001um Springdale School Board meeting. Want to thank everybody for coming out. We have some exciting things on the agenda for today. We're a little light um up front, but um it's okay. This is the All-Star team, so you're in good hands. Just don't tell the other three I said that. Um, so at this time, if you would stand and join me in the pledge. I pledge allegiance 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. [Music] All right. So, that brings us to our agenda for the evening. Dr. Cleveland, have any changes that we need to make to the agenda? [Music] I'll second. Have a motion by Mr. Owen and a second by Mr. Bell to
002approve the agenda as presented. All those in favor? I opposed. Motion passes. brings us to our consent agenda. Board, we have any questions about any items in the consent agenda? I'll make a motion to approve the consent agenda as presented. So motion by Mr. Hutchinson and a second by Mr. Owen to approve the consent agenda as presented. All those in favor? I opposed. Motion passes. brings us to presentation by Dr. Cleveland. Oh, first I'd like to uh invite Dr. Shepard to the podium. We have a a really great um award that Dr. Shepard and his team. Yeah, this is always fun because the particular award that um we recently had with being named a promising practices school by um by solution tree is really because of the work of our students um and the the
003achievement and the growth that our students have shown um over the last several years. This is the first step along our journey of being a model PLC school. I know that there are a couple of schools in our district that have already earned the um recognition of being a model PLC school. This journey started about I don't know two or three years ago when we decided that we really wanted to make sure that we had our systems and structures in place um so that we were providing our kids the best opportunities to be able to have high achievement and high growth and grade level um achievement that we knew that they could do. And in fact, I remember talking with Dr. Cleveland a few years ago about our plan and putting it in and um
004one of the things I love with working with and for uh Dr. Cleveland is that his his response was that is a fantastic plan. Now let's see the results. Now we need results from it. And so that's what's so fun is to be able to stand here today and say we got the results. We got the results to a degree that we've now been awarded a national award for those results. And the even more fun part about um this award is that this award was based on our 2024 results um or or data or 2024 data. We've had a chance to dig into our 2025 data that's just come out in the last week and our 2025 data is even better than the 2024 data. And so we're very very excited about that. We're excited
005about the trajectory that our students are showing um at Lakeside. We're excited about the results that have come from the work that um that we've put in. Um we're excited to be recognized for those results. It's always great to be recognized. Uh the next slide there kind of gives an idea of where how this award was given. And I've kind of gone gone through all of that, but what to put in red down there at the bottom. Most importantly, this award recognizes that our students are learning, achieving, and growing at high levels at Lakeside. And that's what I'm particularly proud to stand here and be able to represent our teachers and our students and the work that they have put in to really show those high levels of achievement and growth at Lakeside. So um
006I get to be the representative to come and represent the work that a whole lot of other people are doing. Um and that's advantage of the advantage of being the principal is getting to come and represent the work that a whole lot of other people are doing. So very proud um of their work and thank you for letting me come and and present this to everyone. Appreciate it. Congratulations. [Applause] Mr. President, this is kind of the time of year where uh as Mr. Thompson shared with me earlier, it's the Springdale shuffle. I didn't realize there was a name to it, Mr. Thompson. Yes, sir. Until you told me about that. Yes, sir. So, we had the Springdale administrative shuffle this year, and I thought he started it, but he said he did not. Somebody else
007did. So, I'd like to recognize Mr. Thompson. Yeah. Um board, Dr. Cleveland and your team. Thank you guys so much. Um, leaving Hilston was a really, really hard decision because it's such a great school, but the reason why I'm here and able to work alongside Miss Ryan and so excited to be at Walker is because of all the things I learned from Dr. Bifford and Miss Harrison there and um the the Linen Bin team is strong and I'm never been more excited to to be at Walker and be a part of that community and help those teachers um know that they're already doing such great work. So just to come alongside and help them and and do that with some servant leadership in as humble a way as I can. So I'm happy to help
008and happy to be here and thank you for the opportunity. Congratulations. While you're there. Yes, sir. You haven't. What's your goal? Um my goal is to lead and help in any way that I can. Um I'm really excited to be at Walker. I've got a first grader there. Um and I have a three-year-old girl. So, you know, eight years would get me all the way through being with them. Now, that's not certainly the only reason why I'm at Walker. I'm so excited. I've never heard a bad thing about Walker. Heard great things about working with Miss Ryan. Um, and really um excited for a a change and just to help those elementary teachers. I know they've got a tall task, you know, 28 kids um in a lot of those classrooms all day every day.
009So, I'm excited to learn from them because I'm the first one to know and explain that I don't know everything. I'm going to learn from them and help, you know, share what what I learned at Helston. Um, from some great people here, too. I've got Allison Ashworth and Michael Tapy and even Karen now connected to Hester, which is really cool to see four of the eight recognized with links to such a great school that, you know, many of you have had great kids and families go through. I'm excited to to be a little bit bigger part of um, you know, students staying there for longer. So, I'm excited about that. I'll put you on the spot. You did a great job. Well, I mean, hey, I'm I'm happy to lead, but leading as an assistant
010principal is such a unique um and cool role, but when the building principal job, you know, is is right and it's the right fit for our district, that's great, too. But I love and want to be with Miss Retit Walker for a good long time. I'm excited. This board's given us corrections in the past. We don't hire assistant principles. We hire principles. Yes, sir. Service. Absolutely. Yeah. Well, thank you guys so much. Congratulations. [Applause] Mayan, you probably know her or recognize her. She is everywhere over at Archer. She's been around for a long time and now she's risen through the ranks of Archer and I'd like to introduce her as new administrator over at ALC. Hi. Uh this is my this will be my 12th year at Archer and I'm really excited to um take
011on a different role there. Um I'd really like to thank Dr. Cleveland and his team and you all for this opportunity. Um I guess um I know that you haven't asked me yet, but as far as my my goal, I really just want to make a positive difference in the lives of others. And a part of that is to help our students. A lot of our students don't have that confidence um just to to get there, to get to the finish line and um to go on and do great things. and and our kids, some of our kids, um they just need that little extra push. And and I think um this role is going to allow me a little bit more opportunity to be able to do um more with that and to make
012a more a a bigger difference in the lives of our students there at Archer. Do y'all have any questions? I'm a little more worried about you keeping Dr. Davis in line. But that's going to be a full-time job. Congratulations. She can. Trust me. She's been doing it already. Thank you for coming. M. Johnson. I'd like to invite you to the podium. Like to introduce Miss Karen Johnson. I know you all know her. She's been part of our family for a long time over at Southwest Junior High. Tonight's our official introduction is in the new Hell Stern Middle School. Yes. For Dr. Glad Gladen or sorry, Dr. Cleveland, um thank you for the opportunity to lead at Hell Stern. It has been the most amazing two days. I've already met with um about three4s of the
013staff and I met with parents this morning and it is one a wonderful place to be and I'm excited. I mentioned Dr. Gladen a second ago, but I'm just he prepared me for this with Mr. Alonzo, Terrell, and um I'm ready. I'm excited. We're going to do great things at Hster this year. Continue great things at Hell Stern this year. Thank you guys so much. Congratulations. [Applause] First, I think everyone knows Mr. Tapy. He's not been assistant principal or principal or anything else, but he's been a lot of things national attention, national press, and we've bounced him around Central Hester. Those are the two. Those are the two. Yeah. And now you're planning to get in a new place. I am very Thank you. Very excited. I'm sorry. Didn't mean to cut you off there.
014Uh very excited to start at DTSOI as the assistant principal. It's a huge honor. Uh and yeah, I I am so blessed. I said this in the in the email announcement, but I'm so blessed by the the people that I've gotten to learn and and practice education under uh from my time at Holster with Dr. Bifford and Dr. Loftton and uh Ben and Misty and um the IFS there and then continuing at Central uh through the great leadership team with Dr. Loftton again um and uh Miss Henzy and Miss Schlife and Miss Sheridan and just uh yeah, just I am so excited to take what I've learned here in Springdale Public Schools and continue it. Uh Miss Harrison and the team at DTSY has already been just such a blessing and so welcoming. Um, and
015I can't wait to work at a school like Don Tyson where just excellence is happening, where we're trying new things, where we're exploring, experimenting, um, and just diving deep into student learning and student proficiency. Uh, and as I've gotten to interact with education on a more national level at times, um, just my passion for this profession has has only grown and my desire to see the way cleared for teachers to do the amazing things that they do. Uh, I can't wait to help do that uh through service and through new ideas and and passion and energy at at Don Tyson. So, can't wait to be a part of that. Any questions? Thank you. Good job. Thank you so much. I don't know if I saw Miss Emlay. Miss Emlay is not here, but she is
016our new Southwest assistant principal. Uh, she should be she was here at the last board meeting. Uh, and u we'll introduce her again at some point. Uh, coach, your turn. I just told Jeff I had to follow follow Michael there that just rattle that off and I have to read all my stuff. So, very good job. Uh first off board tonight uh I want to recognize and just say u coach Wood did a great job for me the last two years and the leadership that he brought to this role uh coming in uh you know of course being here for as long as he was he knew where a lot of things were and I'm really happy for him and his family to go on to this next goal of being down at SMU. Uh
017he's down there currently right now. Uh, but I got a chance to uh go out and rehire a guy. Uh, Jeff Williams has been a coach for 28 years. Uh, four one time we were together longer than my actual marriage, but uh, it was a while. So, we were roommates in college, but uh, he spent four and a half years as the AD at Sylum Springs, 15 years as a head coach at Southside, was eight years at Elora where we started out together. was the head coach also down there. Did a stint at P Ridge. Um, of course in 2006 he won a state championship, was back-to-back state runner up in football in 2008 2009, earned the Loyal Manning Award. He also received the Kurt King Lifetime Achievement Award in 2023. Um, he was inducted
018into the Arkansas High School Coaches Association Hall of Fame in 2002 2024. Uh, which was a incredible honor just to see him up there. Uh, we celebrate a lot of holidays together, Christmas, Memorial Days, that type of thing. Runs a podcast with my brother. Uh, he'll bring a lot to this leadership role here on this harbor side of town as far as taking over the same uh, setup that we had going. Uh it's been really good for the last couple days to kind of get him involved with it. So I just want to introduce to the board the administration, Dr. Cleveland, Jeff Williams. [Applause] Well, he's right about that. We do go way back and we were together longer. He was married for a while. So, and uh extremely excited to be here, get to
019work with Keith, Dr. Cleveland, known him for a while. And I've always watched a school district from afar and just what a presence and what it does for kids and and something I wanted to be a part of. I was actually about to retire and but when I he called there was it took about five minutes to I'm I'm on board with you. But I'm extremely excited about being here. I'm looking forward to serve the coaches. I think with my experience and and that part of it can actually help grow those guys. But I'm a big server in kids. Kids always come first in every every decision I make and that's just kind of our mindset and I know that's coach Fimple and that's Dr. Cleveland's vision but kids are first and but my main
020job is to serve kids and do whatever it takes to make them a little bit better every day. Any questions? Thank you. [Applause] Next I'd like to invite Miss Wendy Roart. There you are. I didn't get a chance to put that up there. We knew the lineup. My name is Wendy Rowark and I'm going to be the new preschool special education coordinator. So, I get to um I concur with what you said about always making the right decisions about kids and staying kid focused. And that's what I'll do in my role, too, is trying to get all of our youngest learners ready to enter kindergarten. Um, so I'm excited to get to work with the community. Um, all the daycarees out there that have kids that need some extra support. I'm excited to work with
021families and all of our pre-K programs in our buildings will also serve um those kiddos that need some extra support. So, I'm excited. We're building it as we go and um and I know we can do it. I have a great team over at the special education department to to help me and I thank you all for the opportunity, Dr. Cleveland and Dr. Smith. Thank you guys for the opportunity. This is a new role. Big role. Co-op used to run this and what we found is that way more children out in preks and daycarees that were entering into our spend arena. Yeah. So, our effort for child bond is now here. And so, we that's our obligation. And so, you're a leader. Yeah. I'm ready. We're gonna do it. Thank you. Miss Ashworth. Good evening.
022Um, my name is Allison Ashworth and I will be taking over the role of coordinator of academic and administrative accountability. um all of these amazing administrators before me. I just want to echo the gratitude um that I have for being selected for this position. I am a firm believer in the power of public education. And um I'm excited to continue and contribute to the success and traditions of the best school district in the state, Springdale Public Schools. Well, we're glad Bobby retired as you know. It's a hard job. There's a lot to it. Officer civil rights information, a lot of work, making sure schedules are done, but you're set to do that work. And so, we're really glad that you decided that you wanted to do it. I know Dr. Smith and you had a
023long conversation. So, congratulations to you and I hope you don't regret it. Thank you. I'm up for the challenge. Thank you, sir. Congratulations. I'm [Applause] She's She's going to be great. Um, as you know, I was in Washington DC for a few days this last week at JASA governing board and I uh created a little bit of a report about what I learned. Um, see my information is just absolutely y'all going. He said doublea governing board report and everybody's [Laughter] we just retracted all of their promotions. So I bowled it down to about five different major talking points. One of them was that there's 6.8 8 uh billion dollars that have been held back from the appropriation funds in K12 public education across the nation. I think you're aware of that pretty significant amount of
024money. Core issue is that this 6.8 billion of federal K12 money um is that um the White House has held that back. Congress has to prove that that hadn't been that hadn't been done. So, we're interested to see what the next step might be. The opposite of management and budget usually sends that out by July 1st, and that didn't happen. So, this action um that's being characterized by many as a um we'll just say it as an an illegal act of empoundment has yet to be decided whether it's an illegal act of empoundment or not. So, that's to be determined. It's not up to us to determine that or not, but we are waiting to see if those funds are going to come. So there are some specific title programs that are affected and it
025does impact Springdale, Arkansas. So the withheld funds that impact several of our title programs directly are title 1 C these are funds for migrant education that's about $375 million nationally. Title 2A which we have funds in title 2A. These are grants for educa educator professional development funds and it's uh also efforts to reduce class size. That's 2.2 2 billion nationally and I'll provide you a summary of how it impacts us later. Specifically, title 3A funds, these are funds for English learner services. That's $189 million nationally. Title 4A, this is money for student support and academic enrichment programs. This includes steam and college and career counseling, things like that. That's $1.3 billion nationally. and title 4B funding. This is funding for before and after school programming. We call it 21st century community learning centers and it
026supports those before and after and it's 1.4 billion nationally. Um the administration stated reasoning for the holdback is this. The administration has indicated that these funds are under review to ensure they align with the president's policy priorities. The office of management and budgement uh has cited concerns about some of the programs involving support for undocumented immigrants or LGBT and LGBTQ and inclusion and things like that. However, there hasn't been a formal recision request uh since Congress. So, more to come on that particular aspect. The fourth major talking point is there is an immediate and disruptive impact to school districts. This funding freeze comes at a particularly challenging time districts across the country, including us in Springdale. We finalized budgets. We've hired staff. We planned for programs for the upcoming school year based on the expectation
027of receiving these funds July the 1st. The sudden withholding has created a significant budgetary chaos and uncertainty. And I mean it. Uh this puts programs at risk. Just so you know. This directly jeopardizes some of our critical programs like some of our summer learning initiatives. Thankfully, our state has come through and said, "Okay, we've got some some money that's carried over and they uh or Secretary Leva and Gregor Rogers at the State Department said, "We've got enough money to carry through your summer programs." So, I'm very appreciative of our secretary for that. Otherwise, we would not have summer programs. Um so professional development for our teachers um and some essential support service for our English language learners and immigrant students. These programs are at risk in the future. We've got some staffing concerns. As you
028know, we have fewer students or few fewer staff members that we've hired that we've replaced or should have probably replaced coming up for this next year. How many 30 40 50 60 staff members? Something like that. We've got a report for you on that. Uh across the district, we've reduced staff. Uh the delay or loss of these funds could force schools to delay hiring, scale back planned initiatives, or even consider layoffs leading to larger class sizes and reduced student services. That is a national quote that I pulled. It's not necessarily for us. And there is a disproportionate impact. So nationally, districts serving high poverty students and student populations and those with the higher portion of English learners are expected to be hit hardest by these cuts. Guess what? We have a large number of English
029language learners in Scri. Number five, potential next steps and mitigation. We continue to closely monitor this situation, including the ongoing legal challenges and any communication from the US Department of Education or Congress. We're also in communication with the Arkansas Department of Education to understand any state level guidance or potential mitigation strategies. Our priority remains to minimize disruption to our students and staff. We'll be evaluating our current budget and programs to assess the potential impact and identify any necessary adjustments. We will keep you informed fully as this situation continues to develop. It sounds really negative, but our focus is that our families and our community and you and our teachers won't know much different than what last year felt like. Does that make sense? We're going to continue to work and and try to make sure
030our needs are met everywhere. So the conclusion of these holdbacks is this federal funding holdback presents some really serious challenges adding to the complexities we are already navigating uh with previous bills from the last two session learns and access. Um however I want to assure the board and community that we're committed to facing these head on um with some the same resilience and dedication that defines our Springdale school district and it has over time. who will continue to advocate for the release of these funds and work tirelessly to ensure that our students receive the high quality education they deserve. And I wrote that because I wanted to make sure that I articulated it correctly. So, sounds hard, sounds difficult. Um, it's not political, it's fact. So, that's just where we are. Any questions to talk
031about anything I said? Do we know the total impact for just our district? Yeah, I asked that when I was in DC the other day. I asked, give me just one second. I pulled that up and let's see. [Music] Hold on just one second. uh the potential loss of funding. Um we've got a few issues that could be significant. Have y'all um one is you've heard the term supplement and supplant before. Uh a supplement, we've got federal funding over here and we've got Arkansas funding and we've got local funding. So if we pay for something at a local funding that we have to have, we can use federal funding to supplement those efforts. Right? That's supplement. But if we ever pay for something out of federal funding and we can't use it anymore and we
032use it because we have to have it and we use local money, we can't ever really come back and use federal funding again. That would be supplanting. Does that make sense? So once you ever have to use something and you were using federal money for it before and now it goes away and you use local money or state money for it again, they can't ever use federal money for it again. So there's something that uh we call maintenance of effort as well and you know we could call Miss Hopkins up here as well but every year the federal government requires us to spend at least the same amount we spent the year before of federal money if not a dollar more. Correct Miss Hopkins? So, we have to have that maintenance of effort. And if
033we spend more local money on something, whether it's special ed or any other kind of federal program match, we've got to spend even more the next year of local money to continue a maintenance of effort. Well, if that federal money goes away and we're having to spend even more state and local money, guess what we've got to do if we're ever reinstated? We've got to keep that same high level of state and federal money. Does that make any sense? So that forces school district school districts to really reduce. So they got to reduce staff, they got to reduce spending, they got to reduce all of that because if they try to maintain it, the next year they got to come back and meet that again. Even if they don't have the money, they don't have
034the kids. So it's a really dangerous thing. But you ask me the amount of money um just in one area for Springdale. Miss Glass tells me for title 4A funding into the title one uh to help sustain our contract and salaries for title one, this will be a loss of over $400,000. She's not able to know the entire impact until we receive our title one allocation from the department. But on a call, this was on July 8th, she says on a call yesterday, which would been on the 7th, they said we were basically level funded. But when she spoke to uh a representative within sped I guess or within federal funds she said it looked like we will receive much less funding. So we normally receive our allocation at the end of July uh typically
035around the Aea summer conference but our total impact is really not known. Title 1C migrant uh with 297,000 title 2 is approximately 751,000. Title three approximately 784,000. Title 4 A approximately 420. Title 4 B which is 21 CCLC money 1.7 million. My understanding is all that's on hold. Correct. Is that on hold? Yes. Yeah. PreK, these are ABC funds, federal funds that come through the state, 2.6 million. CCDF, which is DHS, 2 million. and stayed 300,000. All that money is on hold. That is a significant hit. Now, when I was in DC, um the Noel, she approached uh Dr. Jones. Now, Dr. Jones is the other state representative from Arkansas from Dens and she said there was conversation at the department of ed that 21c money might be released next week which is this week.
036Did any of you hear any of that whether it was released or not but they think that 21c might be released. So, it is a really difficult message, but it is a message that I must share because it's real. Okay, any questions? Everybody left. Um, we have we have a plan. We're going to figure this out, but it's going to take everybody on the board and all of us at the same time to make sure that we're very regimented in our work this year. That being said, um the next proposal I have for you is maybe to explore doing some other things. You know, uh it's hard to purchase homes and to rent homes and things up here. Um you know, used to interview everybody here used to come through and this year, Miss Frink
037and Dr. Smith and Miss Tisher, they're even interviewing people as well. And a lot of our people moving in are having a hard time finding homes. Well, we have some people who are interested in potentially helping us come up with creative solutions. I have to give credit to Dusty Graham. Dusty Graham is one of our architects. He is brilliant young man and um he brought forward the idea of potentially using three acres that we have over at Westwood. That is just ground, not even really used as playground uh for potential employee housing. And so I'm asking you tonight if I could explore, not asking to do it, but explore what that would look like if uh if we could find some funding and maybe create 60 or more town homes or something like that. We
038don't know what it might look like, but if we could come alongside some different groups who might be interested in helping us bring together some teacher or employee housing that bus drivers, custodians, aids, teachers, whatever for a sliding scale kind of rent um to have some homes for us that we would own, we would rent and have people that would live in Springdale work in Springdale, shop in Springdale, and serve our kids in Springdale. Just a thought. It's not anything that says we're going to do it, then it's going to be done, but if we don't explore, it'll never get done. So, I've always heard you will never hit a pitch you you don't swing at. And so, you know, you all have pushed me to be creative, to be innovative. Certainly in a time
039like today where money is scarce, our folks aren't going to to have opportunities to live here and work here and go to church here and learn here and thrive here if they can't live here. So I think this is one of those things that you've asked me to do. So if you're okay with me exploring this, I'll bring you more information in the next month or two. Is that okay? Works for me. It's okay. It's okay. Okay. I don't know if it's going to work out or not, but we just uh I don't want to go on down the road without your permission. Okay. Thank you. Uh Dr. Smith, good evening board. Dr. Cleveland. Um, Miss Tisher and Miss Thinker are at the AD summit doing a lot of learning about what was discussed today.
040So hopefully they'll bring us some good information. Um, I would like to share I'm sure about two weeks ago your email blew up with all the different events. I tried to send a calendar invite to all of you. So just quickly going over those. This uh Friday we will be holding our first PDC. We're opening it up. We're so excited. The CNI team will be having their day with administrators. You are all welcome to come. We'd love to see you there. Next Friday will be Dr. Cleveland's day with the administrators. It will also be held at the PDC. We have a great theme that we will wait and share it with you. Um then on July 31st, this will be at Central Junior High. We'd like to show up show off our new facilities. We
041will be having our new teacher orientation. Um August 6th is a day you cannot miss. It is our chamber event that will be held at Springdale High School. Um it is an amazing uh time for everybody. The following day on August 7th at Springdale High School PAC, we'll be doing our back to school event u with all the staff and Dr. Cleveland. And then August 11th, our students return. So I think you should all have calendar invites to remind you of those dates. But any and all of those events, you're welcome to come. We would love to see you at any of those. Um the second item I would like to just share a little bit about um what's happening with our benchmark curriculum. Um and I know you saw the note in the consent
042agenda about our district curriculum that we um shared, but there was an email. It's also linked to your um agenda, but an email was sent out on July 2nd. It was news to all of us until we got the email. Um the information was sent out about benchmark which is our curriculum that we use. Um it is on the approved DESIE curriculum list. Um and just to to give you a reminder, we wanted to make sure that when we chose this curriculum, it took us months and months to choose it. It was on the approved list and we had a whole bunch of teachers that came together and were the deciding factors on this. But on July 2nd, Secretary Oliva sent out an email to Benchmark Company saying that they had intentionally omitted some of
043the materials and that those materials did not comply with the Arkansas law and would be removed. They would be removed from the approval list. Um they are requesting a full refund for districts. Um I think dating back I think is it November starting? Yeah. So from November 2020 reimbursing us all the cost. Um so that is an exorbitant amount of money. We're not sure um where we are with that. But the steps for school districts that have that curriculum is they want to give us a year even though it's been removed from an option for us to use. They are giving us an idea of giving us a year to work. We did have a six-year contract with them. So we're not sure exactly what that means. Um I think we still have three or
044four more years on our contract with them. So we're waiting to hear that. So what we have done so far is u Miss Frink has worked closely. They've put the co-op as our direct line of support. So she's been working with our co-op to start putting together what this year will look like for Springdale Schools. Miss Frink is very um uh very much devoted to ensuring that whatever our next steps are that she brings teachers together to help make those decisions since they will be teaching the new curriculum. What what we will probably be doing this year are there are just a handful that we understand there are just a handful of pockets of lessons that have the three queuing system and that if we can remove those and replace them that we'll be fine
045this year. Um but we are trying to figure out what does that mean? Um we have spent a lot of work aligning especially in March and April aligning our standards with this curriculum and so we are kind of in a wait uh and hold pattern. I know Dr. Cleveland has I think got a little red when we got this information because we were doing everything we could to abide by the rules they set for us. So we will have more information and we will share that with you. But we just wanted you to be aware of that. Do you have any questions on that? When did we adopt this? I was thinking it was like in the last year or so. No, I think we've had it for I want to say three, but you
046really made a push in the last 18 months. Yes. Yes. So when a bad word buy in, but you really spent a lot of time with the teachers. Yes. Well, a lot of people spend a lot of time with the teachers and it is and I think what's hard is there's a difference between the cost of the curriculum versus the cost of our subs. Those are two different pots of money that we use. And so I'm really not sure what that means for us, but I mean the the work that was done this spring was absolutely beautiful with our teachers coming together aligning the standards, the proficiency scales, everything you can possibly imagine. So um that's where we are right now. So okay, the next thing I wanted to share with you is just about
047the data that Dr. Cleveland mentioned has just recently come out. And so I'm going to be a little cautious with this information because in Springdale we do have a large mobility large students with mobility. And so it's really hard uh when you look at data when it hasn't been truly scrubbed to to share information. But I am going to share from a state level and a little bit from a district level. So one thing I just want to remind you of, I've already shared the nine cell letter grade. So if you'll notice there's um the top light bluish color yellow and then the bottom green color and each one of those represents a third. So uh it's called nine cell because each one of those is one ninth of the overall score. Um high school
048is very similar, but you'll notice number seven is the lighter green. Those actually come together as one cell. And then you have your eight and nine. But for what I'm getting ready to share, I'm just looking at those top three cells. I'm looking at only achievement scores. And this is from the state department. Um, so just a reminder, Atlas is the assessment that we give. We give a summitive assessment at the end of the school year. We give it in grades three through eight in ELA, math, and science. We also give an algebra 1 and a course, a geometry end of course, and a biology end of course. Algebra and geometry fall under math and then biology under science. And so those are the different areas that we test. This is from the state. And
049really the most important thing is to look at some of the comments made at the top. But you will see when they did a 2425 comparison from one year to the next that ELA did go up8 of a percent. Um math went up 2.7% and science went up 2.4%. And so, um, there were gains in all three of those areas. Again, looking at the top in blue, so the 2025 ELA performance, when you're looking across all different levels, a level three and a level four is considered proficient or advanced in in the assessment. Um, if you'll notice, it says Atlas ELA in the state of Arkansas, grades four, six, seven, eight, and 10 went up. And so you can kind of see the distribution of scores in those top two bands and how they fluctuated
050through the different grades. Again, you're looking at state data, not district data. When you look at math uh performance, they saw an increase in grades 3, 4, 6, 7, 8, algebra 1, and geometry. And you can just see the progression of of as across the state as you get to some of the higher grades the percentage of proficiency does go down a little bit overall. And then science um all tested grades demonstrated a gain in science mastery um over last year. I think part of that has been because now it's part of a state assessment. So there is quite a bit more attention given to science. But you can also see the increase in our level threes and four across the state. [Music] This chart right here goes uh pretty in depth about where they
051saw anomalies or what was happening. But really if you'll look at the yellow columns, you will see the change from 23 24 to this year's 2425. And you can see third grade went down a little bit in ELA and then uh it also went down in 9th, but the rest of them stayed the same or went up. And you can see math had a pretty good significant change um with the exception of fifth grade. One of the things that was predominant in our district and across the state is something where it happened in fifth grade. So most most of the districts across the state and on average fifth grade went down for some reason. So they're I think going to dive a little deeper into what was happening in fifth grade. And so because this
052data is raw data without mobility, we haven't been able to scrub the data. We don't know. The one thing I was able to pull um without looking out without taking out our highly mobile is, and I'll just give you this. So in all of our grade levels that took ELA, um there are six different grade bands. Six of our eight went up. In reading, seven of our eight went up. In math, five of our eight went up. And in science, five of our seven. So, at least 75% of our grades in Springdale went up. That is prior to pulling out our highly mobile. So, I figure when I pull out the highly mobile, those will show even more growth in more areas. So, seven out of eight in reading was using the benchmark. No, it
053Oh, yes. Yes. Mhm. Yep. Exactly. So we approve. I I made that comment to somebody else and I was like, "Oh man." So anyway, that is the the current data. As we start scrubbing it and hearing a little bit more, again, this was just the achievement score, our growth scores. I expect to see quite a bit higher scores in and growth for that. Anything else that I can answer? Okay. Thank you. Thank you. Good evening board. Dr. Cleveland, Leanne. Um, the only item that I have on my section this month is the financial statements for June 30th, 2025. Um, as y'all will recall, we kind of have that little interim section there where we have what we call period 13. And so we're still in period 13. So what you'll what you have before you
054in your board packet is the financials as of June 30th, 2025 prior to us opening up period 13. And then so next month, you'll have two financial statements. You'll have the the final final for the year that would include period 13. And then you'll also have the July financial statements which will represent period one of 2026. So um so to go to the second page of your packet um where I've got the revenue as you'll see our tax collections came in quite a bit higher than what we had budgeted and so I was very pleased with that. uh national board stipens. Um you'll see that budgeted revenue was a million25,000. Our actual collections was 932,000. That's simply just a pass through from the state. So I budgeted based on previous years and so this year,
055you know, we had fewer people receiving that stipen from the state. So I wanted to explain that so y'all would know why there was a difference in that. Um for other grants and aid state we had quite a bit more money that we got as state grants over the course of the year. For instance, our school safety grant, we also received an additional professional development grant that was um in addition to what you normally see as our professional development funds that are categorical funds. And so those are embodied in that 180% collection. I also wanted to um back up a little bit and talk about miscellaneous revenue from local sources. That was higher than we had originally budgeted. And part of the money that is included in that is some of those um we've talked
056about every every month we've run a little bit higher on our vocational expenditures than what I had budgeted. And so every month I've reminded you guys that that is from that equipment that was purchased for our career tech programs. And so we got reimbursed by office of skills development. And so that revenue from office of skills development is included in that miscellaneous revenue from local sources. So when you see that vocational expenses on page three or higher, it's being offset by that additional revenue that was collected as a pass through reimbursement. Um the other item that I wanted to point out was on special ed assistance. We had originally budgeted about 766,000 which has historically been about what we received for that. Um this year we got over a million. We got a million 33,000.
057And so I wanted to explain a little bit about what that is. Um, a lot most of that revenue came from what we call catastrophic special education assistance. And so what that means is any one student that we have in the district that cost us to provide services for that one particular student more than $30,000. those expenditures over 30,000 we can submit to the state to get additional um money to help support that student. And so essentially the state gets a big pot of money and then based on the submissions they get statewide from all the districts for the students that cost more than $30,000 to support, then they devy that pod up. And so we were one of the few schools that actually got an increase um from previous year on that. Um we
058had a I was at a meeting last week for um CASBO certification and we were having a conversation about that because some of the districts have new um special ed coordinators or supervisors. And so there there's some concern there that maybe the paperwork wasn't filed correctly, but it ended up for our benefit that we got more than what we have received in pre previous years. So I just wanted to explain that a little bit and and make y'all aware of that. Um so overall our percent collected to date was about 5% over what we anticipated and so I was very pleased with that. Um, for expenditures on page three, uh, fund one, which is our t our teacher salary fund, we ended up right about where I expected us to. We ended up at 99.54%.
059So that's where I anticipated we would be. Um, on vocational education, you'll see that it's over by about 36 almost 37%. And that goes back to what we talked about with that those equipment purchases that were actually reimbursed by OSD because those items were not originally budgeted when we started the year. Um, another item that I want to point out to you is we were over budget on district administration. Um, that has to do with the settlement agreement that was reached in a lawsuit that we had pending. And then also I wanted to show uh explain a little bit about student transportation. That increase or that overage is it's not really an overage. It just that's just how it shows up because we had in school year 24 we had approved some purchase orders for
060some buses that were on order and we didn't actually receive them until school year 25. And so at the end of school year 24, I held over a little bit additional fund balance because I knew that money was going to have to be paid at some point. So I didn't put buses in the budget for school year 25. And so that's where you're seeing that difference. So I I just wanted to explain that. Um the only the last thing I wanted to point out is a change that I made to the check register. And so if you'll look at that, what you'll see, what you'll notice is there's no check numbers on the register. It's just simply the date, the vendor, a description, and the amount. And the reason why I did that is um
061as part of the conversations that I've had with other school financial officers across the state, several of them had have noted that once they took those check numbers off of their public financial statements, their fraudulent activity declined somewhat because then people don't the general public doesn't know what your check number series is. And so for our bank right now, they're only matching uh check number, the amount, and the date. And so they're not matching the vendor. So they're handpulling anything that's over 10,000. But there's an opportunity, there was an opportunity there that a check might have looked like it appeared in our series of numbers that might have not been to the appropriate vendor. So, this is just a um just a little precautionary step that was kind of an easy step for me to
062do without really um changing the information that's available to you as the board and the public, but gives a little bit of extra layer of protection for fraudulent activity. Any questions? Okay. Thank you. I guess we need to make a motion. June finances. A motion by Mr. Bell and a second by Mr. Ombi to approve the June 2025 financials. All those in favor? Opposed? Motion passes. Thank you. Hello board and Dr. Cleveland. I've got a a construction update and actually I'm going to do a little bit of a facility update on summer projects. So the PDC, we have our first meeting in there this week. Um here's just a few of the pictures. This is the the first floor, a couple of the rooms. So, the tables out of the uh the old PDC, we
063moved over on and filled up the first floor. Um the second floor, we ordered some new furniture. It's not here yet. So, we've got some loner um tables and chairs going in there. They went in there today. Um and that'll get us through until the 23rd when our when our real furniture shows up and then they'll switch that out. So, that that building's going really good. Um, we've already moved uh a couple staff members in and some more will come on contract in the next couple weeks and we'll move them into their new new offices. Um, out at at Harbor, we've got a lot of work going on out there. This is just some of the new fence that's going around the track. Um, we will be we put new turf on the football field.
064That's complete. Um, we put in new fences, got rid of the plastic fence that was deteriorated from the sun. Um, we'll be finishing up some drink rails on the north end of that. That'll finish up this week. That'll complete the football field. Um, and then they're going to start working on the u the multi-use field in the middle of the track. They're going to put turf down there and then resurface the track. There was a damaged spot on the uh northwest corner from a drainage pipe. They're going to repair that and then resurface the the track. We're also doing some work on the batting cages and the tennis courts. Um they they had had some storm damage. Um so that's that's in the works also. Um so those will be you know th those projects
065will just be ongoing and we'll get those done as soon as we can. Um the industrial arts building. So, uh, Southern Brothers is they're moving all their focus over to the the industrial arts building. Um, so, so they're putting in a lot of the HVAC. So, this is a shop area on the on the north side. Garage doors are in. They've got their f first coat of paint on the walls. Uh, this is one of the classrooms. They're they're getting the duct work put in there and the HBAC units. Um and and yesterday they had their today they had their um inwall inspections and then uh once we get it passed we'll start putting in the sheetrock and and finishing all all of the inside finishes. So this is is the shop area. You can
066see all the uh sprinkler lines and and everything uh going in. So there's still a lot of work going on over there. Um but um we look like we'll get it like August 10th. The And um we did have one issue on the um sprinkler line. There was a valve that was bad and the city was waiting till school got out to change that valve cuz they were going to take the system down. So about 3 weeks ago they got that valve changed. And so we did our calculations and the the 4-in line that was existing in that building won't handle then the the water flow that we need for that building. So we're having to um tap on to a 12-in water line that that runs on the west side of this building and
067then uh bring a new 6 in into this. So that's probably going to happen after school starts. Um we did get all the drawings done today. Um we got that over to u the city and the water department for them to approve. Then once they approve it, they will send it to the health department to approve. Um but once the city approves it, we can go and start the work uh before it gets the final approval. Um so we're moving on that as quick as we can. I'm working with the fire department if it's not completed by the time school starts and we get kids in there to to work on a plan B to possibly do a firewalk. I'd have somebody in the building just just walking, you know, if there is a fire
068can get on the intercom, let everybody know, evacuate it. So, we're working on a on a plan B in case we can't get this this work done in in time. Um, other projects we have, um, we've been working on Westwood with the architect to get the drawings to meet all the P requirements for the state. Uh, I think we've got that accomplished. I met with the principal today. Um, so the architect's starting to put in all the, uh, mechanical, electrical, and plumbing into the plans and and continue to work on on those drawings. um Tyson Elementary. Uh we're doing some work over there on all the floors. All all the floors will be polished uh by the end of the week. Uh the epoxy floors are going in the restrooms. And then once that cures
069for a couple days, we'll put in the new fixtures and partitions and they're already putting uh some of the metal sophets and fascia back on the building. Um so that that work will go on. um met with the principal. We're going to meet the the kindergarten jump start uh deadline. Uh Parson Hills, uh we're um redoing the floor in the in the kitchen. And then um we're adding a a a sped room over there. So we're actually changing locations of the lounge and the in this bedroom. Um so that work is going on. It'll it'll be done before school starts. Um, Springdale High, we replaced the roof on the 600 and then we're putting on new HVAC units and those will go back up on the roof on the 28th, which is a Saturday and
070then we'll get those uh do a startup on those. George Elementary, we put all new heat and air units in that school. Um, all the units are on except the two rooftop units. They haven't got here yet. Uh, so as soon as they arrive, we'll we'll get a crane over and get them set in place. that uh but they're back everything's back up and going other than those two. Um and then our custodial department this summer um we've been removing carpet and polishing floors. So they've done Springdale High School, they've done the 1000 building and the 600 building. Uh George Elementary, we had 16 rooms there. We removed carpet there. Uh J Kelly, they removed it in 44 classrooms. Sonora Middle School, they removed 40 classrooms and then Tyson Elementary, they did 31 rooms and
071uh the main office. So, they're they're on track to to finish that up and have custodians back in the building in their own buildings on the I think it's the 28th is is the plan. So, you guys have any questions. All going smooth, isn't it? It's all going smooth, just like normal. So, I really like your picture on your background of your slideshow. Yeah, Dr. Smith helps me with with that. All right, that's all I have. Thanks. Thanks, J. Now, we do have next Tuesday board session. So, Mr. Emerson and I were talking back on the phone and we had discussed for the agenda talking about uh the new meeting structure that we're going to have beginning in August. We had also talked about what else you might want on the agenda. Do we want
072to talk budget at this work session or do you want to want to talk budget at another work session? We also uh talked about because I think we had discussed scheduling out when you wanted to have grand openings for Southwest Central, the PDC and the industrial arts and things like that. The last time we all got together, was there any other topic that you all wanted to discuss at that work session? Do you recall, Mr. Did you ever remember? No, I could I was thinking there were two. It was agenda and something else, but I can't think of what it was. Did you have one? I'll think about it. We can do a grab bag kind of a deal. Anything you want. Just give us heads up first and maybe an update on the hold
073back of funds. Yeah. Okay. Yeah, I'll have some of that. Yeah. I'm sorry that was so heavy. Yeah, it's not much time for change, but Oh, yeah. We'll get it as Dr. Smith el says or it may have been Yeah, I think we'll probably make the news just anyway. That's all we did. That is Tuesday. Yes, sir. 11:30 at the PDC. Do we have anything going at PDC that can we carve out a room? 22nd. Tuesday the 22nd. If not, we can do it here. But we'll make it happen. Don't kick anybody out. Come on. No, don't do that. Oh, is an hour and a half long enough? Oh, yeah. I always feel like we're crunched for time every time we do them. So, we're going to do it. I'd want it to be okay.
074It's not real heavy. No. And then whatever grab And then whatever grab bag kind of information you want to talk about, we'll just do that. Okay. Anything else board? Well, that meeting is journal. [Music]