001Stand please meeting for the uh moment of silence and a pledge of allegiance. Salute pledge. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands. One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Like to welcome everybody to our meeting tonight. Uh Mr. Wilson won't be here, so we will be presiding. Uh at this moment, can I get an adoption of uh meeting agenda for June 3rd, 2025 record board meeting? So move, Mr. Chair. Second. Have a first motion and a second. All in favor? I I. Anybody opposed? Can I get a motion to approve the minutes from the May 20th, 2025 regular board meeting and the minutes from the May 27th, 2025 call student hearings. So move, Mr. Chair. Second. We have
002a motion and a second. All in favor? Anybody oppose? Thank you. Item number five, recognize Northridge Middle School baseball team as city county champions. Dr. Cameron. Oops. Mr. Herd. I apologize. I'm just reading. Good evening, board members. Good evening. Good evening. It is truly a pleasure to be here again to recognize two North Northridge Middle School athletic programs for winning city county champions. Um our first team is our baseball team. Um Northridge Middle School won the City County Baseball Championship hosted at Eckles. They defeated Eckles 11 to7 on April 17th to win this championship. Coach Deacon Meadows has been doing a great job with the program and we just look forward to continued success first. First and foremost, I always want to thank the parents for all of the work, hard work, and dedication, support
003that they put in for our young people to make to give them opportunities like this. And Dr. Rainey, um, Ad Cherry, all of our teachers and our support staff for making sure that our student athletes are truly that student athletes. And at this time, I'll bring Coach Meadows up to introduce his staff and talk about his team and his [Applause] Good evening. Um, these are my six due to the scheduling. The first time we were going to do this, I had about 18 that were going to show up. So, I'm proud of these six for making it back. Starting left to right, Price Ingram, Jack Reed, Kane Wise, John Rivers, Oliver, Nathan Mccanz, and Collins Good. Um, Collins and and Nathan were two of our stud pitchers for the year, and all these guys contributed
004in a big way. Um, I seems like I just did this for football. I'm getting pretty used to coming up here and doing these things. So, winning's good, you know. Um, looking at our season, we were 20 and six overall. We were 5-0 against our cross town rival, Eckles. We also went up to Birmingham and played a Hwitt Trustful team that they're one of the more talented programs in the state, and they crank out a lot of good players and they've only lost four games over the last two years. We were able to beat them four to one early in the year. I was really proud of our guys for that. I have some numbers for you. We scored 176 runs on the year, which is about 6.7 runs a game. If you watched any
005of the college baseball this weekend, that doesn't sound crazy, but our games were only five innings, some of them are seven. So, that's over a run innings. So, I thought our offense played really well the whole year. As a pitching staff, we struck out 154 batters and only 136 innings pitched, which over one an inning and held opponents to a 188 batting average against. So that meant out of every 10 hitters, you're getting roughly two hits. So if we limited the free passes, our pitching was pretty topnotch. What I was most proud of this team is we lost four in a row to end the regular season going into a regular season finale against Oak Mountain. Um, we were able to write the ship, finish with the win, and then go on and win our
006tournament and deal with that adversity, which showed that they were buying into the things we were selling, you know, about losing yourself and the team, letting the name on the front of the jersey taking precedence to the name on the back. Was very proud of how they did that. They showed up to practice in games and played a nameless, faceless opponent every day. And I have a quote I like to use because the margins on winning and losing for baseball are razor thin. If all you're chasing is a championship, then you're chasing the wrong thing. Championships are a byproduct, not the goal. Build champions in how you train, how you prepare, and how you live. If you do that, the results will take care of themselves. I think they embodied that all year. They were
007a great group. They were fun to coach, and I'm so glad their hard work was rewarded with the championship because that doesn't always happen. Um, can I say something to these handsome young men? Listen, I'm a baseball mom and I absolutely hate that my boys um stopped playing and they got into basketball more. So, please keep going with baseball because it can take you places you wouldn't even imagine. Now, I do have a request. I need a t-shirt and a schedule for next year so I can at least catch one or two, you know, games cuz I love baseball. And my other one of my boys, he wouldn't even hit or do nothing until I got to the game. And my husband always say, "You gonna get put out cuz I always fuss with the
008umpire." But um I love baseball. So congratulations to you all. Congratulations you guys. We are so proud of you. Thank you so much for your hard work and your dedication to each other and to your team and to the school. And thank you, Coach Meadows, for all of the time and love that you pour into these boys. And of course, thank you to the parents for getting them there. We appreciate you all. Thank you so much. And one more thing, remember what your coach said. It's about the name on the front first and then it's about the name on the back. So teamwork will make the dream work. Can we get the parents to stand for us? See that's here. Thank you all. See all said, coach, thank you very much for what you put
009into them because you not only teach them to play baseball, but you teach them to be real young men and we appreciate that. Yes, sir. Thank you. I enjoy it. Can we get a picture of you guys in front of the board here? How's that? Gentlemen, congratulations. Congratulations. Awesome. Congratulations. I'm in his right. Thank you. Thank you all very much. Thank you all. Mr. I think we're going to recognize the North Bridge Middle girls track and field city county champions. Again, it's an honor to stand before you to recognize our Northridge Middle School girls track and field team. And under the guidance of coach Joseph Gibbs, this team really dominated this year. They were undefeated in every meet and again winning the city county championship. Um, Coach Gibbs will give you a chance to come
010and say a few words and introduce your staff and your team. Hey everybody, I'm Coach Palmer. Uh, I've worked with the track team this year along with Coach Gibbs, who unfortunately couldn't be here, but I think I speak for him also when I say working with this track team has been truly humbling. Not only because of how well we did, going completely undefeated in the regular season, winning City County, setting the City County relay record, a lot of other great amazing things we've done this year. But what was more important to me is watching this group of girls really develop into great athletes and better students. Here today, we have Lily and Abby who really grew into leaders on this team. They stepped up. They worked with the team. They showed the team how to
011be real leaders. They're moving on to high school next year and I know they're going to bring that leadership experience into the high school and do great things there. So, I'm really proud of them along with uh many other students that cannot be here today. So, I think I speak for myself and Coach Gibbs when I say it has been an amazing experience working with you girls. Congratulations on all of your achievements and I know it's just the very beginning of what you girls are going to do. Congratulations. Hold on, coach. One minute. Coach, I just wanted to say and to you girls, thank you for being here representing your team. And um similarly to what I said to the previous group of boys, we just really appreciate you and all of the work that
012you put in and the example that you set for your fellow classmates. And um it's just we're just so proud to see you up here and thank you for being here. And coach, thank you for all the time that you take out of your schedule to be with these girls and to coach them up. It's clearly working. Thank you. We appreciate you. Thank you, coach. You a picture of parents. Oh, parents. I'm sorry. Thank you. escape coach. Get in this. Congratulations y'all. Congratulations. What events? Congratulations. Congratulations. What are their specialies? Okay. Oh, that's great. You got you know this guy who's taking this picture, right? Thank you all. Thank you. Thank you. So, is that his baby when you said, "Do we know this guy?" Okay. One of those I saw him stand up when
013he said parents, but I didn't I didn't know if he would stand up to take a photo. Thank you all. Thank you for your leadership, Dr. Rainey. Thank you. Okay. Item seven, um, public comments or non-aggenda items. We have none. Moving on to item eight,formational reports from the superintendent and the executive administrative staff. Dr. Daria. Yes, sir. Uh um Miss Nordstrom, Miss Markhamm, Dr. Walker um are going to do a presentation and it's a brief presentation on a lot of important information. They're going to go over our CCRI. Um they're going to talk about recent legislation. They're going to talk about dual enrollment. So, I'm going to hand it to them to get started and um certainly they'll be willing to take your questions either tonight or if you have deeper questions after this evening.
014So, Miss Nordstrom, hi board. How you doing? We a lot of good things going on to follow up on. I don't know how we can beat that, but we're going to give it a shot. Um, so this is our agenda. This is what we're going to talk about. Um, I don't feel like I need to run through that, but um, we just want to make sure that y'all are aware of all the great things that are going on in our system, specifically as it relates to CCRI. Um, as you know, college career readiness and the CCRI has become a a big measure of student attainment and that our new our upcoming senior class must have a CCRI to graduate. If they are participating with the Alabama regular diploma and beginning with the class of 2026,
015that will be our graduation requirement. That is coming from the state. That is not a Tuscaloosa City Schools thing. Um, and what is a Tuscaloosa City Schools thing is a confirmed postsecondary plan. And that's something we're very proud of. We don't think that that's being done. And we also are going to show you some more data to support not only do we have a confirmed postsecondary plan, but we take care of our kids after they cross the finish line going on into what they're going to do as they move forward. These are the college career readiness indicators. Okay, Henry, sorry. These are the college and career readiness indicators. Um these are the nine that our students have access to. um if they're if we have any opportunity to um speak on any of these, we
016know that CTE completers and CTE credentials are huge and it's very appropriate being we're in this building um as well as our dual enrollment and we'll speak to that tonight as well. All right, CCRI attainment. If you look, this is our longitudinal data for our CCRI attainment. Um the class of 2025 is in red because that data is not finalized. We call that dirty data because we're still waiting on data to come down and for the state to um have it all updated and then we'll certify it. The most important thing for us is if you look at the class of 2025, the one to the right, the graduates, those are the kids we can actually lay hands on. So the original the AIM data are our kids that we could have lost because um
017they dropped out multiple reasons but the class of 2025 are the kids that were were actually in our building and we were actually able to make sure that they had a CCRI. So we're very proud of that data. Um and then of course our next step is to look at our junior class which is class of 2026. And this is the highest we've ever come in. So, these kids are rolling into their senior year with we have this many kids already ready to go out the door with a CCRI. So, we're super excited about that. Don't feel like we're going to have to chase them around a lot this year. We're going to continue to move down into the junior class and the sophomore class, which is what we've been doing. And it's good data.
018We're excited about it. Wow. All right. Our confirmed postsecondary plan. These are just some of our babies. They're on our bulletin boards and are on our uh billboards out on the interstates that had that were enrolled, enlisted, employed for this last year. We'll update that as we move forward. We always like to put our own students up there as opposed to a block picture of kids we don't know. Right. All right. Here we go. These are our confirmed postsecary plans. The class of 2025, we had 97.4% of our kids that had a confirmed postsecondary plan, which is huge. This does not happen there. I know of no other system in the nation. We do a lot of going out. We present this a lot and we never have anybody say, "Hey, we're doing this." and
019they always want to know how we're doing it and how they can do it. So, we're very, very excited about what this looks like. But what I'm most excited about is this. This is the class of 2024. At graduation, we had 95% of our kids that had a confirmed postsecondary plan. We did a six-month follow-up with those kids. 86% of those students were still doing what they said they were going to do. And at 12 months, 85% were. So, that's huge for us. It means we're doing good things and that what our kids say they're doing, they're actually doing. So, we're super excited. I do want to show you that of that 85% that's 105 students that were unverified, 96 of those were unreachable. So, we don't know that they're not doing what they said
020they were going to do. We just couldn't connect with them on that level. All right, I'm gonna hand it over to Miss Mark and talk about duel. Um, so dual enrollment or college credit attainment is one of those nine CCRI and it happens to be a very dynamic piece of how we prepare students for life after high school, particularly those students who know that college is in their future or in their career path. Um, at the top you will see a hyperlink to the full fivepage data report on dual enrollment that goes all the way back to the creation of this position. Um, but today I want to just focus on the very very high level data. Bottom line, we have more kids year-over-year participating in dual enrollment programs, taking more college courses, and earning
021more college credit. And you can see um we've got about 50 more students this past school year than we did in 23 24. They took u 25 27ish more courses and they earned about six more college credits. For me, that's exciting because we're seeing students at younger and younger ages participating in dual enrollment the summer after 9th grade instead of waiting until junior or senior year. So, that's really encouraging and we anticipate that our dual enrollment participation will just continue to grow. Um, one of the stats that we are especially proud of relates to our class of 2025 graduates. of those students who crossed the stage less than a month ago, almost 41% of them were leaving Tuscaloosa City Schools with college credit in their pocket. That's huge for us. Um because when we compare
022that to national statistics, nationally, we're looking at about 34% of high school graduates participating in dual enrollment. We've got almost 41% right here in TCS. So, uh, the data that you see there is relatively new or fresh for this board's presentation. Um, Dr. Daria for the past two years has provided us with a focus within our strategic plan to start quantifying and measuring our extracurricular participation. Something that there are really not a lot of national metrics that we can pull on. uh one of the few being from the college board stating that most students between the ages of 12 and 17. Um 80% of those students uh say that they are involved in an extracurricular activity when they're filling out the information as it relates to AP or um PSAT, SAT. uh within the Tuscaloosa
023City Schools, we're currently sitting at a district-wide average of 90% for all students that have shown some type of participation in an extracurricular opportunity or an academic program that is providing an opportunity, an off-campus extended learning class, uh uh extended learning opportunity. Um that's a really high level engagement. It really shows the commitment that this board and that our leadership has to fostering that kind of positive culture, not only inside our classrooms, but outside and allowing them the opportunities to do those things. Um, in moving forward with some of this, again, we said this is fresh data. This is things that we're looking to quantify. We've been working with our college and career readiness partner, Zello, uh to find ways to really dig into this data and allow not only the students to tell their
024stories, but to allow those sponsors uh to verify that participation in a way that they can take that out into the world. Um Zello allows that resume to go with them when they leave and to have those sponsors be able to put that verified check mark, something that all of our students would love to have on various social media platforms. uh think of it as a way that they'll get that blue check mark that they can have on that resume from those sponsors to take out. It'll also allow us to start having a little bit of a closer look. Um something that we're we're not seeing in these numbers are our community participation things with uh things like Tuscaloosa Children's Theater, different dance companies throughout town that it may not necessarily be something they're doing
025on our campuses, but it is something that they're going out and they're still representing TCS as a student in TCS's schools. So, uh, moving forward, we're going to look at that data, but these numbers are a celebration to see that the majority of our students in high school are getting engaged outside of the classroom. Those numbers are incredible. Okay, this is our new legislation. I I've already talked about it, but this is a new legislation that has come down from the state department saying that our seniors, our next year seniors must have a CCRI to graduate. And um this is not anything new for us. We've showed in the data that we've been doing this for several several years. We do not expect to have kids that don't graduate because of the CCRI. So um
026we we've already put in the work. So we know that this is not going to be a problem for us. Option B diploma. State bill 253 is all about the option B or workforce pathways diploma. This is another pathway for students pursuing the general education path to the Alabama high school diploma to earn their diploma. Um, we know that it's a thing. We know also that it's not appropriate for all of our students, but there are some students who would benefit tremendously from this opportunity. A couple big differences in option A, which is default for all of our GEnEd students in Tuscaloosa City Schools, and this new option B pathway, are the credits that students are required to earn in order to satisfy graduation requirements, specifically in math, science, and career tech, which makes sense
027because if we've got kids who are pursuing a workforce pathway, we want them heavily involved in career and technical education on the regular Alabama high school diploma gened pathway. students have to earn four math credits. On this option B diploma, students have to only earn two and that's geometry and algebra 1 or a second appropriate math course for kids who maybe earn math credit uh in in middle school. Um the second major difference is in science. On the option A diploma, students must earn four science credits. On option B, it's just two. biology freshman year and then a physical science uh 10th grade year. And then the third major difference is in that CTE area. Students pursuing this option B pathway must attain CTE completer status and they do that by earning a grade of
02870 or better in three sequenced CTE courses in a declared program. So that's that's a big difference. in that CTE completer status you'll recognize as one of the nine CCRI options. It's the designated CCRI option for students on this pathway. Um and then they will earn their additional six and a half credits from any combination of coursework additional cores that aren't necessarily required other electives more CTE fine arts world languages all the things. So, big differences in what's required for the option B diploma as opposed to the option A. Questions about option B. I know that can be kind of a lot. Um, what you need to know from us is that we have a process in place to help not only identify who those students are that might be suitable for this pathway, but
029also to ensure that the information students and families need to know about option B is clear from the very beginning. Um, for example, a student who wants to attend a four-year college right after high school, option B is not appropriate because they're not going to have that requisite coursework to be able to be admitted to a four-year institution. That's part of our application process. Um, another consideration, just thinking about our our Northridge athletes, this option B is not an appropriate pathway for any student that plans to play at the collegiate level because NCAA is not going to recognize this option B diploma. Alabama High School Athletic Association says everything's fine, but we need to make sure we know what our kids' plans are after they leave us so that we can set them on the
030most appropriate path to get there. How how are we um relating that message to the um the um principles and the counselors at the schools? Yep. So, they're part of the the conversation. Um we have an optin form. All of our students pursuing the general education pathway to the diploma default to option A as early as the spring semester of their 10th grade year. they can opt into option B after we've had a sitdown conversation with the student, with their family, with their school counselor, and the school principal. And we require signatures at each of those levels. Okay. Thank you. And they get so you do like a full explain because then I hear a lot of them say, "Well, we saying that, but I didn't quite understand it." Yes, it is very explicit to
031the point that we ask the questions, are you an athlete? What CTE program are you pursuing completer status in? Like all of that has to be very explicit because we don't want to mess kids up. We don't want to limit their future opportunities. Okay, good on option B. All right, let's talk about House Bill 102. So, we talked a little bit earlier about dual enrollment in Tuscaloosa City Schools. House Bill 102 effectively endeavors to do a couple things throughout the state of Alabama in the world of dual enrollment. The first is that it broadens availability of dual enrollment. That's fantastic for places that aren't us because we've already had very broad access to dual enrollment, including funding through the Elevate scholarship. Um it requires all LEAs for um public school systems to allow students to
032participate in dual enrollment. Again, that's not an issue for us. We've been doing that. It requires courses that are offered for dual enrollment to be approved by the Alabama State Department of Education. And the last one is kind of a big one for us. It requires local school systems to award high school credit or dual credit for the successful completion of any dual enrollment course. This is different for us because previously we had a dual credit crosswalk which matched up courses students could take in the post-secary world with courses that students could take to earn high school credit and it was only those courses that were being placed on the students high school transcripts. Now, with House Bill 102, any coursework that they complete will be reflected on their high school transcript. So, that of
033course then has the opportunity to impact their high school GPA. That's great. So, some of those opportunities will be weighted. That is correct. Um, so in preparation for House Bill 102, our crosswalk now no longer specifies which courses students can receive dual credit for, but it does specify which of those courses students can receive additional quality point consideration for. So like weighted credit. Okay. Yes. Thank you. Welcome. Okay. And then you can see um that updated dual enrollment crosswalk um soon as we're able to complete this briefing for you all tonight. that very intense communication campaign for our students and families that starts tomorrow. So, if a child is transferring from another system here, how does the cross work? Uh, it's provided by the Alabama State Department of Education in terms of what courses are
034acceptable for dual credit. But in terms of transfer students, those courses will be weighted depending on the sending institution. Okay? So we accept them however they came to us with the transfer student. Is that the question? Okay. Because some systems may play different. Correct. So how are we aligning the two together so that it's not being more complex than what it should be? Right. Yes. For transfer students, we accept the waiting system of whatever the sending institution is. But for a student that earns the credit while they're with us. We apply our crosswalk, our processes, and our policies. And then earlier some time ago and recall is going to be real bad. We were talking about how we were doing things here at TCTA lining the the the two not scheduling. Was that the crosswalk
035or the scheduling? The scheduling. Now I'm just thinking about like if we're doing a scheduling here and we were doing scheduling in high school, but if I was on this A plan and I'm on this B plan, how does all of that mesh? If I understand the question, it's it will really mesh at the counseling at the home school. So if that child's on option B, that plan will be done at the home school in conjunction with TCTA because a lot of not all but a lot of that completer status will be done here. So the the two will work together to make sure whatever is declared at that let's call it 10th grade year that that that's enacted at this school and that that child has obviously priority scheduling to become a completer. And
036I think that's an important part if that's your question. If a child says I'm going to go in welding option B, we've got to have clear the path for that child to get all the courses before graduation for that pathway for to be a completer on that pathway because that's a little different from the way we're doing things here. Sort of kind of it's a little different scheduling. I'm talking about making sure that it just all lines up because if I'm doing welding I think if if this I think we do actually a good job if students who are already working to be a completer the three courses in a row. Um I don't know of any examples where they've scheduling comp has conflicted them out of becoming a completer because that's important to us
037for a lot of reasons mostly because it's important to the job. So I don't I don't know of any examples where we've conflicted out due to scheduling because they a really precise job especially for folks who need that completer status of three courses. Just to confirm, previously it would have been possible to take a dual enrollment class if it wasn't on our crosswalk. It would not appear on the transcript at all for high school. Now they can take any dual enrollment class they want and it will for sure be on the transcript but it may not be weighted unless we have specifically said this is okay. That is a perfect way to say that. Yes. Okay. Thank you. And I just wish you all good luck on this. We're still going. We've got more but
038I'm gonna hand this back to Kelly. So this is the CTCR continuum. Um something for our group is we don't ever want to just get complacent. And so we sat down and looked at how we impact the K12 uh school system. And so this year we got some new things that we're going to be implementing. Uh we partnered with several groups and I'm going to show you what that is if I can make this work. Um so mainly we're doing an expansion into literacy. Um, we knew with the reading for third grade, it was super important and we wanted to make sure our kids had the knowledge they needed to know about what careers were available, not only here at TCTA, but in our community as well. So, we have partnered with Tuscaloosa Reads. Um,
039they their books this year will be uh tied to um our career readiness and specifically with the bookworm initiative. The people that are becoming in reading, we hope will have some background in those careers that can talk to those kids about that. Um we're already collaborating with the STEM ecosystem um working with uh challenges for early grades. as it relates to career readiness. And then we are going to partner with TCTA this year and not only to provide books in the field of interest that they choose for MiniWow when the fourth graders come through here, but um also to look at different opportunities like literacy. Um we're looking with um the is it Earl the Squirrel, several things that gives our kids opportunity, young kids, they can make some connections, but it's not anything that
040um is going to be, you know, that they've heard about already. John, do you want to tell us what the next is for extracurricular? Okay. All right. I think that's all y'all. Does anybody have any questions? Lord, I will say you saw a lot of really good data coming out of there. You see that and a lot of planning with intentionality and planning across grade levels and departments. Um, so a big kudos to this team. But I also encourage you there are I would have a lot seeing a lot of that for the first or second time. So, by all means, you let us know. We'll sit down or any member of this team will sit down and walk through some of that in more detail because there's there's a lot there. But, thank you
041all for such a terrific. Thank y'all for doing this slide for me because what I'm going to do is when the parents ask me, I put your phone on right and we'll be happy to talk to y'all. Thank you very much. Thank you so much. We appreciate you. Thank you. Okay. So item B, receive financial reports for October 1, 2024 through March 31st, 2025. And all reports are reconciled with bank statements through March 31st, 2025. Mr. Duke. Yes, sir. Mr. Lucas, that's right. We are halfway through the year for our financial reporting um board superintendent. Ladies and gentlemen, it's my privilege to bring to you the sixmonth report again through March 30th. And I will breeze through that. And certainly if you have any questions, please stop and ask. We'll start looking at our revenue
042on the tax side, the local tax revenue, property tax. Again, winding down. You probably heard me say that the last time I was here, but you can kind of see how the numbers start dwindling down. Collections have come in uh good and close to budget. Um and so we'll continue to track that. We've probably got about three more months of collections left. Car tag tax a lot less dollar-wise, but still local money. And uh you see there that uh it was up versus the prior month last year. And again tracking close to budget sales tax. Um we've been talking over a year or so now about the flattening off and now we finally saw that been kind of holding our breath and we see a little dip there. Uh we'll continue to track that. That's
043a little bit of a concern. And um again, you can attribute a lot of that dip to the SSUT as more sales are being made online and we do not get a penny from online sales. I'm going to say that again. We do not get a penny from online sales. That's SSU tax. That issue is huge. It will continue to be huge until school systems until we get it figured out. And so I'll just leave that there. Trans. I'm sorry. I just had an envision. It's like watching a train um coming towards you. You can't get out of way in time enough. It It's I equate it to like a dream when things get into slow motion. We've been sitting here watching this talking about things sales tax flattening off and you and I have
044talked about it offline some too, Mr. Simmonson. Um, it's it's a huge issue and it's it's millions of dollars. It's not chump change. I mean, you can you guys know what the e-commerce situation is and it's only going to get bigger and bigger as we see those packages on our front door, our neighbors front doors. So, um, we've got to figure out a solution as a school system to this SSU tax situation. Um, and until we come up with that solution, anybody in the community who wants to help should be reminded that they can do that by shopping local. Absolutely. Brick and mortar we call it, but saying the same thing. That's right. Going in those storefronts um in in a Tuscaloosa um city business, if you can walk in and make that purchase, that
045just helps the entire community out, including the school system. That's right. You will see when I get to the um management report when I talk about auxiliary services here in just a second how way under budget it is. But what's going to happen is when I come back here and present the April and May financial statements, you'll see where we will have purchased and we've already purchased 49 school buses at $136,000 a pop. So that right there 136 387 is what one school bus cost us. Chris, if you'll go to the next slide. Our state fleet renewal, the recurring money that we get from the state of Alabama each year. There you go. That we get $75,000. A school bus cost $136,000. There was a statewide article. I may have mentioned it last time, but
046I'm gonna mention it again by the Alabama Daily News. State Superintendent Eric Mackey is warning the state legislature that there's a funding crisis coming as far as it relates to school buses. That is why it's just that simple. School bus prices have went skyrocketed. The states continue to fund us at 75,000 for years now. Chris, if you'll go to the next slide. The the math on that. There's the gap for one school bus. We've got to come up with funds for that. Chris, if you'll go to the next slide. We are fortunate temporarily because we have elected to use some of our what's called advancement and technology money. Set another way. That's some money that the state has been able to put back because of the state uh collections the last couple of years have
047been good. So, um think of the um supplemental appropriations, advancement technology money. Those are one-time monies. We're not guaranteed that next year, but we have elected to use those monies to fill that gap. That's a huge gap. So, this year we're buying 49. Next year we're buying 24 U school buses at again $136,000 a pop. We'll use that advancement technology money to u prop that up. But after that, it gets interesting. Not only for us, and it's not just a Tuscaloosa City Schools thing. Again, the state superintendent has predicted that's going to be a big issue around the state upcoming. How many are in our fleet again? What's that? What's How many are in our fleet? About a u probably 130 or 40 in the fleet, 113 daily routes. Of course, we have to keep
048spares. So, I think 130 140 buses that would actually be on the ground at any given time. Okay, on to the um general fund management report. You see our targets 50%. I'm going focus in on the expenditures just briefly. U again you see that low number that 26.3% by auxiliary services on the percentage 26.3. You're going to see the next two times I'm here. We're going to fast forward because we've spent a lot of money the last um about 60 or 70 days on 49 school buses. Uh six or seven million worth. So uh but the other numbers there are good. When I say good, they're tracking along with budget. This is our state report that we send to the Alabama State Department of Education. our comprehensive um financial statement of all funds and I
049always like to put that up there. This information is on the website. It is available to the public and my phone number's on the website and if anybody you of course always and anybody from the public's ever having questions about any of these numbers, we are an open book. Mr. Vice Chairman, that concludes my report. I'll be glad to take any questions, but otherwise I will wrap it up. Thank you, Mr. Duke. Anyone have any questions? Duke, couple quick questions. Sure. Um, you were talking about the buses a moment ago. The buses, are we adding buses or are we replacing buses or a little bit of bus? Great question. We're replacing buses. They're on a 10-year cycle. They're on a 10-year funding cycle. If they were to get into that 11th year, we stop getting
050um fleet renewal money. So, at the 10-year mark, we replace those buses. You also have warranty issues that start coming up at 10 years. So, we are replacing buses. That's a great question. We're not adding routes or uh we're just simply replacing older buses. And with the older buses, are we able to to sell them or anything we can do to generate any kind of anything to make up that gap? Absolutely. We have already sent uh the spares that are ready to go and become spares to an certified auction house and we do recoup some money. It's it's nominal in the big scheme of things, but it does help. Thank you. Mhm. Sure. Any more questions? And I don't know, this sounds so ugly what was coming up is about to come out. Yes, we
051need the buses, but we need the bus drivers to drive the bus. I think it's harder to get the drivers sometimes to drive the bus. KTJ, can I say that over the mic? We need bus drivers. We need bus drivers. Repeat what you said. We need bus drivers. We can have the buses, but if we don't have the drivers for, you know, you have to have a CDL passenger license and all this stuff to drive the bus. So, we can have nice bus, but if we don't have drivers, then I guess Dr. Cameron and Dr. Pope get to go out and drive buses. You got a CD, you can drive a bus. I'm just asking. On that note, um, on that note, Dr. Cameron, is it accurate to say we could probably start the process
052of getting them signed up tomorrow if they were to call us? But but also though, Mr. Duke, these these new buses all will be air conditioned, right? That's right. So that's a plus, right? So that's a plus and hopefully, you know, that's something that's an incentive for others to come to our system because, you know, I I would prefer to have a individual on the bus with them to help them and aid, but we can't afford everything because you said the SSU needs to So, we just keep Mr. Grant on the bus by himself with 30, 40, 50 kids. Our bus drivers do a great job. We appreciate each and every one of them. We just need a few more. Thank you, Mr. Duke. We appreciate it. You always do a wonderful job. Thank you.
053Thank you. So, Mr. Le, item number nine. Introduction to motions and resolutions for first reading. There are none. So we go to item 10, consent agenda items A through F. Can I get a motion? So move. Second. Okay. A motion and a second. All in favor? Anybody oppose? Motion pass. Turn page. Okay. Item 11, regular uh agenda items. Um final adoption. Uh approve superintendent's recommendation regarding changes in personnel. Dr. Cameron, thank you. We've got the superintendent's uh recommendations regarding changes in personnel. We also have the supplemental list. I will go through both with you. Starting on page one, you have six resignations, four new certified personnel, three new support personnel, two transfer of classified personnel, one administrative transfer, one administrative personnel for summer supplement, one change in contract days, seven reassignments, one rehire, one 2425
054Fall semester academic incentive 42 2425 spring semester academic incentive 12425 spring semester academic supplement academic incentive removal and 56 summer learning academy which carries us to page four. You have one uh 2526 athletic supplement with the supplemental list. You have one retirement, two resignations, six new certified personnel, one new support personnel, six reassignments, three transfer of certified personnel, one rehire, one part-time uh part-time person in 27 summer learning academy board. Before we get a motion, Set a sides. Okay. Any set of signs? Go ahead. I'm sorry. I have I'm sorry. I have a question about it's a procedure question. I see one of the supplemental lists on the My wife's name is some pros. They can tell you how to What number is that? Learning number 33. Number 33 on the uh supplementary going to
055be set aside. Okay. Are there any other set a signs? If not, can I get a motion? We'd all accept number 33 on the supplement. So move. Second. All in favor? I I Motion pass. Can I get a motion for number 33? I'm sorry. I I didn't need to set aside, but I wanted some discussion. I apologize. Uh on number one on the supplemental list. Um I just wanted to be clear for the world at large who may be freaking out about this one that he is staying on as a coach. He's just retiring as a teacher as a teacher. We are very grateful for all of his years of service and psyched that he is going to keep coaching. Yes, ma'am. I had a conversation with Dr. Williams yesterday and that's the intent of
056retiring as a teacher coming back as a contracted coach. Awesome. This was a little fast. Anyone else have any comments? If not, motion pass. Can I get a motion for number 33 on secondary? Second. Okay. Any comments on that? [Music] Was you in orientation? Okay. So, if there's no comments, uh, we have a motion and a second. All those in favor? I and one abstension. Anybody opposed? Pretty good. Motion passed. All right. All right. Speed taking off. Yes. Assume we don't have any more. Everybody's going to go looking for number 33 now. Huh? Look for number 33 tomorrow. Who it is? Uh item C, item B, I'm sorry. discuss uh approved 202526 uh raptor technologies raptor badge alert visitors safe quote Dr. Catwoman. So, I'm going to take this in two different parts. So, uh
057the first part is our visitor management system. If you come into our schools, you know, you got to type in your uh type in your employee number and then you're cleared. So, what we're doing, we hope to do is we're going to purchase iPads uh with our IT department. Purchase iPads. We're going to put them up on the stands to where you can use your badge and you can check in with your badge on the visitor management system. You're also when visitors come in, they'll use their driver's license and be able to use that technology with the iPad and be able to sign in through their B visitor management system. And that way, we'll still do the same thing. It will identify those um it does that next national sex offender check for us. No
058real change other than we're just going away from the computer system of typing your number in. We use a different badge. The badge will have um a code on here. You'll flash it to the iPad and you can be on your way. That's the visitor management system that we hope to do. Now, it uh Chris and Carlos have been fantastic. We'll order the iPads. We don't think this will be up and running till probably September, October. It just needs to give us a little time because it needs to work in conjunction with our badge system, too. we're going to get new badges and in conjunction with that probably la last part of September, first part of October, we'll be able to roll this out. The second part of this is the badge alert system to
059where you'll have your badge, but you also have a badge alert to where if there's emergency, then two different things will happen. So, if you press it three times, let's say it's a medical emergency, the search team will come. Press it seven times or just keep pressing it, the calvary is going to come. So if there's somebody in the building that should be in the building, pressing it seven times or more, everybody's going to come. So what it's going to do is Raptor will come in. Raptor's already with their visitor management system. They'll use these badges. Each employee will have their own badge. This is going to take a little time. You're going to be able to come in into all of our schools and they'll set up beacons around this way. It will triangulate
060where the emergency is happening. It connects with 911, connects with TPD. So, it's just a seamless integration that in helps with safety uh safety and it feels better for our employees, for our students, but also for our community, for our parents coming in knowing we've got those emergency management system. It's going to take a little time because they've got to come into each individual school and do the beacon system. with that. We hope that to get that up and going, if we get it signed tomorrow, they'll they'll start moving um within the next couple of weeks. We hope to get this up and going uh again around September uh September, October full integration. So when we do this, you'll see that cost of 127,000, but you'll also have a recurring cost. Now the recurring cost
061looks a lot, but it's with everything we do with Raptor. So it's a visitor management system and the badge system as well. will use advancement in technology funds to purchase this. So, any questions? Are we approving this tonight? Yes, sir. Yes. Can I get a motion? I'm second. Okay. Any questions? These badges, they're have larger pictures on them. So, your employee badge will have a larger picture on it as well. It'll, you know, right now you can barely see me right now, but it'll be a larger picture and it also be colorcoded. So, it'll be a color code for an employee, a color code for an SRO, color code for um a business uh temporary subs will have their own badges. They they get their own badges through Kelly, but we'll incorporate them. We're also
062with the visitor with the alert badge. Subs will also get that alert badge as well that they'll turn in each day. Sounds like it's got a whole bunch of safety features. I like that. I think that's a great idea. It does. It's going to work and they provide the training for us. So, there'll be um inerson training, virtual training, but we want to make sure that all of our employees feel safe and secure in that and they know how to use the badge as well. Uh I have a question. Will it will they be able to function campuswide? Let's say um if I'm at the fieldhouse at at Bryant or or out at the baseball softball field at Northridge, etc. during a school during the course of a school day. If it's on the campus,
063yes. Now, the one thing they want if you're a bus driver and you're on on the highway, it's not going to function. It's got to be campuswide coverage, but they can get So, we'll ask them to use their radio. They've also got an app that we may can install um on there, but they've got a radio they can use. So, we want them to use the radio, too. Now, if they're on campus, they see something, let's say they're here at TCTA dropping off and they see something, then they can certainly use their badge for an alert. Thank you. Yes, sir. Um, can the can our badges be pink? Oh, just listen. Right on the No. What? Seriously, I've got a special color for you. I'm just I'm just messing with Dr. Jackson. Seriously, this is
064one of the best investments into our school system since I've been s this board. And this is almost year this year nine. Like this is phenomenal. Um the safety measures, whoever thought of it is brilliant. I absolutely love it. I have to give thanks to Chris. Uh thanks to Carla from the ID department, Anthony Harris. They've just been fantastic. Raptors really working with us as well. So, it was certainly a team effort bringing this along. And I know we haven't gotten to this point because that would be because I can see that kind of having its disadvantages, but is there something in the system and that's a more of a Chris question. Whereas now that they're removing cell phones and parents are very concerned, is there ever something that's going to be where there's a
065badge and a can hit the same button because something truly is going on. I know if they're hitting it now, we got kids that do things that bring them in front of us that would not be appropriate. But with the removal or locking up a cell phone, some parents, it hadn't hit them yet. August is going to be a super mental launch for parents to realize my child can't get to me and we still have occurrences of events that are out of our control. You know, we're doing the best that we can, but there's we pray nothing ever happens to any child, but sure to make parents feel better. Is there something where there's a badge, you know, that something to make them feel a little bit more confident? We're not to that point yet
066in perhaps in the future. Now, when this alert goes out, it would go out to all of the devices um devices that we have, desktops, that sort of thing. So, and and it emits a sound that is from uh Chris and I were uh talking with him a couple weeks ago. It's it's a loud sound. So loud that I thought it was going to um bring some attention to to us in ACR. So it emits a a loud sound, but we're not there with students. Not saying we might be in the future. Okay. When we say it emits a sound, is it like the bell? I'm just thinking about our students that have hearing. It's it's a very significant sound that you'll it'll be discerning from the bell. Okay. And then students that have um
067that parents or students have some concerns that it may trigger certain vibes or you know negative. We'll prepare the teachers to to work with um work with that just like we do with a fire drill. We prepare those students for a fire drill. We'll prepare those students in the same way. Um and to piggy back off Dr. Jackson about always I just want to say publicly again that we are being in um you know getting in front of it preventive um measure taking preventive measures to get ready with the phone situation and state is not to city schools been decided because um like I often tell you you know we get beat up but I know me and Dr. Jackson and Marvin I know we we'll get hit with something that came from the state
068but it's okay but um just making it known that we are not taking the phones away from the children because parents do have a big concern like oh what if something happened you know and um I'm one of those parents but I do realize that with in the schools have done to our students um with that some of these phones actually cause the problem. You know, we're getting back to you going to go to the office to use the phone and we have phones in some classrooms as well. So, um just wanted to make that public to the YouTubers. That's all. Yes, ma'am. One question I got, you know, the early stages of these, you know, they was having multiple false alarms. Is there a override false alarm. We can work with Raptor on it.
069Um, and one point I didn't bring out when a badge is getting low it, you know. So, about every 3 to four months you need to charge a badge. Raptor will tell that person, "Hey, Darren, your badge is getting low. Please um, power it back up." So, we'll work with Raptor. I I know um there was another company in a state near us that had some false alarms in that that way. So, we'll work with Raptor what we can do. Yes, sir. So, you're charging this? Yes. Yes, ma'am. It takes um from what Raptor is telling us holds about three maybe four months of a charge, but when it get when it gets down to 20% battery life, you will be um you'll be told, hey, you need to charge this. I think it's a
070minute, but it's it's a fast charge. Yeah. I don't think it takes long. I don't think it I don't think the charge takes long. Any other questions board members, Mr. Chair? If not, all in favor? Anybody opposed? Motion pass. Um item 12. Uh unfinished business. Is there none? Wait. Oh, I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. Yes, sir. Mr. Dr. Duke, I'm sorry. Yes, sir. The um the FY25 budget amendment. This is something we do annually in the normal course of business as do all school systems. And what this is is just a calibration of the budget uh budgeting of any uh allocations that we received after the fact from the state um back in August and September. And so uh we simply will calibrate the budget again adjust the budget to uh more reflect accurate
071revenues and expenditures that have happened during the year. So we simply ask for your approval of the amended budget. Can I get a motion? Second. Any questions or comments from Mr. Duke? Mr. Duke, we've done this. We do this, you know, just as time coming up. That's right. It It's routine. Um and and it's usually late May, early June. So, we're kind of within like a few days of what we did last year. Yes, sir. All in favor? I now. Okay. Any unfinished business? There's none. Any general announcements from any board members? Just want to remind everybody we have on our agenda June 10th uh call board meeting work session at 5:30. Just continue to hold that date on your calendar um for future announcements. Schools closed June 19th, right? Yes. Is there any other
072comments questions? If not meeting ajourned thank members.