001We are glad you're all here. There are lots of seats in the front for anyone who's standing who would like to come and you can come and sit in the front because after all the recognitions then we let let everyone leave. So you don't have to try and sneak out from the front. Um thank you for being here. We're glad to have you all here. Uh it is Thursday the 20th of November 2025 and we are meeting in the boardroom on Legacy Campus. Uh we have special guests this evening. Well, first I'll start with roll call beginning with Jared. >> Jared Black, business administrator. >> Jeff Nielsson, board member. >> Alan Grunick, board member. >> Kathy Christensen, board member. >> Terry Rhodess, board member. Todd McKe, superintendent. >> Brian Chambers, board member. >> Randall Baggley,
002board member. >> And Roger Pulifer, board member, is excused this evening. >> And we have some special guests this evening from North Park Elementary who are going to lead us in the pledge of allegiance. So, can I have Molly Kimber and Maggie Bates come to the front of the room with their teacher, Billy Sue White? Let's go. Let's go. Let's go. Okay. Are you guys going to Who's going to hold it? Are you going to hold it or is Molly going to hold it? >> Okay. Say, "Please stand." >> Please stand. >> Are we doing the whole thing? >> Okay. Let's show them how we do it. Ready? We have a little part first. Hold, please. >> Ready? This is my right hand. This is my heart. There is the flag. We're ready to start.
003I pledge alce 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. Park nights are coming. Do you want to show them how we do it? Okay, put your hands up. Ready? North Park nights are safe, respectful, responsible, and ready to learn. Good job. [laughter] [applause] >> So, this is actually Jensen, who is their um e teacher that led them. So, good job Thank you, Mrs. Gloven. All right, thank you so much for coming. Uh, and our mission statement will be given by Jeff Nelson. >> Thanks, Terry. Our mission is to educate students for success in a changing world. >> Thank you, Jeff. Uh, the most exciting the next exciting part of our agenda is um teacher
004of the year recognitions. We are excited to have four teachers this night that we get to uh recognize. Uh first up we have Cindy Allen from Spring Creek Middle School and her award will be presented by Principal Blair Pal. >> All right. I was told this morning that I have a minute and a half. I'm not sure I can keep that. I don't talk like an auctioneer. And it is important that uh we take this moment to recognize Cindy and cause her embarrassment because she uh just so you know, she didn't even want her picture taken individually for our teacher of the year. She wanted it to be a group photo of the entire faculty, which I think speaks a lot to her um ability to to recognize that um she's a team player and
005uh Cindy always defers to others as far as uh letting them get the recognition. Um, and she's the first cheerleader to line up. Um, anytime any of us have anything that happens in our lives, Cindy's one of the first people that is in your room congratulating you, handing you a gift and a card. I don't know how she responds so quickly. Um, some things that uh I want to just say first of all about Cindy is she takes caring and compassion very seriously. That is the business that she is in. And uh her students recognize it. Her colleagues recognize it. I'm sure her family recognizes it as well. Um and uh we love working with you Cindy. some things the students said about Cindy that I wanted to make sure to share with you tonight.
006Sorry, the eyes are not what they used to be. Several students mentioned, "She is so kind. She is the kindest teacher I've ever had." A student mentioned, "She helps me get ready in the morning." Uh some students commented on the fact that they sing songs in her class every day to help them remember the material that they're learning. She patiently helps me understand. She is funny. I love this one. She can be direct, but she helps me to stay focused. her class is the best. And perhaps one of the most often um repeated things from the students was she is always concerned about the students in her class. Um Cindy, I think that this is probably no matter what we say, you're probably going to uh say, "Well, that doesn't really apply to me." But
007the reality is everything that I've mentioned is entirely part of your character. And that's why we want to recognize you as our Spring Creek teacher of the year. [applause] And Cindy, you know, I'm not a hugger. >> This is a first. [laughter] >> Cindy is a hugger. So, just be warned. >> And after this picture, I hope all of our faculty just come up for a 10-second quick picture together and family. >> Or we can do that out in the >> Oh, no. But she's going to be [laughter] >> Well, I'm going to remember that. YOU THAT'S [laughter] >> YOU GUYS come up real fast. We This is all of our school. I that's why I told Blair there's no way I can take this award because it's everybody in our school that is amazing
008and >> everybody has something they add. >> Thank you for coming up and being in our picture together you guys. >> We're going to have we're going to have to squish in tight. >> We will. And >> well the good thing we like each other. >> Yes. >> Thank you. Oh, sorry. [laughter] >> Thank you. I know that's not a normal thing that you do. [laughter] >> Congratulations, Cindy. We are so grateful for great teachers. Uh, next great teacher we get to recognize is Kennedy Fielding from Canyon Elementary School and her award will be presented by Principal Holly Corbridge. I am really excited about tonight. [laughter] Kennedy is truly one of Canyon's best of the best. Um, when we talk about Kennedy, she just, you can just see it. She just has so much positivity
009and when you walk in her classroom, that is exactly how you feel. Um, no matter who you are, she just makes you feel so welcome. Um, I had the opportunity to ask the community and our staff um, a few things about Kennedy and they all said how amazing she is, which is not surprising, but I want to share a few things that they said. Um, one, she truly cares about each individual student and helps develop each child based on their needs, which is true. She is one that doesn't just teach lessons. She is teaching kids on the daily basis. She loves them. She looks for things that they truly need and she targets those things to make them feel like they belong or that each kid belongs, which is pretty cool. Um, the next thing
010another parent said, she changed the way my son viewed school. She built his confidence and helped him see his strengths. we will forever be grateful. And that was said over and over again that they just the kids just love to be in her classroom. Kids that normally wouldn't want to be there, they want to come to Mrs. Fielding's class. Um so beyond that, she also you'll also see her collaborating with her team. She um is helping them through the hard things that they're going through and it's with such positivity. She just handles herself with grace across the board. Um and that's what they said. They said her daily grace makes such a deep impact. So her her colleagues love her, the students love her. So Kennedy, thank you for being who you are and we
011are so happy that she is at Canyon and our Canyon Teacher of the Year this year. Thank you. [applause] That's my mom. She's going to make us take another [clears throat] one. >> Oh, sorry. [laughter] >> Thanks. >> Congratulations, Kennedy. Thank you [cheering] for being a great teacher. [applause] And our next great teacher that we get to recognize is Nancy Pollson from North Park Elementary School. and her award will be presented by principal Julie Payne. Thank you. So, we love this woman at North Park. I want to tell you a little bit about NY's history. Nancy started in education at North Park as a pareducator. She worked as a PAR educator. I'm going to look at my cheat sheet. For five years at North Park, for those that are unaware, that's an aid. And she
012was a reading pareducator. After her five years there, she was a fourth grade teacher at North Park for three year for 6 years until we swooped her up to be a literacy facilitator. And that meant she assisted with reading programs at both Canyon and Milville. When she did that, I was in a role where I was assisting facilitators as well as ESL teachers in their schools. And I still recall being in Millville when she said, "I really want to work with students learning English someday. How do I do that?" And that was all the way back in 2018. And I had no idea that I would be here today getting to say that Nancy is now my ESL teacher at North Park Elementary. So after some time at Millville and Canyon as a literacy facilitator,
013she spent a year as a first grade teacher at River Heights and then I got to swoop her up as an ESL teacher and she is in her third year at North Park. It's pretty special when someone that supports so many students is recognized because sometimes these exceptional support teachers aren't always um rise risen right to the top. Sometimes um we have amazing people, but there are times where those extra people are unintentionally um not recognized the same way. And our school staff loves Nancy. Our students love Nancy. to be an advocate for this um [clears throat] subgroup in our school that needs that extra love and support. Teachers that love them and then an ESL teacher that loves them means a lot to our school. Just this year, she reached out to an individual
014and said, "How could I get some donations so that our students learning English as their second language can have North Park t-shirts?" She was hoping for a little bit of support. And by the end, all of those students, 35 >> 40 have North Park shirts. And so when we do our spirit day, those kids join in. In fact, those kids join in almost every day. They love their North Park shirts. And that's a tribute to who Nancy is. This summer we had a concern about a student in our school that Nancy also supports and she reached out and we did a home visit to that family because that's who Nancy is that in July she's worrying about her students. So we are so fortunate to have Nancy in our school. We just love her and
015we love those that she works with. Thank you. Thank you. [applause] >> [applause] >> to have all of you over. >> Thank you. [laughter] >> Congratulations, Nancy. Thank you for being a great teacher in our district. Um, last I could say last the best of all the game um is uh Taylor Feder Rico from Cash High School and uh her award will be presented by principal Sheree Hansen. Thanks. Okay, Kevin, that was me. Kevin just said I don't need a mic. He's [laughter] right. He's right, but I don't want to hear it from him. Right. I really don't need a mic. This is Taylor Federico and she started at Cash High also as an a just returned from an LDS mission. She speaks Spanish so she was this great catch and um Michaela Cus who
016also works at Cash High was friends with her and said, "I know this dingling. She would be great. She's got to come work with our kids." And come to find out, she fit right in. She's just part of the same dingling group I am. And Cash High is a special place to be and we need exceptional teachers. I know you would argue you need them everywhere, but we really need them and Taylor is that exceptional teacher. She thinks she's going to get out of coming back next year because she's expecting a baby, but no, we are dragging her back. So, mom and dad be aware of that fun. And Taylor works with every student in our district. She does credit recovery for the four high schools plus Cash High. She teaches um fax classes at
017Cash High. She is a lunch lady. She cleans up at lunch. She comes and translates in the office at a moment's notice. She's so important to what we do every day. And we couldn't do it without her. And she also cares about kids. But what I love most about Taylor, she cares about all I mean all of us. Me, my staff. She's a good friend to everyone she she meets. And um I especially love that she does speak Spanish and can relate to a population that sometimes doesn't feel represented. And we're just so lucky to have her as our teacher of the year. That students and faculty love her but not more than I do. So congratulations. [applause] Thank you, Taylor, for being another one of our great teachers. Can we have all the people
018who are here supporting these four teachers stand up? It really takes a village to keep a teacher in the classroom, DOESN'T IT? [applause] >> [applause] >> THANK YOU ALL for being here. We are grateful for your support and for these wonderful teachers. And we are moving on to the business part of our meeting. So if you want to escape, this is the moment. >> [laughter] >> I feel like I'm >> [cough and clears throat] >> We asked Jared if we have any public. [laughter] >> [clears throat] >> Is Julie still Oh, she is still here. >> I thought you might have snuck out with all your people. >> I told them like [laughter] >> Yes. And so I thought maybe it would help if you didn't have so many people in here to talk to,
019but um I wish that they could would all stay to hear your wonderful report. So, we have um Julie Payne, who is the principal at North Park Elementary, um ready to give us a North Park Elementary board presentation. >> Thank you. And as far as my great school staff, I hope they're out there recognizing Nancy and I'm planning to share share it with them uh tomorrow at faculty meeting. So in order to create this, I did reach out to our staff and say, "What are those questions that you wanted to learn about the challenges, the great things? I think I know the answers, but I wanted to find out what our staff thought as well." So North Park is pretty great. We also are working on educating students for success in a changing world. Our
020demographics, we currently have 422 students, kinder through 6th. We have a special education preschool program as well. We have an essential elements program and you were able to hear from two of our students and their teacher as well as their classroom teacher today. And we have a growing English learner program. Our student numbers have been declining. I've been at North Park since 2020. And I um don't count 2020 numbers the same because we know that year we had a lot of students online. Things were different. But uh 2021 we had about 460 students. 2022 we had the same exact number. Uh the following year it was about four students different and then we've had some declines recently as our younger students are um less than our upper grade students. So we are declining uh and
021we we hope to see that change as more construction around the school happens someday. Our ethnicity race, 12% are Hispanic or Latino, 6% are American Indian, 4% Asian, 2% Africanamean and uh black, 3% Pacific Islander, and then 88% white. If you do the math, that does add up to more than 100, but we recognize that some of our students fall into multiple categories. Free and reduced lunch, we have 28% students. 28% of our students are identified as those receiving free or reduced lunch. Our special education group is 16%. Our students that are limited English proficient or receiving ESL services is 11%. 3% of our students are homeless. Uh that doesn't mean that they are necessarily living on um living without any housing, but they might be doubled up into multiple families in the same location.
022We have had times where a student has lived in the warming center and then um needed to go elsewhere until the bus could pick them up because the warming center would close before transportation um was appropriate to pick her up. So we've we've had some challenges that have increased in recent years. Uh our migrant population is 1% and our immigrants 5%. We have had an increase in our students that are refugees as well. uh that slowed down in January of this year, but prior to that uh we were seeing that grow. In fact, here are the languages that are spoken at North Park. 90% of our students speak English. We hope that to be 100% um and then some of these students speaking multiple languages. So, I'd love for this to not add up to
023100% but more to 100 20%. Right? When we've got kids that fall under multiple categories, but 90% of our students, their first language is English. 6% Spanish, 1% marshal, another 1% Arabic, 1% Swahili. Then we have less than 1% speak Nepali because that's two students. And then we have two students whose first language is Polish. And then you'll see around there all the different ways you can say hello in our languages that are represented at North Park. So hopefully all of our students will be fluent in English before they they leave us. And then we'll have these bilingual North Park nights. our rise data. Here's our 2025 data. You can see the state and then cash and then North Park. The blue line, the darker blue line or bar or language arts. The light blue
024is mathematics and then science is that um darker shade of blue that's not navy. So, right there you can see that our science is our top performing area. And then we have our mathematics and our language arts still comparable in many areas to what the district is doing. And then we um have done better than the state in our most recent testing. Uh so we recognize there's a lot of great things going on at North Park. You can also see that down below. In 2024, you'll notice we have areas that we grew in each area. Our school did grow between 2024 and 2025. In our acadence reading, that's for our kinder through third grade. We do test as a district kinder through 5th, but state reportable is our kinder through third. And you can see
025there, uh, the beginning of the year, let's look at 23 24, 56.9% of our students were on benchmark. By the end of the year, we were at 64.1. The box below that for our 23 24 are the pathways of progress. So were our students making um typical or above typical progress? Uh between the beginning of the year and the middle of the year almost 70% of our students were making typical or above typical progress and by the end of the year it was 77.5. So we'd love to see 100% of our students making typical or above typical progress, but we still celebrate that nearly 78%. In the previous year, so 2425, um we had six, excuse me, 59.6% at the beginning of the year that were scoring at benchmark and then we uh had 64.9
026by the end of the year, which you can see in that case is the same middle of the year and end of the year. Then for our pathways of progress, we had nearly 70% and we ended the year with nearly 71%. So a little bit of progress there. We're glad we didn't lose ground, but we're excited to celebrate that progress. And then you can see the state results and the LEA results as well. And same thing with math. So we've got we went from 61.8% at the beginning of the year kindergarten through 3rd in 23 24 to 23.7. You can see they made a gain in the middle of the year that was an increase and then we did have a decrease but it was still above that beginning of the year. If you look
027though at our pathways of progress for that year they actually did have a 10% decline. So that gave us an area of growth that we knew we needed to focus on. What is it that we need to fill in? You'll see we're still working on that in the following year. Since I'm talking about pathways of progress, let's transition over to the next same area. 56.4 to 54.7. Still an area where we need to be more successful. You can see from our uh third grade through sixth grade rise scores. We're doing well in those areas, but what is it that we're missing in those early things that we figure out by the time they go to take rise, but we're missing it in that kinder through third. We have phenomenal teachers. They're wonderful. But I also
028know our district is working on these things as well. If you look at the bar graphs, you can see uh a loss in our district as well um between midyear and end of the year. So, it's something we're working on districtwide. Beverly Sanders is really supporting us in math. We're trying to get some more opportunities for teachers to grow and develop opportunities. PBIS. So, our PBIS program is focused on nights, and you saw our little second graders do that for you. We work on being safe, respectful, responsible, and then ready to learn. And then in each of our settings, we have what does learn mean? What does it mean to look like that in lunch in the halls? Safety, that's across the school. And flush, that's for the bathrooms. in all of our staff are
029able to hold badges that have listen, excuse me, learn and safety on them. We can use that as a great teaching tool. If there's been a problem out at recess, students can come in. We get an opportunity to take it out of our badge and say, "Let's look at safety." Yes, you were finding friends. You'll see that at F. No. Yes, you kept things on the ground, but did you listen when someone asked you to stop swinging inappropriately? Things kind of thing. So it gives us a chance to recognize the good and then use that as a teaching moment. And then the students have been working on these each month a different topic or a different poster. We have shared values across the school. That's been very helpful. Proactive teaching at the beginning of the
030year. We do nights in training. You'll hear other schools that do boot camps. It's like a boot camp, but because we're the North Park Knights, we call it the nights in training. and we do rotations at all the different important stations in the school, the office, uh the lunchroom and throughout different areas where our sixth graders are there teaching it to their students, excuse me, to the other students in the school. So, they come as grade levels and a first grade group will come into the library and the sixth graders will teach them about bus safety, parent pickup safety, what it means to learn those type of things. And then in the lunchroom, another group of students will tell the others, kinder through fifth grade, what that looks like. We found that the sixth graders
031love it. It's a great teaching opportunity for them. And it also uh helps all of our students not just hear from the teachers, but hear from their peers and the peers they look up to. So, we love that. And then in January, we'll do a retach. When the retach happens, smaller groups of students, still all those sixth graders, but they actually go into the classroom and just hold up the posters and retach the students. We love it. It's a great leadership opportunity for the students. And we have those monthly expectation focuses and then we have a prize cart that happens once a week um or twice a week depending, excuse me, twice a month depending upon schedules where the students can earn these shield tickets you see in the corner. And with those shield tickets,
032they can uh buy items that they'd like to purchase or things like this challenge. You can see this board here. A child wanted to challenge the counselor to a coloring contest. And then students get to vote on who colored best. And this was our winning student entry. You can see a picture here of a basketball game. So students got to earn a basketball game with their 25, excuse me, that's a lot. I think it's 200 shield tickets if we've got any teachers out here. uh 200 shield tickets and then they invite friends. This sweet one invited his older brother and a friend and then they ask teachers to participate. So we try to give opportunities for uh items that they tangible items as well as experiences. The kids really enjoy it. Positive momentum. So we
033are working on academic growth with that focus on um ongoing improvement. Our teachers are wonderful. They try really hard. um we always can improve and that's something that we continue to focus on with our TSSA goals as well as our school trust lands that we're going to include as part of our school improvement plan. We are improving our TAG procedures to maximize those student benefits. Our TAG program continues to grow and we can track students over the years to see what their needs are and make sure we're not missing something. We have the addition of a school support leader thanks to to the support of our school board as well as our district leadership and that school support leader has been a great resource to help in so many ways in the school. We're really
034fortunate to have her in our building. And then additional trainings being provided to school staff and administration to assist with student behavior needs. So then we get to our potential improvements. We want to continue to update the physical learning environment. North Park was built before man landed on the moon. And so when I consider that, I think we've got some areas to grow. And our superintendent has been helping with that. Um Dawn's procedures that we can submit um a capital improvement requests for him to be able to go through that list and see what's appropriate will help North Park. We've got some good things going on there. And then we're trying to integrate best practice strategies for behavior instruction. When we talk about what's an area challenge, we know you've heard it, behavior is a
035challenge. We recognize too that they are kindergarteners through sixth graders and they need instruction and some need a lot of instruction and some just need a little bit. So, we are continuing to work on that and that's right here. We're going to talk about our challenges. We have students experiencing homelessness and we talked about that already. Lack of resources. Uh we've been trying to connect students and their families to resources outside of the district. We also want to try to remove barriers like clothing. Uh just this last week, our amazing secretary helped arrange a um delivery of mattresses to a family that didn't have mattresses. So we have amazing people at North Park that are listening and trying to help. and without that assistance of an our head secretary that probably doesn't want to be
036named, those children wouldn't have those mattresses right now. So, um we are really fortunate. We also are fortunate to have an incredible supportive community that helped those donations happen as well. We are on ATSI so that additional targeted support and improvement. Currently, we're identified for our Hispanic subgroup. We continue to work with that. At one point we were also identified for our students that are um English learners. Some people can get confused about that Hispanic subgroup versus the English learners. We have many students that are in the Hispanic subgroup but do not receive English service instru, excuse me, English development services because they are first language English learners. Um, but we have about 50 students that are in the Hispanic subgroup and that's a group we continue to try to find ways to outre to
037reach out to them. We find attendance can be a big barrier and if you're not in school to learn, we really miss out. We also are trying to build relationships and help those students know they can do it. And that's one area we're really working. We're working on having them respond to complete sentences. We know if you don't respond in complete sentences, you can't write in complete sentences. you don't speak uh you write the way you speak. And then building vocabulary. I'm so impressed with the academic language our teachers teach. We also know that some of our students need it even more foundationally using gestures and uh making sure that students understand what they're being taught. Student behaviors, I mentioned those challenges. So, our staff are providing that proactive instruction and reteing when needed. uh
038we try to work in partnership with parents or guardians because we recognize it's a community and we are stronger with them. [clears throat] Our chronic absenteeism as I mentioned earlier we're trying to foster those relationships. Uh this is our popping with attendance. When we have students here 50 excuse me when a grade level has 95% of the grade at school they can earn a popcorn kernel. if they have 95% in in the week of their classmates on time, they earn a popcorn kernel. So, as students earn popcorn kernels, 10 popcorn kernels will lead to a popcorn party for their grade and then we start all over again. So, that's one way. We also do a principal and counselor outreach. We go and visit families and try to help encourage them to come to school. And
039teachers reach out. Uh the office reaches out. They've had programs with our secretary. You've come to school enough times, you get a bag of Takis. And you'd be amazed what students will do for a bag of Takis. Points of pride. We have a student council. We love our student council. We also try to find other leadership opportunities. This is our weekly night news that you can see three pictures on the side that say night news. Uh I've been doing this for about a year and a half. Each week the students get to hear about what's happening in the school and then it's uh shared with teachers so they can watch it in their own classrooms. Most recently I've started including students so they can learn from their classmates. And I love to watch the students
040do it. So they get to hear the events of the week, uh, birthdays, uh, star students or star athletes of the day, which our PE teacher chooses, lunchroom leaders, and they have an opportunity to connect and I've realized that it really helps them to get to see me more frequently. Uh, even if I can't have a face-to-face conversation with every student in the school, this is one way. We have a spirit Friday where we encourage students to wear school colors or school shirts or sweatshirts. The colors helps our students that don't have access to a sweatshirt that says North Park to still be involved. So, anyone wearing yellow, blue, black, or white that day as a sweatshirt or a t-shirt is part of our school spirit as well as anyone else in a North Park
041shirt. And then we just recently had a student a couple months ago ask me, "Can we have a newspaper?" I said, 'Great idea. Let's talk about it. 2 days later, he submitted something and we had created the Night Gazette before I even realized we were ready to roll out. So impressed. He's doing an amazing job. He's got a new a little committee and I love it. So, every two weeks we now have the night gazette and then we have our orchestra that the schools around the district have. We have a diverse student population with really kind-hearted children, very generous parents, staff that assist students in need. Got a very collaborative staff that's supportive. We've got a family unit. And I have told our staff repeatedly, I'd rather do hard things with a good team than
042easy things without a team. Uh our PTO is amazing. Oh, excuse me. We're not there yet. We have an annual talent show, a family night for our ESL students, and I just included some great pictures of our recent veterans program. That was amazing, too. Very supportive PTO and school community. Really quickly, artist of the round table. That's our art show. We don't participate in reflections. When we moved to a PTO uh about four years ago, we uh needed to change that. And so, we have artists of the round table. We have our steam night that the PTO runs forward with our family book quest which is our book experience where the PTO purchases the books as a non-title school. Um we don't necessarily have some of the funds that some schools have used to purchase
043a chapter book for every family but our PTO helps with that field day. They sponsor the field trips. So helpful volunteering in the school and at school events and then providing support throughout the year. All right. Do you have any questions for me about North Park? >> Thanks for letting me share. >> You talked about your tag team. Will you um please tell us what that acronym means? >> Yes. So TAG is teacher and assistance guidance team. Okay. >> Uh previously we had the SAT team, student assistance, student and teacher team, student assistance team. Somebody out there SAT tag. >> Okay. So when it goes back and forth and I actually heard from someone it might be going back to SAT. Well, I don't know. But the point is to have an opportunity to gather
044at least twice a month, sometimes more frequently, to talk as a support team to say, "How do we support these students?" And you'd be impressed with the ideas that a team of people that include our sped support team, counselor, uh the teacher, uh our school support leader, me, can come up with as we're trying to brainstorm. What are we missing and how do we help these kids? >> Excellent. Thank you so much for your presentation. Anyone else have questions? >> Very well done. Thank you. >> That was great. Thank you for listening. I know that's a lot, but North Park's pretty great. >> Thanks, Julie. We appreciate your presentation. [applause] Uh next we have the public input section of our uh meeting and we have three people signed up to uh present public input. Uh
045first we have Ron Hill who is moving to the podium. Good evening. On behalf of the Cash Education Association, I'd like to express both our appreciation for and our support of the consolidated employment provisions and orderly termination policy that you all are voting on today. Tim, Kirk, everyone else in the district throughout this process have really gone above and beyond to ensure that the interests of our educators were represented. We really appreciated the opportunity to work with the district to refine this policy and we look forward to continuing to our partnership as the district continues to modernize and refine our policies. We truly value our partnership with the district. Thank you for all you do to support our teachers so that we can support our students and educate them for success in a changing world.
046>> Thanks, Ron. Uh then we have Heather Holmes. Good evening. Um, first I'd like to thank you for taking the time to think about the South End DLI um, options a little bit longer. Um, I'm Heather Holmes and um, we've been with the Spanish DI program for 12 years, our family and my youngest is in second grade, so hopefully we'll be with it for 10 more years. Um, I have many questions about the DI path forward as well as many other DI families. Um, one example is that a couple months ago, John Anderson told me about a proposal to bus from Heritage to South, but that after school the students might have to wait for 30 minutes um for a bus to come pick them up. This is a huge safety concern that needs to
047be considered if this is an option before a vote takes place. Um, when the bond was voted on, the school district said there would be a middle school for every high school. Next school year, there will be less than 150 Spanish students in middle school, less than 50 students per grade. It seems as though these 150 students may not matter um, if Spanish has been tabled at Ridgeline, don't the middle school students deserve the same consideration and courtesy as the rest of the district to go to the middle school that feeds into their high school? This age is crucial for stability. Um I Why would I want to send my seventh grader to South Cash to make brand new friends for 2 years and then have her go out to Ridgeline in 9th grade to
048um make brand new friends again? Only the Spanish DLI kids at South Cash would not be going to Mountain Crest. It makes more sense for my children to go to the middle school in Nibbi and then onto Ridgeline um to keep that stability. Again, I am curious about how these things and others are going to be. I really want to be able to make decisions for my family with all of the answers. School registration is just a couple of months away. Please finish answering our questions. Thank you. >> Thank you, Heather. Uh, last is Holly Johnson. Hello and thank you for having me join you for giving some feedback. Um, I did send an email to a few of you on the board. I only received a response from Jeff. So, thank you for doing
049that. I appreciate it. I'm just going to resummarize that email for everybody that does have a decision in this matter about the secondary school. Uh, for almost a decade, my two children have been involved in the DLI program through Heritage Elementary. Um we per we were in walking boundaries of heritage less than 2 milesi away walking to and from school. We chose to move our family to hire them for a better land having a little more acreage everything else. We continued our student our kids in the program and drove them across town twice a day. I don't know if you guys have ever driven 3200 South and what a cluster that it is to get to that school every day. But I have made the sacrifice to do that. My child was also at South
050Cash Middle School and she's now a freshman at Mount Crest. No, she is no longer in the DLA program due to different circumstances of life and things and what sports she wanted to play and continuing to participate in those activities, but also staying in the Spanish program was a very disheartening decision for her. Wanting to go and do all the things at Ridgeline or going to Mountain Crest that's literally three blocks from our house. So, as we continued to do that and staying in the program, I then removed her from the program. My son is still in there. He's a fifth grade student. Um, we're making the decision up here to whether or not to move this to the middle school that's right next door in the same walking boundaries as Heritage Elementary is or
051busing those students to South Cash. If we are going to spend $102 million in building these two new schools, why can we not spend $85,000 and hire one single teacher? Put that teacher at the new middle school. You already have a teacher that is at South Cash, Maestro Rodriguez. You already have a Spanish teacher that's at Ridgeline. You already have a Spanish teacher, Mr. Basset, at Mountain Crest. Why are we not hiring a single salary employee to fix the problem? You don't have to bust anybody else over any direction. They're already in walking boundaries. Most of these students, because they are from where they're at, where they naturally have already lived and have grown through this program, they can continue to walk to the new middle school while their parents are shuffling their younger siblings
052to now Spring Creek because there's not buses available for them. Kids can continue still going to Ridgeline or those of us who are maybe going to South Cash, they can still go to South Cash. You can still go to Mountain Crest and still feed into both. Why can't it be both? It's a simple simple thing. Pipeline to both high schools are going to stay intact. There's not a transportation crisis for the families. Kids can continue to walk to that school. There's not any bus reconfigurations that we need to do. and those students that have been in there for 7 to eight years can continue to be in that. >> Time is up. If you'd please conclude, Miss Johnson. >> Yes, I will. As Mrs. Hansen was pointing out to the Cash High School teacher, the
053Taylor Fedriico, and how important that second language is, we're leaving how many students in this program that are possibly going to quit the program because we're not hiring a single employee. There's also a sixth grade teacher that's still at Heritage Elementary. Where is this teacher going? Is she going to South Cash or he? I'm not even sure who it is at this moment because I don't have a sixth grade student. Or are they moving to the middle school as well? Or are they now going to be unemployed? So, thank you again for your consideration and please make the smart choice by hiring the one single teacher. >> Thank you, Holly. We appreciate everyone who came to give public input this evening. Thank you very much. Um, next we uh are to our consent agenda and
054I will take a motion. >> Terry, the what about Kendall's? Uh >> oh, thank you. And we received several um several emails and letters from other parents who uh both in favor of moving and against moving the program from uh uh >> South Cash to the new Nibi Middle School, >> Maple View. [laughter] And uh but I will not be reading those word for word because we have no uh protocol on that for our regular meetings outside of truth and taxation. But please know that we we have um we acknowledge that we have received all of those emails and um we have also read all of those emails everyone. Now um moving to our consent agenda. I will take a motion to a motion to approve or amend our consent agenda as it's printed. >>
055I move that we approve the consent agenda. >> Second. >> Any discussion to approving? All right. We will vote electronically. Voting is closed and the motion to approve the consent agenda passes unanimously. >> Thank you, Jared. Moving on to our action agenda. Finally, Cody gets to give us his presentation. Thank you for your patience as you have waited for this. Uh Cody Bland is um our main auditor from Richie May. Uh used to be >> Jackson and um he has How many years is this now? >> Uh for me personally, uh nine years. >> Wow. Really? >> Yeah. [laughter] Cody has um helped assisted with our audits um for the last nine years and is here to give us uh the final financial audit report minus the federal. Right. >> That's correct. >> Because of
056the shutdown, we don't have the numbers for federal yet. So minus the federal parts of our um uh audit report. So Cody, do you have anything you'd like to say? >> Yes. I just wanted to give a couple brief highlights. Um before I do that though, I just wanted to express our gratitude to you all for the opportunity to work with the school district. Um and we just have this small token of appreciation. >> Thank you. >> We also wanted to give a huge thanks to Jared and and the rest of the staff. We know we cause a lot of waves when we're there. Um and they're great to work with. We appreciate them a lot. So, thank you Jared. Um just a couple of financial highlights that I wanted to hit here with the
057financial statements. Um one thing that uh is important to note is the total net position increased by 13%. Um to approximately 184 uh million which is excellent. You can see that on page 27 and 28 of the report which is the statement of net position. on that statement. Um you can see the major portion of that increase is due to um an increase in capital assets. Um approximately 43 million um for the new schools that were being built and other capital purchases. Um you can also see that cash had a a fairly significant decrease. Um that is primarily due to a large um amount of funding received in the previous year for bonds that were spent on the schools. That's why there's that fluctuation. Um, another thing to note is that the total revenue of
058the district increased approximately 17 million. Um, that one is shown most clearly on page 34, which is the uh statement of revenues, expenditures, and changes in fund balances. You can see there was a slight decrease in um federal aid approximately 7 million decrease which is due primarily to the um the final usage of the pandemic co funding um that's all been used up there. So that's why that decreased. Um there's also a fairly significant increase in state funding which is um great because that just adds you know more raises to you guys to be able to um run the district. Um the last thing to note um that um is maybe kind of a high higher importance is on um note 7 it talked about we talked about the uh the new um fleet lease
059that the district um went into. Um rather than purchasing vehicles, they now lease vehicles which um under the new standard is shown as a ride-of-use asset and a lease liability. And that's discussed here in in note 7. Um so that's something to note. Um and then the last thing I wanted to call to attention was just there was one finding for state compliance reasons. Um but honestly one and and that's shown on the on the last couple pages on page uh 100 and and page 99 and 100. Um [snorts] but only one finding is excellent uh for how many things we test. um we test several things and and quite a few things and and only having one finding is excellent. So great work to everyone at the district for that. So and that and
060that's those are the high high points that I wanted to cover. Is there any any questions you guys had for me? >> So how so you had to take out all of the federal >> Yes. of this and so will you become will Cody be coming back to present that or will you present that at a later date? >> When the federal supplement is released then there would be kind of a secondary uh report issued by the by uh the audit firm uh just confirming uh compliance with the single audit. and we could have Diana or Cody come. I could report that. It it it's probably minor in the in the overall scheme of our audit. We're hopeful that that can be done before the end of the year, but but if not, we'll we'll
061come whenever it's available. So, I I probably could report that, but I'll I'll check with Cody and Diana before to see if one of them could come. Yeah. >> If desired, we'd be happy to come and do that. So, >> and sit for another hour while you wait. It's It's interesting stuff, so it's good. >> Thanks so much for coming. >> Thank you guys for all you do. We appreciate it. Thank you. >> Thank you. >> Um, so I will take a motion to accept the uh this part of the financial audit. Uh, it needs to be pre uh presented to the state uh school board by November 30th. Is that right? >> Yes. We have a requirement uh within 5 months of the end of the fiscal year to provide this report which would
062be the end of November. The federal portion is 6 months. So that'll be the end of December. However, if we're not able to issue it by then, it won't be from any negligence on the district's part. So we would just issue that one as soon as possible. >> Okay. And um those of us who are on the audit committee have seen this and saw it two weeks ago about and um and I read the whole thing and [laughter] >> Okay. >> So um I I would recommend that we approve this audit. I move that we approve the district financial audit report for the year 2025. >> Seconded. >> It's been moved and seconded that we approve this audit report. Is there any discussion to this motion? >> Seeing none, we will vote electronically. Voting is
063closed in the motion to approve the annual financial audit report for the 2425 school year minus the federal single audit portion passes unanimously. Thank you, Jared. And thank you and Scott and all of your department for all the extra time this is taking this year to accomplish [laughter] what we usually get done at the 1st of October. >> Um, next on the agenda, we have a reconsideration um from last month's tableabling of our secondary DLI recommendation and this will be presented by Superintendent McKe. Yes, thank you. Uh let me start off by saying I appreciate everyone's patience throughout uh this process. I recognize that the creation of the Magna schools as well as the shifting of the secondary boundaries has created some disruption particular our DI program and Spanish has been probably hit the most
064uh by this process. You know, as we considered what is the best course of action for the district moving forward, uh there were two key core principles that we've operated from. One was to make sure that we were responsive to parent need. We wanted to make sure we understood their concerns um and that we're considering the best path forward for them and their family. But at the same time, we have a responsibility to all the DI programs as well as the district as a whole. and we needed to make sure whatever response uh we put forward would be balanced against those broader needs. I think it's important for us to realize that it's not just the families impacted in Spanish DI that are watching what we do tonight. Uh but there are many eyes outside
065that community. They're also watching to see how we handle the situation. And so being really um attuned and considerate of that I think is really important. some of the options that we've uh considered. We we took input. We heard from parents continually and they had some of them raised some really reasonable um suggestions. We also had a lot of dialogue internally to look at different solutions. Some of the things we considered one was uh to keep the just completely keep the DI program at Southach. We also looked at very carefully whether or not it was feasible to split it between South Cache and the new Maple View Middle School. Uh we looked at a remote and a hybrid instruction model and whether that would be feasible. Uh we also looked at retaining sixth grade in
066the elementary school and using and seeing if that would help us alleviate some of the concern and perhaps u divide the program in seventh and eighth grade. Uh we looked at wholly relocating the program to the new Maple View and removing it completely from South Cache. And then we looked at transportation solutions. Um none of these um approaches um was considered perfect. They all had trade-offs. each of them um you know including such concerns as staffing cost to the district uh impacts to the other DLI programs um operational complexity and whether or not it was sustainable long term you know there that was there's a key piece in that is um this whatever decision we make is not made within a bubble bubble there are ripple effects across the district for including the impact on
067the French, Chinese and Portuguese DIA programs as well. So in the end, my recommendation is for the board to approve uh retaining the program at Southach while providing up to four years of busing for the families that are impacted in Nibbi. Uh this seemed to most directly uh address the concerns we were hearing around access and transportation. uh it went to the heart of the matter um and it was also the most costefficient for the district moving forward. I believe this decision would uh put the Spanish DI program on equitable footing with the other DLI programs. Uh it would be the least disruptive. It avoid uh situations with staffing or reconsideration of boundaries or some other things that we looked at. is certainly more cost effective. As we looked at the costs of staffing and
068the cost of providing a bus, uh the the thing would actually be cheaper. Um and it actually provides the access that parents were asking about. Uh we have to also recognize that um going into next year we're facing multiple transitions and that families and schools need stability and this would help us maintain stability going into next year. No solution was perfect, but this I believe best balances out our responsibility uh to the district as well as being responsive to the needs of parents. And with that, I'll address any questions that you might have. Thank you for all the work that you and the committees have done and for all the questions that you've answered. I appreciate that work. Thank you. >> You know, I don't think there's one perfect solution as you said, Todd, but
069this seems to be a pretty good compromise and takes everything that we need. Plus, it gives us time to tweak it if we need to tweak it. >> It certainly will put Spanish on an equal footing with the other uh DI programs. And you know, four years of busing, if we need to tweak something, we can tweak it then, too. >> That's right. >> So, this would be a good experience to go with. >> Any other questions, concerns, comments? Go ahead, Brian. >> No question, just comment. Um, this is more for residents as a board and it's I think all of us, we've spent a lot of time on this and I know I've looked into it a lot personally over the last several months and you might think that if emails aren't being responded
070to, we're not evaluating it carefully, but we really are. It's significant to us, not only as board members, but as community members and parents ourselves or grandparents. And so over I don't know seven or eight months, nine months, it's been an intense evaluation talking to administrators, talking to parents inside and outside of DLI, um talking to students and um you know, as I've had an opportunity to visit with some of these principles and these schools, I have left being so grateful for the principles that are running these DI schools. They're incredible and I think there's some of the best principles we have in our district. Um I have many friends that have kids in DLI and they like the program. There are some that have pulled their kids out for different reasons. And so I
071think it's important for us to recognize that while DLI is serving a small portion of our district and some of those parents and students are loving it, there's some that aren't. Now, for me, I'm representing the outside community. There are 17 elementary schools. Four elementary schools have access to DI. 13 don't. Most of the DI kids are within walking distance. They're within the boundary of those schools. So, I hear equity and access, and I can respect and appreciate that, but as a public school district, DLI is not equitable or accessible to all the students and families in our community. It's just not. And so we need to be careful when we're talking about equity and access because we have 10% of our students that have easy access to it, but 90% that don't. And so
072this decision for me is also listening to the 90%. Um, and the people that I represent in Wellsville and Mend and part of Hyum, uh, they value, uh, DLI in, uh, South. Uh, but it's also very difficult for them to make that commute into Heritage or soon to be Spring Creek. There's challenges all the way around for a lot of people in the community. And so I respect and appreciate all that the district has done to try to make this program work. Um 2008 it was kicked off because the governor wanted to prepare kids for future work workplace needs. That was 17 years ago. uh we know how quickly things change in the economy and uh I think the district has done an admira admirable job trying to keep things going to the point that
073we're making magnet schools to make it better in a way because there's been complications with DI and nonli kids in the same schools. So you think of the sacrifice not to the district but to the communities that were putting these magnet schools in. If I'm a Spring Creek parent with kids not in DLI, I can't send my kid to Spring Creek. I'm sending them somewhere else. And so there's challenges outside of DI too that we have to recognize. Um, so with that said, I appreciate the committee that was put together by the district with parents inside and outside of DI that made the recommendation initially that the district agreed upon. And as a voting member on the school board that's representing a a large community, um I uh I support and uh will definitely uh
074agree with what the superintendent's offering, which still helps the students have some access with transportation that are in it. We don't want to see these uh these programs suffer. And so I think the um transportation is great. And mind you, this is additional cost to the district. Um, when you talk to teachers as well, there's teachers in DLI with 20 kids. There's teachers outside of DLA with kids in their class over 30. Is that equitable? It's it's not. And so, there's equity and access with parents and and and the community, and there's equity and access with teachers. And I think as we consider that, um, it makes this decision still difficult, but a little bit easier. So those are my thoughts. >> Thank you. Well spoken, Brian, and thank you for all of your re
075own research in the last nine months. We appreciate all that you've done um trying to understand the the uh difficulties that face a lot of people and like you I represent uh a a lot of communities who don't have access to DLI or um easy access. So, I do have a neighbor who drove her youngest child um 10 miles one way, so 20 m each day to go to a DLI school for his elementary, but that was her last child because she could do that then. Um and they don't regret that. But, um it is a it is a huge sacrifice for anyone in your area and mine. Anyone else have comments? concerns. I'll take a motion to the superintendent's recommendation. I'll move that we um accept superintendent's recommendation that we move forward with the
076DLI that the district now has available. >> Second. It's been moved and seconded that we accept the superintendent and uh district leadership recommendation as well as the DLI committee. Um any further discussion to this motion. All right, we will vote electronically. Voting is closed in the motion to accept the recommendation explained by Superintendent McKe and and from the district administration and DLI committee passes by a vote of five in favor and one against. >> Thank you Jared. We appreciate that. and um are glad to have this vote done and move forward. Uh next on our action agenda is a request for the approval of the new elementary school in Hyde Park. Their naming committee, the naming committee's recommendation of Old Ephraim Elementary uh that Amy presented. She's not here, right? Right. >> Amy presented at
077our last meeting. >> I'll make a motion to approve the new name of the uh new elementary school. >> I second it. >> It's been moved and seconded that we approve the recommendation from the naming committee of the new elementary school in Hyde Park as Old Ephraim Elementary. Any discussion to this motion? Well, representing Hyde Park. I don't know that anybody knows that name. I've had several people ask me about it. [clears throat] >> Well, I talked to the PTA president, the proposed PTA president for that school yesterday, and she's ecstatic and already has lots of plans for the Cubs. >> Well, I think it's a good thing. But the people that that I'm associated with around there did not know what the name was. >> Well, now you can advertise it. Oh, I've been
078telling him [laughter] and >> I think there will probably be a lot of education um as the school begins. >> Yeah, >> public know. >> I think it's a great name. >> Okay. >> The historic >> It's been um moved and seconded. Uh this motion has been uh any further discussion. All right, we'll vote electronically. Voting [snorts] is closed and the motion to approve the recommended name of Old Ephraim Elementary for the new elementary school being built in Hyde Park passes unanimously. Thank you, Jared. Uh, last on our action agenda is a request for approval of the school choice data that um, Alden Jack presented to us earlier. This new um data includes a uh change in the um enrollment window opportunity due to the fact that um we are um opening new schools and
079in our district next year. So for next year's data, this data shows that um the enrollment window is different than what Alden presented and that's the only difference. Right. >> That's right. >> And from what he presented earlier. So I'll take a motion to approve the school choice data. >> I move that we approve the school choice data. >> Second. It's been moved and seconded that we approve this. Uh any discussion or questions? If so, the superintendent will answer them. >> I'll do my best. >> All right. Okay. We will vote electronically. Voting is closed and the motion to approve the school choice data passes unanimously. >> Thank you Jared. Uh moving on to our reports agenda. We have the monthly financial report for October 2025 uh presented by Jared. Okay, couple of of uh
080things I I included for school board members a copy of the normal monthly report that includes a summary of our revenues and expenditures for the month. I also included a copy of the district's fraud risk assessment. And this isn't a final copy. I wanted you to have a chance to look at it and then we'll we'll bring it for uh more official review and approval in a month or two. Uh one of the uh components on the fraud risk assessment is that uh school board members complete training on the state auditor website and I believe many if not most of you have done that. But that I I just wanted to make you aware that's something I'll I'll probably follow up with with you individually on just so that we can include that with that
081as well as um Robin's certification as a CPFO. That will probably put us in the the best category for this assessment which would be wonderful. Um so just wanted to present that and give you a chance to look it over this next month. And then on the normal uh report, uh first I' I'd just like to offer as a district staff our appreciation as well for Diana and Cody and and the the group that we work with at Richie May for our annual financial audit. They're really good. They're thorough. Um we we go through a lot in that financial audits. It's a very comprehensive process and it allows us to improve and and refine what we're doing every year. So, uh, we appreciate our partnership with them. We're we are, uh, participating in several ongoing,
082uh, state, uh, compliance, uh, audits or reviews right now, um, with Title 3, with school food services, uh, CTE, uh, land trust, our our land trust. The information that's on our school websites is being reviewed right now. So, we're in the midst of of a variety of of uh smaller scale audits, but those are all going well. Um, we have published on the state auditor's website and also the school district's website our financial reports for the year. So, those are available to review. The one that we've not completed yet is the popular annual financial report. That's because we have to have our regular financial report completed, which we we did tonight uh before we can um move those numbers into the popular annual financial report. So, we'll get that one shortly. Um we're grateful to
083have finished our bond issuance. So, we do have all of the funding that was approved in the 2023 general obligation uh election for our new schools. And uh, of course, we're heavy into all of those construction projects. Uh, we're also um for for board awareness, the the school district is paying out at the end of November a $1,000 supplement for employees prrated for part-time employees. This is largely funded through the legislature uh through a one-time bill that was passed this last year. That bill did not include all employees. So, the district is is uh paying on a one-time basis for those employees that were not covered by the legislative funding. And then, uh just today, we received our mid-year budget updates. So, we'll be working through that. And probably next month, I'll give you a
084quick summary of where things look with our midyear funding. But just looking at it really quickly today, uh it's it's steady. We're we're not seeing any major increases or decreases in what we had originally budgeted um in in most of our state funding lines. So So that that's good um to have that consistency here in the middle of the year. Any questions? >> Thank you for your conservative budgeting recommendations that m make it so that regardless of what the state does, we're okay. >> Yeah. Very well done, Jared. Any other questions? >> Thanks, Jared. >> Yeah, >> I never lose sleep because of finances with the district. There's other things that I lose sleep over, but not the finances. So, thank you. >> That makes one of us, Brian, cuz I do lose sleep, but
085um I appreciate it, [laughter] but I'm glad you don't. >> Yeah. One thing I learned about Jared recently was that he dreads Monday mornings to the point of almost being physically ill. and I feel bad, >> but I don't want to I don't want to let him go. So, he'll just have to figure out how to endure those Mondays. >> Uh, next we have board member reports on our reports agenda. >> Any board member reports? >> I do. I have one on the rec center. Okay. Um we met this um past week >> and the track is completed and um the patrons who are using it love it. >> They um redid um the flooring on it. They also um have completed a heating element that they put in. Is it like a heater on
086top of the building for part of the rec center that they did? >> I missed that part of the meeting. I was there late, so I'm not I'm not entirely sure. Kathy, >> they had to rent a um um Oh my gosh. >> Lift >> like a lift or something. >> Crane. >> Yeah, a crane. And I think that was the what came out of the budget. But the other thing is that they have selected a person to do the appraisal on the rec center. And um Scott Rigby is going to be our representative with him. and also um with Brett at the rec center and it was suggested that all parties involved in the rec center meet with the assessor because there's so many little things that uh need to be talked about before
087they can figure out exactly what the value of it is and then decide if it's feasible for um a buyout um in the future. So that's my report on that. >> Great. Thank you, Kathy, for serving on that committee. [gasps] Um, anything from Bridgerland? >> Um, not yet. Okay. Anyone else? I'll just say real fast that there was a ball game today that I know involved a couple of our uh valley teams, schools, and I think that's really impressive. I mean, it's a big 4A is a big division with teams all across the state. So to have two of our schools represented in that, I thought was awesome. So kudos to the coaches and the trainers and the teachers and everybody that supports that. And of course the kids. I didn't get a chance to
088go down to the game today, but I um I'm sure they represented Cash Valley well. And I just wanted to recognize our district for excellence in on the grid iron, I guess. Yeah. Today, >> you know, it's interesting. and they said that that's the first time a 14 seed had come back through the back door to the to the title game. So, nice job, Grand Canyon. Ridgeline had a juggernaut, but uh you know, what do you do? >> Well, I thought it was pretty exciting that we had >> that we got to have the two top teams in the state. That was pretty exciting. All right, thank you all. Um for my board president report um Monday evening we have the Cash Education Foundation Christmas Tree Jubilee. Thank you all for responding to um my
089request to see who uh would like to go. And so I think Kathy and I will represent this year. I haven't been for four or five years. So I'll take a turn. And um unless you all have burning desire to go Monday night. Um the other thing I need to ask about is we I've had several board meetings suggest that um the legislature opens their um uh floor sessions with prayer. and uh wondered if uh any of you are interested in taking that up as a point of discussion for our board to open our meetings with prayer. >> Yeah, I would be >> I would be >> I don't know how long how long have we not had a prayer at board meeting. Was was there a time period that we did allow it and
090then we stopped? I don't know. >> I'm curious the history of that. >> Yes. >> You have the most on your >> It was before I was ever on the board that that it stopped. >> So that's a long time ago. >> It's been at least maybe 16 17 years. I I think that goes back to a a court case where they try to distinguish and I think the courts even tried to clarify it even further making a difference between what is an institutional sponsored prayer versus an individual. So those organizations that I've seen perhaps this continue, it's not it's not something that's um regularly scheduled on the agenda every month. It's not part of the regular agenda, but it's um what happens is a board member may say as part of my comments, I
091would like to offer a prayer. And that's a more of a personal approach. Um and I think that being able to um split that that hair a little bit I think u would be really important for us. >> Well, we could also invite people from different religions to come and present a reverence or a prayer. >> Usually it's a comment or um yeah, it it's just how you how you put that together. Mhm. >> Um, but I I do know if it's it's similar to prayer at graduation where it's a it's sponsored by the school or district. They draw there's some lines there that we would want to probably >> understand >> cautious about and maybe work with legal counsel on. So, >> but I remember now that you mentioned that that that was a
092court case that it came through and and as a district and it was before my time, but but it was right shortly before that. Um, they decided that it just the wording just didn't work out and and it was just better not to put ourselves into a situation that would cause some problems. So, do you want me to do some research and bring it back to see if it's a possibility? >> Yeah. >> And consider it. Okay. >> You've got enough to do, Terry. >> Is it something Kirk can help with? >> The district, >> but be very careful. Let's not put ourselves into a situation. >> Well, we want to be respectful. I I think each of us would want to be respectful in how how it proceeds. And we have many different religious
093groups in the community. And so as someone mentioned representing and respecting each of them I think would be a good thing. >> Also non [clears throat] those are they're non-believers as well that we want to be considered as well. >> And you should know there are other boards in this school boards in the state that do open their meetings with prayer. >> I know Rich does. >> Yeah. That's how this part of part of why this discussion came about. Anyway, okay. We'll do some research and bring it back. Uh on to the superintendent. >> Yes. Couple of items for the board. Uh first, I received notice from the state office that Lincoln Elementary School has been recognized as a national distinguished school uh for its work with title three students in ESL. Um the state
094is sponsoring a team of them to represent the state of Utah at the national conference and we're thrilled for their success and achievement. We want to recognize them. Hopefully we'll be able to bring them to the in front of the board in the future here so you can recognize them as well. I also want to note that we have um made selections for three principles for next year. Um, so we've appointed Joe Kotrrell as the new principal at Spring Creek DLI Elementary and we're very excited about his appointment. The staff there felt he was an overwhelming selection and he'll do amazing work at Spring Creek. We've also have Doug Snow that will be returning to South Cash. he felt like he had some unfinished work to accomplish at South Cash and I know the staff
095there is excited as well. And then finally, Amy uh Basset will be moving from uh Cedar Ridge to um Summit Elementary School for next year. That does create an opening at Cedar Ridge and we have posted for that and I'll keep you informed as we make progress that way. Uh last, I just want to you'll probably hear this u multiple times over the course of this next year. I just want to acknowledge um my team. You know, I've I've seen districts take on big change. Usually that's uh maybe opening a school or moving just simply moving boundaries for existing schools or maybe shifting one specialized district program. I have never seen a district take on so much change all at once with opening three schools, shifting DI, changing our boundaries, moving sixth grade. And what
096I think is missed um from site for many is the sequencing of events that have to occur to make that happen in a way that we start next year on time and fully ready for kids. um from moving through the creating the parameters with boundary changes and in the in the hearings that we've had to go through already publicly, but making sure that we have all of our leaders in our schools in place before we start to look at staffing preferences, collecting that data, the business office collecting projections for next year in terms of student enrollment, accounting [snorts] for choice. There are just so many variables and factors that have to those dominoes have to topple in the exact same order at the right same time in order for us to to pull this off.
097And I' I've just got to continue to commend and thank my team that are doing yman's work behind the scenes on top of their regular duties of simply trying to keep this school year vibrant and and moving forward for kids. and uh you know their their energy energy level is really high. Um and we hope to keep them moving forward. Um but I'm just grateful for their dedication to this district and to the students of this district. Um because when we pull this off, it will be due to the many hands and the heavy lifting of those folks behind the scenes that don't get seen. >> Sure. >> And I want to make sure that they are seen. So thank you. >> Thank you. Thank you all. Thank you back row. [laughter] You know, I
098have to say Scott has one of the most interesting offices I've ever seen in my career in the district. I was uh in the tech department today and I didn't tread into the office. I could just see in the open door. But wow, I would love to go in there and just look for a long time [laughter] cuz it looks really interesting. Thanks for making my weight today really. [laughter] >> Okay, I'll ask for a guided tour someday. [laughter] >> Thank you all for being here. We appreciate the privilege to work together with you all in this district. Can I just make one more little announcement? >> Mhm. >> Okay. Just want to let the board know we're on track for our board party on the 11th. Please let your spouses know. We'll start at
0996. Um the food has been ordered, but I do need to make some assignments, so I'll send out an email and then you can sign up for uh what you would be willing to bring. >> All right. Thanks, Kathy. We're so glad we have you as our party gal. Uh couldn't do it without you. And seeing we have arrived at the end of our agenda, we will uh