CCSD BOARD OF EDUCATION Regular Meeting: February 9, 2026

001Good evening everyone and welcome to this meeting of the Canton City Schools Board of Education for Monday, February 9th here in downtown Canton. I ask everyone to please silence your devices at this time. Would you please rise for the Pledge of Allegiance? I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. In case you haven't noticed, our boys basketball team is going for win number 2,000 tomorrow at the Fieldhouse, a truly historical achievement. If we accomplish this tomorrow, we will become the first team in Ohio and the ninth nationally to have 2,000 wins. We would like to encourage everyone to be a part of history and let's pack to Fieldhouse. We also want to

002congratulate Manny Haukius and our speech and debate team. They had 10 state qualifiers this year. Once again, another very remarkable achievement. Mr. Gruber, would you call the roll, sir? Mr. Van Olmen? Present. Mr. Parks? Here. Ms. Lackins? Here. Mrs. Brown? Here. Mr. Russ? Here. I'll make the motion to approve the agenda as written. Second. Any changes or corrections? Yes, Mr. President. There are two this evening. The first one occurs on page five at the bottom. Teacher of record, Theresa Koulos, we need to remove that from the agenda because it was actually approved at last month's meeting. Any second and final changes this evening is on page eight. Under leave of absences, Tabitha Brunner, the date should be changed through March 2nd, 2026. And that's it. Thank you, Mr. Gruber. Any other changes or corrections? Hearing

003none, roll call vote. Mr. Van Olmen? Aye. Mr. Parks? Aye. Ms. Lackins? Aye. Mrs. Brown? Aye. Mr. Russ? Aye. I'll make the motion to approve the minutes for the January 5th, 2026 organizational meeting, the January 5th, 2026 regular meeting, the January 12th, 2026 special meeting, and the January 26th, 2026 special meeting. Second. Any changes or corrections? Hearing none, roll call vote. Mr. Van Olmen? Aye. Mr. Parks? Aye. Ms. Lackins? Aye. Mr. Brown? Aye. Mr. Russ? Aye. Is there a presentation? I don't have a presentation, but it will take place in my superintendent's court. Okay. Need for an executive session at the beginning. No, sir. Okay. Hearing of the public, do we have anyone signed up, Mr. Gruber? Yes, we do, Mr. President. Before I call this evening's speaker, we ask the speaker to state their

004name and address and whether they are a resident of the district for the record. Remind the speaker that the board allows three minutes for each individual to address the board. And finally, the president may rule out of order any person using disrespect, obscenities, or arguing a point. This evening's speaker is Mr. Eric Resnick. Eric Resnick, 1828 Grace Avenue Northeast, and I am a resident of the Canton City School District. I'm here this evening to address the public regarding House Bill 671, which appeared six days ago and is currently in the House Finance Committee. Its sponsor is Representative Jamie Callender of Painesville. The bill is getting attention because it seeks to withhold state foundation funding from any school district that challenges the constitutionality of the Ed Choice vouchers, which were found unconstitutional in June. The Canton

005City School District participates in this litigation, and as the convener of the Council of Governments that is doing this, known as Vouchers Heard Ohio Campaign, I want to be perfectly clear about a few things. Number one, Representative Callender has been an enemy of public school districts his entire career. He chaired the Education Committee in the early 2000s and oversaw the voucher program's first expansion. He was and is also a champion of charter schools. He's known as, quote, one of David Brennan's greatest achievements. Two, this is the equivalent of a legislative temper tantrum. Judge Page declared Ed Choice vouchers unconstitutional, and the state is now struggling to appeal. The case is now before the 10th District Court of Appeals. This legislation is also unconstitutional, and we quickly put out a statement which says, in part, that

006the coalition stands behind its members, approximately 330 public school districts, and is prepared to challenge any legislation that withholds funding from districts that protect Ohio's constitutional rights. School districts have a constitutional right and a duty to challenge unconstitutional state laws. In fact, it's done all the time. Our attorney, Mark Wallach, told the steering committee, quote, It would give me great pleasure to sue and have it declared unconstitutional if the idiots in the legislature pass it and the spineless governor signs it. Four, this is the latest in a 25-year Republican mission to destroy Ohio's public school districts and comes from the same place as the failure to fund the Fair School Funding Plan, which is now causing crisis in this district. Our state rep, Jim Thomas, voted against funding the Canton City schools, and so did

007Senator Jane Timkin. This community needs to unite in opposition to those who cast their votes against the children and families of this district. And if they choose bullying tactics and unconstitutional schemes rather than serving this community and funding this district, there will be opposition, and I urge the Canton City Schools family to join me in this action. Thank you, Mr. Resnick. Any other speakers? No, sir. Okay. Superintendent Talbot, response to the previous public speaks. Thank you, President Russ. At our last board meeting, we had a public speaks community member talk about our wrestling program and their protocols when it comes to showering, and so we reached out to our athletic department who sent over their protocols, and I just want to reiterate those protocols that we have in place with our wrestlers. So all wrestlers

008will ask after practice to shower immediately, and there's antibacterial soap made available for them. If they are not able to shower right after practice, they are to use body wipes that are also provided. Those wipes are antibacterial wipes, and they're approved by our athletic trainer and provided to every wrestler on a daily basis. Everything that they wear is washed. That's their workout clothes, their singlets, towels, and their head gear is disinfected daily. They are to wear clean clothes. They're always to bring a fresh, clean workout clothes and a clean towel daily. They wash their hands frequently, again, with soap and water, and they wear shower shoes when they shower, and they use flip-flops because our showers are shared. What to avoid, again, they're told never to share towels, razors, and nail clippers, water bottles, and

009any other topical ointments that they apply. They are also instructed not to enter whirlpools if they have any open wounds that they have. Some of the skin health and reporting, we ask them to trim their nails regularly and to report all skin issues to their coach or athletic trainers to monitor and look for unusual spots, rashes, and bumps before each practice. If they have any of these issues and they are asked to remain out of competition and or practices, they are not to return until they have been officially cleared by our medical staff, our health care provider, or our trainer. So those are all the things that we have in place and we are doing. And those were updated immediately following the board meeting where we had our visitors. Thank you, Superintendent Talbert. Treasurer's report.

010Treasurer Gruber. Yes, Mr. President. This evening I'm going to have two recommendations. We'll start off with item number one, which is a long list of donations that the district greatly appreciates. So moved. Any questions or comments? Hearing none, roll call vote. Mr. Van Almen. Aye. Mr. Parks. Aye. Ms. Watkins. Aye. Mrs. Brown. Aye. Mr. Russ. Aye. All right, the second and final item this evening under the Treasurer's report is the recommendation that the board adopt the fiscal year 2026 forecast as presented in Exhibit T1. So moved. Second. Any questions or comments? Present. I've just prepared some comments here summarizing the forecast that you see in Exhibit T1. This forecast considers the loss of state revenue support, building closures, school consolidations, attendance zone changes, reductions in staff, and reductions in purchase services, materials, and supplies, starting

011with revenues. Loss of state support of $4.5 million this school year and every school year in the forecast moving forward. In addition, I believe what we're going to have to take a look at is also our investment income in the future. We will begin to take a look at that at the conclusion of this fiscal year. On the expense side, over the next two years, expenditure savings considered in this forecast include personnel over 70 positions and $12 million of savings over the next two years, capital outlay, savings of $2.9 million over the next two year period, materials and supplies, $1 plus million over the two year period, purchase services, $1.3 million over the two year period. And with all that being said, if you take a look at the final column on Exhibit T1, the

012district is still anticipating a negative balance in the general fund of $10.5 million. And truthfully, when we start to really get to work on this later on this spring, that might be optimistic that we're only $10.5 million in the hole. I'll wrap up by saying the forecast as presented to you this evening was approved by the Ohio Department of Education and Workforce on February 5th, 2026. This is the forecast they anticipate the district approving and filing with them. With that, I'll take any questions or comments that anyone may have. Any questions or comments? Ms. Watkins? It has been approved by the state, so they're saying that it's okay that we're going to be that much in the hole? Yes. And it's okay with them? Correct. Okay. Any other questions or comments? Mr. President, we don't

013do this very often, but I have a question for Mr. Gruber. So with that negative $10 million that we have at the end of this forecast, you will do another forecast in September? I believe the filing is due in August. In August now? So what will happen if that number is in your next forecast if there's still a negative number at that spot? We'll have to go through the same exercise that we began in December of 2025. It'll be oversight by the Ohio Department of Education and Workforce, and we'll have to follow the exact same steps that we have been following since December when it concluded on I believe was January 26. Okay. And that is, and I heard you say that that number, that minus $10 million is an optimistic number, and it could

014be more depending on how our funding shakes out. Correct. Because we don't actually know how much we're going to get because it depends on attendance of students and how many kids stay and come. Yeah. When we took a look at some of the information, like in our recent history as it relates to average daily membership, we're losing between 1% and 3% on our student population every year. That's going to have a negative impact on the amount that the state's going to fund this at a base cost. Another thing that we have to contemplate is by necessity, we're probably going to have more students walking to school next year than what we currently have. There's a possibility that our transportation reimbursement is going to go down correspondingly as we add more walkers. Another thing that's being

015contemplated by us right now is what is our investment portfolio going to yield every year? Rates are going to probably go down in the future. Interest income might be overstated as we sit here right now. There's a lot of questions that still need to be answered between now and the next time we do this. And for the new board members, it used to be for 30-some years that you actually prepared these forecasts and filed them with the state in November and May. That made too much sense, I guess. So now they moved or shifted the filing of these to August and February. As we see here right now, we only have six months of financial data to compare to actually what we have here on paper because they moved it up three months. I don't

016know the rationale why they did that, but they did it. And so I guess I'm just going to say to the board, the spring filings now, we can't say they're going to be materially correct moving forward. And then one more question, and this is for me. If, for instance, just what we put in our cuts doesn't come to fruition next year and the year after and the negative number that we have set for 2028, that past $17 million number isn't all evaporated and that negative number moves to just two years out or a year out. What would that do to us? Since you brought it up, if you take a look at fiscal year 2028, we're anticipating ending the year with only $1.3 million in cash in the general fund. So what Superintendent Talbert's saying

017is let's just say hypothetically we don't get to the numbers that I discussed. Well, there's a strong possibility in fiscal year 2028 we're actually going to be negative. And that's a whole different situation than what we just recently went through. ODU is going to expect immediate response if this number is not positive in 2028. Thank you. Any other questions from the board, Ms. Watkins? Okay, so that's very distressing news. My question is, as a community member, what can I and my other neighbors and everyone do to help support this district and help to bring in revenue to get us where we know we should be as a district? Because it looks like we got to take care of our own kids and we have to fight for our own children. So what can we do,

018starting now, that can help the district to stay the great district that it is and help educate our youth the way that they should be, quality, caring, and with enough money to be able to allow them to become the leaders of tomorrow who are going to be performing jobs that haven't even been invented yet, that they can be the innovative students that we said who will have a brighter future. What can we do? Well, I'll give you a response, and quite honestly, I might be violating board policy, but if you want to know my honest opinion on a matter, in November that's going to be one of the most important elections that's going to take place in my lifetime. The Republican Party holds a supermajority in this state. They're controlling the purse strings of the

019school districts. If we want change, we're going to have to make different choices in November. And to add to that, it is clear that Columbus isn't going to do anything different. Every time we challenge them, they double down. So when we ask questions about state funding, they double down and go the other way. When we file a lawsuit because we believe the school funding isn't fair and spending public dollars on vouchers, then they put a bill in place to hold more state funding from you like our speaker today talked about. So they're going to make it against the law for you to sue them, and if you do, we're going to hold more state funding from you. When we put things in place to help our youngest readers with preschool and expanding kindergarten and having

020a later date, then they make a law to have more kindergartners not eligible for school at the age of five. And then they have a press conference to celebrate that, that there will be more kids sitting at home without early childhood education. So we need to, when we have the ability, take the opportunity to control our own destiny. And so we talk about that when we look at, right, when we talk about our dog chart and what we value, when we say we strive for excellence and that means work hard, work together and own our work. And that's what we're going to have to do. We're going to have to put a plan in place and we're going to have to embrace the change that has to happen and make tough decisions on what this

021district's going to look like so we can live within our means. Because if we don't, we are not going to get to make these decisions. And that is the piece that, you know, when Mr. Gruber states that we don't either grow that $1.3 million in 2028 for next year, and we let that number be a negative number, we lose say. And that is a different process and they're going to expect immediate cuts and they're not going to care where they come from. And so this is our opportunity right now to make tough decisions about how we operate. And I can tell you, and Mr. Gruber mentioned it a little bit, that some of these decisions may not be decisions that some family members like. And they may choose to go elsewhere. I dare for them

022to find a product that's better than ours. But if that's what they have to do, then that's what they have to do. But if we don't make these tough decisions now, this school district is not going to be around. And that's where we are. And we're not the only school districts dealing with this. It seems like every week our local news stations are another district. Last week, Elyria was up. And so before us, Barberton was up. Before Barberton-Norton was up. Before that, Cleveland was up. Before that, Columbus was up. Every week, right? Every week there's another district that is sitting in this situation where they're making drastic cuts to programs and services that have been staples in their community. So again, during this process, we are in control. And so we have to make those

023cuts. And they have to be real so that we can stay in control of this while we live to fight the next day. To continue to fight the vouchers. To continue to fight Senate Bill 311, which is sitting out there to take our buildings from us. And continue to fight those things. While we're providing a first-class education to our folks. And again, I appreciate all the work that Mr. Gruber and his staff puts into our five-year forecast. I feel as superintendent, and I don't want to speak for Mr. Dixon, but we're well prepared when it comes to looking at where we are financially. We know what every decision we make, how it's going to impact us financially. And we are continuing to look for ways so that that $10 million number in 2029 isn't there

024in September. And if we really, really are able to effectively eliminate that number, even if we miss, 28 is good. So if we're not able to get all 10 and a half and we're able to get seven, six, then that makes 2028 look even better. And that's what's important. We cannot have a negative number. And we talked about going out for a levy in the fall of, in November of 2026. And even if we got that levy, that money would not be, we wouldn't get it until 2027, spring of 2027. And so it will be the spring of 2027. So it will really be hard for it to impact 2029. So we're really going to have to work and double down. Our goal again is to stay away from our core services, to still offer

025the quality type, quality education and programming that we offer. But they are going to have to be offered differently. And so we will continue to communicate that. There will be changes and I'm going to talk about that to the plan that we put in place that you guys voted on last month. Because we are looking to go deeper and again, looking to avoid any mishaps on this. And so we will continue each month. We will continue to come back. And if there's something that we need to change in order to save more money, we will. But at this point in time, our goal is to continue to offer high quality programs to every student in this district. And continue our positive momentum towards reaching our goals. So thank you, Mr. Gruber. I have another question.

026Ms. Walton. This may be, you may have to answer this later. But I know that one of the goals that you all have had was to put this district in a place where we can generate our own money. And I know that the purpose in a lot of our new buildings and the baseball field, all of those areas are areas where we will be able to pull in money ourselves. Can you talk about that a little bit? So, yes, one of the things that I think we do a great job of is offering extracurriculars for our students. And in a lot of districts, those extracurriculars come as a kind of a pay to play type of opportunity. And as we look at just around the country, everything that kids do after school comes with a

027price tag. And so what you see is this wider gap growing between the haves and the have-nots when it comes to opportunity. And so a lot of those types of things we've supported through our general fund. Way back when, and I'm telling my age, way back when when I was in school, that our athletic program generated a lot of money. And it was one of the few athletic programs that was kind of self-sustaining. That doesn't happen anymore. So if you watch, you see districts implementing pay to play. And pay to play can be quite expensive. So what we've decided to do was to create opportunities to where our athletic department can generate funds. And so you do that through selling tickets at games and selling concessions and doing those types of things. And so we

028have property that we lease, that we receive money from. And that property is the property that Hall of Fame Billet sits on. And we receive quarterly lease payments from them. And that will be used to support athletics. But the two new, the Bulldog Activity Center is when that activity center is not being used by Canton City school kids, the people using it are paying a rental fee. Those rental fees go directly to supporting our athletic program and helping our kids. A lot of opportunities that happen in that building, the people are able also to get a break on their rental free if they offer training and opportunities for our kids. So that's also getting our students opportunities. Also, there are naming rights to fields and signage and things that go in that are bringing in

029advertising revenue in that facility as well. The same with Munson. Munson is used by our baseball team. And when they're not there, that field, people are paying us to play there. And our, just like our baseball season runs from February. It's hard to believe. Now baseball is getting a race start, but they'll be inside. But it'll run from February to late May, early June. But the field is used pretty much every day that the weather permits from that time until October, November. And there are two fields there. And those fields, every time it's not our kids using that field, somebody is paying us to use it. And that money goes back into it. And so those are generating, that's generating dollars that we can put into our athletic fund, which keeps us from having to

030transfer money from the general fund. Now, we still have to transfer money to the general fund. Athletics cost a lot. There's transportation. There's coaches and those types of things. But again, just as a part of this plan, that's been reduced. And so the athletic department is now ramping up ways to do this. Having these two facilities makes it easier for them. And like you said, with the rental properties and the rentals in those two facilities, and the lease payments that we receive from the properties up on the McKinley campus that Hall of Fame Village is renting, we're near a million dollars in revenue generated for athletics. And so that's a lot of change. And so they're going to, when they take in their ticket revenues, that's another 300,000 that they can do in ticket revenues.

031And they're going to have to do some fundraisers. But that allows us to buy equipment, clothing, to have team meals, to have insurance, right? Those types of things for our kids that they have an opportunity. And again, all of those things allows us to provide access to our students. Some of our other things are the co-curriculars. The co-curriculars, band, choir, those performance groups. The co-curriculars are just that. They're co-curriculars so they can be funded through some of our other funding mechanisms. And that helps as well. But they have things that happen outside that have to be supported by the general fund too. So any weight we can take off the general fund from athletics helps support all those other programs. So when people talk about those facilities, and what I think people really need to

032understand is that over the last couple of years, we've been able to add facilities without using local taxpayer monies to do so. And I think that that's a key. People have to understand that the Bulldog Activity Center was built with federal funds. The additions to Crenshaw and to STEAM were built using federal funds. And I've seen these online. The turf field that people talk about at Crenshaw was donated by the NFL and trucked up here from New Orleans. And so yes, did we put funding into that? Yes, we did. But we got that bill for half of what it would cost to have that field. So the two new buildings that are going up are paid for by the renewing, basically the renewing of a bond issue that built this building that we sit in

033here now. So while it really didn't increase taxes. So over this whole time period, we've got all of these structures without any new costs and with very little operating funds being put into them. So that is something that this community should be proud of, that there was a plan put in place to give us facilities that will last for 30-plus years that are bringing in revenue that had very little impact on the money we used to operate this district. And I wish that I could take all the credit for coming up with those ideas. But that is about sharing and brainstorming with other people and using that. And we were able to put it in place. And that's going to benefit us. And I'm going to tell you that if we didn't use that money

034this way, especially the money used to do the BAC and the projects at STEAM and Crenshaw, we would have, we'd be cutting way more staff this year than what we are cutting now. Because that money could only be used for expanding buildings and creating more space and creating opportunities to bring kids back and get kids involved before, during, and after school. Or hiring people. And the districts that hire people are cutting all of those people right now as we speak. Because the money was not given renewed. So we received $100 million. So just think, if we had $100 million worth of staff, additional staff that we would have to cut because they did not replace that $100 million. So we are, again, we are not in a great place. And we still have to do

035some things, but we are much better off, I think, going forward because we have facilities, again, that are, that can generate revenue for our athletics to take, to help us in this difficult time to keep athletics from being something that is draining our general fund budget. That's a great question. I have another question. Thank you for that lead-in. Thank you. I have another question. How is all the cutting and programs, disappearance, what is that doing to our special ed department? Because I'm very concerned about that because as I've known in the past, I didn't know if charter schools accepted special ed students, that that primarily is put on Canton City to provide that. So since we're the only ones who provide the educational needs that our children with special needs need, what is going to

036happen with that? So as of right now, and you're going to hear me say right now, as of right now, at this point in time, a lot, because things change every day. But there are no plans to reduce special education services just because we need to make cuts. There are places where enrollments shifted and numbers may be down, so that somebody might leave and we might not replace them because we don't need a person in that role right now. But special ed is something that we're mandated to provide by federal law. So we will provide it. It is one of the few federal funds that hasn't been cut. And so it has not been cut at this time. So we still are receiving those federal funds that we have to use for those purposes. And

037we do a great job with special education. And a lot of folks, a lot of people seek us out to provide that service for them. And even folks in other districts want to come here and work with us. And we continue to strive. We've got a great team, people who work really hard. And we've got some great inclusive practices happening all over the district. So I think we do a really good job of that. We will continue to do that. Because, you know, it is mandated and it is something that they've not taken away. We will continue to do that. And we are also looking to offer some programming, some unique program that we'll talk about maybe next month that will also be a way for us to generate more revenue. Again, we have to

038look for ways to generate revenue that does not rely on our taxpayers, does not rely on the folks in Columbus. And then it also allows us to take advantage of some of the unique things that we have here in the district, that other districts don't have. And so we have some folks in our special ed department working on a plan right now. And we might be able to bring that next month. If not, it will be a month following. Thank you. Thank you, Ms. Watkins. Any other questions? Mr. Parks. I wanted to be able to make a comment and follow up with a question. But I know that since obviously joining the board, a large focus has been on the changes that we've had to make. And the community being involved and making sure that

039they understand that. I just first want to give you kudos to the team for the challenges that are presented and the way that you guys have handled it. I think it's very important to reiterate that the things that you've done have been because we've had to make certain changes. But even prior to that, what we've been able to bring into the district and the way we've been able to generate funds have come from federal funds. They haven't come from us exhausting or improper management of funding. So I just want to give you kudos for that. But my question would be, and I know within the strategic plan, it's stated a few times, getting the community more involved. I know your question about what are some things that you could do at a large scale. And

040Mr. Gruber, your answer focused on things in Columbus. But one of the things that we've been doing since this plan has been rolled out is having touch points for the community. Can you speak to ways that the community can stay involved with understanding what's happening financially, what we've done, just so that way they can be educated and also join the support team for things that we have to do? So can you speak to that? I think we have to continue to explore opportunities to get in front of our community and then reach them where they are. Tomorrow night, we have a parent advisory meeting that I will be attending. And the purpose of starting that, we have one that's a district-wide one, and we also have one that is a McKinley one as well. And

041I will attend that meeting, and we've got a group of parents who are on that committee who are folks that are very, very visible with other groups within the community. And our goal is to give them the knowledge so that they can reach out. Also in the hopper are some short two to three minute videos that I will be shooting that we will put on social media to address some of the questions that we are getting, that we are seeing, some of the concerns what you brought up about revenue and the facilities and where our money is going and those different things. And to get those snippets out, what we're finding is you guys, during this whole process, we've had a lot of media coverage, right? And the media has, all of them have kind

042of harped on. Cutting 70 positions, oh, $17 million in the hole, but not on all the, like, why that's happening. Why do we have to cut? Why are 70 positions? That part has been left out. And so it's really easy for people to get this picture like, oh, right, like, there's been bad financial management, right? It's just like, you know, I remember seeing the one article that just was like, they built this, built this, but now they're out of money. Sounds like bad budgeting. But it's like, that didn't cost any money. That didn't cost any money. That wasn't any additional money. That was half price. It's not budgeting. And so how can we tell that story and get that out? Because the news media isn't there. And if you see something online, especially from the

043newspaper print media, traditional print media, you have to pay to get it. And if you don't pay, you just get the headline. And so in the headline doesn't necessarily tell the whole story. Now, if you read the whole story, we've got great support from our print media. The last couple of articles that we've had about the budget was written by Sharita Gache, and she does a good job of and Mrs. Knapp does a good job. And I believe it's fair reporting locally. So I can't speak on the people outside our community, but locally we get fair reporting. But you got to buy the paper to get to see those great articles. So we're going to work to get some more out and to get little snippets and get those out to people. But but we

044need to be out in our community. We need to be out with our parents. And we need our parents to see that where we were as a district pre pandemic to where we are six years, seven years later is a completely different school district. And that things have shifted and things are absolutely headed in the right direction. And we are the choice that they should make. We have great staff. We have great programming. And every change that we're making right now is to ensure that that programming is protected and allowed to remain in place and allow to continue to grow. And that we're able to increase opportunities for students while living within the means that we have because there is no guarantee that more money is coming. And again, Mr. Gruber and I are both

045the same way. We've never seen the state of Ohio take money from a school district, money that they've already given and allocated. This is the first time. And so knowing that that is something now that they are willing to do, even if we have money that we can put into a forecast, we can't guarantee that it's going to remain there throughout that whole forecast. We have to do a good job of building the bank. And with the new tax laws and the property tax laws, even if we do save money, they can go back and reduce our levies and what we can bring in and take money from us that way. So, again, we have to live within our means. That means that we can no longer talk about right-sizing the number of buildings we

046have, right-sizing the number of programs we have, right-sizing our staff that when we lose our 90 certified people that we lose every year, then that number that we let go has to be closer to 90. When we lose people, we lose over the culture of the year, over 100 of our classified members choose to leave us, every position needs to be looked at and we let those people go. We need to leave those positions blank. We need to right-size because I don't see prices for gas and prices for materials and prices for supplies going down anytime soon. So those costs are still going to be there. I don't see prices that we pay for our wages, for our people going down. I don't see health care going down. I don't see any of that going

047down. So we need to live within our means. Again, if we don't, the folks for Columbus will come here and they will take over and make it and then they will decide what our class sizes should be. And what they will do is they will look at something probably called the CUP report and say you need to be like them. And that's just numbers on a piece of paper. And it doesn't take into account who our kids are and what our community needs. That's a similar district and they spend this much and you're going to spend that much. And if we do that, if they do that, that will be a sad day for the city of Kent. I just want to say this. When I was a principal, I learned about the power that

048our parents in our community possess. And I wish that because of the attack that's happening to our children, I just really wish the day will come that our parents in our community will fight with us, start writing your state rep, putting out emails, calling them and getting on their nerves and let them know, hey, you won't get my vote if this is what you're going to do to my kids. And I would just like to command anybody listening or everybody sitting here, start putting our mouths on this and let them know that our kids are important too. Our children are our leaders for tomorrow. And one thing I remember I saw on the news was somebody said, oh, I love dumb people. We're not dumb people and our kids aren't dumb either, but they want

049to dummy them down. So we have to now be the ones to fight not only for this district, for our teachers, for our staff. We have to fight for the very future of our children because they're trying to dummy them down. They're trying to make them the losers that for some reason people up there believe our poor children are. So I'm just compelling people who are in agencies, people who are sitting at home just thinking this isn't right. Put it on an email and send it to the appropriate person because you possess the power. You possess the way this thing will turn out if you turn out. And that's all I have to say. Thank you, Ms. Watkins. Any other questions from the board? I just have one statement. We don't want to wait till

050November. We want to start now asking the representatives questions about what they feel or how they voted. Make them be honest about how they voted for public schools. Make them accountable for what they've done and what they've not done. We've got to ask them, the new people that want to represent us, make sure that they are in our best interest and not their own agenda. Because it's not about their agenda. It's about the agenda of the community. I'll just add, know who you're voting for and what they stand for. Any other questions from the board? Because the other issue we're going to be looking dead in the face is probably in November, there will be a property tax issue on the ballot about eliminating property taxes. For the people that don't realize, this affects way

051more than just school districts. Your police, your fire, and the townships, roads and bridges, libraries, the Stark MRDD, and parks and rec are all funded through property taxes. Eliminating property taxes eliminates all those services that you enjoy. With that, thank you, Treasurer Gruber. Superintendent Talbert, you're up. We've got to vote on that. Oh, I'm sorry. Roll call vote, sir. Mr. Van Olmen. Aye. Mr. Parks. Aye. Ms. Watkins. Aye. Mrs. Brown. Aye. Mr. Russ. Aye. One now, Superintendent Talbert. Thank you. Mr. President, I recommend the Board of Education approve Section A Human Resources certified staff, which tonight includes retirements and resignations, leave of absences, appointments, and adjustments. So moved. Any questions or comments from the board? Hearing none, roll call vote. Mr. Van Olmen. Aye. Mr. Parks. Aye. Ms. Watkins. Aye. Mr. Brown. Aye. Mr. Russ.

052Aye. Mr. President, I recommend that the Board of Education approve Section B Human Resources classified staff, which tonight includes retirements and resignations, leaves of absences, appointments, and adjustments. So moved. Second. Any questions or comments? Hearing none, roll call vote. Mr. Van Olmen. Aye. Mr. Parks. Aye. Ms. Watkins. Aye. Mr. Brown. Aye. Mr. Russ. Aye. Mr. President, I recommend under Educational Service Report Section C, I recommend that the Board approve item number one, which is our school calendars for the 26th, 27th school year. So moved. Second. Any questions or comments? Hearing none, roll call vote. Mr. Van Olmen. Aye. Mr. Parks. Aye. Ms. Watkins. Aye. Mr. Brown. Aye. Mr. Russ. Aye. Mr. President, I recommend that the Board of Education approve Section C Education Service Report item number two, which is overnight and out of state

053field trips. So moved. Second. Any questions or comments? Hearing none, roll call vote. Mr. Van Olmen. Aye. Mr. Parks. Aye. Ms. Watkins. Aye. Mr. Brown. Aye. Mr. Russ. Aye. Mr. President, under Operations, I recommend that the Board approve item number one, which is a resolution giving us the authority to place a bid for new buses or vans. So moved. Second. Any questions or comments from the Board? Ms. Watkins. How long do we keep buses and vans? 10 plus years. So what we're looking at are those 10 plus years of getting those replaced. Okay. Thank you, Ms. Watkins. Yeah. Good. My question is, are we still in that aggregate for the bidding? Any other questions from the Board? Hearing none, roll call vote. Mr. Van Olmen. Aye. Mr. Parks. Aye. Ms. Watkins. Aye. Mr. Brown. Aye.

054Mr. Russ. Aye. Mr. President, I recommend that the Board of Education approve section three, Operations Report item number two, an easement agreement for sanitary sewer facilities for the new Lincoln Elementary. So moved. Second. Any questions or comments? Hearing none, roll call vote. Mr. Van Olmen. Aye. Mr. Parks. Aye. Ms. Watkins. Aye. Mr. Brown. Aye. Mr. Russ. Aye. And then finally, Mr. President, I recommend the Board approve section D, Operations Report item number three, which is a resolution toward the contract for e-rate category two network equipment and managed internal broadband services. So moved. Second. Any questions or comments? I have a question. Ms. Watkins. I know it's going to save us money. Did you say how much to go with this company as opposed? No, this isn't our, I think you're talking about our student information

055system. Yeah, the student information system will save us when it's fully implemented, about $200,000 a year. But this year is federal money that we receive, a grant we receive to upgrade some of our network systems. And so we're going to receive what? Over $400,000 to get upgrade our network systems. And this is, and so we're going with this Lake Tech company to do this work for us. Okay. I'm kind of confused. No problem. Thank you. Thank you, Ms. Watkins. Any other questions from the Board? Hearing none, roll call vote. Mr. Van Ollen. Aye. Mr. Parks. Aye. Ms. Watkins. Aye. Mr. Brown. Aye. Mr. Rose. Aye. Thank you. And then one final thing on my superintendent's report. Last month, during the approval of the plan, one of the things that we announced was that seventh graders,

056our rising sixth graders who will be choosing their middle schools for next year, would not have the option of going to early college middle school in its current structure. And we added that plan late. And so I'd like to start off by issuing an apology to our staff and families, because when we do this, when we usually do this, we usually give an opportunity, especially for staff, to have a face-to-face meeting with us. And because of the snow day, we weren't able to do that. And so it was a shock to some people to kind of hear that. But, and you guys as well, it was something that we brought to you guys very late in the day. But we promised you a plan on what that would look like today. And so I'm going

057to give you today a 30,000-foot view. And the reason why I'm going to give you a 30,000-foot view is because we still want to work with the peeps who are going to implement it to put this plan together. So we've kind of done a good job, I think, so far of putting it together. I like to use the word loose and tight. So what are the non-negotiables for this program as we transition it to STEAM and to Crenshaw? And then as we continue to work with the buildings principals and the teams, they will continue to put the meat on the bones as we move forward. Again, this plan is for rising sixth graders. So it doesn't impact any current students at early college. So the current seventh graders will be allowed to go on to

058eighth grade. The current eighth graders will make their decision whether they want to go to early college and go through that process, or actually I think their first meeting for that, or visits for that happened this past weekend, I think. They'll be able to apply to go into early college high school or to one of our other high school offerings. But the current students sitting in sixth grade will get the early college, middle school experience that will look a little different. We believe it will be the same offering, but just a little different. And so just in order to explain this, also in this plan, because of some shifting that's happening, there will be some other tweaks to other parts of our plan. And I can assure you that the buildings impacted by that had

059an opportunity to meet with me today and talk as well before. So they're not hearing it for the first time today with me speaking here. So I'm going to take you back to our strategic plan, and everything begins and kind of starts there. But when we talked about our strategic plan back in the spring of last year and back in the fall of this year, October-ish, we were talking about creating an opportunity for every student to have the ability to make a meaningful choice. And when we talk about the choice options that we had in the district, we had Arts Academy, right, which was a choice school that started, you could have your kid, your parents can enroll you there in kindergarten, but it wasn't the arts program, and the arts program started in fourth

060actually. And that was a choice that parents could make. There was an application process, but there were very few spots for kids to get into that. Then STEAM came on board, and STEAM became a choice. And if you remember, STEAM was sixth, seventh, and eighth. Then we expanded it during our last redesign to include fourth graders, trying to increase the number of kids who got choice. Also during our last redesign, we brought back the early college middle school program. But before that, we had early college. Early college was a choice that started in ninth grade that parents could make. And you had your high school experience, which was killing, your typical high school experience, or you could choose to go to early college. And that was a choice that parents could make. All of those

061choices had limited seats. And so there were so many kids whose choice would be McKinley, Crenshaw, or Lehman, or one of your neighborhood elementaries, or a charter, or non-pub, or private. And so with this strategic plan, we are really focusing on how do we create opportunities for every kid in the Kansas City School District to make a meaningful choice in how they are educated. And so we came up with what we are affectionately calling the champion's way because Kansas City Schools is where champions are made and success is tradition. And it's our choice pathways that will be starting. And we talked about that back in October. And so this slide is from that October presentation. So that we will have a creativity and design pathway, again, that is K-12, discovery and innovation, again, K-12, leadership

062and service, K-12, and McKinley Early College High School, or the Early College Pathway, again, 7-12, and then Choices High School, which was 9-12, which is our options, so that every student can make a choice in how they learn best. And again, getting students to align what they're taking, how they're learning, to what they're interested in and their interests and their talents, trying to increase relevance and engagement as we do so for all kids. And so that was our – that's our plan. That is still our plan. Even though we are faced with having to make these cuts, we want to do that. We believe if we're going to stay competitive in this market, where, again, no other school in our county has as many options located within their community as we do. And again, there

063is a purpose behind that. But we need to be able to compete. And so we have to try to do so by remaining fiscally responsible. So what has changed since then is that we believe right now we offer our middle school programming in three locations. We have 959 students total in the seventh and eighth – I mean, seventh and eighth grade combined. We have more staff because of our three locations than we need to meet the needs of those students. And so by having all of our middle school services provided in two locations, again, the same quality, the same level, just in two locations and not three, we will make significant savings. And we will do that by reducing redundancies in staffing, getting really tighter in our staff to student ratio, and also cutting down

064on transportation that happens in between campuses and after school for providing programs. Again, those savings will allow us to increase opportunities for students. So this is what our middle school program will look like when we get it built. And I need people to understand that. Next year we're starting in the seventh. And there are some pieces and parts on here that will be built in 27-28. And that we are also still developing the pathways, which those programs will be in front of the board. The curriculum pieces will be in front of the board for the new pathways. The curriculum pieces will be in front of the board next fall for your approval in the course guide and then for implementation the following year. That's the specific new things that we're going to bring forward. Some

065of the things that you've approved already, you've approved for CREDAW to explore implementing the new tech. They've already started working with tech. They've already visited some schools and very positive things that they will implement. Then in going through the process, they've been approved as an Ohio STEM Learning Network school, a true STEM school in Stark County. And that is not an easy process to happen. To becoming world schools by interdisciplinary instruction, as well as foreign language instruction. Elementary schools have failed in becoming a STEM school. Working towards becoming a STEM school. Throughout this whole process, world classes at all levels, just doing it in fewer places. While this is going on here, who you want to compare to offer is very competitive. So what will happen here is Crenshaw, next year Crenshaw moves. Crenshaw has

066distinct pathways. Crenshaw is our bigger of the two buildings. Crenshaw holds 900 students. It's also just a little over 400. About 50% capacity. So Crenshaw will have two things. One will be our creativity and design pathway. You approve moving and being part of Crenshaw. The Arts Academy moving and being a fourth grade program will be in a sense the creativity and design pathway of Crenshaw. It will be a school there, within a school, with its own leader, its own office. They're running in there. Then the other school there will be the School of Leadership and Service or Leadership and Service Academy that will be there as well. All of those schools will have an instructional model. So the kids, when we talk about kids, so who are the kids that are going to be in

067this leadership and want to sign up for this Leadership and Service Academy? As a parent, and we chose, we didn't choose entrepreneurship, we didn't choose business, these terms. We use leadership and service because we want parents at the elementary level to be able to understand that, hey, you've got a kid who is always organizing things, or the kid, you've got that kid that's kind of bossy and always telling people what to do, or when they pick a team, that team is the captain, right? Like my daughter sat in the back of the, and she was in the car seat telling me what to do from the back. You know who those kids are. You've got the kids who's dancing and singing and drawing and painting. We're using those terms so that folks at our younger

068families or younger kids are able. We're going to start talking these passions all the way down in the fourth grade so that, again, families can make meaningful choices. So when we talk about these schools, everything within these academies will be aligned to how the kids learn. And so the projects will be interdisciplinary. So the elementary programs are transitioning to being interdisciplinary and project-based. The same thing will be happening within these academies. And STEAM. STEAM is the choice school that's been around. The problem with STEAM is that that choice stopped after eighth grade. And so you made that choice, it didn't go any further. So now the discovery and innovation pathway, right, is going to be housed at STEAM, which is a science, technology, engineering, arts, math, and medicine school, and it will continue on to

069high school at McKinley, which will have the School of Discovery and Innovation. And they will work to vertically design those experiences. Each one of these pathways in the programs and academies will have CareerTech embedded in them. The CareerTech teams have already met to begin to talk about what that will look like and how they will align with the kids who receive exposure. The goal is that every kid will start talking about careers that align with their interests, again, starting in the seventh grade. Will they all be in CareerTech? Maybe not. But they all will have the opportunity to learn and to get that exposure. And it will continue all the way up through high school. Again, we are at the beginning stages of this. The high school has divided and picked their teams and their

070names. That's why I'm able to say that today. The high school will begin to pick their leaders, and they will have design teams together to build that. And even our early college has been making plans to talk about what they're going to do in their transition and how they're going to continue to prepare kids to be prepared to go to college and start their second semester or junior year on a college campus. And so that's what makes this particular shift so hard because work has been done. So to honor that work, what will happen with the early college program? And spend some time talking to their principal and all the things that they put in place. Double blocking some classes, allowing kids to earn multiple high school credit, specific grouping of kids so that not

071only can they take kids who have the coursework and are prepared for that advance and acceleration, but that kids who are on the borderline are actually getting the things that they need, even if that means taking two math courses in the same year so that they're on track to be able to take college-level math. All of those things, those are the things that we will be extremely tied to. We will be extremely tied about when we work with STEAM and Crenshaw to build this program. So what will end up happening and how this will look is that at Crenshaw and STEAM next year, there will be an early college track because those courses are so different than what's the course's content. Yep, we're all taking eighth grade math or some of us are taking algebra.

072But the expectations and the level in those classes have to be a little higher. Those kids need to get some high school credits out of the way so that they are ready to go to early college and they are prepared for the advance and accelerated coursework. The shift will be that not only will those kids be there as early college pathway students, they will also be there working as my early college pathway student who leans towards creativity. So my electives will be tied to the creativity pathway. So I want to do music, I want to do art, I want to do those types of things. I'm interested in broadcast media so I want to try to do that. I'm going to do that along with my ramped up... And those kids in early college, they're

073going to take Spanish in there because they have to get that early college out there. They're going to get their PE credit done, they're going to get their health credit done. All those things have to be out of the way. And so that's what will happen with those students. Again, it'll be probably 50 to 75 students at each one of the schools taking their classes. So they will move around together because they're going to have a common joint experience. Again, a student who is a leadership and service kid, their electives will look a little different. The students will look a little different than the kid who is the arts kid. And then at STEAM, of course, they're choosing STEAM. If I end up in the early college team at STEAM, I'm choosing it because I'm

074more interested in discovering innovation, what that science, technology, and engineering math product looks like. But my core classes are built around prepping me for what I need to get to early college. And so again, that prep, what it requires, and what those courses look like are designed from early college to high school because they know what's coming down. Again, it is advanced core instruction with elective courses that are aligned to what interests them, giving them that true, true experience, and not having them to have to make a choice in middle school about what I'm able to offer. What bogs us down money-wise is we have three locations, and we've done this, hey, let's offer everything everywhere, every student, same level, all the time. We can't continue to do that. Our neighboring districts, all the fourth

075and fifth graders are in one place. All the seventh and eighth graders are in one place, and all the things are here. Other districts, if you choose, I was just down at another meeting with another district, if you want this, then you go here. If you don't go there, you don't get this. And when we had the money, it was great to offer everything everywhere, duplication of services, but we can't do it anymore. So the more kids at a grade level we can get in one place, the more we're going to be able to offer so that we can keep the same level of offerings for our kids. And so what this does is it will allow us, at Crenshaw, we're going to ask kids, hey, think about this, parents, when you make this decision,

076talk to your kids and we're going to start working with them in the fourth and fifth grade about, hey, take this interest survey, take this, how do you learn best? Well, if it's the STEM route and you want to do robotics and you want to do pre-engineering and you want to work on, hey, go over here and do this. And now we're going to give you the same rigorous coursework if you know that, hey, in ninth grade, I want my child to be in early college. I want them to go to early college. I want them to earn an associate's degree. And that's the key. What we've got to tell people, we want to earn an associate's degree before we graduate high school because you can get college credit at McKinley and CCP. You can

077get that. But that's not early college. Early college is I'm going to get an associate's degree before I graduate. And so we want to make sure that more students than not are prepared for that. And so the program that we're building will do that. The shift is it's not LA. And so we believe that we can build that. The other shift is they're still going to get to explore full, robust career opportunities in middle school if that's what they would like to do. They will still get the opportunity to be a part of that full, robust arts program while they're getting that extra push in those extra opportunities in those classes. So that part we're really excited about. It's different. Again, what are the benefits of this? The benefits is that all of our students

078have an opportunity to be in a pathway and learn the way they learn best and learn with their interests to have things taught to them in a way that is that best fits them. But for us as a district, we get to continue to offer this first class opportunity that no one offers. Right. In a way that makes us fiscally responsible in a way that is sustainable into the future. And so that's what we're going to do. It's a change. But we believe this is the way that this is going to be able to remain for four years to come. So just to give on what happens, the shift and you see the pathways again, there's we will still have a school creativity and design, which will be nine to 12 at McKinley, which will

079be a continuation of the Arts Academy. Remember the Arts Academy before the pandemic was K-8 and it stopped. Right. And we had great arts programs and you could go join the band and you could join the choir. You could join our show choir. You could join our our percussion ensemble. But what if I'm a kid or you can take visual and you could take visual arts and take some advanced art classes. But what if I'm a kid and I want more than that? And I went to the Arts Academy and I had a lot of extra time in art, a lot of extra time in music, a lot of extra time and dance. We want to build that and continue that up through and allow kids if that is their focus, then they can go

080focus on that and hone that that we talk a lot of times about our athletic scholarships. But we have our speech team and those folks are earning money through speech that we have students every once in a while who get who get scholarships for art. And you know, my daughter came up at a time and I if you had told me that she would have been offered a full scholarship because she could sing and the amount of people who were coming after her, we have that talent, but we don't have an opportunity for a kid to major in that. And so can we build that opportunity for students? And we have students who are in broadcast arts and those kids are in photography that do a great job. And if you get in the CareerTech

081program, great, because you are majoring in that. But if you don't, right, like you're at school all day and I'm going to tell you kids vote with their feet. They're like, OK, yep, I like this class. I'll go. I don't like this class. I ain't going. And that comes back to our bottom line because we're funded by time. At the high school level, the kid walks out every day at a certain period. We lose money. That's cash on that. So this is the opportunity for us to create opportunity for every kid, for them to have a class, of course, low. And if I'm a kid who wants to do a CareerTech field, but I can't get into the CareerTech, we will have other classes or other CareerTech things that are aligned in these pathways that

082will give the kid the opportunity to work now and do work based learning. So that is all happening right now. And again, we're a year out from bringing you the first courses that will be approved for that. So if you look, there's the School of Discovery and Innovation. Again, STEAM stopped at eighth grade. Now it goes to 912. The School of Leadership and Services, we're bringing that in because we want, again, there are kids out there. And we are uniquely positioned to have business schools. You know, we were talking to someone the other day about sports management or a sports entertainment business. Our high school sits on the campus of Hall of Fame Village, and their next door neighbor is the Pro Football Hall of Fame. The Pro Football Hall of Fame has dozens of

083interns all the time, right? Our athletic department is one of the best athletic departments, biggest athletic departments in the county. We have, we host the state swim meet, we host regional, state semifinals for basketball, we host the state football. What a better place for kids to get opportunities in hospitality and sports and event management if that's something they want to do. And our college partners, Stark State, can give them college credit for those courses. And they have a partner with Akron U that will allow those kids to enroll and start. Those credits can count towards a degree in sports and entertainment management. Those are things that we want to build for kids that will hook kids to allow them to say, hey, I have to take my core because the state says I need these

084courses to graduate. But when I'm not in those courses, which is about half my day, the other half of the day, I can be doing something that is relevant and fun and passionate for me so I come to school. And that is the key in what we have to do in order to compete, because our students are living that now generation, right? If I want to watch something, I can watch it now. I don't have to wait till the next season. I don't have to watch a rerun. I can watch it now. And so that's what we have to offer to our students. And so that's what this will do. Again, we are doing this at a time that we are reducing, which means that we have to make the cuts so that we can

085take the money that we have and invest it in developing these programs that will keep us competitive in the future. So at the end of the day, what it will look like is that the creativity and design will be the Arts Academy, which will be housed at Crenshaw 4 through 8. And I will talk about what that's going to look like moving forward. And then we'll have the schools creativity and design, which will be at McKillian, which will be 9 through 12. Then arts will be offered and arts will be offered at all of our elementary schools as well. So when you think about all our elementary schools, all our elementary schools will address the creativity and design. Discovery and innovation. Discovery and innovation will be at Belden Elementary. And we hope to add one

086more elementary and we'll bring that name to you. We're pretty close to bringing that name to you next month. That will be an elementary on each side of town. That will be a Discovery Elementary. So that if families choose at the elementary level to have that STEM education be the way their kid is educated, we won't be able to transport them, but they can do through inner district open enrollment, take their kids to those schools and there will be one on each side of town so they don't have to drive all the way across town to do so. The rest of the elementary will be become IB schools, which fit in a leadership and service pathway and the creativity and design pathway. Leadership and that would be STEAM Academy. We talked about that and there

087will be a School of Discovery and Innovation at McKinley High School. Then leadership and service. Again, Crenshaw Middle School will have that. It will be seven through eight. It will also have an early college middle school option in it like the other two pathways. And then the School of Leadership and Service at McKinley High School will be there as well. Will be there. And then we will have McKinley Early College High School, which will be housed at the layman campus and will be nine through twelve. And again, the goal of that program is to have students earn associate's degrees and to also become be more often than not become full time student on the college campus starting second semester of their junior year. And that is a little bit of a shift. Right. You know,

088before now, now they spend their senior year. This is trying to get them out earlier, trying to increase the not only increase the number of kids who are able to earn associate's degrees, but also increase the number of kids who go on the college and matriculate to and finish. And so there will be some shifts there and we'll continue to talk about it. But the early cost team has been working on that for a couple of years now. As we've developed these pathways and ramped up, I like to commend the early college team because they've been talking about this for some time and they've been kind of the leaders on this, especially their high school team. And so they've done a good job, which is kind of set in the temple from where we want

089to be. And we're excited. And then choices choices has been a place that's been an alternative school and students were placed there. We believe choices is a model that some students will pick because they they need a different educational environment, whether it's, hey, I need to move through and get through high school quickly because I have other obligations or I'm really, really advanced and just sitting in a class is not my. So this is a blended model school that allows them to to be able to move through quickly. And I was brought to my attention that we actually have a student, I believe, that's going to be a sophomore next year that has moved so far ahead that is looking for a way to get into career tech as a sophomore. And they have asked

090the question. I think our whole team sat at the table was like, you can't do that. But then we've we found a way that that we think we're going to be able to do that for kids. So in that school, if you needed different hours, different days, that's a school that you would choose. But a part of that high school is also a place where for students who aren't making it in our other places for one reason or another, this is a place where we can send you that you can get back on track. And if you're credit deficient, if you've got attendance issues, you can go there and you have a chance to graduate on time. So, again, creating high quality options for all kids, narrowing down where we offer these things so that

091we can continue to offer the core so that there is something for every student. Other school districts go to school districts. You know where they send kids to go to alternative school assembly can't right because we have the program because they can't afford to do it. If we don't do it, there's nobody else rising up to stand up to do that for our students. And so we have to make sure that we remain fiscally financially solvent so we can offer these programs that don't exist. And so that's where we will be at the at the end of the day with this and where that will look. And finally, because of the conversations we've had about seventh grade, early college and moving arts, it was brought to our attention that there are rising sixth graders at

092arts who might want to stay at arts and continue to do that in the seventh. And we were like, okay, they could stay at arts because arts will move next year. But then going through it and planning, we felt that they wouldn't get the true middle school experience if we left them at the Arts Academy. So we decided that it was in our best interest to move arts now. So starting next school year, arts will move to Crenshaw. And that came up because we were going back and forth. And Mr. Dixon finally asked a question like, why aren't we moving them now? And I said, well, I didn't think you could get the building ready. He said, I could do that. And so so so we believe that that we can get the building ready

093and that, you know, the performance faces and those types of things will be ready. And and so we're going to be able to do that. It's a lot of work on the team. It's a lot of work. I met with early college today to talk to them about it. They had a lot of questions. I didn't have a lot of answers because this is we're building this ship, this plane while we're flying it. But again, leaving seventh graders at arts when it's not a full complement of middle school opportunities there would not be fair to them. And they don't get another seventh grade year. So it is better if we do this. Now, we push that domino and you know what happens when you push a domino and you got them all stacked up, a

094whole bunch of other dominoes start to fall. So what we saw was that, well, if we hit that domino summits empty and it's just left like what happens to K one, two and three. So that means that summit can become a neighborhood school next year. And so that will now happen. Well, summit becomes a neighborhood school next year. Then that's going to take kids who next year were scheduled to go to Clarendon because they live in the summit neighborhood. Now we'll go to summit. That means that Clarendon can become a case six next year. So Clarendon will become a case six next year. And that means that as of right now, the only school in Kansas City School District elementary wise that will not be a case six would be harder. Harder will be K

095four still with one hundred and sixty nine students who don't fit in Cedar who will also be going to Lincoln when Lincoln opens. And so that will help us attack that ten point five million dollars because the savings we weren't going to realize until twenty seven, twenty eight. We will now realize in twenty twenty six, twenty seven, which will give us an extra year, which will lower that number, which gives us a jumpstart on on on getting that ten point five million dollars and avoiding being under one point three. And so that's why it's important that we do this. And so we're again, we're going to continue to look at opportunities like that. We met with harder. We met with arts. We met with Crenshaw today so that their staff were aware of this moving

096forward. The Clarendon principal talked with their staff today during her time because we were all spread out. And so we will continue to work with those teams. We've got a lot of work to do with arts, a lot of quick work to do with arts as we look to to to explain to those parents what's going to happen to those kids that will be moving. And so we will do that. We have starting this week. We have parent and parent and open houses at our buildings for kids who are in and at grade levels that will be transitioning. And so at those meetings, we will have information and flyers for rising sixth graders about early college and early college middle school program in that process and what that will look like. We'll have flyers for

097them for students who will be have the opportunity to apply to arts. We will have flyers to talk about that. We'll have information for them to say, hey, the arts program still exists. It's just moving and that there will be auditions and that there will be auditions now for rising sixth graders so we can improve the number and grow the number in that and have our kids move forward. And that have arts families, arts Academy students for the seventh grade. So all that will continue to happen as we move forward. Question. So right now they have a little under 300 students enrolled and that's K through three in that building. K one, two and three won't be going. So before five and six, there are two sections of students at each grade level right now.

098So we will continue that, but we will expand that by taking seventh graders next year. And so we will have to see how many kids meet the requirements through the audition process and apply to see. But our goal is to grow that. We will also work to grow fourth grade next year as we as they start rising third graders will be auditioning. So we hope to grow third grade. The number of kids we took hope to grow fourth grade. The number of kids we took at arts in fourth grade was limited by the space that we had in the building. So we could only do two sections there. We hope to take more fourth graders next year. Yes. I think there will still be a number right there will still be a number. I don't

099that number will be higher than what it is right now, but there's going to have to be a number. But but we hope that we were going to be able to take all the kids who audition and meet the qualifications. And that's the that's the key. When we talk to arts and we've met with their staff, they're like there are a lot of kids here that aren't naturally art students. And some of them are there because they are part of the gifted program. Some of them are are are there because they're their siblings went. And so we're hoping that we can get through our kids and expand that offering and do some great things. And the arts team all year long, again, we're we're consolidating and moving the growth. The key was to grow the

100arts program from the beginning of the year as a part of our pathway. So they've been visiting other schools all school year. They've been working on making plans all school year. And the shift to move in buildings just happened because of budget cuts. So that that work they've been doing isn't wasn't wasteful that we can we can continue to grow the arts program. And so, again, a lot of the things what people need to understand is we're talking about cuts right now. But a lot of these things that we are doing as a result are things that we've already been planning to do. And now we just have to do them in fewer places to be fiscally responsible so we can make them happen. Any other questions? I do. For layman, we're going to just

101have layman early college. How many students will it be or do you expect? There are there are about 400 students there. Now we take we we encourage or we try to get about one hundred and twenty kids in the ninth grade class. Now, through attrition, that that changes what we struggle with. And what they will tell you they struggle with is making sure that the kids who are there are kids who can do the work and persist through. And so we hope that through this middle school program and really focusing on that that the kids who are going there, the kids who apply and enroll and go there are ready to do the work and understand the rigors of those work that work. And that's why it's important that that that vertical alignment happens and

102that that the team at early college gets to say this is what you take. Right. And so again, today's meeting here and early cost principal talk about this is what we do. This is what we do. This is what we do. This is how we do it. And that's the part that we're really tight about like that part. That's tight like that's not. So what are we going to have to do with the schedule at Crenshaw to make that work? What do we have to do with the schedule at STEAM to make that work? And then how are we going to build that? Because that's the part because it's once they get to ninth grade, it's unforgiving. They're working on their college transcripts. If they're taking a college course and they don't do well, that

103doesn't go away. Right. And so we want to make sure that when the kids get there, they're prepared, they're ready to go. And so we're going to continue to work to do this again. That is working with the folks and understanding what they're doing. Our goal is that the folks who are currently teaching the program will go because they know. Right. And that they will go there and they will work and that that that happens. So that it's some consistency in that program and we'll have to work with them. You know, again, we we we we don't like to force teachers to do anything so they will have some choice in that. But but we hope that they are the ones who are going because they've had the experience in doing it. Well, we like

104to talk about and I said the same thing to art that that buildings are buildings and there there there is there is a culture piece and that that is the fact. But I believe that we have a district wide culture and that that I believe that we can replicate that culture and we're working to replicate that culture piece. But but programs can move and buildings and people believe in it and people own it. And we stay true to what we value that we can take that program and we can move it. And then so we're going to do everything we can to make it make it successful and to continue the growth that that we've had. I can tell you that, again, the early college middle school being at layman was something that that was

105important to me. And I helped develop the plan to put there. And and and it was in my brother's when you looked and you saw the plan that we had in place for the pathways. It was still there up until the time that I made that recommendation. Not and that recommendation was made not because I wanted to. But reducing what it costs to run our middle school program has to be something that we have to do and it's fiscally responsible. And so now it's up to us to take these cars that we've been dealt and to build them into the best game plan that we possibly can win and can do so that our kids win. And so that's that's the goal here. I believe that we have the right people, the right the right

106leadership to make this happen and to move forward and to continue to improve all the products we offer our family. And how are we going to how and when are we going to communicate this plan to the parents? So, again, that that will happen at our that will happen at our open houses that we will have. So those open houses start as early as this week. I think Wednesday, the open houses and then for the early college piece, something that we want to do is to do some recruiting and some targeting and have some some some special nights to people that, hey, we're able now and something that they've started at the early college middle school. What we're able to look and see, hey, here's the profile of a student who will be successful. And

107and and so we know we're able and Mr. Russell was able to share this with me. Like, here are the students who are ready to go and ready to take advance. And here are students who are close but need a little bit. Here are the students that may be a really good fit with a little love and tender love and care. We can get there. And so we're going to look at those kids all across the district and make sure they know and reach out to them. Now, hey, here's an opportunity for you if this is what you want and understand that this means that there's going to be more homework. There's going to be more right extra rigor spent with you. You're going to be in this class that's going to ask you to

108do that. And and you won't get to be all day in the creativity and design pathway because you're giving that up to be a part of this. And you'll be given that up to earn some high school credits in middle school. But you are choosing to do an associate's degree. So we will reach out and we will have those things and that will be a little different. But that's something that we'll be planning to do as well. And then what about the parents for Clariden that are going to be K through six now instead of four through six? So we will send letters to families telling them what schools they're going to. And then that will and that's something that we talked about today that we will monitor when those emails are open and when

109they're not. And we will give a certain amount of time. And every email that wasn't open, we will send a card and what the parents that are the teachers that are told me says we can even put them in the backpacks with kids and hopefully they will open them there too. And then if we don't get any responses, then we're going to make calls to make sure that all the families know their kids will be going to another school and doing that. We I think we did a really good job of getting out to the buildings and talking to those parents. We will be at arts next Wednesday to meet with the arts parents and to talk to them about the changes there. Because the open house is for kids who are going to be

110applying to go to art. So we need to make sure that we go to talk to the current art parents to let them know what moving is going to look like for them. Again, for the incoming early college students, because this plan for early college students only impacts students who are coming. So again, we will reach out to them at the open houses and give them some information. And then again, we hope to have a session where we recruit some kids and actually send some letters and get kids involved in the program that we want to be involved in the program. There's something else that I didn't mention and I inadvertently glazed over with what's going to happen at the middle schools right now. Our gifted program where we identify students who are gifted in

111the third grade and give them the opportunity. They go to arts if they choose it. We've had fewer and fewer students choose that over the last couple of years, but we would like to kind of bring that back. And for folks, remember, there used to be a can high ability program. And right. And so our gifted program isn't operating that way anymore. So we're going to take some time over the rest of this year and next year and hopefully bring you a plan to expand that. But when we expand it, it will be located. There'll be a section of it at steam and there'll be a section at Crenshaw so that kids don't have to say, well, I'm not going to do that because I don't want to be in the arts. I can go

112if I learn this way, I can do it that way. So that will also be put on top and those students will be four or five, six there and then be able to choose if they want to go into the early college program. And that gives us the opportunity as well. Because if there's kids in there that we see who are in that early college program, we can push some of those prerequisite courses down a little bit so that we can help kids become even more prepared. So, again, by combining and consolidating, we believe we're going to be able to do more for less and be able to continue to increase the offerings and the quality of the programs we provide. Yes. I want to see what it looks like. So my child wants to

113be a chef in the middle school. What would be the best way for him to go to get into the cooking? So and and so the I believe and again, I could be wrong because they're still working on this and I haven't seen it. But I believe the culinary arts program at the middle school level is a part of the creativity and design pathway. So so there's a couple of ways that could happen. So if if your if your student is signs up for the Arts Academy because they're artistic in nature and they apply to go to the Arts Academy in the fourth grade through eighth grade, they're already be in that pathway. If they're sitting at, let's say, Clareton right now in the sixth grade and that's and they they want to be in

114the culinary arts program, we will come out and we will give interest based surveys to them in elementary school. And then we'll talk to them about, well, you're interested in being a chef. Hey, look at Crenshaw because Crenshaw has the School of Creativity and Design and built into that school is a culinary arts program. And so you can start to explore that. But you can also explore that. You can also explore broadcast media. You can also you can also explore web web design. You can also explore all of the career tech programs that we have at the high school that are aligned in that pathway. And so that's what will happen. So that student will then go through our sign up process and our enrollment process to say, hey, I want to go to Crenshaw

115and I want to be in the School of Creativity and Design at Crenshaw or the Arts Academy. And that's where they will be. They can do that. They can start in their two places to get in that will be seventh grade and also the fourth grade. And so that's the way that that could happen for for students. And it would be the it would be the same way if I wanted if I was interested in construction trades, you know, I'm helping build stuff or if I'm interested in and agriculture or I'm in and those things will be at steam. And so kids have that interest. They will be able to and we will talk to them in the fourth and fifth grade about all of that. And that's the importance. As we Thursday, I had

116the opportunity to go down to the governor's matching and meet with them and Director Dakin, who's the head of the Ohio Department of Education and Workforce. And if anything came out of that, all the Ohio superintendents were there talking about the importance of getting our kids exposure to careers and those opportunities at a very young age. And they are all moving to making sure that every kid in their district has some type of experience in career tech. The difference is that a lot of those places are thinking nine, 10, 11, 12. I think that that's too late. I think if the kids don't have some type of understanding at a younger age that we missed the boat and they disengaged by the time they get there. So we are starting these programs in the seventh

117and we're starting exposing. We would like to expose the kids to those in fourth and fifth grade and not just kids, parents and families. So the parents and families will make that choice for middle school, understanding what their kids did on their interest surveys and what they want to do. The key and what you're going to hear. How are my kids supposed to make that choice in the sixth grade? And what happens if they change their mind? Because that happens, their kids. And so they will be able to move in between these, right? There will be as long as there's space in these places, they will be able to move in between and they can move in between all the way up through high school. And we do that now. And so we will again.

118We are continuing to build this. The goal is, is that that five year forecast has to stay positive. So we get the opportunity to build this because if we don't, it would look like math, reading, writing, social studies, science. Lunch, go home. And that's what will happen. And that's what the state will tell us to do because that's all we're mandated to teach. Can you speak to, I know there's a lot of transitioning happening and building, moving kids going to different places. But with now going back to neighborhood schools and kind of having a clear plan for each school. Can you speak to, does this new way of having our school system stabilize kids moving consistently? And if so, can you speak to how parents can expect to have their kid in one space? So

119that's a good statement. Like it's some of the things we heard in our parent meetings. I was a very, a very, very honest, upset parent because they had picked a couple of schools. And what ended up happening is I think they were at one of our schools and then those schools became grade level school buildings. And then they left us and went to, they left us and maybe went to a choice outside of the district and then came back and came to one of our buildings. That's K-6. And then now we're like, oh, that building is not going to be there anymore. And now you got to go here for a year and then here for a year. And they were like, the reason why I picked this school is so that my kid could

120stay for a long time and not have to jump. And so that's what we want to have at the elementary level when we go to K-6. And when you enter into a K-6, that becomes your school. And you're going to stay there from K through 6. And I was asked a question in one of the meetings about grade configuration and the importance of that grade configuration model. And when you look at grade configuration, every district has their own type of grade configuration. But there are very few grade configuration models that have research to back them as like this works. And that is the best way is if you can go somewhere K and you can stay all the way through 12. Best. But not allow people to do that. And doing that and having all

121the kids in the building and being able to offer all this stuff is not fiscally responsible. Because you think how many K-12 buildings we would have to have in order to do that or how big a K-12 building would have to be. Unfortunately, I got the opportunity to work in a district that's K-12 and one building. But it's hard and they can't offer as much in that district because they can't afford to do it and they don't have enough kids to do it. Then the next one would be K-8. And you see some people who are doing K-8. And again, with a district our size, think about how big a K-8 building would have to do and then all the duplication you would have in a K-8 building. Does K-8, does each K-8 offer career

122tech? And do they have a full variety of career tech things? Do each K-8 have extracurricular activities? And do you do that? And how big that building has to be in order to do that? So it gets expensive. And then you could look at a 7-12 model and you do that. But then you get the same things. So we are looking at what's best for us and what's that model look like for us. And that model is let's go K-6. That's as long as we can do it. Then we're going to have to break some things up. Right. And then so now when we look at breaking things up, how do you do it? And then because we know that when you transition, that transition impacts students. Right. And that's what the research says. The

123research says that every time a kid transitions, they regress a little bit. And if you want to impact that regression, you have to work on what happens at that transition point. Where are they going? How many of them are moving together? Are they right? And so the reason why, one of the reasons why we have these pathways and these pathways are vertically aligned. So if I'm a kid and I'm transitioning to STEAM in the seventh and eighth, it's because I chose STEAM because that's how I'm interested in it. And I've got this. And the team at McKinley High School, the Discovery Innovation Design, are now working with those folks. And will there be kids who change? Probably so. But the other kids know what they're going into. They know what they're going to be taught.

124They've had some interaction with students who are already in that program because they're doing the same things and the same skills. So when they transition, they're going to see familiar faces and people who are talking the same language. So that helps with that transition piece. So when you do that, now we've got a transition. K-6, hey, you're going to stay there. Then you're going to go 7-8. But you're going to go 7-8 already in a pathway that you can continue all the way up through, where teachers and staff and students are using the same language. So when you move, you're moving with people that are talking the same things, like interests. So when you transition in, that transition is a little easier. And so those are all the things that are built into this, which

125tells you, right? Yes, the budget cuts quit now. We were told we had to do that in October with the forecast. This plan has been being built behind the scenes for two to three years. Consolidating is being forced us. Now we have to implement this plan a little different. But the plan is quality, and so it's able to be adjusted so that the impact on kids when we do it is only going to be positive. And we're ramping up the quality of instruction that we have and the opportunities for staff as well to align their interests, right? So when we look at the teachers who are going to be in a creativity and design pathway, we want teachers who learn that way, too, so that they can identify with the kids. And we want teachers

126who are in that leadership and service pathway. They can identify that way, too. So they're in there working with the kids the same way with discovery and design. So now everybody is operating in a mode that best aligns with them so that we have engaged students and engaged adults working with students. I would encourage every parent who wants their child to be in a movement that way. A, leave your children with Canton City Schools from pre-K up or B, bring them back so they can be ready next year to get on with the movement that we're going to do with students, because if not, you're going to miss out on a lot bringing them back in. But my encouragement would be I want my child to choose pathways. And you're not going to get that

127outside of this district the way that it's designed. I think it's a great plan, and I'm excited about it. Thank you. Any other questions? I've got a couple questions, Superintendent Talbert. What will the, maybe I'm getting a little bit ahead of us, but what will the leadership look like at the two new early college programs at Crenshaw and at STEAM? Are we looking at two principals in that school or a dean of students? So STEAM already has, STEAM has a setup right now where they have a principal that focuses on four, five, and six, and they have a principal that focuses on seven, eight. So at STEAM, because it is a one pathway school, the seven, eight principal will be in charge of the early college students, because they will be a group of students

128taking courses and moving together throughout that team. And they will have the electives. So there will be a principal that will be dedicated to the seventh and eighth kids. That's their current model. The early college, I mean, the Crenshaw model will be a school. There will be a principal for the creativity pathway, the Arts Academy. They will have a leader or principal. And the Leadership and Service Academy will have its principal as well. And then there will be a campus principal. And I had that conversation today as well. At Arts, they were like, well, why you got it? I said, listen, we could put a principal over each of those and put them in the building, but not having somebody over top of both of them will just be a disaster waiting to happen. And

129I think Mr. Dixon and I kind of lived that a little bit when we were at McKinley and there was like five principals and no person over top. And that caused the issue. But the autonomy that's going to happen with those teams, the schedules that they have will be this way, vertical and not like this. And then the early college program will be a group of teachers and staff that will probably, at Crenshaw, will sit in between. And those kids will be, I will sign up to be creativity and design arts, or I'll be leadership and services. But my early college pathway will be in the middle. And we will follow together in there. And then elective times, we will go back to the school that we signed up for, if that makes sense. Yeah.

130Will our current teachers at early college, middle school have priority to move? Yes, we had that conversation with them. And earlier I said that we hope, and that's what we encourage, that our current early college staff, the ones that want to go, because we're really not in it. There will be a time when we have to force people, but we really don't want, we give people the opportunity here to tell us what they want. And as much as we can, we try to honor where they want to go. But we believe that their experience in this is the best way to do this. And they have that experience. And so we want them there to do that. And so that's what we want to do. And we will continue to work with them throughout that

131staffing process to make that happen. Okay. Lastly, we were talking about financials earlier and about kids attending school and losing money when they're not in our seats. Are we financially penalized when our students are leaving their second semester of their junior year to attend Stark State? Is that... So that's a really good question, right? And so the schools at the colleges and the schools are funded through the same dollar amount. So kids are funded through FTEs. And that FTE means how much time they spend in your building, right? And so when kids go off to college, their FTE is paid to the college. That number is, I don't know how much they get because I'm not college, but they get money for that there, for their coursework. We don't essentially write a check to Stark

132State. The money goes directly to Stark State for that. And so will we receive less funding for those kids? Yes, we will when they go there. But the key is that if they weren't there, right, we would be actually paying more to educate them here. We pay about $130 a kid a credit hour for a student that goes. That's the cost. And so I'm not great at math, but if you take that, what's that, 400 a course? And if they take, what, six courses somewhere around there, right? So that's $2,400. So that would be $2,400 for that kid to take a full year of courses. So we spend $21,000 a kid. So $2,400 versus $21,000, right? We work out on that. But what that allows us to do is that will allow us to take

133more kids in the 9th and 10th grade with the same staff, right, and have even more kids have the opportunity to go to early college. And so that's the goal. The goal isn't, hey, let's get the kids off the campus and let's not, right, do anything else. The goal is, hey, if we can get the kids off, the kids who are ready to go off campus, and actually where we think the benefit is, they get a true college experience with us watching them. That way, if they misstep, we can catch them before they go. And this is the part, the best part, I think, about early college is the kids get to sample college when they have guidance from adults. So when they make that mistake, and that's the same thing we want to do

134with CareerTech. When a high school kid graduates from us, this is what happens. Oh, go to the world of work, go to college, you're on your own. They're not ready yet. And those of us who've had kids who are at that age, how many times have they leaned on that safety net? So if we could build that into our programs, right, and early college is that model. So we're going to allow these kids, and the sooner we can get them on college campuses, and we're working with Stark State so that that campus is really not downtown anymore. That campus is Stark State, so they can be in and really experience it. So the likelihood of them running into a road that they haven't seen when they go away goes down. So those are all the

135things we want to do. Early college is an attractive program. And so the more kids we can get there ready to go, the more kids we can take a ninth and tenth grade. And I mean, there are people trying to get into that program everywhere. And again, this move with the middle school is so that early college, high school is not a target. Early college, high school, the way it's currently constructed is very expensive, folks. And so how do we make it? And that's why we have to make this move. And I know that it is not the best thing. I know that that change is hard. But I believe this is the type of change that has to happen so that we can continue to offer this superior product, and we can continue to

136grow and get better as a district, and it's fiscally responsible. Any other questions for Superintendent Talbert? That concludes my superintendent's report for this evening. Thank you, Superintendent Talbert. Is there a need for an executive session? No, sir. Very good. With that, I'll make the motion to adjourn. Second. All those in favor signify by saying aye. Aye. Everybody be safe getting home. Have a great night.