Regular Board Meeting - Thursday, March 12, 2026

001the to the March 12th board meeting. Um we are beginning at see the time is 5:02 p.m. A call to order and then we will um is there any Miss Ellinger is there any so call to order 502 is Miss Ellinger? Is there any public to address the board on close session agenda items? >> President Aaser or not? Okay, with that we convened to close session at 5:03 Okay. want to welcome everybody back uh report out from close session. During close session, the board voted 5 to zero to approve a settlement agreement between BRSSD and one student in lie of pending litigation. Now we reconvene to open s get going. Open session. Um call to order for the flag salute. Please rise. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and

002to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. >> So, since I just did the announcements report on close session, we will move on to approval of the agenda and the consent agenda. Do I have a motion for the approval of the cons of the agenda and consent agenda? >> I move to approve the agenda and the consent agenda. >> Great. Do I have a second? >> Second. >> Great. Um, all those in favor of the agenda and consent agenda, please say I. >> I. Great. 50. The agenda consent agenda pass or approved. Next item is number eight, speakers wishing to address the board on non-aggenda items. Miss Ellinger, do we have any uh speakers at this time? >> Yes, President. Yes, President C. We have

003uh three speakers. So, the first one is Pamela Miller from BRSFA and Lisa Fehee. You want to come up? >> Great. Thank you. Before you um start pay again the board appreciates uh and supports stakeholder input at our meetings. Engagement by members of the public and civic matter is a cornerstone of our democracy. We have established guidelines for these meetings. Um public comments are limited to three minutes per person per topic. Um and if you are anybody else addressing the board, please come see Miss Ellinger. Um, and you'll be given an item number to come up. And with that, go ahead. >> Good evening. Thank you so much. I'd like to speak to the districtwide impact of the long-term planning that accompanied the decision to um maintain the status quo and keep both middle schools

004open. Much of the conversation has been centered around Nesbbit and Sam Piper, but this decision affected every teacher in the district. For months, staff across all sites experienced uncertainty, wondering about potential displacement, shifting enrollment, program changes, and staffing adjustments. When enrollment moves, class sizes shift, when numbers change, staffing allocations change, budgets tighten, programs shift, every teacher feels the ripple effects. This was not an isolated issue. It touched the entire system. Now that the is going to maintain for three years. There's relief, but there's also lingering uncertainty. Families are already asking if closures will be revisited in three years. What happens then? Parents plan ahead. If there's uncertainty about a school's long-term future, some may hesitate to enroll. That hesitation alone could impact enrollment as early as next year. And those impacts will once again be

005felt districtwide through staffing and programming changes. Of course, we all hope that enrollment committee is successful and that both schools reach strong sustainable numbers and that's the best case scenario. But hope can't be a strategy. We need a clear transparent plan that's not uh that b that's based on putting that's not based on putting more responsibilities on already overloaded teacher and administrators. What benchmarks will determine success? What data will be monitored? What are the contingency plans if enrollment doesn't increase? How will those decisions affect staffing and programs across the entire district? Would it affect, as mentioned in previous board meetings, counselors, music, sports programs, reading specialists, etc. This conversation is also inseparable from the financial landscape. We're facing a 4.5 million deficit. We've been told that we're not in immediate crisis, but that our runway

006runway is shorter, and that means reductions are coming. Where will those reductions occur? How will we protect the quality of education across all of our schools? It's been stated that staffing is our largest expense and we're fortunate, educated, experienced in the district, and that experience directly benefits students. But it also places teachers higher on the salary schedule. There's growing concern that budget constraints may result in little or no salary increases in the future bargaining cycles. With the cost of living continuing to rise and without automatic COLA adjustments, stagnant wages will make it increasingly difficult to retain the excellent educators who strengthen every school in this district. The decision was has district-wide impact. What we're asking for now is clarity, transparency, and sustainability. A thoughtful plan that considers enrollment stability, fiscal responsibility, and the human impact

007on every school community. Our educators are committed to the sess success of the entire district. And we ask that the path forward reflect that same level of care for the whole district. Thank you very much. Good evening board members. I'm gonna kind of continue Pamela's thought as the BRFA union president. So, thank you for read reaching a decision regarding our middle schools. The clarity you provided some real relief to many educators knowing where they'll teach next year and what roles they will be in. That matters deeply. Stabil stability supports teachers and when teachers feel stable, students, students benefit. Tonight, I want to focus specifically on the impact this plan may have on our teachers and students at Nesbbit and at San Piper. As part of the decision, a volunteer committee will be formed to support

008enrollment effort at these two schools. I agree that increasing community awareness is important. Nesbbit and Sandpapers have strong programs and dedicated educators who care deeply about their students. Every school in our district has something special to offer and those strengths should be clearly communicated, not just to families, but to staff and the broader community as well. However, we need to talk honestly about what this means in practice. There will likely be an expectation that teachers help promote their schools, attending outreach events, developing presentations, expanding programs, serving as ambassadors, and supporting marketing efforts. While this may be framed as voluntary, we must ask, is it actually truly voluntary if teachers feel that their school's long-term survival and therefore position depends on participation and community um pressure. The ask of teachers continues to grow every year. Academic

009expectations increase. Social emotional needs are rising. Documentation requires more. Family communication is constant. Teachers are balancing instruction, intervention, collaboration, and compliance all while building meaningful relationship with students. Sandpiper and Nesbbitz have smaller staff, especially at the middle school level. That means fewer adults to share responsibility. These educators are already stretched thin. One of the greatest strengths of these schools is their tight-knit community, the advisory structures, the personal attention, and the relationships that help these students thrive. Those relationship require time and energy. They do not happen by accident. If additional responsibilities, particularly ones outside of instructional duties are layered on top of already full workloads, something will give. What we risk impacting is the very thing that makes these schools special. They're strong student centered communities. Work life balance also matters. Some teachers have family obligations.

010Some teachers um have other afterchool's responsibilities such as tutoring, coaching, and maybe another afterchool job to help them with the cost of living in this area. Is it equitable to ask teachers at two specific sites to take on additional responsibility to preserve enrollment while teachers at other sites are not being asked to do the same? Our educators will always show up for our students. They are deeply committed. But sustainability matters and if we want our schools to thrive, we must ensure that expectation placed on our staff is realistic, equitable, and truly voluntary. Thank you. >> Okay. And our last set of speakers is Claire Marks and Allison Kim. Good evening. We're here to speak on behalf of our colleague Megan Chidus at Rston. Hello. I am Megan Chidus, social studies and debate teacher at Rston

011and I want to begin by being direct. I am deeply disappointed in the board's decision to make a non-decision regarding the future of our middle school programs. I write to you tonight not just as an employee, but as a middle school teacher at Rston who has dedicated 12 years to this district and who intends to stay. I care deeply about the long-term health and stability of our schools. Initially, many of us at Rston felt it was not our place to speak. None of the options presented directly threatened our program, and we trusted the board to weigh the evidence and make the difficult decision before you. However, after watching hours of deliberation last month, it became clear that this non-decision carries implications for all of us. First, this action does not address the issue that prompted

012this entire conversation, declining enrollment. The purpose of taking action now was to prevent future financial instability. I supported the proactive approach because a healthy district benefits everyone. It allows the district to offer competitive cost of living increases, maintain strong health benefits, and provide the classroom resources necessary to continue delivering the highquality education our community expects. Choosing not to address a known imminent challenge is not a neutral act. is a delay with consequences. Second, while cons consolidation would have been difficult and emotional for many, it also offered stability. It provided a clearer path for teachers who love this community to remain in this community. During deliberations, it was stated that if Nesbet and Sandpiper cannot naturally increase enrollment, compulsory reassignment of students may occur. That may temporarily balance numbers, but it creates another problem that was

013not fully acknowledged. Austin teachers are single subject credentialed. If our enrollment declines due to students being redirected and staffing reductions follow, many of our teachers would not be able to transfer to other sites. They would simply be without positions. In contrast, multi-ubject credentials teachers may have more flexibility within the district. That distinction matters when we are discussing people's livelihoods. Third, this decision effectively kicks the can down the road. Enrollment trends are not reversing. As a millennial, I can tell you that many in my generation are having fewer children due to the rising cost of living. That reality is unlikely to shift dramatically in the next three years. In the meantime, middle school educators will carry the weight of uncertainty. When job security feels unstable, it inevitably inevitably creates competition between programs. We will be tasked

014with selling our schools simply to preserve our positions. That is not a healthy environment for collaboration or for students. Finally, with all due respect, you are elected to make difficult decisions. Forming a task force feels less like leadership and more like deferral. While community involvement is valuable, responsibly responsibility ultimately rest with this board. While I understand that the decision cannot be reconsidered tonight, I urge you to reflect on the weight it carries. For the next three years, more than 60 middle school employees will come to work each day knowing that significant change is looming, but without clarity about what that change will mean for them. That uncertainty is not abstract. It affects morale, collaboration, and stability our students depend on. Thank you. >> And those are all the speakers for non-aggenda items. >> Thank you,

015Miss Ellinger. Um, now we're on to item number nine, board of trustees report. Board members may report on events or topics which have taken place since the last board meeting. Um, should we start at the Would anybody like to go first? >> Go ahead. >> I like to go first because people always steal what I'm going to say and then if I go first then they can't steal it. Um uh so a couple of things from me. I had the opportunity to attend the final two masters in governance classes. So we have five classes. Um they're four hours each. So um it was very very good training. So um yeah, glad that it's over, but like it is very good material. So um I did enjoy the training. It's very interactive and so it's um

016with other board members in other districts all across California. Um I was also able to attend the virtual middle school information night which I thought was really great. Um and then I also attended a meeting with um other elected officials in Sonteo County to go over the vehicle licensing fee fiasco. Um so that was also very interesting and I think more to come on that. um later. Um and then and then um also um yesterday I was able to attend um actually I did I did two parent tours. One at Nesbbit I think that was on Tuesday. Was that a Tuesday? >> Yeah, Tuesday. And then one at Sam Piper yesterday and they were um also both very very good tours. So that's it for me. Hi. So, it's been a good long while. Thank

017you all for being here. Um, I think what well, not what I I think. So, this uh this morning I was got I had gotten a chance to go and see um the Sam Piper uh information session for the parents and after the decision at our last meeting to keep all three of our middle schools indefinitely fully supported by the board forever. as far as we know. Um, and that we are only changing enrollment practices in terms of where students go was the decision after 3 years. Not saying that we would and our decision was also not to say that we would revisit the student school closing option. So I feel like that decision was very supportive for teachers so that they know that they have all three schools to rely on in the foreseeable

018future. I felt like it was a really great experience to see Sam Piper, Sam Piper parents, all the students and parents that were available that showed up to Sam Piper. Um um just in terms of showing up and being interested. Um the marketing efforts of our committee is has been doing really great. Last year they had 10 parents sign up for our information sessions. This year they had 50. Um, I think that's a huge difference and I think it'll make it um it'll make it'll go a long way in terms of what we decide to do. So, I'm very excited to think that it went well. Thank you. So, I um uh just want to highlight um that I attended uh Trusty Bruno and I and Superintendent Duara and uh business chief business official Reese

019Matsumoto um did attend our school force uh board meeting this week. And um so just to speak to that um really appreciate all the work that school forest does, all of the parent volunteers for making sure that we have the funds needed to provide the highquality education that we want for um our children. So um thanks to them for doing that and um we really really appreciate their support and um I believe uh celebrate the music will be coming up and um the uh annual event uh which is a party for adults um that will be coming up as well. So, if you're able to, please uh please attend and support School Force, which supports our district. I um yeah, uh I'm just gonna throw out some also kind of appreciations. Um I h I

020have been reflecting since our last meeting and uh I am appreciating cander. Um there's been a lot of that and and uh over the last few months and I think more to come and I really do uh in my role as board it has been the most active kind of time. Um, which I yeah, honestly I wish it had happened the whole time because I think it's part of why why I set out here. So, it's been really it's been great actually to hear from a lot of people. Um, I I went to campus today for parent teacher conferences and I find myself just kind of in general appreciation of teachers and how much they do. Like we say it a lot, but it's it's great to feel it of how much they do for

021not just my kids but so many. and just hearing and seeing the amount of people there um kind of yeah checking in on their kids getting reports on on on the services the students the teachers are doing and I could see the weight of it for better force I could see I could see how much they care I could hear it um and I appreciate that uh I feel like I haven't thought as much if I'm being honest about the union and school force and administrators I always do appreciate but I feel like it's friend of mine now. Uh I always throw out kind of like the whatever cultural time of year. It's uh women's history month and I want to shout that out. Education is full of really dope women. Um we had the

022speakers today, the majority of this room, the majority of this table. Um you all are crushing it. I really appreciate what you've done, including Birming. Um that that was that's impowerful. Uh and Scholastic. I bought some cool toys that are broken already. Um, >> yeah, >> thank you, Jason. And I do appreciate the book fair. My kids have a blast with it. Uh, that's my time. Yeah. >> Thank you. Um, just I I'll just touch on a few things. Uh, one was about a earlier this month uh attended with Trusty Northup the 2 by two uh meeting with Carl Mont. So two trustees from from ours kind of correspond and as well as superintendent Duara and the correspondent superintendent. We met with two trustees um from there and and we were talking kind of comparing

023and contrasting the the decisions. They also went through a decision to call close Tide Academy that was that while challenging and difficult, they um unanimously voted to to close it and just kind of their decision-m and what what went through kind of their minds and how they're also dealing with the transitions and and so again um they went a different direction but certainly um as well as felt the compassion and and the empathy towards the students and how they're going to kind of deal with um with the post the post vote. Um, so it was really it was helpful just to kind of get theirs and then we just kind of uh also touched on a few other things because I think it's important one of the reasons that I want to get a lot

024of value out of that committee is because you know just to make sure that our transition from our middle school students uh to the high school no matter what high school they pick whether it's Carlmont or or the other ones um is a good one and that we're preparing our students to to find success as they enter that new phase um of high school. So, it was really really important. I really get a lot of value out of that. Um, and I want to equally thank Nesbbit. Uh, it was actually Monday. I looked at Yeah, it was Monday. I know these days are going crazy. Um, so I I had the the pleasure to attend uh the Nesbbit walking tour uh of the IB program in the middle school and fantastic um uh very very

025nicely organized. But I think the my joy is to touch base with the students and see what they're working on and how eloquent they are and how passionate are whether it was them doing a science um part to also like I got to sit in and talk to somebody in Spanish who was a student and kind of working on their conjugations. Um and then um seeing uh Mr. Whiteb Bread's little um book collage where he took pictures of of books which is awesome about how many books the students are reading in the course so far of a semester even a year. Uh it's impressive. Um I definitely am not reading nearly as many. Uh but but I do actually plan to borrow a book from from the library because of my one of my conversations

026with one of the students um who eloquently kind of explained it. So again, I think um I was in the second session and I'm glad I was in that one because the first one was apparently very packed, which is great to hear. Um um so I I'm glad I had a little bit of chair space and everything like that. Um but I wish um and I'm looking forward to um going on the shadow tours with San Piper and Nesbbit as we continue to support all the middle schools. So, I will leave it at that and bring it over to the superintendent report, but I want to thank everybody um for all their just attention and amazing energy that they bring forth every day. And I really do appreciate that. I think we all do. Yes,

027Mr. I forgot to say happy holy if that's a day you celebrate when I call out things. It's a good times a great story. >> All right. Uh good evening everybody. I am going to keep it short intentionally because I hear we have a treat coming up. Uh so uh two things. Uh school year is eb and flow. Uh there's times that go a little bit more smoothly and times that are a little bit more rocky. Um and it's definitely been one of those busy times. I just want to take a moment to thank our staff uh who have been engaging in conferences all week. um who have been doing shadow tours, who have been um uh prepping lessons in different ways, inner sessions, all of that stuff that's been happening. Um it doesn't go

028unnoticed and I just want to say thank you. Uh we have amazing staff uh that go above and beyond and uh do whatever they need to do to make sure our kiddos are successful. So a big thank you. Um, second thank you is I'm my my days are blending. It's Thursday. Yesterday was Wednesday. Uh, was I heart school force day. Um, it's a day where um, us as staff uh, get to show appreciation for school force for all that they do. We wear shirts, we take pictures, and uh, there were some pretty awesome pictures that are in people's email. Um, now I just want to say thank you to school force. uh and school force really is everybody um who contributes uh to make sure that our kids have uh what they need to be

029successful. And then above and beyond that, there's a core group of school force kind of board members and school reps um that do so much more and give so much more of their free time to make sure all those connections are made. So, uh, big thank you to all of our school force supporters in the audience, to our school force board members. Uh, we appreciate you and we love you. And with that, I'll pass it back. >> Great. >> So, very uh very excited for this um month's school spotlight, which is on NZIT school. And uh with that, I just want to um thank Principal Hansen, Assistant Principal Sper, the entire staff, and and this the surprise that's outside our doors that they're amazingly they're kind of quiet actually. Are they really out there or

030did they go to Menches already? So, uh anyway, I'll give this over to Principal Hansen who will showcase um the pride and joy of NES. Just a little housekeeping. Jerome, I'm telling you when to switch the slide. Got you. Okay. Hi everybody. Um my name is Ryan Hansen. I am the proud principal of Nesbbit School Board of Trustees. Um Superintendent Dora, cabinet, and community. We're really happy to present to you tonight. Nesbbit rolls deep. We appreciate every family member that showed up tonight as we highlight our school. So tonight, I'll highlight for you some of the outstanding work that sets Nesbbit apart. You'll hear from our reading specialists. You'll receive a highlight of our seventh grade and then we'll close with a performance from our fourth graders. Next slide, please. So to set the stage,

031it's really important to note um Nesbbit's programmatic alignment with BRSSD strategic plan and our profile of an empowered learner. There are many intentional moves that Nesbbit makes to take these plans from paper to practice. Next slide. So, starting with the why is a phrase that was made popular by Simon Synynic. Um, he gives many leadership talks about a framework that pushes leaders to focus on their purpose, their cause, and their belief. And so, at Nesbbit School, our why is to deeply understand the beloved, diverse students that we're privileged to serve. Um the data before you sets the tone for the level of skill, tenacity, and socially conscious educators that make up Nesbbit's K- through5 program and our international baloria middle years program. So for us, the details are in the data. For example, seventh grade

032who we'll highlight tonight has an enrollment of 35 students. Of just that 35, 31.43 are multilingual learners. 45.71 are within the socioeconomically disadvantaged category and 17% are students receiving special education support. Our primary grades represent an average of 21.82% multilingual learners, 25% are within the socioeconomically disadvantaged category, and 13.2% are students receiving special education support. Next slide, please. So deeply understanding our demographical data of our students helps us to analyze um other markers that communicate to us areas of growth, development and need. We use um our K through2 MClass data, our 3 through8 fastbridge data and our youth truth data to inform our instructional practices. So we are focused on agency and engagement and that's through our solutionary work. Every single grade level at NESBID designs a solutionary project based on the solutionary framework and

033that is also connected with our environmental literacy standards. We have analyzed our data to create a strategy that is a throughine approach in grades K through 8 and we are specifically focused on foundational literacy gaps. Next slide. So this is pretty exciting. Our K2 teachers are piloting the foundations curriculum via Wilson Literacy. Um this is a Nesbbit specific pilot that is fully funded by our school's allocation. So that's in collaboration with Chinpe and Ree. So thank you for believing in our wild ideas. Um this is really focused on the science of reading uh phonics foundational reading skills of our emerging readers. Um, our K through2 teachers are receiving expert coaching. They're enrolled in online training courses and they meet multiple times per year to track their class data and their class's pro progress. Next slide.

034So, our third through eighth grade teachers are also receiving literacy professional development that's focused on reimagining the independent practice in their classrooms. And so we use a professional mentor text called shifting the balance uh to learn strategies that teachers can use to bring the science of reading to life in their upper grade classrooms. So third and fourth grade are focused on vocabulary. Fifth grade is focused on fluency and sixth through eighth grade is focused on comprehension and strategies. Next slide. So this is our creative way of designing Nesbbit's very own scarboers reading rope. Um so Nesbbit takes on a gardener and a carpenter approach to literacy. So gardener skills for us are agency, the solutionary work, healthy relationships, belonging, relevance, authentic audiences, independence and collaboration. We weave those skills skills like rigor, power standards, fluency,

035explicit strategy instruction, word work, and structured literacy. And for us, that's transforming our teaching and learning. Next slide. So, our reading specialists work alongside our teachers to support that literacy development. We are very fortunate to have Stephanie McMaster and Megan Gazumiday in our primary grade servicing our students in first through third grade. And we have restructured how we support upper grades fourth through 8th. Christine Litwin is our fourth and fifth grade reading specialist and that is fully sightfunded. Again, thanks to Ree for supporting our wild thinking and helping us make things happen. And then Lisa Mud is our dedicated middle school reading specialist. Before this structure existed, Stephanie, Megan, and Lisa were expected to meet the outcomes for our entire entire school's demographical data, which I showed you on the earlier slide. So, this structure

036is doing a better job servicing our community. And so, our reading specialists are going to share with you how they get that all done. Good evening, and thank you for the opportunity to share our literacy progress. This year, our K2 team alongside our interventionists implemented the Wilson reading system foundations, a structured systematic phonics and word study program as our core tier one instruction. Students receive daily explicit lessons in phmic awareness, decoding, spelling, and fluency. We pair this with small groupoup instruction for our students performing below benchmark using foundations fun and focus a tier 2 intervention provided by the reading specialist and progress monitor using the amplify M-class screening data. A key strength of this approach is that it is multi-tiered and aligned across all levels of support. Because both tier one and tier 2 instruction

037use the same language, routines, and instructional structures, students experience consistency in how reading skills are taught and practiced. This shared framework helps reinforce learning, reduces confusion for students who need additional support, and allows teachers and interventionists to collaborate more effectively around student progress. >> Next slide, please. As you can see by looking at our beginning of the year to middle of the year results, we're seeing encouraging growth. We reduce students below benchmark by four points and increase students at benchmark by six points in grades kindergarten through 2 grade. That means more students are on track for grade level reading. In first grade, the percentage of students performing at benchmark increased from 23 to 29%, a six-point gain. At the same time, the percentage of students below benchmark decreased from 17% to 13%. Our above benchmark

038group remains strong and stable. What this tells us is that more students are moving into grade level proficiency as the year progresses, which is exactly what we want to see from strong foundational reading instruction. When we look classroom by classroom, we see similar patterns of growth. Fewer students in risk categories and more meeting or exceeding benchmark expectations. It's also to important to provide context. Nesbbit serves a fairly transient student population. Throughout the year, we enroll new students who may not have had prior exposure to our phonics program or consistent literacy instruction. Mobility can often slow or flatten mid-year growth data. So the fact that we still see measurable gains, more students reaching benchmark and fewer below suggests that our core phonics instruction is effective and helps students accelerate quickly once they're here. Our next steps

039are to continue implementing foundations with fidelity, use small groupoup intervention to target students still in the well below range and monitor progress every four to six weeks so we can adjust instruction quickly. Overall, we're encouraged by the trajectory. We're seeing evidence that our instructional approach is strengthening early literacy skills and putting our students on track for reading success by the end of first grade. Next slide. We'd like to share a quick snapshot of what's happening in our K2 classrooms. >> Maybe not. It's a really great video. >> What it is is what a glimpse of what instruction look can do as you see the scaffold of the pilot that we're implementing and the intentional work that we're doing with the Wilson. So, That's right. >> That's okay. We have we have another performance that may

040save this. >> Principal Hansen, you can share the link. We'll make sure that I have the link and I'll share with the board. >> Next slide. >> Hello. As mentioned earlier, I'm the fourth and fifth grade reading specialist at Nesbbit. We appreciate this opportunity to share with you a little bit about the important work that's happening in our upper grades. The cornerstone of the science of reading and the overall framework of the Wilson reading system state that decoding skills lead to the automaticity of word level reading which leads to the fluent reading of connected text and fluency is the bridge to comprehension which is the goal of reading. Phmic awareness and decoding skills remain critically important in fourth and fifth grade for students who have not yet mastered foundational phonics patterns. By returning to core

041skills such as breaking words into parts, recognizing common spelling patterns, and learning the rules that guide how words are decoded, students gain the tools they need to approach unfamiliar words with greater confidence. Applying these same patterns to spelling helps strengthen their understanding of how words work, supporting both reading and writing. In addition, continued practice with vocabulary and highfrequency words helps build reading fluency, allowing students to focus more on comprehension and meaning. Together, these foundational skills help develop more confident, independent readers and writers in our upper grades. Last year, after reviewing our data, NESBIT leadership and the reading team identified a clear need for a dedicated middle school interventionist to support tier 2 students in reading and language development. While the national conversation about COVID learning loss has faded, we can't deny that its impact is

042still present. We took action for our students in this decision. Our current middle school students were in kindergarten, first and second grade during the shutdown, the years when foundational reading skills are built. For many students, these early skills still needed strengthening using dyslexia screeners, assessments like core um phonics, which you are sending teachers to for professional development, classroom data, and teacher input. We created small grade level cohorts and targeted the literacy and language needs within each group. Once the groups were in progress are in progress, we provide highly focused specific targeted structured intervention using Wilson UFly and Orton Gillingham which um I realized I should add in here because it was I love school force. I thank you to School force for funding my training over the last two years in Orton Gillingham. Um these

043are all evidence-based programs grounded in the science of reading. In the interest of time, I'm only highlighting the cohort's collective fastbridge general reading scores because it's a composite and the composite is what generates their Lexile scores which the high schools use. Um in this chart you can see u fall to winter my co these are my my cohorts not the grade not their peers um you can see their fall to winter the growth was significant 11 points for sixth grade 20 points for seventh grade 14 points for eighth grade this illustrates the power of timely consistent intervention when we identify students accurately and provide targeted instruction instruction. They grow and they often grow faster than their student than than their classroom peers as they work to close gaps. Reading is a lifeline. It's a human

044right and we're proud of the focused work happening at Nesbbit to ensure every student receives the support they need to succeed. Um, and I want to mention that we're all very happy to take any questions about the growth and the programs um, after the presentation. Next slide, please. So, um, at Nesbbit, as you've heard, literacy provides the essential foundations that allow students to fully engage in our schoolwide solutionary work and grade level projects. Through these experiences, students apply their core literacy skills like reading, writing, fluency, and speaking in meaningful realworld contexts. From kindergarten all the way through 8th grade, students explore topics that they care about and develop thoughtful, actionable solutions to authentic problems. They also learn to communicate their ideas to a range of audiences from their peers and families to the broader community,

045reinforcing literacy as both a tool for learning and a vehicle for impact. By middle school, this work reflects the hallmarks of an international balorate education as students grow as inquirers, critical thinkers, communicators, and principled learners who take informed action. Next slide, please. While our middle school has many shining examples of how literacy work and our solutionary work is a through line at Nesbbit, we've chosen to highlight the seventh grade. Tonight, I'd like to introduce Mr. Jay Harrington to tell you about the seventh grade project. >> Thank you. Good evening. Um, over the past several months, our class has been using the solutionary framework to learn about plastic and the impact it has on our worlds. We started by investigating why plastic was created in the first place, which we found out was actually to help

046preserve animals. Um, we also studied how it's made, starting with fossil fuels like oils and natural gas, how it's processed and manufactured in products we use every single day. Um, we also researched the environmental impacts of plastic, including how plastic harm wildlife, pollute oceans, and takes hundreds of years to break down. So, this project was the ultimate way for us to apply the skills and knowledge that we've been working on. As part of this, we practice important public speaking skills so we could easily communicate our ideas and clearly um our research to others. We use math to calculate the amount of resources we would need and predict how many we would get. Most importantly, we would practice essential leadership and collaboration skills as if our project was an actual company. Um using what we learned,

047we worked together to research solutions. I'd like to introduce you one of my students, Anderson, and he's going to talk about the solution our class decided to create. >> Next slide, please. >> Oh, Anderson. >> We decided it would be best to somehow reuse plastic bottles and turn them into something better. So, we began collecting them. After getting inspired by a YouTube video, we settled on the idea of using bottle crops to create a mural which would both beautify our campus, save the environment, and raise awareness. We realized that a single class wouldn't be able to do much. So, we ignited the entirety of seventh grade and planned for a plastic drive to encourage the entire school to contribute to our collection. Before we implemented this, we needed to get permission, which we did easily

048with a presentation to the principal. This presentation was a large collection of the background knowledge that we had accumulated and a detailed overview of what we had done so far and what we plan to do. The end of this presentation was only be the beginning of our project as it marked the start of a new phase collecting plastic. Once the drive began, we started constructing a system of class roles to help the operation run smoothly like making announcements, creating posters, and organizing data. With this in place, we had collected enough bottles before we even realized it. And from there on, we finally started building the mural. Again, we could create another system of class roles like painting caps, placing caps, and quality control. With each student given the opportunity to put their best foot forward,

049this is what we could create so far. >> Next slide, please. So inspired by our seventh grade, our fourth grade solutionary project focused on the impact of plastic and food waste in the Nesbbit community. They researched, they tested, they designed and informed, they read, they built a massive vocabulary and they set out to teach the school what they learned. Um the phenomenon that recycling is not perfect and much of our waste still ends up in landfills. They needed to teach Nesbbit school the importance of reducing and reusing. They needed to do it in a way where people would listen. So they created their own show and the wasted resources Nutcracker was born. As a caveat, they've already showcased this in December. This was their highlight. That was their culminating activity for their solutionary project. They

050wrote every single word. They designed their own costumes. They rehearsed. and they realize how important it is to get word out there in creative ways. Next slide. So, there is no better way to close out our presentation than for our fourth graders to perform to you tonight. Fourth graders, you probably should take your places. Go Pumas. Going to face the board. Is it on? >> Fourth graders, you have to face the board. Mark, you can help us. He will not. It's all team, Miss Marsh. There's never And this is our pipeline middle school. Thank you. >> Thank you. That was >> wonderful. >> Thank you. That is so important. Do it tomorrow morning. >> Order. Order in the court. Order. Or just get ready to proceed, Chisy. All right. So, um, >> yeah. Did she

051leave with a um outstanding presentation all around from from from the get-go to the culmination. So, I want to open it up to the board um for any questions or thoughts um of um Principal Hansen and Assistant Speaker. >> Thank you so much. Um no questions, just a couple of comments if I may. I'm actually sad that all the students left because that was I I don't even have words to say how great that was. Like my my cheeks actually hurt because I was smiling so hard the whole time. Um really really good and also I just wanted to say Anderson your presentation sir so impressive so impressive thank you for sharing with us um you speak very eloquently and um I think that's something that you should be really proud of thank you um

052I don't have very many questions and but I did want to say thank you so much for that fantastic presentation, highlight of my week, month, maybe even year. Um, they were fantastic. Anderson, you're fantastic. And Principal Hansen, I just want to say I really appreciate all the work that you guys are putting forth in the science of reading. I do feel like that's one of the one of the really core pieces of instruction that we need to really be pushing forward in these next couple years. So, seeing that you guys are on the ball and ahead of the game, that is amazing. So, great work. Thank you. Yeah, great presentation, great work that you everybody is doing, Edna, but thank you so much. Um, maybe because my youngest child is in middle school, I don't

053know, but the fourth graders, I felt like I was going to cry the whole time. Um and just so amazing of their their enthusiasm and uh the learning that they did and they it was uh their total selves were involved in it and thank you for guiding them in that learning. >> Um appreciations. Uh yeah, of course that was dope. Enough people said that. That was that was awesome. And I liked it the first time. I liked it again that time. It was nice to have better seats. I didn't have to show up early and steal the front row. It was actually felt like payback cuz all the parents who had the front row were behind them. Um, so I I really did enjoy that. Uh, every time I get to school highlight, I try

054to make sure I say it, but like you're awesome. So it's really easy to like talk about your staff and your students and of course they're amazing. But you're doing a great job. Um, your slide makes it kind of pop even more. Like I can say that but like of course I can say that and I and I'm and I walk there but slide three like this that's impressive to produce whatever you're producing however you produce it with that um you highlighted your team um specifically your your reading specialist and again I want to say that too like that sounds it sounds tricky. It really does. Um, I've heard I keep saying you, Ryan, I'm talking to you, but also I'm talking to your whole team and I've heard you mention it before and it

055hit me then. I never really thought about it in all of the years of thinking I recognize what Nesbbit is and where the tricky parts are. Um, one of the reading special brought it up too, but the kind of like transit is like a hard word for me to use even as I say it, right? But like like the nature of that part of the community, how do you how do you deal with that? like what's and and and maybe even how could we support it is what I want to ask directly. However, it is data where people that are not in our community that Derartision by highlight for me is very important. My upper grade and fifth grade is a pivotal year because it all we're not strongers. We're not So that's why this

056meant school,000 behind us. I'm sorry. >> Say all that again. I'm uh uh Thank you. I mean, yeah, I had a few questions that were all kind of the same thing and I think you answered all of it right there. Uh yeah, I can't say it clearly enough. Uh I haven't said this into a microphone and I think I'm still accurate on it. Dr. Hansen, that's Yeah. So, not only you awesome, for whatever it's worth, I'm proud of you. uh just to allow you to have space. Christina, same all the same appreciations. You're doing a really good job. Uh we spent a lot of time appreciate. Sorry, go ahead and clap for that. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Uh and then just to say it again, you said it well, but we we did talk about your

057middle school and I feel like for years we've been like talking about how how hard your your staff has worked to create the IP program and the strength of it. And I just want to actually separate it while fully agreeing and saying your K through five is also doing really hard work and really great job and uh I specifically in my household appreciate that. So thank you. So yes, I I echo everything as you know. Um I wanted to to look at talk about the reading specialist transition. You you you said the the the why Lisa, you said the kind of the why you felt there was a need for a reorganization. Um, yeah, as a team I I got right. I'm sure you didn't come up with it just Yeah. So, I'm wondering kind

058of like where, you know, any reorganization is challenging. So, and it certainly seems like you've demonstrated there really great results. Is there any um challenges? Is this kind of like a three like a a multi-year kind of look to see like it fully kind of transpire the way you want it? I mean, do you >> I mean, in an ideal world, I'm worked out of a job, right? This program is building from first, second, third grade, and then there isn't a need for it in the middle school. But realistically, as Steph mentioned, we have students that are coming from all over all of the time. And my students that I work with, not one of them began at >> Nesbbit. >> So when I mentioned that they're we're we're um impacted by learning loss, that's

059not just from this is international. We have students that are coming from all over. we don't necessarily know what their learning experience was um in their home country >> and they're coming from all over you know up and down the state of California across the country I mean we have um lot of languages and um so I even though I think in an ideal world I'm worked out of a position I if we continue to be a school district that supports our um community so Well, and they're coming from all over and I think they seek us out for that reason. We have a reputation for being so supportive, then I think my, you know, the need for for middle school support remains. Um, kids develop at different ages. They're coming um from all over

060the map with um their needs. And so I think one of the really amazing things that we did is create this system where there isn't a grade that isn't supported. Um and tier 2 isn't just kindergarten first second. I mean it's it's all the ages. It's even in high school. So yeah, >> I think it's um it's unique. You don't see this everywhere. And I credit it to our administrative staff that is our leaders that are are able to get creative with all of you and make this happen for us for our students. >> Well, it's impressive that stat of the the getting to the at level at grade level at age level the plus 6% already. >> Yeah. I mean the it's there it's it's you know they're with we need them to move

061at a faster clip than their peers because they have a huge gap. >> Yeah. and we can't do it without having these the the screeners that we have in place, the um pilot that we're working on. So, the gap is able to close because we're provided with the training and the resources that we need. >> Um, thank you very much. I I want can can I think it's slide 12. I maybe the next one. Oh, then the next one. Oh, yeah. the one. Yeah, that the the the chain the that that one. So, you've made it look easy with two now two grades, seventh and fourth grade of solutionary and I know and I know but it's really I feel like quite challenging to go from that part of literary literacy to solutionary. Um, I

062know privately working with with students one-on-one that they don't just because you know vocabulary for a test, it's not truly assimilated until they feel confident to put it into their papers, to even put it into their dialogue. So, the fact that it seems like they're embracing it. Um, is that is that the hardest kind of um transition point the literacy to solutionary or is it the other? Can you kind of talk about like how that those transitions are working out? >> The hardest transition is not literacy to solutionary. The hardest transition is getting to the IB >> because we are trying to create a throughline strategy that represents a pipeline. When I'm meeting kindergarten families, it's the hope that I have kindergarten families that are entering at age five and I have them until they

063graduate at age 14. And that's the been the hardest part. We've created all of these pieces in isolation and it was just these past two years that they've strung all together and now there is a purpose. Our K2 is now understanding more deeply what an IB program means because every single grade level is required to design a solutionary project. So you have a brochure that highlights a seventh grade project. Every single project at Nesbbit has one of those brochures. So they document and make their teaching public. Just like we require our students to showcase publicly and that is putting into practice oral speaking. It is putting into practice presentation and showcasing skills. Anderson is an amazing speaker, but so are all 35 of those seventh graders that needed to give up get up and give

064a presentation just like Anderson has done. and the fourth grade performers, our first graders, our kindergarteners, our third graders are all doing those types of presentations. And it's also inspiring our teachers. Our seventh grade team, including Jay, won an award from the Sanonteo County Office of Ed for the design of that solutionary project. Casta Wood, our IB coordinator, just had students that qualified for the STEM the STEM county fair. Correct. what is that what it's called it the interview phase um so like it's inspiring our teachers too and it inspired my own journey my research for my dissertation had to do with teacher efficacy in an international bal laorate middle years program and I chronicled that throughine strategy yeah >> thank you um and I love the work that you're doing and I know it's

065a it's a multi-year kind of year effort and you're building off of the successes and the energy of the previous year can I ask you a question. >> Okay. >> So, I want to know what was your favorite part of the solutionary, but also what was the most challenging? Can what was your favorite part of the doing that project? My favorite part was probably doing the math of like calculating how many bottle caps we would need and how many we would get. >> And what was the challenging one? >> Right. >> Yeah. telling eighth grade that they didn't collect enough bottles >> and that they had to paint them like this. Okay, now you've learned a lot of vocabulary. So, here's my other my last question to you is what is your it doesn't have

066to be on this project because but what is your do you have a favorite vocabulary word? >> No. Okay. >> Not not like >> no. Okay, fair enough. Oh yeah. Well, you did an amazing job. Uh my favorite word is plethora. I always love that word. Um anyway, thank you for for coming up here and and sharing what you've done and what your fellow peers have done. You did a great job. So, we want to thank you. >> Um any other Yeah. Sorry, you have all these reading specials here. Uh, Fastbridge. Do we like it? Fastbridge the screeners or any of the screeners. Do you like them? >> Okay. >> We love the MClass Amplify screener for our K2 students. We're getting great information. It's um easy to use. It's easy to progress monitor kids.

067It's pretty se It gives great information. It is user friendly. It's all of the thumbs up. >> Thank you. >> Let's grow it. >> Let's get it for 38. We want it. We're like I haven't even looked at f I'm going to be honest because I'm only focusing on the lower grades. I look at fast version. I'm like ah. So, >> okay. >> MCL class is really amazing. >> Yeah. >> Thank you. >> Yes. Good question. Um, so yeah, so thank you very much, um, Nesbet, everybody from NESB, we love you and thank you for coming in. Thank you for presenting. >> Yes, Charlotte, good job. Good job. Fourth graders out there, if you're still out there. Okay, switching to agenda number 12. Far more interesting. No, not really. But >> we've got Tim. >>

068But but we've got somebody to make it interesting. And that is our own CBO Matsumoto to talk about the Citizens Bond Oversight Committee annual report. Take it away. >> Good evening, trustees. Uh definitely a tough act to follow. Um however we are very fortunate to be joined by Tim Hoffman who is our chair of our bond oversight committee. Um for some background uh the bond oversight committee uh is mandatory when we have um public debt or in this case we have um our measure P bond measure. Um the task of the bond oversight committee is to review the expenditures um for any of our bond projects and make sure that it is following um the letter of uh basically the language that it was passed by. Um before I hand it over to Tim here

069I I just wanted to you know express my gratitude for all the work that you know every single member especially Tim has has done on the bond oversight committee. Um these are people who come to our district office after their long days at work um and are gracious enough to you know review all these things to make sure that we are following the letter of the law that make sure we're following the letter of uh the language of the bond itself. So um thank you very much Tim. Uh I'd also like to shout out the other members of the committee uh Ryan Lewis uh Serena Sans Gabber Matt Devski uh Adele Dela Santina. So if anyone else is watching, please you have just my utmost gratitude for all the work that you guys do for

070our district. So thank you. >> Well, thank you very much Tim Hoffman uh Cypriyani parent rston parent X uh 2009 to 2022 uh and uh President CS uh trustees superintendent Dan uh Dgera. Um, thanks again for your opportunity this year to present the annual report of the measures IMPP, Citizens Oversight Committee. And in short, um, this past year, the committee reviewed with, uh, Ree uh, district materials and reports related to planned and ongoing bond expenditures during calendar 2025. And based on that review, I'm happy to report that the committee deter determined that the Belmont Redwood Shores School District is in compliance with requirements spelled out in the relevant sections of the California Constitution and bond revenues were spent only on the purposes that were uh described in the plain language of measures I and P.

071And the findings in detail uh are in the written report that I've provided uh Ree this evening. And um just a few points of context in the past year. So uh 2025 was the first year that u the combined measures I and P committee uh was formed. As you may know, uh we were on the Measure I bond oversight committee and then 2024 voters graciously approved measure P. And so we merged the two. And so the members that Reese just me mentioned and myself are now part of that combined committee. And we're u uh we're the transition was uh very smooth and uh everything is going forward uh well as um with measure P and measure I. uh uh as measure P especially uh begins it spend it at uh spending in earnest on the

072measure I side the final issue issuance of about 9.8 8 million dollar worth of those bonds have been put to work. Uh projects completed um are underway include uh the transitional kindergarten restrooms and sinkhole repair, important sinkhole repair at rston uh technology upgrades and district office modernization efforts. So, measure I is approaching the finish line. And on the measure P side, the district has begun initial uh expenditures focused on the roofs, roofing uh replacements at several school sites with planning underway for HVAC uh you know, field upgrades and other facilities needs in the uh upcoming years. Uh just like uh Reese just mentioned, the committee met um uh a few times in the in the past year in February, May, and November and received uh additionally a written update from staff in August. And at

073each meeting, uh CBO Matsumoto uh provided detailed expenditure and reports on both measures. And I just want to thank Ree um uh and the district staff uh for the excellent quality and transparency uh of the information that was provided to the committee because it's that's what enables the committee to uh do its job effectively on on behalf of our uh residents and voters. And finally, I'd like to recognize uh Mary Morrisy Pardon uh whose term on the committee ended in last May and that was after 10 years of being on the measure I committee and if any you know Mary that's just Mary. So uh thank her uh if you see her next thank her profusely for all of her time and service on that committee. And I want to thank the full committee as

074Ree just mentioned uh vice chair uh Adele Delis Santina and Matt Debsky, Ryan Lewis and Serena Sansgabber uh for their time, diligence and commitment to the accountability that Prop 39 uh requires and to the transparency transparency that uh our voters require. So with that, I'm happy to take any questions that you may have. Just one quick question for you and thank you and to everyone on the on the um committee for all the hard work that you put into this. We really appreciate it. Um do you feel like you have everything that you need as far as like you know to to be able to do this in a timely manner? Is there anything that you need from from us or from the district that could help in your >> I don't think there's anything

075that we're wanting. No, and you know, Reese and and everybody that supports him and Dan have just been uh really great in getting us all the information that we you request. From time to time, you know, during meetings, we'll we'll ask for additional information and that just shows up very quickly. So, it's it's been wonderful to work with him and no, I don't think there's anything else. >> Okay, great. Thank you so much. Thank you very much. No questions. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Uh thank you for your personal service to the district that continued even as your children are are out of the district. And um also thank you to the committee and as you said Mary Morrisy pardon may Mary Mary Moresy pardon for 10 years on on the district committee. That

076has to be a record. Uh, so definitely appreciate that and everybody on your committee. >> Thank you. >> Absolutely. Thank you very much. >> Ditto. >> Do I have eyes? >> Yeah. >> And thanks for the shout out for school force as you know and Trustee Northrup and many of you know it's near and dear to me school force. So, it's it's good to see that uh that they're still, you know, a huge force in in helping every every student in this district uh get a awesome education. So, thanks again. >> Thank you. I move that we thank Tim. >> Great. Thank you, Tim. >> All right. Thank you very much. >> Thank you. >> This was a Thank you. uh information item >> item agenda number 13 the approval of I hope I'm pronouncing

077this right Siobhan Siobhan and Associates as district auditor am I saying that correctly >> that is correct okay >> and this is going to be an action item >> that is correct >> would you like to give a brief >> that is correct >> over that is correct >> yes I would like to um thank you very much Tim um good evening again trustees and also you know while I still have the mic thank you very much to Mary Morrisy partner for all her service um as we move on to um you know thinking about our audit report for the 2526 school year um it is suggested by uh the county office of education that a school district switch their auditors roughly every 5 years uh just to make sure that you're getting a fresh

078perspective on your books. Um, with that in mind, uh, we went out for RFP about 2 months ago, um, for audit services for this school year. Um, we had a number of vendors, um, ultimately submit a response to that RFP, uh, and then went through the process of grading those RFPs and then also going through an interview process. Um as a result of that, our staff believes that we should move forward with Siobhan and Associates um who services actually a number of other districts um within Sonteo County um as our auditor for the uh 25 26 26 27 27 28 school year. Um the reason is three years is that is uh what is the norm for your auditors. You basically do what is known as a 3+ 1 plus 1. So your first contracts

079for three years and then you reup them for the next two years and that's how you get to five. >> Great. Thank you. Does anybody have any questions for >> I mean was there anything that like stood out about them that made you choose this one over others? >> So ultimately I think there are really two main things that come to mind. One of them is price of course. Uh and the second being do we feel confident that auditor or that the auditor in question can get us our audit by December 15th which is the due date right and obviously some things come up at some points in time which the auditor cannot foresee such as you know someone on their team has to leave for an extended amount of time and we can always

080apply with the county for an extension but generally do we feel confident in their ability to get that done um and ultimately yes we we feel that Shyana Associates that's hits both kind of the price aspect and we do feel confident that they can um they can hit the mark. You know when it comes to auditors you know a lot of the times it also you know is up to the district to make sure that it's a partnership to make sure we are getting them data in a timely fashion. Um so ultimately I think if we do that we'll be on time. >> Great. Thank you. >> Okay. Um, so since this is an action item, would somebody like to make a recommendation? >> I move that we approve Siobhan and Associates as the district

081auditor. >> Second. >> Great. Um, all those in favor? >> I. Any opposed? No. So, the motion passes five to zero. >> Okay. On to item number agenda item number 14, approval of the memorandum and understanding between BRSSD and the California School Employees Association chapter 308. Uh talking about the classified nutrition clerk hours increase. Uh and with that to talk about this is an action item. Um Director East, >> good evening. Uh before you is theou that was created between the district and CSEA as a result of the change in vendor for food service this year and the functions that the systems that had to change as a result um which resulted in increased hours increased need in hours for the nutrition clerks. you see the chart below the increase in hours per site. Um,

082so if there's any questions, I was just wondering, um, Nesbbit's listed twice with a 3 to 3.5 and a 3.5 to four. >> They have two part-time positions. >> Yeah. >> Thank you. So, I guess that answers my my my the next question, which would be why they're around 3.5 and four and the other elementary schools are are are higher at sixish. Six. And that's because there's two of them. Oh, >> I'm happy to answer that one. Um, yes. Uh, it's because they have two nut clerks. Um ultimately we are trying to make a change that um is fair to all the employees involved. Um and even though Nesbet has two nut clerks um ultimately Nesbet also has the highest volume right now um and besides Rosson but Rosson has a little bit different way

083of serving um breakfast and lunch. >> Okay, great. Thank you for that clarification. By the way, I love the abbreviation a nut clerk. Like like they're foraging and like saving for the winter. >> Unintentional but brilliant, right? >> Yeah. It's very very interesting. Um okay. Do I have a motion? Um since this is an action item, >> I move to approve theou between BRSSD and CSEA um to increase the nutrition clerk hours. >> Is there a second? >> Second. All in favor? >> I >> Okay. Um, none are opposed. So, it passes. Um, five to zero. >> Thank you very much. Are you up there for another Oh, that stay right up. Like, she's just hanging out there. Okay. Item number 15 um is a resolution 2025/26-8 the reduction of classified services uh March 15th

084notices director. >> So in front of you is a resolution to reduce a particular kind of service. It's a 05 PAR position that was created a few years ago with a specific need at a site for additional PAR support. Um, since then numbers and clientele have changed and that position is no longer being used for special ed specifically. So um we are reducing that position 15 at rston. >> Any questions? Okay. Um again that is an action item. Would someone like to make a motion? >> I move to approve resol resolution 2025- uh26-8 reduction of classified services March 15 notice. Anybody second it? >> Second. >> Okay. All those in favor? >> I. >> Any opposed? No. That motion passes 5-0. >> Thank you. Okay. The next uh is from assistant superintendent who to talk

085about the math adoption update. >> Good evening. This is going to be quick and easy. I just want to give you a preview of what's going on just to keep you up to date as we move through. As we spoke about earlier, we are in the midst of an adoption pilot. So, all of our schools have participants. Not every single student is participating in the pilot, but we have representatives from every school and every grade level. So, there's a good number of students and teachers who are utilizing the new materials. We are kind of in this first gray bar in terms of the local adoption committee convening. They have colds down from the 60 plus materials down to two publishers per grade span. They have just wrapped up the pilot of the first publication either

086last week or at the end of this week kind of depending because of parent teacher conferences and the difference differences in calendaring between the middle school and elementary schools. Everyone is switching over to their second publisher and we will finish that up with five weeks of instruction. So we will finish after spring break and we will convene the team at that point to collect all of their feedback. We have been collecting feedback all along. So with each week Narina who is our STEM coach deserves a huge public shout out. Narina Carpenter has taken the lead on preparing materials, contacting the publishers, scheduling everything. I have had the easiest go about in adoption committees of all of the curriculum that I've led adoptions through in my nine years here. Along with setting everything up, Narina has

087been both following up with the teachers on a weekly basis. She and I designed a form based off of their evaluation rubric to capture feedback on a weekly basis and then summarizing at the very end. As you can imagine, week one can be a little bit tricky because we're still starting. We're still still learning all the bells and whistles and it could be frustrating and if we only took a dipstick measure once at the beginning and once at the end, we may not necessarily capture everything. So, we've done that a little bit differently this year. Um, they have given feedback. We will get the culminating feedback of program one before they switch over to program two. Like I said, the dates are a little bit different. So, as we're wrapping up Innovat, and Carnegie in

088the K5 and 68 respective grade levels, everybody is switching over to Illustrative Math by Imagine Learning. On Monday of this week, our middle school teachers were trained and have already launched in with their materials. On March 19th, the rest of our teachers are going to have a day of training after their parent teacher conferences are over. There is a little bit of scheduling conflict, so a couple middle school teachers will be joining on the 19th as well. works out well that we have two days. The publishers are totally able to adjust for that. They are going to launch into the new program and we will continue surveying teachers on a weekly basis in the same pattern. So week one that's going to kind of mimic the very beginning for all of our teachers when we

089do have new curriculum. We need to know what the holdups are, what the difficulties are, so we can plan around and preemptively, proactively support teachers come fall when the whole district is going to have something new. Um, the other piece that's happening throughout, all of our publishers have sent coaches for whether they come and do demo lessons or they come and pre-plan with you and then do a demo lesson and the debrief. Each of the three publishers that we hosted last night at our parent webinar have been on campus watching, giving feedback, providing support, taking the feedback back to their publishers. Um, lots of little glitches around technology. Jerome and his team also have been stellar at working through with our various providers. It's not an easy task to not only run the district, but

090to problem solve on the fly when something's not loading in a Nova and they're a program based in Spain. So negotiating time difference with their tech team is a little bit of a challenge. Um, everyone's been incredibly helpful. We did host a parent webinar last night. We had Anovamat, we had Carnegie Learning, and we had Imagine Imagine Learning's um, illustrative program showcased for families that was uploaded to the cloud. What I will do is take that once it's posted to YouTube and send that out to families tomorrow via parent square so that anybody who wasn't able to attend can still watch the recordings along with that final slide in that presentation which will also go out via parent square is our timeline for our materials road show. For those of you who have been around

091a while you'll remember that anytime we have curriculum I send materials to the school sites. people can go to their home school to look or they can go to whatever school makes sense in their schedule. So ultimately every single school is going to get to see all of the materials that are pertinent to their grade level. They're not going to see every single grade material, right? So Central is going to have materials in their library the week of March 16th through the 19th. They're going to have grades K2 and four. Um, and they're going to be able to see a Nova and imagine learning illustrative math 360. You can see them side by side. Parents will have a QR code and a piece of paper depending on whatever they're comfortable with to be able to

092give feedback right then and there at the library or they can take it back and give feedback later on. We are also giving all the families access to online instructional materials. It is 2026. So most of most of what is in paper is also online in the exact same visual representation. So we shouldn't be limited by those who have the freedom to come to school during the school day. Yes, everybody who comes to school will still need to sign at the front office, go to the library, check out the materials, make sure they sign out and whatnot. This is a little bit of a hassle, but there are people who like to touch and see and so we want to make that available. I would encourage everybody to log in online because you can see

093any of the materials. Parents can look at K5 materials. They can look at 68 materials. They can look at algebra materials. It's not limited to I have a third grade. I should only look at third grade materials. That's going to be part of the feedback process. We will take the parent feedback in conjunction with the student feedback in conjunction with the teacher feedback. The teachers are the experts. They've gone through all of the training on the framework. They are the pedagogical experts. Their their selection will their voice will probably be the loudest in the selection um as it should be. they are our content experts, but we do value everybody's input and if there's something that stands out from either the students or the parents, we'll work through that as a staff. We are hoping

094to come to you either the very last week of in our at our May meeting or our June meeting depending on how quickly we can come to consensus, but we are coming planning to come to you before the end of the school year for sure with a recommendation for adoption so that we can purchase and launch in August. I had a question and it's just it's really simple. It's just clarifying. You said that there were three publishers that you guys met with. Is that the current publisher plus Nova Mat and >> K5 chose two publishers. They narrowed down from the 65 out there down to 12. That might make sense. We looked at those at the publishers fair went through with one rubric at that point to narrow it down again. And there were two

095clear leaders. So K5 wanted to try Innovat in person and imagine learning in person. >> 68 did the same process. So they came up with Clear Math from Carnegie and Imagine Learning Illustrative Math. So it just so happens that we have one publisher that is going to meet that could potentially meet the needs of K8 through algebra. Um it is a plus. It's it wasn't a must-have for our district. There are certain districts in our county that are saying they're only going to consider programs that can cover from kinder all the way through algebra 1. We're going to let our teachers decide what's most important. We obviously have been aligning to our profile of a learner. So, we'll go for that. 6A also across the board at all three of our middle school programs have

096had an unofficial pilot of Amplified Desmos for the past two school years. We were able to get a discounted rate from them. We just weren't sure if they were right. We didn't know for sure that they'd be on the pilot list until November, but we have been using their materials. So, effectively, our 68 teachers are comparing Clear Math, illustrative math, and Desmos to decide what's going to be the best fit. >> And then those programs would be consistent to across all of our district. All of our middle schools would use the same program. All of our elementary would be using the same program. >> Um, great. And and if we decide that we do not like clear math and we do not like imagine learning, we would default to Desmos. >> We'll see what the

097committee thinks and and where that goes. I mean, there are a lot of options. I think trust uh I think CBO Matsumoto would not be very happy with me if our committee didn't come up with an answer. We do have some funds that we are trying to use before June 30th to maximize our cash flow. Um, however, we are based in what's best instructionally for students. I do not think we're going to come to June with no option. There is definitely a possibility that the teachers say, "None of these programs are good. Let's go back to the drawing board." >> I I having been in on the conversations and hearing them through their trainings and looking at their feedback forms and looking at the quality of the programs that we have, I don't anticipate that

098being, but it is not my singular decision. So, right, >> it's definitely a possibility even if not a probability. Okay, >> Thank you. Thank you for sharing all of this with us. Um, I was just wondering about our youngest students. Is there a curriculum for math for TK students? >> We are going to be working with our TK team to continue working on their aligned curriculum. TK primarily is meant to be playbased and developing the pre-academic skills. So our team has all year long since we started grade level retreats last year and through this year been looking at the preschool prek learning foundations to figure out how to best support the students. Each of the programs has a TK component um that ultimately we once once the K8 team decides what they're going to do,

099we will share with the TK team to see if this is appropriate. Does that actually align with the California PreK Learning Foundations, they do have a TK math is really about counting and number fluency and playing with manipulatives and building building with blocks. So, it's not something that necessarily requires a textbook. So they do have what they need in support and we will look to see whatever adopted curriculum is if it makes sense to also purchase for our TK. It's not part of the state requirement. I mean I think largely because preK is meant to be pre-academic skills. >> I just have one uh question. So thank you well and a comment. Well, thank you very much for allowing the community members so much opportunity to for in input. I think I mean maybe it's

100been this robust in the past, but I I think it's really really well. I think it's I hope we get a lot of people who kind of review it. I think it'll just make our program stronger. But with the parent information session, and I'm glad it's coming out with a recording because I had a a commitment that I couldn't make this, but did you get any sense from the chat feature? I don't know if that was operable, but any parent feedback or what were their questions if they had any was it just purely informational or was there a an opportunity >> happening? It was it wasn't a I wouldn't say it was a robust chat. We probably only had about 12 to 15 questions over the course of the evening. There were some questions about

101timeline. There were some questions about is every grade level getting new materials. There were some questions about extending and challenging students um and differentiation. Um >> other than that they they there were they were really more logistical questions than they were programmatic prioritizing questions for us. >> Got it. >> Yeah. >> Okay. Great. Thank you. >> It'll be interesting to see what people's feedback is. >> Yeah. Well, looking forward to the uh to the results of the pilot and what people are recommending. Thank you. >> Any other Thanks. That's it for me tonight. >> Yep. Item number 17 is the second interim budget and we have back with us CBO Matsumoto and this is an action item. >> Good evening trustees. Um I would actually like to bring up uh Katherine Ree who is our

102business services specialist uh to assist and actually present most of our our second interim presentation today. Uh just as an initial um you know point here of context. So uh Katherine is our jack of all trades in the business services department. She does a lot of a lot and uh most notably she uh basically manages most of our nutrition program. So you know as we've had a lot of good feedback on that this year. Katherine is a really big driver of why that is. Uh Katherine actually has aspirations of being a CBO one day. Um, and you know, as our current CVO, I I believe it's my obligation to make sure that our staff has every opportunity to uh basically flex their skill set. Um, and so we're we really lucky to have Katherine here

103in the district and also very lucky to have her here today presenting the second interim. With that, take it away, Katherine. You >> Reese um and thank you board members um for passing theou for the nutrition clerks. I will also add because I know that they work very hard um and with the changes that has been a really valuable asset. So um I am Katherine Ree. Um I work with Ree which makes it a little confusing sometimes. Um but as business services specialist, it's been um a great opportunity to work closely with both our CBO and with our site administrators, our principles, our nutrition clerk staff, our uh facilities director and the maintenance team and being able to see where uh decisions about how uh day-to-day purchasing the rubber hits the road with um the

104master budget that the board passes and that the um district leadership sets forth at the top of every fiscal year. So I wanted to share um second interim with that lens. Next slide please. Okay, let me see. Oh, thank you. Thank you, Chai. Okay. So, I think first I'll just do a brief overview of the key takeaways. And I think it's really helpful for us to recognize that second interim is um one of two statemandated reporting periods, but we really use it as a strategic opportunity to reflect back on year-to-ate spending so far. So, for second interim specifically, we're looking at spending from July 1st, 2025 through the end of January 2026. And right now our uh CBO uh superintendent Duara and our uh budget owners and leaders are working on the master budget for

105next year which will be um uh put forth in April. And so this is an opportunity for us to reflect on how we're seeing district spending so far this year um and incorporate those learnings and trends into the master budget for next year and an opportunity to just continue to hone our instincts on what is worth investing in and what's working well and what we might need to adjust on. At a high level, a few key takeaways are that um at that point up to January 2026, we've spent about 52% of our master budget. This is very on trend with historical data about how much we've spent um up to this point in the school year. Um and I'll talk a little bit more about that in a minute. But one other thing is that

106uh not much has changed since first interim reporting period, but um we are still projected to have a roughly $6.2 2 million deficit and this is part of the strategic spending plan um where the district has built up um reserves coming out of the co 19 pandemic. They we prioritize um making sure that we're spending down funds in the order of expiration dates so that we're able to uh have a longer runway um and a softer landing in terms of um being able to close and move out of deficit spending over the next several years. Um I think it's important to also recognize that we are commun communityf funded district um also known as basic aid and so since the 2022 23 school year where we had for a period flipping and flopping back between

107LCFF or locally control funding formula um funding mechanism and community funded were now expected to be solidly community funded for the next um for the foreseeable future. So looking a little closer at this 52% of the budget that we've spent so far, I think it's really helpful uh to keep in mind that spending money on students and educational outcomes is a good thing. And so one of the things that CBO Matsumoto has brought with to us in the district is a new master budget tool which um has been great to hear feedback from principles that it's increased their transparency in their budget so that they're able to see year-to-ate spending um more consistently throughout the school year so that they can get a longer runway on making strategic decisions about how they spend their site

108allocations throughout the school year. So, I think part of that is that we've increased the transparency and so folks are able to make decisions um sooner about how they plan to invest in field trips or um staff professional development opportunities or other things that would ultimately um support their students um and their student enrichment. Uh, and if I can add here, um, you know, you may look at this slide and be, uh, basically say, okay, well, if we're ahead of the trend line, like what makes you so confident that we're going to get back on the trend line? Um, to give a little bit more context here, you know, the the reason why we're slightly above the dotted line is mostly because of the non-personal side, not the personnel side, right? So, on the non-personnel

109side, it's easy for us to track. And as Katherine alluded to, a lot of that is coming because of the master budget, right? because people have more insight into all the codes that they have and how much money they have left and you know where they at at any given point of the year, they've been better about spending their money more upfront, right? Um and also because we have the master budget tool, it's easy or for us to track that as well on the back end, right? So as people start to get towards their their budgeted totals for this year, you know, it's easy for us to, you know, give them warnings. Hey, you've got 20,000 left, you've got 10,000 left, you've got 5,000 left. You are done, right? Um, so that gives us confidence

110that, you know, even though the line is very slightly above where we typically are at this point of the year, that we will be okay. And in conjunction with that also since we moved to a new um electronic record system, the ERP system that we've transitioned to over the last two years, that's another way in which all folks who have a hand stake in um how we do day-to-day spending, whether it's putting in requisitions, which is like an appro permission to approve. Um all of that is lading up to again that transparency and being able to be more monitoring of spending. So the key takeaways I want to stress from just second interim itself um on the revenue side we've largely seen um the trend being similar with first interim with slight increased um higher

111thanex expected state and local revenue and some of the drivers of that include um one uh school force and uh PTA uh which again we're really grateful for school force's commitment to the district And so um as a pass through we sometimes end up receiving revenues and um distributing funds or making purchases um that will eventually be reimbursed through school force um as well as collecting revenue for other things such as sports donations. Um so similarly on the expenditure side we've seen relatively consistent with the first interim again first interim was looking backwards from the end of October through July 1st um of 2025 and so we've seen a slight increase in expenditures but um has actually been offset by the slight increase in revenues that we've also seen. So the main driver here is

112around books and instructional materials. And again, um it's good for us to be investing in these things that are ultimately supporting our students. And we do our best to be able to foresee that at the outset of the school year, but things come up and so sometimes things shift in the budget. So similarly you might see that um some of the allocation has just shifted from um salaries and benefits to uh um contractor services and some of that is around um especially with the shortage of certain sped positions um in the district and just statewide. Um, we recognize that at the start of every fiscal year, we really intend to budget for having these staffs on our books because we want to have students and the community to have that consistency of of these staff.

113But, um, sometimes we have positions that we're not able to fill immediately. And so, we've seen that um, in able to in order to close that gap, we've um, relied on some contracting services there. >> Yeah. Did you >> uh if I sorry can you flip back one slide please? Thank you. Uh to pro provide just a little bit of more context on top of that. Right. So um you know as as Katherine mentioned um we receive money as reimbursements for you know sports leagues etc. Things that we pay for upfront and that we're reimbured for. So basically if you think about the increased revenues on the pass side on the local side that's really the donations. If you think about kind of the books and supplies, like that's kind of where a lot of

114that ends up being captured. So those kind of offset each other, right? Now, if you think about the salaries and the services and other operating expenses, those basically negate each other. And as Katherine was alluding to, right? Again, when we think about a lot of our sped staffing, right, we budget for it as people, right? And the reason for that is we want to make sure that we're properly accounting for all the people and that we're running, you know, appropriately sized programs and everything, right? But unfortunately, it's very difficult to hire pet staff, right? Um I believe uh director Eastburn uh talked about this earlier in the year. I think there's almost a statewide crisis, statewide emergency calling for additional national Thank you very much. National emergency calling for additional sped staff, right? So unfortunately

115throughout the year if we're not able to hire for a position we have to bring in a contractor instead right however I think it's important for us not to lose track of that right and not just put all the money into the the contracts line from the beginning because then we lose sight of okay what is our intention right like what are we trying to do with these positions right if we just put everything in the a mishmash of all the the you know the contracts and services it's easy to lose sight of that right and also by starting the year with the budget in terms of people, right? It gives us the onus to continue trying to fill those positions, right? And doesn't allow us to get lazy of, okay, well, it's difficult to

116find this position, so we're just going to go with a contractor anyways, right? We want to bring these positions inhouse because that is more costefficient for the district and also provides more continuity for our kids. >> Thank you. Um, and so I'll briefly touch on our multi-year spending and saving plan. Um and then I will hand it over to uh Ree to to wrap us up. So I think um as we've mentioned before, the district has built up these reserves over time. Um there was a lot of one-time funding available um coming out of the CO 19 pandemic. And so the fact that we've been able to prioritize spending down those grants as they're about to expire, but being able to draw on reserves, um we've been able to have a softer landing with um

117moving into deficit spending years, but ultimately knowing that um we're working on making iterative changes year-over-year so that we eventually come out of deficit spending. And I think a key component of that is really around the fact that we're communityf funded. So being basic aid means that uh we make uh we receive more in funding from local property taxes than we do um based on the state uh local control funding formula. So to that extent um even though our district has seen declining enrollment um due to things like declining birth rates um which is happening across the state again um we are not as impacted and we're able to keep per pupil spending relatively high because the overall pool of money that we're receiving um is staying relatively consistent even though we're seeing declining enrollment.

118And so, uh, the challenge at hand is just us being able to make these decision, uh, being able to be fiscally solvent and good fiscal stewards. Um, and some from there, I will just hand it back to Ree. >> Great. Thank you. Um, again, you know, given the direction that we have now from the board as of um, was it a month ago now? Um, I thought it'd be prudent just to, you know, talk about this a little bit more. And then we also have one other slide about this. Sorry, can you go back one more slide? Thank you. Um, again, right, as we think about closing the deficit, right, what does that mean? We are basic a funded, which means that our our growth in the largest part of our revenues is largely coming

119from property taxes, right? And that's stable, mostly stable. Um, in comparison to the state funded LCFF, local contract fund, local control funding formula, which really can go up and down. For example, a few years ago, they thought about giving out a 0% cola for that. Not great. Luckily, we are a little bit immune to that, which helps us in the long term and really helps us when we think about closing the deficit. However, even though our expenses, our our revenues are are slated to consistently kind of increase over time. Uh, in order to close the deficit, we need to keep our expenditures roughly the same, right? However, there are upward forces on our expenditures such as people moving up steps every year and colas that we give our employees, right? Because they are high achievers.

120Um and so for us, you know, as we think about closing the deficit, the way that we get there is really through by running an efficient program, an efficient um you know, efficient staffing across our district and also making um very thoughtout uh small cuts a little bit at a time, right? Like the whole purpose of this plan that we have is to not make sure that we oh we just have we store up all this for the end and then you know try and erase the deficit all at once. We have to make small cuts every year right in order to get to where we need to go. Um and if you have questions about that we can talk more about that after. Uh next slide please. Um, and also I wanted to take

121some time here today to talk a little bit about how we model all of this out and some of the assumptions that we're taking because I think it's important for not only the board but also our community to um, understand why we feel like we have a path towards this, right? Um, ultimately on the revenue side, right? Most of our revenues are coming from our property taxes, right? Um while we have other sources of revenue such as state funds which largely go towards sped expenditures um and federal funds which largely go towards some sped and title funds a large part of it is coming from our property tax revenue right u and I also want to uh just shout out even though it's not here on the slide school force as well right um school

122force all of our school force board members and all of our volunteers go through backbreaking work every single year to make sure that we have additional funding for our district. And I know Jackie, you smirk at that. Oh, >> that's >> Oh, it is on. >> Oh, >> well, I'm glad I'm more detail- oriented than I thought. Um, but you know, truly, I just want to give School Force a quick shout out for all the work that they do as well. Um but you know getting back to the point on our property taxes historically right our our property tax growth rate has been anywhere between five and 5 a.5% per year. Um and I may get the question here so I'll preemptive it um what happened during the 2008 2009 2010 housing crisis. Um our

123property taxes were much lower. I think they're in like the 1 to 3%. But overall, right, as we think about um what our property taxes are largely on average, they've been somewhere between 5 and 5 1/2. Um and what does that mean for us as we kind of budget our revenues going forward? We try to do so conservatively, right? Instead of, you know, budgeting at that five and 5 1/2%, we try to take a more conservative approach uh and budget closer in kind of like the four and 4 1/2%, right? um that essentially makes sure that uh you know in case of any variance that we may see uh particularly with um some volatility potentially in our economy um that we are able to kind of weather all storms and the other part of that

124that is important is you know throughout this entire projection multi-year projection process I've come back to the point of 17% reserves right and that is the school services of California recommended reserve level you know as if we are able to stay above that line which currently we have a path to do so that helps us also further weather any storms that may come. um thinking about our expenditure side, right? So, you know, typically districts find it difficult to get a super accurate read on their expenditures, but you know, I think for us, we feel relatively confident because one, most of our expenditures are actually on people. And the way to budget that out is if you have someone who is on step 10 today, they are very likely to be on step 11 next year

125and potentially they will get a colup, right? And as we think about that, we are able to model out every single year, at least on the people side, right? On the personnel side, the way that we get there largely is by um allocating budgets on a per pupil basis. And the benefits of doing so are that in times where you have enrollment decline, you're able to keep your per pupil spending at the same level even though the overall budget may shrink a little bit, right? So in doing so, we're able to kind of make sure that our budget slowly right sizes with our declining enrollment. So um this is just a little bit about how you know we model all these scenarios out and you know as of right now you know we do have

126a path and you know given the board direction from a month ago obviously we will still have to you know we will there are trade-offs right given that we are choosing to move in the direction we are we'll make trade-offs in our budget but overall right now we have a path and you know if anything becomes murkier in the future we'll be sure to let you know. Um, and I believe there's actually one more slide after this that says next steps. Thank you. Um, so for next steps, we are working on the budget for next year. Um, we've met with um all of our principles. We're meeting with our central office staff basically to formulate the budget for next year. Um, and our hope is to bring that to the board in April, uh, for

127an initial run through of what we were thinking for the budget for 2627. And in doing so, it gives our leadership time to pre basically pre-order their materials for the next year. Um, given that we have purchasing deadlines that we have to comply with. Um, and then also we will bring that for formal passing in June. With that, I conclude my presentation and thank you very much, Katherine. any questions? >> Yeah, I have a couple of questions. Um, but just first, Katherine, thank you so much. Um, I thought you did a great job. Um, I think it's it's really nice to see um, you know, the the allyship of of CBO Matsoto, you know, really, um, give us the kind of like insight on um, you know, we don't get to see the talent that

128you bring all the time. So, I think it it's very nice that, you know, thank you, Ree, for for allowing Katherine to, you know, take the stage and I think you did a really great job. Um, and thank you for all the work that you do. Um, a couple of questions. Um, so, okay. So, when you're saying that, um, our budget, so because we're we're basic aid, so most of our funding comes from our property taxes, but it sounds like we still do get some like per student funding. Is that true? And can you just tell me like how much actually is dependent on the number of students? >> Um well now you have me doing mental math. Um I believe close to believe it's about uh 75 to 80% is basically of our property

129taxes and the other 20ish% uh is coming from a mix of federal, state, and local dollars. Are you looking for like exact numbers? >> No, not at all. I just want to clarify. So, the 20% is based on student numbers, student enrollment. >> That is correct. And you know, for a large part of the state and federal funding, it's based on specific student populations and not just our total students. >> Okay. Okay. Thank you very much. And then, um, you know, I don't want to put you on the spot, so if there's no examples, that's fine. But just curious, um, so when we're talking about like, okay, now we need to make tradeoffs, right? Can you give us some kind of like broad examples of tradeoffs that we might have to that we might face?

130I think some, you know, as of right now, you know, as we think about next year's budget, right? I think tangible examples are um, you know, potentially we take away some money that we're considering, you know, for example, bringing on another maintenance person to see if we can potentially make our schools nicer, for example, right? We have essentially nixed that right now in the interest of making sure that we run an efficient program, right? um in the future it's a little bit difficult to appine on what exactly might happen but um I think as superintendent Duoara and I you know mentioned during the course of you know the the board meetings you know if it the the the order of operations on some of these things becomes you know the supplemental additional things that we

131do at our sites will have to be evaluated right if it gets to that point um potentially that could be some of the some of the the counseling or maybe you We might have to see some of our our music teachers cover a little bit more of the district. >> That I think I asked Reese very similar question to this and so I think also when I was referring to per pup people spending I think one of the ways that we can consistently track per pupil spending is that um you know regardless of where the funding source is coming from that's how Reese thinks about it when he gives principles their site allocations for the year. So part of it is that just gradually over time principal's budget allocations are going down proportionate to the

132number of students they have enrolled at the site um rather than it just being an unlimited faucet. So that's just a way in which we're able to have a sensitive pulse on on some of the declining enrollment. Um, and one other thing I also wanted to maybe just add, I think, is around um, I recognize with the the decision about the middle school consolidation, I think part of it was just around like how quickly we close the budget def deficit. And so it just being another matter of again um, I understand that that decision wasn't solely driven by financial standing. It would have been a quicker way to close the deficit, but there are other ways that we can do it again more gradually aligned with per pupil spending and site allocations. >> Thank you.

133Um I don't know if I may just kind of elaborate on the middle school piece. Um, so like for example, right, um, we're we're going to keep all three programs open and then we're going to hope that naturally Nesbbit and Sam Piper have enrollment that is viable, right? Um, so I guess I'm just asking as as we have less just students in general, not not like people not wanting to go to the smaller programs, but just like less kids, right, in our district and say the smaller schools are full now, right? So then the declining enrollment would happen at Rston, right? So then at some point we would have to start thinking about like decreasing staffing at rston if all of the decline is is there. Does that make sense? >> So so I think

134when we are talking about budget the responsible thing to do is you um keep staff uh in proportion to the number of students that you have. What often happens is districts leave staff in place when their enrollment is shrinking. Um, and that adds pressure to the budget. Um, so as our enrollment changes, it's incumbent upon us to look at where those um, uh, reductions need to happen naturally. um if districts are on top of it, typically um you're able to account for that attrition via retirements uh via folks moving via uh transfer between schools um and and that's our approach. So, um the idea that and we've always maintained that any decision we made um wasn't impacting um uh what we would call a reduction in force. um we would simply realize that through natural

135attrition um and we would be able to maintain all of the employees that are currently employed. >> Okay, thank you. >> Um thank you all the things. Good job. It I actually I will say this. I'll restate the same thing. Um, it's great to see partnership, mentorship, leadership, like whatever's going on. But the the call out, I really do appreciate that as as someone who tries to do a good job of that myself. That was a a great example that I will copy between both of you. Um, even in the recent supports, you said something specifically that I just am not aware of. Uh, sports donations as as revenue or something like that. What is that? >> Yeah, I can answer that. Um, >> clearly talking. I'm joking. Go ahead. I'm sorry. I'll just seed

136myself out. >> I apologize. >> That was a good interview, Catherine. >> Um, no. So, they're basically some things, sports, uh, jerseys, for example, um, that some parents donate towards that the school buys and that parents, uh, basically cover. Some other things that for example um some of our PTAs if they're looking to buy something essentially they have to file a specific form if they purchase some something over a specific amount and if uh if they if basically their accountant is not willing to do that for that specific purchase the district can help. So basically they can pass it through us and then they reimburse us after for it. Gotcha. >> Yeah. So those are not really expenditures that we budget for because they end up being neutral. Gota. >> Yeah. >> Okay. Thank you.

137Um, and then I don't know if you can see the slide. You mentioned grants from after pandemic and you I want to make sure I'm speaking the same language. You use the word expire. Do they actually expire by time or you just mean that we'd run out of it? >> So the the grants expire with time. So let me just say for example, right? In 2020 2021, the federal government came with a number of different grants, right? There's SR1, SER 2, SER 3, which you would think they all have the same spending um regulations. They do not, hilariously. Um, and they basically all had a short spending timeline, right? So, there are kind of two ways to go about it, right? You could spend all that money all at once, right? And you create this

138mountain of spending and then you create this trunch of spending, right? when now you've used all of it and now you can't use it for anything. The way we have done it which was wise and I thank the previous CBO who was here um is that basically they try to um you know use as much of that grant money to I don't want to say displace but essentially you know on things that we're already spending on right and what that did is it helped to basically increase our reserves so that on the back end we could then increase the types of services that we offer our students right and instead of it just being like a a one-year thing we can offer for it over many years and run a deficit until our revenue catches

139up with our expenditures. Does that make sense? >> Yes, it does. And I'll I'll ask a more specific question just I see you approaching. >> I was just going to add another example in the meals department is around uh the kitchen infrastructure and training funds that we received. And the original expiration date was actually June 2025. And at like 4:50 p.m. on June 30th, 2025, we received an email that they were actually extending that horizon. And leading up to that expiration deadline, we had done a lot of surveying with our nutritional staff of like what do they really need? And with the actual demand of our previous meals provider, there wasn't anything that we really needed. But um rather than us spending money for the sake of spending money and then having expensive equipment to

140repair and like adding more, we had made the difficult decision of like you know um oftentimes sometimes the spending horizon will be extended but you you can't really risk it. We can't gamble these funds. And so being able to strategically now put that towards uh refrigerator maintenance once our demand for the meals program went up. We also had the ability to then actually purchase the additional refrigeration space that we needed. Um so just another example of those deadlines we're racing against, >> right? Um thank you. Uh I'm I'm trying to think about this in uh letter from my own understanding as I think about whether it's the next 10 months or 60. Um, and I said it earlier like in speaking kind of candidly like if I hear there's terms we're using like uh gamble

141and risk and weather storms and small cuts and closing gaps and expirations but also like in I I do trust that you're you're both doing a good job but as a lite in this conversation and with like decisions we made a month ago and I imagine And as you reorient where the small cuts might come from, you feel good about the next 3 to 5 years is what you've always been saying for the last three years of my time and now I'm asking about the next three. >> Yeah, I will say we have a plan, right? There's a way that we can get there. And you know, when we have presented the budget in the past, we weren't presenting it from a place where we had assumed that, you know, the school would close. We

142had done the budget in the assumption that all schools are open, right? So, you know, this is not so much that the plan has suddenly shifted after, you know, a month ago and decisions were made. This is kind of always been the plan. If another decision were made that had benefited us more financially, that would have eased it, right? But that doesn't make us any less confident that we can't quote unquote land the plane. >> Yep. Um, perfectly to my next question is both like if I had asked you four months ago and if I'm asking you now and you mentioned like there's when you say small cuts or strategic cuts, however you worded it, I like I like it. I don't I don't know if I can fathom some like easy examples of like

143impactful ones like what what would that look like as a fourth grade parent hypothetically, >> right, >> in a district? A a good example might be a combination class. In some cases where we want to we want to um not create a or have reason to maybe not create that combination class. >> Uh we might be in a budgetary situation where >> saving that $150,000 is a worthwhile thing to do. >> Y >> So those are some of the tradeoffs um that we start to look at um as we're we're examining it. >> Thank you. Yeah. I wanted to curious like tangibly what those look like. Thank you. Any any other examples? That was that was helpful. You don't have I don't mean to pressure. It was just good for me to see it. >>

144Yeah. >> Not off the top of my head right now. I mean I think >> look it the way to think about this right is the things that are painless go first >> for sure >> and then the thing like as you get further and further along it you slowly progress down things that become more and more painful. >> Right. The other thing I'll I'll say is it's important that we're talking about this now as we have the multiple years. Every dollar Reese would say every dollar we save today is actually three years $3 down the line, right? Um every every adjustment we make now saves threefold down the line. So >> yeah. And then uh my last question just I'm still I still have this visual like the the I think the last slide

145showed it like as we're closing the gap. What I keep seeing is this like downward trend that levels but I I I'm not picturing it when you you mention what might what cuts might come. It's not that like when that closes then we definitely are. That's just what supposed to look like. Stability >> or just >> like you're basically asking like what does the tail end of this green line mean? >> We're going to cross towards a downhill trend that keeps going. >> So basically if our revenues are like this our expenditures are above it, >> right? So they will cross at some point and that is where we find ourselves having quote unquote solved the deficit. Right? At that point then, you know, if our revenues keep increasing, we could potentially, you know, revisit

146our expenditures or, you know, have to add to our reserves depending on what it looks like at that given point in time. >> Does that help? >> Yes. >> Okay. >> Thank you. >> So, one question I had was on with the math adoption, does that affect that book line item significantly? like when we're in years of buying bulk instructional material, does that um does that is that just part of what's built in or is it a real kind of significant? >> So, we work with assistant superintendent who at the beginning of each year on a schedule of how we're planning some of these pilots. So, this is already budgeted for in this specific school year. Um ultimately right you know we work with assistant superintendent who to figure out you know what what should

147be the plan how should we approach it and given planned expenditures out for the future then we adjust other things around it in the budget. >> Do you have a sense of just or just in general from past adop uh instructional material adoptions like what is that? So I think it was 3.4 the line item now. So what what does that look like in a year where there's an adaption? >> I mean it it depends also on the specific I mean it depends what you're buying. If you're buying both materials, manipulatives, software, right? It could be on the higher end. You know as a general range it could be anywhere between 500k and 1.5 million depending on how you implement it, right? That also >> more above above the the 3.4. So like the 3.4

148is a stable. >> Oh no. So I mean I think stablewise we probably are a little bit closer to two or something like that. >> Okay. >> Right. But you know if we we're taking into account that there the pilot is going on and potentially we can purchase some of these materials in this year. >> Okay. >> Yeah. >> Got it. And and the the slide that you just showed I don't um with the summer school because you have to spend down the are I don't know. Yeah. Uh that one. Um the summer school, was that the ELOP program? >> No, this is the arts, music, and instructional materials grant that was passed a few years ago. >> Okay. >> Um ultimately it's a grant that expires at the end of this year, but we

149also have Prop $28, which is the >> oh the the name of the Prop 28 taking me. Um but you know, let me just put it to you this way, right? Like the general philosophy, right, when we think about our budget and the different grants, right, is we try to get our district to spend on things that we see as general priorities, right? And then what we do is we take the like the business office then overlays the grants based on our general um strategic priorities within our district, right? And what that does is instead of, oh, we have a grant for music this year and we have a grant for this another year, you know, and instead of trying to overlay our staffing and how we teach kids to fit the grants, >> we

150know what we want to do and what will make this district successful and then we overlay the costs that we're already doing to support those things with the grants that we already have. >> Great. Thank you. Okay. Um, any other questions at this time? No. This was a act. So, this is an action item. >> Yes. >> Um, does anybody um have a motion? >> I move to approve the second interim budget. >> Okay, we have a second. >> Second. >> Great. Um, all those in favor of approving the inter. >> I Okay. Um, it it passes. The budget approves passes 50. Okay. The ne the next item is agenda number 18 and this has to do with the district advisory committee um middle school marketing and enrollment and to talk about it. help contact

151person meek. This is an action item. Um so in a second I'm I'll read something but yeah here so it is recommended so that the board of trustees approve the following individuals to serve on the district advisory committee middle school marketing enrollment board committee. Um, Superintendent Duo and I met um and reviewed various um criteria that we thought was uh important um to create this committee um to kind of create a a balanced committee from a few different perspectives. Um initially our our criteria seemed to be very the same. I'll have Superintendent Aguire talk to that in a second, but you know, things from like where the comm where is the community coming from? What are some of the perspectives? Um make you know, also thinking about the value of having um parents that are

152that you know residents that are in the district but maybe um their kids are at Carlmont, for example, um as as one person has. um you know looking at a variety of different kind of uh criteria we created this m or superintendent created this matrix and we then selected these individuals. I'm very proud um of of these individuals and I feel like it's going to I hope and I think we all hope that it will yield some very um interesting ideas and input into this process. Um before I kind of continue, do you do you have some of those um kind of those um criteria that we >> um I will um just speak. Uh first off, I want to thank all of the 20 applicants districtwide. >> Yes. >> Um that responded to the

153survey that was sent out. Um we were able to select 12 um in a balanced way to represent schools uh represent schools uh folks uh particularly attending San Piper and Nesbbit as well as representing schools outside of um those two. Uh there's um a an individual that actually does not have um students in our district uh that we selected kind of that uh global um perspective uh there as well. Um in terms of of criteria um applicants were asked to answer a couple of questions as to why uh they wanted to serve um on the committee. I know when I was looking at it I looked primarily um I wanted to see school representation. I wanted to look at longevity. I.e. if if um from my perspective somebody that had uh kiddos in in say

154fourth grade and sixth grade might have more longevity. So the idea of having longevity to participate in the committee uh was important. Um I personally rated um uh each of the applications um to to come up with my recommended list. uh we compared lists and for the most part >> like 90% >> I would say 90% yeah we were uh we had this the same um uh uh selection in in cases where one of us uh uh was affirmative and the other was not uh we deferred to adding the person uh to to the committee. Um so it was a a a collaborative effort I think right >> um that resulted in uh the committee here um that you see before you go ahead >> I was just wondering how many schools are represented on

155the in the 12 is every school represented >> uh no not every school is represented as I'm recalling I may have a couple off but it was primarily Nesbbit uh sandpaper and Fox or not Fox Central as I recall. >> Do we have anyone from Rston? >> Um, we had a graduate from Rston, I believe, >> because I I I almost feel like we need to have someone from Rston because we would want this this committee to help sync the three schools all together in terms of their marketing. We don't want Sam Piper and Nesbbit going off and doing a bunch of stuff and then Rston doing its own. So I think I think um some of the parents um are from um other schools like Central like Central was a had a they responded

156um some of the parents and I think that that I see your point but I also think that that should they kind of took that perspective actually I think that that's a healthy from from them to to be participating because they both said like we we want the all the schools to succeed and we're going to look at all three schools and you know not having just being from the Nesbbit or Sam Piper community um I think will be appropriate. Um and >> is it that we didn't have any >> I'm trying to look I don't don't recall off hand. Uh >> these were the ones >> I think we did. >> Okay. >> So I mean out of your but you know it was for me honest it was a little not not the

157the the representation that we got. I want to thank everybody who who who did it. But but I would say, you know, in our in those meetings, we got 700 signatures >> from from the San Piper group, right? We got 700 signatures from from people who were like we like we value Rston and not not you know and so we got like 20ish who answered this survey. So >> per my notes we did, >> you know, I it's so I think that those that were selected from So I think that's a little personally it was a little you know disappointing to to see the energy that they portrayed in the meetings and and and the outcome of how many signed up for the form but that doesn't that that doesn't deter um the group that

158has been assembled by by any means I think >> from whatever um avenue they they came to us from from whether whether it's another school or Nesbbit San Piper certainly against central um had a lot of um parents who I and then there again like I said one parent um is is is an advocate in the in the Carmont Education Foundation and her her kids have went through the pipeline that we have and and are at CarMont and everything and I think that's great. I think that's going to be an amazing perspective considering what we were talk have been talking about with pathways and just how so I hear I >> hear what you're saying if you don't have anyone who that's don't have anyone who applied I was just I was wondering if >>

159yeah I think it's still going to be look all of them um I was impressed by what they had to say in their answers to the questions and I think they're going to do a great job in being um thoughtful and uh inquisitive and and bring the ideas forward as a group. And I also was impressed that I think a lot of what came out in their items were about group collaboration and you know just working together and I think that's going to be important because if you have 12 people you know you need them to kind of coales co and sync up. Um Dan, just a question for you. Um with the district advisory committee and their middle school marketing and thoughts on how we go about with the enrollment as we move forward.

160Um my assumption and I just want you to confirm yay or nay um is that we would then take that information especially since we don't have representation from r that rston community on the committee itself that we would take that and we'd push it back towards for uh towards the district for a more district-wide approach that includes rston in that mix of things that we're doing or no >> um I I heard two things. Uh I I heard the question um are we going to look at so I'll I'll ask you is the question are we going to um pressure test test the ideas that come up with um rston specific community members uh as one question or if um the things that we come up with will for Nesbbit and Sam Piper will also

161apply to Rston. The second >> um so uh I I will largely say my perspective um has been to approach this from an equity mindset not an equality mindset. >> Okay. >> Um equity is when uh someone or some group needs something more we provide more. In this case, Nesbbit and Sandpiper are our focus in terms of enrollment, in terms of um making sure that the program gets out. Therefore, we provide them more i.e. shadow days, i.e. tours, i.e. those kinds of of things. Um uh and I think that was some of the conversation that was happening um with the board, but that is uh the way I'm approaching it. Um I do think um you know perhaps the committee will recommend uh thinking about it uh through a little different lens. Um I also

162think maybe um there are opportunities uh uh that we can invite folks to all all places but uh at this point I'm I am approaching it from an equity uh perspective. Thank you. And thank you both so much for all the work that you've put into um one soliciting applications, reviewing applications, making a selection. I do know that we had originally said that there would be no staff member from the district staff that would be on the committee itself doing things on the committee. Is that right? I I feel like I feel like you had mentioned No, >> to your point um I think we were saying that we would not be um asking a staff member to use part of their workday right >> on this, >> right? So if we're not I mean

163but then that means we're not staffing it if we're not going to be using their workday. >> Um I think the idea is is that it's a volunteer committee. >> It's a volunteer committee. >> Okay. And I'm just concerned that you know I don't want you guys to get burned out. And if it is a whole volunteer committee, can we have them is that organized on their own? Like how does >> No. So So uh with um a board committee um the board um by their actions um formed a committee with a specific purpose >> with a specific timeline. Um and um the committee is being formed. um my role um as superintendent is to support that committee in whatever they might need uh to guide their work. So um I will um I I

164anticipate um hopefully working with a member or two of the board um getting the group launched uh getting uh helping them organize um the first meeting is already scheduled for March 23rd um first convening. I think at that meeting the group will identify uh the time times that they want to meet and what's what's going to work for them. Uh they'll identify probably a chair and a co-chair uh to help um move the work forward. Um and then uh they'll continue to develop their agenda and that'll evolve. >> Perfect. Thank you. So I guess one of the questions out there is is there is this could be ongoing certainly monthly. There any um board members I guess we have to determine how as a board we want to participate I if if at all versus

165you know they're certainly going to come to us with their recommendations. Um, I do know that Nesbbit has of of those who have been, you know, offered spots. There are two people from from Nesbbit. Um, so that's pretty light. Um, just putting it out there. I still think it's a very balanced group. I think they're still going to do a great job of looking at both schools. Um, but I'm just putting it out there. So I don't know if one idea I had was that we could rotate so that it's not ownorous laborious on any of us you know that we and also that we could also get a glimpse as to you know how the how the advisory committee is going. I do agree that probably our four person would be selected and kind

166of a chairperson vice chair and they would organize themselves. Um we would but it might be interesting um instead of just traditionally picking one or two trustees to represent the committee for a year or soever that we just kind of maybe rotate in. I don't know that's just one thought I wanted to pose to the group. >> I think I think it's a really good idea for um for trying to spread out the the time commitment. However, I think because um it is a board um created committee um then it's subject to provisions of the Brown Act and we need to at the most have two uh board members who are involved in the discussion. So I think if we were rotating monthtomonth that would cause challenges for us because if I were the member

167one month, I would not or me and one other person were the member one month, we would not be able to tell the two people who were coming on the next month what we talked about, right? because then that would be four of the board members talking about something outside of the board meeting. >> Okay. I don't think that's how it's should be inter >> um I'm imagining just like just like our other meetings where there are only two board members the content of those meetings get shared in this meeting. If that's happening, would that still be an issue? Because no matter what at each month, all of us would be aware of what was said in that meeting. So even if two rotated, >> but is it on the agenda each month to be

168fair out >> like 2 by twos and two by two by twos that all get shared out to all of us? >> So So the the committee will be making decisions uh in a Brown Act style uh with quorums and whatnot if there's if there's decisions to be made. Yeah. Um uh so for that reason if board board board members are on that committee um there probably should be just two. Uh if you extend that then you're actually making a my fear is you're making a decision as a board um because it is Brown Act kind of it's a it's a little bit awkward. Um as many board members who want to be there to observe can. So if you appoint two members to be particip participate on the committee um uh uh their participation

169the other three board members can come and observe as a member from the public. They just can't uh talk because then it becomes um a a majority of the board is is um acting. Could I It's not This is This is not an angry face. We thinking we The committee is only going to meet once a month. Is that right? >> Uh we've said uh one to two hours per month is what we anticipate. Uh the committee is going to meet as much as the committee needs to meet to fulfill your obligation >> if your charge. If the committee meets once a month and so do we and if the decisions and conversations that are made are shared in either board updates or in this meeting after that if two more come in like like

170I'm not actually I'm not part of a serial meeting it would be a new meeting then wouldn't it like the content is going to be shared with all of us in the public every time >> but I I I would um venture to say that there's going to be conversations that happen and decisions that are made that might go back to something that was discussed when another um board member was participating. >> So you would not suggest what I suggested then you would not suggest like they you would say okay if you want to observe go ahead if you're curious but you would suggest we have kind of if any board members are want to be on this committee that we kind of make them for the >> duration. I think you I think we

171would want to have consistency with the committee that's um formed um so that um you're also there to kind of reiterate and recclarify uh where it's needed kind of the board's initial charge um in this to keep the direction moving forward. >> And to your point, Trusty Bruno, I think that they would be >> I want to make it a point. Yeah. >> No, no, no. But I was going to just add that I think just like other committees do a se you know a quarterly whatever debrief then just like what was his name? Um Tim thank you. he came up and kind of debriefed and we would build that in as an agenda item to have the advisory committee whoever they designate all of them or two of them to come in and and

172and kind of make a presentation to us or just kind of let us know what their findings or or formal recommendations at the time. I'm I'm assuming that's >> yeah part of their charge is to inform the board and make presentations to the board. So what that cadence is, I think we could determine that probably wouldn't be monthly for us. Probably would be semianually or at the at a but I guess during the trustee report those trustees that are on they could add that in if they attended a meeting or probably not advisable. >> Uh they they can uh share information. >> Yeah. So then >> those trustees who have been kind of designated then could could share out. >> I would like to volunteer to be a part of the committee. >> Okay. Anybody

173else have um time andor interest? >> I mean I have interest. I would be happy to be on the committee if no one else wants to fight me for it. >> No, >> I'm fine with that. >> You guys okay? All right. >> Yep. >> I know that you had concerns about not enough Nesbbit representation, >> right? >> And that was my that was my my hesitation. >> Right. I appreciate that. Um, >> and if Nesbbit would prefer to have a strong presence there as well, that would be okay with me. >> Okay. I'm thinking what do I other think about that? I don't know. Um, I will I appreciate that. I will I will >> be the other I will uh on your to do it or >> no take me up on the

174offer to >> Yes, I will I will be on the committee. >> You would like to be on the >> and we'll see how it goes. >> Okay. >> Yeah. Thank you. >> Thank you. >> I know we have a lot of strong Sam Piper parents there. So, >> yeah. Thank you. Well, I I I feel like the I don't necessarily the group is very balanced and I think they're going to approach it in a balanced viewpoint. >> What I mean by strong sandpiper, a lot of very smart, passionate. Oh, it's a good group and I'm very I'm very appreciative of of them to give their time. >> Thank you for for that. >> Of course. >> Okay. So, so uh with that it'll be Trusty Deng and and myself. Go ahead. Trust me. >>

175I have some unrelated questions but still on the subject. Um >> I don't think we need to go through each. I don't know who's who, but I see >> one teacher. Is there more than one? >> Uh no. Uh Travis Whitebird is the only staff member. >> And to be very clear, the Jonathan Tang on that list is not my husband. >> It is not my husband. There is another Jonathan. >> I wasn't even >> not mine. >> And I I believe the board has full access to all of the applications and data that was submitted. >> Yeah, thank you for providing that. Uh I I appreciate it. >> Are there any other and and I don't know if it was the intent or not. any other important entities represented, school force, open doors, anything

176like that in this group or was that like the intent? >> Uh I I I'm going to guess there's probably some school force connections >> connections. >> Um when I was when I was lumping uh folks together, I in my deliberation, I looked at I I considered community member. >> Gotcha. >> Yeah. community and staff were the two. >> Do the ones you did not accept know or are they finding out potentially right now? >> Uh no uh everybody everybody was notified. >> Yeah. >> Cool. All right. And I will say >> funding all came through too, right? >> Yes, that is correct. I I will say um like uh um everybody who applied was amazing. like I I don't want to the f the the eight folks who weren't selected. Um it wasn't because

177um they didn't have a passion or skill set or or wouldn't have brought amazing things to the table. Um it was really a balance and finding um that right balance and when we balanced it out it it came to that that 12 number. um we didn't enter it into we didn't come in saying we're going to pick 12 or we're going to pick 15 or we're going to pick eight. Um it just just balanced out with that 12. >> Um yeah, I uh just wanted to say before we uh vote on this group um and I do I do approve I do I will vote yes for this group. Um but um along the lines of what Superintendent Duara said, um I would just like to thank everybody who applied and um emphasize that we

178really really appreciate everybody's participation um and their interest. And um there are lots of volunteer roles that uh people can do to help our district and help our students. Um, so you know, as we as we had the example of uh Tim Hoffman with the bond oversight committee, there's a parcel tax oversight committee as well. There's school force of course, which is so important. Um, there's uh PTA at your individual schools. Um, there's school site council as well. Um, >> and your room parents. >> And room parents. Yes, exactly. So, um, we definitely welcome all of the parents, uh, interest in volunteering and contributing and and we thank them for doing that. >> I also just wanted to, um, thank you, Trust. I just wanted to piggyback on that to kind of say something I

179I think we we've been briefed on, but I this is more kind of for the community at large. um that there's something we've been seeing in our community over the past few weeks. I'm I'm I'm reading this just so I have my thoughts down on paper. Many parents obviously, as we know, care deeply about our schools, want to advocate for what they believe is best for students, and that commitment is something we value as a district. At the same time, we've recently seen a few instances where outreach and messaging have happened outside of district coordination, and I think that creates confusion and makes it harder for our schools to operate effectively. For that reason, I want to ask that these kind for and it's a small minority, but these kinds of independent efforts that they

180stop so communication outreach can happen in coordination with district and site leadership. That is the reason why we the board directed the formation of this district advisory committee to provide a constructive and coordinated place for community voices and input. And so my personal recommend request is that please work through the process that that we've created rather than in parallel. I think when we channel our energy together, it strengthens our schools and our community. >> Can I speak on that just a little bit? >> Yes. I know we have a very passionate and excited group of parents that really want to help get the word out, especially before this very uh quickly upcoming um uh cycle. And I just wanted to say or ask would they be allowed to coordinate and then talk with the advisory

181committee and then move off and push forward just because if the advisory committee is only meeting once a month that that is a long time to wait to be able to do XYZ different things that they want to push forward with. And that's that's just where I >> so my my idea for that is that um the the committee um uh sets the direction and then if the committee is like we want to do x y or z and we need 20 volunteers then they put that call out for 20 volunteers and then we of course welcome the volunteers. Um I I do recognize it is tricky with the timeline of the uh the uh questionnaire being sent out to families. Um and that parents are are uh energized and want to get going. Um

182but I think uh just having things happen at a district level has resulted in a lot more um engagement in the in in learning about uh San Piper Middle and Nesbbit Middle. >> Absolutely. I I totally agree. So just for my own clarification, the district advisory committee would say this is what we want to do. They would then gather their I mean like kind of like a tree, right? district advisory committee and then they would gather all of the volunteers and then then as a group since everyone in the district advisory committee is aligned those down here as the part volunteers would be able to go and execute. So, so I agree with No, so I agree with Tess Northrup about the coordination and communication. I would not say that that's exactly No, this is

183not an implementation group. This is a advisory group. If their advisory is that we need to do flyers or anything like that, then that's brought to us and and and the district leadership to then potentially implement. >> But then that would be staff hours that would be applied. >> I'm sorry. I'm like I'm I'm just trying to sort it in my brain how it would function. >> At the end of the day, we have a responsibility to implement and support our programs. Full stop. >> Right. >> Um and um we've done that in certain ways and um the board is interested in uh exploring uh how we might do that differently um through the work of a board um committee. Um, so the board committee will do this work. Uh, you know, maybe it's maybe

184it ends up being um testimonial videos. Uh, maybe that's a recommendation. Maybe they they come up with um somebody who wants to do a testimonial and maybe we um work with um district resources that can film that testimonial, something like that. Um so yeah it it I mean ultimately it does involve staff time regardless um because the implementation piece has to >> Got it. Okay. Yeah, that's I think that's where I was. >> Yeah. Whether that's more implementation than currently has been done or just in a different direction, that's but that implementation is by the district >> and and if we need more resources to to implement uh the recommendations, I'll come to you and and uh seek funding for those resources depending on what it is. Um and we evaluate um whether it's a

185it's a useful um idea or not. >> Okay. That's why I'm encouraging please like when you go back to your respective constituents and everything that you just encourage them. >> This is why we created an advisory committee >> um not to go to be in coordination with the district, right? So that we're we are better coordinated as a district versus smaller groups doing independently. Again, best intentions at heart, but it's still independent of what we're trying to do. Um and I think it would also then um devalue the advisory committee and for those who are volunteering their time to create something in place if you have all these different groups going around. >> Okay. >> Yeah. Uh >> no, >> I I if I can just add one more thing, I I I absolutely don't

186want to complicate this, >> uh but I want to be transparent and responsive, uh to board questions in terms of applicants and filling the committee. Um uh I was looking at school assignments. Um so we we looked at things from a number of different levels. Um there is um one person that that does have um a rston connection um but through the other balance um didn't uh get prioritized for the committee. So I just want to put that out there that there was um one person in that that space. >> Thank you. I have questions because right we meet once a month and we're talking about a thing like I don't know if we're like on the agenda item anymore as far as like approving these people but I do have questions that and I'm

187trying to uncomplicate I'm talking too much already. Uh don't take my questions as challenges. It's just academic curiosities. The this advisory group is advising on a thing that I feel like we've talked about we needed action on. And I'm not trying to necessarily counter or support any comments. I'm just curious about it with less than a month till the survey goes out to some degree or like just any like current Yeah. >> animations around middle school selections. And here let me ask a straight question. >> Are we going to do anything in the committee that >> not necessarily are we? My my question literally is I'm thinking about past that is how so like uh this advisory committee that will meet with >> two board members there like >> who's setting the agenda for it

188is it that those 14 people come up with an agenda and then talk or is it an agenda that goes into it um and then in that 14 people is it hierarchical? >> Uh they'll they'll need to uh form a a chair and a co-chair. >> There we go. Um and then um they will form have meetings just like we have meetings. Uh they will form their agenda, right? >> Um and function according to their agenda under the Brown Act, >> right? >> Um and um move the workforce. It's a it's it's formal like us um but the nature of what they're talking about and they're doing is a little bit less formal. Um and it's a lot bigger of a group. So, uh, making a not having a a working group that doesn't meet

189a majority, um, is easier as well, >> right? So, >> March, whatever it is today, March 12th, today, we don't meet again. They meet I think I saw March 23rd, >> correct? >> With no chair or co-chair, they no action will happen from that group before. >> No, we won't until April. they they will start to form their committee and identifi hopefully identify a chair and a co-chair um and um start to um tackle what their next steps are. Realistically um for this current year into next year, I don't think the committee's going to come up with anything that's going to influence this year. And I think that's why it's been a little bit messy. to to President CS's point, it's been a little bit messy. I anticipate that messiness will resolve itself. Uh the

190committee will will work and they'll have lead time to next year. >> So there's that's I think you're you're starting to name the tension I'm having, which again I'm not trying to like front seat my own, but a committee that I think the the the benefit of its existence will will actualize next January, right? Um, and up to that like that. I don't mean that. I mean that with no shade. I'm so thankful for all of you people who applied and people who will support them. >> I agree with what could be confusing with actions of groups that aren't aligned with what the district wants to do now. And then as a board member who wants schools to feel supported, teachers feel supported, communities feel supported. I wonder if maybe we have things that could

191happen or maybe it's happening already. This is not I'm not being instructive. I just like the act the reason action is happening now is because of recent animations and desires to act. And if we're talking about a group that will formalize to act over the next seven months, what should be happening or not happening over the next four to six weeks? >> Well, can I >> Yeah, please. this. >> So, one of the things I know we we discussed, I think that was shared was that the next legitimate item that we that needs the consideration by this advisory committee is there's some qu is is the questions that are going to go out in the the the survey selection or the however whatever we're calling it. um do they feel like some question is is

192urgently missing >> right >> that should be included. I think that is a very tangible real time that needs to be kind of we solved at that meeting. So at that meeting come away with we love all those questions. We would do this differently. We or add another one or take another one away for you know I think that in addition to the normalizing and and and selecting of of like a chair co-chair I think that is an item that needs to kind of that they can really kind of do it in the time frame that we're envisioning this committee meeting for. I think what I'm Yeah, maybe if I was to say it directly and and Dan, maybe this is I'm asking you, >> not kicking you out. Uh, >> you said something like

193like the getting messaging from the district has paid off or worked or something like that. And if we agree with that, I think I don't know that I've actually heard that said out loud. I think I've said it, but I I think to these empty chairs what you might be saying is you say, you know, offset groups, we got this. I don't know if it's been said like that. of if over the next two months district is going to be sending out the message and supporting its staff who's been doing some new events I believe and then this committee is going to be advising in a clear way representing parents who've stepped up with the questions and the survey and then other than that we want just that to be happening is that right >>

194uh so I'm going to say this is the board's committee uh with the board directive of increasing marketing and enrollment at Sandpiper and Nesbbit. It's it's an indication that um the district needs to do more work and should be doing more work and needs to have some outside conversations with uh for feedback about what next steps might be. But the reality of like harvesting that outside is limited >> for the coming decision. >> Until that moment, the district is doing it and has increased its efforts. >> Uh uh we we have formal I will say we formalized our efforts >> um which has resulted in an increase. Yes. >> I think I'm I think I'm like asking for that Cheryl. This part like I think I know it. I don't know that he microphone. And

195the last time I heard about it, it was a thing that we were saying wasn't wasn't happening or we again clearly had suggestions on how to do it differently. We've seen results from that in like the recent days. Yeah. >> Uh we I so we've seen um uh more people attend a a parent tour. We've seen um uh greater response to a shadow day um >> across the board. AC >> across the board, >> right? Um I we we haven't had the time to see if um that results in any uh change to the to the choice. >> I think I'm trying to if I if I'm not somebody who was part of a a more active group to try to get more word out. It would be help me to hear that the word

196has gotten out and more people are listening because if I don't hear that then I feel like what I should do is knock on doors. But if you're asking me not to, then I would want to believe that you like what you're doing is working. And I should believe that. Again, when I say working, I don't mean working like more people choose a school. I mean working like more people are listening. >> I I >> Right. That's I think we heard the quote that went from 10 at San Piper to 50 taking. >> I'm saying it out loud. If at the same time we're going to say any additional efforts should trust us, I would say the reason they should is because it has worked across the board. We don't need Right. Right. I'm trying

197I'm I'm trying to actually support something you said. But if we're asking a a group >> to not be so focused on one site because we believe that our efforts have worked for all sites. Um I I think what President C is asking is for a unif unified um push um so that there is not misinformation >> that's out there. >> Yes. And if I was somebody who was trying to protect my school, I could believe that your uniform push is happening and is manifesting more people listening for this decision that's coming up that might impact my third or fourth or fifth graders future. >> I believe so. Yes. >> Yes. I Yeah, that was my bid. I really like I wasn't sure I had heard that and if I were somebody who wanted to

198get people to join me for an effort, I would do that. If what I was hearing is that the committee that will help can't help until April, >> I think it needs to be kind of coordinated and and and funneled. But I don't think No, but I don't think what if if somebody comes and says, "Oh, you you you're at somebody comes and says, I'm considering Nesbbit and and and whatever RS and oh, you're in the NESB community. Tell me what do you think about I don't know much about the IB program." I don't think that I don't think we're saying like please don't use your like exude the amazingness that you feel about these schools in any regard. We're not saying don't we're not stifling. I'm just we're just trying to say there's been

199some advocacy in harmful ways that unintended consequences have rippled through with either misinformation or work done that maybe has taken up that has um where teachers have commented that or and administrators have commented that it's not been productive and has put them in difficult spots. And I'm saying don't do that. I'm not saying please don't talk about the amazingness of your schools. >> I'm not trying to dig into it. I think if if I were one of those people, what would help me to hear is you say our efforts >> have been working. >> Yeah. I don't know if it might be at this point, but it sounds like >> anecdotally and from the numbers that >> we're trending in the right direction. >> I hope you know hopefully that will translate. >> I think

200the answer is yes. That's what I'm trying. Yeah. >> Yeah. I mean, it's very positive. I'm excited. >> Hey Jackie, just out of curiosity, do you think that people need to hear that? Do you think that like the district should put something out to say >> to parents that >> you know what I mean? Like do you think that people need to hear it like that or >> people would read people people are paying attention right I think I've said that in different spaces but I think we have eyes and ears more so than perhaps ever and there's a part where where um in in maintaining the intention and trust and continuing to strengthen or rebuild uh their hope in both the efforts of the committee and our and our the district's efforts and our

201efforts but you your efforts um like yeah hearing that recent attendance has been great. We've appreciated people's showing up and that whatever the survey is coming out soon. We're looking forward to results that are going to ask more questions. I think that clarity would help me if I thought what I needed to do was help the district. And again, I hear you saying it's been confusing or harmful, but if if we allow ourselves to believe they're doing it with good intent, but they're missing, then right, like I would not do it if I believed I didn't need to. >> I understand what you're saying. >> Yeah. >> All right. I understand what you're saying. I'm just I'm asking you like actually like a literal question like do you think that we that Okay. So, you

202think that we should send something out to say >> I'm one person, right? >> No, no, but that's what I'm asking. Like, do you think that people >> Okay, never mind. >> Yeah. >> So, for now though, um >> can we uh this specific item? For now, I move to approve of the dire the district advisory committee middle school marketing enrollment team that Dan and President C, superintendent Darao, sorry. President C have um have recommended to us. >> Second. >> Great. All those in favor I. >> All those opposed. Okay. So, it passes uh five to zero. the formation of the district advisory committee. Wonderful. Okay. Um the next item is is a 2 by two debrief. I kind of actually spoke on that inadvertently in my trusty report, so I'm going to defer. I

203have nothing really more to add. Do you have anything to add? Great. Okay. >> Trusty North. >> Thank you. >> Oh, sorry. Of course. Sorry. >> No worries. Um, yeah. Uh, just I think as as as Trusty CS mentioned, uh, always good to be able to connect, uh, with Sequoia Union High School District and, um, you know, uh, see their perspectives and share with them what, uh, what situations we've been dealing with. And um also I I would say probably just um going along those lines of um you know making sure that we have communication uh for I'm trying to think of what was specifically said at at the uh at the meeting with um Sequoia Union, but I I believe it one of the things was um you know letting all of our middle

204school students know that they have different options within Sequoia Union. like there's, you know, kind of uh people may think that they just go to Carlmont, but that actually there's multiple different options in Sequoia Union. Um, including, for example, that there's an IB program at Sequoia High School. Um, so anyway, so I I thought that was very helpful and I I look forward to continuing that partnership and conversation with them. Um so that uh we can you know like like we're um uh reaching out to the fifth grade parents and letting them know about what's what are possibilities um that also Sequoia Union will partner with us and you know let us know about opportunities that we can share with eighth graders. Yeah, actually I forgot that was a that was a critical kind of

205a good discussion a really great discussion that kind of let them know about the other choices that they have um as they kind of think about high schools. >> Anything at that? >> Nope. I think uh you guys covered it. >> Great. Okay. Um moving on to agenda number 20, CSBA board policy update February 2026 first read. Um Superintendent Duara, would you like to provide some context? >> Yeah. Uh so it is February's first read of CSBA board policy. Uh it's our uh tradition to have all of the policies updated by staff. Um uh updating legal language. Uh taking a look at uh any changes uh that need to be made. Uh putting them forth uh for first read. Uh taking feedback comments um and making any adjustments uh for second read next month. Um,

206I know there's I I have received a little bit of feedback, so I think opening it to the board for discussion uh is important. >> Thank you, Superintendent Dora. Um, yeah, I wanted to um What do I say when I want to make a I want to I don't want to move, right? I don't want to I don't want to do any kind of movement. I want to I want to um propose an amendment to um our bylaw um on the reimbursement and other benefits. So, um I know that California law has just changed and um now the reimbursement allowance has been raised. Um I know that it has been tradition here at BRSSD to um you know do this work purely on a voluntary basis which I think is you know all of well

207and good. Um I do think it does kind of limit the people the pool of people who would be willing to join the school board um to do this work um for for no compensation. Um so >> so it's up there right now. >> Great. Yes. Great. Thank you. I really think it's it's really just the first um sentence that I would amend. Um and and I would suggest that it would be um each member of the governing board shall be provided monthly compensation up to $1,200. Um which is the state maximum. Um, and if you continue reading, I'm not going to read the whole thing. Um, but it it does say that board members are not required to accept the monthly compensation. So, if board members would like to continue with the current um

208purely volunteer, you know, part then they would be um be able to do that as well. Um but I do think that um you know it is important to allow you know a um a reasonable compensation and and I don't think I know like going from 40 to 1,200 seems like oh my gosh that's like a huge number but if you really look at the um the number of hours that are spent um I think it is pretty reasonable. So um that that would be my u suggestion. So my thought I I would I I don't I don't think we should and I think it falls and the reason for that isn't because I don't think that the work we do is valuable or that we don't work really hard cuz we really do. Um,

209it's more that I worry if we attach a compensation to it, we may attract people who are not actually here to do the work of doing what's best for our kids. >> Um, why do you think that? >> Because I've heard stories of people who come and join boards because they can collect something. They won't necessarily do the work. they won't necessarily do the things. And by making it almost a volunteer position, the people who come are the people who care and the people who care are the people who want to do the right thing. >> Yeah, I I I I appreciate your um perspective. I um respectfully disagree, but I mean, obviously, we don't have to agree about everything. Um, but I don't think that um a $1,200 a month compensation would um motivate

210someone to come to do something nefarious. >> Jesse North. >> Um I'm definitely interested in um in exploring this. I know uh I know it seems like a large jump uh from $40 to $1,200. Um my understanding uh related to that uh I believe the $40 amount was uh sorry that the with the state law changing recently that was the first time that the state law had changed in 40 years of updating school board member compensation. So 40 years ago everybody can put that into their inflation calculator right um and I know that does not get up to 1,200. Um the other thing I would say as well is um even prior to the state law changing um based on the size of our district uh we could have been offering $240 a month at

211I believe approximately uh as a compensation. And uh when that was brought up a couple of years ago uh it was a previous board um that was reject rejected and we kept it at this amount. Um so I think um another thing I would say as well is that um city councils have been um getting compensated at a uh a similar level for to what what is proposed uh for school board and um I still think you're getting 99% of the time people who really really care because again the compensation is not anywhere near what a full-time job would be. It's it's a supplement. Um, right? If the if a board member or a city council member is getting 1,200 a month, that's that's not replacing a full-time job, right? So, I do think um

212it would allow more people to consider running for the board. um if they knew that they would at least be able to um uh any additional expenses that they had from being on the board like child care for meetings late in the evening um that they would have some funding to be able to uh to take care of that. Um, also if you get paid by the hour and for example, you go to a school during the workday one of as as a school visit for and I'm I'm being facicious that I should stop. I get paid by the hour now. I get paid by the hour. Not a lot. Not a lot. So if I take two hours to go visit a school and I want to do that, then I tell my employer

213I can't work those two hours. And yes, I have some paid time off, but mostly anything I do for BRSSD during the school day, I then lose compensation from my job. >> So why Right. There's there's only so much we can ask people to do in the name of volunteerism. >> So I'm with So I hear what you both are saying. I'm with Trusty Tang. I think I think the one my one consideration when this came up a little while ago was with volunteerism being down that I think at a minimum obviously we do a lot more than just come to the monthly meeting, right? there is a child care aspect. So um could that 40 maybe be like 100 to pay for child care for the monthly meetings? obviously that we do a we

214do more and some months are more in this last decision it was more but but $1,200 that that calculates if all five of us were to take that that's $66,000 $6,000 a month times our 11 months that we're that we're not that we're kind of we're you know doing this that's 66,000 this is still a volunteer position to me and and I appreciate when people say to the service um do some months. Honestly, am I out of pocket? Okay, maybe I am. But the the fact is is we have to be fiscally good stewards. And I think it's pretty um and the fact is is this is then would be the district would be then paying us versus it going to the kids and the programs. And I'd rather it honestly go to the kids

215and the programs and support the support the services. I hear what you're saying, April, but the reality is is that some people then are not should not then become elected officials and some I understand circumstances may change. Um but I I think to the point about um seeing trustees from other districts, I was at CSBA at the at the last conference as and and there was this gentleman um and he was like older gentleman and thank you for I'm glad he was be able to serve, but he had been there for like 30 plus years. I'm like I didn't even think that was possible to be in service as a trustee that that long. Um, and I just think that maybe people would do it for another reason if it was a monetary option. I

216would hope that wouldn't be the case. But this, so I'm I'm a little torn because certainly we don't want anybody to be to not apply because of let's say some bare minimums in place. Um, but I think that jump to that number, I just think fundamentally this is a volunteer position and I don't want this not to go to the kids and that's how I thought about it last time when I thought about it which and that's how I'm thinking about it this time. I think um you know you can serve at like you said before you can serve at different levels and if circumstances change then you don't get to to you know go during the day and I think the community understands we can do as much as we can do right and

217that doesn't mean because I can go to some things during the day that and others can't that I think we're not we're not looked at any lesser it's it's it's thank you for your service and you're doing the best you can and thank you for representing us uh to the best of our ability. So, I I'm I'd rather that money honestly just go to the program. And I also think it's a little um given the recent decision, I would hate I think it's a little tonedeaf um to, you know, to to say that we've especially in the light of turning down the district's recommendation to close a school to to save hundreds of thousands of dollars over the time period, whatever that time period is. I think to then say and we would like this

218increase in compensation. I think um I think that's not going to be well received by the community. So that's my my viewpoints. Thank you, David. Um I think it's important to hear everyone's perspective. Um I do think that the decision, the middle school alignment decision, um was mentioned several times that it was not due to money savings. Um, so I think it's, you know, a little I don't know. I I don't think that we can say, oh, you know, we're not we're not making this decision because of budget and then also say, well, you know, we made the decision because of the budget or whatever. You know what I mean? Like you can't you can't say both things where like we're not worried about the budget um and now we are worried about the budget.

219So, I I'd actually like to um to if I could, CBO Matsumoto, um if if the board compensation was raised, would that money come from the programs or is there money in the budget to allow for a a a higher board compensation? It would I mean for a direct answer it would come at the expense of something that is currently going towards students but this is that this is not budgeted for next year currently um given that it's hasn't been made a decision um and another thing to point out is I believe under the the bylaws or you know what is proposed from CSBA uh board members also would have to discuss about whether or not they would be entitled to benefits as as well. Um, on average, uh, I believe the lowest tier of

220coverage is roughly around $15,000 per year, I believe, for our members of our district. So, on top of roughly if at max on top of roughly the 1,200 per month, there would also be another call it, you know, 1300 1350,400 for health benefits as well. But that would that would be um like if people took it, right? So like that is correct. You you we would like offer it but then people wouldn't have to take it. >> That that is also correct. >> Is there a number that we can come to? Maybe we wait until second read. I don't really know how it all works out. that um you know I would hate for it to be that like you know single parents couldn't be on the school board because they don't get compensated to

221you know have someone watch their kids I think $100 per month is super low to ask a babysitter to come you know if you have three kids and you're gone for five hours you're going to pay someone $100 you know I also think Um yeah, I think that's it. But >> just process question or or process clarification. Uh one thing I just want to um uh piggyback on what CBO Matsumoto shared. Uh there's two options within the the policy. Um there's a um compensation piece and there's a benefits piece. Uh you can do one or the other or both. Uh so just clarifying that. Um second second piece, this is not an action item tonight. So the board can't take action on it this evening. Um you can uh direct uh me if it's the

222will of the board to come back with um alternate scenarios um that you look at that you process. Um I'm happy to bring back uh different workings if it serves the board. Um the other thing is um it doesn't have to be approved second read. So I can bring back to you scenarios for further discussion. Um and when it whenever it serves the board for approval you you take action. We agendaize for action. >> Thank you Dan for that cla. So you would take it out of the so we would approve as recommended by district and then if it gets value if it wants to be evaluated later or how does it >> so so the current policy is status quo >> uh so we would just we wouldn't make any amendments until the board

223decides it's time to make an amendment >> um uh what I I guess what I'm suggesting is it's okay to take a policy um out of the normal cadence um and uh have as much time to discuss and and revisit and table um as as the board needs. So so next month assuming there's no changes of the other policies they would all go up for second read on the consent assume get passed this one would not. Um just one thing that I would um be interested in asking the district to if they could find out clarification is um previously before the state law was amended um it was my understanding that if a board changed the compensation it wouldn't go into effect immediately um and that it would have to uh you'd have to have

224an election in between. not necessarily for yourself for your term, but just that there would have to be an election at all that was uh for your governing board. So that if the voters do not like what that the board voted on, if the board were to vote on on uh increasing compensation, then those people who voted for increased compensation, they wouldn't actually get it because there'd be an election in the meantime. I I don't recall seeing that when I was uh going through the updates. Uh but I will um verify that um uh if if we bring it forward. >> Yeah, it's already discussed. I have another clarifying question. When you were talking about the options, you mentioned one or the other or both. Is neither an option? >> Uh yes. Uh so um

225ours is is ours currently is very very nominal. It's uh $40 um a month and um uh currently is not utilized by trustees. Uh so um uh it's essentially um none. The way the the CSBA has written it is you can have the line item with a a blank dollar figure. Um and I did some background because we did look at this a while ago. Um uh we were when we did it a couple years ago uh we were at 40, San Bruno was at 240, Beayshore 120, Sequoia 308. Um there was a bunch of there was also language in many that was voluntary served voluntarily. Uh we had you know s and again I please nobody quote me on this because this was data a long time ago that I redug up. San Carlos

226was voluntary, Portoola, La Honda, Berlingame, and then there were some districts that had it written in um as um maximum compensation. They didn't say um the dollar, they just said whatever the maximum is. Um and that was Jefferson, Brisbane, and Cababrio. Um in terms of benefits uh the vast majority of benefits um uh uh benefits uh were were no benefits or or board pays full cost of benefits uh was all all of the districts except for two. So, um, and those two have the same as district >> when we talked about this two years ago, whenever that was. Um, I feel like maybe I can't remember, but I feel like we talked about it as like a not all or nothing by quantity, but all or nothing by population. Like whatever number, whenever time frame

227we talk about it, does everyone have to take it? >> No. Uh it's uh the board the policy is written that a board member can decline. Um just another um thought as well is um uh excuse me um for there there will be uh board elections in the fall um for uh three seats um and uh including myself who uh We may or I may or may not run um in the fall. I haven't decided yet. Um but in general uh over the last few years um there has not been a high number of people running for school board. Um Trusty Tang and Trusty Deng, you were unopposed when you ran. Uh Trusty C, Trusty Bruno and I, we were three elected out of four. Um, so I do think um I do think that

228um increasing the compensation would um cause more people to seriously consider it. Um and I I I don't think they will be doing it for the money. I think the the the amount of money would help them uh defay the costs. Um, I know again just completely personally for anybody who may be listening. Um, a couple of years ago I was doing school board part-time and I was working on my masters part-time and I was my kids were a little bit younger, etc. And all those like part-times together that worked for me. Right now my kids are a little bit older. I've gone back to work full-time and then I'm like, wow, school board is something else, right? And so I have thought about, well, do I want to try to Jackie, you can close

229your ears. Do I want to try to have a part-time job so that I can spend more time on on on volunteering that I want to do, etc., etc. And then I'm like, "No, I'm I'm middle-aged and I deserve to serve. I deserve to save for my retirement. If I could just add anecdotally, um, you know, in my case, it's like my husband's been unemployed for almost a year now. So, you know, our kids are young, our youngest is in daycare. Our oldest goes to afterchool care for half the day. Um, so, you know, I feel like it's a very reasonable amount. I I just think it's very reasonable. And even if it's not $1,200, even, you know, a a a any increase would would be, I think, beneficial to any board member that chose

230if they chose to take it. So, I do feel like if there are board members who feel like, you know, compensation um may look bad, you know, like then maybe you choose not to take it. Um but I do think it is limiting um as far as like people who would consider, you know, running for school board. >> Thank you for that comment. Um so at this time we certainly consider it between now and and the month your positions and just this is just a first read so it'sformational. So um I think are we can we go forward? >> Okay. Yeah. Yeah please. I happy to just table um it or if there's direction for me to bring some something back in some form >> or perhaps it's a a board update with cost estimations

231and we revisit >> can you do that but can you um if possible I know it was some leg work to to to kind of anecdotally or maybe get some of that information of what other what other boards are doing now that given the new state is there >> I can send out another survey to colleagues that >> that would be helpful I think >> any other requests for for okay >> uh cl uh >> so we'll keep status quo and I mean or we just ra raise discussion the full second >> I I think because we're I think my My understanding would be um that this was the only board policy um that we pulled for discussion so that we would be on track to approve all the other policies as written at the

232next read, but that this one we're not sure. We may have it on the agenda next month of approving it with different wording or we may put it on the agenda at a later date with different >> I don't know if we've officially pulled it. I think we've discussed it. Um how >> I see what you're saying. I think maybe we need to pull it we would pull it at the next meeting. Yeah. >> Uh so there's no action tonight. Um uh I can bring it back with revisions next meeting. We can leave it as is next meeting and um pull it, table it, do whatever we need to do next meeting. And um maybe I'll have uh between now and then uh had the opportunity to update board and board update with additional information

233that can inform that. So we ne at next meeting in in the interim we get some additional information but at next meeting it's going to be part of the consent agenda unless we agree and vote on to pull it. Is that how it or there's a second and then >> that's probably what I would recommend. we would move everything up like we normally do since there's no direction and at that point you guys pull it make a a different decision um and and we go from there unless there's substantive information that comes out between now and then and we're able to make that decision at the time. >> Okay. I don't I don't understand. Okay. I think I got it. So for now we just continue on. >> I'm sorry. what to do. Now >>

234I think the uh conversation comes back. Do you want to have additional discussion on this? >> And if the answer is yes, uh we won't put it up for approval next time, we'll put it as a discussion item. >> It sounds like there's certainly some of our trustees that would like additional discussion. Is that kind of what I'm hearing? If not, maybe all of us having additional discussion. So, we should pull it or we should have have it for additional discussion next week andor at another time. Is that is that what I'm hear? Trusty Bruno, what do you what do you Sorry, I I'm not trying to count. Can we not just put it this bylaw on our agenda for the next meeting? >> Oh, we c we can't. >> I feel like I feel

235like we clearly need to do that, but maybe I'm missing >> Yeah. >> Right. >> Yeah. Uh it the other the other ones will go into consent for approval. >> Yes. >> Um this one would be its own item. >> That would be up for discussion. >> Got it. >> Yes. >> Absolutely. >> Yes. >> Perfect. >> Okay. >> It's a discussion item. I know you were clear. >> Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Good. >> Go for it. Let's do that. >> Have to do anything official with that? >> There's no action. You cannot. >> No, I mean to say like we we just did. We just did. We're moving on. Okay. >> Yes. Thank you. Uh, okay. Good. Item 21. H, future board agenda items. Well, we have just done one. >> We will add that

236one. >> Yeah. >> Let's see what we have. >> I'm sorry. Uh, >> that's okay. >> Uh, future agenda items. Uh, school highlight central. Uh, declaration of need. um uh is a is a a normal through HR. Uh we will have a a budget um uh um presentation. I will just say CBO Matsumoto is working to get us our budget in advance. We always come up with the crunch when budget and LCAP is being developed simultaneously. Um, with with CBO Matsumoto getting a jump on the budget, that gives uh assistant superintendent who a little bit more uh leeway and and hopefully a bit little bit more time there. Um, we're showing the April 23rd board study session. Uh, special programs. Uh, that's a holdover from our January. Uh, we have construction update and board governance.

237Uh and then uh May school highlight is Rston uh public hearing for the budget public hearing for LCAP that has to happen in advance of the formal adoption in June. And we will have had a 2 by 2 by two city and district uh uh meeting. So we'll have a debrief there. >> Superintendent Dora, can you make a note that it's now May 14th? >> Thank you. Thank you. My apologies. Uh uh May 21st um is um uh open houses and all of y'all have kiddos in our schools and likely want to go to open house. Um so um I believe we socialized May 14th. Is that correct? >> Everybody we we can't officially take action but I will advertise uh that as draft and we'll make sure or tentative we'll put that on our

238calendar. uh we will have on the consent agenda a formal uh change at that meeting in April. Thank you, Miss Alger. >> Trusty Burner, >> specifically name advisory board as a thing to talk about on both these next meetings. >> Um I'm not sure that you want them to report to every meeting. Um uh it's >> I think it's just because it's they'll have just been formed and we'd like to see their direction, what they what their plans are and their agenda as they move forward. I think I I for one would like to see what they're thinking. Not not necessarily every meeting have them here to say something, but to just get kicked off. and having a board meeting that you have to go to kind of says, "Oh, I have to go and

239do something." >> Hey, um, is that the May 14th or are you looking at the April 16th? >> Um, either or. >> Okay. >> My >> I I think if I may, sorry, sorry to interrupt. Um, if it would I would like to see um sooner rather than later. Like I I would appreciate an April 16th. and and I I think important pieces of information that I would like to know are like the goals. Um >> the >> yeah the chairs yeah like it doesn't need to be any kind of like you know >> so they will have had one meeting likely before April 16th that will be their formation meeting. Um, we want to push that committee to have a formal board report on April 16th. >> To be clear, I was only suggesting

240in the same way that I see like a 2 by2 x2 debrief like and and maybe I'm highlighting that doesn't need to be highlighted, but because I see that there in the same way that like that debrief like they're not reporting to me, those who were there are reporting. And I'm thinking if you or the board members, I'm sorry, I forgot already. You two would share out literally how it went that it was formed. the things you just said. It might be short. Yeah. I >> I don't necessarily think it needs to be like the committee coming. >> I don't mean to push the committee, >> but I think putting it on the agenda so that we can talk about it at the next meeting would be appreciated. >> Great. Uh that Nope. So, uh

241the trustees who are participating are presenting. Great. That's that's not a problem. >> Correct. >> You're not getting elaborate slides. I'm not giving you slides. >> Reese could do it. Uh one of the reasons could do that. Um same similar question that I like I genuine suggestion and you because I know I don't know if we normally do it but given current animations and maybe it's just my own in May uh some sort of report of like placement numbers kind of where we end up like if that could be named as a thing. So, so I have two two things to add. one. Um, this is if if appropriate, certainly at least by June, I would love to hear uh another update on just the the infrastructure bond from a specific like the tanches and

242just tanch one and just how some of the u the items are progressing especially, you know, I know we were all getting excited around Rson's field and that track and you know, that kind of stuff like you know, plan that is Not Tranch one. >> We have a a construction update. >> Sorry. Where is that on the thing? Did >> I miss it? >> Got to go. >> Oh, I didn't move over enough. >> Study session working session. >> Sorry, it's on there. I didn't I didn't scroll. Swipe left or swipe right. Okay. Um, the other thing I I I wanted to bring up and and it was advised for a special retreat, but when I was piggybacking, sorry, let me speak. piggybacking on what we were just kind of talking about volunteerism and and

243an upcoming election. It was I enjoyed um speaking last time about what it meant to be a trustee on a board for those who might be interested or thinking about um running and so I thought that that would be good to certainly continue that tradition and trend of of having that. Superan Duo mentioned that probably would be more appropriate like a special meeting where we just sit around and talk. Do you have any ideas of a of of a count of calendaring for that yet? Or >> April 29th and May 11th are the two dates that are up >> here at the county office. >> And have you been socializing that with the board? >> Oh, I have to get by. Is that the the Okay, >> that's what we have reserved. So, it needs

244to be socialized and decided. >> Okay. Um, which one's the Monday one? All right. So, um, >> sorry. Uh, >> May 11th. >> Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. We'll I I'll get back to we'll we'll socialize it then. >> So, May 11th is >> I know I'm saying that. Got it. Yeah. We'll I'll I'll I'll group with you. Okay. That was my two. So with that, we don't have to Okay, great. So we don't have to reconvene to close session. So with that, we can adjourn at 10:04 p.m. Well, 10:04 p.m. 10:04 p.m. Thank you all. >> Okay, we made it.