001ing uh the board of trustees of the Lake Tahoe Unified School District into regular open session at 6:00 and um we are now going to report on any act or we have the opportunity to report on any actions from close session. We don't have any items to report this evening and so our next item is item number seven which is communication reports and these reports are limited to five minutes. Um first I'll ask for reports from any of the board members. Okay. Um, it's been an incredibly busy week. Last week was state of the district and I was able to sit at a table with Mount Tac, three Mount TAC students, and just getting their opinions and their thoughts was very it was it was fun and informative. And then I got to see the
002man who came to dinner on um on Sunday at the high school. The set and the costumes, it's still open again this weekend. Get your tickets. And Monday was the um Elorado County Office of Education Award dinner. And not only was I proud of our own award recipients, but it was really kind of enlightening to hear what other community what all around Elder Elorado County, what other organizations and people are doing to make our county better and to make the the kids in the county their lives better. um last night joint meeting with Lake Tahoe Community College and our board and once again heard from students from heard a lot about the high school collaboration, dual enrollment, concurrent enrollment. One thing that really stood out for me that um the superintendent's advisory council kids, Scott
003being one of them, um are so articulate and so impressive in their passion, their ideas, their solutions. It was just that was fun. And then today I got to go up to the high school and again saw just some amazing teachers and amazing kids working. Went into a bunch of different math rooms and I knew that I needed more education on all areas. Anyway, I had it's been a busy week but a great one. Thank you. Anyone else? Thank you, President. Uh Keer, I'd like to just uh reiterate what what President um Trusty Mansfield said. We attended several of really dynamic learning um meetings this past week. And a big shout out to the high school that man who came to dinner the set. If y'all haven't gone yet, it was terrific. Got to see
004TAP perform at Beiju on Monday. The K all the students were just mesmerized and it was it was just a really exciting um to see them so engaged with that. And then um lastly, I was able to visit Beiju today and learn all about the different programs and it was just a very positive loving environment and I had a great time. Thank you. Thank you. I today I had the opportunity to go to two performances of the uh tap uh uh offerings for the back house dancers. Different setup for both of them. Uh much more interactive with the elementary group out at Meyers Elementary uh than it was at the middle school today. Uh really really exciting to see the the kids totally into this modern dance. I I was I was very pleased to
005see how receptive they were uh uh to this terrific performance. Uh so that's it for me today. Thank you. Uh like everyone else, a busy week. Uh wonderful stuff going on between the LTSD and uh the community college, state of the district. Um good turnout and then just very excited for this bond work to get going. So thank you community for supporting us and investing in the school district. Excellent. Um well said everyone and uh so I'm going to move on to the student board member report. Scott Yamamaoka. Um hello everybody. Uh it's been an exciting and eventful few weeks for our school community. Um prom is building up. Uh tickets are now on sale and we also had the black light dance earlier this month and um although there may not have been as
006many students as we would have liked to see there, it was still a really fun night. Um we're also kicking off elections at the high school uh including the um election for the incoming student board member. Um, so this is an important time to get involved and, uh, make your voice heard as we look ahead toward the future. Um, spring sports are also in full swing, uh, including, uh, track, baseball, softball, uh, swim, and boys golf. Um, track in particular, they've already had some huge milestones. A big congratulations to some of our athletes um Leslie Pledo, Brody DeFranco, and Evan Habaratus uh for their amazing performances. Um in the world of theater, as everybody has said already, uh The Man Who Came to Dinner, uh it's a great play. I do recommend going to see
007it if you haven't already. Um uh this weekend is the closing weekend and um as a lot of the actors you see up on stage, they're all seniors. So, um, again, I encourage you to go see the show. And of course, uh, midterms are just quick around the corner there. Um, so let's stay focused and finish strong. A little deeper. Um, some of the things that we're continuing to work on at the high school level, uh, is strengthening our school community. Um again, attendance remains a top priority and uh trying to figure out how to use the LCAP data um at school sites to target and improve certain areas. Um as well as bringing more light to um what it means to have WASK accreditation and uh a lot of the processes that are going
008on there um and that we're implementing at the high school. Um, most importantly, um, we are working very hard on, um, making sure that everybody here, um, in our community and at our schools feels, uh, truly included. Um, and not more just more than just, uh, being present present. Uh, it's, uh, feeling seen, valued, and human. Um, so there's still a lot of stuff to do with that, but um, we're committed to building a more connected and supportive community. Um, thank you everybody. That's my report. Anky's got excellent report. Really appreciate the efforts you've been making on that on that front of people feeling having people feel more included. All of our uh students especially and staff. Um all right. Now we have our superintendent report and our superintendent is not here but we have
009Dr. Alan Reader, our associate super. Thank you, President Camper. Hey, thank you Scott and you you always share such impressive information. It's it's I have to remind myself that I'm I'm listening to a young an 18year-old young man 17 18 year old young man and you're just very impressive. Did you have anything else you wanted to share? I think I think that's all right. I'll leave it there. Thank Okay. If you change your mind, we'd love to hear. All right. Uh he has some some very very good news. Hey, so so just as President Camper shared, uh Dr. Cutler is currently at a training in the Bay Area with our Caled partners. Uh very exciting work that we're doing to align our math instruction and curriculum with uh the new California math framework. And so
010you're going to hear a little bit more about that from our friends from Sierra House tonight. But we're just real excited that we have all of our schools engaged in this uh very important work and we have a very valued partner. But it is a requirement that the superintendent attend these trainings and Dr. Cutler speaks very highly of these trainings. Secondly, I just want to thank everybody for being here. I know we got a packed house and this is really exciting because when Kelly does her report, there's probably not going to be anybody here. You guys are going to enjoy this moment and take off, but we're really happy to have you all here. We did have we did have both our high school friends and Meyers Elementary scheduled for March 13th, our last board
011meeting. If you remember, that was a snow day. We were able to make it uh for the board meeting, but we did have to cancel uh we didn't want to cancel. We wanted to cancel because we wanted to make sure all of our children were safe. So, we appreciate all of you being here. And I apologize for the packed house, but it's important stuff. We're really excited to to hear from our Tahoe Valley friends, our Meyers friends, our South Tahoe High School athletes, and then a little bit later from our Sierra House friends on their um single focus on the good work they're doing with their single focus. Just real quickly, a shout out to Miss Dilman, our coordinator of special education. They have been uh quite short staffed. Uh we're working with Alpine County
012to find a SUPA director. They just offered an opportunity for an amazing special education specialist. Um, we we looked at the board today. We've gone from 12 aid openings to seven aid openings. So, if anybody out there is interested, we would love to talk to you. We uh we need we always need help and we just greatly appreciate Miss Dilman's leadership and the good work that she's been doing. Um, I will cut it off right there. Thank you. Thank you, Dr. Reer. and you're welcome to stay for the entire meeting because everything we do is important and we want to feel valued as as trustees but uh we're really we are really glad to have uh all the support tonight. Um next item is the employee association reports. I saw Jody Dayberry in the room
013and you have a report. All right, thank you. Good evening. Um, is this on? We're good. Good evening uh um board and um community uh partners, parents, and students. My name is Jody Dberry. I'm the president of Saho Educators Association. And on behalf of the association, I do want to bring a couple of issues. Uh just uh to uh to your attention. Well, um the community college and the school district uh work in partnership and um have their annual meeting and uh discussions. um last night uh was uh revolved around concurrent enrollment. We also have dual enrollment with the high school. I respectfully request going forward all conversations include the association as there are several issues um both contractually and I believe the input of educators the people actually teaching um should be included in
014any conversations secondly I also want to bring the board's attention to school safety issues Um, PA has a desire for deeper conversations to be held uh, including conversations with all stakeholders, administration, staff, both certificated and classified students, parents, and other public health and safety agencies. We're kind of in unchartered territories um concerning safety, mental health issues um and some different circumstances um have come up and um feel it's paramount to get some people together, get people in the room and have a much deeper conversation. [Music] Um, all students, all staff should feel safe no matter where they are in the district. So, I look forward to um getting that going with you. And um I also want to recognize all the work that is being done. We're kind of at the point of the year
015um twothirds through a lot still to do and uh just recognize um so many things uh that is happening that is happening at our schools and the really good things. um too often some of that goes unnoticed and um there are great things happening in our schools and uh I appreciate the support from the board. I appreciate the support from our administration, but I do want to um be able to address uh issues that have to do with further um engagement for our students. Um, as the young gentleman, uh, Scott brought up, uh, coming from an equity lens, uh, we have more work to do there and certainly looking at the challenges that many of our families are facing in the right now in the community, housing, economics, job loss. There's a lot of things
016that are happening that we don't always like to hear about, but it's very real. And I would like the board to consider finding ways to further support our students by offering um after school programs with transportation. So often we have people that have great things that they want to do, but at some of our school sites, lack of transportation is very prohibitive. And I think it is incumbent on all of you as a board to find ways that all students can participate in after school programs. and it should not be dependent on whether a parent can leave work to pick them up or have a vehicle even to drive to pick them up. And I think that is something that should be a priority of the board going forward. Thank you. Thank you, Jody. And
017do we have Bernardet Santana? Some don't see Bernardet. All right. I don't think so. All right. Our next item is public comment. So, this is an opportunity for anyone who wants to speak on something that is not on the agenda tonight. Do we have any requests? No. No. Okay. None. Then we're going to move on. We've not received any. And we're moving on to student celebrations, which Meyers Elementary is the first one up. And uh Principal Dan Rol is here to kick us off. Good evening, uh, President Kemper, board of trustees. Uh, thank you very much for allowing us to be here tonight. Uh, full disclosure, I did tell them that nobody ever comes to schoolboard meetings because they're boring, but I guess I was wrong. Um, Trustee Anderson, thank you for coming to Myers
018today. We enjoyed having you. All right. So, I'm gonna turn it over to the kids because that's why you're here. Go first. This is our Matters Elementary fifth grade kindness club slideshow. Hope you enjoy. Um, so every month we have character traits that represent different ways that we can show ourselves like kindness and empathy. And every month students get a chance to win an award for showing that they have that trait. Um, every morning a kindness club member goes with Mr. Daml into his office and on the intercom says a quote reflecting the character trait and the quotes are chosen by Maddie. Um, every morning the kindness club member that did the quote also says the pledge of allegiance and stands there with Mr. Dammer and make sure that he gets all of the announcements
019done. Make sure I do. Yeah. Um, and morning greeters. For some of the Myers Elementary parents out there, you may have seen us outside waving to your children as you drop them off. We're just there to say hi and to help people out. So for our kindness week activities, we have many fun activities for little kids to have like better manners, be kind, and not like grow up being meaner. and including this thing called Monday Madness. We would do this thing every month on Monday where we send members of the kindness club down to the lower grade lunch and give high fives, maybe stickers to kids who are being good and not like messing around with their food, eating their food kindly and like being kind to other students and also doing a lot of
020things just to help them. And also for Valentine's Day, we have a week every year called Kindness Week where we make like a bunch of decorations and little hearts dedicated to students to make them feel really special about themselves. All right. So, I'm Louis the Awesome, known as Maddie, and I do peaceful playground along with a bunch of other students. And the goal of this is to create a very peaceful playground so kids can feel safe and special during the time that we're down there. And it works by like sending the fifth grade members of the kindness club down to the younger grades like second kindergarten and first to go play with them and like work on the behavior of the children there and like make sure that they're acting responsibly. And it also like
021helps them solve problems that can happen on the playground and like also like make memories with us and gives the chance for like a fifth the fifth graders to um act in a caring way and act responsible with these children. And then the next one is assembly helpers. This one's a very important one because during assemblies we help teachers out during stuff by sitting next to grades or like doing the drawings for students that like get picked to get little gifts. And then we also help out by um like keeping the kids quiet and in good behavior and also by like creating school spirit and getting kids engaged and excited to see us. And it really is fun for us and the little kids as well. My name is Owen and this is um at
022each um assembly that we do for our kindness club traits rewards. We do a chant that um kind of like sets a good example or something. Oh, this is a repeat after us chant and this is for the board members too. Act responsibly. We act responsibly. We practice safety. We practice safety. We work together. We work together. We show respect. We show respect. Thank you. And thank you adults and board members for your time. Thank you so much for letting us present. Thank you. So, they do so much more. They help me. They're out with the kids. They're in there at lunch helping them. They're in there at the assembly. Uh Trusty Anderson saw him today sitting with students, sitting all around. Students that are maybe messing around a little bit or having more fun
023than they should be. They they let them know sometimes they let me know. Um and they're all fifth graders and our fifth grade teachers, uh Miss Thorne is back here somewhere. Um have been really supportive of this and our counselor, Miss T is their mentor and she is absolutely amazing. So, this um this kindness club uh really helps with our single focus of building relationships because these kids are building relationships with the younger kids every day and those younger kids really look up to them and are excited to have them there. Thank you. Thank you. We want a quick picture. Wait, before you go mass on kindness club, we take a quick Hold on. I'm going take a picture. Thank you guys. All right. Excellent. I love I love seeing the leadership in uh those
024fifth graders and hope they continue to lead when they're at the middle school next year. Um, next we have the Tahoe Valley Elementary School Student Celebration. And I know uh Miss Little's got and uh Principal Arnette, I saw Miss Little setting up for the performance. Come on up. They're out in the hallway. Mara, thank you, Principal Haret. Yeah. Look at the picture. Good size group. Thunderbird Thunderbird. All right. Hi, President Keer, members of the board, families, community members. Good evening. I am Pat Harnett, principal at Tahoe Valley Elementary School, and I am proud to be here this evening to share a celebration of part of what our students are achieving through active and engaging learning. This year we celebrate the performance of our 10th musical and it's called Susicle Kids. Tahoe Valley is grateful for
025the support we have received in the past from Lake Tahoe Educational Fund, the Elorado Community Fund and the continued support from the Tahoe Arts Project. Due to changes in grant funding, Tahoe Valley Performing Arts is exploring alternative funding sources to continue the after-school musical program serving students first through fifth grade yearly. The community is invited to attend the inaugural preview night gayla perform gala performance on Tuesday, April 1st. A limited number of tickets are still available for this fun-filled evening. This season, 68, yes, 68 student performers are enjoying an application of reading, speaking, listening, and creative movement in a public forum. Students have been meeting with our talented staff, talented staff after school to perfect their parts and are ready for their performance. So much joy and happiness is shared during this experience. I invite
026you to join us for the gala or the other community performances next week. And now, please enjoy Tahoe Valley students performing Green Eggs and Ham. Board members, please turn off your microphones. Yep. Right there. Thank you for coming. Thank you all for coming. Tahoe Valley kids, Susical Kids. Thank you, Pat. Please turn the mic back on. That was very fun. Exactly. Next, we're queuing up the high school winter activities. Thank you all for coming. Yeah. Can stick around for more fun. Good. Thank you guys. Thanks for coming. They were amazing, huh? Sounded awesome. Professionals. Thank you. Right. All right, Dr. Reer. Oh, you're rearranging the microphone. All right, we have uh the high school winter activities. Principal Zunino. Everybody can spread out now and get take a whole room. for the high school. Oh, she's
027here for the high school. Okay, excellent. All right, President Zunino, good evening. Good evening, trustees. Uh, it's a great night tonight. I might suggest double doors over here for uh, I'll tell you a lot lot going on. Great to celebrate tonight. You'll be a part of it. appreciate very much having the opportunity. Uh tonight have some uh scholar athletes like to uh present tonight that have had some outstanding achievements over the winter season. Uh and I have uh coach Hennessy that will introduce our coaches and then from there athletes. So again, thank you. Good evening everybody. Again, thank you for having us. Um winter sports were we had a great year, a great season. I know some of the board members came to our basketball games and we had you saw bands and cheer and
028dance and um we had a lot of success with basketball hosting backtoback home games for the first time for playoffs that was quite an event not successful but you know steps were go going forward our Nordic team did did really well and then some of our other teams were exceptional um so I'm so proud to introduce a couple of teams three teams tonight actually four. Uh we're going to start with our alpine ski team. I'm going to introduce um Coach Jones. Um we had a lot of success up on the mountain this year, you know, especially with the lack of snow we got during the season, but um they found ways to become successful. So, I'm going to turn it over to Mr. Jones. Thanks to the board and the community for having us and
029recognizing a couple of our student athletes here tonight. Uh we actually ro rostered about 30 student athletes this year. So it's a little disappointing. We only have two, but these two guys were were crucial in what you see here in front of you tonight. So we've got Max Fish and Jace Voeva. And these two in particular worked really really hard. Uh Jace was super eager this year. And we had we had a great coaching staff this year. I'm not the only coach. Um, but he was super eager and really made great strides throughout the season. And he wasn't the only one. So, we started, we were kind of consistently finishing between third and fifth out of eight teams. And then at states, they really just kind of peaked and came home with second place in
030Giant Somn for the boys. And these two both played a huge role in that. And I'm gonna have to pull out the piece of paper because Max uh stood on four podiums that day. Yeah. So, uh, Max got third in GS, second in slalom, and then third in the combined of the two, and then his fourth podium was as the team for the boys. And Jace earned an all state. Uh, I think he was sixth. So, after the fourth, you're not on the podium, but he was sixth for states. And mostly, it was because of all his consistent finishes throughout the throughout the season. So, it was a really great season. And we have a young team. We actually have a lot of girls. Um, Max was a freshman this year, so we've got him
031for three more years, which is awesome. So, I'm I've got high hopes for the team moving forward. So, thanks. Thanks for Thank you guys. Yes. Our our next team we're going to recognize um is our cheer team. And let me just tell you um how amazing they've done this year. But we've grown that team to we we had so many young ladies. We added a JV team this year. So we added almost another 25 girls to that team. So, you know, we have almost 50 girls in the winter in our cheer program, which was phenomenal. Um, last summer, for the first time in a long time, they went to a camp, a cheer camp. They're going to be going again this year. Um, so it's really becoming something that they it's we're empowering them, and
032the girls are really just take taking off with it. There's girls now want are thinking about they want to cheer in college. Um, so it's it's really become something special. So, I'm going to introduce um their coach couldn't make it tonight, Izzy Preston, but I'm going introduce Gabriella Lancelotti, their captain. Come on, Gabby. And and Izzy Ga and Matt Ga. And then the rest of you cheer girls, come on up. Gabby's gonna say something just real quick. Hi. Yes, we had an amazing season and we worked so hard to get first place at our first big or not our first competition, but we got our first big win at our competition. And we're so excited for what's ahead. And we want to give a huge thanks to our incredible coach Izzy, our athletic director, Hennessy,
033and everyone else who supported us to make this all possible. That is one big trophy. In this competition, they were beating schools like Bishop McNog, much bigger than us. Much bigger than us. Congratulations. As I said when I started, we had a lot of success. um our boys and girls wrestling team and let me tell you too our girls wrestling team has just exploded um in terms of girls interested in participating that number went almost tripled I think this year so um I mean things are really kids are connecting and I think that's you know as we always talk about the whole child I mean we're connecting those kids through athletics and and it's it's amazing to see so I'm going to bring up coach White House. He's going to talk a little bit about
034the boys and the girls and then the wrestlers. Gary, come on. Good morning or good afternoon, evening, I don't know what time it is. Um, uh, just to kick it off real quick, I don't want to take up too much of your time. I know you guys have a packed agenda, but, uh, I'm here kind of in place. we kind of all uh rallied this year around our head coach being uh Ryan Wallace being down a little bit and so it was really a great community of effort of coaches stepping up administrators and really the the kids on the team really supporting everyone and so we had a lot of success and want to start off our boys team with Charlie Burquist and Cash Hendricks state champions uh at the Nevada state level and really
035an incredible year by both of these young men. Uh they both came in third last year and uh right after that tournament very hungry to uh capitalize on that success and get that championship. So um you know with the lack of u kind of year round wrestling last year these guys you know I think Cash went to the North Dakota. I think he went to the east coast Ohio to seek out competition. Charlie went all over California um going even training with Olympic gold medals Amit Allure um and really seeking out opportunities to better themselves, taking that responsibility and that leadership under their own hand and uh hopefully leaving a legacy um with that team, the boys team next year for them to follow with that great success. So, uh that's the boys and coach
036Robert Hook couldn't be here, but he sends his congratulations to both of those young men, too. Uh for the girls, I'm kind of a little partial with them because I spent a lot of time with them this year and that was really my intent. And um you know, for the state of Nevada, this is the second or third year that uh women's wrestling is a sanctioned sport. So, we're a little bit behind uh some of the other states, but it's catching up quickly. And what these three women represent, Alice Lily, DM Johnson, and Lily Verdusco, is they're really the first wave starting at the middle school. Uh and they're juniors right now. Um they're all, you know, state qualifiers last year, one matches, then came back this year and all three of them placed third
037in the state this year. Um so second in the region behind the number 25 uh team in the nation, Reed High School. And then we qualified the third largest team to the state tournament. Um and they came in sixth as a team. And uh one thing that's unique for girls wrestling is a single division. So we're going up against Slam, Centennial, a lot of the big schools. It's a single division in Vegas. So I really want to emphasize the team. Although we have three standout individual leaders, they really contribute to the growing women's wrestling movement uh not just in the you know United States but really uh in California uh in uh Nevada and really just growing at the youth level as well too. And these girls and these guys are all there at uh
038the middle school practices and our youth practices giving back too. So congratulations to all them and uh here they are. Thank you guys. Yes. So, and real quick, kind of what uh coach was talking about for the women, um there's only one division. So, when he was mentioning those schools, those are schools of 3,000 kids, 3500, 4,000 kids out of Las Vegas that we're competing with. Reed, we all know how big that is. That's in our neighborhood. And we're just, you know, a small school of 1050. Um and so for the girls to have that much success, um attribute to the coach and attribute to the girls for how hard they work. And and I can say the other thing I wanted to say about the boys is I've looked and I don't know when
039the last time we've had two state champions. Um I I just you know um again growing growing. We had more boys and more girls. And so I just you know I'm excited cuz spring sports has started. I hope to be back here in May with lots more uh champions to present to you. Um because I can tell you that the the program is growing athletics across the board. We've got more kids in it than we've had last year and we had a huge number. Um and it just things are things are on the up. I mean it's really bright and you can see all these great kids that that are student athletes keeping their grades up and excited to be a part of the high school. So thank you guys. Okay, thank you Principal Zunino
040and um and the South Tahoe High School. That was awesome. And now we're moving on to item nine, educational services. And we have the Sierra House is first up for their presenting their single focus plan for this year. Thank you, President Camper. Please welcome Principal Holmes and her team to provide us with a brief update on their single focus. Good evening, board of trustees. Dr. Reer, nice to see you in that seat. My name is Karen Holmes. I'm the principal of South of uh Sierra House Elementary School. And this evening, we are here to present our progress on our single site focus. And is this on? Yes. Okay, I turned it off. Sometimes it takes a second, but Okay. Presenting with me tonight is the amazing team of first grade teacher and member of our
041Cal Ed partner team, Julie Molsworth, second grade teacher, Laurel Forhan, third grade teacher and member of our Cal Ed partner team, Jeff Henderson, third grade teacher Allison Buis, fifth grade teacher Amy Turpin, and our lead teacher and intervention specialist, Paige Sephilu. And just a note, this is not just us doing this. The Sier House team is all in. So we're we're just representing our single focus began with the practice of posting our daily learning objective in math and making sure students and teachers are clear about the learning intention each day. According to Jane John Hattie the the teacher clarity has a 75 correlation with improved student outcomes. A point4 correlation is equivalent to one year of student academic growth. Hi guys. So from there, we chose to focus our learning objectives on math. Little did
042we know when we started this process in 2021 just how involved we would get in learning about the latest math research and improving our instructional practices. We've uncovered innovative strategies, challenged our previous approaches, and deepened our understanding of how our students learn math effectively. This journey has not only transformed our teaching, but it's also strengthened our commitment to fostering a more engaging and effective math learning experience. Our single focused journey has taught us that every student comes to us with math knowledge and we are learning to approach math from an assetbased perspective. This is truly fostering the unique talents and potential of each of our students. Math is now a favorite subject of all of our students and for our teachers. And I can tell you personally, I love teaching math now. It probably wasn't
043my favorite subject, but it definitely is now after this experience and doing this journey with our staff. As a result, we've noticed increased confidence not only in our students, but I think in our teachers teaching the curriculum, deeper engagement, and a stronger sense of curiosity in math. Students now see themselves as capable mathematicians and math is fun. Our single focus plan started with establishing clear objective al objectives aligned with California state math standards. We dedicated an entire year to unpacking the California um excuse me unpacking the Marzano critical concepts which organized the state standards into cohesive clusters. Over the past four years, we've deepened our understanding of these concepts, collaborating monthly to ensure they remain the cornerstone of our instruction. We also engage in regular conversations with other grade levels to ensure vertical alignment. In
044addition, we spent the last four years working alongside California ed partners to enhance our understanding of research-based best practices that have been proven to help students become confident, capable mathematicians. This partnership has been invaluable to the success of our single focus approach and we cannot overstate its significance. These six high leveraged math teaching practices developed by Dr. Megan Frankie and her UCLA team have significantly shaped our approach to instruction. In the first year, we focused on the practices highlighted with yellow stars, encouraging students to discuss their mathematical ideas and use tools and representations that made sense to them. During the second year, we expanded our efforts around math conversations, providing students with more opportunities to share their thinking with one another. As a result, students began to appreciate the value of their ideas and grew
045in confidence as capable mathematicians. In the third year, our focus shifted to how we as educators can learn from reflecting on student work. This reflection helps us to make more informed decisions about our teaching. We also continue to refine our ability to ask follow-up questions that engage deeply with student thinking, further enriching both the student and teacher understanding of mathematics. This slide is um a really not You can't see what it says, but it is our it's a quick look at our yearly planning document that we outline at the beginning of the year to then each month we add to it as we complete our objectives. It's a record of what we've done and what we plan to do. And we have a couple years of this added to our belt. So, as we move
046forward without our um Pioneer collaboration, we have this document to work with. And all of the documents that we use during the year are linked into this one main document. This slide is an example of the type of document uploaded to our yearly planning file. Each collaboration session has its own sheet where we capture our thoughts, learning questions, and discoveries. These documents are crafted monthly with specific outcomes in mind and they're then added to our grade level math binders. All the along with student work samples, these documents serve as both a reference for the future and an artifact reflecting our progress. All of this is designed to support our growth and develop our professional practices. And we have amazing binders if you ever want to peruse them. I don't know what else to um so
047there's three key insights from our mathematical growth as a staff. The first one is um we've learned to value all student thinking and re re um reasoning which has helped foster stronger relationships by appreciating each student's ideas. Second, our math instruction is not only promoting a positive math self concept, but also engaging students in relevant and challenging tasks. In the picture on the right, students are tackling a story problem about how much money Mrs. Holmes needs to buy a new dog. I was part of that. I remember that. It was great. So through this problem, students are developing a deeper mathematical understanding by learning how to take the time to clarify their understanding of what the question is asking them to do. They're counting, they're sharing ideas, and they're exploring multiple problem solving strategies. They
048work together collaboratively. It is amazing to see. Um these critical thinking skills are benefiting our students across all subject areas, and you can see that in everything they do. It's pretty spectacular. Um our next slide is this is an amazing thing that we have developed and um it is so wonderful to use for us as teachers. We just go to it and we can use it right away. Um it is our LTUSD elementary math Google site. This is a living site that we are continually updating and improving. We invite you to explore the site and see all the amazing activities available all districtwide and for our teachers to explore and use in their classrooms. Thank you. This year, we put $3,000 of our single focus funds into white books for every classroom. Research shows that
049um uh student engagement increases when they are up out of their seats and collaborating about a concept. We have found this to be true. This slide shows students collaborating around the white books and how teachers can move from group to group, observe how students are approaching a task, and ask questions. Teachers can include gallery walks, group presentations, and many other activities to let students take the lead in their learning together. One important rule for white books is students do not erase their thinking. This helps them see that struggles can be productive and persistent payoffs. The action steps listed on uh uh these slides go into some detail about how we plan to continue to grow our math systems at Sier House. These steps are strategic and each step is important to the success of our
050uh student f our single focus. I would like to highlight number four. We have two days a month set aside for teacher collaboration and this time is non-negotiable. Right now these two days are the last Tuesday and Wednesday of the month backto-back meetings with laser focus on our math data analyzing student work and planning instruction based on what we see. Action step number nine addresses our learning labs. We are committed to studying as grade level teams specific strategies that we would like to improve on um or increase on in our classrooms. Through our learning labs, our knowledge has grown, but even more, we have learned to trust each other, take risks together, and grow as a team. The next two slides show examples of student performance on the I Ready Diagnostic Assessment. Uh this is
051comparing our schoolwide I Ready results from last winter to this winter. Here we're seeing a 6% decrease in students uh performing two or more grade levels below and a 7% increase in students performing at or above grade level. Uh that's 35 more students performing in the green compared to a year ago. Our schoolwide results from September to January of this school year continue to show a consistent positive trend of students moving from below grade level to near grade level and from near grade level to meeting and exceeding grade level benchmarks. We're also continuing to see positive trends in our CASP summitive results. Over the last three years, our third grade students have made consistent gains in math where we have observed a 13 and a half point increase in students meeting an exceeding standard. Dates
052got messed up on that. Hi. Um, a data collection resource we used this year to support it with support from our CALED partners was our learning from children assessment and data. The learning from children looks at six California state math standards and what strategies students use to solve the problems. Each question was given four time or will be given four times at the beginning of the year and at the end of each trimester. And um here is some of the data. It's a little bit hard to see but you can see on the on my left there it shows us those dark ones shows us the students getting the answer correct. more students you can see are getting the answer correct each time that the assessment is given. But whether or not they get the
053answer correct isn't the whole story. So if you look in the colored the pretty colored bands, those show us the strategies. We also just record what strategies they're using. So at the very bottom you can see that they there's some red and pink. The red indicates that the child didn't make any attempt, didn't do anything. The pink said they tried something but it didn't work very well and it wasn't going to work. It was an invalid strategy. So you can see that from the beginning when we gave this test to now, many students have converted their invalid strategies into valid strategies that will eventually lead them to the right answer. Sounds great. That's great. Thank you. Um our work at Sierra House is getting noticed and we're really proud of that. We were featured in
054an article published by Pace through Stanford um University. This article proposes that the Sierra House model serves as a blueprint for building adult capacity and fostering instructional coherence. The study highlights the roles of leadership, strategic strategic resource use and collaborative structures in improving math instruction and scaling practices. Um that article was picked up by Cal Matters, an online publication, and um it featured Sierra House is one of two schools in California that's showing promise in improving student outcomes. Finally, this year, Sierra House was recognized by the Educational Results Partnership for our CASP score data making gains at closing the achievement gap in California. As we know, that's a big thing everybody wants to do is close that gap. So, we were one of 21% of el eligible schools in California received this distinction. Thank you.
055We didn't have much money to spend on our single focus this year, but we made great strides anyways. We spent $2,000 traveling to Kaled partner um covenings and 3,000 on white books for all classrooms. Our monthly collaboration time is just putting contractual time to good use. Making math accessible and fun while improving student outcomes is priceless. With our single focus, we believe that we are making a difference every day. We understand the critical concepts and how to make them accessible to all students. Students are enjoying math and believe in their abilities. Kaled partnership is ending, but we are looking forward to joining the other LTUSD elementary schools in the EDCO collaboration next year. All right. So, we have a couple upcoming events for our um that are related to math. On April 21st and 24th,
056we will be engaging in our um spring learning labs. And if anyone is interested process, you are welcome. And then on April 24th, the same day, it's a very busy day. Um we have the EDCO superintendent coming to Sierra House to learn about our math programs and systems. It's an annual convening of superintendent and they're going to come check us out, which was a really big honor. Um and whoops, where am I? I don't know where I am. So, we're just going to say thank you. This was an information item only. We um love to have you come by anytime and visit us. And are there any questions? Any questions from any of the board members? Mostly comments. I have a question. I have a comment. What's that? I'm just so proud of you guys.
057We have an amazing team working together at this. It's It is I see them weekly. Called Partners has been an unbelievable partner and having them working with our all of our elementary schools and our um 89 collaboration is such a great thing to support. So just keep and the rest of the SH teachers if you didn't know that Ed Monthala our superintendent of Elorado County gave a huge shout out to you guys at the state of the district. So in front of all of our partners and other parents and students and stuff. So and then he also did at the Edco dinner too. So talked about you guys. So you guys are you are making your marks and this whole district is proud of you. Thanks. Are we good? Did you have something bo? No,
058you're good. All right. She covered it. All right. Well, we're so impressed and very excited is appropriate. Um, all right. Next, we have uh a review of our school year calendar. Love the enthusiasm in the crowd. Thank you. You know, you think the calendar would be a simple thing, but we actually spent a lot of time in our negotiations on this one. So, uh, President Kemper and Trustees, uh, before you this evening is the 202526, uh, academic calendar. We wanted to bring this forward for your review and discussion. Um, in the calendar, uh, we put a couple things in place this year, uh, that we thought would be nice to get some input on. We, um, embedded our snow days. Um, we had snow day in January, May, and then at the end of the
059year. um as well as a couple of key dates. If you could change the slide, this kind of highlights and brings your attention to some of the things that are on our academic calendar. Um we worked with the calendar committee and uh both union groups um in April and May and we brought it forward for board approval on May 23rd. The first day of school next year is August 25th. um our professional development day um it it seems to go back and forth um from October 31st to November 1st and so we agreed that we would move it to that Friday. So the PD day moving forward uh if all goes as planned would be on the Friday last Friday of the month or the first Friday of the next month. uh snow days planned
060in January, May, and June again. And then our graduation for South Tower High School is uh the week before we get out of school. So it's that Friday, June tw June 12th. And um last day of school is June 16th, could be 17th, could be 18th depending snow days. But this is all in agreement to do everything we can to finish the school year prior to Junth holiday. couple years ago, we had the Junth holiday a day before the last day of school. So, it really threw off our attendance and kind of the flow of that last week. So, we really want to wrap things up before that date. And, uh, that's all I have on the calendar, but it is for information and discussion for the board. Thank you. And this is an information
061item, but we will approve. It'll come back as an action item at the It's already approved. It's already approved for this next approved. However, if the board has suggestions or would like to make uh changes, of course, we would take that to the committee and then bring it back forward for your approval. All right. Any um questions or input or interest or I know that um yeah, I know John wants to move on. I I appreciate all the work of the committee and trying to um sus out the thing and I I think I I was the one who wanted to kind of have the item mainly to hear if there was any um interest from the community and and I I've heard from some community. I know the that January day that we we
062had a day off because we hadn't had a snow day. You know, there were some parents frustrated with, you know, a random Monday that they didn't have child care for. You know what I mean? I heard I heard some of that and I and talking with staff, you know, having that date in January is important, having it while it's still part of the high school semester because, you know, if if we took all the snow days later in the year, it it's like some teachers would, you know, the first semester you might miss three days and then the second semester you might have three extra days to teach. It's it's sort of awkward that way. So, trying to balance that. Yeah, we work really hard to provide a snow day in the high school's first
063term. First term, right? So that's what that day is. Yeah. Um but there's definitely been talk about possibly pushing the other uh snow days out in later, you know, in May just because there's such a um long gap between spring break and the end of the school year. Like would it be nice to have longer um weekends in May possibly or lumping them together the the remaining two? I've heard that idea. Um but I think in general it seems to be working. I will say that I did hear even though it was not on the agenda last night for the joint uh college um school district. There's still an interest in trying to align the spring breaks which are now just a week apart. Um and and uh it it seems like it may there
064may be an opportunity in a in a given year. It may not be next year but just something to um continue to look at. So if there's a way of lining that. So anyway, anybody else? Everybody else okay with what we're doing? Okay, just wanted to share those thoughts and uh sounds like we're okay then we won't we won't schedule this for a future meeting for action because that calendar is in place but the follow like a year from now we would have this conversation again and we would be talking about the following calendar. um or you try to do it. We'll bring we'll bring the 26 27 calendar forward this year for your approval for appro that's the one that would come for approval would be in the next month or so in May
065for the following year. Okay. All right. Thank you. You still have me. That's it. Moving on to item number 10. Thank you, John. Oh, you're you're standing there because you're going to talk about uh personal services. Item 10 A, uh, Sunshine for STA and then 10B, Sunshine Lake Tahoe Unified School District. All right. Yeah. Um, happy to have Jody Dayberry join me for this. Um, we're bringing forward uh before you this evening. Um, the South Tahoe Educ Educators Association submission for sunshine items for the 202526 school year. Uh, SDA submits the following sunshine items. Article 11, uni member hours. Article 14, transfers and reassignments. Article 15, unit member evaluation. Article 19, early retirement incentive program. Article 20, grades span adjustment. Article 24 teacher induction program. Um, and the peer support coaching program. Along with uh
066this article, association will review contract articles andus that have become obsolete or need updating. Um, Jody, do you want to speak to that at all? Thank you, Mr. Simmons. Um, SDA looks forward to um starting negotiations uh by uh April 22nd is our start date and um getting together with the district with the uh hope and belief that uh we always are working towards improvement and uh in evaluating some of the articles and where there are ways that uh we may be able to make things better both for our members but also uh for the district as a whole. Uh one thing specifically that uh we feel very strongly about is um finding a way to support our newest members. As you may be aware, it is harder and harder to find, recruit, and retain
067teachers. um and especially in uh certain subjects, special education being one of them. And so I have long been a proponent of growing our own and with the hope someday we can actually work through uh some type of program CTE or whatnot to start uh up at the high school having students that may be interested in a career in education. So that's one thing that I think would just be a huge benefit for uh both the association and the districts in a way to be able to also support our newer teachers that may not have finished or completed a a program a teacher education program. Um but we are having such difficulties finding people specially in special education. So, uh that is to me very exciting uh because it's long overdue and the rest of
068the things there uh look forward to working through with the district and um really want to thank the district. We have had some very very uh uh productive um negotiations and have had a really nice uh tone as we go into things. So, I appreciate that. Okay. All right. Item number 10B. Thank you, President Keer. Um before you this evening is are also the uh Lake Tahoe Unified School District's submission for sunshine items. Uh we're bringing forward for negotiation this year uh article 12 absences and leaves as well as article uh 26 just the terms of the agreement. This is a three-year um agreement and so we just need to update that and um that is all. Okay. The district. Um all right. Thank you. Any questions from the board? Both item 10A and 10B
069the sunshine items for South Tower Educator Association and for the Lake Taho Unified School District are action items. So we need a motion to adopt. And um I think we can take one motion for both items 10 A and 10B. Let's separate them. Okay. 10 A first. Let's do a motion for 10A for the South Tahoe Educator Associations. I move that we adopt the sunshine with South Tahoe Educators Association going forward. Do I have a second? Second. All right. Um I have a motion from Trusty Mansfield and a second from Trustee Anderson. Um, do I have any final questions or thoughts? I just want to take that. And I want to just make it clear that these are we're approving the list of topics for negotiation, not that there's been a resolution of any public
070comment on these items. No public comment has been received. All right, then I will take a vote. All in favor say I. I. I. Opposed? Okay, that motion has passed. It's carried forward. Item 10B is the sunshine items from the Lake Tahoe Unified School District Administration. Uh, do I have a motion? I'll make a motion to approve the um recommendations for the negot initial negotiations. All right. Second. Second. Okay. I have a motion by Trusty Kamacho and a second by Trusty Heatherington. And do I have any comments or questions or any public comments? Seeing none. All right. All those in favor say I. I. opposed. No. Okay. Motion carries. All right. Item Thank you, Mr. Simmons. Item 11, facilities and transportation. Uh, this is an information item on the Myers walk-in cooler project. Mr. Zebo.
071Good evening, President Keer and members of the board. Our food service department has secured funding to purchase and install a walk-in freezer refrigerator combination for our Meyers Elementary School. Uh due to space and limitations in this kitchen, we plan to construct an exterior enclosure attached to the rear of the kitchen to house this unit while still having access through the kitchen. Uh to move forward, Studio W Architect has provided a proposal to develop and submit the required plans to the division of the state architect DSA for approval. Uh given the extended DSA review process, this item is being presented for information this evening with the hope that the board would support moving forward with action at the next meeting on April 24th. This timeline aims to facilitate project completion by the fall of next school
072year. Um we do appreciate the board's consideration with this and I do have Tammy Miller here, our food and service our food services director. And between the two of us, we can answer any questions related to the needs for this walk-in cooler, the funding, or any other construction specific related questions you might have. Thank you. Any questions or comments? You said you you said you secured funding for the project. Can you explain that? That is correct. Tammy, would you like to? Yes. mic, we secured a grant from um the state of California. It's a 2022, I believe, um equipment grant. And so it's for a certain amount for the walking cooler. However, it'll be a bit more, but those funds will be paid out of fund 13. So everything that as far as the architect,
073everything will be paid out of fund 13 because I have a spend down program with our funds. So, nothing will be paid out of the district. Thank you. Um, I would like because of the length of time that DSA takes, I would like that it go on the consent agenda. So, we don't even So, it gets voted on and boom, this evening. No, we can't do it this evening. We can't do we because we've already adopted the agenda. But for for next meeting, the April meeting, April 2, that would be much appreciated. All right. All right. Any other questions or comments? Well, I think that yes, we're we're happy ba basically because there aren't any I I mean Tammy and maybe later I know um Kelly Martin could probably explain what fund 13 is, but
074is that specific to the cafeteria funds? Sorry, we're separate from fund one. Anything that the district does is fund one. Food services is fund 13. So, we're totally separate. We earn our own money. We're self-supporting. We go out for grants. We actually have another grant for dishwashers to replace three dishwashers. It's next year. No. So, um, we really try and go out there and and get any funds that are available. We can improve some of our sites. Myers has never had a walk-in ever. and they have raised their um lunch and breakfast numbers to the same equivalent as every other elementary school whereas they used to serve a portion, you know, maybe a third of what everybody did. So, they deserve a walk. They they need space. They need to be able to provide those
075for kids. Yeah. Can you take a followup, Tammy? Sure. Um I was out there this morning and and uh Joel showed me where it's going. Yeah. And um there's a trash can compactor out there. He could not explain where that was going. He said, "Nobody tells me anything." Yeah, we have a spot for that. It's going to go right around the corner be right behind the NPR. Um if you know where the custodial office is, right there kind of right behind that. Okay. I believe there's a container already in that kind of in that same vicinity. All right. Thank you. Yeah. Thank you. And um good luck with the project. Yeah. And thank you Tammy for um seeking those grant funds whenever you can. I appreciate that. Thank you. All right. Um so that will
076be a action item on April 24th and consent is fine. All right, Miss Martin. Next item 12, business services and operations. We're doing budget development. Um we're going to have a presentation and discussion around um possible reductions in the future. Teresa, can you put up the presentation? It's fine. It 15 years. Uh at the last board meeting, staff presented the second interim budget in which we showed the multi-year projections for the next uh two fiscal years that included reductions. To give the board and the public a better understanding of how we develop multi-year budgets and weigh reduction options, I will review some basics of building a budget and multi-year projections and then look at reduction possibilities. I think this just goes to sleep, Teresa. Now that was me. Okay, now it's happy again. Building a
077budget for a school district is an incredibly complex. Uh so we start with the assumptions of both revenues and expenditures. In layman's terms, it's income and expenses. This slide shows our assumptions for revenues that include cola changes in average daily attendance, enrollment information, the average daily attendance, unduplicated pupil count, unduplicated pupil percentage, and lottery for both the unrestricted and restricted restricted sides. Keep in mind that the unduplicated pupil percentage is what drives the supplemental and concentration part of the local control funding formula or LCFF. And if we fall below the 55% mark, then we do not receive concentration funds. And I did share at the last meeting, we're hovering right at that 55%. And in talking to EDCO today, um we're not the only ones because we have universal meals. That funding is based on
078families qualifying for uni universal meals, but free meals. We don't require that paperwork. So, we think we're missing some because we actually believe we're significantly higher than 55%. There it goes. The assumptions for expenditures are even more complicated. The district has to take into account the additional costs of teachers moving step and column with the salary schedule, salary increases, increases in stirs and pers rates, growth or decline of teaching and aid staff, increase in transportation costs, increase in utility costs, as well as maintaining the 3% for routine restricted maintenance and a 3% reserve for economic uncertainty. Please note that our utilities increased an average of 35% for this fiscal year and we are projecting a continued increase in utility costs at this point. We're it's almost a guess of 15% because we aren't getting the
079information out of all of our utility companies in order to accurately project. Um, I'm sure all of you noticed even your home electric bill went up more than probably 40% in this last year. So, we're dealing with that at a much larger larger scale. Here we go. In the second interim report, staff included blanket reductions to meet the minimum reserve. We did a 5% reduction in services districtwide and a 5% reduction in supplies districtwide. This will be felt at the site level as we've had 35% cuts over the last few years, but we can stick to this plan if that's what the board prefers. These reductions account for additional expendit expenses due to increases in salaries, benefits, and operating expenses. Some examples of reducing services are eliminating our partnership that we have currently with EDCO
080and their SULPA helping support us while we're without a director, reducing or eliminating consultants, reducing or eliminating data systems that are non-essential or are redundant. The reductions in supply budgets will mean less of things like office supplies, books, and custo custodial supplies, which we're running on a very bare minimum right now. I went too far. Here we go. This slide shows a few ways the district has uh oh no uh uh hill sorry has reduced expenses and other ways to reduce expenses. For example, we've cut two director positions a director of IT and a director of student services. This savings is only 105,000 for a couple of reasons. First, the director of student services was a shared position with Alpine County. So, they were paying a portion of that salary. Next, to maintain a level
081of service, we are hiring an IT technician to ensure that we have a high standard of service and following all legal compliance for the IT department. The next option for reducing expenses expenses is to cut non-core programs. These are simply examples and are not recommended at this time. For example, if you cut music as a program, you would say $425,000. We're able to keep our music operating at its current level because of Prop 98 or Prop 28 funding. Without Prop 28, we have not would not have been able to continue it. Next, you can see the examples of cutting both an intervention and performing arts program as well as cutting staff child care the staff staff child care program. To reiterate, these aren't recommendations for cuts, simply examples of how you can reduce expenditures in
082a school district. These dollars are really salary and benefit costs. We chose these programs so you can see the dollar figure and compare the difference between a program like in intervention which has quite a bit more staff than a program like music which is a smaller group of uh staff members. Both music and performing arts address the board's priority to support the whole child while intervention is part of the board's priority for literacy. Intervention is also outlined in the local control accountability plan or LCAP, which would need to be modified if the board chose to cut a program like this. Another way to right side a budget is to increase revenue. For example, if we increase the amount we charge for child care to $655. So that's 65 infant, 55 uh preschool, which would be
083$5 less than the lowest um private child care in town, not an inhome child care. Um the we would reduce the district's contribution by h 100,000. So meaning the district would go from losing $250,000 annually to only losing $150,000 annually. Though this is a contribution we have to make to maintain the program. Another option is to reinstitute the fair share donation for athletics at the middle school and high school. This was instituted in 2005 to help cover the cost of transportation. This is a donation and does not prevent a student from participating. The rates shown are the last rates used in 2018209. If a student plays more than one sport or a family has the family's maximum donation is $250 for this school year. So, I would use Kevin Hennessy's two boys as an example
084because they both play three sports each. So, have to pay the 155 every kid. He would max um $250. Um last we could increase bus fees. We started charging bus fees again this year after a hiatus postcoid. The last time we charged bus fees as we discussed last year was in the 2019 2020 school year. uh we use the fees from 2019 2020 to start. We could increase the fees to $175 which is a 17% increase from those uh from the 1920 school year. So we just looked at kind of what that increase in revenue would be and you can see those comparisons. This is a discussion item only. Do you have any questions or suggestions on how you would like to the staff to move forward? I know that with not just LCAP and
085intervention, but our board priorities, we need to keep music. We need to keep performing arts. We need um the intervention and we need the staff child care to retain our teachers. So, we need to we we know it's going to be hard, but we we got to look we have to be creative and innovative, which is another board priority. Um, any other questions or comments? Scott, do you have some input? Uh uh I would like to say um thank you Miss Mansfield and thank you for the board for recognizing the importance of the arts uh and performing arts in our community. Um from a student perspective uh these are some things that really make South Tahoe um part of uh what we are as a community. Um and uh more than just saying it, uh
086I do uh encourage us to keep working to find those innovative and creative solutions. Um because I know there's a lot of unrest in our communities um not simply within uh what's happening um within our district uh but within the state of our nation as well. So again, um, thank you for your support and, uh, I do urge to keep a lot of these programs because, um, looking at it, they really do matter to the student population, um, more than, uh, people may express, uh, explicitly. So, thank you. Anyone else have a comment or a thought or idea, discussion? You have comments from the public. And then I just want to um thank you, Miss Buttery, for um presenting that. And um I heard I have a couple things, but I heard last night at
087the LTCC LTUSD joint board meeting, somebody was congratulating us on a $750,000 grant, a workforce grant. And I thought, wow, that's a lot of money. $750,000 if we're looking for 2 million specific for to CTE. It's that's okay. It's still program. Okay. I just thought I mean I was like I know it's specific to a particular program but I also know it's coming into our budget. So um it's to grow the existing program. Yeah. It's a do you know more about it? He wrote it partially for Mount Tac to help um with entrepreneurship maker space. Um so it's written for specific reasons. Unfortunately I wish that we could just take the 750,000 and go let's just cut down the No, they would take it right back. and I'm gonna go to CEO jail. Well, I
088mean there may be I mean there may be a little savings if you know we're using it to expand something at TAC that's maybe already began. You know what I'm saying? If there's like some percentage of somebody's time that it might shave off maybe not so much of um budgets in government and school districts is is puzzles where how we can make this money work and how can we make it go the farthest. So that's what we're always kind of looking at. Um, and even Mari Mar and I were in the car today down at Edco, my director, and coming up trying to come up with different solutions of how we can uh make some adjustments that will benefit everybody and try to keep it as far away from the classroom as possible and as
089far away from the students as possible. And I do want to reiterate, we have no plan to cut unless we're directed by the board, music, performing arts. It's really to give you a dollar figure of what that looks like. um when we're looking at potentially $2 and a half million dollars of goods. And I just want to say that um I I appreciate that and I um in looking at those other couple I would say okay we're keeping arts and performing arts and music. Um just I would say that I wouldn't I I'm you know I think the the bus fee situation you know we could charge a little more. I'm still I'm mostly just appalled that only 340 students of our 3600 students use the bus. So I really far more than use that.
090But it's just based on average of how many of we've collected. So it's just sort of a it's some people get waved the fee waved if they're if they can afford it, that sort of thing. And we don't deny a student a ride. Yeah. Right. So if they're waiting for the bus, the bus drivers don't deny a student a ride. So, I mean, I think then I then from that perspective, I wouldn't mind seeing an increase there. You know, by that $25, most folks could afford that that are already paying it. The ones that aren't paying it wouldn't be paying it anyway. And then, um, as it relates to child care, I think that we could raise the rates. You know, I don't know how we go about deciding what what amount, but to me,
091um, the child care, it it's a huge investment by the district right now. out the $250,000 for a very small number of people compared to what the district already pays for insurance for everybody. You know, it's a very large number per person uh as compared to the cost of busing or something like that. We're happy to take direction from you on how much you would want us to if you direct us to raise rates and or ask Dr. Cutler to put an analysis together, we're happy to do that to see where we would fall out in the end if we raised them x number of dollars. We're happy to do that. We kind of already started. You kind of did. I mean you kind of presented that but I don't know how the rest of
092the board members you know feel about that but I just uh in looking at comparing all the I mean there's a lot more benefit from the other programs to a lot more individuals you know staff and and students but um that I mean that's just the observation from what you shared with us and then um related to just the I think what Dr. Dr. Cutler has explained is that in the past these cuts we managed to figure out a way to do it like you said through cutting services and um supplies and um you know that that seems to be working. I hope we don't run out of toilet paper. um you know, but I mean, you know, I know that you guys have been good at at doing that and figuring out ways to
093come up with that dollar amount. And I think we've been fortunate with our community partners to have books donated and things like that and supplies and and often if we put that request out, you know, we get more supplies, too. So, we may have to get creative about um soliciting more donations for things like that. Um all right, I'm ready to take public comments. Yes, we have one public comment from Jody representing the SDA. Thank you uh for this time to speak. Kelly, thank you for your presentation. Um just looking through uh some of the things uh and where we are with projected colas uh enrollment declining or not because right now what I'm looking at is we're making some assumptions that our enrollment is going to be staying flat for the next two years
094out. Um ADA with where it is very little fluctuation is projected on this. Um but we do have the uncertainties of what's going on with at the federal level uh with title monies for sure um which uh they do end up paying for quite a few of our uh uh classified people's and positions. So we are definitely keenly aware of that. Um, and I appreciate uh Kelly's uh saying, you know, the district desires to keep the cuts away from kids. I have a couple of things that I think we need to do a better job exploring. Um, suggestions if you'll have it. Uh, one, that family income survey. While people do not have to f uh fill it out to uh qualify for the breakfast and lunch program, I think we can do a far
095better job. Far better. And it's going to take boots on the ground. Boots from the school sites, district office. I mean, we need to do a better job. The fact that we are falling so close to that 55% is somewhat absurd. And I personally have watched students come in and enroll and that's not like there's a certain point where we say doesn't really matter if they're filling them out or not. That's not the message we want to put out there. Um it can be electronic. It can also be paper. and we need to do a better job. There must be a way to track as those things come in and target families that haven't turned them in. And if we did a better job promoting why it is so important, there's quite a bit of
096revenue. Secondly, um transitional kindergarten as you know uh the state has we are now where it is a mandatory offering and right now we are not seeing a whole lot of enrollment and there's been mixed messages mixed different information from different school sites that are going out and we are a unified school district and it's kind of confusing for me and other staff members. So, if it's confusing for us right now, think of what some of our parents are that that are going to have students starting in our district. So, TK, there's a lot more funding for TK. It's not the same ADA funding as for our kindergarteners. And now with that, we have to have a second person. The cap on it is 20 students and two staff. If you go over, then you
097have to have a third staff person in the classroom. But we can do a lot better job as a district promoting TK. It's a win for everybody, especially those people that are having trouble finding child care. Okay. Every every announcement that I get from every school, you know, like from the Thunderbird paper, whatever, and the Sierra House and Meyers and um Soaring, I guess is the Thunderbird paper. They're all talking about it and they're all saying enrollment dates are open. So, can you explain to me how are they how are what are the mixed messages? Um different school sites when families come to enroll um because right now we currently have two sites that offer TK and then since notifications have gone out and remember if you're a brand new parent to the school district
098why would you be checking the Meyers newsletter or Tahoe Valley? That's true. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. So if you haven't had a student in school and you don't know about this. Yeah. So it's a bigger community promotion I believe needs to happen. Do you have suggestions on how to do that? Because I think that's important. And like Thunderbird shirts and waving. It's free. You don't have to pay daycare. No. All kidding aside, we want foury olds. Yeah. We want your kids. Please. But uh yeah, I I do think and as you know, our kindergarten enrollment numbers were quite low this year. So that means going forward, unless we have kids coming in, and this year was just a a blip, we may be having less kids all around. Um the second or the third thing, um
099the increase to ADA through attendance. And I know how hard it is, especially up coming out of COVID and parents just, well, my kids stayed home for all that time. What does it matter if they stay home now from school? Whether it's some type of incentive again, what we can do at the school sites with kids, but the kids can't really drive themselves to school or get themselves up and go to bus stops. Um, at least the littles. But uh the effort there for attendance increase and looking at where we're seeing those drop offs. I know we had a pretty big drop at well the uh after the snow day this last snow day and it you know every time we drop attendance you know it it it's a cost. So I think those are
100things that we can do. Um, as far as the child care, that was something and I don't think any of you were here on the board or any of you were actually um in the district except for Kelly. Um, but when we did create that, I'm sorry, Val, you were. I apologize. exceptional. But when we did that, um it really was to help attract and retain not just teachers. The employee daycare is for all employees. Our classified administration has had students that go to our employee daycare. And so it is one of the few things that we can offer. A and it makes a difference for people. And I've had teachers tell me this will make a difference whether I can keep working if they if the daycare goes away um and they need to
101move away. So those are just some things to consider. Uh we look forward to always uh working with the district and through the LCAP processes and whatnot. Um thank you for speaking to the programs, the music, the arts, all of those things. Whatever gets a kid hooked, whatever it is, that is really what is most important. So when you do have to get to that, please keep that at the forefront. Thank you. Thank you. All right. Any other thoughts, direction? All right. Well, thank you. That was a presentation information item and now we're moving on to item 13, board governance. Um, we have the resolution number 2024-2511 to adopt the updated board governance handbook. Dr. Reer, do you have any any information for us? I think this is pretty much our item, but you may
102have something. I I do not have any uh anything prepared, but just I just see this as an action item. Yes, President Keer. All right. Do we have any uh questions or comments? This is really our board's governance handbook that we um went over during our retreat in January. And um there's a resolution that updates with all of our signatures um that we will implement um our board protocols and principles and things of that nature. I would like to make a motion to add pot the updated board government handbook. All right. Do I have a second? I second. All right. I have a motion by Trustee Mansfield and a second by Trustee Heatherton. Um do um I have any other thoughts before we take a vote. Do I have any public comments? And uh Trusty
103Mansville is pointing out the typo. says ADP pot instead of adopt. But poor our executive assistant gets she spells the right she spells things right you know 99% of the time 99 and a half 95% of the time we have to have a little fun in here some above satisfactory all right um all in favor say I I post the motion was by trusty Mansfield second by trusty Heatherington to adopt the resolution. All right. And it passed unanimously. And the last uh item for action is our consent agenda. Um do I have a motion? I'll make a motion to adopt a consent agenda. All right. I have a motion. Uh do I have a second? Second. All right. I have a motion from Trusty Kamacho and a second by Trustee Anderson. Um all in favor
104say I. I. All opposed. Okay, that carries. And uh item 15 is items for consideration at a future board meeting. any suggestions or I I do I was up at the high school today and uh we all know that little kids don't have a big attention span. It gets greater until about fifth grade and then it starts to go down again. And I'm just thinking that the 4x4 needs to be looked at just for the length of time that you're spending on this one subject. And also last night at the LTCC LTUSD joint meeting, we need to have some more options of classes. And if we do go to say five periods plus a flex a flex period or something like that, there would be so many more options and you could have 17 students
105in a class and it's not going to, you know, break the bank. Um, so I just think we need to look at that at a future meeting. Okay. All right. Any uh anyone else? All right. Then um moving on to item 16, I adjourn the meeting at 7:41.