001All right. All right. Good afternoon everyone. We'll call this April 22nd 4pm work session of the ASD school board to order. Present in the boardroom are members Lessons, Wilson, Jacobs, who's chairing today, Higgins, Donley, and then online we have members Hullman and Bellamy. Um, we've called ourselves to order. Our first item on our agenda today for work session is B1 budget. Dr. Bryant and team, the floor is yours. Thank you, Mr. Chair. So today's work session follows up on some key topics that are on our educators minds and that includes our budget development processes, timelines. I understand that there's a lot of questions around staffing. We'll be prepared to answer that and then we'll also share some information on the record that we also shared with legislators uh this week on our fund balance. But
002with that said, today's work session is going to be very process heavy. But before we start getting into all of that, I think it's very important that the community and everybody in this room understand that there's real people attached to these processes. And this is a devastating time to be an educator right now. And it doesn't help that just moments ago, uh, the governor's veto was sustained by the legislature. So, a lot of educators are feeling panic and they need to hear that we have their backs and we're going to do whatever it takes to help them. So before we get into the nitty-gritty of processes and that sort of thing, it's people first here and we're going to do whatever we can and we'll talk through some of that today, but I had to
003say it off the top. So with that said, uh team, go ahead. All right, thank you. Um I'll go ahead and kick this off. Uh really I wanted to spend this presentation on the budget side of it. Really focusing on our fund balances, how we report and disclose those, the different categories of fund balances and the impact of onetime funding and attrition that they have on that. Um we'll give a brief legislative update based on the fistic fiscal impact of the governor's new proposed bill and then I'll turn it over to Marty and his team to discuss uh give you a little more information on the staffing. Uh right now we're in the here's our budget calendar again. and it's really we are in the legislative session really just trying to wait to see what
004happens there. Um as Dr. Bryant mentioned the the veto of the funding was sustained so they're going to have to go back to the drawing board and figure out something for education. So really the first one is um just trying to dispel some of the misconceptions that have been out there around ASD's fund balance and some other items that have how it's been reported. The first misconception that we've had is that the district has $121 million in savings that could be used to uh prevent reductions of staff for next year. Reality, the majority of these funds have either been restricted for use or have already been dedicated. So, of that 121 million that that's what we ended last year, that I believe that's where the number came for on the report. Uh 37 million is
005in our spending plan for this year. almost 50 million for next year and then about 27 million is restricted for our bond rating reserve and is otherwise unspendable. So that leaves about you a little under $8 million of actual spendable money to address uh any sort of Sure. And we'll go through them a little more go through them all in a little more detail and kind of where's those reports are at. Um, but really the $121 million that we ended last year with is largely spoken for at this point. And here's the report that I believe that the folks were looking at to get that 121 million. So, this comes out of our financial statements. Uh, you can see the general fund unreserved fund balance 121.6 million here. Um, or about 18.45% 45% of our
006expenditures. We do have fund balances for other in other areas such as incumbrances, inventory, prepaid, self- insurance, impact aid, and then student aotments which are also restricted. Uh this is we are above the 10% limit that has been waved through the end of this year and should go back into effect next year unless there's other legislative changes surrounding that. To break that down a little bit further, the district also prepared a report uh that's also in our fi in our financial reports that show um a little more detail on how that's broken out. So, of that 121.6 million, you can see here we have the 37 million that it's already been dedicated or at that time had been dedicated towards the current year's budget, uh the $26 million in bond rating, and then it shows
007$58 million in other which is our un unassigned fund balance. So, of that 58 million, that's really where we're drawing the $50 million from for next year. Um, but again, this report's ending June 30th of 24. We wouldn't know how much we're spending next year until we got closer to the budget. So, that's why we have uh we don't we show that as unassigned, but truly that $58 million is going to be the ma vast majority of is planned to be spent for next year. There's also a crosswalk between the state of Alaska charter of accounts or their reporting standard and the governmental accounting standards board uh statement number 54 reporting. So we have right now we're in this area where we have to do two different reports. One based on the state standards and
008one based on the the Gazsby standards that we have to do our financial reports for. And we do a crosswalk to there so you can see the different categor categorizations of fund balance. Um, but I really don't want to get into a lot of that here because that's going to get really technical and probably uh an accounting lesson for another time. But we do provide that just because we have to do two different reporting standards. So uh question from member lessons. Yeah, thank you. If you could just clarify um this is you know the end of FY24. So, the way that I've been thinking about it is as as if we had taken, you know, a a Polaroid or a snapshot at 11:59 p.m. on June 30th, 2024. I mean, is that a correct sort
009of this is a moment in time depiction? I mean, it's now we're now 10 months out from the end of FY24. Yeah. So, that would be the amount of money that we had essentially at the end of FY24. Um, and that's kind of this was actually done after the board had gone back and redone the adopted budget for 25 because as you recall when we did our preliminary budget, we had I believe it's like 70 million or so in fund balance dedicated to it. Um, now we have 37 because the state onetime money came in. So this does account for that kind of one-time money coming in and a little bit lower usage of fund balance, but we're still using it. It it account So it accounts for the money that we re the onetime
010funds that we received from the state. They wouldn't necessarily be in there, but the amount of fund balance the board has chosen to use to support this year's budget. Okay. That changed in August. We changed the financial statements for the prior year because of that because it's a considered a subsequent event and we need to include it if it's within a certain amount of time after the close of the f financial period. Okay. Thank you. Um, the next misconception would be that ASD did not spend any of the onetime funds for 2425. That would be the $49 million um that was provided as a $680 BSA equivalent in to the districts. Um, in reality, we fully incorporated that $49 million into our budget um in addition to the $37 million in fund balance that we're
011planning on spending. Mr. I'm going to pause there and get a question from member Donley. I just want to clarify the difference between the various proposals on the BSA. Um so last year there was a 680 dollar increase which equaled 49 million for ASD. Right. Correct. And um our current gap is based on the things we the board wants to restore is about a $100 BSA. So that I mean a $1,000 BSA. So what's that? Total is how much? Uh about in total dollars? Yes. About 71 million. So it's 71. And then the latest proposal I saw being put forward by the executive was 560 which would be how much? Uh just under 40 million. So that would still leave us with about 60 million to figure out where to cut. We'd have to based
012based on the amendment that passed when we did the budget saying if there's a $1,000 BSA increase, here's what we're going to do with it. would be short about 40 million still of those items. About a $30 million difference between the thousand and the the five. So it going for 71 to 39. I'm just trying to anticipate what we're going to be faced with in in a month here if if it doesn't if you know if we end up with 560, right? So we'd be looking about about 30 million we'd have to go back and figure out what 30 million of that million we'd still have to cut. Correct. I mean, yeah. Or what you want to add back with that 40 million. I mean, that's really how we would look at it is the
013administration would probably just like in other instances. Here's an administration proposal to add this money back. Does the board concur or want to change it? Thank you. One more question from member Hickness. Yeah, I I was in a community council meeting, Eagle River area, and I was listening to one of the participants there, one of the members reading off stuff from a from the legislature, talking about how we got onetime funding last year, didn't use any of that money. Uh that we had more in savings than what we even needed this year. And listening to all of these things that just kind of blew me away because I also sit on the finance committee, so I kind of know that part. And I responded to a lot of that, but I'm trying to figure out
014how was this even made up or where did they come from to think that we haven't spent one penny of the money from the BSA increase last year, the one-time funding, and that we have such a massive amount of savings. And they're using that as a basis to say that ASD doesn't need anything. Kind of like the issue of admin. we don't need it because we got admin so big even though we provided the information we of how limited it is and if we cut all admin people won't get paid. Uh it still didn't go across but I'm wondering where the numbers came from. How could they have possibly come up with this assumption that none of the one-time funding was spent? None of it. And we had all this hundred and so many million
015dollars in savings that we could spend, but none no BSA money was spent last year. That was the one time funding. You have any idea where that was made up? How it was even come about? I've got a couple theories. Yes. Um, so yeah, the two theories that I have are, uh, one in the state report that's due July 15th, um, we didn't know how much money we were going to have until like June 28th, that Friday before, uh, we left for July 4th break. Uh, the school board is out of session, so we did not have a budget to the state by July 15th that reflected the new money addition. I I suspect most other districts didn't either. Um, we were told to submit the budgets as as they were without the money included.
016So, the the official report for Anchorage's budget as of July 15th did not include that $49 million in one-time funding. Um, so if you're just looking at that, you probably wouldn't have seen it in there, although the board subsequently came back in August, allocated those funds, and put them in the adopted budget. The other theory I can think of and this was um talking to someone. I think there may be consu conf confusion because both the numbers of the one-time funding and the amount that we're using in our fund balance for next year is 49 million. It's the same amount just coincidentally. So as you're looking at those two numbers, I think there's some confusion to say, "Oh yeah, you're just holding that money over for next year." When in reality, you know, we had
017more than that to begin with. We're still spending 37 million this year. Um, but it just on coincidence it happened to be the same number that we're carrying forward that we received in onetime money. I I just hope that we send something out to the legislature clarifying this and also inviting them that before they go out with something that's so inaccurate that they give us a chance to respond. They're they're damaging kids when in information and schools and they're doing it by providing information that is totally wrong. They're not trying to even verify it because they've got a goal and it's just frustrating to watch this type of attack without any chance to correct it. If we can have a honest communication about funding, that's fine. And if they got areas to do, I I
018can I I'll concede if they find areas of issues. I've got issues. But this thing of coming out with something without any communications, no back and forth information, totally wrong. They're going to base, even if they gave us $1,000 this year, they're going to say we didn't spend it because they're going to base it upon the the budget we gave them in February. March. That's about what I'm hearing here now is that because we had to submit a budget earlier, they're going to say that budget didn't change when we know it did. So, I don't I it's just somehow getting the information out there to legislators who may not want to support and fund public education. Fine. But at least do it honestly. And if they do that, they'll give us a chance to respond
019before they go out there and provide this false information to the public and use that to justify undermining public education. Thank you. Uh, does I believe Margot has her hand raised as well? All right, member Bellamy, we'll get you question next. I'm sorry, I don't even have a question. I just wanted to follow up with uh member Higgins. Um, because I agree with him. Uh, if people would be honest and accept the facts, we wouldn't have this kind of misunderstanding. I believe it's intentional and I believe it's directed at ASD in particular. Um, and it's it's terrible. I don't know. Uh, and I do want to thank the superintendent for sending out his letter yesterday very early to all the legislators. Many of us also uh uh followed up with the legislators. It apparently didn't
020do any good because they still voted to override if that was their only uh uh confusion. So, even clearing up the misconceptions at this point in time does not work. Um, but I I I agree. I mean, we we've got to find some way to uh for people to hopefully some way for people to at least ask the questions that they that that are important to them and then accept the response for what it is, the truth. Anyway, thank you, Mr. Chair. Thank you, member Bellamy. All right, I think now we have our questions answered. We can continue, Mr. Ellen. All right. Thank you. Um, so the next slide I wanted to show is uh the general fund re revenue summary that's in our adopted budget book. Uh, just highlighting the two numbers I want
021to pay attention to are one the 37 million that we're spending in fund balance in fund balance this year and the 49 million operating grants. That's the onetime money outside the BSA. So this is incorporated in the budget that the school board approved and plans to spend for uh the current year. So that really has been included in our budget. Um I don't know any way around it. It's it's there. It's all it's accounted for. Uh the last uh misconception I really wanted to address today is that in regards to our having 41 million in funds and overestimated salaries or HR accounts as it's been kind of loosely described that could be used to pre also prevent teacher reductions next year. Um ASD incorporates an estimate of unspent funds into its budget to try to
022prevent having a lot of excess funding at the end of the year. uh this basic concept is shown we show this in the concept below. If you have a revenue coming in of $100 and you know every year that some amount of that money the U budget does not get spent um the way that we've handled this in current year and previous years to some extent has been as we include this attrition number. So, we'll say, "Hey, you guys can spend $105, but I'm going to take a risk, a kind of a calculated risk, that five of that $5 is going to go unspent." The inherent risk is that everyone spends all their money and I'm five bucks short at the end of the year, which I really don't want to be in that position.
023And so as we get kind of closer and we have more and more vacancies throughout um in turnover throughout the years and that number gets higher and higher, how high do we chase that and trying to alleviate or put money back into the budget um and essentially take on more and more risk that you're going to be eventually be overspent. Um so at 41 million I think we're going to be pretty tight on it this year. uh next year it's given me some pause. Also, if we're really going to have to reduce a lot of positions, then we may not have as many turnover vacancies and that 41 million is going to be uh harder to meet. But really, the basic the most simple example is, you know, we tell people they can spend more
024than we actually anticipate getting in on the assumption that they're not going to spend it all. Um it's happened generally every year and that number that they don't spend just keeps on growing. So, we're trying to uh get closer than that. So we don't have a lot of excess funding at the end of the year that doesn't go to meet our students needs. Um so instead of $5 ASD has done uh has 41 million out there is that EST estimate that's going to be unspent. Could you just member Don question? So what fiscal year or what school year is that applicable to? Um both this year and next it's about 41 million. Isn't it g if we end up reducing positions? This this makes sense to me. We're not going to have the potential for
025as much carryover next after the next school year because we'll have fewer positions to assume vacancies from. So why are you projecting the same number next year as this year? Um, I mean what we've seen in the past because we've been cutting resources for years is you kind of get this stasis and then you start the folks that are in there once they figure out they have, you know, they have 35 or 40 kids in the class or having to take on so much extra work because we've cut so much other staff. I think we're going to see more turnover frankly um or more vacancies and there may be sustained longer. I mean, it's really we're just trying to do our best to project out and not have that money at the end of the
026year, but at the same time, you know, I think we you could get into a position where you're a little bit overextended that and that's why it's good to have good practice to have fund balance in there so you can absorb some of those if something comes up. Yeah, it's given me some pause right now. And thank you, member Donley. Seeing no other questions, we can continue. All right. So, um I did want to spend a little bit of time on uh our projections. This will be shown and we'll go through this more in a lot more detail at the finance committee. I just wanted to hit some high points and get it out in front of you guys because I'm also going to use this in some testimony to the Senate tomorrow. um in
027regards to how much money we expect to have at the end of the year because that's one of the things they get that they that attrition uh misconception gets at is you're going to have all this money left over because you've overestimated on your salaries because you have all those vacancies and turnover. Um so just want to briefly highlight some of the things that we see in our fund balance projections and we'll go through a lot more detail um on Thursday. Um, so our total revenue, we have a negative variance of about 37 million. That's because we planned on spending 37 million in fund balance. So our revenue is fairly well on target overall. Um, but we do plan on spending that money that we said we're or not receiving that money we said we're
028going to receive through fund balance because you don't record it as an actual revenue source. On the expenditure side, you we have in our budget documentation and all of our projections, we you see these attrition and the benefit attrition line items. It's a little over 40 million here. Um that's where you see that negative adjustment for having all those vacancies and turnover and folks waving benefits. Overall, you know, between the salaries and benefits and these variances here, we're going to see about a little under a million dollars in savings overall on our budget. We'll see on our expense side about $8 million in positive variance for this year. So, we are trending okay on that, but we are going to have to transfer some money out um for transportation and I think some other things.
029We'll get into that a little more on Thursday. But really, the point I want to drive home on this is on our summary page is our revenue is going to be under our expenditures by about 36 million. So, we plan to spend 37 million. We're going to spend about 36 of it. So, we're going to be in about where we said we would be. Um, you know, I think some of the folks in the legislature have been remember times and we didn't budget as much in our attrition or have that offset as much and we did have quite a bit of funds left over at the end of the year. Um, that's not the case this year and really doubt it'll be the case next year. Our projected ending undesated unreserved fund balances is going
030to be there. Again, you see the 27 million in the bond rating, the 49.8 8 million in fund balance that we're spending next year and then that unassigned balance of about $7.5 million. So that's really our flexibility is with that $7.5 million and it's just not there. We don't have the money sitting around to reinstate the staff that um folks are saying that we have the money that's out there. Um member Donley question. Um so the staffing unfilled staffing positions that result in the potential carryover to fill the gap. There's in instruction there's two big types right there's teachers and and uh teaching assistants. Um, have we I guess my question is as the year went on, did we continue to try to fill those gaps or did we see or was our policy because
031we were so far in the hole budget-wise that we stop we gave up trying to fill those budgeted spots? Member Donley, I can answer that. Um, a lot of times it's difficult to fill teaching positions midyear because most of the available pool is under contract with other districts. Um, when it comes to pair of professionals though, um, we continue to keep those positions posted and, um, our principles and supervisors continue to hire folks all year long as we get applicants um, for those individual postings. And so we tend to see, you know, some regular turnover in in those hourly positions, but we regularly post and and try to hire those as they're as they're vacant. Okay. Thank you. Yeah. And I would say that a lot of those positions that we have that are unfilled
032are within special education, the the pair professionals and the teachers in there, and those really weren't reduced very much. So, I think we'll still have the vacancy rates on that side quite a bit more. It's that gen ed side that we may not have as much, but they didn't have a whole lot of vacancies to begin with, I don't think. Um, so I think we'll be okay, but it's going to get tight, a little tighter than it is this year. All right, no other questions, Mr. Red. All right. Um, finally kind of want to point on our FY226 budget book. What in the proposed book we had here's the 49.8 8 million in fund balance that we're planning on using for this year just to show that it's is incorporated in our budget documentation. We
033do plan on spending it for next year. Um so that's really just kind of what we wanted to say about uh the misconceptions that have been going around about our fund balance and how much money we may have to put towards uh retaining staff for this year. Next, just kind of jump into what's in the the governor's new education bill for financial things. Yeah, before we before we go there, I just kind of want to put a pin in the the fund balance because I've been um contemplating about this a lot for a couple different reasons over the last week. And I just want to check my understanding, I guess, that part of the reason the fund balance issue is so complicated in part is because our budget cycle and the state budget cycle don't
034align, that we um have to pass a budget before the state funding is certain. um that leads to our having to guess in some instances, which is essentially what we did last year, the amount of a potential BSA increased, and we guessed wrong. Um and we were conservative in our guess, which I think given the um efficacy of the current legislature was wise. Um, and I also think it's important to to note that there were opportunities to provide there are opportunities every year despite that misalignment to provide school districts like Anchorage some certainty. Um, the governor is required in December to produce an annual budget that could um indicate his support for an increase to the foundation formula. um there's legislation that could be introduced which could indicate support for a early increase to the
035foundation formula and and so we can use those indicators when they're put in place early. Um those things just haven't happened and so um I really just wanted to highlight that fund balance challenges and interpreting um the complex way that districts have to carry over funds given the uncertainty from the state is not of our own doing or choice. And so, um, assuming you have no objection with that, because it really didn't end in more of a question, we can continue on. Thanks. All right. And I would say our our budget cycles do align. We're all on the fiscal year ending June 30. However, it's just the timing of when those budgets have to be approved. That's different. Like ours has to be done by the first Monday in March. So, we can do it
036the assembly and get to the tax request. But um the underlying issue is we don't find out how much money we have until we're the day before school starts or the next fiscal year starts. It makes it really difficult to have staffing in place and get those resources uh to um sent out to our schools. Uh but within governor's new education bill, the financial pieces in that include a $560 BSA increase about 39.8 8 million. Moving correspondence funding from a 0.9 to a 1.0 would generate about 1.2 million for Anchorage. And then there was some K6 reading proficiency improvement or improvement grants. You know, if the students are proficient or show improvement, there was a $450 per eligible student included in there. Estimate that at about 3 to 6 million, but we really need more
037clarity on really which students would qualify under that, how they're going to define improvement. um is there some sort of cut score that defines that and how many kids would fall under that? And then which testing year would uh tie to which funding year? So would it be the cast kids tested in this current year or funding next year essentially or what that metric is? Um so we just don't know what the timing on the the distribution would be. Um but that's really the financial components in there. There was some other things regarding the charter schools and open enrollment in that bill as well and cell phone usage. Um, but this was the as as the finance piece. Member L's question. Thank you. I appreciate the the quick glance at the new bill. Um, I
038I too have been scratching my head with the the reading sort of component of the bill. Um, this is the first estimate I've seen of what ASD thinks perhaps it could generate. Is there any language in the bill as it has been presented that um would direct how those dollars are spent? You know, if reading proficiency grants are generated and produce revenue of some sort for ASD, is there anything dictating where they need to go at that point forward or does that remain thus far in local control or or we just we just don't know. Yeah, the way the bill was written, it seemed to just provide the funding for that, but it didn't really have any sort of specificity on what to be used for or how it would be distributed or when. So,
039in an extreme example, and I don't want to be blas about this, we wouldn't be buying $6 million of pizza parties for kids who could already read. We could in fact direct $6 million towards kids who can't read. That's not what I Oh, that that's correct. That's how I'm interpreting it. I think that would be the most prudent way to use those dollars. And I'm looking at the bill right now to Mr. Ratliff's point. It's I think intentionally vague to allow that flexibility, but I would support using those dollars to help our students who are not proficient get proficient. Have a question online. All right. I think we're okay to move forward. Right. Uh that's what I have for the budget. And with that, I'll turn it to Mr. Lang. Thank you, Andy. Um, yeah,
040we wanted to take a moment to come and update you on where we're at with our internal staffing process. Um, given the scope and scale of the reductions in the FY26 budget and its impact on our staff, um, there has obviously been a lot of attention on kind of each phase of our internal staffing process that we go through in the spring. And so, we just wanted to spend a little bit of time telling you where we are in that process and what some of the next steps look for. And like Dr. Bryant said at the top of the session today, as we talk about numbers and processes here, we do we are cognizant um of the fact that there are real individuals being impacted by this. And this is the unfortunate reality of where
041we're at today. And this is a process I think all of us wish we we could um avoid, but we're we're caught up in a legislative cycle right now that um unfortunately keeps us in this reality each spring. So, we'll start with just where we are in terms of our certificated staffing numbers. I think um the board is aware that the FY26 budget reduced about 380 certificated positions. Um to date, we've received uh 282 resignations um at the for the end of the year. So, we are able to offset a good portion of those through current vacancies that we have and um the resignations that we've received thus far if those reductions have to be our permanent reality into next year. Um we still have some upheaval that um is caused every year when we
042have to try to get folks in the right places for the following year. And so we've notified to date 188 staff members that they are displaced from their current positions for next year. So they're still teaching in those positions or working in those positions through the end of this year, but we don't have the FTE to keep them in that position at their current work location for next year. We do have 128 open positions um in uh in general ed. And so we'll be shortly here starting the process of trying to take those displaced individuals and find new positions for them for next year in those openings. Uh I will note that that does not include um special ed positions. We currently have 68 vacancies as well in special ed. Um but that is uh
043there are no displacements in that area. In fact, we're already we've already moved to the external hiring phase in special ed uh because of the hard to fill nature of those positions. I also wanted to spend just a moment noting where we are with our uh principles association as well and those certificated positions. We did reduce uh 24 assistant principles across all funding sources. Um there were 15 positions that were eliminated um at the elementary level. Uh we have been using some carryover title one funds to fund those positions and we don't have uh sustainable funds for next year to keep folks in those positions. We have two middle school assistant principles that were reduced based on uh declining enrollment through our metrics. And then of the seven high school reductions, three of those are
044based on declining enrollment and four of those were grant-f funded positions through themies of Anchorage. So um we have had some resignations uh in our principal ranks as well. So we've been able to reabsorb 11 of those 24 um we currently still have 13 individuals who are displaced. And I wanted to note that because as we talk about our Aea staffing typically when we haven't had homes for folks and we've had to displace in our principal ranks we've allowed them to return to the classroom. So we will be actively trying to place those individuals in teaching positions for next year if they still have their teaching cert um until we're able to recall them in into openings uh in the principal ranks. So in terms of next steps um tomorrow is actually our displacement staffing
045process. We'll have folks from um the academic divisions, from talent management, um looking at the information that we've collected from displaced individuals. Uh we have displaced folks state their preferences of where they would like to work next year if it's not the school where they're currently working. Uh principles also have an opportunity to interview those candidates. And what we look for in our display staffing is those matchmatch situations where the individual has stated a school is their top preference and that principal is interested in picking them up because they have an opening there. So um once those are done, we'll hopefully still have some openings and uh we'll then actively start placing other displaced individuals who didn't get picked up in that matchmatch process in those openings. Um, as you saw in the previous slide,
046it is likely that after that displacement staffing process tomorrow, we will still have obligations to some displaced individuals, meaning we will not there will not be an opening in the area in which they're qualified and certified. And so, um, we won't yet be able to name a position for them for next year. So by the end of the week, where that leaves us is after talent management kind of sorts through all of the movement that happens tomorrow, we'll be able to identify which areas of our staffing are open and which are frozen. Open means we're able to move into the next stage of our internal process, which is considering voluntary transfers, those folks who are returning from extended leave, those who might be returning from another bargaining unit like those displaced assistant principles, and then
047also moving into the external hire process. Uh, if an area is frozen, again, that means that we still have a displace we have an obligation to a displaced individual, and we don't yet have an opening that we can place them based on their qualifications. And so that job area or content area will be frozen until we can find a home for them. So, um, April 29th, next week, we'll go through our general staffing process. That's where, uh, principles will work to pick up folks on voluntary transfers in areas that are open to hiring. We'll consider those return from leave, return from bargaining unit, and then move to external hiring and hope to start to hire some folks um, in those harder to fill categories while there's still candidates available outside of the district. And then
048by the end of the month, um, as we head into early May, we'll have a pretty clear picture if we have any areas where we still have displacement obligations that could potentially lead to layoffs at the end of the year. So, we have a statutory deadline, as I think you're aware, um, to notify any tenur staff um, that are laid off by May 15th. And for folks who are not yet tenured, um, we have to make those notifications by the last student day on May 22nd. to dig a little bit more into displacements. Um most of our displaced uh folks were notified um on March 31st. Um again, a displacement means that that individual's existing position at their school is not budgeted at that school for the next year. Supervisors, in this case mostly principles,
049determine who is displaced by seniority at the work location. So at elementary, that's fairly straightforward. When you're talking about classroom teachers, the least senior teacher at the school, regardless of what grade level they teach, is the one who's displaced if there's not a position available for them for the next year. At middle school and high school and our secondary schools, it's a little bit more complicated. The principal has some discretion to pick which departments to make those cuts from, and then it's the least senior in those departments that are displaced. Um, we then look for those open positions to place them. And at the top of the slide, we noted that most teachers were notified on March 31st. It did take us a little bit longer in some specialty areas to figure out um how
050to work those displacements because the FY26 budget identified some cuts in some unique ways that we haven't um really experienced before. So it took a little longer for um you know working across departments to figure out the best process for that in order to impact the fewest num individuals overall. So if we go to the next slide I'll kind of walk through some of those specialty areas. Uh one was our nurse displacements. Um they were notified on April 2nd if they were displaced from their current position. Um I think you'll recall that the FY26 budget as adopted um reduces 13 FTE from our nurses. Um the intent there was to red reduce 26 schools to half-time nurses. Um specifically schools with less than 300 students. Um, we did uh choose to absorb one of those
051cuts in our health services department, which meant that we had 24 schools that were affected by those reductions to a half-time nurse. Um when we looked at it strictly by enrollment numbers, um with nursing specifically, we knew that probably wasn't the only criteria we could use because you could have a a school with a a relatively small student population, but with one or two students with very high medical needs. And so our health services department um develop a metric um or a matrix. They went through each of those smaller schools and they performed what they called an acuity assessment to make sure that that school could move to a a halftime nurse. And while still not ideal, the medical needs at that school would would allow for that. Um, member lessons, I see you have
052a question. Thanks. Member, thank you. I appreciate that. Um, this is really hard work. Number one, um, how does the enrollment of new kindergarteners for whom we don't know health needs and acuity complicate this? I don't know that we've talked about that or I haven't and been part of the it is a that conversation. Yeah, it is a potentially complicating factor. It's one that health services has contemplated. Um, we know that we're um identifying schools and pairing schools based on the best information that we have at the moment. Um, we know that some families will move, you know, transition over the summer. We have new students coming in that we haven't yet met and and may not be aware of their needs. And so, every fall, um, you know, we have to sort of reassess
053what the situation is. there is the potential that we may have to shift some of these assignments next year based on, you know, a a fall acuity assessment of student needs. Kirsten, anything you would add to that? I know you've been tracking closely with this process as well. Yeah. Um, we are able to do a little bit of work ahead of time by looking at our preschool needs that are already in our system. So, that does give us a little bit of a heads up, but that doesn't account for all of it. But, Marty summarized it pretty well. Um there is a the acutity matrix. Um we will likely look at that again right after registration in August um and make adjustments before students arrive on the first day. One of the other things that
054we paused to do was see if there were any nurses who were at those 24 schools that were affected that would prefer to go from full-time to part-time or halftime to stay just at that school. And um when we surveyed and we did have six individuals who opted to do that um which meant we were affecting fewer schools than we originally thought in terms of pairing schools but we did pair the remaining schools and post those positions. Um those who did not reduce to.5 were displaced from their position and we will work to place them in those newly paired openings tomorrow during displacement staffing. Memberless. Should additional funding be introduced and and be passed by the legislature sometime, to what extent are plans in place to reverse um you know, I guess broadly all of
055these displacements. Um are the tell us how things can be walked back from from what you understand. Yeah, I've been joking that if we got money today, we could play our UNO reverse card and we could put all of these folks right back in the positions where they're they're currently at and then go through our normal, you know, voluntary staffing process to see if people want to move to, you know, on a volunteer basis to different schools. Um, we can do that easily up through that general staffing meeting. Once we get to general ed staffing, areas that are open will start to layer on other complexities with, you know, the voluntary transfers, the return from leaves, external hires. it gets a little bit more comp complex and challenging just to simply hit the reset button,
056but we still have other levers that we can pull through the AA contract to try to give people an option to move back to their original position if there is an opening when we get that, you know, that additional FTE. Just to to clarify, you used a phrase general staffing. Is that the April 29th? Correct. So that's that's a week from now. So you're saying or what I think I'm hearing is that within the next week is really when we would need to hear something meaningful in order to walk back these displacements in its simplest form. Play the UNO reverse card at its simplest form. Correct. And then we we've already started conversations with the association. We've had a lot of conversations internally. you know, when we get additional funding, how can we to the
057greatest extent possible put people back in the communities where they've been working? One last thought. Can can that be concisely communicated to legislators in some sort of a followup? I mean, there was an an would you could you at least entertain that notion? That seems like an important timeline that they should be aware of, especially our acreage delegation. Sure. I I'm happy to have that com that message relayed. I'm looking at MJ so we can strategize on the best format. Um but it is an important milestone I'd like them to know. Yeah. And we're committed um to internally communicating as well at each step to to make sure staff are aware that some of those um things are being considered. And you know, our hope is still that we'll we'll be able to unwind as
058many of these disruptions as possible. Member Wilson. So I I have a question in regards to the nurses. If we have to move toward halftime for some of these schools, are there placements for the the nurses that want to work halftime at two different schools? Are the placements intentionally trying to be close to each other to the schools that are closest to each other? And and I'll throw out there that I I learned um a little while ago that King Tech, which I was shocked because of the population of students that come through there, is one of the schools that was on the list for for halftime. So at least at the very least if if some of these schools have to go to having a half-time nurse, can they be at least in as
059close as possible proximity to Yeah. And we those pairings um were done in partnership with um with the instructional division. So I'm going to let Kirsten to respond to kind of the the the thoughtful intentionality that went behind how those were paired. Sure. Um so to answer the question, we did look at uh proximity for sure. Um the idea being that if a nurse is um at one school and the other school has a need that they'd be able to get there quickly potentially. The other thing that we have is a a buddy school system set up so that if um that nurse isn't able to come over, there's another additional school that could help out um if there's a question or a need or an emergency, if you will. Um, so we did look
060at schools regionally so that we don't have people driving from South Anchorage to Eagle River as an example. Um, and we we actually did make some accommodations for Gerwood as well because it's a far drive. Um, in in terms of King and some of our secondary schools that were paired. Um part of of what the acuity matrix looked like um in terms of an assessment is how many visits um each nurse gets, how many medications are are serviced through that office, um how many um complex medical needs of students in that building and and so it was done in a very databased um fashion. Um and for King in particular, there there isn't a high rate of um visits, office visits, if you will, through through their office. If that gives some context to that
061placement member lesson is there is there liability of not having a nurse I mean we've gone through the budget conversation but if there is not a nurse on hand to I don't know properly log things give the correct medication are we increasing our li I mean we don't want bad things to happen to kids number one, but we also don't want bad things to happen to the district because a person who is certified and and and is the right person on the job for that task is not present. So, I'm trying to I want are there things that nurses are doing in our schools that if they're not on site would could not be done by another person legally? So, I could start and then others could weigh in. Um, so we are covered as
062educators and general public under good Samaritan laws for medical treatment. So, if there is an emergency and you're rendering aid, it doesn't matter if you're a teacher in a classroom or someone walking down the street, if if you potentially didn't aid that person correctly, you're you're covered for liability under Good Samaritan laws. That said, um we do have a system for um administering medications, which is a big function of of nurses in our buildings. Um and we have a backup system in place for how that's done um within our buildings already. So, we're relying on that. That said, um I I won't discount that our nurses do a lot of things outside of those really emergent medical needs um and requirements and and they fill a lot of gaps in a lot of other ways.
063So, so their services will be missed regardless of if they're seeing an official um you know student for a seizure as an example or administering a medication. Um there's a lot of other little things that they do that can't be accounted for so it will be a loss um no doubt. All right. Yeah. Two more slides. Um I wanted to just talk about librarians which mirrors in many ways the same process that we um we used with the nurse displacements. Um they were notified on April 10th. Um there were 20 schools 26 schools affected by um a reduction to a halftime librarian. Uh we also went through the same process of surveying those individuals at the affected schools to see if there were any who were interested in in um voluntarily reducing to halftime to
064stay at just one school. Um we had a couple who showed some initial interest but um nobody ultimately um decided to to voluntarily um go that direction. Um so we paired um the schools using a lot of the same um you know processes that um that Kirsten outlined and um displaced uh those librarians from the full-time positions at those 26 impacted schools. um they've had an opportunity to interview and they'll be um hopefully placed through that displacement staffing process uh tomorrow on April 23rd. And then the last kind of specialty category we had is our elementary specialists. Um they were notified a week ago Monday on April 14th. Um we talk about elementary specialists. Um that's art, health, music, and PE teachers. Um, and I think you're probably already aware that specialists often are shared
065across multiple schools already. Um, in our current model with the plus4 PTR increase in the FY26 budget, um, we reduced an additional 54 specialist FTE. And when elementary ed senior directors sat down to try to figure out how to thoughtfully pair schools, what they found is that proved very difficult to create those pairings. Um with those reductions in mind, um it was just they were fractionalizing FTE to the point in splitting folks across so many schools that it became um highly inefficient because of the time that would be lost in uh transition. Um and so they uh at one point realized there was not at this point a good workable model and we didn't have the time to sort of pivot to you know how would we in this current FTE situation build that model
066out. So we decided to wait to pair positions until we know kind of the outcome of the legislative process and what funding may be coming. we knew we still had to displace some teachers. So, we um uh differed a little bit from the other processes we used and we looked at how many positions we needed to reduce in each of those specialty areas and did it strictly off of seniority and just notified um the least senior in each of those areas um who needed to be displaced. The folks who are not displaced still don't know their current work locations for next year, but as soon as we know our funding, we'll be able to work on that model, thoughtfully pair those schools in an efficient way, and um they'll receive their teaching assignments um later
067once those pairings are complete. Have a question from President Hollerman. Oh, thank you. And it it's not really a question and it's not really directed at the administration, but to my fellow board members that that when you begin to put people in part-time positions in schools, there's no way they really integrate in the same way they do when they're full-time. And when you're full-time, uh, and for the people that are trying to do their job with a certain level of excellence, you do more things. And you you do things because you want to create a program. You want you want your existence to really matter and and that's a standard that that we've worked at for a very long time. We start making people part-time and splitting them between buildings. They show up and do
068what they need to do because that's really all the time they have and they there's just not the ability to be there before and after. Um, I appreciate what the administration's doing in terms of trying to make things work with the resources they have. I do think it's important that all of us remember that we're really dismantling the Anchorage School District at this point. We really are changing things to where it's it's going to be more and more difficult for teachers to pursue a passion of excellence. Um, if I sound a little bit depressed about it, I am. But, uh, I just wanted to put that in there that there's a bigger effect than we can measure, I think. Thank you, President Hullman. I'm not seeing any other questions. We have bit more information or
069are we officially ready for questions now? That's everything we had to present formally. So, we are ready for questions. All right, board members. Do we have other questions for the team on the topic discussed today? Mr. Chair, member Belling. Thank you. Uh, going back to I I don't know the number of the slide, but uh, when we were looking at the governor's new bill, is that 560 a statutory increase or a one-time money? I believe that would be statutory. Okay. Thank you. and then um clarifying the K6. So the way I read it is that the governor wants to reward districts for kids who can read. I I don't I don't read this as um him wanting to improve reading. But I hope I'm wrong because that infuriates me. Um so I guess we'll have
070to wait for more clarity. But when I read it, it when I read it, the bill, it looked to me that the governor is giving $450 per student who who is re who is performing who is proficient in reading. I hope I'm wrong. So, I guess we we we we will need more information on that. Anyway, thank you guys. A great presentation. Um, and thank you for answering all the millions of questions that have come up. I know within with forever, but especially in these last few days. Thank you so much, Mr. Chair. Yeah, Dr. Um, through the chair, uh, member Bellamy, great point about the reading proficiency bonuses. I'm looking at it right now and for those following along, it's page nine of the bill. I'm looking at the section, section 16 specifically on
071reading proficiency. I just wanted to add to what member Bellamy shared. Um, as she mentioned, we would receive a $450 increase for students performing at grade level reading proficiency, but I did want to also flag that you can also receive it if at the end of the year you've demonstrated quote unquote improvement on the statewide screening tool or a standardsbased assessment in language arts approved by the department. So, I do think that there is a lot there that we need to ask more questions about. Uh the reasons why a lot of districts did not support this initially is because they don't have enough uh students that are reading at proficient at proficient levels to generate enough dollars to actually intervene and to move the needle. Uh so that is a true concern, but it is
072my sincere hope that if this bill or a version like this move forward that districts would have the flexibility to direct these dollars towards students who need extra support. Um, I I do have issues with the particular ways that this uh this intervention is framed, but I do think there's something positive that can come of it. So, I just wanted to put that out. Okay. I I certainly do hope so. And my final question had to do with the resignations. Were uh Marty, were those resignations uh what you know people didn't like did we have librarians that or nurses that uh resigned from that position only to apply for and then came back and applied for another position like a teaching position? Did we have any of that going on? No, those resignations are folks
073who who are leaving education period. are leaving the district for a variety of reasons and we give them the opportunity to participate in an exit survey and so we will at a later date have some data on you know what they indicated they're going to do next but this is not too far off the number of we've seen um you know over the last three years. Okay. All right. Thank you. Member lessons. Do I see a question? Yeah. I was I mean I was going to I don't know raise a question or remark about um you know how how can you budget for a grant? We are budgeting for FY26. We don't know what students will be proficient in FY26 or what which students will demonstrate growth in FY26. So that seems very challenging from
074a budgeting standpoint. you know, how how you're going to apply an estimated, you know, dollar figure that you might receive. So, it seems like I don't know, it just seems very perplexing to me. Do you have any thoughts on that? Uh, Mr. Rattler, before we answer, I'm just going to ask if there's any objection to um increasing the length of our work session by 15 minutes. No more than 15 minutes. Okay. Not seeing any. Mr. Rat, if you get to answer the question now. Um, no, that's a good question. That's one that we had and we're going to flag for the our partners in the legislature as well is you know what testing year to ties to which funding year. So are they going to look uh retro back but our testing for 24 to
075or for 25 to fund 26. Um and when would we actually receive that if it's based on AK star? We may not get that till a little bit further into the year. Um but really we just have we have quite a few questions around that. But um hopefully we can get some clarity on what that'll mean for us. And that's a great segue. I did want to inform the board that our team has reviewed the governor's bill. We've created initial analyses of the uh pieces of the proposal, but along with that analysis was also more than a dozen questions. And one of my top priorities is to get clarification um either from the governor's office through deed and or our education committees who can start asking these questions because that is just the tip of
076the iceberg. There's a lot that we need to understand and my top priority is to find a path forward to collaborate and to get something across the finish line and getting these questions answered is key to that. Member lessons. Yeah. Thanks. And um you know pivoting to the um elementary specialist sort of portion of the presentation. Um I've shared with the administration and and you know a couple of board members um President Holm and I this gave me um I don't know I thought I had seen it all and then I woke up Tuesday morning a week ago um to to news that elementary specialists had were being displaced and I was just racking my brain for where in the budget process where did I miss this? Where did we have this conversation? Unlike last
077year when we talked about um you know potentially uh transforming health and art education, we we were specifically talking about specialists. In previous years, we've specifically talked about health specialists. Um I mean they were cut from the budget and then CO funds brought them uh I'm sorry. Um yeah, the health specialists COVID funds brought them back. This is four or five years ago now. Um, and this just wasn't on my radar. Even though I think I also understood at some level because I've we've had budget conversations that PTR involves more than a classroom teacher. But I truly did think that we were talking about just and I use just and you know with a big asterisk um just really large class sizes in elementary schools not really large class sizes and pulling away the people
078for whom you talk to any elementary kid specials are the best part of their day. Um the PE teachers are how we uh ensure alignment with state statute about a certain amount of time with you know physical activity. Health teachers deliver information that is in state statute. Um the specialists also ensure that our classroom teachers receive prep time which is in their contract. specialists are also and especially in you know I think in all schools but in the non-title schools where you don't have the additional staffing provided in some cases by title funds they're on hand and they're helping ensure alignment with the Alaska Reads Act right by having small or smallish um groups where you can focus on students who need that dialed in level of instruction and so you know and then there's
079also just like the layer of longitudinal support that you know the PE or the music or the art teacher offers. They know a child in kindergarten and they know they know that same child you know when they are in fifth grade and they know their brothers and their sisters and they have that whole that whole person understood. Um and that just it kind of did me in last week. I don't know if you can just share about how how we missed this in our budget process. Um, sure. So, the way we did it this year is at least for the budget preparations, the way we've always done it, it's always tied to the PTR metric. If you have fewer teachers, you need less specialists to cover those planning time. Um, what we found this year
080was more is when we went to do that displacement process, we're like, oh, we can't we have to fragment these specialists so much it's hard to get them to cover the building. So it was more I think the timing issue more than anything that flagged it as a as a difference than a normal process where in a normal year when we're going and doing all our displacements is all done at the same time. Um but in this year since we're having trouble figuring out what those placements might be and we still are I believe um that's kind of why it's felt like a separate process and also you know when we're talking about some of the reporting that we did this year to say here's how many classrooms the school would lose the specialists aren't
081included in there because it's not necessarily losing a direct classroom it's just that planning time component of it so I think that was the difference between previous years but the math has always been the same as far as the the ptr our calculations. Well, I guess I'm I'm going to file an early request. Um assuming that the math is not going to be in our favor for budgeting for FY27, it seems that we need to make sure we have all of these conversations out um ahead of time. Uh because I project that we will be having more of these um consequences in about what is this April? You know, by December of next year or by December of this year. member lessons. Just to kind of give you a little bit more on that, we
082there's a process we have to go through in order to get to the specialists because we need to figure out where we need to have people, especially with the like you said the planning time and that kind of stuff as well. So, this became very intricate and it our my staff just really dove in. and they sequestered for over a week just trying to figure this out. And that's how we ended up coming to this because it's just at a point where it's broken. Not seeing any other questions and we're still um decent time. So with that said, I just want to circle back to something made or a request made earlier um to again connect maybe through district administration with our Anchorage delegation specifically um to provide them the most up-to-date context we have,
083which is that there's still time to act um in support of our students. Um the time um is still possible and available for them to utilize um to pass a bill uh that would provide certainty for us this year and the future. Um, I also think, you know, it's worth noting that, you know, we had 33 um votes in in favor of overriding HB69 today. Um, we were we're close. Um, there are still votes in the Anchorage delegation um that I think um could be swayed with um a better understanding of our uh support for reasonable policies that also support students. And I'm thinking of things that we currently know that we support. um increased transportation funding, a return to a defined benefit retirement plan, which is part of the governor's teacher retention and recruitment
084playbook. Um we've implemented policies that effectively implement a cell phone ban and a financial literacy curriculum which has been um introduced to separate bills and so um many of our priorities and things that we're implementing um align with a common sense multiaceted education bill. And so I'm hoping that uh President Halman, myself, and then um district administration can collaborate on a document that maybe um can be made available to all board members who wish to sign um and then sent to the legislature. Just uh making clear our priorities for policy as the legislature looks for something that can get us 40 votes. Um, with that said and not seeing any other questions or objections, I'm going to ask that the for a motion to adjourn our work session into executive session for the purpose of
085negotiations, legal updates, and contracts. Second made by member Wilson, seconded by member Lessons. Seeing no objection, we are in executive session as of uh well, we'll return to executive session 508. Thank you everyone.