S-O School Board Meeting, February 17, 2026

001I just saw that you saw those advertising. >> So, how you doing? >> How are you? >> Good. >> Yeah. >> I don't know if that if that's I mean their name is at the bottom of that page. Thank you. Mhm. >> Oh, tell Jamie Jennifer is joining virtually. >> She got called into work and then Tom said he'll be late. He's in the middle school for >> Quinnley's. >> Yeah. >> Um basketball game. >> That's so weird. One of them was local and one wasn't. >> Yeah, this one is this is the one I worked at last week. I'm going to share it with you. So yes, we'll talk about it tomorrow. Okay, perfect. So closer 641 code 641 it looks like. Must be central Iowa. >> Must be central Iowa. >> Oops. >>

002It just must have just started. Did you get in? >> Got it, bud. I don't know why the eighth time was the trick, but finally went through. >> All right, we got 5:30. We ready to go? We are. >> All right, got 5:30. We'll call uh uh February school civilian schoolware meeting to order. Uh first item is approval is a approval of the agenda. Would have a motion to approve that. Make a motion to approve the agenda. >> One second. >> All right. It's been moved and seconded to approve the agenda as presented. All those in favor say I. I. >> All those opposed. >> Motion passes. All right. Uh, first item is schoolboard basics. Put students first. >> Let's go around. >> Yeah. >> Uh, follow the law and your own policy. >> Respect

003the chain of command. >> Base decisions on shared objective information. >> Operate in the public eye. All right. The Cibiochin mission statement. At Cibiochin Schools, we build partnerships to challenge minds, to invest in community, and to embrace life. All right. Next item would be any visitors, any paperwork at all. Okay. Moving on to the consent agend consent items. There's anything that anybody had any questions on or Kendra had anything to >> I don't think so. There was just some open enrollment bills or the bigger ones this month and the bus payment for three of our buses is that Daimler Chrysler one. Otherwise, they're all >> pretty normal thing. And this was for previous bus leases or >> Yeah, our current buses. >> Yep. >> We're in >> um current ones. Yes. >> Second. Second year,

004>> maybe. >> Technically finishing up, well, technically finishing up third, but I hate to use this word going back to COVID. They were delayed, so we didn't get them all at the same time. That's why some aren't as far into the lease. >> Sounds good. Try to avoid saying that. >> Yeah. >> Okay. If there's no more questions, I guess I ask for a motion to approve those. >> I'll make a motion to approve the consent consent agenda. >> Second. >> All right. It's been moved and second to approve the consent items consent items as presented. All those in favor say I. I. >> Those opposed? Motion passes. All right, moving on to administrative reports. Um, Mr. Dale. >> Okay. Yeah. So, pretty business, I guess, business-like this um this month. We are just kind

005of in the thick of it here. Uh, in the middle of it's been helpful a little bit that our weather has been a little bit nicer. Um it worries me that when the weather gets too nice too quickly, we get some ritis a little bit and so um not that I want more cold, but just to be able to finish out the year strong um a little more normal weather might be okay. So attached um our winter um assessment data for you all in terms of literacy and um math. Very proud of the growth that our staff is achieving and that our stu students are showing. Um either one is fine. You want to do math first? So um and we can talk a little bit more math later. I believe there's another item on

006um on the agenda for um later in the meeting, but um just really pleased with where we're at. You know, our goal is to kind of sit at that 80% and so um for the five grades in the elementary building, two of the five are at that 80%, one is at 79 and then a couple um a little bit lower than that. But again, um would focus on the growth and and the difference between the fall assessments to the winter assessments and the percent of kids that made growth. And so, um you know, the lowest percent of students that made growth is at 86%. So, um very pleased. Um some of the growth we need to continue pushing so we can continue to close the gaps. Um, but you know, some of that growth is

007kids that are already proficient and they don't have as much room to grow. And so it's kind of balancing those and uh taking a peek at those. Like to give a huge credit to Barb Williamson and to our testing team um who really an do a good job analyzing that data and communicating that with grade level teams and talking through that and what can we continue to do so um to to meet the kids where they're at. So, um the literacy, if we go ahead and go to the literacy, yeah, again, not quite where we needed to be, but um very pleased with the growth there. Again, um so, um yeah, um like I said, pretty pretty business-like report for this month, but um um very pleased with how our assessments look for the winter.

008And then, um our professional development continues to be um centered around like our our mentoring program. Um we spent a lot of time with our math curriculum review and feel very prepared for um that discussion slashrecommendation um as I mentioned a little bit later on the meeting. So um yeah and then the staff attendance is listed at the bottom both daily and professional development wise. So, any questions? >> Do you track this year over year? >> We do. Absolutely. We do. We actually have assessment or um spreadsheets that track for the kids. Yep. And all the teachers have access to it and they use it. And that's kind of what I was talking about and alluding to uh with Coach Williamson, our instructional coach, um having those conversations with teacher teams and some of those

009kind of things. Okay, where were they at? Are are they making the growth we need them to? everyone and each student every student one by one we try and meet them where they're at. So >> Gotcha. >> Yep. >> The spreadsheets are very impressive. There is a lot of data. >> Yeah. And we keep adding data to them. So um you've heard us talk about our MTSS process, our multi-ter system of supports. We've added now a uh additional tab in our spreadsheets for any students that had been brought up uh maybe had struggling before. what kind of interventions we're doing that have been successful and just kind of keeping records of those as we go throughout and so um we can communicate that as the kids go through. So just and that way though, okay,

010so this kid was brought up before as having struggled or as being advanced either way in first grade. Now all of a sudden we're in third or fourth grade and either they're really soaring and so what worked before to um meet them and advance them or what interventions kind of brought them back up where they didn't need it in those middle grades. And so yeah, it's a lot of is a lot of data and it's really good data. So, great question. I feel like our staff does a really good job of looking at that data and using that data, too. >> Well, you look like say some of these grades are lower. Is it >> Yep. >> like year over year. Is it that grade that tends to be lower? Not the third grade, not

011necessarily that group of kids like we're going to a higher level. Does it? >> Yep. Sometimes. >> Yeah. >> Yep. versus >> and and some of it is some grades just struggle more than others. And so, yeah, trying to find that pattern of, >> you know, are we are we and that's why I included that growth column in there. Yep. >> And so, because I think that's as important as anything else is are we getting growth out of these students, right, >> in those manners? And I those percentages tell me yes. Again, maybe not exactly where we need them to be. um you know, and some of them slid a little bit and so we're having some of those difficult discussions, but I I just really appreciate the work that our staff is putting in

012and and embracing those difficult conversations once in a while. So, very good. >> All right. Any other questions? All right. Thanks, Mr. Dale. Uh Mr. Herz. >> Yeah. Uh, not a ton of information on mine either and I've got a long presentation later, so I'll try to make this short, but activities winding down. Congrats to the boys basketball team advancing on for Thursday. Excited for them. Um, we're setting things up for ISASPs for this spring. We're getting ready for high school registration. Just doing some final touches on the registration guide, our handbook there. um excited with our new industrial technology teacher. Um some of the courses that we're going to be offering, being able to offer a few different things just based on her background. So excited for that. Um this summer, something that's been

013coming, I'll be proposing an increase to the graduation requirement. um last this fall we we started giving a quarter credit or a half credit for um success and so those freshmen each year will get additional credits and um we also now are requiring careers as part of the decap which I'll explain later. Um so we're at 46 required for that graduating class of of 29 or maybe of 30. I'll kind of look at how that might phase in. uh increasing that graduation rate. >> You mean 2029 and 2030? >> Yeah. 2029 and 2030. Those classes we would look at increasing that just to match these kids are going to have opportunities to earn more credits than previous students because of some of those changes. So, uh that'll be in July. I'll present that. But just

014kind of putting that on your radar. Uh assessment data. So, fifth through 8th grade assessment data is kind of in two different ways. So unfortunately the um it's called Panorama where a lot of this data is housed only lets you do reports for K through six even though we also test seventh and eighth. So that's why I have data in a few different places. So I have all the growth for math and ELA. Um very impressed with our math growth from the fall to the winter. I know that's been a discussion. and we talk we've talked about curriculum and and we've had some community reach out, you know, just concerns about math and and wanting to make sure our kids are getting, you know, quality instruction. I just wanted to highlight that uh our our

015math growth was really good in fifth through 8th and very excited about that. Um ELA probably similar to what Kent said, maybe not where we want it to be. Uh fifth and sixth grade showing some growth, but seventh and eighth either pretty stagnant or taking a step backwards. So, we've made some changes to the interventions in ELA, and I'm hoping that we're going to see good growth from the winter assessment to the spring. And then below that is the math proficiency for seventh and eighth grade and the ELA proficiency. So, you you want to be at or above that 80% proficient. Um, so our seventh grade group is achieving that. For math, really close for ELA. Eighth grade, pretty close for math, but struggling with ELA. And that's again an area we've got to to

016refocus and see if we can make some improvements before the end of the year. And then attached, I have the fifth and sixth grade math proficiency. >> You want the math one? >> Uh, sure. And that's just a trend over time. So the spring, the fall, and now the winter, we've been sitting right around that 76% proficient. Um, that's just where we're at there. >> These last three dots are this year, right? >> Yep. >> Well, the last two are fall and winter and spring. So, those are the three most recent is maybe the way to >> to say that. And then ELA, uh, fall and winter, we've been pretty flat at that 68% proficient. So excited for the changes to the intervention process. Really great reading and maybe I'll stop talking so I don't

017steal the thunder of our presenters today. But um excited for that process and hoping to see some good growth. >> What I would highlight too as we look in these percentages, one student can make a huge difference when we're talking about percent proficient because we're at classes of you know 40 to 50 kids. one student can be anywhere from four to two to four to 5%. You know what I mean? So you see a jump or a decrease in 5% know that might just be one student that was really close or didn't quite make it this time. So just some perspective there I think. >> Yeah. Or or had a bad day and was proficient on every test prior and then >> dropped >> several points. Yeah. That kind of stuff does happen. Yep. And

018also the tests each session the benchmark moves up, >> right? >> So depending on the test anywhere between 3 to 10 points higher. So the kids had to score 3 to 10 points higher to maintain that proficiency which is you know probably the right thing. They have another semester of school. They should probably be scoring a little higher. And so just always kind of in that never ending race to catch up. Yep. For professional development, continuing our mentoring program, focusing on our MTSS processes. That's part of our um improvement plans that we're going through at the middle school and high school as well. Um the DECAP, we did a training session earlier this year. We'll have another one this spring to kind of talk about things we need for the decap. Um, and we've already

019started working on the plan for next year. So, lots lots in the works. And then at the bottom there is the staff attendance. Any questions? >> What's Dcap again? >> District career and academic plan. >> So, that's my my presentation later will be everything you all want to know. >> Sounds good. >> All right. All right. Any other questions? All right. Thanks, Mr. Herz. Superintendent, Mr. Gazo. >> Yeah, I put some things on there without maybe reading it verbatim, highlight some things. Um, they were talking about it and and planning one of the things, just as a reminder, next week, Wednesday, we'll have our board work session. And I met with Lanna for about an hour today, 45 minutes planning for that. So, I'm excited for that for us. um a fair amount of time

020on things voted ple and having some discussions with different groups and posting things and we're preparing for that coming up. It's probably taking a lot of the time. Um and then doing some feedback with as you can see the the work that the building level teams have been doing on some of our ELA and math scores and just looking at that from the the big level picture and things like that would probably summarize some of the main things there. And then with staff retention engagement, it's just that time of year. We're just in the middle of costs and budgets and numbers and everything like that. So that Kendra and I have been spending a fair amount of time doing that and you can kind of see some of the specifics there. So just kind of

021a highlight. And then as a reminder for new board members, March is when we do my annual evaluation. So March will be at our normal board meeting. Then we'll finish with the evaluation at the end. That's all I got for now. Okay. >> All right. Any questions. >> All right. Thank you. Board committees, policy, finance. >> Nothing to add. Pol or um policy. We we've had some ones, but we didn't have anything in the last month. Finance, we've been having discussions and we're going to meet. We'll probably have some meetings coming up and discussions before we get to um our March meeting. And then facilities, we have not met. I'm kind of waiting to see as we get closer. Some of what we're going to discuss will be dependent on how the vote turns out

022in March three to be honest and what our future plans are with that. So, >> okay. Recognition of excellence. >> Yep. So, we have senior Alexa Mahia Martina here to Martinez here to present the recognition of excellence. >> Last week was National School Counseling Week. Thanks to Mrs. Colling, Mrs. Jensen and Mrs. Ruggles for all they do to help students with their academic and social/behavioral needs. Lincoln Crowit participated in the regional braille challenge this past weekend. He placed first in the rookie group FFA subdist convention. Katie Krueger, Egg Broadcasting, Grant Skipoff, Christopher Braimemer, Haley Gakei, Aliyah Marco, Lindy Tracy, Bryson Lawrence, and Elijah Syler. Conduct of meetings. My Poland, Olivia Lopez, Emma Boi, Griffin Taylor, and Mariah Dick. Parliamentary Procedure. JC Julius Creed speaking. Emily Lopez job interview. Grant Skipoff, State FFA degree. Katie Krueger,

023district officer candidate. Christopher Bramer, district officer candidate. January generals of the week. January 9th, elementary, Meen Doden. Middle school, Adrien Jensen. High school, Dominic Marco. Staff, Abby. January 16, elementary, Hannah Krueger. Middle school, Jasine Parsons. High school, Maria Martinez. Staff, Kelly Westfall. January 30, elementary, Corey Oul, Middle School, Gabriel Victoria, High School, Katie Krueger. Staff, Jessica Peterson. >> Thank you. >> All right, moving on to discussion items. >> All right, we'll start with um the famous Mrs. Schroeder and Mrs. Nag will present for our literacy in ELA. Well, I'm Mrs. Nag and I teach fifth grade literacy and sixth grade social studies. And I'm also the curriculum for K through 5. >> And I'm Mrs. Schroeder and I am the 5 through 12 instructional coach and the CAPS instructor and then the English department head

024for 6 through 12. So um with amplify it's a reading program for K through eight. It's designed to improve the literacy skills through the science of reading. There are five main parts of the science of reading program. The phonics, the phmic awareness which is the notice and work with the spoken words, the vocabulary, the fluency and also the comprehension. And I'm just going to talk to you a little bit what each grade is doing. Kindergarten students are working on their knowledge unit on symbols and presidents. First grade, they just finished the amplify unit on animals in their habitats. They researched an animal of their choice to learn about its diet and how it survives. Second grade, they just finished their on unit seven of knowledge is about westward expansion and journeys of both pioneers and

025native Americans and how they endured the living condition. Also, students just finished unit four, knowledge skills with common and proper nouns, singular and plural nouns. Third grade, um, they're working very hard on fluency and comprehension. They're getting together with, uh, small groups and they're reading to each other and they're also involved or they're getting their reading from the CKLA stories and levelbased stories and read works. fourth grade. They just finished expanding their knowledge on learning about inventors and inventions. The fourth grade team allowed students to work in their already existing lab groups to research new inventors and inventions. The then they on their computer skills they made a slideshow presentation and this is to get them for their wax museum. And when is their wax? >> Friday. >> This Friday is the wax museum. Okay.

026So they've been preparing for that to speaking and you know doing a lot of research on that titles um they just finished their a reading test which the scores which they talked about and they for their intervention they do foundation literacy and they focus on the six key skills of letter sounds, phonics, site words, fluency, print concept and f uh their phonological awareness. ESL, English as a second language. Um, they're building on forming sentences. For example, JC, she gives the student different words. Uh, watch a movie once a week. Then they need to put them in the correct order. We watch a movie once a week. Fifth grade, which I teach, we just wrapped up on their poetry unit, which they all loved. No, they didn't. But it's amazing what like a little piece of

027candy can do. Hershey's kiss. If you give them candy, if you give them food, then they're loving it. But um we listened and we read and we had a writing a variety of poems and with the Hershey's Kiss, they had to describe their five sentences with strong adjectives and then they had to write a poem on the Hershey kiss. And then I also started the new program, Really Great Reading, which Katie's going to talk about too. But I really need to say a big thank you to Mrs. Schuler for your endless work with helping me with getting students or actually she got the students in there in panorama me going with her. It's a constant question. So big thank you. And then to Katie too with really great reading with getting that all organized and

028the I ready skills. So we're well second week into that. So I think it's going okay. So now if you want to talk about really great reading and some of the things. >> You bet. So, as a middle school and the high school department head, u we've been very busy in January with wrapping up testing. And then once we know who's proficient and who's not, that's when we're starting our interventions. So, we wanted to give you an idea of what we do with that. Um, as Mrs. Nag had mentioned, we're starting a new middle school intervention called Really Great Reading. Um Casey shared our winter fast testing data with you. And one of the unique struggles with middle school is finding those gaps in their reading skills that we can really hone in on to

029be able to bridge that gap so they can work on their comprehension. And so we're really excited about this new program. Um it's rooted in the science of reading and it's been shown to help our students strengthen those basics, especially their decoding skills. You wouldn't think that our middle school students would have struggles with decoding, but that's really where we've found some of those gaps. And so, this program has been shown to be able to fill those and help get them into the next level. So, hopefully this spring will be able to see those gains that we're hoping to from this program. Um the students who are not proficient in the winter fast assessment will be receiving interventions twice a week um to strengthen those foundational uh skills that will support them with their future

030reading and academic success. So in sixth, seventh, and eighth grade, we're really trying to focus in on laying that foundation be prepare them for high school rigor. So for seventh and eighth grade to give you a little overview, seventh grade, we do a really strong focus on grammar and then grammar has to be paired with writing of course otherwise grammar kind of loses its meaning. If any of you have gone through lessons on jirens and then not knowing how to apply it, it gets pretty difficult. So we're really trying to support our seventh graders and our eighth graders and knowing how grammar connects with writing and then strengthening that. um they use the Amplify curriculum in reading and they do two additional novels as well. And then with our eighth grade, it's just a deeper

031level level of grammar development, literary analysis, essays, and more complex sentence structure and vocabulary. Um in both grades, morphology has been a major focus. Uh morphology is one of the areas that our fast tests go over and we've seen a dip in that in recent years. So, Mrs. Klein Waltering's been really focusing in on that. And for morphology, that's looking at Latin and Greek roots, prefixes, and suffixes because when students learn the meaning of a root, it unlocks dozens of other words that have that same root in it. Um, just an example of that, I've been co-eing in math with eighth grade and they were learning about monomials this last week and when you introduce a vocabulary word like monomials, they look at you kind of bugeyed like, what are you talking about? And we

032talked about okay you know the word monarch what does monarch mean like a single ruler well monomial means a single number or variable after that they were able to explain that really easily next couple days so it's teaching them how to integrate this knowledge into many subject areas too. Additionally this semester fifth through eighth grade teachers have improved communication with parents regarding students fast scores. Sometimes when you hear about fast, you also go bugeyed because you don't know what all of these different terminology means. And so, um, Mrs. Snag, Mrs. Snder, and then Mrs. Kleinwalter have been sending home information this semester to help parents understand that, but then also partner with parents to know how you guys can support your students at home and how we're doing it at school. So, hopefully we can

033together make gains for our students. Um, at the high school level, uh, each grade centers around a different theme, which I think is really neat. So, ELA1, which is our ninth graders, they work on the dark and the light. That's their theme. ELA2 is leadership and power. ELA3 is deception and honesty, and ELA4 is security and risk. So, these themes kind of anchor our reading selections and their writing assignments. They allow the students to encounter literature not as isolated texts, but as part of a larger conversation about the human experience. Our curriculum continues to evolve. One of the things we're working really hard on is our curriculum maps to make sure everything is aligned um K12. Um so we're working on that this semester pretty hard. Um additionally, 9th through 11th graders are given time

034for independent reading so that they learn the stamina ownership and the love of reading that goes beyond high school. Um some highlights from 10th grade. The sophomores began their year with studying mice and men and Lord of the Flies and examining power structures, influence, and moral leadership. One of the highlights was a pen pal project with the students in Rio de Janeiro. The students exchanged three handwritten letters via scan copies because we were not going to use the postal system. And then later they met their pen pals virtually and got to have those discussions. So, the project where they wrote those things helped them with their analytical writing, cross-cultural communication and curiosity and inquiry. And then a highlight from 12th grade. Um, senior English connects literature to civic engagement and real world issues because we

035want our seniors really to understand the importance of being an active community member and a positive community member. Um, so in the fall they studied our town, World Lit, and Fahrenheit 451. Right now they're reading 12 Angry Men and they're researching wrongful incarceration cases, which can't get more exciting than that, right? >> Um, and then they're going to be touring the county courthouse and meeting with the county attorney coming up here to be part of that unit. So, the hope is that the experience connects literature to justice, civic responsibility, and critical thinking. Our goal is that our graduates can communicate effectively whether they're going into college, they're starting their career, or they're a member of our communities. So, thank you so much for your time and we welcome any of the questions you might have

036for us. >> It sounds really good. >> Yeah. That was a lot of work. Thank you for doing that. >> Yeah. >> Thank you guys. >> Very good. Thanks. date. >> I can let you know that. >> I know the calling attorney mentioned this meeting. >> All right. Lost my thing here. Come on back. >> Oh, you got it. >> Okay. >> So, I got the two minute. Yep. Go ahead. >> Um I we had talked about this last year, but we had a new board. I wasn't and then I I saw an article about a board in a different district having questions on how the agenda was presented. So I put this on there solely for that reason. And here's our policy. But the the short version without reading it for verbatim is the

037one of the main requirements of the myself and the board president is to establish the agenda and sending it out and so forth and that people can request and it's the president may put it on there but they don't have to. So, I'm just putting that in policy so people have an idea of kind of how that goes and it and it talks through that, but generally that's one of the main responsibilities of myself and then conferring with the board president to do that each month. So, I just kind of put that on there with recent news in other districts. Not that we've been having issues. So, later in the in the meeting, we're going to talk about approving the budget guarantee. So, I thought I would do and show and try and make this

038as simple as possible um what the budget guarantee is. So you kind of get an idea of what we're talking about as new board members coming up here. >> Pointing up here, but I thought if we go back and I'll try and highlight this and do this because I know Casey's going to have a great presentation here too and we have some other things to go over. So what is the budget guarantee that we're going to talk through here in a second. So when we're talking in a fiscal year, we have what's called regular program district cost. And it's the the base dollars we're going to get in our general fund. And the easiest way to think of it is the district cost um is how the state defines it. State cost per pupil. There

039are districts in the state that have higher cost than the state. So it is categorized as district cost. Ours is the same, but it's a district cost per pupil, which the state sets times your enrollment from the fall. That's what your regular program district cost is for the next year. So I took for next year as an example, and I just came up with 2%. If the state um gave us 2% SSA, it would increase our cost per pupil to $8,148, took our certified enrollment, and that's what we're starting with. There's other factors that will go in on top of that, but that's what we're starting with for the general fund. Okay? 5,000 and change for fiscal year 27 next year. Okay? That's the important one to remember. If you look back last year doing

040the same thing, this was our dollars that we ended up with last year times our certified enrollment. You can see that this number is bigger. Okay, so right there is kind of a what's the problem here, right? Next year, this is what it's projected at. And I said last year, but I meant last year's enrollment for this year. This number is bigger. So that's what we're talking about with the budget guarantee here. So, if we go back, I'm going to go back a few years here without generating the numbers. In fiscal year 24, that was what our regular program district cost was. In fiscal year 25, our enrollment went down. That was our number. Well, you're guaranteed to get 101% of what you had for that regular program cost the year before. This number is

041obviously less than that. So, they figure out what's the 101% of that number and then they add it on. That's called the budget guarantee. But that's only good for one year. Okay. So that brought us to fiscal year 25. So in that year we were on the budget guarantee. The thing with the budget guarantee is that's all property tax and not just for civil achievement statewide. Anyone that's on that. Okay. So moving forward to the current year where we're at right now. Last year notice you go back not to the number you got to go back to that regular district cost. Okay? So last year here was a number. We're on the budget guarantee, but we're only guaranteed 101% of that number. Well, for this year, we were up students. Our number naturally rose above

042that. So, we're not on the budget guarantee, which is a good thing. It's bigger. So, it's just straight dollar amount. Okay. Next year, as of right now, now we're back on it. Why? Well, here's our number for the current year being down in enrollment and only at 2% SSA. This is the projected right now or estimated cost of what our budget guarantee would be for next year. So, kind of pointing it out where that comes from when we approve this later that it goes in resolution. When we approve our budget, we have to have a board resolution that says that we're willing to do that because that's a significant funding piece for us each year. And you can see the importance when we're talking about things that we can't control. Okay? We have some control

043on enrollment, not a lot, right? We can't control birth rates and um economic conditions and people moving in for jobs. We can call our legislators, but we don't have a lot of control over SSA. So, we kind of have to deal with when you're in public education, the hand that you're dealt with. So, when I'm talking about you approving the budget guarantee later this evening here, this is what we're talking about. Whatever the final number is, because that number could change depending on what the legislature approves. So, I'm just we're just estimating it right now, but we're asking to approve this number so that we have at least 1% of our regular program cost from last year. That's where that comes at. Okay? And that's what that's where we're getting at. So, it's remember it's

044100% property tax and that's why enrollment is important when we talk about the enrollment applying to our budget each year. That that's why it is important. So hopefully lot of numbers up there but at least give you a big picture overview of what we're talking about to make that a little bit more palatable and understandable when we have to prove it tonight. Questions on that right now? All right. Decap report discussion. >> Yep. So linked in the presentation but also did a PDF. just wasn't sure what you guys would have access to. Wanted to make sure I had copies in there. So, >> do you want to move ahead or you can >> um Sure. All right. So, the district current academic plan, this is our board presentation. Um, the decap is a little unique

045in that it is both a review of this year's current plan in action, but also like a forward planning tool for next year. So, it's it's a little bizarre in that there's things that are on the plan for the 2526 review that we really aren't starting until next year. That's how they do it. It's a little confusing, but we make it work. So the DECAP again, district career and academic plan. It's how are we ensuring that students are ready for life after high school. That's that's what this plan is. Uh it's composed of seven sections. A lot of what we've been working on the last few years is that section number five, essential components of the ICAP, which IAP stands for individual career and academic plan. So that's, you know, Johnny or Suz's actual plan

046for after graduation. So giving students the opportunities within the school day, within the classroom setting to actually focus on what they're going to do after high school. And that's composed of five elements. Self-standing, career information, career exploration, experiences, post-secary exploration, and career and post-secondary decision. So a lot of understanding yourself, what careers are you may be interested in, and then are we giving you opportunities to explore those? And if you're going to go on to some type of college beyond high school, are we giving you opportunities to explore that and make decisions, informed decisions on that? So last year, our overall goal was to improve our decap score. So every year this is graded on a rubric. Um the 24 20 let me see here 2425 no 23 24 score was a 36 uh 13

047out of 36 not where we wanted to be. Our goal was to increase that to 20 out of 36 for the 2425 and we did achieve that. So we ended up with a 24 out of 36. So we jumped 11 points. At one point it was actually higher than that and then they redid the scores. I was told later that there were some complaints about how things were scored and so they went back in and re-reviewed uh all of them and rescored us. So others were adjusted to not just us. Um so we achieved that by improving a lot of different things. So our our individual career and academic planning, we had better alignment. We did a better job of giving kids opportunities in those essential components. And all of those scores moved to proficient.

048So, a big chunk of our increase was going from like not proficient to proficient. And there were some other things in there, too. But, um, continuing to work on the IAP process. That's our goal this year as well, trying to refine that, make it a little more streamlined. Um, we're doing that in success through IAP assignments. Um, and each grade level is assigned specific tasks. So over time they build this portfolio and I'll show you an example of that later. We call it the digital IAP portfolio. Some schools might call it something like the portrait of a graduate. Basically it's all of the things they've done throughout their high school and and now even middle school. They're expanding the requirements to middle school. I'll talk about that, too. So, we need to in this include

049data that shows that we've met our goal. That was one of the critiques last year that we didn't have data supporting it. Um, so what are some good things we're seeing in our data? This is coming from the school performance profile, the high school page. We have really good participation in uh college credit. So, we have a lot of students taking college credit classes while in high school. Um, we're at 78.26% 26% the state average is at 70. Um across the board our kids outperform the state in this area. Um our low socioeconomic status, our kids are doing really well there. And so that's part of the data that supports we're giving kids opportunity to have success after high school if they're choosing to go to college. um the number of students participating in work-based

050learning. We're also way out in front of the state there. A big chunk of that is our school to career students. So 73.17 is kind of where we're at with all students and the state average is 45. Um so that's like a percentage of a certain student population. I'm not exactly sure how they measure that, but we're we're doing really well there. So that's data supporting that we did achieve what we set out to achieve uh last year. So if you're interested, I did link the rubrics in. For the sake of time, I'm not going to open them up here. Um we're hoping to see, you know, our score improve from 24 maybe to 26, 27, something like that. But as you get towards that 36 mark, the the rubrics are it's difficult to score

051high. So it's we're happy with 24. That was one of the best scores in our region. So that was great to see. And there's just a list of different things that we've kind of accomplished since really digging into this, presenting it to the school board, making sure our kids have a four-year plan, work-based learning experiences, all of those things. So for the 25 26 areas for growth, we're going to continue to focus on the IAP implementation and that portfolio that we created. And another big area for improvement was the annual board review. So I did present this last year to board members, but the feedback we got, they wanted basically more data cited. So, if this presentation seems kind of wordy and it has a lot of stuff in it, I'm I'm throwing in all

052the things that they're asking for and it just makes for a really dense presentation. Um, but that's that's what they want to see. So, decisions supported by data. And we were doing that previous years, but for the sake of time, I didn't include them in the presentation. And they do look at it to grade your your scores. So looking to improve in those two areas and our goal is to develop a 512 scope and sequence for the ICAP portfolio and overall IAP integration for the 2526 school year and beyond. We want to ensure that every student meets the essential components required and has a post-secary plan prior to graduation. The nice thing about this is that's also our idea goal for our targeted status. uh so it it aligns well with other things that we're

053working on. So again, goal alignment, I have to show how this is aligned to district initiative. So I think it fits well with our mission statement. We want to prepare kids to invest in their community, which means work experiences in the community and opportunities within our community. And I think we do a great job of that. That's one of my favorite things about SOSR school to career program. I love that. So again, the DECAP and IAP, giving every kid that opportunity, making sure it aligns with our initiatives like improving literacy. That's one of our board goals, improving literacy, and I believe it aligns with that. Might be maybe not the greatest time to discuss, but I'd be open to any feedback board members have on like how to better align our decap to what our

054initiatives are. Um, it's a little unique in that a lot of board goals, not just us, but I think everywhere is focused on the things you're tested on, math and and ELA literacy, but the state also has this big push in workbased learning and this DECAP component. Um, not many boards make goals about, yeah, we want to have more work-based learning. It's more literacy focused. And I think that makes sense because that's, you know, what we do in in schools. we we teach kids. But so if you have thoughts on either goals, I know that's maybe a work session coming up at some point. But yeah, just throwing it out there. I'm open to ideas on how we can better align them. Those two things and then connecting it back to the data. So lots

055of things linked in here and actually some really cool reports that the state creates. Um the first one, the post-secondary enrollment data. One area where we can improve is our post-secary enrollment for our students who have English as a second language. And believe it or not, actually our talented and gifted students. So our talented and gifted gifted student enrollment in post-secary education is actually lower than the state average for that same subgroup. So not not sure what's going on there. Some of it is it's a small cohort of kids. So last year it was like eight kids in TAG in the high school and if six of the eight were in college classes and two weren't that puts us below the state average. So just something that I noticed as looking through data and of

056course you know those kids have the ability to go to school beyond high school if they want to and that's something we want to make sure they know they have that opportunity. Um the attendance piece, it's pretty well documented that if students have a plan for after high school and they see the value in attending high school, they're much more likely to have good attendance. So that's something we track. Our attendance compared to the state is really good. Our kids in general are here every day and that's that's why we have the success that we have. Graduation rate, that's an area we would like to see improved. So, same thing as attendance. If kids have a plan for after high school, they see the value in educ education and the high school diploma, they're much

057more likely to finish high school. Um, that rate's not where we want it. Um, all of these are live links, so it should pull in. I think the first time you have to actually look up our high school. It's thinking hard. So, the four-year and five-year graduation rates are 81 and 86. We would like that to be higher over 90 ideally. Um, and we're hoping that as we get a better plan for the place and and give kids more opportunities that they see, oh, this is a place where if I stay and finish, I'm going to have, you know, potentially job opportunities or some of my college completed or um, you know, whatever it might be through through this. >> Yeah, both to show that. Yeah, just both of those numbers. So that 81 is

058the four-year graduation rate and and that 86 is the five-year graduation rate. So not where we want them to be. That's one area where we are below the state average and something that we're working on. And then the last piece, the post-secary readiness reports. Again, also pretty cool data. Would you click on that, Stan? Open that up. Hopefully it goes. So you can look up any high school through this and see >> obviously one sibly. >> Yep. You can see their their overall post-secary enrollment. So it's by graduation year how many kids enroll and then it tracks them uh based on their state ID number through their years of college to completion uh or six years whichever is first. So you can see, you know, 70% of our students in 21, 22, and 23 went

059enrolled in college after high school, which is a pretty high percentage. And then 54% from that class of 2028 persisted and graduated. Um, so it's just interesting to watch those trends. And you know, ideally we'd see that above 70 enrollment for some type of post-secary education. And that includes two-year, four-year, other trade degrees. And we'd like to see that completion a little higher because that means they enrolled and they have the skills and, you know, determination to finish. We'd like to see a higher finish rate. But just interesting data that connects back to what we're doing with our plan. Any questions about that? I'm flying through things. Just feel free to ask if you have them. Again, pretty dense. There's a lot of data there. It could take you hours to look through all that.

060So, if you're interested, dive in, reach out if you have questions. So going back to the plan, we have a team uh a pretty big team. Although the primary uh members would be myself, our high school counselor, middle school counselor, and our instructional coach Katie Schroeder, and then Jordan Mening, who we share with some other districts. This is a role that he helps. Uh we do include community. So, this is something I talk about at chamber board meetings. Um, meeting with Andre Andre Abdi for the Oila E County Economic Development. So, just trying to pull in lots of voices and and get their input on what we're trying to accomplish. And we want I mean really we want to give kids opportunities here so they stay here employed and help grow our community. Next one.

061So, professional development. We, like I mentioned in my report, we'll have some DECAP training sessions essentially talking to teachers about, hey, make sure you're giving kids opportunities to, you know, explore different careers or see where, you know, this English class could take them or what opportunities that could open for them. And once we've done those things in the classroom, we also need to get them on our plan so we get credit for them. And that's what we've been working on the last couple years is teachers were doing a lot of great things in the classroom, but it wasn't getting recorded on our plan. So, we weren't getting credit for it. And that's part of our our score increase, too, was making those updates. Let's see here. And then stakeholder benefits. I've touched on that a

062little bit, but you know, definitely great for our community to keep kids locally. It's great for students, gives them opportunity. The workbased learning movement that's going on in the state of Iowa and I think other states is great. I think kids do need real world experience. We see that a lot in teaching. You do a four-year teaching program preparation, but you learn more in that first semester teaching than you did in the four years of your preparation program because there's there's just nothing like actually going out and doing the work. So, love that our kids get that opportunity here. Um, you know, the community benefits. I know CAPS and our school decurs students have done a lot of cool um projects and things for our community, you know, so everybody's benefiting from that. The the

063businesses, the the community, the students, and then parents, I think hopefully, you know, puts them at ease knowing that their kids can have an opportunity to have some real life work experience built into their school day and not every district offers that. Um, I think we're kind of on the cutting edge there. And then just a plan overview of other things that are included in the decap. It's a uh like a 56 page document at this point. Every year it gets a little longer. Um, we we have our success period. That's where we do a lot of the IAP requirements. Youth science is our career information system. the state requires that you have a career information system and that's what we've used primarily that's used in the eighth grade um FASA advisement is part of

064it and Mrs. struggles covers a lot of that. She had a FASA financial aid meeting on conference night and sends out a lot of information as that comes in. Again, workbased learning, something that they want to see on your DECAP and uh careers, which I mentioned in my board report, too, that's a required class. Now, um, making sure kids get exposure to all of the careers and the information that they do in their research pro projects includes like what education do you need, what's the starting salary, you know, what's the job outlook, is this a growing career field, a shrinking career field, all those things they cover in careers. The thought process being as a freshman, you get that. So, you know, okay, there's more than just, you know, teacher, plumber, electrician, and nurse. There's

065a million jobs out there you could do. What's going to be the best fit for you? And then through the self-standing and other exposure they get through high school, we're hoping by the time they're a senior, they've maybe narrowed it down to a two two or three career fields that they could do a a career placement, a school to career placement in. That's the that's kind of the arc of the plan across high school. All right. So, new this year is our IAP portfolio. This is a screenshot. I do also have it linked in uh that fourth bullet point down. It says IAP portfolio template. Um Stan, would you click on that? Yep, that one. So, every student made a copy of this and this template is where they're going to put all of their

066information. So all their like self-standing surveys and different things we have to do the career exploration college visits four-year planning all of it goes on here and we build in over their four years of high school. Um so in the left hand side you can see the links those are the different components of the IAP. So the individual career academic plan those are the individual components that are required. So yeah, this is our first year building this. So it'll be fun to see four years from now how much kids have added to that. >> Where was the track before or was it? >> Yeah, really wasn't. And that was part of the issue and we spent a lot of time kind of brainstorming. Do we does it just go in a folder on an every

067student's drive? Is it something we collect? Use Science has some of these things but not everything. Our concern storing it there is if you science, you know, their price goes up 100% and we decide not to go with them. Now all of our stuff is stored there. So going with the Google site, each kid can customize it. We can always have access to it to check it, update it, whatever we need to do. Um, yeah, it just seemed like the best fit for what we were looking for. and Sous Center or Bordon Hall was doing something similar. So, we were able to look at their portfolio um and kind of base ours off of theirs and they've liked it and so far I think it's been a good fit for for what we need. All

068right, we're getting close to the end here. So next steps, we'll continue to work within our success, give students opportunities. We'll complete those requirements for the IAAP. Um our careers being a required class. I'm excited about that. Continuing to integrate the IAP essential elements. Um we'll keep working on our DECAP team. I think we have pretty good participation having community, chamber, staff, students. I think we have, you know, pretty good input. One thing that is new is now the state is requiring that you extend this plan down to fifth grade. So there are three components that are new for fifth through 7th grade students. It's a lot of the career exploration things. Just trying to get kids exposure earlier is the thinking. Um so Katie Colin, our middle school counselor, has that embedded in her

069curriculum. So they do some like uh research into a different career area and then there's some type of like activity connected to that. So when they did an agriculture unit, they researched different egg uh careers and then they also did like an egg simulator. There's some free like farming simulators online. So they did that as like a combo. So trying to make it fun and engaging because it's, you know, younger kids that they're maybe not sure what they want to do when they grow up yet at that age and but still get some learning. Um, yeah, and continue to improve on our rubric based on the feedback that we get. All right, that was the career and academic plan. A lot of information. Any questions or thoughts, suggestions? >> I only heard half of it,

070so I'm not going to ask you to repeat the beginning half of that. Casey, >> I appreciate that. So, I'm not even on the team. I mean, I'm aware they're doing that, but all the pieces, but some of the pieces that we got an improvement on, as I'm looking that you're talking through, some of those pieces now are also would be fair to say what's important and what's scored on our school performance profile cuz like in elementary, they're not graded on career exploration in third and fourth grade, right? But that's becoming a bigger, you know, it's the math and the reading growth and proficiency and that's a piece in high school, but it's also the career exploration point. So some of the pieces that you guys have started putting in here is also being used

071for other data points, right? >> Yeah. And a big reason the high school was high performing was was the changes that we made in reporting but also just trying to get more students in school to career and taking college classes. So I think it ends up to be about a third of your um performance profile score uh if you include graduation rates in there. So post-secary readiness, work-based learning, and graduation rates together are about a third. Proficiency is about a third, and growth is about a third of your of your total score. >> And so with that, this part I know the answer to, but I'm >> okay. Hopefully I >> explaining when you said we got to work on the five and the four-year graduation rates, which we do, but there's also we've looked

072into that some reasons for that. Maybe give the big 10,000 what view of some of the reasons for that. >> Yeah. So the things we can and can't control, right? >> Yep. Definitely. You know, just with our population, we've had situations where, you know, students turn 18 and they feel obligated to work and they, you know, make a choice to not finish high school and and and work. That's been a chunk of our students who haven't finished in four or five years. Um, we've also, um, had some students move into our district, maybe be here for a month or two, and then leave our district and then not enroll in their new community. And that drop also comes back to us. So, that's been three or four two or three cases. Um, and again, small,

073you know, when you've got a graduating class of 45, 40 kids, if you have two or three like that, that is why you're at 80% and not 90%. So, yeah, things that we're working on. Certainly, some things out of our control, but I do think some things we can do better, and that's what we're trying to do. >> Yeah. any other >> you feel like the students that are looking for a career experience are able to find them? >> Yeah, good question. A lot of credit to our high school uh guidance counselor Terresa Rugles. She has put in a lot of time and effort into like tracking down these really unique opportunities. So, we have a student who is interested in being a pilot. So he is actually going up to Warthingington to their airport

074and doing a school to career placement up there. So that's a new one we've never done before. Um trying to think there was one other maintainer has been great. They've accepted two or three students. That's a new partnership this year. So it seems like every year we're kind of adding more opportunities. So if if we can find a place locally to send a student in about that 20 mile radius, we'll do that. So we have a few in Sheldon, we have a few up in Warthingington, uh but the rest would be in the Sibui local area. So yeah, CF's been great taking students. Hospital always takes uh like three students. So, we have some reoccurring, you know, partners that take kids every year. Automotive has been very popular in this group, and there's been several

075uh shops in the area that have taken kids on and given them opportunities. So, that's been fun to see. >> But that is a challenge what you're getting. Sometimes it's >> just hard to find the right placement, >> right? >> That is a challenge. Yeah. >> Yep. And we >> But they've worked hard at it. >> Yeah. We try to be flexible. So like the pilot program, you know, they didn't have enough work or staff. It's a small airport to have that student there every day for four periods a day. So it's kind of a split placement and we do that with a few kids, especially if they're in unique situations where they can't be there every day, but we still want them to get that exposure. So yeah, I think that student is working

076on pilot license now and is hoping to have it completed by the end of the year. So yeah, pretty pretty cool opportunity. I don't know if he'll be our first pilot graduate. Probably >> maybe you'll get some kickbacks from that case a free flight here or there with >> other questions you guys got. A lot of good information there. >> Yeah. >> Yep. They're due to be submitted April 1st. And this is kind of one of the last things I have to collect. I have to show the agenda and the minutes and the presentation as part of the plan. So can check that off the list. >> Is it a graduation requirement >> to do a career? >> So good question. No, the you're talking about the IAP portfolio for the students. It's not. So,

077one of the reasons that we're giving credit for success is because then we can require the IAP components to be completed. So, I success is a pass fail based on completing the essential components. So, there's like five to six assignments each semester that they have to complete. If they complete all of them, then they get a pass. >> Yep. If they don't, then they get a fail. So, that's kind of our accountability to make sure students are are doing it because we're we're required to have them do it. But >> Yep. >> All right. Well, thanks, Casey. >> Yep. >> All right. Moving on to new business. Consider approval of operational sharing agreements. >> So, these aren't new. of these are just continuations of ones that we've had in the past for new board members

078to remind you there's certain positions that we share that we have to approve annually but not only does it help with the cost basis but we get additional students. So by sharing them we get basically um depending on the position depending on the position four students added to our enrollment for next year. So transportation is one of those. We've done that the last handful of years. Um Harris Lake Park is still interested in doing that. um and how that that can be handled in a variety of ways. So um the first one is the agreement to share Amos Clint Walter with Harris Lake Park as transportation director. >> We've done we've done that in the past. >> Yep. Yeah. It's no change. Yep. We just have to approve it annually. >> So some of those

079positions are weighted differently then is like Cuz I remember getting like five students for something I always thought. So they So as an example, those the two we have tonight are four. They mentioned Jordan Menning. We'll do that later. Um but we don't hold the contract on that one. So I got I have to wait till they send us the contract. But that one we get two. >> Okay. >> For Jordan Mennings is two. Transportation director and HR is four. There's some other ones that are listed you can get four. You can get like you could share an SBO or under that like a school business official. There's a few others that you can do under that title. Superintendence is nine. That's the oddball. So most are four. There's a few that are two and

080then superintendents are nine. Okay. >> So when you see schools sharing a superintendent, >> sometimes it's cuz there's lack of candidates, but sometimes they do that they're small enough. It's a it's a major cost savings when they do that. >> Questions? Otherwise, we accept a motion to >> I'll motion to accept the sharing of our transportation director as it's stated in the meeting minutes. >> I'll second it. All right. It's been moved and seconded to approve the trans sharing the transportation director with Harris Lake Park. Any discussion? All right. Hearing none. All those in favor say I. >> I. >> Those opposed? >> I. >> Those opposed? Motion passes. >> Same thing for HR director. Um the only difference there is that's an it's an additional state item. We've done that the last few years.

081That's Chrissy Acriman. Um the biggest duties because sometimes people hear HR, but um and think of a lot of things, but HR can mean a lot of things. So what she does a lot with, we share that with Emittsburg, Harris Lake Park, and ourselves a third each one. She does a lot of policy work for them. So they'll send their policies, she'll up update them or look at, hey, here make these suggestions and prepare them for their board meetings. That's what she does in her role with those districts as as an example among some other things. So and same thing that's been done the last handful of years. All right, any questions? Make a motion to approve the sharing of the human resources director with Harris Lake Park and Emittsburg as stated. >> I'll second.

082>> All right. It's been moved and seconded to approve the human resources director position. All those in favor say I. >> I. >> Those opposed. >> All those opposed. Motion passes. So we have to say the set the dates for the public hearings on the certified budget. So the the process is as we're working through this now we have to submit that to the state or the depart DOE we'll say the department of management on March 5th. Then that goes into their database and does everything out comes back to the county um the assessors and then they have to have that finalized with all a tax taxing agencies in the in the state and the county and then they have to have that in by the 15th and they send out notices and then we

083have to have two hearings on that. That's the kind of the big level description of that. Um you can't have your first hearing before the 20th and you have to have the whole proc of March, excuse me, and the whole process done before the 30th. So we're looking at um in viewing the the calendar. We're looking at Monday, March 30th at 5:30 here in the high school for the first budget hearing. Um we also usually do I do a budget presentation with that like kind of an overview that night. We'll do that and then the second hearing is just a followup and we'll do that at our regularly scheduled board meeting in April on the 20th. If for some reason we decide the second one that there's a conflict on that April. I don't know

084of one right now. I'm just saying because that's happened in the past the April board meeting we would move the budget hearing with it. >> You still have 10 days to get that in there then too. >> Yes. Correct. >> Yep. >> Okay. So, those are our recommendations for the dates. >> All right. Any questions on that? No. I'll make a motion to approve the dates suggested suggested uh for the public hearings of the Cibiochin certified budget as presented. >> Second. >> All right. It's been moved and seconded to set the dates for the public hearing on certified budget for Monday, March 30th and Monday, April 20th. All those in favor say I. >> I. >> All those opposed. Motion passes. >> All right. So, kind of connecting to what I presented on slightly earlier,

085the budget guarantee. Um, so well not finalized yet, but more than likely in the unless the state comes back and gives us like 20% SSA, which is not happening. >> Okay, that was a lot of sarcasm there. >> Um, that will qualify for the budget guarantee each year >> or this year, excuse me, for new board members. We approve this and there's nothing wrong with this. A lot of school districts, we approve it each year because it doesn't hurt to approve it if you don't need it, but you need that in the minutes and then we have to upload that and get that to the department of management which allows us to ask for the budget guarantee as part of the budget process. So, we have to do that this evening before we can take

086the next step to certify the budget. And so, what it's reading is just explaining it, you know, being down students and at 101% what we'll need like I presented earlier, the resolution um whoever makes the recommendation would have to read that in the recommendation. And I move that it be resolved and they can read um read the rest of that. I won't read that verbatim. But what this is getting at is approving us to have the authority and the authorization to ask for that budget guarantee amount what I was talking about earlier. And it's it's we don't know for sure, but it'll be about $300,000. All right. Any discussion or any questions on that? Would there be a motion to I move that resolve that the board of directors of the civil jet community school

087district will lever levy property taxes for fiscal year 2027 for the regular program budget adjustment as allowed under section 25714 code of Iowa. >> I'll second. >> Okay. Okay, it's been moved and second to consider approval of the budget guarantee resolution as presented. Any discussion? All those in favor say I. >> I. >> All those opposed. >> Motion passes. >> So the next two agenda items kind of go hand in hand. And if you've paid attention the last half year a little bit, this has come up because we're we're talking about renewing our voted ple. Part of that comes from the income sir tax which is on there. So this is the point that we kind of have a discussion here and we're making a recommendation and then we need to use those numbers as

088part of the budget process. So we have two things that are funded or can be funded eligible to be funded as part of our budget with income sax and one of that is voted ple and the other item is what's next is the instructional support levy. um in looking and going back uh we believe they started out setting it from our understanding at 4%. Um going back to 20 FY um 16 2016 and you can read the rest there. The last handful of years we've had our income sir tax rate at 10% overall. Doesn't matter how you divide it up. So what we've done the um last year is we've put 3% we've set the income sir tax rate at 3% for the voted pole portion and then at 7% which was the next agenda

089item on the instructional support levy in terms of dollars that doesn't change anything and you know by having even if people tell you this by having uh uh income sir tax that doesn't generate us dollars additionally beyond what our budget asks for it doesn't um do anything it just shifts where the the taxes are coming from from income versus property, right? That's what an income sir tax is. It's a tax on a tax on individual income taxes. It just changes where that comes from. >> Um the reason we put the at last year at 3% on the voted ple is because if in the future some districts will have voted ple or ple notes that they can borrow against your ple savings to pay off some things, you can only borrow against the portion that's

090not funded through income sir tax. Okay. Um, we don't have plans to do that, but if that would ever come up, we're therefore using less of that paid through income sert tax. So, that's why we did that. Um, we've left the rate the same the last two years, but we we've adjusted the levers on each end. Does that make sense? >> Okay. So, we have left it right now recommending at 10% overall, putting 3% on the voted ple portion and 7% on the instructional support levy, which is the next one. But just kind of um setting that up there so you know what we're asking. So I would imagine before we approve this you might have a few questions and if not that's fine too. But that's what we're looking at and then we we

091would use that as part of the budget process. >> So if >> moving forward >> if the pebble doesn't pass then what happens to this? >> So great question because this is due March 5 and the votes March 3. Okay. And we've asked the same thing. >> Um because we're probably not the only one, but we're one of the few in the district because you can or in the state, excuse me. There's three times you can vote to renew this, right? >> So some districts that >> are up this year may be approved in September. Some approved it in November. I don't know how many will be we won't know till it's done or on the ballot in March. And some might be approving it this year. You can do it a year ahead of

092time as well. So I asked that. I said, "We're one of the few here. This is our last chance for this. Do we put that on there?" And so the Department of Management, they said, "Yeah, you put that on there and then you can always reduce levies at tax hearings, but you can't increase them." So you put that on there. Hopefully this doesn't happen, but we'll approve it on the 5th. If it doesn't pass, it would just get removed from the budget. Does that make sense? And then whatever rate we would specifically set the income sir tax at for voted Peppa would be >> so null and void. Mhm. because we don't have one at that point. I really hope that doesn't happen. But that is a great question and that's we're like how do

093we do this because we want to do this the right way. So we asked the department of management that that specific question and they said factor it in like you think it's going to pass because you don't want to factor it in like it's not going to pass and add it later because you can't. It's not allowed under code. >> Did that kind is that what you were getting? >> Yeah. So like this 3% comes out of >> comes out It's the additional tax. So like the next one, the income s. It's uh that doesn't that's a different that's not the that's not part of the pebble though. >> Correct. >> So what we're looking at is like you're talking it's 10% but then what we'd only have is 7%. >> We'd only have 7%

094on that portion. Correct. Yes. And remember the the I didn't state this tonight, but from previous things, the highest you can set that rate at is 20. Now, we could set it there and I don't know how the final numbers will will work out for next year's budget, right? What we're working on this year, but if that generates more dollars than what we're asking for, then it won't allow us to do that. We can't do that to >> I know some people think that we can't do that to get more money for the school. Income sir tax doesn't work that way. It doesn't give us it's just shifting where it comes. In the end it gives us the same dollars, right? And that's important. I've tried to answer that for people when they ask that.

095It's not a way to slip it in later that we put it at 10 now the public passes this and we're going to raise it to 20 later and get more done. That's not how that works. There's accountability measures in place, right? That's just the max of what it could be set at. Is there anything magical about 10? No. That's just what we've been at. So, and seem to be comfortable with the last few years. So, that's why we stuck with that. Again, I don't know that there's uh yeah, a magic reason for that. That's that's what we put it at. We didn't see reason to change it. Doesn't mean we can't. That's why we're presented to you guys before we certify the budget >> or >> So, would it be better for us to

096put this at a 2% and look for the other one being at eight to generate? We definitely could >> just because we don't know if the pebble's going to I mean we're assuming it like we're hoping and >> but I'm I'm just I I don't know like like to gener to potentially have a little bit more funds available. Would it would that be a better solution? >> That same thought's gone through my mind. >> Okay. >> I've flipped both ways. So you're I I've had the same thought in my >> run through my brain as well. >> Okay. Yes, definitely. So, I kind of left it here just as this is what we did, but I figured there'd be discussion on it tonight. >> Y >> and we definitely could do that because we just

097have the recommendation, but what we approve is what we'll set it at. >> So, we we could do that. >> If you change it to 8%, that just will change the amount that comes from the tax, not the overall levy. >> Correct. Correct. >> Yeah. >> If we keep the overall levy at 10, put this at two and that at eight, like I said, the overall levy rate remain the same. It's not. It's just like at at this point though, like if it doesn't pass, we won't have that 3% to play. >> Yeah. We Yeah. There won't be a We won't be getting um um PEP money, the voted portion, right? So then there wouldn't be a sir tax on that part. >> Your levy would drop to 7%. Yeah, the um in the in

098the income sir tax would go down to that rate because you're only doing on the on the um instructional support side. >> But on the instructional support side, if that's approved, even if you had 0%, you would still get those funds through property tax, right? >> Yeah. Yeah. It won't it it won't affect the in the Oh, I got I got >> So if you moved it from seven to 8 to 10, all that does is now you're generating more through sir tax and less through property tax. Correct. Yes. It won't affect the um instructional support side. It's just where the dollars come from. >> Oh, I got you. >> If it does, if the voted ple wouldn't pass, we're just not getting the voted ple dollars, but we're still getting those instructional support levy

099dollars. >> Okay. >> And they'll either through sir tax or property tax or a combination of the two. Let me ask this to kind of guide this. Are we Here's maybe the bigger question. Are we okay keeping the overall um income sir tax rate at 10? >> Do you feel a need to change that? >> No. >> All right. You know, >> no. >> I'm not trying to guide this. I'm just asking if we're good with that, then really the the question becomes then how do we want to divide it up? If you have it, you have to have if you have it on the ballot, you have to have it at at least 1%. >> So, we couldn't go at 10 and zero because, you know what I mean, you're required, you're required to

100have that at one. And I'm not suggesting that either. I'm just saying. So, then the question comes down to do we want 3% on the voted ple I've heard two. Do we want it in that range? And then it'd be either seven or eight on the other one. That's really I think what we're debating then if we want to keep the overall rate at 10 for income sir tax would that be fair to summarize kind of whatever I'm thinking I don't want to put >> the only thing is the 3% takes a little bit more burden off the property tax itself right I mean if we if it would pass >> cor well it takes the if it would pass whether it's three to overall it'll take the same amount of burden off because it's

101taking the income sir tax is taking burden off the instru instructional support levy side as well. Do you do you know what I'm saying? That 10% if it passes that 10% it doesn't matter how we divide it up. It it's relieving the burden the same amount 1% of income sir tax is the same. >> Okay. >> Um relief whether that's applying to the instructional support levy or the voted pole. >> Okay. >> It's roughly from I'm going from the slides from last fall. I wanted to say every every 1% was like $38,000 in relief. Don't quote me there. I'm just going from memory. And I think that's roughly what it would estimate to be. And it's just you're just saying, are we putting that relief towards the instructional support levy or ple? It's providing relief

102the same way. It's just where it's providing. >> So the numbers the same. >> So how can these instructional support levies? So what can those funds be used for? general fund. >> This this straight general fund. >> Yep. The instructional support levy is Yep. In essence, yes. Yeah. It's complet Yeah. It's confusing because it's completely separate from voted Pepple, but they both can also be funded through >> income sir tax or supported through that, right? you leave it the same just with the voted couple coming up and what you've done your presentations and talked about and >> Yep. I think that makes sense >> versus you go change it and you say just muddies the water a little bit. >> That's that's partly what's gone through my mind. Right. >> I'm sitting here going it's

103been this way at least >> that's what that's like why it's gone back and forth. I didn't want to put words in you guys' mouth, but to make it easy moving forward to not look like we changed something midstream, that's the that's the counter to >> Well, I appreciate the, you know, discussion on that, right? I mean, so you how that looks and what it what it actually does >> and it's high level. It's confusing to people. >> It just is. It is. So, I'm kind of hearing let's for the voted ple income tax rate at 3%. Would that be fair? Yep. >> Okay. So then we'll need a motion >> a motion uh to keep the uh recommendation to set the income sax rate at 3% for the fiscal year of the 2027 budget.

104>> I'll second. >> All right. It's been moved and second to set the income sir tax at 3% for the fiscal 2027 budget. All right. Any more discussion? All right. Hearing none. All those in favor saying I. I >> I >> All those opposed. Motion passes. >> So the second one, hopefully this will make that simple. Then we would put it at 7% the income sax for the instructional support levy. The instructional support levy is um if it's board approved is redone every 5 years. And we did it in the fall of 20 summer fall of 2023. So my guess is that would have started for fiscal year if we did in the fall of 23 which would is really FY24. So that that probably began in FY25. So probably the summer fall of f

105of 2028 is when we'll have to renew and do the paperwork on that. Again just to explain that process that's done through board resolution to last for 5 years. Regardless, we need to a motion to approve setting the income sir tax for the instructional support levy at 7%. Then >> just to back up, what' you say about five years there stamp? >> So that's done through board resolution the um instructional support levy >> y >> is done every 5 years. So, we did it in the fall of 2023. Yeah. >> To have the instructional support levy and then we can continue to ask for those funds for 5 years and then at the end we would have to do that again and you can do that through board resolution but every year you can adjust

106the percentage. >> Correct. >> Yep. Yep. >> So that's not a vote. That's just board approved. >> Correct. >> When you do it for 5 years. >> Okay. >> Um you can do it you can do it to public vote to last for 10 years. There's very few districts that do that. They just do it through board resolution generally. Then it has to be reapproved and then it it's a certain percentage of your general fund that it gives you additional dollars from and then it goes through property tax, but you can fund some of that through income tax. That's what that's what we're approving tonight. >> All right. Any other questions? be a motion to approve the I recommend to set the income s tax at 7% on the instructional support levy for the fiscal

107year 2027 budget. >> I'll second. >> All right, it's been moved and seconded to set the income sir tax at 7% on the instructional support levy for the fiscal year 2027. Any discussion? Hearing none. All those in favor say I. >> I. All those opposed. Motion passes. >> All right. I'm going to let Kent here take over in a second here. But basically, um, those that have been whether you just got on the board this fall or or followed along last year. This has kind of been like a year and a half, two school year process to get to this point. And I only want to point that out because they've done a lot of work and deep dive into this. And like they were going to do it last year, but they said, "Hey,

108we want to take some more time." So, I do really appreciate that they did this um and the time and the work they went into that. So, um they have two quotes on here which were the two main competitors. Is that the right word to use? Competitors that it came down to at the end and they have a recommendation and we can pull that up and I'll let um Mr. Dale here explain or answer your other questions, but maybe you can explain why the recommendation from the team. >> Yeah, absolutely. or which one you have, right? >> Yeah. So, I'd like to echo what uh Superintendent D said by thanking our math team for the diligence in the process. Um kind of led by Carrie Kroman, the math department uh lead teacher, head um whatever

109you want to call it. But also special note to uh Mr. Pacific, uh Mrs. Snder, Mr. Anderson, Mrs. Tess Rockman, Mrs. Glade, Mrs. Hitrider, and Mrs. Roseberry were are part of our team. So, they put a lot of time and effort into um determining what we feel like will continue to move our district forward in this K8 math curriculum. Um it doesn't stop here, but this is a start. And so that's why we're looking for your uh approval of the curriculum associates quote. Um there so these were our two finalists. These were the two that we had kind of narrowed it down. We had started with a whole bunch, narrowed it down to three and then really funneled it into these two. Um the HMH is our current curriculum. As we talked in terms of

110proficiency scores, especially with math, we feel like it was doing a good job. We feel like um this this ready math, the curriculum associates math, classroom math, um will continue to to move us forward. Not that the IN2 math the HMH wouldn't, but um just feel like the the curriculum associates is a better fit for our district. Number one, it aligns with our um diagnostic assessment, our secondary state reporting assessment. It aligns our classroom curriculum with that assessment. And so we've noticed some differences in the assessment into the instruction and and classroom curriculum with what the way we're currently operating it. So, we're hoping that that alignment, we're we're um really looking forward to that alignment being more streamlined. Um, additionally, um, a factor into the curriculum associates, the readymath versus the into math, we

111would need to purchase a secondary assessment, math assessment for our secondary state reporting, which we're currently paying about $15,000 for our I Ready Diagnostic, which would be an additional cost over the H.M.H. And so that really kind of narrows the gap. I know it doesn't completely close the gap between the $100,000 into math quote versus the 124 and change um I ready math quote or ready mathematics classrooms quote but um we feel like that was something that was important to us as well. Also um the readymath the curriculum associates quote is includes any updates that would come up in our six-year process. HMH was not willing to include those updates. They said it was unlikely that they would have updates in the six years, but they would give us the option to purchase updates, whereas

112uh curriculum associates, it's all included. We'd get their their most current material. And so feel like that's also worth something. Um, we did a lot of school visits, had a lot of discussions with other local educators who are currently implementing the Ready Math and they really like it and so our team was enthused about the good things that they saw happening. We went on some some school visits and um enthused about the good things they're seeing happening at other schools that are similar to us both in size and other demographics. And so yeah, it's our recommendation to go with the curriculum associates ready math room ready ma classroom ready math classroom mathematics. Sorry. >> So is our is our current math program like is it what are we currently >> we currently have into math

113with HMH? Okay. >> And so now HMH is updating to a newer version. And so that intrigued us as well. And that was that kind of why I for lack of a better term why it's our runner up. You know what I mean? We we do like what we're seeing with proficiency scores and some of those kind of things. But I think the the classroom mathematics from uh ready math or curriculum associates can kind of with that alignment just a little bit better with the diagnostic. We think it'll be a good thing. We were not ready to get rid of that diagnostic. there are other options for diagnostics and screeners and some of those secondary reporting that we have to do that we're required to do by the state. We really like that part of

114the I Ready. Um and so we weren't ready to get rid of that and so that's why we'd have to factor that cost into the HMH like I kind of mentioned. But >> would this start next school year then or >> Correct? Yep. We would actually plan some professional development um this second semester for implementation. Then next year if if somebody wanted to pilot some of this or jump right into it the second semester, I think that would be possible. But yep, we'd start doing some PD and planning and training around effective implementation for the 2627 school year. >> So I know there's been some discussions within the public. We've had parents come in here and talk also uh about the middle school math program. Does this help us get more aligned to where we

115maybe don't have maybe such a gap in that program? Does this help us with that? >> Yes. >> As I would say without a doubt, yes. Um and that's why another draw for it is we so last year at about this time I think maybe a little bit later we approved a one-year purchase of into math because with the turn turnover in staff in our like seventh and eighth grade math positions here over the last fiveish years um the that curriculum had kind of got not gotten lost. not but kind of gone by the wayside. There wasn't any continuity or consistency there. So, we did purchase one year of the into math and didn't feel like it fit our needs. And so, actually using a lot of the trial basis in Ready Math um the

116classroom mathematics. So, I it's a long-winded answer for yeah, I really I really do think it will. Um and it'll be K8. So the kids as they work through the system, the students as they work through the system >> hopefully will get a better understanding for it and it builds off itself. Yeah. I mean that's what math >> y >> I mean self-explanatory but we know that Yeah. Exa exactly. Yep. I I don't know if you remember when Carrie Krogman, was that this year or an earlier presentation when when they were looking into this, they said one of the things that's really hard is there's not a good K12 curriculum and you can find a lot of K6 options or high school, but sometimes incorporating the middle school is difficult. The seventh and eighth level,

117you know, sometimes it's the um ugly stepchild of the math curriculum world. >> She did say that. Yeah. and and yeah, when they were looking at this, that was a common thing. And I think that was one of their I mean, from hearing their updates, at least they presented to me that they I really think they did a lot of due diligence and looking for ones that could try and >> K through K through eight. >> Yeah. And address some of those issues to be consistent. >> Okay. >> Those those were kind of our buzzwords as we continued to evaluate was the consistency and the sustainability. And so through some of those things that I mentioned, it's a K8 program that addresses some of that consistency. Um, other schools are having success with it. Um,

118uh, curriculum associates willingness to provide updates as they come and not and including that as a part of this price. Um, I think really speaks to that sustainability for us. >> And with it being uh, K through eight, then Carrie being Mr. program and being on this >> correct. >> It gets them >> I from that eighth seventh eighth grade spot. It gets them like she feels this program is what gets them ready for that ninth and 12th. >> Yes. >> Okay. >> Yep. I I don't want to speak for her but >> No, but I mean she was on there. >> Yep. Yep. Feel fairly confident that that's the answer she would give. >> And how long will we use this for? >> Uh it's a six-year purchase. Okay. >> Yep. Six year purchase.

119>> And there's no annual fee. which is >> this is it for all six years. Yep. And and that's the nice thing is well and so I suppose you could kind of bake that into So speaking of annual fees that um I reading diagnostic is a $14,000 purchase per year. Like I didn't even think about that until you said that right now. But >> so all of a sudden you're looking at six years of for about >> I mean >> conservatively it's $60,000. You know what I mean? But that's >> half >> right. That's all in in this quote that's provided with it >> that we were paying before. >> Correct. Correct. >> I didn't know that. >> You said yourself for an infomercial. >> I didn't I didn't think about that either. I was

120just thinking about that one time cost, but that is an annual cost. >> Yeah. get it now. >> So, >> well, I do appreciate that like with how you had everybody from middle school to elementary all the way through high school put in their two cents making it a I >> and it wasn't even two cents because I can't stress how diligent the team was like I said. So, we tried to provide the infrastructure, but it was an us decision, not a curriculum director, Mr. Deo decision. It was a I need you guys to to buy into this because you're the ones that are going to be teaching it, that are going to be using it. And so, um, we put a vote out and there was one person that felt really strongly about the

121HMH from our math team. Um and then the other people either felt very strongly for um um readymath or they were like well I could really go either way. So we do feel like I think that's the other thing. We do feel like these are two very good programs and so we're kind of splitting hairs a little bit. Um but I think that's a good problem to have. >> So that fair say >> summaries >> totally agree with all that. Yep. >> Six years. It saves us money. >> I was going to say your other program is more expensive. >> Yes. If you factor in the annual cost for the secondary assessment, right? >> Yep. It's exactly right. I I don't want to put the cart in front of the horse either. One of the

122other districts that we went and um shadowed or um observed also uses um ready uh I Ready um ELA and really liked the overlap like the the consistency and platform there. our literacy curriculum is up for a couple of in a couple of years and so um it would be an option not that we would have to go this way. That was a kind of a secondary discussion as we got into it. The other piece to that is HMH has into math and into reading which is also very good ELA program. So yeah, just some options for us as we move forward for some familiarity and some consistency there as well. So one of the other benefits that was provided to us for the readymath curric the classroom mathematics was the schools that have adopted

123it felt like their professional development was very very good and so that came very highly recommended as well. So I'm excited about that. >> And that's a big part of your success. >> Yes. >> Is how well they get your teachers. >> Yep. So yeah, my if you haven't heard it through the conversation, my recommendation is for the curriculum associates classroom mathemat math classroom mathematics. >> What what fund does this come out of? Is this a general fund expense? >> Correct. Instruction >> curriculum. Yep. All right. Any other questions? I >> assume from our budget it makes sense. >> We try to to factor in each year for we're on a curriculum cycle. >> Okay. >> Um is it >> six years? I believe seven years that we rotate through. So we try to factor

124that in each year >> knowing a couple of the years are more expensive than others. like when you buy your reading curriculum or your math, that's a more expensive year than when you're purchasing. I think one of the years is like um all the CTE areas. >> It's just not as costly of a purchase that year, right? >> It's six years, which makes sense. That's why our quote is for six years because then we'll re-evaluate. >> I couldn't remember for sure. >> Either reup or Yeah. So this year is math. next year is business um technology industrial tech the career tech ed and vocational. So I think that's what Mr. Superintendent Zale was kind of talking about is you know those courses are more secondary based. So we're not looking at K12 curriculum. We're looking

125at 712 912 type curriculum. So obviously you're going to save on >> what you're doing. >> Yeah. Financing. All right. Any other discussions or questions? >> Make a motion to approve the curriculum associates code of $124,862.58 for the K8 math curriculum curriculum. >> I'll second that. >> All right. It's been moved and seconded to approve the curriculum associated associates quote of 124,862 and 58 cents for the K8 math curriculum. Any discussion hearing? None. All those in favor say I. >> I. >> All those opposed. Motion passes. So, speaking of voted ple and income sir tax, when the state of Iowa sends out the income sir tax for our voted ple and the instructional support levy, it comes to our general account and um sometimes they do a better job of notifying us when that arrives

126than others. But, um the amount that we received is $50,8682. So, we have to get approval, then we transfer that out into the ple account. That 50,000 is the plea portion or the >> Yes. >> Yeah. I didn't that's Yeah, I didn't state that, but that's the plea portion. >> So, that's really all it is. >> Motion to approve the fund transfer of $50,8682 cents to the Pebble Fund. >> Second. >> All right. It's been moved and seconded to approve uh fund transfer in the amount of $50,8682 from the general fund to the Pebble account. Any discussion? Hearing none. All those in favor say I. >> I. >> All those opposed. Motion passes. and new contracts um they've started but two um support personnel Keat Neltzer hopefully both names are familiar to people here and

127Emma Jacobs from both that pairs in the middle school and high school recent so graduates >> these are full-time positions >> yes >> yep and being actively used Mr. hurts. >> They started already. >> Yeah. Yeah. >> Doing a great job. >> Yeah. >> I'll make a motion to approve the new contracts as presented. >> Second. >> All right. It's been moved and seconded to approve the contracts as presented. Any discussion? Hearing none. And all those in favor say I. >> I. >> All those opposed. Motion passes. Just reminder, I put on there when our next regular scheduled meetings are. Um, in addition to that um because I didn't know obviously if we'd approve that tonight or not, but March 30. And you'll get more information as we lead into that. And some reminders will

128be when the um first certified budget public hearing number one is. And then a week from tomorrow here in the high school will be our um work session. Um Lannne will be leading that and we'll be talking about some district goals and where the lines are moving down and we'll have some the admin team here as well. So those are our next meetings. >> Do you have So on those meetings cuz I did see you put something together for talking public. >> Oh yeah, I didn't put that on here. Um good thing for a week from today the it'd be the 24th we'll do the um voted ple public forum at the town hall at 6:30. >> I'm glad you said that. I was trying to remember to do that and I forgot all about

129it. >> No, you're fine. I just saw it today. So >> Yep. Yep. So a week from um today and say almost exactly a week but we're a little past the start time but we'll do that at the town hall. All right. Any talking points? >> I guess I'll start off with just appreciation. Kent throwing all your the stuff on the curriculum long haul for the last year or two. I guess I've heard a lot about it. So, thanks for reaching the end line on that. And Casey, your work on this the decap IAP program. It's appreciate that presentation. lets us understand it a lot better, I guess. I know I've heard a lot about it, but it helps with these visuals and stuff like that. So, I appreciate that. >> Very good. >> All

130right. Anything else? Not tonight. >> All right. I guess that' be it. So, we look for a motion to adjurnn. >> I'll make a motion to adjurnn. I'll second. >> All right. Been moved in a second to adjurnn the meeting. All those in favor say I. >> I. >> Those opposed. We are adjourned. >> Thanks. Thank you. >> Thank you. It's >> like having Beetlejuice >> talking through the TV. Hope you guys >> I didn't know she was on there. So the first one it almost sounded like Laura Glass. Will you be able to be there next week? Tuesday the 24th. >> Say what? >> You going to be in no cheating on 24th? >> Yeah, I should be. I got to look at Quinnley's basketball. >> Do you want anything in the >> That's

131the only thing I think it's her last week >> ahead of time. >> I want to call on a few people. calling. Make sure it gets