001Okay, we'll go ahead and get our meeting roll. Hower here. Kent here. Me here. Mickey here. Rice here. Williams here. Young here. I would move to approve the agenda. Me second. All those in favor? I I opposed. Motion carries. Josh, you're up. The district mission is to teach all and reach all. The district vision is Urbanale will be a school district that brings learning to li learning to life for everyone. And our board mission is to partner with stakeholders to teach all and reach all through governance of board policy and operating protocol. And superintendent report I have just a couple of items. Um, first thing I'd like to bring to the parent and guardians attention is that we have the achieve family portal launched by the Department of Education that connects students with IEPs to
002connects families to students with IEPs. They can access their child's uh records and information. Um, it's 247 access. So any parent or guardian of a child with the IEP or an individualized family service plan can opt in to create this. There was some information that was sent out via parent square. So if you're listening to this and you have questions about how to get in, if you connect with your child's teacher, they will be able to help them to do that. Um I want to report out that the graduation rates for the state are now public. They were um given to us in an embargoed state while they got it ready to roll out to the public last week. And Urbanddale School District's graduation rate is 94.9%. And if you're interested in more granular details,
003you can go to the state website. I think for the board, I put in your Friday newsletter a link to that site. You can compare years and break it down every which way that you would like to. Um, want to remind families also kindergarten registration is continuing and if you are interested in open enrolling your student to Urbandale, those applications are due by September. Um, returning families can continue to register at their child's school or if they need to come to the district office, they can do so. And then lastly, just the final reminder about the ISASP. That's our state testing. They're still getting their letters this week, correct? For grades four through 11. So, those are kids that tested last year. Those scores will go home to families. So, we're hoping that the families
004will um take the information about the testing window and invite them to have a conversation with their child about the importance of the assessment. I know kids don't like to take those assessments. We don't necessarily like to give them. They're very long, but there's a lot of information and decisions that are made from those assessments. So, we want kids to do their best. Uh that's all I have. Thank you. We're gonna head into the compensation structure. Students, oh, sorry, guys. I jumped a bunch there. They're just seniors. I bet they have nothing to say. Well, not we don't have much to share this week, but um just as Dr. Docker stated, we do have ISAPs coming up next week. Um that's just something that's on students radar. It happens every year, but just being aware
005of that and just a big thing that's just happening at the high school and as well as the other schools in our district right now. The only thing is spring sports are really kicking in right now. Track, soccer, tennis, and golf. Um, boys soccer game has a game tonight at home, so pop out. Um, but other activities can be found on the activities uh calendar on uub. Um, that's pretty much it for us, I would add. that anybody out there that wants to volunteer, we're still looking for people for track and I believe the concession for soccer. I don't think I've gotten any other requests, but it comes out through parent square. So, if you have some time, we could really use some volunteers. So, feel free to sign up for any and all events.
006Okay. the my name is Mia from I'm a partner with Bonsack and from and this was the first year that we performed the audit for the district. Um and I just have a summary presentation tonight but I'm happy to go over any questions you have as well. So first we did complete three audits. Um the financial statement audit is what everyone knows and would expect. Um an audit over your financial information. The second audit is over government auditing standards. So this is understanding internal controls and then also compliance with laws and regulations. And the third audit is the federal single audit. Whenever an organization expends 750,000 of total federal awards, they're required to undergo another audit over those federal programs. And as a result, you have three deliverables. Um you have the bound document that
007um has all of your financial statements and uh financial note disclosures. And then we issued two letters. There's one that is stapled and dated March 20th. Um, this is what's called the board governing letter or board communication letter. It talks about the audits we've performed and that there were in your case no issues as we were performing those audits. And then there's one letter. Um, I'll get those to you because I didn't bring them over. Oh, I'm sorry. That's me. My fault. I didn't grab those when I grabbed the books. Um, so there is one letter. Um, this the old term was management advice letter. It's now called the control deficiency letter. These are items that do not rise to a finding level, but we believe they're of importance that we should bring them to
008the board's attention. So, they're more observational comments. That letter is on page one in the audit book. Um, so the results, um, I'm happy to report tonight that there were the financial audit has an unmodified opinion. That's what we call a clean opinion. The financial statements follow accounting principles. So that's that's good news. That's the highest level of opinion you can receive. Under the government auditing standards audit, there are no material items to report. No material compliance findings and no material weaknesses in internal controls. There are what are called significant deficiencies that we are reporting. um they're towards the back of the bound document if you want to go into the details um of those. And when we look at internal controls, we look at design and operation. In this case, it happens to do
009with design access levels and segregating access levels. Um so this was all discussed when we came out. I think it was June or July July and um right away management had come back with uh recommendations and changes to be made for fiscal year 25 as a result of that. There's also a part four in the back of the report that's statutory reporting. The state requires all districts to have certain things tested each year and for us to report back on them. And so you'll see that section. There was nothing material to report in that section. In terms of the single audit, um the largest program of the district is the child nutrition program. So that's going to be um free and reduced breakfast and and lunch. Um the district expended 2.8 million in federal awards
010and the child nutrition program was approximately 1.5 million of that. So by far that's your largest program. A big change that you're going to be seeing is those ESSER dollars are now expired. They had to be spent by fall of 2024. So you're not going to see those large COVID 19 programs going forward. And under that child nutrition program, we test both internal controls and compliance with the federal programs guidelines. And we have no findings to report. So again, a plain opinion. So I'll good news to share tonight. This is a summary of all revenues of the district of all functions. Um, and it's a comparison of fiscal year 2024 to 2023 by significant revenue source. In total, revenues increased 2% from the prior year. And some highlights to point out. Um, one of the
011increases was in charges for services and that's largely from tuition charge to other districts, an increase due to special education tuition billings which are also um dependent on the needs of services that need to be provided. Um you will also see operating grants decreasing and that is because of the esser co 19 funding that is much less in fiscal year 24 compared to what it had been a couple years um when it first came out. Local taxes increased 2% because of increases in assessed valuation. Um no change in tax rate. It was all valuation based and unrestricted state grants increase. This is the state funding formula. It's going to include supplemental funding. Uh it's going to include restricted funding. So it's state sources that are impacting that. And then other um the I'm sorry investment
012earnings you'll see an increase there. That is because of the interest rates at the time for fiscal year 24. The next slide is the expenses of the district, all funds, all functions expenses increased 9%. Uh but there's quite a uh variation here. And uh one thing to note is um the changes, you know, you have a lot of capital going on. So you're some of that is um your interest for the for the debt that was issued in prior years and the debt service to serve that and also the depreciation on those capital assets are going to be included in these numbers. Um but the the main operating functions are instruction and support services and those increased um because of the wage and benefit increases. Um increases were approved at about three three to four
013just under 4% for fiscal year 24. And that's right in line with um the changes in your instruction and support services along with significant increases in building and property insurance um repairs and maintenance and transportation costs. Um, and then because of the remodeling, you had a loss on a capital asset that was deleted. It was a remodel project from 1990. I think that's that's no longer in existence that we needed to write off from the capital assets. And then the last column I just wanted to point out is your business type activities. This would be school nutrition, your child care, and your community education funds. And those expenses are also largely due to wages and benefits and pension actuarial changes from the um pension program, the IP program. I understand that summary. So, but I
014am happy to take comments or questions. I had one quick question on I think it was like page 83. There was like three or four there was like four things that you had said needed corrected. Is there any reason that you don't foresee those being taken care of easily? Um no no I think sometimes it just takes time and implementing and process um and looking at a few lining duty so you don't create another issue right um so sometimes it takes a little bit of time. Okay. But they all seem very doable to you. Okay. Thank you. Anyone else? Thank you. Appreciate your It's a pleasure to work with the district. Thank you. Thank you. We're glad you're here. So now we will jump onto the Yes. Okay. Um, good evening. Thanks for having Jenna
015and I here today. We're going to briefly just introduce ourselves. My name is Christa Evans. I'm a consultant for Total Rewards Consulting. We're a division um from Cuttingham and Butler. Um, prior to being a compensation consultant, I actually was a high school math teacher for a district in Wisconsin. Um, Jenna Bedwell is a colleague of mine that will be helping us out today. Um, prior to coming to TRC, she actually had um, experience in an HR school district also in Wisconsin. So, I think it's just important to note that, you know, not only do we work with um education only specific clients, but we're also coming from a background of public education that I think it's important to note. Um, we have a lot to go over today. We'll try to make it brief, but
016we will be taking questions at the end. Um we're going to start with just a process overview of key policy issues and questions that kind of led our project. Um we'll go into the internal consistency review which was our job evaluation process. Next we'll look at our target market and market comparison which I'm sure we're all wanting to see and discuss. Um from there we'll discuss the pay structure design um and administration and where we're at in the project right now. um and kind of go over some implementation strategy recommendations um that we've been working with the leadership team on. So here's just a brief process overview. Um I do want to thank Lauren and Kate behind me as well as Rosalie. Um we've been working hard. This project started in August. So um we've
017had a lot of discussions. Um there's been a lot of work behind the scenes. So we just want to thank your district for that. Um, we started back in August with just some discussions with HR regarding the state of your current job descriptions. It was really important that when we started this project that we had accurate job documentation, if that's what we're using. Um, we determined that using the TRC job descript job description questionnaire, also known as a JDP, JDQ, was the best process just to ensure that we have not only accurate but current, up-to-date job descriptions if that's how we're evaluating. The next few months were kind of filled with gathering census information from the district as well as getting those JDQs filled out. Um all the GDQs were reviewed by their supervisors as
018well as HR. Our team began that market data collection process after some internal discussions were had kind of regarding who we wanted to compare ourselves to, who we wanted the market to be. We will get into detail in some future slides who that was, why we chose who we did. Once all those JDQ um and job descriptions were received, our team began that job evaluation process. Um in addition, we did do some training with HR on our job evaluation system so that they're able to maintain that system moving forward. In December, then we shared preliminary results with the HR team and had discussions around that internal hierarchy um that was developed from that study. We then brought our findings to the leadership team in January. Again, numerous discussions um around the type of structures and
019implementation strategies the um leadership team was looking for. We drafted up structures. We drafted up some preliminary costing for them um based on those conversations. Um and we're here today to present those. These are the four essential policy questions that the team kept coming back to especially when diffic diff difficult conversations had to be had. Um the first one is defining that target market. Really the questions here are um who are we attracting talent from? Who are we also maybe losing talent to? Um who do we want to compete with? That was determined right away in the beginning of the project. Um, from there we were able again to job evaluate market pricing and then we wanted to determine market placement. Again, numerous discussions back and forth. Really here we're thinking of how do we
020want to compete against that said target market? Do we want to lead the market? Do we want to like the market? Do we want to be at the market? From there, we um decided the design structure questions we asked a lot to the leadership team were just how do you pay each year? How are people going to get raises, right? Um what is this going to look like? And then finally, we're in discussions with that implementation plan and that's really how do we go from where we are today to implementing these new structures. Um, I think it's important, especially when we're talking compensation, which is a very sensitive subject, is what this process was and what this process wasn't. So, let's start with what the process was. This was a review of the district's administrator
021and support staff jobs as it relates to the job content. Again, it's important to note we weren't just out matching job titles. We're really looking at those essential responsibilities um that each position had. um from evaluations and mark pricing, we were then able to rebuild the hierarchy into a grade order list as well as redesign the pay structures. What this process wasn't um it was not a capacity study. Um it was not a performance review of individuals. Um again strictly looking at those job description questionnaires. Um from there we also did not recommend decreasing anyone's wages or eliminate any position. It's it's really just to look at what positions you have for your district and making sure that we're compensating them for the work that's being done. So again, this first part of the project
022was internal consistency, which was our job evaluations. The most important part of a job evaluation is keeping that internal consistency and making sure that we're ensuring that unbiased review of the positions. Um because again we're evaluating and market pricing based off of job job documentation. It was important that we had accurate current up-to-date job descriptions and GDQs for that. Again we did not evaluate any individual's performance or solely on job title alone but instead we used our evaluation which process which we'll explain in a little bit on the key responsibilities. Again, at the end of the project, we just want to emphasize that the whole goal for this is to ensure your employees are being paid appropriately for the work that they provide for your district. So, the bas basis of our job evaluation system
023was a job description questionnaire, also known as a GDQ, um that any individual was invited to fill out. Um, it included different things such as what are your essential responsibilities? What are some typical interactions and communications that you may have? What is your decision-making level of authority? What's your work environment like? What's your minimum qualifications? Um, this was all filled out by individuals themselves. Then it was reviewed by their supervisor. And then finally for HR we also looked at job descriptions and some organizational charts that were provided to us and we also collaborated with the HR team. So these are the um TRC job evaluation factors that we evaluated each position on. Again, we were able to train um the HR department on these factors and our job evaluation tool so that moving forward the
024maintenance um for your job evaluations can be had. So the first factor that we um will uh evaluate jobs with is your thinking challenges and problem solving. Here we're really looking at the context of everyday problems and the complexity of those problems as well as the required response for them. Sometimes it's hard um in education too is to think about the whole school year, not just the beginning of the school year, but the middle of the school year, the end of the school year. What are those typical um thinking challenges and problem solving that's required? Our second factor is our only factor that actually has three components. The first component is about the impact of the um organization for decision making. Um, we really think about, you know, does your decision making affect just me,
025myself, and I? Does it affect a whole department? Does it affect a larger department? Or does your everyday decision-m affect the whole organization? We're also looking at the extent of those actions taken as well as the level of decision- making. Do they have a seat at the table for that decision- making? Can they participate? Um, or do they really not have any say and they're kind of um on on their own a little bit? The third one is our interactions and communications. We're thinking here the context of um our inter interactions. Um again we know that education is so different. Every day something is thrown at us. But again typical interactions we have. We're thinking why are we having those interactions and what is the outcome and effects of those interactions. Our fourth one is
026our work environment. We could think of our OSHA regulations here. So it's twofold. We're thinking what's the potential for accidents or hazards as well as the physical requirements for that job. Finally, and this is the big one, um what's the formal prep and experience for those minimum qualifications. We're thinking education as well as years of experience here. We do want to note that in our system there is an equivalency built in. So, if typically HR would say, hey, I'd really love a bachelor's degree. Um that does equate to an associates in four to five years. So there's an equivalency built in. The reason why this one's a little tricky or I shouldn't say tricky but is is a big one is that the higher the formal prep and experience, the higher the thinking challenges, decision-m
027and interactions and communications are. So when we get job documentation and we evaluate a job and they're saying, you know, it's a high school in one to two years, but you're telling us there's really high level decision making or thinking challenges. That's where we have to go back and look at that job documentation. But I will say because your district decided to do um JDQs, which is a little bit lengthier process, we we didn't have so much back and forth like that because we got the most current accurate information. So this is just an example of um what this possibly could look like for a typical job. So you can see here there's different ratings for those different five factors. Each of those ratings have a different number of points allocating to a total number
028of points. So ranges of these points are identified to create those different alpha pay grades. Um each grade is meant to represent a different cluster of positions with overall similar point totals. So you can see here that this total was 527 that fell in a in the range between 487 and 535 which resulted in grade H. It is important to note that just because a positions are in the same grade does not mean they were evaluated the same way. It just means that their total number of points fell into that grade. After we evaluated and really felt like we had a good handle on what a job does, we went out to the market and did market comparison. So many conversations again were had with the HR about where um what the market is going
029to be. You know, so many times you hear employees saying, "Well, the market said this and the market said that." Well, who are you comparing to and what are you talking about? I think that's really important. So, it's really twofold here. The first is who the comparable marketplace is. Really, we're thinking of that traditional approach of who is most like Urbandale, right? We're going to look at um different things of similar size, scope, and the close um geographic proximity to Urbandale. But the second component is also that competitive marketplace. And so here both public and private organizations were discussed. Um we want to make sure we're measuring positions that are found across industry. So there are positions for the district that are found outside of education. We want to make sure that we're also measuring
030those positions as well. This is just going to result in a more diverse and holistic um market. You're going to hear us um talk a little bit a lot of it about benchmark jobs here. Um and so what we what we want to make sure to understand is just that um benchmark positions is a position that we were actually able to market price with sufficient data. We felt that the the position we matched really matched those essential roles and responsibilities as well as making sure that we had sufficient number of data points. Again, we're really making sure that the data that we have is stable and reliable. And we also want to make sure that we have a mix of data sources for that. So here you have the different list of um the market
031data sources that we used um both industry and cross industry. Um so from those discussions you can see the K12 school districts um that we used for that comparable list as well as different surveys that um our um consulting team has access to. Again really looking at um your geographic region specific. From there, um, we were able to benchmark 80% of the positions, resulting in 85% of your employees. As a district, overall, your market was sitting at 95% of the median market. So, just just some background here. The median is equal to the 50th percentile. So, what that means is that half of the market is paying more and half of the market is paying less. The sample size that we were able to benchmark was high. We usually aim to 50 to 70% of
032positions. We felt comfortable benchmarking 80% of your positions and that's really helping us build a reliable pay structure um because our numbers were so high. So what you can see here and I always love this slide because I was a high school math teacher. So I was like see kids you use it in real life. Um, so on so on the x- axis you have our job evaluation points again stemming from those five different factors and then on the y- ais you're going to see that base target market estimate. Those little red diamonds represent those benchmark positions. What you see here is um that the correlation coefficient was 97%. That's really high. Again we aim for about 91 to 92%. It just demonstrates that strong correlation between the job evaluation points and the target market.
033Why is this important? Um the correlation was so strong that we're able to utilize that job evaluation process to place nonbenchmark jobs into an appropriate pay range. Um this approach is intended to provide the district with a balanced pay system. Um it's not a pure market-based model, right? So, we're balancing that job evaluation and that internal perspective along with what the market is saying. So, we're just trying to balance those internal and external needs to build that pay structure. So, after we looked at that, um, we developed and came back with some various pay um, plans for the district. There's a lot of information in here, so I'm going to do my best to walk you through a little bit of it. Uh this first one is the non-exempt structure and I will show you
034the exempt structure. Um for both there were many discussions around the structure development. Um we want to make sure that we're balancing Urbandale's financial responsibility and competitiveness and that was really the forefront of our conversations. We explored many different uh structure types. Um it was decided for the non-exempt employees that we would have a step structure and for the exempt employees we're going to be recommending an open structure and I'll share with you what that means. Um for both we decided to anchor that control point. Um and again control point referring to the midpoint of the pay range and we anchored that to 50th percent again meaning half will pay more and half will pay less. We did, I do want to make sure to tell the board that we did explore um anchoring that
035control point to a 50th 75th blend as well as a 75th percentile. But after discussions and looking at the costing and financial implications of that, it was just too heavy. So we did decide as a leadership team um to anchor that control point at that 50th percentile. Um next we explored different minimums and maximums of the structure. Um one thing to note that these percentages are all based off of that control point or that median of the market. Finally, we explored various step increments here. There are six steps up into the control point um from the minimum to the control point at 2 and a half% for each step. There are then five steps at 2% step increments. um from the control point to the maximum. The idea here is that the larger steps from
036the min minimum to the control point is going to move your employees faster to that median market and providing more financial um money towards that beginning of the step structure. Um and in a few slides we'll talk about the maintenance of that structure. So this is the exempt structure. It's an open structure. You can see it's it looks a lot different. Again, want to point out that that control point is still anchored to the 50th percentile. Um the development for an open structure for exempt employees is really to provide flexibility. Uh it really is I think most important to allow flexibility for new hires as they can be placed anywhere in the range based off of experience and district needs. Um it also allows financial flexibility each year in deter determining those appropriate increases. The
037leadership team can decide to provide across the board increases or they can give increases based on performance. Um both structures have a minimum of 85% but you can see in this structure that you have a maximum of 125 and that's just typically because in an open range model it results in a higher earning potential. This is contrasted with that step model due to the predictability of those steps and that financial implication of that and this provides a clear pathway to the max implementation strategy and exploration. The leadership team is currently exploring various implementation strategies again balancing that financial impact. Um it's important uh we want to address that it's important that the district balances affordability and structure utilization. Um one of the decisions to make will be the pay philosophy behind how to pay those
038that are identified over that maximum both in the non-exempt structure and the exempt structure. We reviewed three different options that we have listed up here. The first is called a hard red circle which would mean that that incumbent would receive no pay increase. The second option is called a soft red circle. This is our recommended approach and this is where um incumbents over the max would receive a nonbase building stipen. That stipen could match the percentage increase others are receiving. It also could be different. There is a third option of a no limit and that would mean that um they would just keep providing base building increases. So it is our consulting firm to recommend the soft red circle for that. Um here the maintenance of the structure we really want to make sure you
039understand that this is twofold. Um first is that both of the structures should have an annual assessment for structure adjustments to keep pace with that target market. So you want to take both structures and make sure that you're aging that structure forward. um the adjustments would then be made to that control point or that median market at 100%. And then those steps or the min and max on the open structure would be based off of that adjustment. Um in the non-exempt structure, we would want to make sure that we are moving and progressing people a step or awarded a step if the district had that financial ability. Um, and then for those over the maximum, again, we would recommend providing a non-base building lump sum until that structure moves forward enough that their current pay
040might fall back into the structure. Um, here are just some HR compensation um, maintenance tools that we are recommending. First is an internal job evaluation review. Again, we have trained the HR department with our job evaluation system. And so if you get a new position to your um district or a position has changed in significantly in responsibilities, the HR team is trained on that and they can evaluate that. Um our team is also here to help. We also have external support through us for both ad hoc job evaluations and market pricing moving forward. So any questions for Jenna or myself? It's a lot of information. Yeah. Can you help me understand how like the the increases that you're talking about? I know that's negotiated, right? So, how some of it is, some of it isn't.
041Okay. Just the uh because teachers are not included in this, right? So, it's just the UEW which would be negotiated. Okay. So, how how does that fit with what you're recommending? So, we would work in conjunction with union leadership. Okay. Um to um similar to any other year to land in a place that is uh an agreed upon settlement but utilizing uh the new structure. uh have had initial conversations even pre any negotiations with the UEW about that. Okay. And we don't know to the affordability point if we can't afford the because we had different levels like a 2% a 4% I mean 6% we we had them run strategies. Yeah. And if if we can't do the plan the way that it comes out, we need to bring you guys some options. So, we'll
042need to run more numbers possibly with Steve's team. We'll need to take a look at what the teacher group is suggesting. And all of that has to be put together. So, what we bring to you is actually something we can go forward with. It might be a piece of this. It might be a particular group of this. It might be put this aside for a year and see. I we don't know. But we felt like you guys at this point should hear what has been done over all of these months because there's been a lot. I mean, the HR team has spent hours and hours working on this. So, this is this is a lot of really good work. I think for me, I feel like it's always been just kind of which way is
043the wind going to figure out. You know, you can ask superintendent what they do for positions, but this is a more scientific way to look at it to match apples to apples and be able to figure that out. We we weren't looking to be the best in the metro area. We knew that there's no way that we were going to be able to afford what Walke could pay, for example. So, that's where the median came from is if we can if we can be in the middle, then that's not a bad place to be. So that's all of those pieces of conversation ended up with the two charts that you saw tonight. So again, there's got to be more conversation on what we bring to you. So going back to page 18, could you talk
044me through a hypothetical position that we have and and and what does that look like in there? Like Sure. pick a job that Sure. So like if a position, let's say, is in grade E, we'll say, right? Okay. So, um, one of the implementation strategies is to place them on a step that provides an increase. That's usually where we're going to start with. So, let's say that the employee is making$1910 an hour. Okay. Okay. We're going to place them on that step two at 1963 because that's going to be the step that provides an increase for them. Okay. Now, as a maintenance structure moving forward, you're going to want to age your structure forward, right? So meaning that those control points down the middle right are going to change typically maybe 2% 3% we don't
045know the state of the economy right um but then all of those 85 87 is also going to change now not only is your structure going to age forward but if you have the financial stability you would also hope then that employee A on step two is also going to move to step three next year. So again that maintenance is moving forward. Okay. So where like wherever they are it's not that everyone starts at correct that 100%. It's closest to where they are. Yes. And then these two and a half steps are the the steps that we would have traditionally seen before. Right. Okay. And the the idea again behind having larger steps in the beginning from the min minimum to the control point is to move people faster because that control point again is
046what we're aiming to pay people. Right. That's that anchored to the 50th percentile. After that we just slow down a little bit um up to the max. Can you talk about real quick? One of the things that we've had conversations about and to understand it is a goal is to get everybody on the scale. In other words, there are some that are in a in a certain grade that aren't on this particular scale based on our current structure. Like E, they're making maybe $18 an hour, right? Okay. To get them on the scale, they got to get a$17 more. Okay. where the person that's making 1910 to go to 1963 is only going to be 53 cents. So, okay, it's not a hey, everybody gets a 1% raise or 2% raise because if those people
047aren't even on the schedule, they're going to get a significant to get them your implementation is going to be the most costly is to get these structures in place. To Rosali's point, you know, moving them on to the structure can be very expensive. There's different implementation strategies around it. There's even different implementation strategies as far as saying, hey, I want everyone to have at least a 2% or at least a 3%. So therefore, they might move two steps further, but that's, you know, what your district is, your leadership team is exploring right now because of those financial implications of implementing a new structure. So that first year of implementing it is the most costly. And is there any debate or discussion on where your job fits in grade IHG? Yeah. So that was the job
048evaluation that we did. Okay. Yep. So we we our team first job evaluated all of those. Um we placed them in that we call it like an internal hierarchy or grade order list. Hey, these are the jobs that we think are an I and H and G. And again, we're looking at the market two, right? So that's that twofold. We want that internal view but we want that external view as well. There were discussions with HR and leadership. We went back and forth because again that internal viewpoint is important. This is not a pure marketbased system. Um and so from that those control points are derived from that linear regression from there. Okay. So yes there was and that was so that was your team and our team working together working together to decide those%.
049Yep. Okay. Thank you. And again, I think it's important that um your district did decide to do JDQs because I think we had less back and forth just because we had a true snapshot of what positions were doing today and not just what their title is. A huge thank you to the employees who filled those out because they were timeconuming, but they were really, really beneficial. They were really because not only do we want to make sure that we've evaluated them correctly, but we also want to make sure that when we went out to the market that we were benchmarking the correct job that we're not just doing it title for title. Can you speak to how performance reviews impact the scale? It did not. We did not look at performance at all. But like
050moving forward as an employees on this, how would their increase be influenced by their performance? Sure. So, uh when a district has a sound performance management system in place where the factors that are being measured and assessed are um identified and consistently applied across the district. You can use the outcomes of those performance evaluation systems in two ways. On a step model like this, you could say that uh high performing individuals may be eligible for a step movement in six months as opposed to waiting a year. You could decide that high performing individuals may be eligible for two steps as opposed to one step. So there's different ways that you could apply a performance element to a step model. In the open range model, that would be more like your your typical what I describe
051as like a private sector merit matrix, right? So where high performing individuals lower in their pay range may be eligible for a larger percentage than your standard percentage increase based upon those performance outcomes. So there's flexibility in both models to utilize a pay for performance model if that was the desired approach. But this is independent of that. It is the the creation of it is absolutely independent of individual's performance today. Yep. Okay. Thank you for clarifying that. Yeah, it's a good question. What kind of maintenance is involved with like all of the job rankings and keeping track of where is the 50th percentile? This something we need to do every year, every five years, you know, seems like it was a large undertaking. Is this something we can, you know, do a little bit every
052year on like a 10 year cycle? Just how does that work? Yeah, that's a great question. Um, usually we'll tell our clients that the maintenance for a market review is every two to three years to your point to go out and do just a market study and seeing where um, your jobs lie there. Again, it depends on um, the state of the economy as well. Um, but our recommendation is that every two to three years you go back and you do a a new market study um, to to take a look at your jobs and how they're falling in your market competitiveness. Um right now, like I said, you're at a 95th percentile. If we go and do a market study in two to three years and you drop low, then we know that um
053we have some work to do. But if you're doing the maintenance of your structure and moving that structure forward and moving people forward, if you can afford it, um hope you don't fall behind. Then the other piece just to clarify too is with that market update as Christa's describing it, that's a testing of your benchmarks. So it's not the first part of the the project which was the setting of your internal hierarchy. Chris has mentioned many times that your HR team now is equipped to manage that. So that piece of it this is this is where comp is not a set it and forget it. You you did it once so you're good for the next. Yeah. You want to keep with it after you did all this work. So as jobs change as new
054positions are added using that job evaluation process to place them into your structure is going to maintain that hierarchy. So you don't have to revisit that hierarchy. Our clients who pay attention to that and stay on top of those job changes can get away with not doing a study like this, a whole study for 8 to 10 years. Okay? So there's longevity to it, but there is some maintenance work that goes into it as well. especially if a position has changed. Um if you're doing restructuring sometimes within departments, uh if you have a brand new position um for your district, um again, Lauren and Kate were trained. Jen and I are always happy to help them out. Um some clients will say, "I took a stab at it, but can you can you take a
055look at it as well?" Um we're here to partner with you and to help you through that. [Music] Thank you. Thank you. Human services. Good evening. Brandon Sh, director of teaching and learning and I've had the opportunity this year to work alongside our three human services um teachers uh to support human services curriculum review. And so last year they engaged in empathy interviews. This is their opportunity to share what is currently working uh related to uh the delivery of instruction as well as programming in this area along with providing opportunities for growth. This is their opportunity to share what might not be going uh the way we would hope. Um and then we also had the 912 uh human services teachers uh engage in their state review uh as part of the CTE or career
056and technical education review. Those operate on a cycle and so we've kind of paired up that review to happen the year prior to the actual curriculum review. Uh one of the reasons we did that is because it's a comprehensive review of programming. It's opportunity for them to self-score themselves as well as set goals for the future and the programming. And so we were able to use all that information along with the state feedback uh to guide that review. Uh and then this fall really began some collective learning around um human services and that work along with um outlining our program vision. They also reviewed the course sequence for 912 um to look at what we're offering. Part of that process is to look at uh what is the current requests for those courses uh in
057the previous years uh as well as look at areas school districts around us and to see what they're offering as part of their programming in that area. And then we also time reviewing uh the career and technical education standards for this area in order uh to pace those out and scaffold them that we offer FCS or family and consumer sciences in sixth grade, seventh grade in the current middle school schedule. Uh and so th those two courses uh allow our students to get kind of the wide band of all things human services. So they do a unit on just in general what is family and consumer sciences, what are jobs and careers in that area. They also do some sewing uh and some design. Uh they also have a unit on culinary arts and child
058and growth development. Uh and so they get kind of a wide net of the different facets of human services. Uh and then moving into ninth grade, that's when those most more specialized courses occur. Uh and we have the previous course title uh and then the updated course title. So part of uh kind of the work in the review was to identify are there courses uh that maybe aren't capturing the essence of the course? because as we put forth those courses, we want to make sure that students uh have a clear understanding of what the offering is. Uh and as part of that um really switched, we used to have our courses in the culinary arts were called food and nutrition uh one and food and nutrition 2 and really uh revised that to be introduction
059to culinary arts. And then we um brought to you in the fall uh two new course proposals and created the Jay-Hawk Culinary Academy where we're introducing ProStart one and ProStart 2 um which allows for a more broader um sense of just food management and what it they learn skills around restaurant management as well along with lots of different culinary techniques. Uh and then we are trying to remove actual numbers in our course titles to be more uh the Roman numerals to make it consistent with other courses. So you'll see that change uh across the courses as well as getting rid of uh courses that have 101 in them and instead simply calling them the name because often 101 suggests kind of like a lower level or introductory. uh and so wanted to make that change
060as well. You'll also see textiles and clothing was revised to sewing and fashion design uh more updated and more representative of the work that they do in that course. And then we shifted the foundations to education that initial field experience uh to align to um the academy. So we have the Jay-Hawk culinary academy and then we have uh the teacher academy uh strand as well. And then adult living skills, uh, we updated that to be adulting essentials. Uh, when you look at this list, where do we sign up for adulting, right? I know. Uh, that is the only course uh that's kind of left. Uh, we did not complete the review of that. So, that was delayed till next year. So, just know that that will be coming to you uh next year. And so
061then this just paints the picture of what that updated sequence is uh at the 912 level um and how that works. We are not offering ProStart 2 or Joel Jay-Hawk Culinary Academy um that ProStart 2 this next upcoming year. And the rationale behind that is they need ProStart one before they can enter ProStart 2. Um, and so we're hopeful that there will be enough that uh students that leave ProStart one that do indeed want to continue on to ProStart 2. So uh this just kind of shows that we did work around those pathways. I know that that was brought to you earlier in January. Uh but we that is part of this whole human services pathway at the high school just the potential careers. Um the career options are laid out and then um those
062potential credentials, certifications and internships. What I'll share is in the human services pathway as part of the review, uh the team identified some industry recognized credentials. One is the ProStart certification. So a student can test at the end of ProStart one to receive their ProStart certification. Uh the other is is all students in uh ProStart uh will also uh complete uh in the first unit the safe serve food handling certification. So they'll have that uh and then in the teacher academy strand uh the for child growth and development too uh the industry recognized uh credential is the parah educator and the pediatric uh first aid. Uh and so layering in those industry recognized credentials as part of that pathway so that students have those certifications as a result of their work in those courses. This
063was the vision that the team identified through their learning. And so on the left you see kind of the framework for family consumer sciences and CTE and all the different elements and then really highlighting that idea of offering those hands-on experiences, collaboration and practical skills. And that's been embedded in all the courses uh that were reviewed as well as making sure that we're embedding uh that career connected learning uh within each course as well so that students are getting opportunities to hear from industry experts as well as go on job site uh visits. um two in ProStart. One having a food truck uh kind of throwdown where uh they plan kind of a food truck menu uh and then they offer that to the um student body uh as an opportunity to have an audience
064for their food. uh as part of the process also reviewing those standards and then making sure we prioritize them because there is a lot uh in this whole strand of CTE and so making sure that we're prioritizing uh those standards that um are most enduring uh and important and then making sure that we're aligning like standards to those prioritized standards. So, we're covering everything but making sure we're assessing towards those that we're lifting up. You'll see kind of the culmination of that prioritization and the document that's attached which is the learning requirement document which really uh summarizes what are the big ideas that students can expect to learn. Those are also shared with students uh upon entry to the course and then they're used also for um assessment purposes as well. So the one recommendation
065for additional instructional materials is uh the course and assessment uh for SA serve safe sorry I think I may have said that wrong the first time I apologize surf safe food handling um I didn't include that in the quote because we're actually in the process of also working on a grant with the state uh to pay for industry recognized credentials. So I kind of set that aside. Um, but the idea is is that Surf Safe would be part of that first unit uh before they even step into the kitchen uh and start their labs. Uh, but then the student book and teacher edition um for ProStart one uh is what we're recommending for the instructional materials for that course. What questions do you have about the human services curriculum? Brandon, I'm looking at slide four
066where you've got the flow listed and under DMAC credit options, it includes a teacher academy, but it doesn't include the culinary academy. Is that just something that's off the table? Is that something that we're working toward or is DMAC where what where are we with that? Yeah, it's really based on uh the instructor. Uh so the instructor has to meet the qualifications to offer a course for concurrent enrollment. So that's a large part of that process and right now there's no kind of timeline for that. Okay. It is that we do have students that do go to DMAC uh for coursework related to this. Yes. But the certification that they get is a recognized certification for completing that. It is. Yep. It is on the It is on the state's uh list of industry recognized
067credentials. I think it just got added this spring. Um so that's a real positive. Um the other piece that isn't in the quote, and we're still kind of working through this, but not in instructional materials that students in ProStart will have a uniform. So they'll have their apron, uh the chef beanie, and then also a chef coat. Um, as part of that process, there is are competitions related to ProStart. Many area districts in our area compete. Um, so that has potential as well within the ProStart program. Thank you, Brandon. Thank you. Okay. It's my understanding there's no public comment. public comment. So, we're going to move into approving fiscal year 24 district audit. Just ask the administration asked the board approved the audit as was presented tonight. And Jenny, on your page 83 that you
068were talking earlier. Yep. Let me get to that. Um we have on the very first one with the um budget amounts on the um certified budget we were over in two categories but overall we were not over budget. Okay. um in that we use forecast five mo module to kind of predict and um follow through and try to forecast that out and sometimes we can get it sometimes you just don't because you have expenses that come in late that have to be if there if items are um completed by June 30th we have to pay them in that fiscal year even though if they may be generated into supposed to be into next year. Okay. On that one, um the certifi the certified enrollment and the um supple supplementary waiting are usually categories where if
069we have a district that didn't know someone moved, uh that student might be categorized or under one district and then we end up not knowing that until later on and then that causes an audit adjustment. And the same with the the class on the supplemental meeting. Okay. And then the um community ed piece as you can see shows that it was corrected for this year. Yeah. Thank you. And they talked about getting the audit earlier next year. So we expect to be able to present in December like we normally would. As Katherine was just whispering to me, um it is very basic that a lot of districts go over in one or two of those categories. Even when you amend the budget, it's just hard to forecast those expenses sometimes. Yeah. And so if you
070know the typically the officers um go in with report um so all the years that I was an officer, this is almost identical. I mean it's it's just very common. Mhm. Um, I would say that in, you know, the time that I was inside and the time I've been on the board, we have improved our ability to predict and track the money remarkably well. And the internal control pieces, it's kind of funny that previous auditors had no problems with the way we previously had things and then they came in like they really went through things with a fine tooth comb. And I mean they really we it's probably the most extensive audit I've been through in 40 years and they did a really bangup job going through things. So yeah and we absolutely and we
071and we made corrections on those immediately and have different things done within our office. So I would move to approve the uh 24 audits. Williams will second. And this will be a roll call. Hower. Yes. Kent. Yes. Made. Yes. Mankey. Yes. Yes. Williams. Yes. Young. Yes. Motion passes 70. Okay. And the open enrollment capacities for the 2526 school year. Stephanie Davis, director of student services. Um tonight we are here with the annual review of the open enrollment um capacity. And this is just a reminder that this isn't a class size determination. The open enrollment cap um is the moment at which we stop accepting open enrollment applications. So when we the class reaches that size, so class size can expand above and beyond that. Um and just as a reminder, a student is open enrolled
072to the district. you may request a particular school um but the open enrollment is to the district. If we can honor the request, we certainly do. Um so no change is requested at the elementary or high school levels this coming year. The elementary levels have been um the capacity has been in place for about eight years. Um we are requesting a change at the middle school from 280 to 315 for this coming year. So, um just a little bit of a change in the middle school schedule going forward and so that allows us to um change that number going forward. Um so, just as a reminder, the open enrollment window has closed for grades 1 through 12, but if you're interested in open enrolling for your kindergarten student, you can do that through September 1st.
073And the only class at the middle school, I remember our conversation today, that is now at the 3:15 would be 8th grade. So, we would not we aren't going to get any more unless it's a due cause situation. But just because it's due cause doesn't to come in doesn't mean that we are obligated to accept it. So, if there's no space, we would decline it for the same reason that our programming or our seats were limited. We had a total of 10 for the middle school this year. Kindergarten continues to come in and I do have a total but I didn't finalize it for elementary. So I can share that with you next board meeting if you would like. You say 10 10 per grade or 10? No, there was uh one seventh grader, three
074sixth graders and these are new but new applications not ones that are currently there. So, eight would be closed now. Six and eight would both be closed. Yeah, I can't remember the number off the top of my head today. I'm cheating. I'm looking at the numbers. So, we had a little bit of an issue with open enrollment at the beginning of the year at Mstead and some kids that ended up having to move because kids within the district. So, I'm curious as to why we're not are we factoring that in when we think about what these numbers are like because we've got four different buildings. If we lower that number, we have a little more more control over where we maybe send kids. Um because again, we're not it's not that we're not welcome welcoming
075students to our district. We're just kind of having a little more control then if these numbers were a little bit lower so that we don't get ourselves in a situation like we were at the beginning of the year. Well, Mstead I would say is is a unique example that five families in fifth grade moving in in a day was never something that we expected. Right. And I will admit that we got we open enrollment at the elementary level got a little out of our hand at a point. Elijah has a better system where she's monitoring by school, by grade to make sure. So if somebody sends in I mean we had a number come in for Karen Acres which was great. We're able to place all of those. You have some that came in for
076a grade at um Mstead that we can't take. So that family would be notified. I think that might be one that said Mstead or Polarius. So she's making those contacts with the families and saying this seat is not we can't take any kids at this level. So I think we have a better process for monitoring where those open enrollment requests are coming from. I guess I guess in my it just and and I and I think about the middle school too and and we anticipated this problem because if if we had if we you know if we kept the open enrollment at 25 for fifth grade, we're still way over capacity at middle school. And I keep hearing things about a change in schedule at the middle school, but I know that less than three
077years ago, we just changed the schedule. So we don't have any knowledge on the board of what this new schedule is looking like. So, it's a little bit hard and feels a little premature to make a decision on this when we don't have any knowledge of the change that's happening to the middle school schedule because that feels like a pretty significant change going from 280 to 3:15. And so, I'm a little bit uncomfortable with the position that we're in to to make a decision on that. And so I I'm I'm struggling with the elementary position because I think I think we need to be a little more mindful about how we can be even across our buildings. And I think by lowering that number, we can control where those open enrollment students go. And I'm
078I'm struggling with with um the the change in middle school because I I just I don't know what the new schedule is going to be or what that's going to look like. So I don't know how we can take this many more students potentially in those three grades. Well, we don't know. We're actually meeting again tomorrow, uh, Wednesday, okay, with Dr. Mlin and her team to talk about. We have a model schedule that we've recommended that we found some things we need to talk about today because they won't there's concerns about them. So, the idea is right now any period you have 10 spaces for kids to go. So, that's 31.5. So 32 per class if it was a straight even division. It's not a straight even division always. But then the model we're trying
079to get to is where they have at least 11 places to go because that'll bring the class down even more. So that's the how do you do that with the number of staff that you have in a restructure of the day? That's the that's what we're trying to work out now. If we did nothing, we would still be in in the eighth grade. It'd be the only one that would be the highest straight across the board at 32 a class, but the other grades should be okay. So, that's the details that we have not we thought we had worked out, but we don't have worked out. I don't know. I mean, we do have those middle school 10 on the open enrollment request tonight. So, if the board decided not to approve this and wait,
080we would have to make a note and probably pull that item and not approve those 10 that are on for the middle school if that was the board's choice. Can we start with like elementary or middle school and move through them because I also have similar questions. So, maybe if I start with elementary. So, the 25 students per class is our maximum at where we would decline open enrollment. So, if like Jenny says, we were to move that down, we would basically be turning away open enrollment students earlier, but there's still and that would cap then our class sizes for enrolled students too. Would would you still try and place? Well, if No. Well, if this is where you capped say fifth grade at 25 at Mstead or Valerius, you'd have a hundred before at
081the point you would um close open enrollment. But again, open enrollment is done right now anyway except for kindergarten. And I think the misnomer that people have is that it's 25 period. 100 I can't have anymore. But I believe it was two over is the recommended number to be say 27. So at that point though, you still have, which is where we ended up last year, you still have people that move in that are residents of that zone. So to make room for them is where the open enrolled are going to have to move. And we've changed the letter that they get once they're accepted in open enrollment. So tomorrow Elijah has letters ready to go assuming that these kids are accepted. And in that letter it tells them that you're accepted to the district,
082but you're not it that open enrollment is not to a school other than high school, middle school, but you're you could be moved. And for context, at the elementary level of all of the grade levels in all of our buildings, there are only two that are closed right now. So, and yeah, so there second and fifth at Mstead. Otherwise, we have plenty of space. So, it's across the district, this this number has been working very well. Is there reason for us to look at policy change instead of this in terms of what happened with the open enrollment situation last year on how we handle the open enrollment? Like could the board modify policy with we don't move a student if or we do move an open enrolled student if or do we follow law that
083you open enroll to the district you open enroll. That's the law. So that's the broadest piece. If the board decided that you don't want to move open enrolled students or you want to define it in policy then we could draft that and share it with the attorney. Um, I think that's still within the law because you're still saying you can come to the district, we have a seat here, but we don't have a seat here. And we could choose to guarantee it in certain circumstances. If it's a fifth grade student or if it's um something like that if we wanted, we could pursue that. I don't know any districts that have that in their policy. I know that they're all pretty well following the IASB's uh script, so to speak, for in andout open enrollment.
084That's all my questions for elementary and then and then but then we'd have the issue of like again then class size at Homestead might be 28 and you know Valarius might be 24 and that I guess that's where I'm thinking if we lowered this number even by one student we then have that gives us more flexibility to make sure we have room you know and and even it out more. Well we have that issue already. I mean, we have classes in the district that might have 20 kids in them and other schools they have 26. Right. And Right. Right. You can't shift that around because you technically have the space. Right. So, Right. We can't control that. That's what I'm saying. This is just a piece of something that we do have a little more
085control over. So, would it give us that flexibility if we lowered this? Is it that I guess that's what I'm questioning in my mind is would it give us as a district to be more equitable among our classrooms? I can tell you that the volume wants the east side schools. Valerius and Homestead are highly selected. Yeah. Schools. Not that the other schools are not right fabulous desired and great schools, but that's where the volume is for the last couple of years. So, I guess that's a decision you guys have to How often do you have people that when you offer them a different building that they get turned down? Is that they turn it down? They say, "No, we only want this building." Is that frequent, infrequent? I think it's I depends. I mean, if
086I'm if I live in De Moines, I don't want to drive to Webster. Not that it's far, but Valerius and Homestead are right here. So I think it depends on where the person's coming from. If you live in Walke, maybe Webster is much closer for you. So it's geographic for some people. Some people it's where they work. Like I work closer to Webster. I might live in De Moine, but I work by Webster. So I'm going to have my kid there in case I need to go. That's a a convenient place. I think it varies unless you guys have seen different things. It's I can't speak to that. I mean when I was doing the registar thing it was I I probably had an equal amount of both and you run into the same kind
087of thing for preschool like where do people choose to go to preschool they're going to go closer especially the younger kids where they can get to quicker. At what point on the timeline do open enrolled students and their families know which building they'll be attending? Well, we were hoping that would be tomorrow, right? Well, because I'm just wondering like is that something that we can say you you know you can come to our district. We can't tell you your building assignment until closer to the school year. So that maybe we avoid I think you you know I mean we can certainly do what the board directs us to do but I think that families want to know now where their kids are going to go to school and I'm afraid if we held off giving
088them that information we might lose some of those open enrollments too. And that at a point if we haven't signed contracts, I mean, we're looking at changes in personnel if I don't But are you going to lose them in August when you say, "Oh, guess what? Now your child can't go to so they've got to go to Webster." Well, that could you Well, that I don't I don't know. I think it would depend on the kid. If they've applied to more than one district, right, then they could be holding on to one, waiting on the other, and finally say, "I'm not going to go because I can't get an answer or they won't tell me what school." I I don't know. Yeah. No, I don't know either. I'm just what happened in August. I mean,
089now we all know how it works, right? We haven't been through that. Um, we also had no deadline. That that was a part of the complicated process is we didn't have a deadline. We had to act on those daily. And all of the ones that have come in are on. She might have gotten a couple continuations. Those are kids that are already ours. They're not adding anything to our number, but they might have moved out. So, they have to fill it out so that it's a continuation process. But everything that has been that was received prior to what was it March 1st, the deadline has been processed. So other than kindergarten, which those have even been processed, but they continue to come in daily. So the letter that goes out tomorrow says, "Welcome to our
090district. You'll be attending Homemstead or whatever building. This could change potentially like there's some sort of We should have brought a copy of the letter. I don't pull it up. um that there's a general under that there's an understanding that you're open enrolled to the district. I get a lot of emails from Elisha trying to pull I had her send it to me a couple of but what happened last year that was like the first time that's happened. So unusual. We have moved kids since I've been here but not not like that. That was that was extreme. So the letter the generic letter because they're fillin she does a database um on board meeting date school district board of education formally approved open enrollment. Oh, that's an out. Sorry. UCSD will make every effort to
091ensure that the student will remain in the aforementioned school in future school years. However, the student may be transferred to a different school within the district if necessitated by classroom capacity. And this approval is effective until your student graduates or ends your enrollment. Um, do you have a priority? See, future year language is what kind of throws me because if we have to do some horse trading over the summer, I think we need to maybe modify that language a bit. Yeah. And then how do students get prioritized for the move? Was it like a first or last in first out or we went with the last application or the Yeah, the last Now the hard part is fifth grade and the last application was three years ago. Yeah. So that was a tough tough decision.
092So like Jenny proposed, if we lower that down, if we were to lower down the number on even the two to five because that's the two that we have a higher capacity, does that I know you can't know and I know you can't forecast, but would that have avoided this issue? No. The fifth grade issue this year? No. you'd have to lower it by four or five and early enough before they all came in that so for it to impact it could be years down the road. Okay. And neighborhood houses are turning over in certain areas and not in other areas. So you can't predict when somebody's going to an older couple might be in a house but then they put it on the market and somebody with four kids moves in. Hey, we're all
093going to Homemstead. And depending on the grade they're in, I mean, they could be twins, they could be triplets. We just can't possibly predict what that looks like. Kristen, did you have more on the middle school? I have more on the middle school question. Um, I guess like Jenny was talking about with the schedule change, um, with us not having all of that information, will the board see and approve the schedule change or is that handled at an administration level? I didn't plan to bring it to the board. That would be something to work with administration on. And so then you were talking about there may still be some changes. What's the feedback process on that schedule look like right now? Will that will the teachers have another chance to provide input into that? um
094or will it be handled again administration? I hadn't planned to at this point. So that's some of the conversation that we need to have and then relating to that um if we were to approve the 315 today and the schedule, let's say for some reason didn't change. I know that's probably not a likely outcome, but let's say that the schedule doesn't change. What What does that look like in You'd still have if it was straight across the board, you'd still have 31.5 32 kids per class, which would be probably some periods and not others. Is there a big elective class that period that takes like choir takes a lot more kids off the table? So, it might be 29. Depends. Is it a small class that's not going to have that many? Like I's not
095going to be a huge class. That's not going to really affect that in that number. It would probably still be at the 31 and a half as long as there's somewhere else for the rest of those 15 kids or 14 kids to go. I'm sure. Can I ask what what's the motivation behind increasing that number so much? Because this is potentially 105 students that we're adding to the school. If if we if we reached that number, that seems like a lot. Like what's the motivation behind this change? number of open enrollment applications that we're declining for the middle school or that we're telling people you can apply, but we're not going to have space because we've been closed for two years now. And then some don't apply. That's why we can't really get the hard
096and fast data because once we tell them that, some people don't apply at all. Some people will send it in hoping that there's something that will come up, but we've declined enough applications and I my assumption was that the board wanted us to be able to have take those applications. So again, this is really your this is really your decision as a board. I mean, we do have the 10 on there tonight that we need to know. If you know, you want to take those off of approval and turn them into a decline and not do anything, then that can happen. But we just have to be to your point about taking elementary kids by the time they get to middle school, we're already over. We're never going to take an open enrollment for a
097middle school again. If we don't if we don't do something, we're never going to take any. And I went back through enrollment numbers of the middle school for up to pre-COVID era and we were at 346 some years for eighth grade. So, we've changed some staffing since then and change some room utilization. Um, so I think there's potential, but I think it hinges on what that schedule looks like and how that Well, that's just I feel like we're making we're adding the students before we have this worked out and that just doesn't feel right in in the position that we're in tonight. And so, that's where I'm really uncomfortable. I think it's really interesting to to know that there we're only 10 for the middle school, but I think that does go back to so
098close and everybody's been like, "Oh, it's not even an option for our kids." Um, and there are families that move into the Urbandale city thinking that they're coming to the Urbandale school district and they don't realize that they live north of Meredith or whatever, just on the other side of that line, you know, and they don't have that opportunity. They came here wanting to go to Urbanddale. It's part of the reason why they picked our community. Um it is you know it is discouraging for those families and probably doesn't I wouldn't say look the best but you know it closes those opportunities for us because then they're attending our neighborhood you know their neighborhood school or whatever and they're not going to come back for high school because then they are rooted in the school
099that they've um attended. My question is, did we decrease the open enrollment capacity with the schedule change three years ago? Yes. Yes. And and I I remember I do remember that board meeting. We were like, wait, what's happening? And and the board at that time was questioning and wanting to know why it wasn't more in line with the rest of the district. And the rest of the district has not gone that way. So I I think I I'm just affirming that that was the impression I had from the board when this all began a few years ago. Yeah. And I think you can look to um like you mentioned there are people I think who just assume that they'll be able to get in and um that does create some stressful situations for people I
100think. Um, and then you know we talk about our sports numbers and things like that too and there's this pinch point at the middle school that doesn't line up with our elementary and our high school capacities and so how do we plan long term and I think this is a step towards that but I think we might be missing some pieces in terms of make us making overall I mean with the open enrollment piece being closed now and we've got 10 students Um, do we do we allow them to come in this year and see how the schedule change goes and we readjust next year hopefully earlier in in the spring uh semester and go from there? I think we've acknowledged that that it is an issue. Um, I would question um, you know, when
101I add these up from this chart, assuming everybody's going to move to the next grade, I hope. Um, you know, I come up with 900 total and six, seven, and eight based on this chart. Um, and we've probably handled that, you know, over the years. I know when I was there, we had teams that had an extra big bulge. There was like 950. Um, so my I think we agree that there's an issue here. The fact that we if even if this stayed stable, of course, you know, it won't be perfectly stable, but most people will come back because they're rooted here. So, we add 10 onto it. So, it's 910. But my question echoes what you guys have said is what you know what goes into that planning um and what does that look
102like? What are because there are always implications to a change that you didn't think of and didn't address uh properly. And so, you know, my question would be, um, I'm echoing what what is that actually going to look like? And do we have to do this now or could we look at it given this stable situation for this year because we know there's 10 coming in and try to address this in a you know in a in a way that doesn't make unintended consequences for people. Um, you know, when I read that we're going to have associates doing the lunch duty, um, you know, I'm retired, but I wouldn't come in for three hours in the middle of the day to do lunch duty with, uh, middle school children. Not Not that there's any issues.
103I I've been there, but, you know, I I I I guess I have some questions about some of the solutions. Um and and you know if it's you know a 19year-old I mean I you can verify I have been in the lunch room and and to a certain extent having a known person in there really is a preventive measure um you know as far as stupid things happening. So I I'm just throwing that out there. I and and again I would really like to see what what the how this is addressed. Um because I don't see a need for haste at this point because we've got these numbers and they look pretty stable. Yeah. Does I mean do does these 10 students that are on the list they are would be over in the previous
104using the previous numbers. Correct. They would not they would not get in. Well we're we exist over the previous numbers without taking anybody. Right. Okay. Because it's 280. I could take 10. I can take zero. I can subtract five. We're still over on all of them. Because the current we get over because they because we put our elementary where we put our elementary. I'm what I'm trying to get to. You know, we talked about having creating fourperson teams at the middle school. If you can make a change and make it schedule-wise and cost effective, you wouldn't have that. We have a good schedule at the middle school, but it's very expensive. And we have teachers that teach four periods and then they do lunch duty and then they have a prep and a planning. We
105have high school that has a prep every other day. You have elementary that never has enough prep. And our thinking was that you could do this and make it more equitable district-wide without adding additional staff. If what you guys are saying is to leave the 280 for now, leave the schedule and spend more time going through it, then that's what we will do. I I'll do whatever I'm directed to do. I mean, it would be some work off our plate right now, but I just we need to understand where we are with it. And we have M's level teachers standing in the lunchroom doing lunch duty and not teaching classes. That was the idea. Lunch duty at elementary and high school. The gened associates that we hire to to go. So teachers, depending on the
106school, will, if we're all fifth grade teachers, maybe I'll walk them down today and get them in line and then I'll head out to lunch, but generally it's the gened associates that are in the room. They get x number of hours per school and that's where they put them in recess and lunch duty. Teachers do have to do recess duty in addition. But I'm not advocating that we have to have certified teachers in there. I'm just saying there's some details that I think need to be examined and and maybe it doesn't have to be tonight and I I don't see a solution around this. I can put a pause on the schedule part, but I need to know what I mean I don't know what the legislative guide if there is a guide. Our policy
107says that you have to approve this every year. So, I guess your choice if we're going to pause on the schedule, you can approve this with a note that you want that changed to back to the 280 and leave it. That that's up to you. I don't think we should go back to the 280. We're already over the 280. I don't think 280 does anything for us as a district as a whole. Um I don't have any concerns with what we're seeing this year with the numbers that we had applied. I don't think those 10 students spread amongst all the grade levels and all the classes are going to have a significantly detrimental um impact on anyone. I think the the schedule piece is another piece that I think more either I guess I don't
108know if more time is the right answer. Giving you that time to figure it out without needing to worry about this is important. I'm not hung up on the 315. And I just wanted to make sure that that I wanted to know how that would work if the schedule didn't change or if the schedule changed differently than what you're thinking since we don't have the schedule piece. It's not going to Yeah, it's not going to make much different because we're already exceeding the numbers. I mean, are these 10 kids going to break the back of the middle school? I mean, I don't because no one else can. But I can tell you a classroom of 32 compared to a classroom of 30 would break your back. I mean, it does. It absolutely does. I I
109mean, so I know we're just talking about 10 students, but I've taught a class of 32 and I've taught a class of 28 and I take 28 any day because of the workload, because of the discipline, because of everything that comes with that. So, it does make a difference. I mean, two students in a classroom make a difference. It it it just does. And and I don't want to belittle that. I don't want to take that away from I mean and middle school's a tough year. It's a tough time for students. It's a tough it's a tough age to teach. And so I just I'm particularly sensitive to you know too much change in that in that area I guess. And right now though they have classes with 32 right and 34 right? So that's
110the piece I think that needs right addressed. a group that's moving on. I didn't But the fifth grade class coming in was over the 315 at the start of this year of fifth graders. They just dropped under by April. So, and and that's why when we've talked open enrollment in the past, why I've always been concerned about our elementary numbers because we knew we're setting ourselves up for that in middle school because the elementary numbers as high as it is. So, this has been, you know, historically, you know, at least the past three years has been something that's been heavy on my heart because we we know that we're setting our middle school up for that because of what our elementary numbers are. You also have, if you look at I don't I didn't remember
111what sheet you attached in here, but when you look at this year's kindergarten, for example, last year's kindergarten was lower than the prior year. This year's kindergarten is lower than both of those years, 250. And it's it's the numbers are not holding like we thought they were going to hold. So by the time I think it's third grade is where the break happens, they're going to get much lower numbers. So it wouldn't make sense to add additional staff to take those when I know that you're going to have to turn around in a couple of years and likely cut that staff because the numbers are not holding. I don't know if the hold of kindergarten is is consistent now. Is that going to be what happens? I know every other district I've talked to their
112kindergarten's lower, but we don't know if that is birth rates. We don't know if that is ESAs. I I don't know. I don't know what that reason is. So, just looking at those numbers from this year's kindergarten through, those numbers are going to they're not going to hold up for additional staff. Mhm. Well, I'm going to propose that we okay this with the knowledge that for next year it's closed. So, it's not going to increase unless we have a huge move in of junior high kids, which that's not where, you know, that's not where they move in. No. So, I'm going to propose accepting this with the understanding that there is some examination and resolution of how that could be altered. the schedule could be altered with the least disruption for the students and the
113staff. Um, yeah, with with the idea that we have acknowledged that there is an issue. So, this will have to require some action. At least that's how I'm reading the board. Is that accurate? Yeah. Yeah. We know that this is a pinpoint, but we trust our administrators that they that they're going to come up with the solution. This 294 is the number that's coming into eighth grade, which is one of our smaller groups. These six kids shouldn't cause a pinch point. No, it will go up to 910 right now, including those those students. Now, is that ideal? Absolutely not. I mean, if we were doing the ideal, we'd have kindergarten classes of 18, right? And yeah, so I think we just need approve this, but we're also setting ourselves up for next year of if
114if we set this then that's what it is, right? So then that and it is an annual review. We will bring it again before next year's approval, right? With the expectation that the schedule could be examined and altered to be able to handle this um you know again with you know good planning. I mean And it's not ideal. Class sizes of 32 and seventh grade aren't ideal. So we've got, you know, it's kind of the least of the evils right now as far as a solution. And so, you know, I'm not I'm not advocating for certified teachers in lunchroom. I'm not advocating for adding staff. I'm advocating that we address this. And, you know, I'm sorry, but for us to know what we're voting on. I mean, I remember when the high school went to
115eight periods and it was like World War II at the at the high school as far as the staff and you know, and we had worked on it for a year. I don't know. Stephanie, were you there then? No, I think it was before. I think I arrived just after. Yes. Yes. And so, you know, we teacher types are kind of notorious for not wanting a whole lot of change. And so I think kind of working through that with okay, we can say, you know, this is going to be your schedule next year, but we can we can tell you you're not going to have 32 kids in a class and and again, there's no good solution to this, you know, unless we had a brand new building with a bunch more staff and we
116aren't going to get that. But I think there's also ways to be creative that don't require a new building, right, that could alleviate some of this because I think we all agree that 30 plus kids in class not good. Um and I you know I mean the other issue is you know Steve just showed me I saw that today the Senate passed a 2% increase and so um well it's good that it's resolved but yeah resolved because I got to get the publication in tomorrow. Right. Right. But the bottom line is we're not be going to be rolling in money either. So, we have to make some painful decisions and um and the reality is we're not on the ground. Some of us have been there, but we're not there now. It's kind of like
117the cell phone came from the staff and the students, the cell phone ban. For that reason, I believe it will be more effective. So, a mandate coming down from us. Um, you know, I I I would entrust the staff and the district staff and the building staff to come up with the solution that we can retain our teachers because, you know, that's another possibility. People say, I don't I don't I don't want to do this. Um, and we don't we we don't want that either. I would propose that we okay this with the knowledge that this will have to be addressed for those of us who are still going to be on the board. It will have to be addressed by this time next year and maybe by the end of the school year by
118sooner than this time next year. Yeah. When you say this will have to be addressed what specifically? I I'm saying you know the somehow things have to be moderated so that we don't have class sizes of 32. That would be the ultimate goal. It's a reasonable teaching load and reasonable expectations with the understanding that it's very hard on the teachers and that's not ideal but we have to do our best for every student too and I don't know what that looks like because I'm not there. So, okay, that's what I would propose is approving it. We have a motion. Do we have a second? I'll second that. I'm I'm gonna pause for just a moment. That was a very involved Got it. Okay. So, so it is an annual, right? Something that's brought to you
119annually. So, the instructions to the superintendent are probably separate from the motion to approve. So, I'll I'll motion to approve this. Okay. And I understand what the board has requested. And I'll second that. Yep. I'll second that one too, Katherine. Are we allowed to after this discuss what the board is requesting so that way we're all clear on what the board is requesting or does that need to happen as part of this action? Let's go ahead and and I have my motions. You don't maybe a vote. Well, we can we can vote after you guys give I'll wake you up if you'd like because this would be the appropriate time to discuss what you're looking for in the 2026 Yes. presentation. Yes. Yes. So, go ahead and like I'm I'm wondering if it doesn't start
120with a discussion at the end of September, the beginning of October with a how's the new schedule at the middle school working out and how is all of that kind of playing? And maybe maybe it's then, maybe it's after November, the first part of December once we have a new board. You said it new schedule. I thought that what you were saying was leave it alone until we spend the time doing that. I'm not saying that and I am not either. What I'm asking is to approve the recommendation that you made. So that that is a separate vote. We'll be voting on that and I don't know about a vote voting on a schedule. No, but it's it's all part of the right. Right. administr administration is doing the schedule but this but the new
121schedule is part of the discussion right and what I'm saying is that we the board should revisit this after a few months in the fall I would like to know what we and and and maybe this isn't a a board okay but I would really like to know what steps are are being taken what measures uh and not to approve or disapprove necessarily necessarily. Um, but if people are asking me, well, you know, why are you hiring all these people, for example, or not, and you know, I'd like to be able to say this is why and this is what happened. And I don't know that it's ours to okay a schedule. I mean I it's not ours to okay but when the new schedule was explained to me it was explained with a justification
122of how it was better for students and how it was better for teachers. And so when we're talking about changing what I understood to be positive changes for students and teachers that's when I have some concern and that's when I have some hesitation. Are you talking about what's there now? What's there now? No. What? No. I'm talking about in the last three years since I've been on the board, the middle school schedule has been explained to me and the changes that were made were explained to me and and shown how it benefits teachers and teacher collaboration because that was one of the things that was a struggle before was how teachers had time to talk about student growth and whatnot. And and so the new schedule allowed for that cross across disciplines teachers to discuss
123students. So they were looking out for the student as a whole, not just me as the math teacher looking at the student. I now had time to meet with is it the PLC's I that they then have time to meet together to look at that student as a whole. And so when the middle school schedule was explained to me, it it it thoroughly explained how students can benefit from the the schedule as it currently is. So I guess I if the only thing driving a change in the schedule is so that we can get more students in the building. I'm not for me I struggle with that as a reason why. So I want to know the AC the I mean our our business is educating students and so how is a schedule change going
124to benefit students is I guess what I'm asking. So, if there is a change in the middle school schedule, I want to know how it's going to benefit students directly, not just how how we're going to serve more students in the building. I guess that's I think this was a not thoroughly addressed concern at the time and I would advocate that it has been very good for students um and staff. The current change. Yeah, I I I really think so. There's I mean it's been good but we have some systemic concerns. I think the biggest not good for students and for teachers that we hear is the class sizes with the current structure. So it's not the um approach the approach that is wrong or needs tweaking and I think that you weren't deceived or
125anything like that. I think it's more we continue to hear from parents year after year and it's shifted some and it's changed and some changes have been made but I see this as a continuation of improving the class sizes is what we're going for with the schedule. Right? It's not to get more kids in the building but it's to bring a class size from 30 to 29 or 28 or 27 is where I understood this to be coming from and what I was hoping for when I was asking questions about this. Um, so when I say let's let these 10 kids in, the max one is at 310. The next are 300 and 300. It's with hope that the schedule then that is produced creates smaller class sizes for students to have a more a
126better student teacher ratio. So that's where I'm coming at it from. I don't know if that's accurate to I'm I'm with you there, too. but also to bring it more in line with our elementary and our high school buildings. To have the one in the middle be the one that's out of sync with the 10 other grade levels doesn't doesn't feel right. Um yeah, and that's our fault because we approved it last year with the high not high numbers in elementary. I mean, it was discussed a year ago. It was discussed the year before that and so we've allowed it to happen. the board has really that was the impetus to trying to figure out how we could change the schedule so that by spreading it out further we could take more kids. Yeah. And
127you have more places for kids to go in a period your class size is going to go down. Did we involve the staff and survey the staff and do a big event with the staff? No, we didn't. And if that's the the part that the board feels is missing, that's that's I thought I knew what you wanted, but now I'm a little confused. So, I didn't survey staff. When I um ask questions about staff input, I think it's more from looking for those pieces like the lunch supervision. Like, are we finding all of the things that with the change that they might have more insight into like, oh, this could be a hiccup. Like, are are we looking for that? And maybe we are. And maybe those things have been covered and this presentation has
128covered that. Or are we hearing there are more things that might come up that we might need to sort out first? And so I just want to make sure the staff who are closest to it have the opportunity to raise a red flag and be like, "Have we thought about this or can we do this?" But I'm fully supportive of creating opportunities for smaller class sizes by um having the new schedule worked on and we don't need to approve that. Um and I think these numbers should be fine with what we're seeing now with our current numbers. So I think you're headed in the right direction. I just want to make sure we have the piece from our staff that's looking out for those. Oh, what about this or what about this? And some of
129them might be things that we hadn't thought of the board and administration and some of them might be things that you have thought of and it's an okay chance you're taking. So, and there there were some areas that we identified today that are potential issues. And if we can't get past those issues, then I don't I don't know. I mean, what what can we do to get past them that would still accomplish that? That's what we have to have a conversation around. If I can't get past those, then there might be it it might have to stay the way it is because I can't I can't create more issues in places that I mean, you'll you'll hear about every single one of them. And I there's a problem. We've acknowledged there's a problem and we
130need to find a solution. So my goal is to find that solution, reduce the class sizes, and be able to be more in line with this. So I can update you after we have that conversation because I don't know everything. I mean, we all found some areas that we need to address. So the best I can say is that that's what I'm going to attempt to do. I think this is more, Katherine, what you're wanting is this is more a reminder to future board that we need to be very mindful of this number going forward. So we're not going up there pushing that upper limit of the 310 and make so that we're getting ourselves right up next to that p that pinch point again in next year. You know, look at our seventh grader,
131look at our sixth graders, you know, and look at our seventh graders so that we aren't running right against that that ceiling every year and getting back ourselves back in the same situation that we're in right now of having the 32 student classes where we can, you know, maybe Yeah, we'll see. Okay, we have capacity for 310, but that's at 32. Well, maybe we really need it to be 300. But right now, we're fine, but just in the future, we need to really look at that and see how the capacity and how all the loads are going to fall. Well, and in three or four years, we'll have a kindergarten class of 250. I mean, this is eb and flow and needs to be addressed now because it's a problem now. Will it always be
132looking at this? Probably not. Um, you know, so again, I think your point about it needs to be revisited every year. These numbers were adopted by the school board probably six or eight years ago and they haven't changed. I mean, those class sizes, they were intended as a rough guideline. And I think that's kind of how they've served because if you have an Urbanale student, they've got to be in a class. Um, so you know it it's evolved into a hard fast line when I don't know that that was intended pre when it was established. I would say I think it all keeps coming back to the middle school point because pre five, six, eight years ago it was like 350 or something. What was the cap? 330 was and so we're not even raising
133back up to where it was. Um, so I don't think we're being irresponsible by approving this handful of applications that we know we have because we're still not to where it once was. I think it's doable, but I do acknowledge there's differences. I understand where you're coming from, Denny, too. But then I also worry fiscally about if we start cutting back our elementary, we're making fiscal decisions for our district for a decade to come. if we start turning away numbers that we weren't previously turning away to accommodate for what the middle school numbers are. And that's why that has that has to be worked on no matter what. If it doesn't change for next year, there has to be something that's done for the following year because otherwise that's your only that's your only recourse
134is to cut those elementary numbers, right? So, and do we have to do it the middle school as block as a block or can we do six six? You can do six, seven, eight. Yeah. So like if we do have some, you know, like we do have a sudden surge in sixth graders, we can that you know that that num that bigger lower number can follow them or bigger number can follow them so that we have to pull resources from a smaller seventh grade class to cover that that can be done. We can move these numbers, right? Yeah. You you could I mean it has been done in the past. There was an extra classroom, an extra team that just followed that followed the kids around. Yeah, that's what we thought we were going to
135be doing, but when you look at the numbers coming, they don't justify right doing that. So, we're going to continue to be above the number if we leave it at 280 no matter what until that small one starts to hit the middle school. So, I don't know that the board has to vote on it, but I I would be really happy being kept up to date on what's happening and and I would ask us to move forward on that vote. Wait, can we talk about this some more? No. Okay. And this is not roll call. Okay. So, all those in favor of approving the open capacity, I I opposed. No. Motion carries. 61. Up next will be the approval of the facilities revisions. So, we're going to have Jessica, while Jasper come up, you guys
136can put a face with a name. Now, Jessica is our community ed coordinator and she will have detailed answers more than I will. So, thank you for coming, Jessica. Hello. Yep. Like she said, I'm the community ed coordinator. Um so we've been kind of looking at the qualifications for each of the categories for our facilities to use. Um and we are proposing to um look at the qual qualifications for category 2 specifically. So currently category 2 states that at least 75% of participants must be residents of the district or the city of Urbanale. So this allows teams to use our gym space even if the players don't necessarily attend our school district. they just have to live in the city of Urbanddale. Um, we recommend changing the policy to require that any sports team whose
137activities overlap with community ed sponsored sports must consist of 100% of players enrolled in our Urbanale schools. Um, we will require rosters and membership lists um to prove that everyone in the school district. So, our current community ed sports um are basketball, wrestling, flag football, and track and field. We believe that it is appropriate to move any team outside of these specific community sponsored programs that do not meet that 100% enrolled in our school district to be um moved to category 3. So that would then require them to pay to use our facilities and they would also be scheduled with a lower priority. So they would be a third priority rather than the current second priority. Teams that do not directly compete with community ed sponsored activities would remain in category 2 with this new
138um proposal. So for example, we have uh UG volleyball that comes to us. They do not compete with our stuff. We don't have volleyball. So they would get to continue to use our facilities because they don't directly compete with us. Um they would get to keep their free gym access and remain as a second priority following our community sponsor activities and other school sponsored activities. Um this change encourages Urbanale students to participate in our community sports which promotes peer interaction and growth within our own programs. We believe that having our young athletes competing with each other at a young age will benefit them as they grow into high school athletics, which is very important. Our programs also receive guidance from our varsity coaches, which outside teams do not receive. So, we believe that that's very
139important for the growth of our youth sports that they're participating in our own activities. Um, also with very limited gym space, especially during our basketball season, this adjustment ensures that Urbanale students are being prioritized over teams that consist of students from other districts. Yeah. You guys have any questions about any of that? I do. Yes. Um, do you know if the policy and I am only familiar with UG um that's what I played 40 plus years ago and that's what my children played. Um, are they changing their policy? Because I know it's any Urbanddale student or any Urbanddale resident can play in that. And I know I mean all the teams I played on had students that went to other schools. My girls all played on schools. So if we make this change, I mean
140we frankly need those numbers. We need those girls that go to De Mo Christian, that go to Dalling that live in Urbandale because otherwise we would we don't have enough teams to have a strong UG program. So if then our Urbanddale students would be punished too if they have less access to gym time and have to pay a fee just because they have students that maybe attend to one Christian or Dalling but live here in Urbandale. So how you mean for like Yeah. So for we they would stay in that category too. So we're suggesting that sports that compete with community ed. So we have basketball, wrestling, track and field and flag football. So any sports that are within that that don't have the 100% would be moved to category 3. So UGRA since they
141don't compete with any community sponsored activities, they would get to stay in two. They wouldn't have to pay and they would remain a second priority. So even if they have students that don't go to urban, they would still get to stay in category 2 since they don't compete with community sponsored. So can you give me an example of who who would be moved like what I can Okay, tell me. So my daughter plays basketball uh for a club that isn't affiliated with Urbandale. Um and not all some of the students but not all of them go to Urbandale. Okay. So they would then first of all they compete against so let's say they're I don't know volleyball or whatever something that doesn't compete they would not they would fall down they wouldn't even be able
142to rent space right correct they could rent space they would just have to pay and they'd be a third priority so whatever is open after our own students get space they would get whatever is left over okay because I know like this year and I'm kind of all new to it because I don't know how it's run in the past, but like this year I came in, we didn't have enough students to make a sixth grade club team. I'm I find it hard to believe we don't have enough athletes in the school district to make club teams. So, we had multiple students that just didn't get to compete in a season at all this year because there weren't enough to make a team. And so my assumption is that those players were going to different
143teams um with students from other schools. Some of them may have been using our space. And so by doing this, we're wanting to try and promote our own programs so our students have those opportunities. Okay. So I'm going to ask a question about that. Yeah. So, there was the same issue with the eighth grade girls basketball team where, you know, they pulled some students up from Urbandale that were younger to play on the team. Um, they did have a member from a different district join the team. Is that still going to be acceptable? So, that you know, like I mean, if you have a basketball team of you just have four players, but you've got somebody from De Mo Christian that wants to join, like that's You mean through like community? True community ed. Yeah.
144So since it's through us, they will always remain under that category one. Um so how it works is they pay us and that gets them, you know, it's a coach's fee, um uniforms, entry to tournaments and then that also includes their facilities use. So they're paying to use our facilities whereas those teams that break off, they're not you, you know, going through us, they don't have to pay a single thing. So, I'm just my worry is that that kind of promotes, right? Well, why why should I go through community yet if I can just do this and then we have people leave and not enough players for our own teams. So, I think like my point here is we're not necessarily telling students who live in Urbandale or the surrounding area that you can't come
145and join our community ed teams. We're not telling people they can't. Correct. But we're promoting community ed over independent rent teams. Um Yep. Yeah. How many team independent teams use our facilities? Um so right now for basketball, which basketball is the main issue, it's about eight, eight or 10 independent teams that aren't independent. Yeah. That do not run through us. Do they pay for it or they just they don't pay for it? Right. They just get it for free. Yep. So as long as 75% of that team just lives in Urbanddale, they get to use it for free. So you could have a team of two Urbanale district kids and the rest of them live in Urbanale but go to Dalling and they get to use our facilities for free. So this is just kind
146of a way to make sure our our students are the main priority and they're joining our program so they can grow together rather than breaking off and playing with um students from other districts and getting that space for free. Okay. So, I get what you're trying to say, but I also understand what other people have said. And I think if we could change the if we could blend category 1 and category 2 to get or the old category one with the new category one, we're in we're right now where it used to be 75% of the players had to live in Urbanddale City proper. But if we switched it to 75% of students had to be enrolled in the district and give them the same benefits because it's still we're helping Urbanale student kids, but
147also it doesn't ex doesn't take away that one that club team that may have one kid that can't fill it or have like one random kid that used to live in the district want to stay playing with their friend in the club and then they can they still but it's still mostly Urbanale kids, Urbanale School District kids. I think if we make that one change, but even that one kid could go through community at still, right? And we talked about building up our youth programming when we did the whole conference affiliation, right? And so I I see this as something like we're trying to build up our youth programming and if we're not putting all our support in our in our current programming first. I just think 100% makes it that that one that if
148we give them that 25% that's like one kid and most of these sports teams we're not talking about teams of 100 people. We're talking kids of 15 20 kids. So that that one giving them that blue way of that one kid I think really would help. Um and it would also get rid of the problem that you said of where you have two kids that live that are in Urbanell district and nine kids that live in the Johnson district but are Urbanell city residents to get it for free. Yes, this would stop that, but it would also keep allow us to give the flexibility that if you had one random kid from another school, it would give you that flexibility to keep it keep serving all the Urbanddale kids. is just for ones that overlap.
149So if they don't overlap with us, then our main our main concern is just getting it. It's a this or that type of thing. Um we want them to be in our own program. So we're trying to promote that. So we feel like if this change is made, if it's well, I either play on a team with kids from another school district and pay for it or I just go through community ed. I get to play with all students from my own team with the guidance of our varsity coaches because that's kind of our main goal is really getting them involved so our kids are learning what they're wanting them to do from a young age with each other and growing up together versus just handpicking our own team having some kids in the district
150and not and doing their own thing. I'm wondering if um because like you said there weren't enough and I can't remember which grade levels didn't have enough to form a team this year. I'm I'm wondering in you know how like when we changed the boundaries we had a grandfather period where we kind of allowed that. So I'm wondering if there's some established teams out there already that if if we could allow some type of a grandfather in for the next year or two because they had to form because community ed wasn't available this year. I I guess I can see, you know, because I think once teams form, I guess my experience with my kids was once teams formed, they kind of like to stay together. And so I'm wondering if there's any way we
151could put some type of a claw in there that or a a clause that said if you were a current team apply or I don't know, somehow we could make an exception because we weren't able to offer community ed this year. But they still can, can't they? They just now have to pay for gym time, right? Which then punishes our Urbanddale kids. You know what I mean? If it's a 75% Urbandale population, but they just didn't have enough, so they had to go get some other kids and those kids want to keep playing together, then they all have to pay. But wait, I'm going to go back to this again. I ask, can a De Mo Christian or anyone else on this established team come through community ed, especially if there isn't enough players to
152make a complete team. Yes. So, they can still play. Now, they're just playing through community ed instead of being sign up. We're not telling them they can't play. We're saying you have to come through our programming. Okay. Could could an entire group of De Moine kids just say sign up to community? And they technically could. That's never happened before. You could have old team up now go through our community. But I think we also need to offer like the families an option other than community ed because if we start you, you know, a lot of these families put a lot of time, money, and effort into these sports. So, if you're telling them if I my kid can't use the Urbanel facilities, well, I'm going to take my kid and put him on this team
153XYZ over here that he's playing all with Dallas Center Rimes kids. Well, I'm going to roll my kid out to Dallas Center Rimes or we're going to lose elite athletes. So, by allow if you using the 75% in district number, you still are going to reach most it still has to be threequarters urbanell students. It's just not going through our community program, but we still are keeping the kids, Urbanale kids, playing with other Urbanale kids and cultivating our youth sports in the community, but they can still rent space a category three, right? Well, right. I So, I haven't reviewed the fee structure either. It's not astronomical, is it? No fees. So to move to category three to use a gym would be $50 an hour. So if you have a team that does one or
154two practices a week that you're looking at 50 to 100 bucks a week for that. So it's a much cheaper option to go through community ed. So that's that's just kind of the whole point is we want to really promote our own programs, right? But do we offer the same type of coaching that some of the clubs teams in that offer too? There's another They're not they're not club teams that are renting space. It's independent teams. They're parent volunteers that are running those independent just form their own programming and and you know find places to play and sometimes it might be in Omaha or Kansas City or whatever. But what what we directed um what we directed the AD to do was to develop those that youth programming. And this is a step toward trying
155to do that. And it's not trying to exclude people. It's trying to encourage people to come into this fold where you have a one-stop easy access for the varsity coaches who don't have to travel all over the county to begin to structure that youth programming. And you know, I think if people want to develop their own team and they they have the finances to do that, they will continue to do it whether or not we offer gym space. I mean, look at the still way more affordable space than anywhere else. Yes. And and so I I think this is a rather painless way because if you're going to pay $50, I suppose you can go out and find a church gym somewhere or something like that if that's really what you want to do. I
156think that it's not so much about excluding people. It's more about trying to build our own programming and the teams and trying to I mean your daughter has a group of friends that are I mean that's a tight group it develop and you spend a lot of time with them. That's what we want to develop here. Yeah. And um so you know I don't if the difference is $50 an hour I don't it's not about excluding that's what I'm hearing. All you have to do if you've got all De Moines Christian kids, all you have to do is go through community ed. And if you go to other districts around here to use gym space, you're going to pay for their gym space as well as these independent teams. If it's not just us, I
157mean, we were really giving them a gift of free gym space for the last several years. But to that point too, there was a point in time when why why my daughter's on a different basketball team club team wasn't available even when we inquired and you know tried to get it set up. It wasn't supported by community ed or the varsity coach coaches supposedly at that point in time. Right? So that's what drove us out. Now we are rooted and so you know I don't I don't know that that's going to change. We're close to the end anyway. You know, but this it the wording of this says any sports team whose activities overlap with community ed sponsored sports must consist of 100% players who are enrolled in Urbanddale schools. So all they have to
158do is go through community ed. But it says they must consist any sports team whose activity overlap. I that doesn't make sense. When I read that, it sounds to me like your team has to be 100% Urbandale schools. Only if we have the we have the sport that you're trying to bring, then you have to have 100%. If we don't even offer the sport like volleyball, right? So, it would be a basketball team. Basketball is the primary one where we gym space is very limited for that. But if it's a basketball team, a wrestling team, track and field, or flag football team wanting our space, if it goes within those four categories, they have to consist of 100% with this proposal. Anything outside of that doesn't matter. It's still stay level two, right? If they
159want to do a golf team, we don't offer golf through community ed. We don't offer volleyball. We don't offer um dance swimming. You don't. Yeah, those those are not in direct competition because we don't offer it in the first place. If a year if I I could see where right now we don't offer volleyball, but let's say in two years we are able to offer volleyball through community ed that group would have to move to category three or have 100% of their players as Urbanddale students or if they're not community ed. That's what's not that sentence is not clear to me. The way that's written is very confusing in my opinion because the way it's written it says any any sports team whose activity overlap with community ed. I don't understand like if you're saying
160it's an outside sports team that that could be fulfilled in community ed, but you're not going through community ed. That's what it is. That's exactly what it So it it then I think it should say not going through community ed because when I read that I was like I that doesn't make it doesn't that sentence doesn't make any sense to me. I I don't read that the way you are interpreting it is not how I read that statement. it overlap with community ed sponsored sports any sports team whose activity I agree with you on that Jenny because it could just be like the timing it's not it doesn't make sense something doesn't make sense in when I read that what if we just change it to if if you're not a community sponsored act activity
161you can't you you then you must be 100% you must be 100% then then that includes like that includ includes any score if you word it that way. So they still covered the UG anyway. Well, UG is class two so or category too. So and I maybe I've looked at it too long. I thought that was a clear way to say it. Basically, we're saying that if you're not community ed, you have to you have to pay and you get and you're not a priority, right? But you could be like you could be category 2 if you're if you're a club team that's 100% Urbandale students that is not through community ed, but you're 100% Urbanddale students, you're still category 2. That's what you're saying, right? So, that makes sense to me. Like I I
162can I'm I'm I'm following and I'm agreeing what you're saying. I don't that that that that wording doesn't say that to me. I hear what you're saying, explaining it to me, but that's not what that's not how I read that. So, I don't want it to be confusing if other people read that. And if if if you read it that same way, too, Margaret, but my my just my last one, I'm going to say this. I still think we should move it down to 75% just in case there's the one straggler on the team or two stragglers on the team and it's and it's predominantly Urbanale kids that if you that it doesn't kick them out because like I said the numbers aren't like you're not talking teams of 100 kids, but all they have
163to do is sign up with community. But maybe they maybe for some reason they don't want to do community ad. It's cheaper. But maybe they but maybe for some reason they don't want to do community ad and they've been doing it. But if you're if you're at 75% for a team, I still feel like that's most that's all that's what age group most of take basketball. What age group are are the ones we're talking about? So our team Jay-Hawk, which is Wreck League, is all the way from kindergarten to uh seventh grade. our club basketball. We've got third and fourth grade, fifth grade teams, sixth, seventh, and eighth grade teams. So, we're back to middle school or we can't take them anyway. I mean, I Everything has a a connection. So, I don't know. Could
164I propose adding one word? Any outside sports team whose activities overlap with community ed sports must consist of 100% Urbanddale schools. Just just distinguishing that but they're not that they're not they're not part of community ed. Do you know what I'm saying? I think that's where I was getting hung up because I you know when I read through preparing for this I was like well that doesn't seem to make sense and then it conflicted with you know reading the list below. So any any outside sports team Yep. support. That clarifies that the wording for me because then then we're talking about two different things. We're talking about community ed. We're talking about somebody from the outside and and then I can Yeah, that makes sense because that clarifies that outside people can still do community
165ed activities, right? Yes. Okay. I'm going to mention that because this is tied to a policy um we probably want to uh it's an exhibit though. It's an exhibit, but with the new language and everything, I would recommend tableabling this and and bringing it back at the next meeting. So the lang you can check the language and at that point approve. Yeah. with the edit with the with the edit that you recommend that it's just from a logistic standpoint. There was a lot of conversation. I want to make sure that changes are exactly what the board is looking for. Okay. I would move to table the updates to the facility use guidelines um for the April 21st, 2025 meeting. A motion. Do I have a second? Second. Okay. And all those in favor? I I
166I opposed. Motion carries. Random question. Do I need to abstain from Oh, yes. from tableling probably. Yes. From table. Motion carries. 64 extension. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Welcome to the board. I hope you enjoyed your [Laughter] first never. Okay. Up next is I never want to do that. To set a public hearing date for the certified budget for fiscal year 26. Madame President, I would move to set the date for the public hearing for the certified budget for fiscal year 26 to April 21st, 2025 at 6 PM at the Urbandale Administration Office in Urbandale. I have a motion. I would second. Thank you. Um, all those in favor I I opposed. Motion carries 70. Should have asked you address and on number 13 additional staffing request. First one up is the full-time employee
167for ELP come up. So this um position currently is a split position with an individual who happens to be certified in both ELP and special education. The throughout the year there's been difficulties in meeting the needs of both of those positions because half of your day is spent with special education kids, meeting the various pull out push in, etc. And then the other half of your day you're trying to do the same thing but on the opposite end of the spectrum with gifted kids. Regardless of what happens with this request here, we are moving the special education piece away from this because it's just not feasible. They currently have a 3.0 staffing for Karen special education. They have two individuals and then a half and a half. And that half and a half is going
168to have to turn into a whole to so that that is not a conflict anymore. we've already had to make some special arrangements with um staffing to be able to make sure that some of these duties could be carried out. So through the conversation, this is where Stephanie is going to request the half position of the ELP teacher. Since we're vacating the special ed portion, our options are to make this a full-time position or to make this a half-time position that that person may or may not want to be in. So, we would have to do some staffing changes. So, I'll let Stephanie take it from here on the logic in this. So, as we're thinking about I know questions come up about the size of the building and the number of students, but as
169we're thinking about some of our changes in programming over the last two years, one thing to keep in mind is regardless of the number of students in the building, there's still the same number of content areas. We have math and reading at six different grade levels that this person is helping to provide extension and enrichment um to the students. As you remember from the board meeting um a few weeks ago when Brandon and I presented on our m multi-tered system of support um our extended learning program expands beyond just students who are identified. We have students who have needs that are far out from their grade level peers and we have students who have needs um that can be served within the regular classroom through enrichment um with the with the classroom teacher. One of
170the issues that we're finding at Karen Acres is while the teacher is able to provide some of that tier 2 enrichment for students, being in a halftime position limits the followup, the feedback that teacher is able to help provide both to the teacher and to the student. And so we're seeing additional limitations with the services that uh that the students are able to um receive. We know that identification for ELP is communication of a learning need and so we want to make sure that we're providing opportunities. One of the things that we're really working towards um with the changes in ELP is more of a talent development model. And when we think about um Karen Acres is one of our buildings with the highest percentage of free and reduced price lunch in the district. And
171so this access to opportunity only helps and benefits all of the students within the building by providing um additional support to teachers on differentiation and additional opportunities for all of our students. I would move to approve the addition. Oh, I have a question. Oh, sorry. Sorry. I was trying to post this. Um, so yes, there's the same content areas at Karen Acres as there are at our other elementary schools. It's been my understanding from previous ELP teachers that a certain percentage of, you know, the top however, you know, scores um are are being pulled out for ELP. Now, when we have twice the number of students at two of our buildings, three of our buildings, um than we do at Karen Acres, how are we justifying that 10 students in fifth grade at Valyriius or
172Mstead versus the five students at Karen Acres. I mean, I know that they're going in in groups, but now you've got a teacher who's got a much smaller roster than their counterparts in the other buildings. H how are we how are we justifying that and and sharing the workload and well as far as the workload one of the things that I'm most excited about um that for next year is we have already set at the elementary level once a week um PLC time for our elementary ELP teachers that will also take place um in some of our other areas and that is a collaboration time that is going to be so valuable for those teachers. Um when we look at identification, um we really want to look at comparing students in their building and looking
173for students who are outliers, who are discrepant academically from their grade level peers in each building. Um so we wouldn't we don't want to look at the district as a whole and compare students in in one fourth grade class with students in another grade fourth grade class. They might have totally different situations. Um, and so it's whether I'm working with five students or whether I'm working with three students, um, whatever it may be, it's still going to look like some sort of extension. It's going to u, and one thing I do want to clear up before I get too far into this, it doesn't always have to be pulled out. I think we get very comfortable, especially at the elementary level, that students are pulled out of class or pulled out for their win time.
174It could look like the ALP teacher pushing in. it could look like a co-eing opportunity. Um, so there's a lot of different options for the way that we're serving our kids. I think we just kind of have that picture um of what it traditionally has been. And so the need is still there. Um, so whether I'm teaching a lesson to 15 students or whether I'm working with three students, um, the goal is that we are meeting whatever student learning needs exist. Um, and we know that there are students who are discrepant from their peers. And so we want to make sure that we're providing those opportunities and additional talent development so that other students have the opportunity to continue to build and grow on their um talents as they as they come in. Are there
175any duties that cross coverage that could benefit the students in other buildings or the workload of the teachers in the other buildings or will it all be solely obviously besides PLC time and things like that? But I I'm I might have mentioned I'm really excited about the PLC time. Um I think that they have a a strong start on that collaboration. One of the things I'd like to see us continue to develop is some of our K1 programming and whether we're looking at Birdie King or the Pats programming. Um but some of the ways that we can continue to develop um our programming at the lower elementary level as well. Great. And then in terms of funding um is this coming from TAG specific funds or is this our elementary fund? Our elementary teachers are
176funded through um a combination of both TAG funds and general education. And that allows because we just we our TAG funding um does would not cover all of our staff. So we don't we are not a district like my previous district that had um carryover. Um so that that's not an opportunity that we have. It allows us to also pull kids that are not identified and that's part of that talent development. There are plenty of kids that maybe it's a particular unit that they already excel in where there's other units that are not necessarily the case. So, it gives the flexibility that we can pull kids or push into kids that are not necessarily identified to help to develop their and expend their talent. And so that's going to be done consist consistently and equitably
177in all of our buildings. That's the goal. And we know we're not there. We know that there's there's a lot of work to be done. And the idea that we expect them to do a certain thing without giving them the tools makes it very difficult to have that expectation because I know that there are I mean we've talked about how much where are there areas that we need to improve on and some of that is us laying the expectation out some of that is holding them accountable to the expectation helping parents understand what that really means that you're not just getting pulled out because there's a special. Is there anything in the job description relating to the like lower level grade? Will there be any distinctions in the job description between this position and the
178other ELP positions? This this is a this is ELP teaching position. So, um while that's that's a hope that I have of something that we can get that again will be part of the collaborative teamwork. So, how how many um ELP teachers do we have at each building? Is there at least one full-time in every building except for Karen Acres? We have a full-time ELP teacher. About So, at the high school, they're responsible for,300 students. At the middle school, they're responsible for 900 students. And at Karen Acres, they'd be responsible for 250. The model looks different at the high school and middle school level than it would at the elementary high school. Um, students are able to have their learning needs met by choices in classes and being um appropriately placed in different classes. And
179so the the the programming model that the teacher is using um it it allows for there to be one teacher at that level. It might look like more consulting. Um she's doing some co-eing at the middle school. They focus um very much on the social that's I'm I'm sorry to interrupt you but we're at 8:35 um I get really excited about gifted they so the ratio then at uh Valarius and Mstead and Webster is what 600 and and 250 yes and and you know I I have some real difficulty with this because what you're talking about would be wonderful in all the elementaryaries, but we've already talked about class size and very a lengthy discussion. And so I'm trying to um wrap my mind around how at the very least it's going to cause some
180trouble with some of the other staff, right? I mean we we already see that consistently where you know this school has very large fifth grade and that school has a very large kindergarten and it's you know it's not equitable amongst our teachers and are aren't we creating more of that with this you know when you talk about pushing in okay well at Karen Acres you have 10 classroom teachers to push in with well at Valarius you have 20 I think it's important to remember too that the scope of the work is not necessarily just based on the student, but the fact that there are six grade levels within the building. There are two different content areas that we're working with um for our identified students. And so the scope of the work is very much
181the same. Yes, there may be um fewer teachers that we're working with, but if I'm working with a PLC, I'm providing extensions, whether I'm working with two teachers or I'm working with four teachers, a lot of that conversation, a lot of that work is going to be very similar. Um, and we know that with the half-time ELP position at Karen Acres, it is creating some difficulties in being able to meet the needs of all of the learners. Is there any possibility of having a halftime there and then with on one of the more heavily uh populated buildings that that this p this position would be halftime in another building in order to accommodate and I'm I'm still having a really difficult time because the bottom line is when I've experienced in like six different systems
182ELP programs at different levels the key to it is a relationship with the student just like anything that you do in education. And so when you got double the number, it seems like that's compounding things. And so I, you know, I I would like to point out that um we're not we're not in a place to add a lot of positions financially. We're just not right now. So, we're going to get 2% maybe from the state. The farm economy is falling apart. Those of us who remain on the board are probably going to see darker times. I don't know where the money would be coming from. And so, you know, I'm really ambivalent um about adding this halftime position in contrasted to other needs in the system. I think a lot of times, especially with
183gifted education and Unfortunately, um, gifted education did not choose its name and, um, I think there's a lot of assumptions that the students will be fine on their own, but these students have needs that need to be met. And right now, we're not adequately meeting the needs of our learners in that building. And we're not seeing that lack of meeting the needs in the other buildings. Not in the same way. they're able to follow up with their tier 2, able to provide feedback and support um and standardizing some of the um time that they have across the buildings will really help with that as well. And you're confident that a 1.0 is the best way to do that, not some other combination. Thank you for explaining that. Well, I like how you point out that
184there's same prep time for reading and math and sixth levels and it's important that every student in every grade is reached and with halfime which students are we not reaching. So I understand the need. So thank you Can I move to approve a full-time employee for extended learning at Karen Acres for the 2025 2026 school year? A motion. Do we have a second? M will second. This is a roll call, Kent. I'm sorry. I'm going to say no at this time. Me? Yes. Mankey. Yes. [Music] Yes. Young. Yes. Hower. No. Motion passes. 52. On to the interventionist at Webster. I'm going to everybody take one of these. Um there was this is Brandon's gonna go over this with you. There was a question on how we determine the interventionist needs. So I will let him
185let's Yeah. So we regularly are monitoring just where our students are at um after screening each window. Um and we're always looking at what the staff and how that aligns. Uh and you might remember when we had remaining ESSER funds, we had used uh that last year of ESRE funds to add an interventionist at Webster. Those funds then were depleted. We looked at the spring results um and didn't feel like it warranted a change at that time, but as we continue to monitor um you know there there is a need. Uh I also know that what's currently happening uh because of the one interventionist at Webster is the dosage of the intervention groups is being um modified to meet with 44 students. We typically say the capacity rate for our interventionist is 30 to 36
186students um across the day and that is um them meeting with three to four students in their 10 groups across their day. Um why we have three to four students is because this is the most intensive intervention that we're um trying to put forth with the student um you know to make sure that they're getting what they need um you know prior to in some cases suspecting a disability. We want to make sure we're giving uh full force uh to meet the students needs. So you can see in that first column the number inter of interventionists. It's important to note that um our interventionists are funded in a multiple different ways. Some of which can be funded at Webster and some that cannot. So title one funding is not a possibility at Webster because it's
187not a title one building. Um Karen Acres, Mstead and Valerius are all schoolwide title one buildings. they get that status because they have 40% or more of their students population that's free and reduced lunch. Uh and so title one funding cannot support an interventionist uh at web Webster. The other pieces is title one funding can't supplant it can only supplement. So for every uh position that we have, so if we take Karen acres for example, one of those positions is not paid from title one, the other is. Uh both cannot be paid out of title one because then that would be supplanting the service. Uh so it has to be in supplement of something we're already doing. Um so that's kind of how that funding works. Again though, uh Webster is kind of exempt from
188all of that. Uh but you can see how we have we added an Mstead interventionist I believe two years ago and that was by looking at the data and helping guide that decision. Um and our goal uh is of course to fade interventionists uh when we feel like the needs of the students are met. um not that we want to move people out of the system, but the goal is is to meet students needs. And so, uh that is uh kind of how that funding works and then how we've used the data. You can see the interventionist to student ratio. That is of course the total student population. That's not the students that are striving or not meeting benchmark. But I think it's just important to note at any time a student uh may need
189uh support and so there's a level of just overall um being considered of the overall risk. Uh and then you see the number of students uh that are striving in the winter uh screening window, the number of students in each building um math. And so the intervention is served both in reading and math. And then the number of students that are currently being served in each of those buildings. Thank you. This is what I needed. This is very helpful. I needed this meat potatoes. How often do you re-evaluate? Um so obviously I'm not where you're at on understanding how much the service is, but what if we wanted to move one from another building? Do you do that just annually? Yeah, we look at it for sure every spring and uh every spring I've promised
190that, you know, maybe something will happen and then it pretty much stays the same. I think one of the sticking points has been uh and even when I was principal at Webster, I would say that there was a need uh but it was pure just the way funding works. Um, and title one funding helps support, you know, half of the positions in every building except for Webster. Uh, we use early intervention funding um for the other portion and that comes from the state. So, a lot of the other positions are funded through early intervention funds. And then we do receive title two funds that we use for class size reduction at lower elementary uh to pay for one of our currently is paying for one of our kindergarten teachers. This position though would come from
191the general fund. I would move to approve this position. I'll second that. Is that Yeah. What's a roll call again? Me? Yes. Mankey? Yes. And Riceweight? Yes. Williams? Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Motion passes 70. The high school registar. So, this came from a request that the high school administrative team made to the cabinet level to consider. Um, after taking a look at their proposal, there is something to be said for having someone who can facilitate records that can facilitate new students coming into the district in the summer where there's nobody in the building. So more um immediate attention to new students to ensure that they're placed in the right courses because that person that would be part of their responsibility. Um new students that come in have to have credit checks. We don't unless they're
192freshman, we don't know what credits they've received in their other district. So we don't know, you know, you can place them somewhere and then find out later and then have to move them, but students don't like to be moved. Once you're in a class, you like to stay in the class. Um, so we also have to get those final records from the other district to ensure if you're enrolling in calculus, say that you've had the courses that come. Not a lot of people probably trying to get into calculus without having the courses, but it's an extreme example of what we were looking at. So, um, I know Brandon, you've you've had a lot more conversations with the, uh, high school on some of these details. We've calculated it to be about a $4,000. It's like
193$3,800 something dollars to make this position go from 11 months to 12 months. So, is there anything you want to add for work? I just that uh students transferring in is there's a lot more intricacies to that than we might recognize which is transcribe translating the previous transcript into current coursework and the credit count and then metro students there's some back and forth with that and then students that are in credit recovery there just a lot of that and state reporting coding all the courses and making sure those course codes are correct so that we get um funding proper funding related to concurrent enrollment. Uh we're now starting to support uh de mo Christian with online coursework through uh concurrent enrollment and so there's just a lot of pieces that um happen behind the scenes
194to make it work well. And is this going to be a new hire or is this person going to extend their contract? Be a new hire. Okay. I would move to approve this position. Will second. Another roll call. Miy, yes. Rice, yes. Williams, yes. Young, yes. Hower, yes. Yes. Yes. Motion passes. Second, sir. And the last item before the consent agenda um is the Genet Associates at Urbanddale Middle. Now, knowing that we're going to work on the schedule that may or may not be able to be changed, I think you could, if you were to pass this, it doesn't mean that I would go out and hire these people tomorrow. it would be if we can't make the schedule work and we needed to continue with what we had, we just wouldn't hire them. So,
195I don't like teachers stuck in the lunchroom an entire period that takes away from instructional. So, there's a world that if we didn't change the schedule, we could still do this. So, I would take whatever direction the board had on that if it was approved. I move that we approve the sorry the what is it? I remember this uh the additional general education associates of middle school. Thank you. We'll second conversation. any conversation. I have a lot to say. So, okay, we're voting on it and not knowing whether we're actually going to need this position, right? Essentially, because you're you're still working on the schedule and whether it's a necessity. Well, I can Yes and no. I mean, is it a necessity? Do we want to keep teachers not teaching a class or do we
196want to free them up so they could teach a class? That's an option. If the schedule stayed the same this year because we couldn't make it work there, they could still have another class in there somehow, possibly. Does voting to approve this send the message that we already think the lunch supervision piece is essential and would it close minds on other potential schedule ideas? could you could decline it and then if I find out I need it, I could bring it back because I'm assuming that um unlike a teaching position where we want to get people secured now, this position would be easier to hire for in the sum early summer. I don't want to push you to like August, but people are out there just begging to do lunch duties. That's true. That's true.
197Great point. I mean, yeah, you're to your point, I'm not looking for a a certified teacher. They're not locking in with a contract with another employer in the same correct. I wasn't meaning to imply. So you could millions of kids. You could table it and and have us bring it back if we determine that that's the need. Am I right? We're not missing anything with that. Yeah. We've already have a motion to also don't hire for positions we don't need even if they're approved. That's correct. currently the case now too with some other so we'd have to vote on their motion in the second just vote can I withdraw my motion no you can make a sub motion to table because through conversation that was something that was can I switch my motion to table
198this to another time when we know if the need is going to be there make sure you get my hand motion I'll second it. Need. Yeah. So, Van Ricewike, yes. Williams, yes. Young, yes. Yes. K. Yes. Me? Yes. Yes. Motion to table item 13D passes. And I would move to bring forward the consent agenda. We have a second. We have a second. Do we have any questions or discussion on the consent agenda? Just to be transparent, I'm going to vote with my previous vote on this. Just so there's no confusion as to when I'm voting, going voting regarding open enrollment. regarding open enrollment. Okay, we're ready for a roll call. Williams, yes. Young, yes. Hower, yes. Kent, yes. Me, no. Maggie, yes. Rice, yes. Six to one. Motion passes. I would move to adjourn. Do
199we have a second? We have a second. All those in favor? I I Opposed.