001e nesting so member Wilson can you lead us in the pledge and then you can please we'd like to welcome you all right good evening I'd like to welcome you to our special uh board meeting uh today is Tuesday February 27th members present uh in the boardroom are members Wilson lesons Jacobs Donley Higgins and Bellamy uh joining uh remotely we have a member board member uh Hollman as well as uh superintendent uh Bryant uh also joining us at the de we have uh Miss America C Sullivan our executive assistant and Dr Bryant's executive assistant uh Miss Katie Grant and we also have uh a full the full staff is here to support tonight thank you with that I'd like to ask member Wilson to do the flag salute and the land acknowledgement the United States
002of America we acknowledge that we gather here today on the traditional lands of the denina people of the upper Cook Inlet for thousands of years the denina people have been and continue to be the stewards of this land ASD is committed to diversity and inclusion and and it is with honor and respect that we recognize all indigenous people who live and learn in our community thank you very much member Wilson uh again I'd like to welcome you to our meeting um like to thank of course our students our parents teachers School business partners and the entire Community uh for your support and your investment in our district uh we appreciate your time the giving of your time your talents and your tax dollars so thank you very much uh tonight um we have one agenda
003item and only one item will be discussed tonight and so that brings us to item three on the agenda Madam president I move to approve the agenda is WR is there a second it has been uh moved to approve the moved and second to approve the agenda as presented any objection seeing hearing no objection the agenda is approved and that brings us to Item B which is our action item we have one item uh ASD memorandum number 109 Madam president I move to approve ASD memorandum number 109 FY 2024 2025 financial plan and budget approval and after for a public testimony I have an amendment as well thank you second okay thank you moved in by member Jacobs second by member Wilson uh to approve memorandum number 109 we have several people signed up up
004to testify on memorandum number 109 so before we uh move any further we would like to invite individuals to testify let's start with Alex Bell come forward please welcome Alex and uh Emanuel Bloom Emanuel can you come forward as well okay well Alex why don't you have a seat and whenever you're ready yes pull the mic down like mine is like yes yes hi I'm Alex Bro I'm from Ravenwood and I am in third grade I in student counsel myself and I know that I'm not the only kid my sisters have been in my sisters when they were in it theys they were in it too and I want to make it so other kids are able to have the chance like student council is it sorry not student council um ignite is a is
005something that kids love it makes them feel special about themselves and I want other kids to be able to feel that too and that is why I think that's Council sorry I ignite ignite should should not be should not be taken off thank thank you Alex is Emanuel here Emanuel Bloom is telephonic okayand Bloom I don't see him online we come back is there Isis Bloom online okay I'll come try to come back to them so we have James Rohan MC llin help me out you can help me out okay stutterer stutterer you you help me out there go testing yes um so it's James Rowan mlon s okay and I hello my name is James from Ser I am here today to testify to keep night in our schools I'm in fourth grade at
006Cuna Elementary and I have been in theit program since the beginning of second grade I was the only second grad to test to ignite ex that b season and I was so excited ignite challenges me a way I love it really tests me in different subjects I wasn't into but now I love something this semester we are dissecting owl pets and using the bones of the prey to make the original skeleton also we made I at the beginning of the year at first I wasn't sure abouts but now I like them when I heard the ignite program could possibly shut down I was really sad that I learn new things that my general classroom wasn't teaching when I encourages kids to be Engineers scientists and even asrs taking away night doesn't help the Future Leaders
007of Alaska we need night for our kids so we can bring out the best of all our own abilities by C night from neighborhood schools I would feel sad because most kids would would lose the opportunity to learn higher academic stuff most kids can't go to a private school because it's too expensive or too far away I pleas you please keep ignite AR we need it thank you for thank you for your time and considering really truly keeping ignite thank you very much James next I'd like to invite mod Garner Garner Garner mod Garner welcome you have three minutes good evening Schoolboard members thank you for being here this evening and for the opportunity to testify my name is ma and I am fourth grade A government Hill Elementary and in the Spanish Emer program
008I would I would like to inform you how I feel about ignite and how we might cut funding I've been an ignite since second grade and every day that I go I always learn something new and expand my horizons it's great to have an extra chall it's great to have extra challenges that take time to think through and and night has always been my favorite subject and fun thing to afford to but it would be heartbreaking to find that I can't do it but because I'm going to fifth grade and then Middle School I won't be able to do with night but I'm not I'm just I'm not just talking about older grades I'm also talking about primary grades if you had the program those young students won't be able to do at night even
009if they would benefit from the program education is an opportunity that offers kids a chance to explore their interest and their capabilities we should keep ignite because kids who participate could get the most out of us school out of school in a day and get the extra academic challenge ignite means a lot to me and I but I think it means a lot to other kids in ignite too some kids have been an ignite for years but some kids have just joined meaning this could be their last or only year of the program for them it would be a relief to find that you decide to keep the program please do it what is best for the kids inite across Anor thank you for listening and thank you for all you do across an school
010thank you very much M next we have uh Ronan a pot guer potg thank you welcome Ronan you have three minutes take a Time hello I am Ronin I am in sixth grade at Denali I am here because I really care about my community and it's been on my mind I am like a lot of kids my age but something sometimes it's really hard for people to understand me I've always been interested in things offered in ignite but they say I can't do night because my test scores are test scores not because I don't want to or because I'm not smart enough or curious enough so when I hear about cutting things like ignite art class it really makes me think those things are important but what about kids like me who need extra support
011and ignite what comes first it doesn't seem fair that we get left behind bored at school and can't communicate our unique ideas easy ideas easy because we struggle with test taking or can't properly demonstrate our abilities in a way we you understand if you don't cut ignite an art and health what are you going to cut my teachers my teacher that helped me be able to survive the school day and listening enough until I until real realizing I am very capable of anything I just do it differently sometimes I was never able to learn an art class or the P or in or the past the test to do ignite no matter how hard I want to we should think about helping all kids not just ones who are doing well what if we use
012the money to help kids who don't have a lot of family or friends who think they are stupid just because no one asks them the right questions or the kids who OCD is so bad at school they can't the only thing they can talk think about is making the pain stop kids like me who need help with those things before we can enjoy art or ignite we were in p too right I know you have a hard job I'll hope I'll hope I but I hope you will remember kids like me when choosing where to spend the money because we all deserve a chance to suce to suceed no matter what thank you R let's go back online um Emanuel bloom how about Isis Bloom I'm not seeing either of them online right we'll continue
013is Angela Will Wilson online not seeing Angela let's go in in room and I'll come back to the online book um I think it's Katherine Thomas I'd like to invite Katherine and Anna Cole up please welcome Catherine Thomas I need spell my last name t h o m s it's pretty solid um I have so much to say uh I'll try to keep it on topic um my daughter is nicknite uh I'm the product of Nite um and I'm also an ignite teacher uh the students I see are phenomenal and I 100% agree with the young man before me um but one thing I think that we do by eliminate ignite is ignoring those students that do need that um I set up my classroom for questions and self-exploration uh that I couldn't do with
014the 314th graders I had last year they ask phenomenal questions and I'm able to take the time to answer them and I feel that just because what I teach isn't measurable by a test doesn't mean it's invalid um one thing I really wanted to point out here is I have students that are twice exceptional they have IEPs for various things and they also qualify for igniting my class and my concern is that those students will not be served uh their ignite their giftedness if they are placed in a wi group that is for their reading um because of a certain disability um gifted students don't have great graduation rates and I think anything we can do to bring them into school uh we should these are the kids that we want to be our pulmonologists
015or our attorneys or our school board members and I think we need to grow that um my concern also is for second area have a medical school a law school um I have a math education degree which can no longer be attained in Alaska I want to do Science Education which is no longer available in Alaska and that's just shocking to me that in a state based on science where we want to recruit Engineers we want to recruit geologists uh we want to recruit mining Engineers uh we want to recruit doctors we want to recruit nurses and we are taking away some of those explor opportunities for those students those thoughts and ideas and desires that emerge in elementary school um I hope that I made the right choice becoming a teacher uh from my
016advanced classes my AP classes and then eventually going through the university system uh ignite is something that's really close to my heart uh based in my childhood based for my uh daughter uh based for my own personal well-being I was a classroom teacher for 14 years and I sweat at night because that's an eight-woman job and I don't want that anymore ignite is a position where I can thoughtfully talk to these children answer their questions give them Rel relevant feedback on their assignments um provide them with that extra that they are entitled to based on state law thank thank you very much I'd like to invite Julie is it full Miss Cole whenever you ready good evening my name is Anna Cole I a product of the Anchorage School District where I spent kindergarten through
01712th grade I am here tonight to urge you to reinstate funding for the ignite program in the fiscal year 25 budget I understand that the board has limited options without a permanent increase to the BSA and I will be urging the legislature to retain their bipartisan agreement to increase the BSA by $680 at a minimum and to reconsider fully funding the BSA I also encourage the board to consider using additional emergency savings to retain the ignite program for fiscal year 25 waiting for crisis to spend reserves is futile crisis is here as demonstrated with the proposed budget the proposed budget does not include any increase to the BSA from the current $ 5,960 if the legislature overrides the governor's veto the district stands to receive an additional 28 .5 million based on enrollment of 42,000
018students which would be a decrease of 3.3% from a 2223 school year just trying to be conservative this funding would easily allow reinstatement of the ignite program which is identified in the budget as costing 2.2 million regardless of the actions of the governor and the legislature I implore you to recognize the value of the ignite program by reinstating funding as you have heard previously from students the program is inspirational across the district the FY 25 preliminary budget book even states that quote the gifted program which includes ignite as well as the highly gifted program provides services for students requiring a curriculum with acceleration and enrichment that these students have been determined to need extensions beyond the regular classrooms end quote by canceling the ignite program the board is denying this need and changing required to
019optional how does this serve our students how does this provide inspiration and achievement goals if Anchorage truly wants to attract and retain a community of independent engaged and self-reliant residents we need to start this work at the elementary level ignite students are future adults that embody the Alaska ethos Work Hard Play Hard give back help each other and think for yourself we are actively losing Professionals in our Marketplace due to local and state funding shortfalls for education and public services the Alaska Economic Development Corporation 2024 economic forecast states that quote slowdown in the number of people moving to our city over the last several years is due to high housing costs perceptions of Public Safety School quality and other community factors end quote we cannot rely on the state to provide the funding we need
020to create the current and future Anchorage we must work where we can exercise control and that includes the fy2 ASD budget I was born and raised in Anchorage left for college and came right back my husband and I are now raising two children within the ASD and for the first time have begun to think about what their educational opportunities might look like if we moved outside I cannot imagine such an action but I cannot stomach the idea of not doing all we can to help every student Thrive at ASD thank you thank you very much Miss Cole okay Julie whenever you're ready please thank you so much so I am here as a mom and a former teacher I have three daughters at be Valley Elementary and my oldest Amilia is in the ignite program
021and as a family who moved from out of state I will say that just like what she was saying I was a little bit nervous honestly about what school was going to look like here and I have a child with special needs who also falls in the category of just worry for me but it was the first time that my oldest daughter actually didn't want to go to school she was really struggling it was right after Co there were a lot lot of scenarios but when she got into the ignite program she just lit up and she got so excited about school and so excited about learning and that is just something that I have seen Grown and it's contagious it has actually spread to her two younger sisters as well her youngest sister was
022invited to come in with the brain Buck system that they use and my middle daughter Eliza who has special needs was invited into Mr ryman's Big Night room when he recognized she was having a really hard day and he took the time to just explain projects and let her ask curious questions and it totally transformed her and I just think that the energy of a classroom like that in the school benefits every single student and I know funds are limited I really do but I just think that when we look at the mission and we look at the mission being a community working cooperatively to educate children for life we have to consider what is this education coming from what is it that we wanted to instill in our kids and I think curiosity and
023teamwork and thinking outside the box and having a chance to really live up to whatever it is that you want to you want to explore is so important and I I feel like it's the school's responsibility to Foster that I think hiai does a really good job of that and as an advocate of a special needs parent I understand that a free and appropriate education is something she's entitled to and I feel that that's equally true for our gifted kids I feel like Amelia and all of the classmates that she has at night are really entitled to that kind of an education as well and I just I'm so grateful for it and I I feel like it's something that I really hope continues and I hope that you really just take pause before it's
024eliminated because it is such an invaluable asset and I know that it is fostering a love for Learning and a curiosity for going forward that would not have otherwise existed thank you very much I'd like to call Mr Chris l and Martin Hansen welcome we have three minutes it's on yeah president Bellamy members uh I appreciate your Indulgence I this is my second time here to test done the only thing I I wanted to add for last week is of a personal story uh my son uh the young boy at be Valley he like the other parent that just testified is a too weak a twice exceptional child has special needs but he also has this incredible inter and like uh again this young parent here at Tes uh Mr Wyman at be Valley has
025open world that he has never know so I know that uh as I was talking to one board members before you uh began this meeting uh in my own Community involvement I I have serve on the other side of the table produc said I I really do appreciate the difficult Ro all would you find yourselves in at moment uh and I know that you have the children at part community at part and the school dist uh so again I do want to thank you for your kind attention to this very difficult matter and listening thank you for your listening uh I know that you're reaching a tough decision tonight I know that myself and uh other children here and in the community parents here are going to um wait anxiously for this obviously I support
026strong kind and I certainly hope that we find a way to continue I think it is a Crown Jewel of the speech and that you all feel that uh I just hope that that you bound way uh to make as Leaders something more that it's very difficult to make thank you very much Mr L uh Mr Hansen are you in the room Martin Hansen let's go to uh Emmanuel Bloom online Emanuel star six to unmute um hi my name is Emanuel I'm name fourth grade at Denali monor and I participate in the ignite program I think we should keep ignite it offers special learning and my ignite teacher challenges me in many ways the kids at ignite deserve to keep this special learning this um learning program to excel their learning it is not only
027a class but a o like new friends and to participate in enhanced learning thank you thank you very much Emanuel next we have hello I am Isis Bloom I I attend sixth grade at Denali and I'm here today to stand against cutting ignite um ignite has helped my mind grow exponentially the ignite teacher is kind and tries to help everyone even though not everyone is in ignite I love the fact that everyone has an opportunity to try to get in in the program we don't only learn from the teacher they learn from us too many people may try to stand against ignite staying um St saying because some students get in and others don't or because they think it's unfair maybe because they think we don't learn or even a hundred different reasons a 100
028different reasons why but none of it's true there are tons of reasons why you could cut ignite but there are a million more reasons to keep it ignite has a sec is is like a second home a second family I have I have spoken to I here to speak to keep ignite um last year um I have spoken to ke ignite last year and I will try to keep trying for the future kids thank you for your time and energy today thank you very much Isis and we'll stay online with Angela Wilson Miss Wilson star six to unmute hello can you hear me yes we can welcome have three minutes yes thank you very much um greetings to all uh my name is Angela Wilson I'm very fortunate to have been I'm a student myself
029with an anchor School District fairw elementary Central School of Science West High um when I was in school uh we had art inside our classes we had music um we had something similar to it night kids be charted off to like I think was like Windler or roic at the time for Excel uh for my children my son um is well known within the sped Community as well he did early interventions uh spread PK Tyson wayy SBF um and he was able to transition from wayy to a charter school Highland tech where he graduated only IP for support um my daughter Tyson Clark and she gradu from East this year she was in ignite since elementary she's Student Government like the needs are there but I would really like to just um if I could
030indulge that whatever is needed for the betterment of the teachers to provide the best educational experience to students should be granted I do however ask for consideration for Al ation for students and staff in sped and charter schools resons are far and few in between for classrooms and Educators and I do not see any wording regarding sped in the bill if I missed it please let me know so I can review it in regards Transportation uh those attending Charter Schools it would be nice if the same was available to for public schools but for Charter as well because not everyone's comfortable car pooling not everyone has a car car everyone can afford ride sharing options and even though the city bus is free for students not all students uh can understand the buzz system and
031um I just want to thank you for this time and that's all I have today thank you very much Miss Wilson and that concludes our public uh our public testimony on this item that brings us back to the board what is the will of the board member Jacobs I would move bamy Jacobs lessons amend number one Z second second let's take it we'll take an at e to figure just a minute Mr Beasley we'll take a five minute at EAS thank you e I'd like to welcome everyone back we have we do have one more person uh that wish to be heard on memorandum number 109 the ignite program part of that Mr Beasley would you come forward please thank you for your patience and understanding hello hi I'm noran Beasley so I'm just here
032and I give those papers up here for a different curriculum just in case the ignite program is cut um and just kind of to further grasp on that is I mean once that's cut I don't really I don't really know personally where my daughter is going to be placed you know in Anchorage School District like uh with those papers you saw there with the details labeled out and the Powerpoints that I put or the bullet points I put in uh I'm already ready to if necessary move my daughter to a different uh school if not it will be online if not in home uh because she is going to need to be Advanced uh she's just putting these kids that are in ignite or any kid that is not like the rest but needs to
033be pushed uh well it doesn't need to be push because they're selling on their own and they're chasing after the education that they want to learn uh it it's just going to impede on the school district even more uh it was shown through covid that once there was a certain amount of kids that could be taught online they didn't come back um it showed in the numbers it showed in the amount of kids that went in the classroom but then it also showed the other negative side which is uh kids had to come back then they had to try to catch up and then with that the teachers had to try to catch up with the students that were excelling that were at home and then they had to slow down for the kids that
034couldn't Excel that were at home uh the curriculum needs to be Stern but delicate uh it needs to be fast but as well as slow we need to start figuring out how we're going to grasp the ignite program and I think that's something that we should also take a back step on and see what we can do in the classroom that is uh fruitful just as much as an ignite as well as it should be in the classroom uh my daughter doesn't like the regular classrooms anymore now she's been ignite um that also shows at home to where now she is bursting with what she wants to continue doing as well as what she wants to also learn uh I think that's a big and pivotal step that we need to take in the school
035district otherwise you're just going to lose more money uh and me coming from a very numb number orientated background uh I'm a manager of a a warehouse box store and numbers and percentages is all I stare at for about half my day and that correlates to am I doing what the customer wants am I doing what my workers need and want and that correlates to income if I hit the same percentages that this school district is hitting I'd be fired I mean flat out we have a 60 to 40% uh per proficiency under proficiency we have a 50 to 60 proficiency uh if I had those numbers in front of my district manager I would be out of a job there's just no way around it uh and I just think that we need to
036take a harder look at that and start being a start figuring a way to think thank you very thank you very much Miss Beasley okay that brings us back to the approval of memorandum number 0 I mean I'm sorry one9 yes um it's been years and years so we did have a poliy handouts they would identify first of all what they yeah and we did capture that he just handed it to us like second it's really helpful to have we stay okay Thanksgiving and what it is yeah okay good point thank you all right we are back to the approval of ASD memorandum number 109 what is the will of the body no well he has I'm not sure we received a second Madam president I moved belly Jacobs lessons amendment number one and that
037was before I'm just doing it again because we were interrupted president I I seconded it you second it was moved a a memorandum amendment number one Bellamy Jacobs lesson's amendment number one was um moved by member Jacobs second by member m member Jacobs yeah thank you madam president um so this amendment does a few things uh first it adjusts projected Revenue for FY 2024 202's um fiscal year budget um by $8.7 million uh to appropriate funds to reverse the proposed elimination of 10 holdback teacher position FTS uh for 1.2 million reverse the proposed um elimination of 36 teacher FTE uh or effectively a PTR increase of plus one across grades 4 through 12 um veral of five positions in our language emersion programs at a cost of roughly $600,000 reversing the cost of um elimination
038of 18 ignite FTE positions at a cost of roughly $2.2 million and adjusting our counselor to student ratio to 300 to one uh which is we have an estimated cost of $186,000 and I'll note that that 3001 ratio is actually still above the American Council school um counselors um with that said um this amendment is made possible in part U due to recent action by the Alaska legislature regarding s sp40 um on February 22nd the Alaska House of Representatives 38 votes in favor um voted to to pass that bill which contains a number of different Provisions uh most relevant to our discussion tonight is a $680 increase to the base student allocation from 5960 to 6640 $500 per uh allotment for key3 students who are identified as having a reading deficiency and a $50 per
039pupil student transportation adjustment from 41 to 531 um the unfortunate situation we're in today of course uh due to uh Anchorage Municipal Charter and Alaska laws we have to address and pass a balance budget hand that to the Anchorage assembly U by next week and so um appropriating the the full scope of the funds that um are are clearly have been uh supported in the Alaska house on the 22nd and then just uh yesterday the Alaska Senate overwhelmingly um seems uh to inject too much risk for my preference U this would inject roughly $8.7 million or what I believe equates to roughly $110 BSA increase uh specifically to um appropriate funds to the classroom to direct instruction and related support services and to items that we know benefit student outcomes the memorandum with this amendment
040would also be modified to indicate that the board commits to following up um and reviewing our budget for possible amendments on or before June 30th when hopefully the the full funding for sp40 um is made clear um at this point we we don't know everything and so I think it's important to commit to um circling back and wisely appropriating the additional resources that we um hope to receive um I do want to take a moment quickly to thank the overwhelming majority 93% of the legislature that voted to pass a bill that's centered on supporting uh students families with that said um this amendment doesn't doesn't solve U everything and do everything I would hope again we are only budgeting a portion of the proposed funds um our our state Governor has publicly um supported a
041$300 increase the Alaska legislature has now support a $680 increase so we're um certainly being cautious there but we are wise l or wood wisely if we adopt this amendment allocate resources to the classroom um at our most recent board meeting you know we we looked at the difference between the state k12a to school districts uh which has actually gone down 3.4% since the last time that BSA was adjusted in fy7 uh through fy2 um compared to other departments like the Department of Corrections which has had a 42.6% positive increase the governor's office office in the legislature which have seen roughly 25% increases Public Safety which has gone up 70% and that speaks to I think the uh roughly 27% unaddressed inflation and education funding and so this amendment would not fix those items um
042but it would save valuable and belove programs our community appreciates that have positive student outcomes it also would honor the intent of the legislature um that when pass sp140 included language specifically indicating its preference to appr funds to student instruction and so I think this would show the our leaders and you know that we're listening and we're um doing what we can uh to uphold our end of the bargain while they navigate the rest of that bill adoption process I think I'll leave my comments for there U at this point I would urge I guess thank you thank you excuse me thank you member Jacobs uh other comments before and I have a couple of question for staff member lessons uh thank you for the opportunity uh it was a pleasure to partner um on
043the creation of this amendment I wanted to underscore some of the key things it does um it helps maintain class sizes for next year for grades four through 12 as they are now um in a way um that will rather than increasing them uh as the proposed budget would would do um it would better support board goals for e8th grade math proficiency it would better better support go board goals for college career life Readiness and I think it would have a positive um compared to the alternative a positive outcome on working conditions for our Educators which I believe is directly tied to Recruitment and Retention um I also think it's going to offer a greater chance for our secondary students to have elective opportunities when we pull one or two FTE away from a school
044we are losing the chance for those students to teach take this course or that course that would have been offered by this teacher or that teacher um I'm also really happy with this amendment because it will allow us to maintain valuable neighborhood-based programs that serve all of our students rather than hitting children and families against Children and Families um and I also am ecstatic that it supports our charter schools um some of whom are struggling with um the costs of rent and they are relying heavily on their fund balance um so so this cille 140 is poised to support uh next year's budget in those ways um and also if if cille 140 moves forward um there's a really exciting chance uh embedded for us to focus on our third grade reading proficiency by really
045targeting additional resources directly at our K through three classrooms um to be able to support the accelerated rates of growth that are needed to improve the overall rates of proficiency so there's much we're still waiting for uh but right now supporting this amend will avoid teacher layoffs and displacements and disruptions to students and their families so I am here to support thank you thank you member lence uh other comments from board members before I go to s yes member Higgins thank you um I'm going to support this I've got other changes I'd like to see I'm not going to try to amend this to try to do that I'll do it separately uh if that falls into that category but what I like about this is that it's focused on kids it's not focused on
046just the dollars uh the night program for example uh we have obligations to every types of all the kids in our school high performing those behind we have watchers Park the night program is meeting an obligation in my opinion that we have for these kids and including that regardless of the circumstances to me is something I would not support um and I'm glad to see that change the the ability to meet the needs of every kid that every kid's different and that ignite program is meeting Our obligation with that cutting back on these um number of teacher openings I don't know if that makes a difference I support it because the truth the matter is we're not in the teacher jobs we have right now unless we apply money or do something to be more
047effective in recruiting and retention of teachers and and staff um you can put any numbers you want down here you can double the Staffing and you're not going to have it filled uh so we have a real prises I put putting the money back in gives us options in regards to how we do it what we may do to be able to recruit and retain teachers and I agree with that completely but uh I want to be realistic about it we've got some money in there for delayed hiring got some money already for salary savings we've got a lot of savings in the budget process simply because we don't have the funding necessary to attract and retain the work force we need that's what's going to be a huge challenge that we have going on
048but the ignite program in there I applaud that I think that is absolutely the right thing to do um the Council of programs um after we had an incident in South High School about 10 years ago uh in which there was a perceived to be a terrorist threat it was a child simply providing venting at the encouragement of the council it's so it was called misunderstood but we had subject matter experts in and they said the counselors are more important to the safety of schools and police officers that's what's really this is about so putting that back in is safe for kids it's necessary and for mental health issues and for right that's that just makes sense to do that's a smart move and I applaud the fact that that said there as well uh
049within it um you know there there are several things in here stopping the the message we sending that teachers are expendable is by itself a very important message because they everything comes in with critical to the entire program that we got uh within that so uh I totally support it uh I think it is focused on kids I think it's focused on academics we have got to do everything we can to focus on that so I appreciate the effort that went into this thank you thank you very much uh yes member oh I'm sorry member Hollman and then we'll come back to you member Wilson member Hollman yes thank you uh I I watched the governor's press conference today as I'm sure everybody did um and it made me wonder if we could do anything
050like this and you know the the unfortunate thing is for Schoolboard we're always working with hypothetical money at budget time and certainly uh the money that the legislatur is appropriated at this point is hypothetical but um yet they did a very tangible thing uh what the governor expressed and what a lot of people expressed is that they're concerned about what the money will do will it really do anything worthwhile is it just going to be swallowed up in administ ministrative cost or kind of disappear without really helping anyone reading through this amendment um I I think this is worth taking to every legislator and taking to the governor um if someone has the opportunity to talk to him and just say this this is just the beginning of what we can bring back of what
051we can avoid cutting um I think everyone understands how much each of these things matters and there are a few that might be a little bit complex but I I think if anyone actually looks at what those folks do for the district and do for students uh they'll agree it's a good use of the money um so I'm I'm going to vote Yes on this because it's a clear statement about how important uh the BSA allocation is and I hope other board members will support it as well thank you member Hollman member Wilson thank you you I will also be supporting this um I wanted to say thank you to the members of the house and the senate for all of their work and their support of Education their their bipartisan work um was very
052very very pleased to see that because it's so difficult to sit in this seat and during budget time and look at what we're going to cut rather than what we can give to our classroom give to our teachers give to our students and I I I just wanted to note that one of the items on this list is a reversal of the proposed elimination of 36.3 teachers full-time teachers across the division 8 and a half of those elementary schools 9.8 full-time Educators at middle schools 14.2 person 14.2 full-time Educators at high schools and 3.8 full-time Educators at alternative schools so that alone increasing our PTR our our people teacher to teer ratio by one for fourth through 12th grade is an elimination of 36.3 teachers and so to be able to keep those folks in
053the classroom working with our students is is just such a huge benefit and I increasing our ptrs is a very difficult thing to do because it really is taking away those supports for not only our staff but our students I also want to say that that I appreciate I'm an advocate for mental health support and the counselor metrics making sure that all of our students have as much access to counselors as they possibly can uh is really important this also addresses our ignite 18 full-time ignite teachers I mean these these are like my I've had kids at night as as many of the parents have stated here they loved the program they they really um they brought that that that spark to them um which which was amazing for for each of the kids that
054were were able to participate um anyways I I will say that I will support this and I I appreciate the work you guys on this thank you member Wilson uh member Donley thank you m president um obviously throughout the budget process I UC primarily not increasing request happy to see MERS bring that now proposal it needs to be clear about this unlike I had reductions to compensate does this by simply projecting distri to get more money required previously project it's a easy way out very difficult challenging decisions and it does nothing to address the long-term budget deficit based because even if that additional list to show up we still have something like an80 million 70 to 80 million we have next year so that since it is several of most important things that I felt
055were lacking in this budget of or I disagreed with which was the increase in class sizes which I also voted against last year this boort did it by he and um the restoration the bank program to support this at this time with the recognition that it doesn't solve the underlying problem here yet thank you member Donley uh I'd like to um um ask uh Mr Ratliff if you could speak to one of Mr D Donley's concerns and of everybody's concern because we are we're taking a risk and uh could you give us an analysis of that risk thank you madam president um so putting money into like a potential BSA increase as a departure from what we've done in the past we've always budgeted based on what's in current statute so doing that is it's
056it's not without risk and you guys probably understand that if we don't get this money um sometime in the next few months we're going to have to come back at the end of April early May and make these reductions again having folks in staff having people in buildings is going to make those reductions probably that much more difficult um that being said the scope of this in terms of what a PB PTR or a BSA increase would be is if it were to just be State money it' be about $120 BSA increase so far less or about a third of what um what we got for the current year and about a third of what even the governor has probably discussed if we were to have a about a $100 BSA increase and then apply
057for the local match the additional local funding that the city could um pay then that would decrease our exposure a little bit on that um but I think that would go back to the maker the amendment to clarify do we want this as a split between state and local funding in terms of what that BSA equivalent might be or do you want it just all in state um my recommendation of course would be to split it between state and local to help kind of gradually step up some of those additional local contributions that are in stat thank you uh M Jacobs yeah thank you mam president um our legislature has sent us a clear message again um 56 out of 60 legislators um supported SP sp40 um I don't doubt that should the BSA increase
058our u local contribution um will at least get due consideration at the assembly level however um um budgeting that amount without a conversation with our assembly at this point seems premature we have a very clear message from State lawmakers as to um the level of funding they value for public schools going ahead to next fiscal year um and again we're be at $120 BSA increase I'll stress that U our CFOs has just stated that that's roughly a third of what's been publicly um supported by all levels of government evidence so um I think wisely spending These funds targeting them in the classroom and keeping our risk as low as possible um while making sure that we're um not having adverse damage by having to try to bring programs back after they've been cut um to
059me is a much more heroing Prospect as um when we attempt to to hire for positions we create in three months those teachers will have have other positions those support staff will have other positions they won't wait around for us to ENT our in our legislature um to identify the level of funding so I think we're on very Solid Ground here and appreciate the question my recommendation is to have this understated come at this time with that said the um path forward through the end of the fiscal year in June does allow us to have a conversation with our assembly is is recently is um just a few weeks away so having a conversation uh with them regarding um the uh first quarter budget revision process I think is worthwhile and I hope we do
060that and I hope we add that to theend and actually it is March 29 uh other comments member Donley thank you madam president I just wanted to understand remarks by Jacobs here um last year got an increase through the timing of but such that we lost our local contribution are related to the increase Mr R shook it his head I don't want that to happen again this year I I think the advice from our our experts should be taken that we should reach out to the assembly in this process earlier um so that we don't have that happen in this as long as we're talking about SP 40 I I want to point out that it totally fails to address the number two priority that Mr an we adoped Ed by the Assembly of this
061board um in the letter that was sent to the legislature fails to address the unfair discrimination against anage students due to the failure to update distri C we should continue to hammer that home because our students are being unfairly discriminated in an epic way thank you member Donley uh did you need a response from Member Jacobs on your question member Jacobs Mike oh oh okay yes let's take a five minute recess we'd like to welcome everyone back okay all right we will resume Our deliberations member Jacobs yeah thank you m president appreciate um the 's there so we could talk talk with our finance chair member Donley and our CFO um with that a clarification I'm comfortable splitting the projected revenue between state and local sources and um hopefully that answers the question from Member
062Donley and provides staff sufficient Direction okay do you need to make any Amendment to the amendment no no not at this time okay thank you um any other comments from the board before I yes just to close out our conversation this amendment um I do appreciate the support by board members um the feedback that got us here to this point member of M president B me thank you for collaborating as always um you know we spoke about the benefits to teacher uh and educator retention reducing class sizes it's one of those items that's one of the things this amendment does um again we had um you know feedback even during our our break that this doesn't address everything and this won't um certainly won't address the retirement disparity that the legislature is currently grappling with
063the S spad there are other things the legislature can and should do to help us um address our Recruitment and Retention challenges but uh this amendment does a number of things um wisely and I think well with projected Revenue that um the legislature has over they approve so um thank you again for the consideration Bergs thank you uh member Higgins I just want to make one comment I appreciate the comment by um um Donley in regards to the BSA I just want to explain that a little bit more than what was provided then the VSA was a came out with a dollar amount it was adjusted based upon cost of living from 1999 hasn't been adjusted then since then Anchorage was at that time the lowest cost of living City in Anchorage and so everyone
064else got more than what Anchorage has today we are not the lowest cost and other communities school districts are getting more money than we do because of what it used to be when we should getting more than them we are not getting fair treatment for our students based upon that formula and they've not done any adjustments since then so um uh I thought uh the fact that it's raised as an issue I just want to make sure the public understands what's going on how unfair it is and you got communities where their cost of living is seven or 14% less than ours they're getting more than than what we have but their cost of living is is is um uh less than us and they're getting more is not fair we are not being treated
065our kids are not being treated and there's an equity requirements here there assembly can only give so much money to us because otherwise we'd have some districts a lot higher than others well the truth of the matter is we've got an inequity that they're trying they claim that they're keeping but they're not meeting the requirement for that either so our kids are getting at the short end of that stick and it's a political issue because some of those communities will not come out ahead compared to us but that is a serious issue that still needs to be addressed by the legislature and I encourage public to let their legislators know that you've got you've got Representatives here which they should be fighting for aans thank you member Higgins and now I'd like to go to
066Dr Bryant thank you madam president uh I'd like to say that this amendment is reasonable and supports our goals and student outcomes I only want to Echo member Jacob's caveats and what Mr Rattler shared um this amendment assumes uh at least a small BSA increase this year and and veers away from our standard practice of passing a budget with known Revenue but this is an unprecedented situation given the livetime action on S sp40 so there is small risk but we can manage it though um if our worst case scenario becomes a reality which would be a z um education funding increase it could result in staff displacement and some turbulence but we can do our best to transparently manage that um if that occurs um so member Jacob address most of my concerns and it
067sounds like we're on the same page thank you very much uh I I'd have just a couple of comments um Dr Brian and I did write a letter to uh the governor yesterday uh asking him to further clarify his intent uh with SB 140 I have not heard back from him yet but I did hear um his speech today and he didn't he didn't say you know he didn't say there would be an increase he didn't say there'd be a decrease um so for the next 15 days um we we you know the state gets to wait and and see our budget however is due to the assembly uh on Monday and uh I again want to thank the staff for the turbulence that we've caused them with uh uh going you know with all
068the questions and the scenarios and the information um but I am very pleased with uh the the the amendment that's before us uh I'm not one to take risks um I'm not one to spend money that I don't have I'm so process driven that it drives me crazy that we're going doing it a little different but our kids are worth it and our staffs are worth it and so uh whatever we get we're going to be back here next year guys unle I just want you to know I mean this is this is the best we can do for now but we we've got to do better and I don't know like I said I don't know what words to say I don't know how to soften Hearts I am encouraged with the process uh
069in the house and and with in the house and in the Senate there was very little light between where people were and and I'm I'm encouraged by that I don't know that I've seen that in a long time well since I've been paying attention over the since I retired because I didn't really pay attention I guess before I retired but I am now paying attention to everything so um so anyway uh FY once we get done with fy2 then we're planning FY 26 and it's that revolving door it's the revolving door but we've got to do right by our kids and that's what this is and the governor and the legislature has to do right by all of Alaska's kids so with that if there's no other oh member lessons um thank you for indulging
070one last perhaps comment um regarding the governor's speeech today you know one of one of the things that he said that I wrote down was that it's the teachers that matter and I I couldn't agree more and this amendment saves more than 71 teachers from being displaced in our district um and I'm really proud of that and eager to see that move forward um I also heard the governor reflect on his interests in beeping up reading the reading component of s 140 and or a companion bill that might come through in the next couple of days and if there were additional supports to support K through Reading we could reduce class sizes down to 15 for our youngest Learners or something much closer than uh the mid 20s uh that we currently at we could
071fund instructional coaches um we could fund a lot of the supports that our students need um in order to be able to see that accelerated rate growth that I'm pretty sure all of us on the bias would like to see okay with that call in a question whenever you ready member Hollman yes member Wilson yes member Donley yes member Jacobs yes member lesons yes member Higgins yes president Bellamy yes and that that Amendment passes we still you guys are out of order thank you so now um the amendment that amendment number one passes we're now ready to vote on the main motion unless there are other amendments yes member Donley thank you madam president um as you know I submitted some proposed amendments yes you did the first one of those was to restore ignite
072funding by reducing others costs so that's been handled Now by amendment number one um there are some additional savings I would like to see in this budget and discussed a lot of for um because we continue to face a huge deficit even going forward into the year after this fiscal year this but this budget pement and one of the things that I remain concerned about is that we belong to organizations that do not represent the best interest of Anchorage taxpayers and one of those I'm concerned about is the Coalition for Education Equity uh the big five school districts anage is the only one only major Urban School District that belongs to this particular group and they oppose M they oppose the formation of local government state of Alaska to fill the vacuum that's out there
073in about 20% of the state they oppose increasing the minimum number of students required to have a state fund in school theyve refused to support our efforts in getting a new District cost study complete and they oppose parental consent for surveys of personal information students and given all that I don't know why we're a member of this organization for $32,000 a year and with that I would move to delete funding for membership in the Coalition education equity for a reduction of $32,000 budget that's before us there a second hearing no second M Donley thank you madam president um another one of the dues that we are reflected in cost in this budget before us in the main motion is uh dues for the Council of great City schools for this District belong to it when
074the district first joined this we had close to 50,000 students and this council is really the National Organization of school districts with more than 50,000 students so they tend to be large urban districts that do not share the same values as angr voters very much so um it Advocates multiple positions that I have seen U are in the contract in interest of alaskans and anage residents that they support radical anti- Firearms laws um really really scary radical laws that we take away um from Law buying citizens right to keep and their arms they promote almost exclusively partisan politicians from LGE large cities at their organizations and they once again oppose parental consent for surveys of personal information of students so with that in mind i' move to delete funding for membership in the council great
075City schools for a reduction of $44,000 in this budget no second but discussion purposes something a second okay well already made my argument so I greatly appreciate the second though is there any yes ma'am no I I I've attended at least one of their meetings and um when when I brought up the fact that some of the things they were doing were directly opposite to what the majority of citizens in Anchorage would believe they just said yeah we know that but we have to do this because this is U what our urban communities be so these are large urban communities and they have a different set of values that Anchorage um Detroit Chicago and such and so I just don't see that we should be subsidizing them pushing these these is that are contrary to
076what I believe the majority of folks in anguage thank youbody else wish to speak Pat did you have your mic on yeah oh did you want to speak yeah okay we'll go to Pat come to lessons thank you I I thank this for discussion purpos only because uh there are issues associated the Council of Gracy schools they Advocate board should not be engaged in reviewing the budget the the board should not be reviewing uh the performance except four go goals four guard rails I went through their training uh I've been called unethical by the Council of great City Schools when we made a budget change once uh they are more of an extension that the superintendent should be in charge of school district without oversight the National School Board Association is strongly advocating always that
077the board's role is to be the voice of the public that includes uh the parents the the General Public public the teachers the students We're The Voice we provide direction to the administration we tell them what we we need to do we should be in charge of curriculum there's a lot of things we should do including the budget and we hold accountability and I'm very pleased that the board has reestablished an internal audit process so that we can review departments for efficiency and look for opportunities to approve outcomes so I I am very supportive of that and except for one reason I would vote for this they conduct audits on behalf of other school district coming in to do audits like purchasing uh and and other departments and they do so at a cost that
078is unbelievable we're B paying for B prum we're paying for travel and that'sa and we're getting things that would cost uh you know when we did purchasing uh some time ago it cost us about 40,000 and we save about half million dollars a year after that it's worth it uh and it's very low cost these are people coming in top people from other schools law school districts and doing the review so I'm not going to support eliminating it but I will support the intent that there is a real issue here that we have an advocate for the board not to do our job that's how I view it and I'm going to express that loudly and I'll express it over and over again but that's not my role my role is to be your voice
079my role is to provide directions because we should provide oversight over the superintendent that we we uh select and um employ and that we have a role to make sure that our dollars are well spent and that academic issues are addressed and that we do so in the best way possible so um I am not an advocate for Council great City Schools uh I consider them a superintendent organization um rather than school board but I do applied what they do for the school district when it comes to audits they do a great job and since reestablished the internal audit committee November 29th last year it's a big date for me because I've been pushing for it uh I am not going to support eliminating but I do concur that there are good reasons to challenge
080that issue is it in the best interest for us to follow that approach we moved away from that and I'm proud of that um but I wanted to explain my vote on that issue thank you member lesons and then member Wilson and I see you member Hollman thank you I just actually wanted to ask the administration to clarify my memory that we have recently had one or more audited by this organization and if so what were they and you could just speak to the value that the audit St out it yeah M lessons we uh engaged with the council and in November they brought up a team of so almost 10 individuals uh from districts around the United States to help us do an a audit of our benefits Department and benefits function in the
081district and our position around the health benefits that we provide to our employees um we are still waiting on those uh on their report from that review uh so we we haven't yet realized the the benefit of that I guess I would say but uh we're expecting that any day now uh they reached out to us a couple weeks ago for a few more data points and they're finalizing their findings rep so we're anticipate that soon thank you member uh Wilson so I have not had the same experience as member donaly and member Higgin with the Council of great City Schools the trainings that I've received from them the trainings that I've participated in the conversations I've participated in with them um really is is lots of conversations about student focused governance so making sure
082that our students are the main focus of of what we're doing as board members um and making sure that we are focusing on assessing all of our students and the growth of all of our students so your experience is very different than mine not to say we all have different experiences so I I will not support eliminating this program the council fund thank you member Wilson um member Hollman thank you president B me U I wanted to say that there there's value that we get from being part of this organization and I think member Higgins outlined a lot of it uh also my experience in attending one meeting uh it was focused on things about running a district and doing the the various jobs that have to be done to make a district work uh
083it wasn't political it it um it wasn't partisan certainly it it was really just focused on um how you make the nuts and bolts of a district function um I also have to say that in my 30 years of being involved with the Anchorage School District there's only been one time a board member tried to move a motion advocating a restriction on gun ownership and member donle that was you um it was about seven years ago I guess but uh we don't take our lead politically or on issues like that from the Council of great City schools or anybody else if somebody has a good idea I think it's good to bring it back home but we just haven't seen that be the case with with any of the political or partisan things that they
084might be doing they're very practical things that make it worthwhile um I think that's uh true for the the previous organization you mentioned as well as the Alaska Association of school boards thank you member hman any other comments member uh Higgins I I'm sorry Conley I just have to say I I I don't think member hollman's accurately remembering seven years ago but but I I can't read his mind um there was an effort by the board that was considered an anti-gun uh resolution that as the uh as a chairman I held a one of our committee meetings about and about 30 or 40 people showed up and concerned with it and it it did eventually was rejected by the board but as a you I I really don't remember anything that I've done is that
085could be characterized as anti-second amendment I did author the current state law that had the request of Public Safety to ensure that if a unauthorized person brought a weapon into a school they could be prosecuted so that was a law that I personally sponsored as a state representative and is now the ex in law regarding that but it clearly provides that it's up to the uh superintendent and the principal of that school to extend the right of uh keeping and bearing arms to people within that school if they think it's necessary for the safety school thank you uh as a probably the person who has had the most contact with uh the most when I say most weekly contact UM with the Council of greatest City Schools uh I attend their president's meetings I attend
086uh their annual conferences much like members of this board will tend either the National School Board association's conference or the Council of Greater City Schools conference it's training and it's for me personally it has been among the best trainings that I have had because it's not about interfering in in not not about interfering with my role it's helping me to focus on students and why we do things and when you do that when you have a mindset of being student focused and you're really focused on student outcomes you behave differently you think differently so the value of this organization um of 78 School District districts across the the the the the United States um I I mean I I can't I I can't imagine us not being a part of a part of that uh
087I've never felt like I could not uh ask this superintendent or the staff or inject get my questions answered um and I don't know what bad experiences people have had they certainly have not been mine and this is my fifth year of of either taking training me uh meeting with them the last three years as president so I will not be supporting this see no other comments we'll call for the vote member Higgins no no member lessons no member Donley yes member Hollman no member Jacobs no member Wilson no president Bellamy no okay that uh amend that Amendment fails 5 to2 next thank you madam president um Madam president we need to continue to find ways to reduce our spending uh obviously um there's been progress in this budget compared to last year but still
088our general fund spending is going up this year um and one of the possible ways to do that would be to discontinue the recently uh adopted Middle School model um it's only been in place a few years now and it requires an extra additional planning period in our middle schools and that additional plan planning period requires an additional 31 Middle School teachers District at a cost of $3.9 million and I believe those funds could be better used to close our budget Gap and to maintain the lowest possible class sizes we can across the district and with that I would move my amendment number four to discontinue the Middle School model for a savings of $3.9 million I'll second for discussion member yeah member Donley thank you madam president I I think there's value in a
089second planning period for middle school kids Middle School is the toughest grades we've got on our children I really believe that um it's very challenging being a seventh and eighth grader and now we're moving our sixth graders there and that's one of the reasons why that there's a cost to us of moving the sixth graders is because of the Middle School model it's more expensive model for providing uh this additional planning time um so it isn't I don't think there's value in it it's just I don't think the value is as high as maintaining the lowest class sizes that we possibly can thank you member B I appreciated the chance to to Second this for discussion um I've bored over this budget looking for every efficiency that we could find uh that would not harm
090our students and I thought about the mdle School model we've spoken about it and to my understanding the Administration has repeatedly underscored and clarified that the value of the Middle School model is greater than the value of the PTR reduction that we could afford through that exchange so I will not be supporting this but I appreciate the D Ence in looking for efficiencies and I am greatly worried about FY 26 thank you thank you member lesons m Jacobs yeah thank you m person I Want To Tread carefully this time more talking about details CFO can clarify but um we talk about reducing spending um and our budget going up despite funding the many um or our student population Anchorage going down my understanding from previous finance committee meetings is that largely the that could be
091attributed to the fact that um we've seen 27% inflation since FY 17 and our student population has gone down or has decreased by a fraction of that is that generally accurate and why we can attribute those two things to um right so our enrollment has gone down over the last you decade or Plus um 10 or 12% uh we do have increased needs of special education particularly intensive needs um yeah I think that's that is correct that the BSA has even with the $680 that's a 12% increase since 2017 it's it's not going to be sufficient to maintain our current operations um we're putting significant amount of our fund balance into this budget so really I mean we we're still making reductions in this budget we're cutting out curriculum we're cutting out it we're cutting
092out other Administration uh so there's there there is things we're taking on more risk um but that being said I don't know that there's a silver bll to balance this budget the Middle School model you know it would save money but it is it is fewer people in buildings thank you m pres I just want yeah thank you I just want to point out that um due to inflation far out pacing the declin birth rates and the outmigration our state is experiencing due to our lack of a fiscal plan and um High Cost of Living and U lack of a functional retirement system for public system employees and our Educators um be it would be very challenging to cut um to adjust for inflation each year so I just want to make sure we talked
093about that too with that said um I think if we want to um continue the challenge es of Recruitment and Retention for educators a really good way to do that would be to cut planning time especially as we're pois to um transition sixth graders to Middle School uh I think our teachers need more time to prepare themselves for the day and unfortunately they're asked to do um far too much as is and so I support planning time that the Middle School model provides thank you thank you very much I have hman member hman next uh thank you president bman yet want say first of all just uh to correct something Middle School in the Anchorage school district has been fully in place for well over 20 years and it the rollout of it was five
094or six years long but by uh 2020 it it was fully in place and has been the the model ever since um so it has quite a history and and changing it would be a a major deal um also want say when when you talk about being a planning period that's not really what the model is about the model is about small communities for students who are coming out of Elementary that are accustomed to spending almost all day with with 30 unfortunately in Anchorage with about 30 of their friends um rather than dropping into a school with completely disconnected classes and and 6 Seven 8 900 students they are on a team of about 120 or 130 would sort of love it if that number was smaller too but things are what they are um
095and students really identify with that group and it kind of gives them a space to grow a little bit uh without being in what I'll call the big swim of what we think of as high school and that structure um so the teachers are given extra responsibilities in terms of working with students and managing students and parent Communication in middle school that planning period is for that specifically it's not simply additional planning time or an extra planning time um it has a purpose and if we are going to take that away to plan it and specify what it is we're dropping um not simply Let It Go by the boards we I think in something like this as a board we'd have a respon possibility to say what we would be replacing middle school with
096because there are several other options I don't think any of them are as good um so I I think the the motion is misconstrued um I do think we get a great deal of value out of it and particularly because sixth graders are going to middle school maintaining that model I think becomes more important than ever so I will be voting no on this thank you neor Hollman neor Higgins I can remember when Middle School was uh adopted because my wife was on school Bo then and the focus was studies that showed the Middle School model improved uh outcomes for students graduation rates and lower Dropout rates these are grades that are really critical for children with an adjustment factor a lot of SM social emotional learning issues and the like so what the Middle
097School model did is provide teachers and I think um I I appreciate Andy's comment they provide teachers additional time so they can work together with the students identifying issues helping those students and the middle school Savings would eliminate that time that's what they're looking at uh I'm outcome based okay everything should be outcome based and the studies with Middle School show that the outcomes improve uh outcomes improve with less dropouts graduation rates go up so there are benefits to kids particularly those at risk that have struggle struggles with it it helps him with that transition and um um for that reason because of the outcome I think it's an important factor I think we need to retain it because it's for the kids everything we should vote for should be for the kids and I
098know we're going to have to cut everything at some point we're going to go crazy if we don't get additional funding on a regular basis but I'm going to oppose this because I don't think it's in the best interest for students is there any other comments member Donley thank you I just don't want the public to misunderstand and conflate the difference between middle school and the middle school model Middle School model was something that was adopted by this board is a budget add-on since I've been here so that's new as far as to this board and for recent history of the school district adding this additional time it came with a cost of multiple millions of dollars and I I'm not going to dispute that it has benefits I just don't think that its benefits
099are as great as the class sizes increases across the board that this board adopted last year including our lowest our youngest students which I think had very you know negative impact on um so there's a difference between middle school and the middle school model when I talk about Middle School philosophically I've advocated for years we go to K through 8 which is what districts of all across the United States are doing to um because Middle School is very problematic and difficult time for students and I support going to k througha um and moving in that direction which at one point in time we had a plan to do begin to incrementally to get there but it got abandoned uh with covid and the budget crisis we're facing so as a former Middle School principal in
100this District in 1992 I set on the other side of in this space but a different space to advocate for Middle School it has been around a long time we worked hard and are still working hard to provide opportunities for kids who are at a very fragile time in their development in their cognitive physical emotional development teachers are trained to uh um create environments that are inviting that are uh differential for kids if they need differentiation uh interactive engaging uh and while we to save 3.9 million to upset I don't know how many kids in the middle it just sounds it it just it makes me a little crazy so but I will not be voting for this because I do not think it's in the best interest of kids uh member Wilson so I
101will not support this one either um our staff at the middle school just to say that that it's it's an extra extra period for them to plan is to me is is a complete understatement it is an opportunity for our staff to collaborate to help our students and there isn't a lot of collaboration time there isn't a lot of time where and I've heard it from many of our staff members where they have where are Educators they have those opportunities to to work together to try to benefit our students to try to help address any issues to try to help just any any type of collaboration time and to take that away particularly when we're moving sixth graders to middle school I see as a detriment to our kids and I I I support that
102either thank you see no other persons wishing to speak we will call the question member Wilson no member jobs no member Higgins no member lessons no member Donley yes member hman no president babby nope thank you madam president the recognition that we're still looking at about a 70 million gap even with additional State funding or it could be a $60 billion Gap going into next year and something that I think some a fact that member Higgins brought up a few meetings ago of the relative increase in administrative costs versus classroom ratios of the total budget and I don't want to misstate here but that over the last decade or so that ratio has tilted more towards Administration classroom so and E and I recognize that this budget does have for virtually first time I've been
103here other than really small amount last year um a significant reduction in administrative overhead it's not related to classroom um but I still think that we're going to have to work in that direction of rebalancing that ratio of administrative costs in the classroom and the state maintains uh the State Department of Education classifies um uh has a standard classification for expenditures by school districts and two of those State function codes function code 510 and state function code 550 relate to non-classroom related administrative overhead and that's where I think we need to focus our efforts in attempting to rebalance this cost of administrative overhead versus classroom because they're the the items that the state requires us to identify and it's identified as non-classroom there's there's still things that district has to do there's no question about
104it but it would minimize the impact on a class actual classroom by focusing on those so with that all said I would move an additional 5% reduction in non-classroom related administrative costs in the state functions 510 and 550 for a reduction of 2,245 th000 a second for discussion thank you madam president I I think I've explained the goal here I I want to thank the administration for coming forth with uh reductions in Administration in the in the main motion that's before us the budget that's before us but I do think that it's concerning that over a long period of time that balances has tilted towards increases with Administration um ratio of the total package if if the information we've gotten is accurate and of all the places to find to seek additional Cuts this is
105the one I hear most from the public out there they want us to examine carefully and attempt to accomplish so that's the spirit that this brought forward in not that these people aren't doing important things I'm not I'm not saying that at all thank you m lence yeah um again I spent a lot of time uh individually with the budget um with members of the administration um and one of the things well I guess I would like to ask the administration to help the board maybe once again understand some of the particular movement that has happened in these two functions thinking about software um and thinking about some of the unsettled contracts which I think are part of um what we might see as growth and if you could just please talk us through some
106of the areas where um if we were to move down this path what would be the consequences of of that given that we have unsettled contracts and a significant investment in software which may be beginning of process ofet uh thank you for that um the president this the software packages are generally budgeted in the state function in which they're used so if we have uh reading intervention or instructional software that's budgeted as instruction it's under its's account so you see it growing with that software but it's not necess necessarily because uh it wants to use this software it's being used in the classrooms um to the point about unsettled contracts we have think a little over $1 million that's in a function for District administration uh two settle contracts for totem Ace and maintenance that
107are outstanding um most of those costs will be transferred out once those contracts are settled to different state functions um and historically speaking you know if you look back at Old budgets you'll see an administr like a District administration line or Administration support that's uh well below what it costs because we put all our attrition budgets in that line I we've gone to a method where we're calculating out based on each function how much attration we expect to receive in or ex uh how much we expect to experience in those those different functions so it's spread out more proportionally in that sense but there are some one-time things in there like the those funding or the funding for the unsettled contracts that kind of skew the amount that's in there um as well as some
108of the Personnel historically like this year we did move a number of it support Personnel that are working in schools and directly supporting student and staff devices into a function 350 for student support um so that was one change we did make that this year so they're kind of offset between the not completely offset between the unsettled contracts and that move um but over the years I mean just from my departments I've cut half the CFO staff I've cut a third of the budget staff we cut a quarter of the accounting staff um there's not a lot more we can do without risking Mission failure from at least from my directed um you know 15 or 20% of the purchasing staff we all of my places have taken Cuts you see some like it is
109grown but we also put in a onetoone initiative where we have thousands and thousands of more devices on the system and and a lot more software for them to handle so those departments that have experienced increases there is a reason for that and if we start taking those down um kind of arbitrarily without really doing a thorough review of what impact that's going to be then that could certainly have some lasting impacts down the road did you have followup you okay member hman thank you president bmy um you know and I'm fully aware especially coming out of the classroom a lot of people like to look at Administration and go if we just had less of them and more teachers would' be great but I I think if you work behind the scenes in ASD
110you begin to realize those people are doing things that matter and and I'll admit there have been times when I thought people didn't do a very good job of what they were doing but that was an individual situation if we were an organization of really had a lot of layers and more people doing the same kinds of things um I can see a general 5% cut as making sense but in a lot of cases when you look at a job description you have one person doing it so you're going to cut that person 5% you're going make them part-time or you're going to tell them they have to take a cut and pay it it really doesn't work you you really need someone to go away so that you can stop paying a salary before
111you can make a reduction like that and I I think we do a disservice if we just nod our heads to people that are saying it without asking what what they're willing to see go by the board um to my knowledge ASDS never missed a payroll never I'm sure there' have been individual checks that have had issues and had to be rectified um but do we want to make it so close that if if we have a couple of people get the flu in one one week that we're at risk for something like that we manage a fleet of school buses that far out strips what the city does every single day and transporting people miles passengers however you want to cut it the IT department is incredibly complex and and is crucial to the
112smooth operation of what we do everything from taking attendance um to parent contacts to to posting grades to working with things so I again I'm going to say as a board if we're going to ask the administration to just cut we need to tell them what we're willing for them to stop doing we're not at the point where we can just send people away and still have things function the way they function and we might be able to find some things that we can do without and I think that'd be great I think we have a responsibility to do that all the time not just when the budget's tight but when there's plenty of money to be spent it all needs to be spent as well as it possibly could but unless you can identify
113something that really doesn't need to happen that we're paying someone to to do I don't see how we can support this I and I don't even see how it can really work feasibly um I think we need to be able to defend the level of administration we have um and again I won't say that every day goes perfectly but I I think we need the people in place that we have I I wish we had more I wish we had more assistant principles in our buildings to handle discipline issues that came up so it would be easier for a classroom teacher um to work in concert and and improve behavior in their classrooms I wish we had more Tas I wish we had um more of a lot of areas that that aren't considered direct
114teaching um but they support teachers in their role if we were a well-funded district we'd have that but we do not I I will oppose this thank you very much uh go to member Higgins thank you um member Don I don't remember anybody ever listening when I spoke so I guess that P out I won't argue with it uh I will say that for uh when I was on the school board the first time for nine years from 2008 to 2017 we cut administration every year but we didn't do it by going across and saying a certain percentage we had people sitting right there going through the budget each department area describing what they're doing us asking questions of what they're adding what would happen if they got delete and we were engaging we aren't
115doing that today like that but that's really where we're at if we cut Administration I don't want to cut uh funds and maintain the status quo of how we operate and see something cut that shouldn't be cut staff development is admin cost it's critical okay we've got a lot of things out there in admin that you can put in there that aren't funded enough maybe we got other areas that wouldn't be the joke with washon is that if you're going to cut the federal budget the first thing they're going to tell you is well then we have to sell the Washington Monument we don't need to have give it up that way we need to provide more directions I support the idea that we know in my opinion we can cut more than 5% we
116can cut a bunch but we need to Target it and question it and know what the outcome is and the impact before we make the changes what I want I want us engaged in looking at the budget like we haven't done on three years I've been coming back that we used to do we need to do that usually it's a two-day process and it was so good you really learned the department and you learned the opportuni so I'm not going to support it because I don't I don't want a cut and still maintain the same way we oper I want to look for opportunities where we improve how the administration is operating we look for areas where it doesn't impact the other areas within the district and we make that kind of change so I
117applied the the goal I think we should be looking at that outside the classroom first but we need to know what it is we're cutting before we do that's my own interation so I um thank you member um Higgins so as I recall we gave the administration guidance on on on all of this um and My Hope was that we would avoid these blind line item Cuts without having um some idea of the impact to the organization uh Juno is suffering school district is suffering right now because they cut so deep that they actually thought they had more money than they had because they had no ST they had less sta doing the same amount work and even as a board member wanting to make these Cuts I really don't have the view that the
118staff have in knowing what the impact is so it's not it's not like we don't want to hear from people on what they're spending their money on for me it's just being more responsible by allowing the people we hire to do what we hire them to do yes we can get whatever reports we want but we are at a point now we've already asked the administration to cut they've cut $6.4 million we know what that consists of because it's in our briefing to come now and ask for another $2.2 million I I just think it's um I I just don't I I don't know why we would do that I will be voting no see no other oh member Jacobs yeah thank you m president do appreciate the clarity from L that um that more
119more accurate picture isn't that um that best District administration is grown um that we're constantly moving things around in our budget and categorizing things differently and some of that is the difference in how different reports get categorized for types of costs and how the state categorizes costs um the legislature was briefed recently that our District Administrative costs I think is 1% of our budget or just north of that which is larger than at least one I'm sorry but small am at least one of the other large school districts in our state so wanted to point that out too um and I I also appreciate the District administration reducing their cost by $6 million in this budget that is significant put uses thank you did you have a followup he get your lights on okay and
120just for um point of just maybe a minor fact I was on the other side of this board having to talk to this the board you guys about my budget I thought it was the worst waste of my time because we've already had to submit a budget to the administration we've always had to justify that that budget to our supervisors and now we've got to come and publicly justify it to the board if that's the way the board wants to do then that's a whole another conversation but I want you I just want you to know that it wasn't all that fantastic not for the people who are doing doing the work so let's uh looks like the motion before you is to um reduce an additional five% from the administrative cost functions sa functions
121510 550 ready vote member Higgins no member Donley yes member lesons no member Wilson no member Hollman no member Jacobs president Bellamy uh no uh it's just a checking with the board do you guys need a break we've got several of these to go or do you want to just push through okay we push through okay that motion uh pass uh that motion fails sorry uh six Nays to one yay member dony thank you madam president thank you for everybody's time I really appreciate this discussion I think it's helpful to the public um so we have a matrix that determines School Staffing and the Matrix is different for elementary schools and middle schools and senior high schools and it says what those schools should get for staff based on their population also um but in
122the budget there are some exceptions to that now one of the exceptions is of course Title One schools who get extal funding and they're they have the flexibility to address particular issues at those schools with that funding with the only exception other than Title One expenditures into to The Matrix for elementary schools it's just two schools there's a halftime position at willall elementary and halftime position at in the view and between the two of them that's $120,000 that's not part of the Matrix that every other Elementary School follows um and I think it would be a much better way to address if they have some unique special need at those schools to do that through agenda and not through exceptions to The Matrix I think every school should be in titled to the same Staffing
123within the Matrix with of course the exception of title one but they make their own decisions on that so with that I would move to delete funding for two- part-time non-title one funded positions and excessive standard Staffing matric at m at elementary school for a reduction of a profit made $120,000 hearing no second that motion fails next M Dow thank you mad president um I've done this proposal every year I've been here um we all we've heard it many times and that is that I remain concerned that our students are dramatically unrepresented or under represented by our participation in the Alaska Association of school boards I think one of the most successful periods for the Anchorage School District was under superintendent Bob Crystal when we withdrew from the Alaska Association of school boards uh they
124had conflicting interests to our district and we were able to better represent ourselves being independent from them uh the matso school district's already made this decision has withdrawn from the Alaska Association School boards and have neighbor are our our neighbors to the north um um and I have raised these issues every year and the association school board says not seem fit to address them and just to give people a sense of it um because of the way it's structured the governance of the Alaska School boards Association governance um the smallest school districts in Alaska are represented on that group with a voting power of 170 times times that of each Anchorage student 170 times more power in making decisions on in the Alaska Association School boards per student and Anchorage students that's just a blatant
125discrimination against anage students they should be have some sort of some rational uh representation and not be underrepresented by 140 times um the ratio with the next largest District which would be the Mato is a 2:1 their students essentially have a 2 to1 voting power over ours it's just not fair and they have chosen not to address this issue I've brought it up many times and I think it's time we drew a line in the stand here and just say that our students are being very unfairly treated within this organization they've advocated multiple positions that are against those of anage taxpayers including opposing the formation of local governments and for those out there you don't know about this Alaska is probably the only state in the Union where about 20% of our land is unorganized
126has no local government whatsoever they pay no local taxes for their schools um the goal at the time of statehood was that all of Alaska would be organized in some sort of burough formation or or local government formation and that every Alaskan uh that works should pay something towards the cost of Education in the state that's not the case there's like 20% of the populace pay nothing towards their local schools that's not right that's not fair to the 80% that are and this organization opposes the formation of additional local governments to cover that and to pay educational taxes um they also oppose the increase in the number of minimum students to have a state funded school right now it's 10 students we all heard the horror stories about how these districts recruit not just their
127teachers but also their support staff based on how many children they will bring into the district to justify their very existence as a school that gets State funding that's just wrong it's wrong on its face and yet this organization refuses to to condemn that and to take action to make it more fair to All Alaska taxpayers uh that pay taxes through local government um they also oppose parental consent for surveys for personal information students thank goodness we have a state law that requires that because they have habitually added that as one of their priorities is repeal of parents having a say over the collection of data about their own children uh so with that I would move to delete funding for membership in the Alaska Association of school boards for a reduction of $30,000 hearing
128second that motion fails member Donald thank you madam president just three to go I guess um I think it was four years ago that the administration created the Office of equity and compliance at the time I observed it sounded like something out of the Soviet Union um subsequent to that they changed the name of this this office within the school district to the office of equity and Community engagement so Community engagement says a lot better than compli Madam president I have to intervene did we just compare the Anchorage School District to the Soviet Union I think he did but uh we will I I object I I I know continue member d uh member D I don't understand the point there that wasn't a point of procedure point of personal privilege I don't understand the
129the Roberts rules Jus down an objection to disparaging the board member hman would you could you hold your comments please for the appropriate time thank you so this is a recent development and I believe there is a a very valuable individual which I have supported the addition to the budget quite a few years ago uh within this organization and that's a community volunteer coordinator position uh I would like to see that continue because I want to maximize parent parental involvement within our schools I think that's the future of educ public education is to get as many parents as possible active within our Public Schools helping out participating um but since this is a newer add-on to our budget I believe it's one place we can look to save some money so if you were to
130eliminate this office of equity and Community engagement but maintain that one parental coordinator um you could save about $450,000 so with that I moved to delete funding for the office of equity and Community engagement for a total Savings of $571,000 and transfer one Community volunteer coordinated position to the office of the superintendent for cost of $110,000 with a total net Savings of approximately $450,000 yil second that motion fails thank you madam president M Dy Madam president I was really really looking for ways to pay for us not increasing class sizes and um to save ignite and um there really weren't a lot of great options at all um um but one of the things that I examined was what we have Librarians they do a great job but we also have in some schools assistant
131Library assistants and um not all schools get those just some schools and um once again this is a thing that not ideal in any shape or form but it's kind of random how the uh assistant Librarians are assigned um so I would look to this as a possible way to reduce and it's not going to be this year we're going to be looking at it again next year with the massive Gap we're looking at for uh not just this this budget but the next budget so um might of all the things to reduce since this would maintain Librarians and all our schools that have existing Li brains would be to possibly eliminate the assistant Li brains and there's nine of these folks I'm sure they're doing great work out there um but when it comes
132to reductions I wanted to focus as much as possible on class sizes um and so as a potential method I wanted to put this before the board this option and I would move to delete funding for nine um full-time equivalency for librarian assistance for a reduction of approximately $800,000 hearing no second that motion fails thank you madam president my last uh Amendment um sure we have discussed this before in past years and that's the distribution of assistant principles to schools um we have some schools um larger high schools that have five um total principles others that only have three um I tried to examine um a way to continue to have assistant principles uh to provide the services they provide and of all the probably reductions I've suggested tonight this is probably the one that
133I regret the most having to propose because of of a lot of the functions that these assistant principles do so hopefully they'd be able to maintain those key core functions I would certainly support well um possibly looking to uh parental volunteers and other ways to mitigate some of the duties they're currently performing in some of the schools um so with that I I'd offer the following amendment to reduce the number of assistant principles in high schools and um we also do have some uh some schools or a school with a population over 500 that doesn't have an assistant principal and that would be a cost additional cost that provide them I think that would be Equitable and fair to do so so this so I'm proposing to reduce the overall number of assistant principles while
134adding one assistant principal to any school that currently has a population of 500 that doesn't have um so I move to reduce all high school all high schools with more than three assistant principles by one assistant principal in addition Al all high schools currently with four by one additional for reduction of eight assistant principles for a total reduction of one L $248,000 and add 143,000 for revised assistant principal metric to provide one assistant principal at schools with populations over 500 that currently do not have an assistant principal for a total net reduction of $1,105 hearing no second that motion fails is that your last one yes ma'am thank you okay that brings us back to the main motion as amended oh P did you have a yeah thank you I'm sorry been that um my
135my concern is sixth grade to $1.6 million that will be spent and you look at the uh National Education you look at Duke you look at the studies that being done in economic research they're all negative uh it's negative on behaviors it's negative on academic outcomes some students May benefit but overall it goes down $1.6 million that's 13 teachers we could be putting in K through three if we wanted to in order to lower to improve academic outcomes study uh and I attended in uh National School Board Association conference in it and it showed that uh putting a low classroom sies K through3 gets 90% of the effectiveness on educational outcomes is putting low act low uh classroom sizes and all the grades we are looking at adding this budget when we have a reduction
136in funds Master amount adding $1.6 million into the budget to do something that is academically not good for for kids everything we should do we should question is this best for kids and we should be looking at that logically and logically there's no logic to it when all the studies say academic results have not improved they go down when it's socially emotional I'm looking at this with the um uh the Department of Education nationally and it talks about uh the impact it have on on behaviors uh violence drugs everything everything stay on they're not ready for it and so we're pushing that and the question is why every question we should ask is is it best for kids that's what we should ask every time we do anything is this putting the best interest of
137kids 1.6 million 13 teachers that we could have in different locations that's what we're choosing between I know that part of the issue with moving sixth grade to middle school is probably so we can cut more elementary schools later deal with that issue at the same time okay if you're trying to make elementary schools smaller so we can justify having less elementary schools and make them bigger fine let's deal with that issue at the same time will we deal with this because board has dealt with that issue it's been raised to it that we won't have any choice and this is kind of inlying that that's going to going to contribute to that decision but I see nothing that the Administration has offered that this is good for kids nothing so and and the impact
138everything we do should be focused on what's best for kids what's best for them that's the only thing we should be asking I see nothing best for kids but I see 13 teachers out there that could be really beneficial for those kids we're hearing that with the pandemic and the academics they need more uh Hands-On tutoring need more support we need to get the academic scores up we know our classroom sizes are so large and we're putting this into that into the middle school we H an example where they do this and and we have one Middle School well over 100% but you got to keep the middle you got to keep the elementary schools and Shrink them so that we can combine them I just want the question is not what the goal is
139question is is it right for kids I think this is inappropriate I think it's not geared towards kids there's no evidence to support that it's going to improve things there is coming out with do there are some kids that because of the exposure with some and they're socially emotionally ready and they do it they may benefit from having some of the options and things in the middle school but overall those kids are going to come down overall the academic schools are going to come down and we will be doing that and we will be cutting money for 13 teachers we don't have the money now we won't have the money in the future even if we get additional BSA and I think we will we're not going to be able to have the surplus of
140the money we need to really impact P class sizes and make some other changes to improve outcomes for these kids we won't have it and this is an opportunity for going if we do this so while we're cutting the budget the administration proposes adding 1.6 million to push kids from sixth grade to Middle School when socially emotionally most of them are not ready they're going to have problems and academically it goes SC I can't justify that so I'm going to move that we um uh eliminate the $1.6 million for moving sixth graders into middle school and that we apply that money to a teacher account for the 13 teachers and I'm not going to push where but K 3 would be what I would want to see that we address the issue from an academic
141standpoint and help those kids and not not uh adversely impact on sixth graders I think this is inappropriate I don't see how anybody has Justified it all that this is good for kids thank you second the motion for purposes discussion to make sure there's a record discussion here do you have comments yeah um you know when we had junior high schools if you were a parent your child was in that school for three years that gave you just barely enough time to make changes and when they went to middle school from only two years you're a parent trying to get something changed at a school or do a major project it's just it's almost impossible and I think Middle School structure of being only two grades is horrible as far as families are concerned and
142for parental involvement in that school ability being successful um that's why I prefer a K through 8 model um because nationally it's proven to be very successful um but I am concerned with the data indicating that moving our kids from sixth grade from out of elementary schools into middle schools even though I like the idea of three years to have parents get involved with that school I'm also concerned that it's showing an academic penalty for that um so I really appreciate the member raising this issue thank you member Jacobs yeah thank you m president um every time we have this conversation it happens more and more it seems um it gets missed that we have sixth graders in Middle Schools their District right now and there's data we talked about this at our last meeting
143and and my understanding from Dr Bryan was that um there isn't a disparity between U those student populations but if the administration could speak to that as they spoke to it in our last meeting we talked about this at this conversation again could you let see who else anybody else M speak I think that M your question yeah I think Administration to speak to again on record unfortunately um the fact that one we have six GRS going to middle school right now and two um if there's a disparity in testing data Dr Brian I believe on record said that there was no such disparity but if that's not correct list thank you good thing thank you madam president uh through the president to member Jacobs yes I will confirm again that there is no difference
144in student achievement when you compare student populations and a more comprehensive write up is available in last Friday's board connect to all board members um and additionally member Higgins raised great points today on the benefits of the Middle School model um it appears that some research has supported graduation rates and other academic benefits so that also provides a compelling rationale for having thousands of additional students benefit from that model thank you thank you um Mr gofin I didn't realize Dr Bryant was gonna jum on we're good all right uh we we keep coming back to this we have had sixth graders in middle school for quite a few years only three of them and and I don't know why we keep coming back to this I don't know what studies you are reading I don't
145know what the detail what the data looks like for what you're reading but it doesn't represent Anchorage and this board had I mean we made the decision collaboratively I don't remember the vote and we can't it it's not good for kids to keep going back forth or families to keep going back and forth on anything uh but this particular topic has just keeps coming up over and over again and I will vote know over and over again member uh member Higgins um I will agree with um M Donley that k28 really have a good history and I know that poera K2 has a really positive um uh outcomes and I appreciate that so what grades in there uh the studies that I refer to referred to uh Elementary versus middle school so that is not
146an issue of midle school model and I know that other than that there's no changes in this my question is what's the benefit $1.6 million which is 13 teachers what's the benefit of pushing that into sixth grade when all the academic studies should go and you look on the internet and there sources all over there on Research isn't supportive of it I don't understand that the public reaction hasn't been positive uh that that I've seen um there were issues with teachers and some maybe mixed views on that but there's I don't see any benefit this is public funds $1.6 million of public money that's going towards some activity which is not going to academically benefit kids from my standpoint so um I'm going to maintain that that and we'll go to a vote we'll see
147where it falls but I'm always if we push it back and it's it's pushing it back to try to do something that's benefit for the kids I won't apologize for that see no other persons wishing to be heard Madam pres did youor brought this up a few times to talk about it um could we talk about the link between sixth graders middle school and our college career Li ready thank you oh sorry yeah so I would like the administration to address the link between sixth graders to middle school and our college career life Readiness school thank you well yes through the chair for for our college career and life Readiness goal we are looking at of course theem of Anchorage model but that goes all the way down into Middle School where we would start
148our career exploration in the sixth grade so we have plans for actually doing that and then we're actually going to push down into Elementary eventually um with some guaranteed experiences but the middle school is where we start those thought processes those decision making for going into ourm for next year we start with fresh of Academy but we are looking at those career experation options in the middle school starting with sixth grade you know I I don't know what kind of benefits um you're you're wanting to hear but you know when kids have more access to Opportunities they have more access to electives they have more they have um designated content classes every single day not just making time for it during the week as they do in in elementary school when they have um PE
149every day they have I I mean I don't I don't understand why we what me those are benefits when kids get to explore higher level classes they get to explore different kinds of opportunities that they wouldn't have in elementary school those are benefits and so I don't so I I I still struggle to understand why why it's so hard to see what those benefits are it does represent a change for families uh but it's not new uh this the concept of 678 is not new and I I would just encourage uh members of the board who are struggling with this to please go visit our 678 combo schools those middle schools those kids are doing some awesome things they're have they're enjoying themselves but I understand as a Nana with a having a a a
150you essentially two uh grandsons uh going to middle school it is stressful but they are thriving and and I don't I don't I don't know if you don't see it and you can't and it I I just don't know but I again I I think there are multiple benefits uh for for the for the district to make this change if I did not believe in that I would not have directed the superintendent or at least this board would not have directed the superintendent to go down that path so if there's a remember um lessons yeah I wanted to share um here I'm a middle schooler I have friends who are have incoming middle school students and there was an information night one of them passed along a flyer to me and I was interested to
151hear some of the options um that sixth graders in Middle School uh at this this particular school would would have um so a sixth grader in middle school would have a choice not just of band for orchestra but band Orchestra and choir so that's an ad component added option and another sort of set of options include um like a quarter of Health a quarter of art a quarter of Project Lead the Way and a quarter of um sort of strategies for Middle School Success and we've heard a lot about art and health recently and um one thing to consider is that a sixth grader in elementary school gets about 18 or 20 hours of Art and 18 or 20 hours of Health over the course of a year but in a quarter get a quarter
152of Art and a quarter of Health you're you're more than doubly think um each of those subjects does that make sense um so you have an opportunity to have as a sixth grader in Middle School a deeper dive into each of uh those two subjects as well as the opportunity um for project Le the way that's just at one school I don't know if that's the same at every school schools are similar but different all I I believe all the middle schools are going to go with the we call the quarter wheel so they'll have opportunities for a quarter in each of those that will build upon what they'll get in seventh and eth grade and in different CT course it depends on what school what they actually have to offer so but all schools
153I believe a good recordation okay thank you see now are you wanting to speak I see your mic's on you good okay call in a question member lesons no member Hollman no member Donley yes member Wilson no member Jacobs no member Higgins yes president Bellamy nope are there any other amendments any other amendments all right we are ready to vote going back to the uh main motion as amended that's memorandum number 109 as amended any further discussion just a clarification will the amendment that was approved 7 to Zer be attached as a separate document to the agenda so I think the instruct oh member Jacobs you can go on and speak to it yeah thank you m president the way the amendment number one that passed on our conversation is that the additional language will
154be added um to the end of the memorandum for reference and the changes to the line items will actually be made throughout the budget does that answer your question it it does but on reflection it might this isn't a formal motion it may be helpful for the public to view that at some point some fashion I don't how that to view the amend amend yeah mam president could we uploaded to board do we we would upload it to board do for sure absolutely it'll be part of our budget page as well and it will also be included in our minutes thank you right see no other motions to speak let's vote you're now voting on the main motion as amended member Higgins member lessons yes member member Jacobs yes member Wilson yes member Hollman yes
155member Donley no president Bellamy yes and that passes 68 to one may yes okay all right that is our only piece of business under action uh we are now at board member comments not that we have not all spoken uh enough tonight but I'm GNA start online with member hman your closing comments member Hollman thank you president Bing um well I think U yeah we have all spoken about the the issues that come before us tonight I won't go through that again I I did want to comment and I mentioned this at the last meeting that uh our our students are listening and they do respond and since that time we've had a legislator in this budget discussion talk about how wrong it is to use kids as props and and those are his words
156not mine but I've had several cases uh a friend of mine's third grader came home and told her mother she wanted to testify at the Schoolboard meeting um that was there a few weeks ago and she explained that her daughter would not let her help her with her testimony and she sent me a a picture of the the speaking notes that her daughter put together with a big marker um in another case at a constituent meeting where a high school student had called home to her father after listening to one of our legislators that visited her school and wanted to um address that wanted to go to the constituent meeting and speak to them so I to be sure sometimes kids are coached they shouldn't be um they should be assisted but not coached but
157to call them props I thought was reprehensible and I have no doubt that a lot of our students heard it and I I want the students that are listening to know that that's not how we view them we listen uh we try to understand what they're saying understand where they're coming from their opinion matters um they don't have to be well spoken they they they count and uh when you hear a legislator say something like that I think it is just a very sad thing um the other thing I I do want to say as we face all this and I hope we can transmit this to the public and the legislature stability and predictability would be a huge Plus for a lot of teachers in terms of retention um sadly being a teacher in
158the state has become more and more poeticized not through any fault of the workforce but they are the ones that bear the brunt of it um I think as we talk to our legislators we need to always emphasize that like a lot of people I was really hardened by uh the fact that the legislature acted so quickly to make a BSA increase with the understanding that it mattered a lot more if they did it now than if they did it later um and and I'll say from watching the legislature something I didn't think could happen but it did um but it has been set back now and that is unfortunate as well I will speak to my objection about member dony characterizing ASD as being in the Soviet Union I and I guess partly I'm
159just hearing a lot of blowback that I think isn't true uh about what's taught in the schools about whether we have um whether we encourage patriotism or whether or not we're trying to drive kids to a particular political agenda again with more than 40,000 students mistakes happen or people do the wrong thing sometimes but basically I I think we have a Workforce that tries hard to do the right thing every day tries to advance kids tries to inform them tries to get them to think without trying to tell them what to think about or whatnot and I I was just stunned to hear it and uh and I apologize for interrupting you but I hope you'll think about it and and point out where that's happening in this district and and maybe we can can
160work on that in a particular way um I do think we've got a couple of rough weeks in front of us I don't quite understand what the legislature needs to do exactly um but I hope we work with them and try to get an unexpected result again and something that alleviates the pain to students uh I do think the amendment that we are uh that we passed to our previous budget l a lot of good things that we have right now that we're going to lose and I think it's real important to just emphasize that to our legislators in Juno thank you thank you okay we'll now go to member lessons um I don't have much to say other that that anticipating this night which I think I anticipated as having would it would have
161been a week ago um is something that's given me heartburn or certainly woken me up in the middle of the night for months um because this is this budget is not a surprise the shortfalls are not a surprise um the legislator strong passage of SD 140 was a surprise and I am deeply appreciative of the hard work and compromise that went into that bill um eager to support uh our partners in Juno and across the state um you know in the coming weeks however we I can we can um and I'm I'm just really happy that we can prevent cuts to classroom learning from half of next year I tallied up the number of fourth through 12th grade students we have uh that we're projected to have next year uh Coury of our CIP and
162it's over 29,000 students so I don't know exactly how the 36.3 FTE will be divided across them but I know that it's going to help them by uh by not taking those resources out of the classroom than thank you very much member Wilson Wilson said um I I do want to speak real briefly about the office of equity and Community engagement um since that was proposed as as one of the the cuts here this evening um which I did not support we have such a beautifully diverse City and a beautifully diverse School District with over a 100 languages being spoke diversity equity and inclusion is crucial in our schools for multiple reasons our schools should mirror the dver diverse societies that that we serve promoting understanding and respect for different backgrounds cultures and perspectives it
163ensures that our students have Fair opportunities to access and access to resources regardless of their background socioeconomic status race or abilities it increases creative and inclusive environments in our schools which Fosters a sense of belonging for all of our students which can improve academic outcomes and their overall well-being prevents discrimination and bias the diversity equity and inclusion in initiatives help identify and address biases and discriminatory practices creating a safer safer and more supportive learning environment prepares our students for a diverse World in today's Global Society students need to navigate diverse workplaces and communities and this education helps them develop essential skills for collaboration and understanding in a multicultural environment it overall and overall integrating diversity equity and inclusion into our schools promotes fairness empathy and respect contributing to a more just and harmonious society and
164it's not just for our students which is it needs to to be there for our students but also for our staff and our families so I do believe it's a critical need for ASD given our diverse Community to continue to support our officy of equity and Community engagement and the community engagement portion of that is extremely near and dear to me um because we want to reach out to our families as well to help our students succeed and and really make sure that our families are Incorporated in that process as well as our Community Partners thank you very much um member Higgins what's been frustrating to me about this process is that we don't have a whole slate of things to look at uh I think member Donal is right what if we ask the
165administration where would you cut the additional 5% then we could have a meaningful discussion rather than being told these are the options we see that you can cut I don't want that in the future I want to be able to say every Department if you're cutting five if you're cutting 10 or if you're adding five even when we're cutting we may need to be adding but we're not doing that we more focus on what the administration is suggesting to us these are the options you should look at and this is how much I want to be more engaged in that because there's more to within that I like it when we have discussions on the budget and we heard about the money going into new programs to help kids I like it the board's engaged
166the board's informed when I came on the board two board members one president left and subject to social emotional learning came up they said we don't get involved with that because that's only the counselors oh it's a lot more than that but that limited understanding of of board members there didn't make sense to me we're not engaged as much as I would like to be I like going to the Departments I like learning what's going on but I like knowing what they're adding and not adding and challenging and saying what if and and so I agree with member Donley we need to be able to ask what we want to cut 5% where to cut it we shouldn't leave it up to others and say well that's not our business it is our business We're
167The Voice we got accountability we by Direction and we can do that I hope next year we can do a process I appreciate what the administration's done I'm not trying to to to I just think the expectations of the board needs to change so that we're more engaged in this process in what this process has been about thank Youk you member um d m president just to put the record straight uh um I questioned the original name of the of the office as inappropriate and apparently the administration thought that also because they changed the name so I stand by my earlier remarks that that name was inappropri um and I was here the night that the administration at that time announced the formation of this office and the director or head of the office at
168that time expounded upon the great merits of critical race theory in utilizing critical race Theory authors as the core to develop the goals of that office uh within the anage school district that inspired me to really research the authors that she had identified and frankly I found some of the things that were contained in their Works terrifying and really really racist an offensive and so I completely agree with member Wilson there's some excellent goals contained in in thoughts that that of the original formation of this but some of the the guid the guidance that was originally offered on this was way way off base and um the superintendent subsequently corrected that and I'm glad to see that and that the iCal race Theory uh component that was originally told to this board was going to
169be key to how this office functioned is no longer being utilized for that because it's clearly inappropriate utilizing that in schools thank you member Jacobs yeah thank you m president um I'll I'll agree with remark question had the effect of disparaging staff and probably was coera the Border um regardless that the that underlying concerns but um that can be done a little bottom line with that said um did want to thank the board for a deliberate thorough conversation regarding the budget I I think we took a step toward making this budget reflect our values as a community tonight which I should with that said uh some thing I wanted to put on the the parking lot for further conversation as the budget process um go from planning to past adoption to U implementation one thing
170that I don't think was well discussed at length was the the changes to school start times and I remain concerned about the the large gap for Middle School families in particular especially with that expanding to sixth grade um at one point we had talked about the possibility of supporting families by making campuses available um next year um at the typical start time and so I hope those conversations are happening as to how we can um support families through that change I think that is a big big adjustment for Middle School families in particular to start think it's on 10:30 on Mondays so um that's not something we need to answer now or discuss now but I didn't want to voice that thank you thank you um member Jacobs we do have a I don't know
171the date yet but we I don't remember the date but we do have a work session on the um coming up on just that very subject um so I I I almost I think I'm gonna just say a few things and then just uh oh wait Dr Bryant are you still on online do you have any comments I am in present just a couple of things I wanted to one thank our our legislators for their passage of sb40 as amended um I completely understand that they've put a lot of things aside to to prioritize supporting public education and I just want to thank them again um as we did in writing earlier this week and uh lastly I just want to thank this board for being incredible Advocates to get us to this point in
172Juno we're not done but you played a great role in getting us to where we are and you've been incredible Partners to the administration and getting to this point today with our budget so just a lot of gratitude um and look forward to seeing you um when I'm back in Anchorage thank you you know so I think of all the people in this room I've probably been around the long 50 years in ASD it's kind of crazy it really is kind of crazy but I've been on both sides of being able to have a clear view of what happens in classrooms and schools in general in the boardroom and I didn't know what happens on this side [Music] um but at the same time I don't live back in 1992 when I was a principal
173at wler I understand how schools work but I know they work differently now because it's 2024 so I I know I don't always get what I want and I agree I think we all agree more than we um than we disagree because we're all here for the kids and and I would I would just encourage us as board members to continue to be for kids uh the adult issues that may come up as to what we want what we think is I mean I don't have all the answers but I am willing to listen to everybody on this panel to share whatever their thoughts are so sometimes the measure of our success has to be the here and the now um history does teach us great lessons but it does not plot the path for
174where we are now um we have we have a new leader ship in this district and I as a board member feel it is my duty to be the voice for the community and to also support the leadership so that they can do the thing that we ask them to do but when we ask them to do things yes we can question you can get whatever answers you want put in the time to read the documents put in the time to ask the questions but at the same time guys we you know when we make a decision as a board we we we need to move forward unless there is some compelling life health safety risks reason why we need to change course because because that creates more confusion and and and within our families
175so um you know when it comes to the equity and and and Community engagement Department I don't care what we call it frankly personally I don't I'm not offended I wasn't offended before but I understand there were there are always those buzzwords those things that people just get all they miss the forest for the trees because they're focused on a word or two words M uh I spent a lot of time trying to explain those two words to a lot of hundreds of hundreds of people but we got to let it go at what point do we let that go and move on in the best interest for kids I think we're on a track to do that tonight I thank members Jacobs and members member lesons for the collaboration on the amendment um it
176is not the best it gives us time and it gives it it it it puts back into place those things that we know are good for kids um so the way I'm wired I will never I am not likely to do a line by line uh budget adjustment I'm not but I will go and talk to the staff about what that might mean um so I you know so as frustrated as frustrating as it is for me we did good tonight and I appreciate it I thank you for your time uh and with that I'll accept a motion to adjourn move toj move in second to adjourn we areour I know I'm I'm kind of like