones that um we've identified is is the one that um would benefit most from the inventorying process and review of the materials. And then when we start talking about review criteria, [clears throat] so once we take a look at um some of the high level uh criteria that we'd be looking for to see if uh materials were appropriately placed. So we would look at developmental suitability. Um make sure that it's adhering to the gradeband literacy expectations that have been identified for that material. Uh contextual re relevance. So in terms of educational purpose and literary value content [clears throat] considerations, we would look for those flags that we had identified on the previous slide, but that would include some of the items that are listed here, which would include

106graphic sexual content, graphic violence, illegal substance use portrayed without educational context, hate speech or discrimin discriminatory uh content or age inappropriate themes that were beyond the developmental appropriateness. uh and again some of those digital tools that we have access to help us identify the appropriateness of books for particular grade levels. Um and then the second phase of this would also be some of the common weeding that is done within the libraries where we talk about the physical condition of the materials. So, if there's materials that are becoming too worn or outdated or damaged that they shouldn't be in the library anymore, uh that would identify them for either replacement or um to be weeded out of our library. Another thing that our librarians look at is circulation fluency. So, how frequently certain materials are checked

107out. There's limited space within the libraries. So if there are materials that are within our libraries uh that the circulation frequency is very low on those materials, this would be a time that we'd be able to identify those materials and then remove them so that we could replace them with um materials that um would circulate at a higher frequency. And then in terms of roles and responsibilities, uh there's going to be a heavy lift for our school librarians and media specialists to um engage in the inventorying and then the the review that they're going to do for the materials. Uh additionally, principles and I have a role in uh the review of the reports that the librarians are able to produce. uh and then we will be bringing that information to the board of education

108for uh review. In terms of training and implementation, the district provides annual professional development on age appropriate guidelines, how to screen for content concerns, cataloging and [cough] the metadata tools that we have available uh as well as the reconsideration process. And then finally, this is a continuous improvement loop. So each year the teaching and learning department is going to evaluate the trends and requests for reconsideration, circulation shifts by grade level ban, any feedback that we receive from our stakeholders, and any new legal or policy requirements that [snorts] may um come up that we need to be aware of or that will impact our libraries. So looks like you guys are going to be busy for a while. [laughter] Um, thank you for doing this. Obviously, it means a lot to the district for one, for

109us to know what we have in the library to make sure it is appropriate for our students and you know and the district and what we have available. Uh, is there going to be as far as um so cross district and all the number of libraries especially in the elementary school that we don't have like six copies of the books and you know like three of our different libraries. Are we going to try to kind of minimize that so they can do cross school um borrow so that we can have more you know obviously a greater selection by not having multiple copies of the same books? >> Yeah, I would say that that already is pretty is done pretty often. We have a pretty um pretty uh good demand on inter library loan already. um

110we don't necessarily um just kind of like rubber stamp quarters for four elementary schools. Our aids do a really good job of keeping a pulse on um their collections, giving us feedback on staff member requests as well as what students are seeking um so that we can try and target each school a little bit individually and then fill those gaps with that inter library alone. But yes, we would continue to do that. Mr. Love, >> is it possible to search on subjects and find books? Is it on the website? Our website. Okay. I'm sorry. I spend most of my time in the board section. >> Yeah. Every school website has a library media center link which will take you right to the online catalog. >> So So you could punch in uh auto mechanics. >>

111Yep. and and get books. >> Yeah. >> Okay. And I think as long as we're reviewing our con content, I'd like us to make sure if at all possible that even in the K through five schools that we have uh age appropriate books for teched, you know, that the students might be able, you know, that might be books that include uh experiments and things that maybe mom and dad could do at home, you know, with their students. uh and get them a little bit interested u in teched and maybe a way of looking forward to the teched classes uh that you know the limited ones they can get in the grade schools and of course more comes in uh middle school and and then of course you get the whole shebang in uh high school

112you know so I'm hoping the books would get a little more complicated and if there are such books uh experiments and things, projects you can build at home, you know, parents and and students uh that they'd be a little more complicated in uh middle school and and of course in high school. I guess the sky's the limit, you know, for what those books might involve. >> Yeah. I mean, I think one of the biggest benefits of this is would allow us to take a look at not only what we can take out, but what we can put in. And I think in the elementary area, especially in the non-fiction areas that are really changing constantly, this will allow us to really take a deep dive into that non-fiction area, see what we have in inventory,

113see what's trending in areas like teched and and technology and other things like that and move more, you know, appropriate and, you know, timely books into those spaces. So, I think we really view this as a good opportunity to um not only look at what's, you know, what we can take out as far as it's past its time or needs to be weeded, but areas of weakness that we can really shore up our curriculum and make our libraries even better. So, I you know, I think it's going to be a good process. We're pro we you know we want to really make sure that the process itself that we use for this is intact because we want this to be something that's continuous you know like you were describing for all of your other uh

114committees you know any with curriculum with anything you don't want to be sitting here five years from now saying well let's let's do it again uh this should be an every year thing and I think we're in the process now with our digital resources our online uh databases where we do that on a yearly basis now um where we're constantly reviewing things. Should we renew this? Does it still fit the curriculum? Um so, and that's working well and I think we'd kind of like to move the same way with with um our book curriculum. >> And as far as the elementary school um you know, request. That's why we really want to start with the elementary schools. Admittedly, Jeff and I have a really good pulse on the buildings in which we work uh in

115our collections, but going through this process will help us be really intentional about flagging those areas uh that we can kind of bolster the collections at our elementary schools, especially in those areas that are rapidly changing. So, uh I think it's good for that reason. >> Yeah, science is a great area. It's changing all the time. uh the books I looked at when I was in grade school would certainly be completely different than what's out there today. Uh but uh you know today I I I guess I see uh in the science area maybe also uh 3D printing that was mentioned here this evening. Uh it's going to be plastic in our schools but you know there's also metal 3D printing out there. um all ju it's just unbelievable what's all out there and it

116seems like you know in the grade schools we could have the basics so that students might be able to learn uh a few things you know grade appropriate you know for those schools and uh so on I'm I I don't know that we're lacking on any of that but I'm guessing it's a it's an area where we might be I think the teched teachers would be happy to have more students rather than less students, you know, in the high school. For example, >> Mr. Loath, while we were talking here, I did a quick search on MacArthur's library and there's a everything robotics or robots and drones, past, present, and future. There's uh experimenting with engineering science. So, they already have some out there, but certainly it'd be good to see what they come up with

117when they do a full review. Yeah, I think I have to peruse some of this rather than just the uh board materials. Um I guess now's as a good a time to any to [clears throat] admit to it. I get past the opening screen so fast to go to the board items. I didn't notice that there were new pictures that showed a lot of teched things. And you, you know, I saw Chris uh just had the opening screen open for a while. So, I opened it on my computer and I'm like, "Wow, look at this. There's a picture of the auto shop in there and all all sorts of things." So, um, you know, I I could see there might be a little bit of material lacking the way things are changing. But anyway, thank

118you for the work and I'll agree with Kim. Uh, you got a lot. It's a big project because I I'm guessing some of the books we think are on the shelf aren't there. And I don't I don't know if there would be any on the shelf that we don't know about, but I mean that might be an issue too depending on the the content. And uh I agree with everything that we uh want to screen out uh things that were mentioned here in the presentation. Thank you. Um, [clears throat] I really do appreciate the answer you gave in regards to this is uh not necessarily a weeding exercise, but as [clears throat] much as it is what are we lacking um and where where's our opportunities to strengthen our supplemental materials for our students and

119our staff. Uh I really view your your two positions, right? You're curators of supplemental information for our buildings. Uh, and it's a wild wild time to be in that position. Um, I I'm I'm gonna just fathom to guess that we're going to get um some interesting comments in regards to this discussion alone. Uh, I know I've been called my fair share of a book burner in the past. Um, laughably so. Uh, I don't think I've I've taken that approach in any way, shape, or form, but it's a wild world we live in and and and you two are kind of in a hot seat in regards to this. I just What's your feelings? And I think you've kind of already answered this, but the process that's laid out here, um, your involvement in building out

120this process, can you kind of give us some of that information? I guess the biggest challenge uh shared with both Chris and Jake would be um just the resource manpower to to carry this through. Um Jeff and I being the two media specialists for six schools. We do have great aids. They work pretty much student schedule and student days, so it's really hard to free them up to do this kind of work during the school year. We do have assistants as well at the middle school and high school. uh and Jeff and I are talking about just ways in which we can kind of free up uh some of that time in order to carry this out. We're hoping that as you saw in the timeline, we can start inventorying in March. And that's not

121just going to be our aids in our elementary schools. It's going to be a combination of our assistance from the middle school high schools supporting that process. um maybe visiting those schools and working with those aids and those collections when time permits to just see how much we can get done and then possibly, you know, come June seeing where are we at in this process and how much time are we going to need over the summer potentially to carry it through to the end. Um the elementary schools certainly present the biggest bite uh with the four collections and so we'll have to revisit but Jeff and I think just from kind of like putting our minds to it that it's doable but being the first time through this process I think if we have to

122adapt we will. [snorts] >> Yeah. I think it's right. It's it's not a it's not going to be done overnight and it's not going to be done all in one take to your point. It's it's a yearly kind of uh goal, right? You put on the board and how much can we get through? Um so I appreciate your efforts in that. Um and I'm sure you're going to come back with some suggestions at some point or or provide Mr. Bizak with some suggestions of what's working well, what's not working well. We could use this or that. uh I think you'd have this board's full support in in whatever you need to get that mission done. Um it's it's a huge undertaking. I appreciate that you're both willing to do it. Um as well as the

123rest of the team. Um it's an interesting way in which we got here because this was not a board uh and we'll call it a board-driven initiative. Um but it was queued up by some citizens and DPI and the the reality was the question was can we answer their question? In some cases, it was very easy. In others, it was a little bit more abstract and what we will be able to do to answer that. And I think this process is going to lend to whether DPI gets back to us or not, a true answer for those citizens. Uh whether they know it or not. Um it really is an interesting way that uh kind of culminated in this project. Um, I don't think that was probably the intent or the ask at that time,

124but but the reality is to give the answer they need. This is going to be part of the process. So, >> yeah. And you'll be able to see, you know, when you line up books with tags and their subject tags that we can drill down and and see exactly what we have and we can show the percentage of our collection that reflects this or that. um you know that everything will be transparent and everything will be available for people to see and and um I think Erin and I are really comfortable that we have a really good collection in the district right now and and so um this is just a way to make a good thing better. >> I I would agree with that. I think it's a good way to to highlight the

125great work that's been done, right? And proof out look at the collection we have to offer. >> Yeah. >> Uh Mr. Viziac, I just have a couple questions for you. Um, obviously part of the part of kind of a couple years back we went on and approved the digital search engine and first off actually for for you to as well thank you for that. We've been able to assist our own students in finding information or accessing information that could help them with a project they've had at school. Um, so that's from a parental standpoint utilizing it that way has been fantastic. Uh, Mr. music. During that, there was also some weeding challenges that were issued and some changes to policy. How many requests have we've gotten since then, which I think that was almost two

126years ago now, if not two full two years ago, probably March. It was March of >> I think one. >> Yeah. >> And so I think that kind of speaks volumes. It's it's to your point a portal for transparency. Um, and we're seeing the results are we're in a good good spot and this is just another way to be able to highlight it. So, thank you. Uh, any other discussion or questions? >> I would just reiterate your sentiment. Uh, Mr. Gascal and Mr. Shriber, uh, when Mr. Mizak and I sat down with them what, three weeks ago and started discussing process and shared some ideas, they had ideas right away and both said, "Yeah, this is makes sense. Let's do this." And we're all in. We will put some financials behind this as well as

127there will be extended contracts in the summer um because there's multiple we people said this is a big job. So we want to make sure we'll work together with them and who else ever they need for their team to make sure that this is um done to quality because we know these two individuals uh expect no more than that. >> Britney might have had her ear plugged for that one. >> Yeah. [laughter] >> Yeah. No, thank you all for it. I think that actually highlights, right? Because it's HR, budget, the libraries, Jake's, that's a team that's going to have to figure this, you know, you know, to be able to accomplish this. So, thank you all for that. Any further? >> I have kind of a general question. Um Jake, you had mentioned tools that

128you have access to to um aid in aid in determining the appropriateness of the books. Who sets the guidelines for those tools? Are they set locally by by us or >> Yeah, I can I can loop that or let the librarian speak to it as well. Uh, one of the things that we can get through uh some of the the resources that we have through the library is we can get multiple um reviews on certain books and those those reviews will also give us age ranges that are appropriate for it. So it's kind of building a consensus amongst those reviews to determine the best age appropriate books. So you know there's a high level of consistency in the reviews that come back about this is the appropriate placement for it. But if there's any kind

129of discrepancy within those it's the librarians have access to that. They can review that. Um, and they're also looking for some of those other indicators that would either prompt them to say, you know, this might be a book that needs to be shifted for one reason or another, or uh, you know, this is a book that I actually have to dig into to to to check the content when there's, you know, discrepant reviews. >> Okay. And Erin, Jeff, have you guys used these tools before? Yeah, I mean when we are ordering uh we usually see a really good amount of reviews about a book and also you know the publishers and and not that the publishers are always right. We know that um but if you take a look at a book is up through

130you know the age of 14 or up through the age of 12 or 5 to 12 or you know we're always looking at the age range. Um, you know, for example, at the high school, um, if it's labeled as young adult or an age group, I look at that. But if there's certain things labeled as an adult book, then I pay extra close attention to that to make sure that that that has an adult labeling is appropriate for the kids that we have at the high school level. And then as we move down, we see, all right, what's going to, you know, when Aaron gets to the middle school, what's going to be appropriate for that specific age to to fit, you know, a pretty diverse age group. And then as we get down to

131the elementary um we're able to look at that. But we use a lot of those tags um through the publishers and also the reviews and things like that um to give our first it gives a first step to to looking into those books. >> And then having used those tools you you can kind of gauge. We've seen this before from this tool and it's a little off compared to what we may have expectations for and kind of develop it that way. >> Right. So, we just actually met with a vendor this week. Uh, it happens to be a vendor that um also uh assists us with our inventory. So, all of the books that we would scan and um account for in our library go into an inventory and then that um software can run

132a collection analysis. There are probably thousands of tags that uh we can hunt down and and click on that align towards those indicators that you mentioned that will at least give us some insight as to okay let's take a a closer look at this. Let's look at the grade level appropriateness, the interest level bands to make sure that they fit um you know the students within our buildings and the collection that they serve. So, um, we'll be looking at those software tools and those tags and those indicators to help us look and then as Jeff said, we can hone in on independent reviews as well to kind of gauge, okay, does this fit or doesn't it >> justify it? >> Great. Thank you. >> Anything further? >> Hearing none. Thank you, gentlemen. We'll move on

133to C discussion and action approved 2627 open enrollment seats. Dr. Reutder. >> Thank you. Uh this evening as we do annually in January um administration comes forward to the board with a recommendation for 20 the uh following year open enrollment seats. Um items that are reviewed in order to make a determination for recommendation are current enrollments and are cast forward what we're expecting. You'll [snorts] denote in the chart that's in the um packet that 4K currently projected forward is 33 students. As I stated, every year since we've had 4K, believe it says 33 39, I'm sorry. Um we just opened that enrollment process. We expect more than 39 students. However, um some for many parents, this is the first student they're registering and we continue to um anticipate a higher enrollment number. So, we cast

134forward our our current enrollment and what that will possibly look like if staying steady for 2627. We look at enrollment based on um average growth in past years and understanding um trends within Washington County as well as the village and outlying municipalities. We also look at counts that include our current open enrollment students and or tuition waiverss. Um as well as students that are residents that open and roll out. Uh we look at our current staffing plan and our projected staffing plan which may lead to um either uh staying flat, adding staffing if enrollment is projecting up as well as if enrollment is projecting down. what that could look like in relation to our class size policy as well as our capacity in our buildings. Um, as recommended last year, administration is recommending zero open

135enrollment seats in both the regular education and general educ uh special education. Um, Mrs. Cole has reviewed um our current case loads as you uh re can reference in from policy committee and what was approved this evening. We did look at language in our open enrollment policy that in effective in the 2627 school year, any family that is currently a resident who decides to move during the school year can apply for tuition waiver, complete the school year, but will have to reapply through open enrollment. Currently, the practice under policy was any student who applies for tuition waiver is then absorbed via open enrollment and does not have to apply. We currently have 80 students in the district um ranging from grades 5K to 12 that we'll grandfather out under that language. So, we currently have

136a high open enrollment rate or open enrollment population that you heard tonight in the financial series from Miss Vieira and Mr. Eert asked the question related to how does that funding work when we project um related to revenue limits and that very complex formula we went to um and Miss Altonorf please correct me if I'm wrong but we are paying um we are factoring in when it comes to that formula the students even that are resident students even if they leave that factors into our revenue limit. However, we pay the district they open enroll to their cost per pupil and those that come in that we're educating through open enrollment is at a lower cost than what our cost per pupil is in the district. That's one of the factors in decision makingaking here. As

137well as our class sizes are stable and adding an open enrollment seats with the projection of we do have transient population in the district that do move in in the summer months as well as there's often changes in demographic. Um that is another reason for recommendation to um not include any additional seats as well as our staffing plan preliminarily looks flat and we would not have to if we were to add more seats could lead to higher class size which would hit tipping points and our desired class size which would lead to more staffing with less revenue to support that staffing. So, um, as well as from the special education standpoint, um, any open enrollment student that comes in, if they are referred for an IEP and the parent does ask for services, we then

138have the right, which we would send back to their home district because they came in under regular education. So, that accounts for existing. However, we are not accepting it. We are recommending no exceptions for new um special education students through open enrollment because we believe that our staff and our funding is right sized for the capacity of what we have from case load and monies and dollars we receive from federal and state as well as our general budget that go towards programming needs. >> Thank you. Uh, with that, I will take a motion. >> Make a motion to approve zero regular education open enrollment seats and zero special education seats spaces for the 2026 2027 school year based in the criteria outlined in Germantown School District policy 5113 and guarantee approval to all applicants currently

139attending the Germantown School District regardless of space availability for the 2026 2027 school year. The board does not require non-resident students already accepted through open enrollment to reapply as long as the student is continuously enrolled in the district. >> Second. >> Mr. Punk, thank you for biting the bullet on that one. Mr. Barney, thank you for your second. Any discussion? [snorts] >> Um, yeah, I would like to to to just reiterate some of what you just talked about. Um, it's important to understand that our students enrolling out through open enrollment do not hinder our revenue limits and students we would allow to come in via open enrollment would come in underfunded for their educational needs and the expenditures this district would have thus over overburdening our [snorts] our residents and taxpayers to help make up

140the difference in which they would need. So I think it's a strong recommendation from not only a financial standpoint, from a classroom standpoint, from an educator standpoint, from a staffing standpoint. Uh at this time, I agree with you 100%. We are right sized um in the current market that we are. We've shown the due diligence to monitor uh developments within the village. Um and in the future, this this recommendation could change based off of some of that, but as we are sitting right now, I believe it's a very strong recommendation. [snorts] >> Thank you. Any further discussion hearing? None. All in favor? I. >> Any opposed? Hearing? None. That passes. [clears throat] D. Discussion only. District school turning. >> Do I need to read that too? >> No, I'm just looking at time. I know

141we have closed after this. Uh, we're just coming up 20 to 10. We should have time for this discussion only. Germantown School District annual assessment report. >> Mr. Mizak, uh with an eye on the clock. Thank you. >> Uh as much of the information here in the annual assessment reports a review at this point in time. Um I I can pay attention to the uh clock very well. Uh one of the reasons why it's a review is the last couple years we've talked about the changes to the forward exam and how those changes to the forward exam have impacted our state report card. Uh so as I stated before, even though you can see a historical look back of where we were in terms of a state report card, uh there are disclaimers if you

142go on to DPI or if you look at the guidance that DPI has provided to school districts this year. Uh there really shouldn't be a comparison between this year's score and previous scores, but you do notice that there's a significant bump between the 23 and 24 school year and the 2425 school year. Um and then in previous discussions I've kind of outlined um why those scores have changed the way that they have. Um one of the things that I think is useful with the state report cards is if you take a look at these priority scores uh for each one of the the key metrics for the school district. If you go into the the state report cards, there's a little section above the bar charts that tells you where we're falling in relation to

143other school districts in the state of Wisconsin by percentile. So, if you look at where we're falling for achievement, we're in the 89th.7th percentile. You take a look at growth, we're in the 90th percentile. So, those are metrics that um we can look at even though there's there's pieces of the state report card that they're, you know, they're not encouraging us to look backwards at. So compare this score to previous scores. We can compare this our current performance to other school districts in the state of Wisconsin. Um so there's a lot to celebrate in terms of our level of performance in that way. Um in terms of our ACT achievement for the last few years, we've been relatively stable in terms of where our our GHS [snorts] students have fallen in terms of their average.

144You can see there's been a slight dip from the 22 23 school year where we were 21.8 and then there's been decimal points of change between um the 2022 and 23 school year and current. Uh there are some initiatives that we are working through in terms of curriculum reviews where we are are looking to um impact those content areas uh so that we can continually improve our students performance as well as the um the content knowledge and experience that our students are getting at the high school. So both uh math and ELA are are currently under reviews. The ELA is starting at a um smaller content piece where we're looking at just English 11. Uh but that again is going to give our students access to those ensure that they have consistent access to the

14511th grade standards uh for ELA. And then our math program again we're reviewing the whole 912 sequence. Uh and then you can get a breakdown in terms of where we're performing in terms of each one of those individual subject areas. And again, you're going to see um that there's a great deal of consistency in terms of what our scores look like for the last three years in each one of those content areas. Uh preac secure uh that's a relatively um new assessment. So prior to this uh there was a different version of an ACT product that we were using within the district. So, uh, the look back data here only goes to the 22 23 school year because that was the first administration of it. Uh, if you were to look at cohort data, you

146would have to track it from 9th grade in the 22 23 school year to [clears throat] 10th grade in the 23 24 school year. So, you can see the the improvement that happens kind of on that diagonal. Um, it is there's a there's the test is identical. So you're actually comparing apples to apples in this case and it's the same students performance. So we can look at student growth um from one year to the other using the preacct secure. Uh the one thing that I'd note here is because there's um limited data how great those increases are. We're not sure yet in terms of what it is. You can see kind of that final output in terms of our ACT. So that if you track students from 9th to 10th to 11th grade, we see

147this constant increase in ACT score. But what [clears throat] constitutes like a really good increase from one year to the other? Um I don't know that we have robust data on yet to determine like what what are we really looking for. Uh within the assessment packet, you can kind of see within individual grade levels. uh in one of the school years we were seeing um jumps between content areas for less than a point and then in the next year we saw some jumps that exceeded uh you know a full point of achievement between the two scores. Um, so one thing that we can note is that we're seeing this level of improvement from one year to the other with the students, but it's it's going to take a little bit of time to establish what

148that baseline growth is and to see how that tracks out to um our eventual ACT performance for our students. Uh, one of the areas that would be new information that I'd like to highlight is our AP testing uh data. So, one of the things that's really nice to see here is um you know, we've got this consistent trend of number of exams taken. So, more and more students are having access to AP courses. And with that increased number of students who are taking those exams, you're seeing our pass rate continue to be exceptionally high. So, uh almost 91% of our students this year uh received a score of three, four or five on the AP exam uh that they took. um which eventually for our families that can result in um potential tuition that they're

149not having to pay at at a college level because those credits can be transferred and used uh at the collegiate level. Uh and then here in this table, what I show for you is the pass rate by subject area. Uh so you can see how well our students are doing in each one of those particular areas. Uh, and if you take a look at English, um, that's something to be exceptionally proud of where almost 98% of our students who are taking an AP test are receiving a three, four, or five. But across the board, um, our students are performing very well in these advanced placement classes. Uh the last thing that I put into the packet for the assessment report, there are a couple of tables that aren't pictured uh on the slides because they

150they just contain too much information. I was worried about how they would project. Uh but what you'll see there is again some historic performance by each one of our elementary schools uh as well as our middle school in terms of this historic performance of advanced or proficient on the forward exam. The same caveat that I said before would still take place here. Whereas you're taking a look at these tables, the historic performance uh is not encouraged to look at because of the changes in the forward exam. If you look at the the the charts that I put on here, these are from the state report cards. But you can see here uh it should be relatively compared because in the 22 or I'm sorry the 23 24 school year they were using the same forward

151exam as they're using in the 25 24 25 school year. So if you're looking across there this data is something that we can use to monitor trends within our schools to see how our schools are performing. So, for example, you can see that for Amy Bell, we've got this significant increase in the number of students who are not only proficient and advanced in ELA, but you also see this jump in the number of students who are advanced. Another nice thing to take a look at is if you look at that very top bar, which I believe is orange, uh you can see the number of students who are in the lowest column for this, which is the our um developing students. uh you can see that there's this decrease that occurred in there which is

152that's the kind of trend data that we're looking for. The asterisk that I'll put on this is the cohorts that represent these groups slightly change. Uh and I'll point this out on the Rockfield data. Um so each year you're rotating in a new group of third graders and you're exiting out a group of fifth graders. So it's not exactly a perfect comparison. So again, you're kind of looking holistically at this data, knowing that some of these student populations have changed within it. Again, if you're taking a look at county line, we're seeing some of those same trends that we were looking at before where we're seeing the number of students who are proficient or advanced uh remain relatively high. And then if you look across, we're increasing the number of students who are advanced and

153then um minimal students who are in the developing category. uh MacArthur's data you see a nice jump in the math performance where the number of students who are advanced went up significantly whereas the reading data looks a little bit more stable uh with a nice decrease on the the developing side and then on Rockfield you can see that for Rockfield you do have an increase in the number of students who are advanced in ELA and then you can see that there's a slight dip in the number of students who are proficient and advanced in mathematics but again This doesn't quite tell the whole story. If you dig into their state report card and you take a look at growth, uh, Rockfield's growth outperforms 100% of the schools in the state of Wisconsin. Uh, so that's

154one of those factors where it's like that cohort has changed. So if you're looking at a student's performance, uh, they're they're demonstrating a high level of growth. So even though the overall achievement might not be as high because the the cohort has changed, the growth of those individual students still remains really high. Uh one of the other indicators that we have that I included in the packet, you can take a look at um the map performance for each one of the buildings. Just like I did last year, this report is limited to the look back of the previous school year uh at a future teaching and learning committee. I can bring the growth data that we have from fall to winter to take a look at some of those. Um I showed you quadrant charts

155last year where we can take a look at students who are um demonstrating low growth and low achievement and then students are demonstrating high growth, high achievement across all of those content areas. So then you can see kind of the the growth metric that's associated with our students. And then [clears throat] finally, here's Kennedy's. again you're seeing fairly consistent performance in terms of ELA but we saw a nice bump in the number of students um who are advanced and then as well in ELA and mathematics. The last thing that I included in the assessment report which not was not a part of the assessment report last year uh was this third grade reading. again the challenges of having those metrics change. Uh one of the things that we can do is just kind of look

156at historic performance. Uh in the packet I included this table which shows where we were in 23 24 in terms of our third grade reading score and then where we were in 2425 in terms of our third grade reading score and then what that net change was. The school districts that I provided on the left hand side, they're just used as a reference point. So they were just schools that scored similar to us. So there's no other metric that I used to determine those. So those are CISO1 schools who performed similar to our 69.4 in terms of our third grade reading score. And then you can see how much change German Town experienced from 23 24 to that subsequent school year. Uh so it's just one other way to try to to put some context

157to the rate of change that we're that we saw uh in that one year. Uh the last table that I put in there, but I did not put into the slide presentation is just kind of what our overall ranking was for third grade reading score. And there there has been some great consistency in where it was. So, out of our CISA1 school districts, uh, way back in the 2021 school year, we were 21st in CISA1, uh, and then 22nd 22nd and then 20th and then finally this last school year, we saw a pretty significant jump up where we've moved up to 16 where our score finally kind of broke the um, average score for CISA1 and now we're kind of in the upper tier of uh, CISA 1 performance. And Jake, could you just remind

158maybe those at home um why the third grade reading score is essential? >> Absolutely. So, uh recently the legislation that that um kind of highlights this is uh by third grade we're looking at uh the proficiency of our students because if you're not proficient by grade three, one that has some long-term implications for your success in school. So, uh, previous research on how well students have performed show that a deficit in third grade reading ability does have some long-term impacts on kids, which was kind of the motivation for the ACT 20 legislation to try to make sure that as many students as possible grow as much as they possibly can during those early years of literacy to make sure that they have access to the best academic outcomes that they have. Um, so this is

159obviously something that we're monitoring in terms of our performance. Uh so that's another set of data that I can bring to the teaching and learning committee. Again, it's it's this year's performance, but I can show you how many students um are receiving reading plans within the school district. Uh at and then at the very end of the year, I can show you how many students have been exited from that. uh without uh the data in front of me, I can tell you that uh the the number of students who are receiving the reading plan is far be below that 20 like 25th percentile is the um kind of range of the data that exists. About 10% of our students at any one of the grade levels is is receiving a reading plan. How did you

160choose those schools? Again, >> uh it's uh I created a um distribution of all the CISO one school districts and then pulled the ones that were closest to us in terms of their previous year's school year's performance. So it was just who was performing similar to us just so that we could take a look at you know what does a jump look like uh I'll use Cedarberg as an example. Cedarberg um should be very proud of their ELA performance uh in 232 24 I think their score was up around 90. Um so their jump into the 2425 school year uh was four points. It's or something around there. it it may not look all that significant. So, I didn't want to just rate it by the level of change because there are [snorts] some school

161districts because of where they fell in that distribution, uh their room to grow was a little bit less than what ours was. Likewise, um I didn't want to expand the entire spreadsheet, but again, if if the board is interested in I can provide that whole data set to you so you can you can see it. It's also publicly available. So DPI offers the ability to download essentially a a data set that's everybody's state report card and that's how I created this. >> I'm just wondering if it makes sense that we kind of have a set group of schools that we benchmark to in other areas. >> I can get that for Friday update. This again the 2324 score. This is where our cluster was comparison. >> I'm not saying replace it but we can get

162that. >> I'm saying layer on top just just forformational purposes. I think the only one that's on there that's um in our our normal cluster of comparison groups would be >> Monomony Falls. >> Wait, it's such a big jump across multiple schools. implementation the co effect >> no implementation of read new reading >> cur act 20 >> and that and that's one thing to note is it's it's kind of that relative performance where um across Wisconsin a lot of school districts are in almost a similar position of we're looking at implementing new resources we're looking at implementing training with our teachers uh it's building the capacity to support this reading initiative so that's one of the reasons why I wanted to to just illustrate that change here to say, you know, the what what's going

163on with our elementary schools and their focus on third grade reading. It is showing that there's [cough and clears throat] um an [snorts] impact on our readers. >> Yeah, I think it's uh it's interesting to see some of the change that's been driven, but I think for our legislators that brought act 2020 20 through and we could debate some of the finer points of it. And I think we have at times uh it it appears it's driving not only locally for us but within the state it seems some some positive changes um of which it was intended to do. I appreciate that we've been I feel like a year to 6 months out in front of that whole process. We were already there. Um but I'm I'm sure glad for the state that everyone's coming

164along. So >> yeah, and I think you heard it earlier tonight when one of our reading specialists was describing as an opportunity that, you know, all of our students really deserve to have a reading plan, right? What are the ways in which we're monitoring their growth to make sure that they're they're making the the largest gains that they can and and uh making the progress that they should. >> Absolutely. >> Any other comments or questions? Seeing none. Thank you, Mr. Miziaak. Uh, we'll move on to item 14. Correct. I didn't skip anything. Close session A. Board of Education will entertain a motion to go into close session pursuant to Wisconsin State Statute item [snorts] 119.85 sub1 subc to consider employment promotion compensation or performance evaluation data of any employee a administrative contracts. I believe we

165are coming back in with intent to come back into open. >> Correct. >> Regarding specifically that topic >> and two 19.85 sub1 sub to deliberate negotiation and purchase of public properties, the involvement of district funds or the conduct conduct of or other board business whenever competitive bargaining reasons require a closed session a G negotiations. And I believe I discussed this earlier in the update. This is just to provide the full board um and the status of where we're at with the GA so we don't have to wait and delay that at a later time. So with second >> roll call >> yes >> Brown >> yes >> Barney is yes >> yes [clears throat] >> yes >> bath >> yes >> lawyer >> yes >> we are now enclosed at 1000 p.m. We'll be back

166>> the board is reconvened back into open session at 11:09 p.m. Um, given the topics, uh, in close session, I will entertain a motion. >> Would like to make a motion to approve the administrative contracts for Dave Smith, Sarah Yu, Nerdle, Jessica Garin, Brandon Cole, Kelly Schultz, Lindseay Chandelia, and Dana Crowette as presented. Enclosed. >> Do I have a second? >> Second. >> Brown. >> Mr. P with a motion. Mr. Brown with a second. Any discussion? Hearing none. All in favor? I. >> Any opposed? Hearing none. Those contracts passed. Approved. >> I will entertain a second motion. >> Like to make a motion to approve the administrative contracts for Jacob Mizak, Katie Cole, Brittney Altonorf as presented with amendment and closed. >> Second. >> Mr. Pac with a motion. Miss Higin Batham with a second.

167Any discussion? Hearing none. All in favor? I >> I. Any opposed? Hearing none. Those pass. Let's hear a third motion. >> Like to make a motion to approve the administrative contract for Chris Reutder as presented with amendment enclosed. >> Second. >> Mr. Pollock with the motion. I'll give that one to uh Mr. Voyer and we'll spread the love. Uh for second. Any discussion? Hearing none. All in favor? >> I. >> Any opposed? Hearing none that passes. I will entertain one more motion to move to second. >> Mr. Brown with the motion, Miss Higinboth with the second. Any discussion hearing? None. All in favor? I. >> Any opposed? Hearing none, we are adjourned at 11:10 p.m.