FEAS Board Meeting - October 6, 2025

001Okay, it is time. Welcome. Thank you guys for coming. Um, and we will call this meeting to order and start with the >> I pledge algiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. >> Okay, we have I know Scott is out of town. Um, I'm not sure. Oh, Ryan's coming in. Okay. Um, do we can you please recognize our guest? >> I will. Ryan Howell is here. Walk us through our audit tonight. Heather S is also here. And then H Mary is also in the audience. Try again. Off. >> We'll start over. Ryan How is here. He'll help us with the audit tonight. Heather Sols is here from the ISD and helps us tremendously

002and Colin Mary is here from the record Patriot. >> Great. >> All right. Uh that any changes, comments, questions on any of the consent agenda items. All right. Hearing none. I entertain a motion to approve. >> I'll make that motion. >> Second. >> Megan. >> Again, last chance comments, questions. All those in favor? >> I Any opposed? Great. >> Public participation. Any comments, questions? None. We will move on to the district audit. Ryan and Heather. Thank you. >> Hi. Um, so I'm just going to recap our audit report, which is the green bound copy that you guys have um in your packets tonight. Um, one change that we have um this year compared to last year is last year to be recorded. >> Oh. Oh, it's okay. >> Um, so one thing we did do

003different this year is there's no single audit. So typic like in the past couple years you guys had two different reports because you had over 750,000 of federal funds. This year you guys dipped below that. Um a lot of that because the ARPA funding kind of ended most of it in that 23 24 fiscal year. So um with that dropping off it it brought you down below that threshold again. So that's why there's only one report this year compared to the two. Um, so the first thing I always like to discuss is our independent auditor's report which is on page one of that bound copy. Um, so we have different sections. The one I'm going to focus in on is that very first section, the opinions. So in the second paragraph on page one, it

004states, "In our opinion, the financial statements referred to above present fairly in all material respects in accordance with accounting principles generally accept the United States." So that's an unqualified or unmodified opinion. That's the best opinion we could have. So you guys have like a clean audit. So um and then everything after this report is really your data um after this letter. So um so then um just to skip ahead um the next section is was the management discussion and analysis section. That's more of a narrative format. I'm going to get past that and get into the meat of the numbers. If we skip to page um 13 and 14 um so this statement is the statement in net position. You don't budget at this level. This is the full acral level. So a couple things

005that um affect this particular it's it's a basically like your balance sheet but at the full acrruel level. So what it does is it adds in your capital assets and depreciates. It adds in uh your other post-employment benefit asset um related to retirees and how it's funded and then also your net pension liability. So um the good thing is both of those um the net pension liability is actually overfunded now. It's actually it was overfunded last year but it's even more overfunded this year. And then the net pension liability um decreased by about 2.8 million from the previous year. So that number is going down too. So that's all good signs because those are large numbers on that particular >> um a lot of it has to do with your investment. So we're like a

006lag. So that is actually as of September 30th 2024 is this that liabilities as of and then we do some adjustments in the deferred inflows and outflows from a timing standpoint to get you back into like what your fiscal year looks like. But yeah, most of it's that investment liability and there's additional funding every year that the state contributes. So basically you get like state aid. It comes in and you have to pay it right back to the state to fund that liability. So a few years ago they actually split it between that um the pension liability and the post-employment benefit liability and then they basically saw the post-employment benefit liabilities like handled with the the regular contribution rate. So they they pumping it all into the pension liability now to help try to get

007that under control. >> Interesting. So, um, so that's really, you know, from a normal budget standpoint, you guys really don't focus on the the full acral level, so I'll just kind of jump ahead, but I always like to touch on that because they're really large numbers on those statements that jump out. So, so if you guys jump ahead to page 18. So, this uh is the statement of revenues, expenditures, and changes in fund balances. So the you have three major funds this year. Um you have the general fund, the 2022 capital projects fund and the 2024 capital projects fund. So the very first column we'll focus on the general fund. The third number from the bottom is your increase in your fund balance this past year. So you guys had an increase of 68,658 this

008year which brings your ending fund balance to 4,259,567. Um you guys have a really you know healthy fund balance. Um you guys are in good financial shape. Um one thing we like to look at is a percentage. So that fund balance as a percentage of your annual expenditures are about 42 43% which is good. So um it that helps with cash flow needs. um especially like this year a lot of we were just talking before the presentation that a lot of school districts that have a a lower fund balance and um that are really dependent on state funding um they're really worried about when this the state budget was going to happen because they they might not have enough money to make payroll at some point you guys because you guys have a nice fund

009balance um that's not an issue from a cash flow standpoint so that's nice Um couple things um that changed is um your local sources did increase about 349,000 mainly due to uh property taxes um compared to the prior year. Um and then also some investment earnings and then state sources also increase um some of those categoricals like the theers funding that we discussed to help um fund that pension liability that increased um some special ed funding increased slightly. So there's a couple other those categoricals that went up. But then on the reverse side, the federal funding went down about 420,000 um mostly due to that er money. Um that uh was from that was like a very specific time period. And then um a couple other things, everything this year was under budget. So um

010that was nice. Um you guys did come in better than budget budgeted um revenues, too. So that's great. Um so that's all I had to to connect with on the general fund. Um and then you have two capital projects fund with both of those have been um funded with bond issuances over the past couple years. So the 2022 capital projects fund decreased um 267,678 which brings you to an ending fund balance of 52,395. So that that capital projects fund is towards the end of its life. It's probably done, I'm assuming, by now. And then you have the 2024 capital projects fund that you guys um received about 6.26.3 million the previous fiscal year that we audited. So, and then you guys actually started spending it down. So, you guys had a decrease of that fund

011balance from the previous year of 3,178 207. at the end of June 2025, you still had $2,864,64 left to spend of those bond proceeds. And most of those both of those um particular funds obviously were um improving very dis various district facilities. Um you guys bought a bus. Um there's there's a a plethora of stuff that you guys have been doing with those. So um and then that fourth column is the other non- major governmental funds. If we jump ahead all the way to the last page of this audit report that gives a breakdown of that column of and by each of those individual funds. So I'll flip over to that page 57. So you have three special revenue funds. You have a food service fund, school activity fund, and community service fund. The food

012service fund this year had a decrease of fund balance of 2446. Typically, you guys keep that right around zero. And then this particular year, you did have to contribute from the general fund $88,50 to basically make that fund whole. Um, and like last year, you didn't have to do that. So there has been some changes in funding and expenses that kind of uh both affected that uh impact of the transfer from the general fund. Um school activity fund is your second special revenue fund. This is like your class accounts. Um and there's kind of timing differences depending on fundraising and when when those funds are actually spent. So that's um a lot of different basically um accounts that accumulate up to one fund there. So, that one actually had an increase of 71,000 for um

013ending fund balance of 388,969. And then the last special revenue fund is the community service fund, which is like the preschool fund. Um that one also um had to have money transferred from the general fund to make it whole. So, the general fund transferred over 38,563 to get that um fund to break even this year. Um >> I have a question. The activity funds. Do those sit all in and all out in a year? Do you know how that >> not always sit there? >> Yeah, it sits there. It used to be different. So like four or five years ago, there was a Gazsby change and we used to they used to be agency funds and you'd have cash of 388,000 and then you'd have a bunch of liability accounts and say like class of

0142027, class of 2028, football and it would just be like literally no fund balance. It would just be cash and a liability that offset said, "Hey, we owe these people. It's not our fund balance." Well, it changed and it basically said, "Hey, well, does anybody in the school oversee those accounts?" Well, yeah. Does like if they if somebody in the class of 2028 wanted to go to Cancun, you guys might somebody has a say in the office that could actually like stop that, you know? Uh so because of that control, they basically said, "Hey, you the school districts need to bring it back in. It's a fund now." Now you guys actually account for it both ways because you have to track, hey, of this 388, who is it owed to? What groups? Because they

015all want their fair share. >> Cash is that cash? >> Yeah. Yeah. So it's exactly what it is. It's all cash. >> Separate conversation. >> Yep. Um and you can >> can it be not cash legally the rules and stuff? >> Yeah. And then Barb would have the breakdown of all those accounts. interest. >> Right. Right. Yeah. Um and then the uh the community service fund. So that one broke even. And then we have the next type of funds are the debt service funds. Couple changes there. Basically you guys uh levy taxes to pay the bond payments. You had two funds that um closed out this year. The 2015 and the 2021 debt funds. Both of those um had a little bit of residual funds left in them and they transferred to the 2022 and

016the 2024 debt funds because those are the the remaining active debt funds um to pay those um capital project uh bond proceeds that we talked about at the beginning of the presentation. Um and then um the final fund is that uh public improvement capital projects fund. That one's uh just has a little bit of interest income of $5,700 and other than that, no change to that fund. Um and then we have uh I also give you two management letters um that would be separate to the bound audit report. And this is where if you we had a material weakness or significant deficiency, we'd noted in here. We did not note any material weaknesses or significant deficiencies this year in your internal control process. And then we also have another one that is communication with those

017charged with governance at the conclusion of the audit. This one if we did have some nitpicky stuff that we see like if you were over budget by like a really small amount, we'd noted in here. Actually, we didn't have anything noted this year. Um, we've also done that in the past. If we can't find like a receipt, like a credit card receipt or something on some of our testing, we'd note it there. Even though it might not rise to the level of a significant deficiency or material weakness, that that letter we'd be noted it in. The only uh comment we have this year is um the condition of the county records were in great shape and you know, we appreciate it. It was just a positive comment. Uh so I like like it when we

018have positive comments. Um, and that's all I had this year. Uh, any questions? >> Sounds like great news. And so, kudos to Heather and Barb and the whole team for making Brian's life a little easier. Hopefully. >> Appreciate it. Yeah, no problem. >> Thank you. >> Thanks. >> Thank you, Ryan. >> All right. And obviously you guys are welcome to stay >> be before they don't stay, which is fine. Thank you. Um, just as a there's Amy and I have chatted a couple times today. Okay, Heather and I have probably chatted six times since the weekend or prior to the weekend. The state budget is out and there's all kinds of conversation circling around that. So, we're going to let that settle a little bit and then I'll be reaching out uh for Heather to

019come to Frankfurt with our finance committee and kind of walk through that just to make sure we're all clear. Um, it was I think we were pretty fortunate really comparatively to other districts. So, I think we're still in pretty good shape obviously, but just so we can wrap our head around it and see what moved. Some things went down, some things went up. So, and we're still in pretty good shape. So, I'll reach out to the finance committee tomorrow and Heather and try to find a time we can chat. >> Yeah. And if you want to watch the MASB recording, it's really confusing, but >> it's a different type. >> It is. >> Well, actually the the news was really spectacular and then Heather explained that the spreadsheet's wrong. So, but it's not bad. It's

020um these are all estimates still and they're still going through the mountains of details of in wording. I mean, it was interesting sitting through the explanation and there's some things where they're just like I don't even know what this wording means. I don't know if we're getting money or not getting money or what you So, there was some wording, for example, that said that we will be um charged a 5% penalty if we don't have all of our students report that turn in the form for free and reduced lunch. But then they were like, but the way it's worded, it says you have to try to get 100%. So is it you really have to have 100% or you just have to tried? So yeah, I think there's a lot but the short answer is

021in the estimate right now it looks like our budget is just getting a very small ding. Right? >> So they Anything else? Any other >> there is a lot. >> Well, thank you very much. Appreciate it. >> Thank you. >> All right. Superintendent report. >> All right. That begins on page 23. Couple things of interest. We Thank you. We are um hosting a flu and vac flu and vac flu vaccine COVID clinic on October 27th. Uh parent teacher conferences are coming up. I'm sure Ann and Matt will address those a little bit. Early childhood uh discussion uh continues on meeting with Amber and with uh send some things to GMBB just some conversation starters. Uh many thanks. The Hall of Fame induction I think went really well. the fundraiser. Thank you, Amy, and those of

022you that were involved with that also went very well that evening. A parking lot light should be here next week. It's getting darker earlier, so we sure hope so. Uh, new signage for the parking lot is in the works. Uh, we went through that. I had a number of staff help me determine what would work and what wouldn't work the best. Uh, I think we're in really good shape with that. upcoming projects over the winter break. Hallway carpets, uh, entry hall furniture, state budget we just heard about and we'll hear more about that when we put a finance committee meeting together. And just my one overall comment, it's in your board packet. Um, I just wanted to thank the staff for uh, you know, stepping up. You know, they kind of start part some of

023them it was a little rougher start than others for a variety of reasons we've already talked about, but they went above board. They were very professional. greatly appreciate um their efforts and getting our school out year off to a good start. We are moving u we're back up running normally uh running very well. So we're just uh learn a little bit and as we move through life we learn and we do better the next time. Uh count day uh Margaret Evans with that. It's been uh good timing with that. That is also behind your packet. um the enrollment numbers and strategic plan. Also, I put in uh the board packet as priority goals each each month and we'll address those um as we go through the school year. A couple other things before we dive

024into the trun law notes. Uh the Benzy we have a I don't know if some of you are aware of this. We have a Benzy strings uh program and we have seven of our students involved with that program. a number of students across the county from Homestead Hills, uh, Lake Anne. It's a it's a pretty cool group and they just started up and they're working with some interest with kids and I believe they had something last week as well. Uh, Rob Jones uh, runs that program. The other point is met with Rotary today and they have approved and helped us with a $5,000 um robotics grant that we will have uh moving forward. So, it was awesome. Met with uh Bruce Ogleby today and we're all set uh with that. So, so lots of good

025news here. Um, moving forward with the school law notes, some of this does not apply. I guess does anybody have any specific questions because we have quite a bit to talk about tonight. >> I had one question on the um, as part of the notes, they were talking about the classroom observations >> with evaluations. And I think in a few last meetings we talked about that there there's a a statute that I think all of us were kind of like surprised by that we had to have that >> procedure on our website. >> The procedure is on the website. >> Okay. >> And one other thing I do need to add yet is the IDP piece. >> Okay. >> Put that on the website. In fact, we're me uh Matt Ann and I tomorrow are

026meeting with uh Brad Rey and Chris Baker Donan to go through the whole evaluation process. to make sure we're all on the same page, make sure everything's covered. Um, so that's tomorrow from 4:00 to 5:00. >> Okay. >> So, I think we're in good shape. >> And where on the website is that located? Is it just a little small disclaimer? >> No, it's um it's on the district page. It's towards the bottom on the right. >> Okay. >> It'll say um that and there's I think it's in the area where the contracts are listed. >> And I can take a look and give you >> Absolutely. Thank you so much. >> Okay. You're welcome. Any other comments on true law notes? All right, that is all I have then for the superintendent report with one

027exception today. Uh afterwards, I need to get a couple signatures from Amy and Aubrey and we'll also need a sign signature uh for one of our business items tonight on summer tax collection. >> That's good. Any questions for Jeff? All right, moving on. We don't have a finance committee report because we didn't yet because we're waiting for the budget to >> Yeah. And I like I said, I'll send I'll send something out and um >> we'll just figure it out. Does anybody have a preference more? I think afternoons probably work better. >> Oh, I'm not going to do it tonight. That was just a general question. I'll send emails out and get it up >> because I need to get Heather involved with that as well. >> Okay. All right. Technology report. Press the button.

028>> It's technology. >> Works when you need it. >> I have 20 things going and they all need to work. >> I even have my weatherman's microphone here. All right, I will go through this. I'm not going to say as fast as possible because that wouldn't really value my presentation very much if I'm whipping through it. So, I'll go through it very efficiently. Um, I wanted to present on AI a little bit, give you just a little background, and then dive into one of the tools that we're adopting that I talked about, the Magic School um AI website. So, if uh we go to our um middle school and high school student handbook, and it's in the elementary, too. But I want to focus on this um that the the policy that we have in

029there covers things and I really like all the aspects that it covers. And I feel like I want to do a better job of getting this information out either by having teachers talk directly about this policy or having it emailed or both having it emailed out to parents. Um, we cover the integrity of academics and making sure that they understand where we stand with that because the more we make it wishy-washy or not discuss it, um, the less defined things are. And that even works as adults. We need to know what are we supposed to be doing, what are we not allowed to do, and it clears up a lot of cloudiness. So, this talks about that aspect. Uh it also talks about class use and what we want to use in class with AI.

030Um it talks about using it to take tests, complete assignments, create multimedia projects and all that. It must align with your teacher syllabus. So that means that there may be a time where you want to use it and you'll see a reason or a method on how. Uh but for the most part, it's up to the teacher on how much of that uh artificial intelligence you're going to put in. And I forgot I had a poster that I handed out to the high school staff that talked about different levels of AI. I'll have to bring that next time. This one's an important one that I didn't think about at first um and I've already heard of an incident, but um using AI to engage in forms of bullying um by turning people in in faces

031and and stuff like that into AI images and putting out fake news. And I mean that stuff happens already as far as national news and state news and um you know comedy shows everybody's superimposing everybody else's images on stuff. So we want to make sure that the students are aware that that's not going to be tolerated. Um and that's one of the pieces of our policy that's uh really important. I like that we cover the bias and inaccuracy of AI. Um, we've heard it now for a while now because we've been talking about AI, but I don't know how much the students know about it. Um, another good discussion in the classroom. Again, it's the students responsibility to check on that relevance if they're going to use it according to what the teacher had said

032to use. And then lastly, privacy. Um, protecting your own privacy and the school's privacy by keeping the personal information out. Another reason to use Magic School AI is because it kind of puts that information in a bubble and protects that information from going out. So, we're going to use Magic School because it's the software that aligns with that policy. Um, it also organizes all the AI tools. It it gives the students guide rails and it also does a good job of covering the literacy for AI by giving the students different messages um and by just putting the guard rails up. So, the teacher side, they have uh at first I thought it was 50 and I actually counted them up and there's over 90 teacher tools to choose from in Magic School. On the teacher

033side, they can uh do stuff. This is just a few categories of lesson planning, generating assessments and ideas, uh communications, whether it be emailing out to parents, report card comments, um just the wording of of certain things. It also provides a lot of tools for student activities in the classroom and those can either be shared with the student on the student side or they can just be used by the teacher. And then lastly and one of the great things is uh allowing for student accommodations and leveling work to meet that student's needs. Uh it also has a chatbot that I talked about called Raina. It's similar to chat GPT if you've used that or Gemini. Um, it allows you to take the responses that you're getting. So, I as a teacher, I'm going to be

034asking this chatbot questions and it's going to spit out the results. I can make the results come out really fast or I can say, you know, take some time and do it smarter than that. Uh, or include a lot of thinking in your response to me. You can also tell it to give you answers in a in a question format. Multiple choice or free response. This might be something where you put in the chatbot that you want an example of a good question that you could ask your students and then you'd want it in multiple choice format. You can also tell it to be a lot longer than it is or half the size of it and when it gets that response. You can also tell it to summarize the response and just spit out

035the response in a sentence or a paragraph or bullet the points. Those bullet points I like the best just because it's easy to see and visualize and and get the step-by-step process of whatever you asked it. And then you can customize it to differentiate, to rewrite it, stuff like that. That's all for the teacher on the teacher chatbot. And then the other really important tool for teachers is this student room creation. So what they can do is let's say we're um teaching um science in the middle school and I want to use the special AI tools with the students. I would create a room for those students in that class. And schooly does this for us. The uh if you the teacher makes a room in schooly, it just gives it out to the kids

036that are in that schooly class. You can also like if at the elementary let's say somebody wasn't using schooly, they could give out a class code and that code would allow the students to join that room. So the teachers pick the tools that they want out of the list of student tools to put in the room. So that when the student accesses the room, all they have are the tools that the teacher selected. Then the teachers can monitor what the students are doing with the tool. Most of those tools are chat bots, but they're chat bots that are organized in a certain way, and I'll show you one today, but you can monitor what goes back and forth between the student and the chatbot. You can also monitor if a student's off task or using

037inappropriate interactions. I'm sure that that would be entertaining to see what the chatbot would say back. I'm sure that's a lot of what the kids do and what probably adults do too is, you know, ask Siri certain things or try and tick them off or something and see how they respond. But this will um monitor that. It'll flag it. It will also redirect and I'll talk about that more in the the chat room stuff for students. All right. I wanted to get to what it looks like on the screen side. So this is what teachers see and these are all the tools that I was talking about. It just goes on and on. The nice thing is that you can search for those by word. You can also look at the categories that they have.

038You could make your own categories if you want to. I like this down here. If you want to just look at the AI tools to help you plan, to support students, to give feedback, it's all separated out there for you. That makes it a little bit easier. And teachers are also going to get better at knowing what tools are available to them uh to use a lot of these tools. When I when I thought of AI at first, I thought it was going to produce a very entertaining interactive graphic interface, and that's that's not the case. AI isn't isn't initially built to do that. It's about getting you to think and working with you and giving you information. So, a lot of it is textbased. You can have that text read to you. uh you

039and the students. So, that helps a little bit if the students having a hard time comprehending the text. Um, but like I said, when I started clicking on these, I'm like, "Hey, where's the fun stuff?" And it's not really built for fun. It's built for productivity. So, even I thought, "All right, Jeopardy. I'm going to see something cool here." And what you do is you put your topic in, you put your grade level in. Um, then you can copy and paste in some categories that you want the Jeopardy questions to be about. Um, and then you generate it and it gives you uh like a textbased list of all the categories and you just have to take those, copy and paste them into like a Google slideshow. I don't remember if I have a nice

040one here set up. I don't think I do. Might be buried in there somewhere. So, those are all the options for teachers. Um, over on the side here, this is that chatbot that I was talking about that teachers have. This is just your generic chatbot. You can chat about anything you want with Raina back and forth. Again, if you've had experience with a chatbot, it it's always prompting you for the next thing that you want to ask about. You ask it a question like, "I'd like to plant some vegetables." And it says, "Hey, that's a great question. What kind of vegetables were you thinking about?" And you say, "Tmatoes." Oh, that's neat. Uh, let's see. What are some things that we, you know, where do you want to plan them or something and it keeps

041a conversation going back and forth? And then it gives you some examples of prompts here that you could start with if you're having a hard time trying to think of uh how to utilize this chatbot. Here's the things that I was talking about as far as the options of the answers that the teacher gets and they can change the um the way those answers are put out there. I'd love to show you more examples, but I got to keep on moving. Uh, the last thing that I liked that I wanted to show you, it's actually under magic student, but it's for teachers. If you click resources, there's uh these how-to videos, there's some AI literacy, but I like these little things that they have set up ahead of time that give you like little packages

042of ways to use AI in your classroom. This would be a good starting point if if teachers just aren't sure about, you know, what route they want to go with that. this choose your ad own adventure looks really fun in the escape room as well. So I'm going to go back to the presentation and I'm just going to show you real quick how what it looks for are on the student side. So the students have about 50 tools. Actually the students aren't choosing the teachers have 50 student tools to choose from. Those tools, like I said, they're pre-configured by the teacher. The students are only given those tools that the teacher allows. And after the class, if you don't want them monkeying around with something, you can close the room. You can pause it and

043open it back up the next day if you want to. You can open it at home, you know, if you want them to use it at home for homework or something. But the idea is to have them in a situation where you can kind of take them through step by step and teach them the right ways to use this. Um, a lot of these tools are not based off of somebody asking a question and you giving them an answer like how many miles is it to the sun. That's not the AI kind of thing. Although we use it kind of on the fly like that, you know, if we need information or if I want to know like how many strikeouts the Tigers have this this year, you know, that's an example of something. But

044that's like a depth of knowledge level one, a DK1. And AI is built for a little bit more complex questions. I'll show you in a bit here with that. But the this is the reason that I like to have AI through Magic School because the students are educated on it. They they practice AI literacy. Um they use it in a monitored environment and it's with a purpose. Again, purpose is really important like why are we doing this? What's the point of this? And it defines it really well when you're doing it. And like I said before, students are redirected within activities if they're off task. um I've tried the chat bots on the student side and said I don't feel like doing this and it responds back and says well you know I understand but

045how about we look at it this way and it it tries to turn them back into the situation. This is what I was talking about with AI that in the classroom we want to, you know, take advantage of what this is offering to us by approaching those higher level thinking skills. And you cannot have a, maybe you could, but you cannot have a conversation with every student in the classroom at the same time. That's impossible. You could have the AI tool interacting with the student and pulling out information and checking for understanding. and the teacher can look at that later if you want to. But the student is getting immediate feedback, something they couldn't get unless they had a personal tutor sitting next to them. But I do understand, I mean, there's a human element

046where, you know, teachers could have conferences with students. Teachers are going to walk around the room and interact with students. This doesn't say, you know, the teacher's going to stand behind the desk with a a wall up and you're not allowed to talk to them. That's not the point at all. That's not our our goal at all. It's to give this to teachers to get some extra one-on-one attention for the students through interaction on these chat bots. So, if you happen to have a phone with you, I was going to let some of you get into a student room and I was going to show you what it looks like on your side, but feel free to scan that QR code and it'll ask for your name. And you guys in the audience can do

047this as well. So, I set up a chat room outside of Schooly. Um, it gives you a little code. I just turned the code into a QR code so that you could easily put it on your phone there. Now, I'll just give you a couple more seconds because I want to show you on the screen side what you're looking at. So, once you're in the room, I set up a a room with two tools. Um, I set up a room for debate and being in a schoolboard meeting, I was like, how how risky do I want to be here on the topic? I started with fruits versus vegetables, but I'm like, I can do better than that. So, uh, the debate was how you feel about standardized testing. And in the setup of the chatbot,

048I'll show you. I can take the teacher can say, "All right, chatbot, you are going to be for student standardized testing." And then the student is going to argue the other option. I think it's fun to put give the uh chatbot the obvious one that you would probably go for as the positive in a debate um and then have the student try and argue the opposite. And then you can flip it around the other way if you wanted to as well. Let me show you on on this side what I'm looking at when I set that up. So I'm going to go into rooms and there's the schoolboard room right here. Sorry, you have to multitask and look up here and work on the room. But here's the people. I'm glad nobody put something like

049butt or anything like that on there. It's because we're not in a high school classroom, so that worked out well. I'm I came in as Joe, so that's why it says inactive. Um, so right now, this is the last tool that they all used. And it's also giving out some messages of what people are texting right now. Um, you can get more in depth by going into insights and it gives a little bit more information on what students are discussing. Um, gives you some more stats on the room and how it's being used. I'll go back to manage room. There's a scheduling. What's that? >> Going on and on. I guess my actions. So, it gives you text. And again, this this is something as a teacher I would prep the students for. When you

050chat with a chatbot, its job is not really to entertain you. It's to interact with you, but not in a a way that's going to give you a bunch of videos to watch. It's going to give you information that you go back and forth with. And if you need to take it up a notch on engagement, you can have it read to them as well. And that may feel more interactive if they're dealing with audio coming back and forth. So, I'm going to go into debate partner, and you can look at what the teacher set up. So, right here, I can just put it what it's called. That doesn't really matter, but I do pick the grade level. So, I picked professional staff, so it's treating you like an adult. So, what you're seeing now

051is not necessarily what a second grader would get in a debate. Um, and then here's what I want them to debate about. Standardized tests in public schools. I even put a couple of standardized tests. I don't Is anybody getting any information about NWEA or MSTEP in the back and forth. I didn't even know what it was going to do with that or if it knows what those acronyms are. And then I can tell it this is the position I want you to take. I want you to be against standardized testing. And so it's going to argue with you and talk about the pros and cons. At the end of my argument with them, I said, "You know what? You're right." And the chatbot said, "Not so fast. there are some good points here. Here's some

052ideas of good things. And it it kind of helped me start to argue more with it. All right. Lastly, this other aspect of this room is the writing feedback. I would say something like, "Hey, when you're done with your debate, go on and use that second tool to kind of have something else ready just in case." In this one, I just made up another activity that you could do. it probably would not be with the same grade level. Maybe it would. Um, get feedback on your assignment. Be sure to highlight the parts of your writing that you chose. That's something I entered. And then I just made up something here. It says, "Students will write five paragraphs about a vacation that they had with their family that they really liked." Um, they could either type

053it in right there, but they could also just bring in a piece of writing that they already worked on. It could be a Google Doc that they already have done. You can upload docs if you want to. And then it will give you feedback on that back and forth. I put an image up here. I uploaded an image. I don't think it's going to let me look at it. An an image of a rubric that I just grabbed off a line. It was a narrative writing rubric that it's going to use to interact with the student. So, you could put anything in there you want the students to focus on. I don't know what that would look like on this end. I haven't done interactions with just um submitting feedback, but I can tell who's

054in there. So, Bella's in there and she's working on the writing feedback. Let's click on her. Oh, this is this Bella. Is this like a summary of this is a summary of your debate down here. And I like how it writes a narrative on here. It kind of puts the information into a a little paragraph that summarizes. Sorry, that's not very big. I should have made something that you could see better for that part. And then eventually she would give me some information. I'd get some information on the writing feedback once Bella started with that. Looks like it can also generate a summary overall on how the student did with this activity. I assume it would be a little bit like that summary down there. So, it tells what the tools used. No misbehaviors noted.

055Good job, Ella. Minimal engagement though because there's not much time. Give strengths and interests. I I really like that being able to see the details of what happened. So, I think that's basically everything I wanted to cover. The staff have not been introduced to the student rooms yet. I have uh one teacher that's kind of trying it out in schooly to see how it works. Um but I'll roll that out in our PD sessions in October and talk to them about how to do student rooms and get that going. Right now we've covered the teacher tools in the chatbot and um they're playing around with that and seeing the different things that they can do with that and then we'll we'll do the second part here as well. So did you have any questions about

056all that? I appreciate you guys listening for that long during a school board meeting. >> Oh, that's cool. What grade level? >> What's that? >> It says kindergarten, but if I choose a if I choose an age level for a room and I say kindergarten, it um it doesn't make the text like bigger or it I don't like how it really adapts to kindergarten. I think they can do a better job of that and maybe they just need to work on this a little bit more to allow that. But when you set up right here, it says prek. So, I don't know what they're thinking if a toddler is going to be able to handle stuff like this. Um, you know, this message right here is not kindergarten, but you can teach a kindergartener how

057to press the speaker and have it read to them. So, this is kindergarten level, but when I press start to see a sample of the room, you know, that's that's not like a groundbreaking kindergarten thing, but I don't know if this sound is going to work. I doubt it will. Hi, I'm your AI helper. Ask me about school work, time management, curious questions about what you'd like to learn, or anything else you >> So, this is a generic chatbot that has not been set up. You can put anything you want in here as the teacher. So, I could put, hey, this is Mr. So and So, you know, we really had fun on our activity when we went to go visit the fire department. Um, why don't you see if you can type a word

058that you learned when you were there or something like that or type out vowels that you know or letters of the alphabet. It's not big >> students using this at home as like a school sponsored homework helper. >> Not yet. No. And and right now only student room the student rooms can only be opened by the teachers. >> Okay. So, I'm I think there's something in there behind the scenes for the organization where we could say, "We're going to open up this or that because there's a whole category of writing feedback, homework helper, uh SAT tutoring, all sorts of great things that you can go back and forth on that would be helpful. We'll just have to get comfortable with it and also make sure that kind of across the board we all have an

059understanding as a staff about how this is going out and how it's being used >> and and you know they could just go on chat GPT on their phone I know and do whatever they want but at least we're doing our part and trying to educate them on on how to use it. >> Sorry I missed it. The roll out plan is teachers testing it now. Is that what you said? Sorry >> the teachers are using the teacher tools already. Okay. >> Are they all are >> well the ones that some of them are the ones we I did a presentation in September and we had um a majority of teachers show up and we presented that >> the second session is going to be the student tools and how to access that and make

060student rooms >> at the October professional development. >> Correct. >> You said okay >> sorry I was debating with my partner how how have the teachers found the tools tools of utility? Uh well, I just rolled that part out in September, so I haven't got a lot of feedback yet on what those tools are doing for them, >> but I could, you know, that's something that I want to do in the October one. Kind of start with feedback on the teacher tools and how those are being used. >> Mike, um are there other schools in the ISD that are doing this? Like are you working with other tech coordinators like or is it how how has this happened? Like how did this come to us? Um, I was doing research and a lot of my

061groups that I belong to have talked about magic school and I was looking for something that that wasn't just a tool because there's a hundred thousand tools out there and it just seemed like it was too hard to control and I came across this as a like a summary video and through one of my emails um, uh, Kelly Akre Piersma comes from Mik and she said they've been using Magic School now for a couple of years. So I think it was kind of clumsy at first and it's getting better now. I'd like to do a poll of kind of ask the um other schools in the ISD more and get a better summary of what they're doing. I did ask if there's any district policy or any presentation of how AI is uh lined out

062or presented to students and I didn't get much feedback on that but that was tech coordinators that wasn't administrators. So I don't know in principal or superintendent meetings if you guys have had any discussion about what that looks like in a school district yet. So, I'll pretend that no information means we're way ahead. >> Yeah, I mean, we definitely we've talked about it and I think it's really I really appreciate you taking the initiative and doing the research and bringing us a tool um that seems like it works. I mean, this seems like it'd be customizable for us for >> I don't know what I would do in a with a different scenario of let's say we have Gemini, which we could use as a part of our Google stuff, but >> nothing lines outlines

063it enough to to be able to deliver it in an organized way. >> Well, I think the guard rails are incredibly important, too. Yeah. And putting kids in different, you know, I hate unleashing them on the entire web, whatever they need, but no, this this is awesome. Thank you so much for doing it. Yep. Any other >> the teacher tools would be super useful. So I'm curious to hear how how how uh the adoption rates are and how people are are finding it. >> The nice thing that we can do as an administrative team too is look at um the list of teachers and the tools that they've used and what's the most we can get that information through magic school. >> Yeah. I know you've told us in the past teachers are going online

064to other things to make up like like uh the third grade teacher are making up games or something and they're using online thingamajigs and this will just make that a lot better. >> Y I mean for all up and down the scale. >> Yes. >> How much does it cost? >> This is four grand a year right now >> for the whole school. >> Mhm. which 10 years ago I'd say that they're out of their minds, but every it's like the going rate now for any subscription for dumb stuff for a year is like two to 5,000. It's just ridiculous. >> Yeah, >> I don't think that's so bad. >> Great. Any other questions? >> If they use it, >> yes, >> of course, >> which I feel like we're we're taking the steps necessary

065by having the offer in the PD and >> Right. It'll take some time. Yeah, >> thanks Mike. Appreciate it. Thanks for taking, like Liz said, all that initiative and >> it'll be fun to see how it does roll out, >> how we grow with it. >> All right. Uh, superintendent goals. >> All right. Reminders for tomorrow. >> Okay. Um, 8.3, it's really it's four, excuse me, five buckets. Uh obviously continuing to follow our strategic plan as the guiding light here. Um district long-range planning, lots of information. We need to get that going again and I will be contacting that group as well and setting up some conversation times. Uh supporting the building principles for instructional leadership is in my mind is the most important thing that we do because that's what why we're technically here.

066Um I'm not going to read all this to you. One bullet that I am going to add when I go back and look at this again is uh the staff and teacher evaluation uh working with Matt and Anne to make sure that process is seamless and we get things accomplished uh and more importantly with conversations with our staff with some meaningful feedback. Uh the fourth one is financial stewardship. Um once again there's some big buckets there. general fund, food service, early childhood, and the bond that we continue to work through. And then working with Amber uh Wilson and others with our childhood programming and uh hopefully uh moving forward with some space. And then the fifth one is just some initiatives that I continue to work on uh for the school year with probably the

067two big two biggest items there, the long range planning and the district curriculum committee. Um, and then of course AI and I've already mentioned long range planning. >> Any questions? I'm happy to answer or we can move on or contact me any other time. It's fine too. >> Sounds good. Okay. Uh, middle and high school principal goals. Matt Those were deals with thank you deals with AI um teacher and student learning with teacher clarity improved eval process and uh student feedback. back and you can see at the end of each of those paragraphs the category that it's tied to with regards to the ones that were uh district priorities. um you see an achievement goal there um dealing with growth norms and then on the second page or as you continue in your if it's

068online that you're looking at um you can see um even though the numbers don't correspond but I'll have to flip those um you can see those are also tied um to our priorities maintaining a healthy culture faced focused on physical emotional safety a couple things that were spelled out in the um in the board priorities dealing with specific intervent interventions um using those uh for you know to our CSTs um and teacher recommendations on how we're approaching each student differently and their supports uh addressing the well-being and safety needs you know as far as the culture of high expectations and then how are we doing you know following through with that accountability and then communication and systems of trying to make sure like all of our processes interventions uh our policies are consistent stuff and

069it's done no matter who's around like It happens from year to year regardless of who um is doing what job within our system. So uh the last one there you see educational opportunities. Um this was also something discussed and that was identify areas of need and interest and work with teachers, admin and school board to develop infrastructure. That's the big key there to to support current programming and future programming that provide opportunities to all students. So those are the big those the big four. Any questions for Matt? >> The the PD on teacher clarity. Is there like assessment that goes on that says, "Hey, this is aligning with, you know, that it's worthwhile PD or >> Sure. We're in the second year um of the three-year track. Um we finish up like we did half

070of it last year and this is like the second half and then there's a lot of like opportunities for teachers doing walkthroughs in you know in their own rooms but then there's a pro like we're trying this year to crosswalk it with our um evaluation model which is Marzano and so teachers growth goals will also fit in with that you know it's an it's basically an instructional type of guide for us for for all of our teachers they're part of so it should be Any other questions? And elementary school goals. >> So, our goals are really foundational goals. We're looking at uh English language arts and we're looking at math fluency. And those two goals are based really upon the data that we have. So, in the English language arts, we are working to increase

071our scores on NWA and then ultimately on MSTEP. So, we're going to focus on professional learning for the new version of CKLA. We've gotten a grant for $75,500 to purchase um the new version of CKLA. So, we'll be working together to um get training for that. and we'll be focusing on tier one instruction to improve all students um outcomes. And so you can see that we'll be doing dyslexia training through our science of reading training. Um there are new laws that go into effect in 2026 2027. And so all of our teachers will be learning uh more about the science of reading and how to address dyslexia. We'll also be uh working with coaching from North Ed Consultants um and Greta Lions especially will be working here with us from North Ed. Um and we'll

072be continuing our teacher clarity work and focusing on explicit teaching, explicit instruction, uh learning targets and success criteria. We'll be offering a book study called Just Tell Them and that's about explicit instruction. and we'll continue with our targeted interventions and our power half hours um computer programs to help including boost learning which is by amplify which is our CLA provider. So we'll be using an actual intervention that goes with our ELA curriculum. There should be a bullet there that's before elementary participation in the regional elementary ELA PLC and the title one regional PLC. And then we will apply for a grant for um targeted afterchool tutoring uh if it becomes available. It usually becomes available in November and I will apply for it at that time. Um and we're going to try to increase um

073proficiency and we are going to try to increase proficient and advanced on the MSTEP and four percentile points in the next two years. Now, that doesn't seem like a huge number, but percentile points um is actually a pretty good leap and we want to focus on making sure that we're able to get our students to that um by the end of those years. And we'll continue to do our data days and we're going to continue to go to uh literacy conferences uh and especially looking at Michigan Reading Association this year. And then for math fluency, um we're going to work on increasing our scores. We're going to be focusing um with our teacher clarity kind of combining them together. We're going to be working on the math essentials and last year we did a lot

074with the literacy essentials. These are the essentials that the state has that says these are the foundational skills that every student must have and it gives grade level um and grade band lower and upper L um standards that we would look for. Again, we'll be using some of the same things. Um, our teacher clarity, our math expressions work. Um, we may be looking at the new version of expressions. Um, they say you shouldn't buy a car the first year it's out. And from everything I've heard at my professional meetings, we shouldn't have gone with expressions the first year was out. So, we're going to let other people get through the clunkiness. And then we'll consider possibly moving to the new version of math expressions. Um, power hours will continue. One of the really cool things

075that we'll be working on um with math fluency is games, using math games to help students increase their fluency. And there's a lot of data and a lot of research that says that that's important um to help students be more successful. So, we'll be looking at math games as part of our training. So, if you walk by and you see us rolling dice or playing with manipulatives, we're not playing, we're learning. So, um, we'll be working on that and we'll continue to use math programs. We have representatives on the math PLC, um, for the ISD and we're going to try to increase this by six percentile points in the next two years. Do you have any questions? >> Do you have like a 30 second elevator explanation of teacher clarity? So teacher clarity are all

076of the moves and strategies that teachers use in order to let students know explicitly what they're learning and then to have the moves in their instruction to have students be successful in learning. And a lot of that has to do with turn and talk and hearing more student voices than just teacher voices. um trying to teach a concept and have students apply it at different levels of depth of knowledge. Um which was one of the things that Mike talked about a little bit. Um and so we're going to look at all of those those things that go into the recipe of good teaching and just making sure that we're using all of the things that we can so that students can learn the best that they can possibly learn. >> How is that? Was that

077good enough? >> Good. I just Googled it and it was very similar. >> Okay. >> Google it too. >> Yes. Um, and you know, we're going to do the um, just tell them book study, which is a short little paperback, but it's like do this, this is going to get you this shield, do this, it's going to get you this shield. And we can actually look at different strategies and we can say this kind of a strategy will give you this kind of a payback in terms of how much it impacts learning. Um, if you really have insomnia, look up John Hattie's work and you'll read a lot about a lot of these different things that you can use with minute specificity um, of what these different instructional shifts will do for students. >> I

078have more of a general question. Um, so I know that we have this at our table every time and this is cool. Um, it's slightly different than when she was talking about, but last month when Adrienne was here and she was asking for more transparency in terms of like that was more curriculum based, but I feel like I know that you guys have been doing these goals for us the last few years and this and we've been coming up with these goals for ourselves the last few years. Do we actually publish these on our website so that we can refer parents to them because I feel like that would be really helpful in like in addition to us getting this. >> The strategic plan is on our website. >> I know. I mean like like

079the building goals and like the your goals as superintendent. I'm just wondering if there's I mean maybe that's a bigger conversation for another day, but I just wonder if that would help in being something that we can point parents to when they have questions like that. >> Yeah. maybe a simplified version of >> I think like some of this is in the weeds and something that we talk about a lot and we know but definitely yes I agree it could be simplified but >> but I get I mean it's kind of like saying from what I'm hearing what teacher clarity is it's also clearly saying this is what we're trying to do in our building or >> for our kids this year. >> Yeah, maybe that's something you guys talk about in admin. >> Sure.

080I just really support the idea of telling students why they're learning something because that's it just seems like that's been the perennial question. Why do I have to learn this? because and I I think that I just really quickly looked it up and it seems like explaining to the children why they have to learn this and how they're going to go about it and giving them that framework really helps them digest it and give it more weight than if they were otherwise just said okay here's what we're doing blah blah blah follow the steps so that I don't know I think I don't know why that's so revolutionary it just seems like it is I like that >> so in our in our action priorities of high standards, high supports. Are there things that resources

081that you three feel like you don't have that you need to achieve the goals? One of one of the things that I'm going to come and ask for some money for is face-to-face CKLA instruction. probably cost about $7,000, but that will be somebody coming from Amplify and walking us through how to get the absolute best results using the highest fidelity of our new curriculum. So, that's one of the things I'm going to ask for for this building. >> All right, great. >> Not to say we won't be back. >> Right. Right. And then accountabilitywise, how do we help support >> like, you know, this is how, you know, by next month we've done this or maybe that's not a realistic time frame. It's, you know, by the end of the semester, we've gotten >> Well,

082I think one of the things the board has asked for is some updates at least quarterly on what we've been working on and kind of where we're at in the process. Yeah, >> that's probably the easiest way to do that. >> Okay. >> Yeah, I think that a great question that that is something that we've kind of failed at in the past is we we set goals and then we kind of don't talk about them enough >> measuring. >> Yeah. Um and I think it's tricky looking at Matt's goals. These are great, but a lot of it is it is not like by next Thursday we will do X, you know, it's it's a you know, cultivate a culture kind of stuff. But If it just thinking about it, it would be nice if we

083were if we were to do quarterly updates, something along those lines um couple through the year to have it might be a way to achieve this might be to say, okay, like for that one, just give us a couple bullet points, the kind of stuff that's going on. Like maybe it's hard to know did we cultivate a culture or did we not cultivate a culture but be nice to know some of the actions or you know or students coming to talk about oh yeah we're doing this new program and it's helping like with you know sort of some even if some of these things are difficult to measure it be nice to hear in those updates some of the things that are happening in an effort to meet the uh meet the goal. >> Yeah.

084>> The tasks that >> Yeah. Because we don't have like a culture score that we can measure. you go up by 5%. You know, it's like it's not like that. >> But still, you know, >> well, the good news is that we this is where we work with Jeff. So, like the action planning part like and I do with Jeff and then you always give some updates talking about quarterly, >> you know, on how things are going. Sure. >> Great. Great. >> Sounds good. Any other questions, comments? Moving on. Athletic sportsmanship update. >> Uhuh. >> At everybody's table um should have a one page sheet that just says athletic updates kind of representing Joe with some information. Um first bullet there is a continuation of some of the conversation that happened at the when we

085were in a smaller group you know when kind of got together at the elementary school less than a month ago. was just to reiterate, we've received multiple compliments now from officials in multiple sports about uh our actions, you know, the interactions with our fall athletes um and those student athletes and they've been really positive those references so far from those officials. Um and so we're happy we want to build off that. Uh and the second bullet point there says we still have work to do, but coaches and athletes have been responsive still working to extinguish any negative comments and promote positive sportsmanship and from the beginning like that's you know that tone was set we have a at the workshop Joe shared that with you guys I think and just said hey at the beginning

086of the year all coaches were involved and across the board everybody was hearing the same message and we're going to continue to do that. Um then then you see um at the next bullet this is just kind of a neat thing um one of our Frankfurt alums who attends Elbian right now and was playing in the football game on Saturday, graduated three, four years ago. Um there was an issue happening and the crowd was kind of yelling and screaming some negatives and um our Frankfurt student had a turn and yelled at the LB crowd while they were on the field and said, "Hey, we don't do that here. You know, that's not who we are. Keep it positive." And it was just kind of a cool deal. Now granted, they're representing, you know, fine institution

087like right now, right? But at the same time, uh it was we thought it was a cool move, but one that like we're happy to share with the rest of our athletes and student athletes from, you know, all the way through, you know, grade six through 12. So, it was kind of a cool deal. Um, and then you see the next part, this is this is a reference that Jeff, excuse me, Joe made uh earlier in the summer when he attended uh the board meeting here. see kind of the background to that. Members of the board stated they'd be happy to help in any way, including some type of board policy that might support our efforts with regards to improve sportsmanship as far as spectators go. Last year we had a rough year um and

088had to have several parents um and uh not parents, you know, just spectators, we'll put it that way, asked to leave, etc. So, one of the things the coaches mentioned and one of the things that the board mentioned is supporting some type of polic and Um what I what I'll say to this is there's two policies here that have been uh put up for options and policy is a term that we're using but it can also just be a procedure that we do and so it doesn't necessarily have to be adopted by the board but it is something we really want to make sure we have your support on so we can make it a procedure we move forward uh especially after the board said hey we'd like to you know support any efforts so

089you see option A and B exact same thing. They just say them a little differently. Um option A is talking about uh if a spectator is asked to leave an event um you can read it due to inappropriate behavior. This is the requirement during that meeting they're going to receive official notice saying they cannot attend any more events for that season for that sport. And doesn't matter if it's home or away just a clear cut. The second one says exactly the same thing, just says it a little harsher. And and so there's two different tones there, but they both say the exact same thing. And basically the policy would be um if you're tossed from a from a game, you know, and that never happens just you're gone. That you know, officials always give warnings.

090They always talk to ads or talk to game management and say, "Hey, can you help with that parent or can you help with that spectator orever that student or whatever?" And so there's always options for that. Um, in this particular thing, it just says, "Hey, you know, if you take it to the point where you have to be ejected, then you're just done watching. You can watch them on the pixel lot, you know, on the on the TV. You don't come in person." So, it's it's a it's a pretty harsh no tolerance thing. We did do a survey of the uh Northwest conferences of of all the schools and nobody really had a set policy, but they all have had similar situations within the last year and a couple have just said, "Hey, you're done

091for, you know, remainder of the season." So, we have I think out of the all the schools, Joe, I think received something back from every school, you know, to say what they've done or what they're doing, but nobody had a like had a policy like this that would be in stone, something that we could put right something that we can put, you know, on our website. So, >> just as far as enforcement goes, >> I know we're a small school, so a lot of times we know who everyone is, but like the people taking tickets would then have to be in charge of like if that person were to show up when they're not supposed to, right? Like we'd have a list theoretically, like how would that kind of work? >> Yeah, logistically we'd have

092to, you know, there's lots of things we'd have to do, but in terms of that's why the meeting would happen, you know, ahead of time. >> Hopefully. Hopefully, right to come to a meeting. >> Yeah, exactly. That's what I was wondering. >> And we just served, you know, served papers and make sure, you know, we got the message out and Yeah. And we never want to put some a game person in a bad spot. So, we just we would, you know, ask law enforcement to help >> who asks who will ask them to leave? >> Uh, I do, Joe does, >> uh, or our school resource does, school resource officer. We we we've all had our turn. >> Yeah. Jeff's >> I know that. But I just wondered like when it gets right down to

093it then okay. >> Well, you know, it's always difficult because obviously it's a little bit in the heat of the moment. But then we always follow up and have that conversation when it's settled a little bit. Kind of the 24-hour rule. Then I think I think the important part here is getting the message on our programs, getting the message on our website, letting people know in advance this is how we're going to operate. And it's always helpful for Matt and I and Joe to know that the board and I know you do that the board stands behind this. >> Yeah, we do. I I would prefer the stricter tone because I think it has the um the weight of almost a legal ease type of speaking. Um, it shouldn't be a conversational tone type thing

094if somebody is being um inappropriate at a game. The only other thing is if they're required to attend this meeting, they're going to be issued the formal written notice banning them regardless or is there a conversation that happens and the guy goes, "Yeah, I get it. It was inappropriate. I won't do it again." >> No, it's it's just more of a notice like or notice, you know, like we're serving you and we want to make sure there's no misunderstandings of what this means and we don't want you to show up, you know, unannounced and just like, hey, you know, we're sorry this is being applied to you, but this is what's happening. >> So, somebody who's been kicked out of the game, would they would they show up for this meeting? >> Right. It's possible

095they wouldn't, right? We would we would attempt to talk to them and bring them in and um and we've had actually pretty good success in the last few years um of people coming in, but it doesn't mean they will. And if they don't, then we just have to make sure we deliver the paperwork and make sure that they see it. >> How do we know if someone gets kicked out from an away game? Because like I said, like if someone gets kicked out here, >> but the coaches the coaches will know. People get >> it'll be on Facebook and Okay. I'm just like you don't secretly get kicked out of a game, man. It's bad. >> No, I know. I know that. But like the point is like do the other schools let you know

096or is it the officials like >> they always do and then and then depending on if it's somebody can tell who where the fans from or you know because it could be somebody just going to games >> and so my next question was going to be what if it's a opposing team like if we're playing a different team like do the same rules apply that they if they were to like >> do we play some of those teams twice I don't know how that works. So what how that applies for us would be like in that type of situation would be like we can't enforce if something happens at somebody else's place, right? But we can enforce what happens at our place. So we would just have that person if they if there was like

097a second game at our place or Yeah. something they just can't come to our place anymore. But we let other schools take care of their >> That's what I That's what I meant. Like they wouldn't be able to come back at that point. Okay. >> Hey, just uh putting my my fake lawyer hat on. You might just is the meeting part for the for the for the program thing the the meeting part is a little confusing. Why wasn't it just say any spectators removed whether home or away due to misconduct will uh be banned from attending all remaining events both home and away for the current sports season. >> It can't it can say that >> it just it just the part about and then they're going to have to a meeting and this and

098that. It's like it's a little >> Yeah. I don't know, like just say and and the the practical effect is they'll get a call, they have to come to a meeting, they have to but like it just if you're just trying to post the rule. The rule is if you get kicked out, you can't come, >> right? So just a suggestion for clarity. >> Yeah, it's a really good suggestion. >> I was kind of thinking that too, Brian. That that was the line that I was going down. The only thing is I would think it would be more inconvenient for somebody I think it would be more of a detriment to know that they were going to be required to attend. >> It might be it's very embarrassing to have very embarrassing. Yes. >> So

099I would maybe that's it. Maybe that's it. I don't >> like an offender would prefer probably just to be served something written. You can't go to games like but oh my god I have to show up at the principal's office. >> Report to the principal's office. >> Yeah. So I don't know. Oh, I kind of, you know, but I think I don't know how realistic it is, but >> I think different people have different perspectives on why or what what they do or don't care about and if they're used to being yelled at by principles, then maybe it's not a big deal, you know. So, I don't know, but but I think anyway, I sorry, take taking away some of the levity. I think this is great. Personal personally, I think some some version of

100this is wonderful and I think it's down to all of us to see to it that it's enforced. I think from an accountability standpoint in the community, making sure that this if this is the rule that this rule applies to everybody, no matter who they are, is going to go a long way towards overcoming some of the challenges we've had about, you know, different rules for different people, that kind of thing. Um, but the first step is absolutely to state the rule clearly and then and then the second thing is figuring out how to follow it and all that. But I I think this is great, Matt, and thank you very much for encouraging the the the group to to go to take the step >> and that its delivery is uniformally across the board.

101So there is no >> unless you're misinterpretation of anything. >> That's exactly right. That's that's wonderful. Yeah, >> this will be published. >> Yeah. >> I mean, I had thought of that, but yeah, it would be >> Yeah, we'll we'll work through that with Joe. I'll Joe and Matt and I work through that. It'll be published. It'll be loud and clear. At one point we were putting it up on the TV screen above the concession stand. >> Yeah. >> And Mike is we've read it. >> Oh, so this is already this is already in in out in the world. >> Not technically, but we wanted this is the direction we were we wanted to go, but we wanted to make sure that obviously the board needs to be aware of this so you don't get

102it secondhand like what are they doing? >> And also Matt, I should have said I didn't want to interrupt you before. It's also this is great news about the positive feedback thus far in the season and that we're we have that that you know uh that that's just great. So congrats again. That's that's awesome. >> And Joe's done a really good job of uh communicating with coaches and you know follow through to make sure that they're hearing the message loud and clear. >> That's great. >> Good. >> Yeah, I think the message is pretty much we support the tone and intent of both both versions. So if whatever you guys decide. >> Yeah, we might just take out some of that writing. I mean, >> yeah, >> whatever you guys think. But >> either way,

103the message gets delivered and >> Yeah. >> Yep. All right. >> Thank you. Thanks for the support. >> Anything else on that? >> All right. And well, first of all, too, thanks for being here and sorry about the loss of your dad. >> All right. Um, my report was late. Thank you guys for your grace and letting me turn it in tonight. Um, we are almost exactly where we were in terms of number of students last year. Um, with this year, um, we have 61 in our infant and preschool program. That doesn't mean they come every day, but it means that that's the total number of them who are enrolled. We started band for fifth grade. Um, Mr. Joslyn has had a lot of new excitement this year about, you know, reaching out to students

104and their families to try to um make band a really great experience. And they're going three times a week in the afternoon and we have really good participation with our fifth graders. Um we had several thousand new books delivered for our library last week. Um and we are in the process of trying to get them all ready to be on the shelves and all of the right tags on them. They're beautiful. If you like the smell of books, walk in there and just breathe in because it's amazing. Um and um we have a little bit more work to do. We're hoping to get it open in early November for students and to have a a celebration uh of our grand reopening. We had our first child study team day. We sit at those meetings and

105we have a lot of people around the table and we try to problem solve for our students. and it was a successful day. We have our next one the 20th of October and it is completely full for the day. Uh we'll be meeting and talking about students um and at our early release day on September 24th. Uh the reading league came in for our last reading league training and they prevent presented advanced word study and it was interesting in our day-to-day hearing people reference what they had learned in that training. Those have been excellent trainings. the elementary school. I got to see the high school in the big parade on the 23rd or 26th. Um we've had some field trips to start the year. Um and I like that we use a lot of local

106activities as some of our field trips. Um we have done our first benchmark testing and we're in the midst of our data days. Um, every day this week in the morning, we'll have a data conversation and analysis with an individual grade and then they have the afternoon to work on their interventions and the things that they're going to do to to meet the needs of the various groups that we determine. Um, I attended the regional principles meeting. I feel so good about our staff and our school and our direction when I go to those meetings. We have something special here. Um, and lots and lots of meetings at the beginning of the year especially. You have a ton of meetings and so it's been very busy here. Uh, Jeff referenced the Benzy strings and we

107will have our first classes here on Friday. Um, and I think it's this Friday or next Friday, but we will be using our music room upstairs and they will be here for 32 weeks. If you were here for our back to school night, you got to hear Rodrigo playing the violin. Um, to get kids interested in the Beny Strings program. It's at no charge to our students. They have the instruments for the students to use. They've gotten lots of um money to make that happen. Um so it's a it's exciting program. Um we have conferences next week on Wednesday and Thursday. Um, and we will have kind of a long day on Thursday, but hopefully we'll have really good um, conferences with all of our parents and build those partnerships with our parents. >> Do

108you have any questions? >> I was just wondering who back >> Oh, sorry. Who backfilled Tammy Garrett's position? >> Um, his name is Nicholas Spencer, I think. >> Okay. He's doing a good job. The students are enjoying having Mr. Nick back there and it's good. >> Just wondering about our after school clubs and which ones we have coming back this year and what our participation rates are. >> I will be working on that. I've been out for about three weeks. >> Okay, cool. Thank you. >> Any other questions? All right. Thanks, Ann Matt. I put a copy of my principal report. There's some things that we'll go over a little bit. But before I start, I just during our first day of staff PD, Jeff and the board um they did a good job helping

109us celebrate and recognize some re recent recognition um that began in our in our buildings and um but I failed to mention it at the September meeting. So I wanted to make sure to uh make sure give it give it its credit and it's due. Um we have some amazing humans uh in this district and you see the first bullet point is uh congratulations to our middle school, high school and I put and elementary because it is a it is a team effort with regards to when these things come up and uh um fortunately we had some awesome rec recognition by US News and World Reports. Um you can see there's a attachment that's separate that kind of explains what it is. Um Jeff can forward the links to it as well. Um and then

110also we just we printed out the sheet that listed the top I think 10 or 12 schools but u you know the the actual spreadsheet goes on to like 30 area schools to take a look and some compare some data. Um but I tell you what our teachers do a great job. They go above and beyond. uh they are truly experts in their field and um I just really feel like um you know I felt bad by for omitting that at the last meeting but I want to make sure I get that across because it's really newsworthy and uh I'm not always a great promoter. Um sometimes we just report what we're doing but I think it's important to make sure like we take a second to recognize um all the accomplishments and that they're

111doing and and that's teachers, you know, support staff, aids, I mean office staff, kitchen, I mean it's it goes hand in hand. Everybody's doing a really good job uh and we're doing a good job, you know, not only with scores and how we compare to other schools, but also um understanding that there's room to grow and and we can, you know, still improve the stuff that that we're doing. So, wanted to make sure to give that out because I really feel really really feel like our teachers do a nice job. Um that being said, you can see there's testing information there. Um in the second bullet, um we're just finishing up our makeups right now. Then uh within the next week, we'll be giving our insights, which is uh it used to be called the

112cell web. It's one that we share at the end of the year with you. We do it three times a year. That that information uh is something that we'll be sharing with the board throughout the year. But at the same time, um just want you to know that's underway. You see, a special thanks to our student council adviser, Ashley N, our student council leaders, uh for their planning with homecoming. Uh it was a great week, a lot of fun. Um kids did a a great job. you know, our numbers are down uh kid-wise, but uh participation was up and everybody did a really nice job. Uh the weather was incredible. Uh we couldn't ask for, you know, a couple better days th Friday and Saturday. Um but thanks to the student council and their leadership.

113Bella was a big part of that. Thank you, Bella, for being involved with all that. It was fun. We've got some fall testing for the high school coming up. Uh then you see conference information also uh in there and the half day stuff. Um I wanted to put give some attention to the third bullet from the bottom. We've had multiple fire drills and lockdown drill. Those drills are really proving to be beneficial. Um we we had a number of things that you know kind of weren't perfect in our first drill just because of summer um construction and what works and what doesn't. So, uh, we had the, uh, fire department here, we had, uh, the police department here, and we were able to work out some kinks, which was really, um, great for our first,

114uh, lockdown drill, and, uh, we'll get better as they go on. And then today, we had our our second fire drill. Uh, and the kids really did a great job and the staff did a good job. We have a new Mckin Vinto person uh, coordinating our building this year. That's Miss Chisum. Um, so we're excited about her taking on that role. We'll have numbers at the next meeting. You see the next bullet is um we had our senior parent guardian meeting. Uh Patty did a great job presenting to parents and then Mr. Rei, Mr. Baker Donan in this case discussed the senior uh trip to Washington DC. Seniors have until this Friday to deposit uh to make a deposit to guarantee the reservation. Last year we took 26 students. So we're hoping for a big

115group again this year. Um our kids went to camp last week. You can see some information in there. We we we almost sent them all which was pretty amazing. Um and we had great support while we were out there and again great weather. Um and then we you saw since our last meeting we have our we had our seventh grade canoe trip. Got a blood drive coming up. Our eighth graders going to be at CTC. Uh physics is going to the locks again this year. And then our seniors are going to be at Benzy's uh best career expo at Crystal Mountain. And then I put the picture retake date down because some of you guys have kiddos that might need picture retakes. So, I want to make sure that you have that information as well.

116And um our building uh volunteer coordinator is doing a her first thing this this week and u they're bringing the Maples over to the middle school after school on Wednesday to play bingo with some of our middle school kids. So, we did that last year in the spring and um they've had a good communication and so they're going to do that after school on Wednesday and it should be a pretty cool thing. So Maples are gonna cart their people over and we'll set up some tables for bingo and they'll just play for about an hour or so and and uh it'll be a cool activity. So >> that's great. >> Yeah. And then our uh new teachers are doing a really good job. We're working on IEPs right now and trying to make sure everybody's

117um kind of u getting settled as we um get to do some, you know, amazing things. Um Miss Akre has been a great addition. Uh Mr. Price is proving to really do a nice job as a first year teacher. And then uh Kelsey's, you know, it's like she's been in the middle school for two years now. She's doing a really good job making that transition as well. >> Thank you. >> Thanks. And happy principal month. >> Happy principal month. >> We appreciate you. Um Matt, well a general question to not just when we we talked about um like assigning teacher mentors to new teachers. Now I realize we have some teachers that are like have been teaching a long time in other districts, but have we been able to coordinate the teacher mentors and that's

118working out? >> Cool. we have a good relationship with uh working with the union to make sure we have good u alignment and and matching you know with how that works and um but I'll say and I can I'll speak for an too I'm sure is that uh you know doesn't matter if they're a mentor or not we've had a lot of teachers going out our way to make those teachers feel comfortable and answer questions which has been great >> that's great and then I know at the senior meeting um we learned that or Brooke didn't come back to help Patty. Are we and it sounded like Patty was just going to absorb those responsibilities, but is there a need for somebody to support in that counseling role or the >> super confident with um

119you know the job that Patty can do in that role because she's worked super like really close with um >> um the last few years with that MCAM type of permission or LCAN or whatever whichever position it is. And um and so I I I think Brook and not only did they have a good um uh working relationship, but I think they also shared a lot of information. And so that's something I can bring up with Jeff in our admin meeting about like the direction we want to take with that. >> Happy to have that discussion >> because it also seemed like Brooke was there too, like if a sub was needed to cover a class or something. >> She did a lot. >> It was very helpful. >> She did a lot for us.

120>> All right. I was just curious if there was a need there. >> Great. Did the Mckin Vento did we get any additional funding for that program? >> I'd have to defer back to >> I don't know. I wouldn't call it additional funding. Um I can I can answer that better for you in November because the three of us are heading to a meeting in Traverse City and we'll have some more information for you. >> But is that does that um help students with additional support and resources and >> Yeah. And and I'll say this is like that position in both buildings helps us identify the kids that need supports and it just guarantees that we make sure those kids have supports and then we do then we really try then to work on you

121know getting funding for it and you know pay back you know as far as some of that stuff goes. But I think initially it's much more about identifying and making sure they have those supports. Yeah. >> Thank you. >> Using our community partners to help us out. Anything else? Bella, what's going on with the students? All righty. Um, as you guys know, homecoming week was upon us last week. Lots of fun, very busy. Um, we had a fun spirit week and dance and pep assembly. We had the fun parade, too, which was good. Um, we had the senior meeting, which we've mentioned. And then we've had like multiple colleges coming in during lunchtime just presenting their college which has been helpful for seniors. Um and then Justin's also talked to quite a few grades last

122week and then getting settled in getting back to our team. Fall sports are still happening. There's a home game for football this Friday and uh cross country is at Benzy tomorrow. So you want to go support our Panthers? We're home this week a little bit. >> Great. There's a blood drive on October 15th, too. And if you guys are interested, just let one of us know. >> Do we need to make appointments for that? >> Uh, yeah. I can send you a link, too. >> Yeah, I think we do. Okay. Thanks. >> Great. See, it's a great blood and the Halloween season. >> Yes. Oh, there's also um I don't know if you guys remember, but uh a while ago we did like haunted hallways. We're doing that again this year, which is gonna be

123fun. I think it's >> for whom? What was that? >> We uh we're gonna do at the elementary NHS fundraiser and >> Yeah. Yeah. >> Sunday afternoon. >> Yeah. >> You want to be scared? >> Is that in conjunction with what Vicky Slater is doing with the carnival costume? >> The costume carnival. Correct. >> And that is going to go toward the >> food pantry. >> Yeah. >> She's done it for several years. >> Yeah. And we should give her a big public thank you for doing that. I don't know how much they raised, but I know the kids have a ton of fun. >> Great. Anything else? Thank you, Bella. All right. business approval of summer tax collection. >> All right. >> So move. >> Well, hold on. Let me turn the page. Yes,

124summer tax collection is very important. Uh it's obvious uh that's the majority of our revenue. So it is obviously my recommendation to approve the resolution to collect summer taxes in 2026. And once approved, uh we'll need a signature. I think this one is from Aubrey at the end of the meeting. >> So, we'll try that motion and approval one more time. How's that? >> I'll make the motion. >> All right, Brian. >> Any discussion? All those in favor? >> I. >> Any opposed? >> Awesome. >> All right. Early childhood assistant teacher hire. >> I'm catching up. Just a minute. >> Brian West. Yes. Yep. Got it. Thank you. And I know Barb has this as well. All right. Next item. This is uh approval of help in our early childhood program. As you can see,

125we have 61 students. Um Chloe Franklin has been involved with the program through everything that's been happening. We need to formally approve her tonight. and all of her background checks are already approved because she's in place uh and has been uh a little bit in the spring and has started back up with us again. Also, we have another um request, another recommendation, and that is to um hire uh Paige Donan for hire for early childhood uh a GSRP special needs aid. We have some um situations in the middle sorry in the early childhood program that we need some extra assistance. So it's the recommendation of the superintendent and Amber Wilson to approve the hire of Khloe Franklin to fill the position of an early childhood assistant teacher and then to approve Paige Donnan as an

126early childhood GSRP special needs aid. >> So moved. >> Second. >> Any discussion? I guess the one question um when you're talking about what Paige is being hired to help with, are there are there grants or special grants or things that we'd be able to apply for for that? >> Possibly. But a lot of this sometimes that I I don't go into a lot of detail with this. Sometimes the way we code our our employees depending what area they work with and what students they work with, we do get some reimbursement depending how we code them. >> Okay. and Heather and I talk about that a lot. So, yes, we we do get a little bit of assistance back. >> Yeah, that my question I think was in the same vein was budget question just

127is this is this budgeted >> in our the addition the addition we're adding to the staff count there. Yeah. >> Well, we have a person that's out on leave. Okay. So, and we have to fill that. >> Yeah. And then we have and what happens uh through the course of the school year different needs arise and we we have to we have to >> react to that. >> No, I think this early childhood is super important here and then then we're doing a bunch of work on it. Just >> to answer your question, Brian, we're going to Heather and I and Amber are going to meet shortly once we get a lot of this budget stuff figured out and we'll bring back, you know, what the budget looks like for early childhood. >> Okay. And

128we did we which will help we did get some more slots for GSRP. >> Oh, great. >> That's also and we kind of Heather or excuse me, Amber's kind of worked with shuffling some kids and >> balancing the classes out and and so and the good thing about having our all of our early childhood in one area. Now granted, this area is a little busy. Um, but by having that they're really efficient at kind of job sharing if if they see an area they need to help. Uh, so they work really good as a unit. >> So, >> great. >> But we'll get some more information for you once we have that meeting. >> Okay. Thank you. >> Any other questions? All right, we have a motion and a second. All those in favor? >>

129I. >> Any opposed? Awesome. We will open it up for public comment. Colin or Chris? No. All right. >> Yes. >> Hence why we need some help. >> That's coming too. >> Anything else? >> I have one quick comment and then we're going to go home because it's been a long day. I want to reiterate what Matt has said and I'm going to say the same thing about an with Ann's group as well. When you really look at this data and really take a close look, we have a lot of kids that we really take really good care of. And when you look at that number and then you look at the achievement level, it it's in my mind it's it's top-notch instruction. And I want to thank the staff because they really really work

130hard. >> Absolutely. Agreed. >> Yeah. Oh, Ann, um I know you've been super busy, but um maybe next month could we get like how the alpaca surveying is going like >> Yeah. Great. [Laughter] Sounds good. All right. Well, thank you guys. >> Thank you.