001Welcome everybody here and virtually. It is 6 o'clock and I'm calling this meeting the regular board of education meeting to order. Um if you would like is any citizens that would like to make a public comment. There are forms on the back shelf. if you would fill those out with your name and what you'd like to um speak about, address, and if you would return them to our wonderful secretary here, Sarah, that would be awesome. And at this time, we're going to stand and say the pledge of allegiance. Sarah, can you do the roll call? Miss Hamilton, Mrs. Simonetti, Miss Williams, Miss Sharp, Mr. Doby's, Mr. Ready, Miss Actton. Agenda n number four, approval of agenda. Do I have a motion to approve the agenda? >> Second. >> Any deliberation hearing? None. All those in
002favor say I. I. Oppose. No. Motion carries. Agenda item number five. I'm turning it over to Jeremy, our superintendent, for his report. >> Thank you, President Actton and board of trustees. Welcome to the April uh meeting. I have some celebrations. I think this time of year we just need a little positive shot on the arm, so I'll try to be brief. Uh today was bus driver appreciation day, and we were able to spend some time at our operations and transportation department uh with a pizza and ice cream social. And so we want to say thank you to all of our uh transportation providers for all their hard work and efforts getting our young people to uh school and back and all the evening activities. They're very busy this time of year and it was a
003great day to say thank you. Happy bus driver appreciation day. Uh last week was administrative professionals day. So, uh, Sarah, my right hand over here, taking care of business, the people behind the scenes, the face of our buildings, our secretaries, uh, they really carry the heavy lift for our buildings, answering phones, first to get there, last to leave many times. And so, we want to make sure we acknowledge them publicly as well. Had a great time celebrating with them. Coming up is uh, May 4th through 8th. Uh, for everyone out there, thank a teacher. Happy teacher appreciation coming up and we're especially celebrating Lisa Rando. Uh Lisa has been named a Jackson Magazine top 10 teacher. She is a kindergarten teacher at Sharp Park Academy and has been with the district since 1999. So um
004there will be lots of representatives throughout the county and we're proud that Jackson Public Schools is being represented by Mrs. Rando. Uh this is hot off the press. Jackson Public Schools uh sent a group of young people to Charlotte, North Carolina for academic games, a long-standing tradition of excellence with Jackson Public Schools. Jackson High School took in onsets, a logic game. Uh sophomore Leo Nuin took first place on onset. So, we have a national champion at Jackson Public Schools. While we have four national champions historically, Leo is the first player in JPS to win the individual national championship while playing in the elevated division, which is all juniors and seniors, and he's a sophomore. So, we're that's very prestigious what he's accomplished. Again, the uh Jackson High took second in the nation in equations. So,
005uh they have some nice pictures on social media with their trophies and just really the experience. Jake Holland, our coach, as a former uh national champion winner as well, came back. One of our former board members, Libby Brown, was a longtime teacher of academic games. So, it's great to see uh the young people coming back. We had two seniors, Vincent Woo and um Lillian Lee, and a junior, Jaden Roy, and two sophomores, uh Ean and Leo. And so, uh the future is bright and we congratulate them on their success at the national stage. And finally, my last update is uh JPS strategic planning has been a big part of the work that we said we wanted to do and we are well on our way. So, we began partnering with MASB as a result of
006this board's decision to hire uh that company to support us in this work. We surveyed over 500 students, families, community members, in-person, virtual opportunities to gather feedback and uh many board members, all these board members actually 50 community members came together a couple weekends ago and just really did great work to provide uh mission, strategy, belief statements, and the work continues. Yesterday actually about another 20 30 of us got together to continue that process of it's called a post retreat implementation workshop. We looked at our my kip goals goals that have been our goals for a few years and how we integrate this work together. So we're not completely changing the plan just making sure we have a shared vision. What are those challenges for Jackson public schools where we want to continue to improve?
007What are those priorities and targets? So, you got a lot of things, right? But if you're going to do things well, then you need to narrow the scope and the vision. And we continue to do that. So, at next month's board meeting, uh, Kimberly May will be here to present out on that whole process. So, we want to say thank you to everyone who's participated and thank you to the board of education uh, for, you know, providing this opportunity to, uh, plan for success for many years to come with Jackson Public Schools and through that strategic planning process. So, at this time, this concludes the superintendent's report, unless you have any questions. >> Thank you, Superintendent Patterson. Item number six, consent agenda. Do I have a motion to approve the consent agenda? >> Support. >>
008Any deliberation? Hearing none. All those in favor say I. I oppose. No. Hearing none. Motion carries. Item number seven, citizens requesting to address the board. So I have John C. King. I'm John King. I live at 2033rd Street here in the city. Um, I wanted to speak out against the attack against the United States Constitution that was done during the last meeting by disgraced and former vice president and somehow now treasure Derek Dobies along with Jen Gallagher and others. Um, I know with Jen Galler and then Mayor Dobies, they had a meeting basically the same uh sort of an attack against the United States Constitution. Jen Gallagher was the mom's demand action representative at that meeting. Oh, it must been at least five to seven years ago. Um, so Carl Strubal ends up mentioning Oakland
009County Schools, the uh that tragic shooting there. And I'm thinking, uh, you know, kind of like close to home, I think he was suggesting. I was thinking we had a 13-year-old just this year kill a 16year-old just you know I don't know five six blocks away maybe or or not that far and so you know it so with and of course it was I think past midnight they you know they are having a sleepover apparently um I don't think it was to study for school and yet you have that situation so disgraced and former vice president and now somehow treasurer doies Jen Gallagher Carl Strubel and others think the problem is the United States Constitution of course now today we have like James Comey being indicted again. Uh he wrote 865 with seashells and posted
010on social media. Uh Michigan's governor did that back in 2020. And of course we have a shooting at the Saturday night at the White House correspondence center. But I guess our problem is the United States Constitution to many of them. Um I also wanted me to mention bring up uh the Superintendent Patterson being listed as endorsing city council candidates. Uh currently, you know, I I speak of Derek Dobies again. That's when Shalon Hunt was endorsed by him. Uh there was a post Jeremy Patterson superintendent with the JPS logo. That is clearly illegal. There's no questions. All the other stuff with Derek Dobby say it's highly unethical at best for him to have a subordinate endorse him. I mean is he really endorse him? I mean, I don't think there's such great candidates that the superintendent
011should be endorsing them, but um so there's certainly highly ethical and probably legal issues, and I would hope for the board to maybe have the attorney give an opinion on that. Thank you. >> Thank you, Mr. King. Item number eight, discussion items lend co-painting and I'm going to turn this over to Marcus. >> All right. Good evening. Um so as you probably remember over the last few years we've been repainting the high school here, the corridors and the classrooms uh mostly in the summertime. Um so this summer we're looking to finish up the final floor. So, we're going back to the first floor to paint those corridors. Um, we received a quote from Lenco, who's done the rest of the building, so to keep it consistent. We'd like to stay with the same uh painter.
012He's done a great job. Um, the amount is $54,893. It would be done over the summer. And again, because the summer spreads over both fiscal years, a little bit of that will touch each budget. Um, so again, nothing required this month. This is just for discussion. We'll bring it back in May for final approval. >> Can I ask one question? So, just remind me last year we talked about this painting and we broke it into two years. Was it a couple years? Did we break it down last year? And >> well, >> my real question is, is this the same amount that we discussed? >> It's it's similar. So, we So, last year we were painting the corridors and the classrooms each year. So last year we went down to ground floor um and we
013decided to not do the classrooms. We break it up and just do the corridors. Um we decided we're not going to go back and do the classrooms at this time because we realized now that the bond is passed, we'll be touching each of the classrooms and painting is allowable through the bond. So we're going to finish the last corridor which would not be a bond expense and then we'll wait for the bond to come through and hit the classrooms. So the money's up comes out of the general fund, correct? >> Correct. This would be a regular maintenance item. >> Thank you. Any other questions? Item number 252683 FY preliminary budget. And I'm turning that back over to Marcus. >> Sure. And again, we've talked about this every year. So, this is actually the ISD's budget.
014Um, there's a state law um that requires all districts to review and vote either approve or or reject the ISD's budget for the upcoming year. So, this is a copy of their preliminary budget that I have in front of you with some of their assumptions. Of course, they had to make these before the Senate and House released their budget proposal. So, um you know, I don't know how that um will change things in their picture. Again, you have the handout here. Feel free to look it over. We'll we can discuss it a little bit more at finance um next week and then we'll bring it back at the end of May at the meeting for the board's approval at that time. >> I was curious why why would special education costs go up so much?
015They went up over 1.4 million. Do you know do we know why that happened? Just I don't know the exact reasons. I'm sure a lot of that is going to be salary and benefit costs for, you know, I don't know what their contracts look like or their health insurance or what they're hiring, but as we know, um, special ed costs everywhere are going up just um, as as you see trends across the state. >> Okay, thank you. >> Questions for Marcus. Next item on the agenda um 252684 banking services RFP and Marcus will present this item also. All right. Um so I don't know I'm sure everyone's familiar America went through a merger earlier this past year. They were bought out by Fifth Third um bank. America is our main depository and um we felt
016that it was the right time to put an RFP out for banking services just to see what's out there to ensure we're getting the best quality and pricing for our district. Also, it's been a while. I think the last one was done in 2017, so it's been almost a decade at this point. Um and it's just good practice to do these every once in a while. So, in our opinion, the merger is not going to be without changes. So, there's going to be some changes to the district. um and we'd rather not make changes twice. So, we wanted to run this RFP and and be confident in who we're going to be banking with. Um at this stage, we're still evaluating the bids. I think it was sent out on the state website to over
017170 institutions. We received six or seven responses. Uh we're currently evaluating them and we will have a few finalists selected for presentations um between now and the May board meeting. So we'll have um more discussion and and bring a recommendation at that time for who we'll be banking with us. >> So would you expect then at the May board meeting it will be discussion or action? >> It'll be for action. This will be the discussion just to let you know and we'll have more discussion next week at finance as well. >> Any other questions? Number agenda item number nine, action items 252685, TAR annual contract renewal. I'm turning this back over to Marcus again. >> All right. So, uh, last year we put out our our our bid for food services. We're required to bid
018those services every 5 years. It's a five-year contract. Um within that five-year period, um we are required by MDE to um bring back our annual renewals, which is just really uh to get approval for the management company service fee um which I believe is the lower of 3% and the food CPI which would be three 3% this year. So you have that information in front of you. Uh we did bring this in the March meeting board and finance to discuss a little bit. So tonight we would be recommending approval of Tahar's new contract for next year. >> Move approval of the annual renewal president >> any deliberation. >> I have a question. So just on number one and two these management fees administration fees like And it it says meal or month. So are they
019for the month? Is number one meal and number two month? How do we interpret this? >> I guess number one is meal, but then number two says meal or month. So I'm guessing that's month. >> That would be the monthly. The number one would be per meal. >> Okay. Any any other deliberation hearing? None. All those in favor say I. >> I oppose. No. Hearing none. Motion carries. nonunit salary schedule. I'm turning this back over to Marcus. >> It's my night. So again, um we brought our 9-unit salary schedule to both the March uh board and finance facility committee meetings. Um and we explained at that time that the schedule looks a little different or a lot different in year than in years past. Um we found out from ORS, the retirement uh arm of
020the government. Um groups that are not in a traditional collective bargaining unit need to have a salary schedule to help protect their pensions. So, um, human resources and finance, we we, um, got together to create a salary schedule that looks more like a traditional you would see in a in a in a bargaining units group. Um, so we came up with a three-year salary schedule that would start in the for the 2728 year. As you might remember, we were typically approving two-year salary increases prior. So, next year's salaries were approved last year by the board. So this would start for the 27 28 year run through 2930 and we wouldn't bring this back again until this expires at the end of that three years. So instead of bringing this every year, we bring it just
021like we bring any other collective bargaining agreement for approval at the end of that term. Um so again tonight we'll be looking for uh approval of the salary schedule for nine unit staff starting in the 2728 fiscal year. Do I I make a motion to approve the non-unit salary schedule? >> Any deliberation hearing? None. All those in favor say I. I. Oppose. No. Hearing none. Motion carries. Item number 10, board comments. I'll say wow. >> Um, yeah. So, I mean, congratulations to everyone who has been honored in the recent weeks. Bus drivers, administrative assistants, teachers, academic games. I think there's also something for DECA. There's so many things posted and so many great things that we're doing. So, I think uh Chris mentioned recently to share, share, share when you see that stuff on social
022media so people know that we're out there and the great things that we're doing. Thank you. Cheryl stole all of mine, but thank you to the bus drivers and the admin staff and congratulations to our national champions and to everyone that participated with the strategic planning um staff and community. It was a long Saturday, but it was really enjoyable and I think we made some great strides in the right direction for our district. Can I just echo to Cheryl's point about why it's important to share in our strategic plan is this is the time where families are making decisions about next year. And so that's why it's important that we celebrate and recognize the great things that are happening. so people can make informed decisions about Jackson Public Schools cuz we have great programs all
023the way across and uh the social media platform has been very beneficial as well as opportunities to join any school at any time uh for a visit. So, thank you for lifting that up. Um I just want to um I've been hearing uh few schools of Jackson public schools that kids are on waiting list. That's so soothing for me. Um and they're there um they're especially Shar Park Academy. Um their parents came up to me. They're saying, "Yeah, my son is on the waiting list. He's can you help us out?" So and I didn't say that. I said, "Let me see what I can do." So hopefully, you know, yeah, we we are heading in the right direction. And like Mr. Patterson said, this is the time where parents make decisions to, you know, for
024their kids to see where they want to send their kids. So share all those positive wives all over the social media. So thanks everyone. >> Yeah, >> I'll keep my comments short. Um, appreciate all of the the bus drivers and our uh, director of transportation who I was able to sit next to during our strategic planning process and excited to see what comes out of out of that and how we can really uh, move our district forward uh, with some of that planning that uh, we haven't done in a long time. Uh thank you to our uh administrators, administrative assistants, and those that uh put in that incredibly important work. And next week to all of our teachers who are doing the work in the classrooms to educate the next generation of Jacksonians. So, lots
025of thanks this week and thank you to the madam president for uh almost getting out of us out of here and I have our >> spoke too soon. >> I want to go. I just wanted to say thanks. I know um kindergarten roundup ended and that's a big heavy lift for those of you in the schools and for everybody else who's organizing that. So, thank you. Thank you. Thank you. um and testing as well, which is a which is a um not really rewarding part of our jobs, but a hard one. And since we're at the home stretch, um just want to lift you up and encourage all of you who are in the schools, the buildings helping our kiddos. We appreciate you so much. Keep it up. >> Chris, did you want to say
026something about our hundred years? So, I just kind of want to make sure that you guys are informed as we go along. The 2027 year is going to be the centennial year for Jackson High School. Um, so we will, but we need to plan for it, right? So, the planning starts now May 5th. There is a concert that the high school is doing. A couple of years ago, um, our past director, um, Joel Shainer had commissioned for a piece of music, which is pretty common that you might do that. Um, so they're going to just uh showcase that and just kind of introduce it, but it really isn't going to be yet our centennial. I just wanted you to know that that was coming out and it's good for them. They've been practicing it. And
027then in about by the end of this week, you should receive an email. We'll be sending out to many, many folks in the community to join our Jackson um Centennial 100-year committee. And from there, we'll be asking some folks to lead some committees. There's lots of things that we plan on doing. We kind of made a preliminary uh year-long events from January on, but some things will happen before that leading up to the hundredyear. Um, obviously, we'll be doing uh logos and selling uh or you know, selling gear and all that kind of stuff. But I just wanted you guys to be aware of when the centennial actually is and to um be prepared to be ready to join committees and be part of things as we move forward through um planning for next year.
028It's a big undertaking, but we're pretty excited about it and we know everybody is excited to celebrate and we hear so many people who are excited. So, um I think there's a lot of fun things planned. But I wanted you guys to be aware of it so that if you get any questions or you have any questions or you see stuff coming that you aren't confused that it starts at a different time than it does. It's just that we have to start planning and getting ready and ramping up and all those things. So, just join in the fun and take the ride with us. And also we on behalf of um cabinet we did want to say to thank you to all of you who showed up to um our Saturday strategic plan. It meant
029a lot to us and you all had a lot of great input and we appreciate working with you very much. >> Thank you Chris. So um I wanted to also thank everyone that came out for the strategic planning that was your s a Saturday 8:30 till 4:30. It was an all day meeting and I was so impressed by the talent and there were generational people coming to this meeting. They'd been through, you know, their parents now and then they were there, their children. It was remarkable. I just want to really publicly thank everyone for coming on their Saturday and spending time with us. It was really remarkable. So, thank you. So um at this time agenda item number 11 is the calendar. So May 20th, it's our Jackson High School Balorat downtown First United Methodist
030Church, 6 PM. May 21st, Jackson High School Honors Night in our Jackson High School Auditorium, 6 PM. May 22nd, CCMV commencement, Jackson High School Auditorium, 100 p.m. May 22nd, 2026, J High School Pathways Commencement, Wington Community Stadium, 6 p.m. May 25th, Memorial Day observance, no school. May 26, our regular board meeting. So that's going to be a fourth that's yeah, the fourth um Tuesday of the month. So at this time, do I have a motion to adjourn? >> Any deliberation? Hearing none. All those in favor say I. I. Oppose. No. Motion carries. >> I have one thing to add really quick too, you guys. The the Euphan choir from Jackson High School is going to be performing at States this Thursday. Um so kind of send all your good vibes. That's in Mason High School.
031It's at I think they perform at 145. So, >> thank thank you, Jessica. You're welcome. >> And the pop goes the weasel is Thursday and then the other one >> and then the big uh Jackson High art celebration is May 5th. So, we just want to make sure we get those in there for you in case you're not looking at your social media constantly. Sift.