Board of Education meeting_06_5_25

001Secretary Never Martinez and Trustine Ninsky, could you please go to the podium or stand in front, whatever you prefer, um to conduct the oath of office. Wonderful. So, uh repeat after me. I do solemnly swear or affirm I do solemnly swear or affirm that I will support the Constitution of the United that I will support the Constitution of the United States and the Constitution of this state that I will support the Constitution of the United States and of this state and that I will faithfully discharge the duties of the office of member of the board of education of Lancing School District. and that I will faithfully discharge discharge the duties of trustee of the board of education of the Lancing School District according to the best of my ability. Wonderful. Welcome. Welcome. All right. Let

002the business begin. Next, we're going to stand for our opening uh s well our pledge of allegiance 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. All righty. If I could have a trustee volunteer to read our district mission statement. Oh, madame sec secretary, our mission is to provide a high quality education in a culturally safe and nurturing environment that supports all students to live purposeful and fulfilling lives. Thank you. Could the clerk please call the role? Dr. Kavanaaugh, present. Mr. Herd, present. Mr. Lopez, present. Mrs. Moore, present. Dr. Navarus Martinez present Mr. Neske present Dr. Rodriguez Mrs. Tro present. Miss Williams is present. Thank you very much. Do we have any public comments on agenda

003items at this time? Seeing none, we'll move on to our um approval of minutes from our last couple of meetings. Um oh goodness, our meeting Thursday, our May 15th meeting. And I believe that's it. I believe that's it. Are there any adjustments to those meetings at this time from our from our board? Alrighty, seeing none, moving on. Oh, this is an ex. Yes. Um, Trustee Ninsky, there also the two special meeting minutes, too. Thank you. Where? Oh, see, I don't have that. Okay. Okay, here we go. Yes. Thank you so much. It's all staple together. Um, yes. any questions from our it's our excuse me approval for our minutes for May 15th and that's a regular board meeting and then we have a special meeting that was held on May 21st and a and a

004special meeting that was held on May 22nd. Are there any um corrections to those minutes at this time from our trustees? All right, seeing none. Thank you Trusty Ninsky for lifting that. a very exciting time. We have presentation time, our visual learning board's presentation. And I don't know if Superintendent, are you going to speak on that? All righty. I'm going to give the floor to over to our superintendent at this time. Thank you so much, uh, Madame President. Uh, just as a reminder, uh, at the beginning of each month, we have our wonderful schools present the work that they're doing. So, we have some great people in the audience. Uh, we have some wonderful, uh, visual learning boards. And so I'm going to turn it over to uh Deputy Superintendent Jessica Benovitz to kind of

005explain what we're going to do and take us through this work. But just for those of you who have not been here before, just know that this is something we try to do every month to show the great work of our educators and our children. Thank you. Good evening everyone. Uh this is one of our favorite parts of our board meetings each month and uh we have our visual learning board set up. We are on our last three schools of the year. So, this is pretty exciting. Uh, this evening we do have Forest View. So, if you're here with Forest View, if you could please stand up. We'd like to give you a round of applause for being here. Thank you. We also have uh Oh, hold on one second. I have to go back

006to my my thing. Uh, Lancing Learning Hub. If you're here with the Lancing Learning Hub, if you could please stand up, we can recognize you. [Applause] And last but certainly not least, if you are with Postto, if you could please stand up so we can recognize you as well. So the learning boards that are up are examples of student work from each of our schools. And so what we'd like to do is a learning walk for everyone in the audience. So if you are from those individual schools, you can walk to your boards. And then what we do is we have our board members and our audience kind of take a learning walk to each of the boards so that you can share the projects and the work that you've been doing at your school.

007And so we can celebrate you and all of your achievements that you're kind of showcasing this evening. So without further ado, if you have the three schools kind of head to your boards, we typically spend about three minutes or so. We've tried to ring a bell and do things, but it's really hard to get people to move from one space to the other. So we will try our best. All right. Thank you. What about you? Tell us about your work. Okay. So, what we did was we tried to Now, you're never going to Alrighty. Thank you again um to all the schools that presented tonight, your wonderful work, your students. Thank you so much for sharing with us. Um let's give them a round of applause for being here. I know. What is this? The

008last day of school today or tomorrow? But everybody's like ready to go. No, thank you. I get it. Um at this time, we're going to move on to our reports. Oh, no, no, we're not. We have a presentation. Um our our budget amendment number two, Miss Kim Adams, trust or not trustee, but superintendent, do you have something you want? So, thank you so much again. Um, as always, this is our amendment two to the budget. Uh, Kim will certainly walk you through the process, but as everybody knows that we get a certain budget that we try to allocate what's best for children and for the schools, but as the year goes on, there are adjustments that are need to be made. Either funding changes from the state or funding changes from us or needs change

009here and there. So, what we'll see today is our second amendment that uh the assistant superintendent of budget and finance uh Miss Kim Adams will be presenting. And so, please take it away, Kim. Thank you. [Music] Thank you. Maybe there we go. Good evening. I am pleased to present budget amendment number two for the 2024 2025 school year. I know I said I was really happy with budget amendment number one. I'm even more happy with budget amendment number two. So, if you recall, budget amendment number one, as presented in December of 2024, estimated our ending fund balance at 48.3 million. With budget amendment number two, I'm very happy to announce that we are increasing um our ending fund balance or decreasing the use of fund balance by $2.7 million, bringing our estimated ending fund balance

010at June 30, 2025 to 51.1 million. I will say I think it will be better than that, but I need to be conservative when I budget. What is this due to? It's due to $2.4 million in increased revenues. Our local revenues, primarily interest and rental income, increased by $416,000. Our state revenue, primarily over the months of April and May, have increased by $4.6 million. I don't know if June, July, and August will bring additional changes, but the past two months have been very positive. Our federal revenues, mainly our SE uh specialed county income from the ISD, increased by 1.3 million, and we returned $4 million to the capital project fund for use in deferred maintenance costs. We also had an increase in revenue from the food service fund for indirect. So the total increase in

011revenue is 2.4 almost $2.5 million. We also had some expenditure changes. The net is a decrease in expenditures which is a good thing. Um, we had some additional program investments of $4.9 million where we set aside funding for additional outgoing transfers to the capital projects, ISD transportation and tuition cost increases, substitute teacher cost increase, and indirect adjustment. We also had 5 almost $3 million in savings school deferrals to fiscal year 25. Um, so our schools can elect to choose to either receive carryover in the fall or they can defer funds during the budget process. So during our budget meetings with all of our schools, we had almost $2.6 million deferred, which means they took money from this year's budget, said, "We're not going to spend it, and we're going to use it for program needs

012for next year." We also had some school loan repayments, and you may ask what those are. Um, we fronted schools some money in anticipation that their enrollment would increase and or that they would have cost savings and they could pay us back. So, their cost came in below what was expected and they repaid us. So, in essence, our fund balance per amendment number one said we think June will be at 48.3 million. We had total positive adjustments of 2.7 million, bringing our projected ending fund balance to 51.1 million. And that is probably the shortest PowerPoint you will ever receive from me. You're welcome. Are there any questions for um Miss Adams at this time or from our board members? I see none. Oh yeah. VP Los you said um school building adjustments or deferrals. Money

013that deferments. Yep. So they keep that money for next year. So schools can roll over up to 15% of the current year allocations. Um and yes, they get to keep that money for next year. So they only ask for the balance of that for their total budget. They asked to defer money to help cover costs of things that they'd like to do in the future that were different than what they did this year. Right. Yep. So, their total budget for the next year will be the deferred plus the new. Exactly. Yes. Okay. And and and obviously you get a uh a list of the things that they want to buy. Oh, yes. They go through their budget in very uh a lot of detail, line by line, supplies, materials, software, contracts. We people for those

014schools that have uh balance due. Yes. Um how do they um pay back that? How did they pay us back? because they had open positions primarily or they had increased um enrollment in the fall as compared to what we thought they were going to have at the beginning of the school year. But the large part of it came from open positions where they had a sub or a partial time teacher in there who maybe left for whatever reason. So they had budget savings and then they pay for their sub and the extra is what they chose to defer. So there's a cost differential between a a live teacher and a subteer. So there's different ways that a principal or the school improvement team can pay back that Yes. their due. Yep. Okay. Um so is

015there any um negative impact to the school to the school uh having a deficit budget? Um, I would say no simply because none of our schools have deficit budgets for next year. Um, we're still working through the best way of implementing the school-based budgeting. And so to begin with, we gave all of our schools the same per pupil amount. Moving forward to next year, we realized that giving all the schools the same per pupil created a did not create an economies of scale. So if you have a school who has a lower enrollment, they have the same cost but yet a school that has a higher enrollment has more money because of the number of kids they have. So we try to clean that up a little bit by creating a tiered structure. So schools

016say with 0 to 300 or 300 kids receive a certain dollar amount. Schools up the next level receive a percentage of the first tier and so on. And what this will do is it streamline the process so that there weren't any deficits created by what the schools wanted to do. And during the budget process this year, this past spring for next year, there were no schools that had deficits. Good. Thank you. You're welcome. Uh, Trustee, for for people who are still trying to figure out how all of this works, why do schools have to pay it back at all? Fairness, equit, equitability. Um, and also our internal rules and processes are that you can carry over 15%. So, in many cases, the schools deferred their 15% and still had extra left over. So, it's best

017just to repay it back. I mean, it's going to go back into fund balance anyway. We just held everybody accountable. Are you all set with your question? Trusty Herd. Trusty Strode. Thank you. I just had one question uh about the tier uh structure. Yes. when did that uh become implemented and when did we notice the change or what prompted the change to create that? Yes. So the change was prompted by preparing for next year's budget. And what I like to do when we determine what the allocations are for the school. I create um I guess test budgets on their behalf to see if they were able to fund everything they currently had because our goal is never to penalize a school or to put give the children less than what they deserve. So when we

018did that process we found that there were several schools those primarily with lower enrollment that were going to be penalized and were going to be in a deficit situation and we didn't want that. So we created the tiered structure and we found that there wasn't going to be a school in deficit. So we'll continue to fine-tune the process, but this was the one we implemented for next year. Yes, we implemented it for the budget process for next school year. So the tier structure was published out to all of our schools in the spring. Yep. You're welcome. All righty. Any other questions from our board members at this time? Alrighty. Thank you. Oh, thank you. Did you have some? Nope. All right. Thank you, Miss Say. Thanks. Thank you, Miss Adams. Thank you so much. All

019righty. All right. Now, we're on to our reports for this evening. Um, can we have our officer's report from our secretary at this time, trustee? Yes, madame president. So, tomorrow, June 6, is our last day of school and it will be a half day. Um, June 7th, Saturday, we have our graduation ceremonies for our high schools. They will be at the Breland Center um with Ston High School at 9:00 a.m. We'll be there bright and early and uh Everett High School at 12:30 and Eastern High School at 400 p.m. Um, so we are very excited to see everyone there. Um, a reminder for our parents to join your school's PTO and you can ask your school for the parent interest form so you can sign up. And the Lancing School District is accepting new students

020for the 2025 um 2026 school year. So, please reach out to our enrollment team at 517755-2820. Um, you can do it online. I did it uh this week and it was very easy to complete. Um so um we are uh excited to see all our new students that we're going to get. Um, our next board meetings, we have June 26th. We have a public hearing at 5:30 p.m. It's a regular meeting andformational stud and then we go into a regular meeting andformational study session at 6 p.m. July 24, we'll have a regular board meeting and information session. And August 7, a regular board meeting. All righty. Thank you, Madam Secretary. At this time, can we We're going to move on to our finance committee report by Trustee Kavanaaugh. Thank you. The finance committee met on

021Monday, May 21st. Um, present were myself and Dr. Nvarez Martinez. Uh, I do want to note for anyone who is interested in joining our meetings in the future. They're open to the public. Um, our next meeting was slightly changed to accommodate some schedules. Uh so the next meeting of the finance committee will be June 30th from 12:30 to 1:30, not June 23rd as was previously scheduled. So it'll be June 30th instead. Um however, at the uh May finance committee meeting, honestly, the big item of business was reviewing the um the budget amendment that we just heard um from Miss Adams. Um so luckily, I I don't have much to cover from the meeting beyond what we just saw. Um, however, we did receive exciting news, which is that the district's credit rating, um, series 2

022credit rating was upgraded to an A rating with a positive outlook. Um, and so that is very positive. That was by the S&P is who gives out that rating. Uh, and so we are very glad to have um such such a great rating from the S&P. Uh, the detailed treasures report for the period of April 1st through April 30th is attached to this evening's agenda and the following are the highlights of the report. The beginning cash and investment balance was $74,63,244. Receipts totaled 17,313,896 while dispersements equaled $33,412,52. Net interfund transfers totaled 11,364,768 in interest from fund investments to the student and bond funds as well as journal entries to remove the due two due frs in all funds. The monthly transfer to the general fund for bond expenses was $7,83,867. The ending general fund cash

023and investment balance on April 30th, 2025 was 76,413,274. The general fund's cash and investment balance is $15,10,312 greater as compared to the same time last year. Great news. Um, I also want to highlight our donations received during the month of April. We had 5,000 over $5,000 of donations in the month of April, which is very exciting. Um, I especially want to note we had several different donors, one, two, three, four, five, um, donors who made donations to the Latino Advisory Council and that money specifically goes to scholarships. Um, so we especially appreciate those donations, but of course we appreciate any and all donations that we receive um, here at the Lancing Board of Education. Um, and other than that, Mrs. President, this concludes the April 2025 treasures report. Thank you so much, uh, Trustee Kavanaaugh.

024Are there any questions for our trustee at this time regarding her report? All right. May I have a motion to approve the expendure expenditures as presented for April 2025? Madam President, yes. I move that the board of education uh approve the budget as presented. Second. Thank you. It's been moved by Trusty Strode and second by Trustee Williams. Um, all in favor, please, please signify by saying I. I. Any oppose? Motion passes 80. Thank you. I do want to make a correction if I could. I was not at the meeting at our Oh, did I say you were? You did. Oh, I'm so sorry. So, I just want to make make record of that. All righty. That's okay. I would have loved to be there, but I wasn't. All righty. Moving on to our policy committee.

025Um, Secretary NZ Martinez. Yes. So, um, today we are going to be presenting our policies from the policy committee for a second reading and those are going to be, um, PO264 will be rescended um, and replaced by the one we had previous is that's the discrimination on the basis of sex and education programs or activities. PO2266 non-discrimination on the base of sex. That's the one that's going to be um activated again. Um PO14304430 on leaves of absence. PO 5320 immunizations. PO 5330 use of medications. PO 5330.01 epinephrine auto injectors. PO8510 wellness. PO850 food services. and PO8320 personnel files. All righty. I have a motion on the floor that the board of education receive the policies for second as presented. Madam President, yes. I recommend that the board of education receive the policies for second reading

026and approve them as presented. Second move by second by trustee. Are there any questions or discussion regarding policies at this time. I did have something I noticed when I was reading P2266 on I think it's the it's not the last page but under the title coordinators there's a Darren Walter that's presented as and then at the bottom of that page he's added that just a Um, it would be the fourth page of P226. Oh, I'm sorry, my mic's not on. Excuse me. PO2266. And I I just think it might be just a mistake, but I just wanted to to bring it to your attention. Give me one second. Okay. Yeah. copy of non-discrimination on basis of sex in education programs or activities. It was page um the page one you see it it's page four.

027Yes, that's an error. Okay. I just want to make He's no longer with the Lancing School District. Okay, perfect. I was Brandon Lang Landingga. He is our new uh compliance specialist uh who's taken over the duties of the title 9 coordinator. So uh that in green is correct. Uh Brandon works directly with uh schools for student related incidents and Aaron Miracle works uh that is correct. She works uh in HR and she will uh deal uh immediately with staff uh related incidents. Okay. So Brandon then would go up where the Darren Walter is, right? Okay, got it. Yes, he would need to go up. Yes. Yes, he would need to go up as well. I just didn't want to be confused. No, you're not. You're fine. Working on um allowing administrative changes like that that

028don't change policy to be done by the the staff and that way we don't have to keep voting on updating. Clarifying that. I appreciate that. All right. Well, I guess I was on you was about to All righty. Um any any questions about um or discussion regarding our policies at this time? Alrighty. Um all in favor of um our policies signify by saying I. I. Any oppose? Motion passes. 80. All righty. Thank you. Moving on to Cort. All right. Uh good evening everyone. Uh it is the last time that we are as a board before the end of the school year. Uh it's amazing how much has happened this year. How quickly and how slowly it is all gone. Uh time is really quite amazing. Um as always during the school year I read the

029transportation information. Uh not surprising. Uh the 2,450 gas cards have all been filled because I don't think anybody's asking for a new gas card the last day of school. Um but that is good news that everybody who's wanted a gas card can get one. Again, that's 2450. Same thing with Kata 615. And the good news is that uh 3,452 kids are routed on the yellow uh school bus with Dean with 3,595 being asked, which is only a differential of 143 uh which again is well below the 200 mark that we've been kind of at for a while. So it's not perfect. We still need to fix uh transportation, but the fact that we only have 143 kids non-outed on the yellow bus is really quite significant. And again, as a reminder, that doesn't mean that

030ch children don't have transportation. It means that they either use kata or um a gas card. I will use this point again to remind everybody if you are sending your child to school next year, please, please, please, please make sure to fill out all the transportation information. It's online. It's on our website. If you have any questions, email us, call us, come to the office. uh the earlier we get the information about your transportation needs, the easier it is for us to help route you. Again, if you want a gas card, that's great. We can just give it to you again if you qualify. Um but, you know, when we're routing for yellow buses for next year, it is a pretty complex uh situation because we have so many kids that are going to different

031schools throughout the community. So, we love that schools uh are different and that children decide to go to, you know, Luton or Post Oak or Patentill or whatever, but because of the impact to transportation, we really the earlier the better that we can get that. Um, some other really wonderful highlights, we had our uh graduation for adult ed, we had our graduation for Lancing Learning Hub, we had our graduation uh for online school. Uh it was really, really powerful. You know, this district uh over the last couple years has really uh invested quite heavily millions and millions of dollars in creating alternative education programs for our children. You know, I've been an educator all my career. I love teaching in a school. I love being in a classroom. Not every child felt that love. Um

032even when they had great teachers and great facilities, sometimes kids learn better in smaller settings. some kind kids learn better in smaller buildings. uh sometimes students learn better online and over the last couple of years we've really fine-tuned our online work and in fact one of the presentations today was about the Lancing Learning Hub and two of the directors were there and what we have found really over these last couple of years is by creating an alternative education that is still academic that still holds them to state standards and you know expectations but maybe acts a little bit different where they can come into a school at a different time or a different day or have, you know, a different way of being with more support, be it guidance or social work, that the students

033that sadly typically would drop out or students that wouldn't be engaged are now coming back in droves. And to put a kind of fine point on it, this district years ago used to run alternative education programs. And if you look back uh on the data from the state, most of these schools had a 0% graduation rate over four years. And what that was saying was that really it wasn't necessarily serving the children. And now what we saw in that kind of amazing graduation and if you were there it was energetic to say the least in that building. Uh all of Hill seemed to be completely packed and it was awesome. And you know you had families that really cared deeply about their children and children that were re-engaged that really cared deeply um came back

034and that was really special. And so I hope that the community sees that this district is trying its best to not just have these wonderful kind of traditional brickandmortar schools, right? You've got Eastern, you've got Everett, you've got Ston, but we also now have Lancing Tech, we have Lancing Learning Hub, we have uh, you know, the Alted programs online. And you know, our job is to not try to put round pegs into square holes. Our job is to make sure that all of our children are special and unique and that we serve them accordingly. And I think this week has been really uh indicative of that. And then of course on Saturday we will see our wonderful traditional schools graduate at Brelin. And I'm looking very forward to that wonderful yet very long day. Um

035and certainly for all of you out there who are listening, if you have a graduate, uh if you're going to be there, congratulations. We're so proud of you. Uh the amount of work that's been done in our schools has been just tremendous. Absolutely tremendous. So with that, I just want to thank everybody for their great work this year, for their incredible incredible uh energy and enthusiasm and engagement. And you know, I think that not only will we see, you know, our graduation rate at or better than it was, but we also saw our attendance rate go up and our G, you know, our grades go up and our test scores go up and all those things because look, graduation is one number and it's awesome. But when you start to see kids coming to school

036more often and our chronic absentee rate is lower, what that's saying at large is children are finding more reasons, more love, more support, more engagement to make sure that they are in their schools. And that is really a testament to the staff. It's a testament to the families. It's a testament to the community. And so with that, I really thank everybody for that and uh turn it back over to our president. Thank you. Thank you, Superintendent. Um, are there any questions for our beloved superintendent? Yes. Uh, okay. We got three questions. I'm gonna start around this end. Trusty Williams, can you address for the community if their children are in high school, do they not necessarily have to go take because some parents are concerned about taking cattle or the gas cars? Can they be

037put on a school bus route? No. The way that the decision was made uh years ago was that a child can either take KATA or that they can have a a a gas card for $50 per child per month. No, I'm saying if they are high schooler who does not want the bus card or the gas card, can they be put on a yellow bus? No, they cannot. The this district does not do that. this district for all high school students, unless they have special needs that are within the ISD purview, all students who are high school students take either the KATA or they get the $50 gas card. Thank you. Okay, I think Vice President Lope I was going to work our way around. Now, I just want to ask a superintendent um maybe

038his prediction for for next year uh in view of the um the will federal government cuts and refugees and and and those kinds of things. Uh no, I appreciate the question. Um look, I am not a prognosticator. I can't kind of look into the the the the the magic ball and see, but I will say that what my job is is to support as much as I can with protecting this district as best I can. And so what you saw from our budget at $51 million that I think gives us the flexibility that if the federal government does get rid of title one, gets rid of title two, gets rid of title three, that we will at least be ready for that. Um my gut and I have to take people at their word. The

039federal government has said that they are not um Hold on for a second. Um the my my gut says that title one and tit and IDA are um going to be protected I think but title two is possible title three um those are things that are possibly going away and so I'm not really sure that um I'm not really sure that that's going to stay but I do believe that we have enough money to protect ourselves The good news is that the state has been um very good and generous with their money. Um but it's hard. What we do know and I can speak very clearly about is that um we have had some federal grants that have been taken away and that we have had to adjust uh because of that. So yeah, actually

040also thank you for that. But I was thinking in terms of bodies uh children from the refugee programs u yeah that may be curtailed or and to come. Yeah. No, and I appreciate that. I mean for those of you kind of watching at home or in the audience, this district tends to be a really welcoming and warm place for uh refugees and immigrant families. um the numbers of new students into the district will probably be lower uh than they have been over the years. And so again, that's why you have a budget that is robust enough to deal with those. Um and I think that again, you know, we would see numbers probably going down. The good news, um and I think I've said this is that for the first time in a while, our

041enrollment number actually went up in the middle of the year. So, our count number in October is higher than the count was low was was higher in the spring than it was in October, which is actually really good news, which means kids that are in the district are staying in the district. Um, but what that means and what that looks like um for next year, I I can't tell you. I will say that already initially in the new numbers for next year, we are seeing a reduction in the students from other countries and other communities, you know. All set. Vice President Trusty Herd, I was wondering about your vision for making the learning hub in our online school um more more visible, yes, but um more in our face so it doesn't seem as other.

042I first of all I love that question and thank you for saying that all of our children we love equally and we would never want any school to be seen as another and I think you're right that when we think of alt ed it because it's alternative there is that kind of otherness that's right exactly and so I think what we have to do as a district is try our best to promote it and talk about it as something really special and unique but not another right it's just it's we have eastern we have ever we have sex we have online we of LLH all in that kind of same breath. And you know, I think what's been happening, you know, we we just started it a couple years ago, so not a lot of

043people even knew about it. And now that we have kind of success, what we're trying to do, and Ryan, our comm's director, has been really great about it, is telling the story of the graduates, telling the story of those that are going into it. And we've also started to expand our program. So we actually have kids who might live in other cities that are actually our online students, which is kind of amazing. So, I appreciate the question. I think we can do more. Um, and maybe over the summer getting more of our graduate stories out there. Uh, talking about them as equal to our other schools, I think would be helpful. But the good news is that we have this now robust program. And I will say in Michigan, there are a lot of, and

044like I would say no shade, but I kind of throw some shade here, is that you do have some for-profit companies. you have some online companies that maybe be a little bit unscrupulous. Um, and here we are as a true district where we're are a public school and a public entity that are giving them uh really a great education. So I appreciate the question and I think we can do more uh to promote it and also to tell the stories of these amazing kids and I mean some of the kids you know when they spoke at the graduation these were kids that had started with us maybe didn't do so well were down on their luck made some mistakes even their own admission and they came back and they found a place that really supported

045them and got them to graduate. So thank you for that question. Alrighty with no more questions for our super Yes. Yes, Trusty Herd. Um, and it was about, I believe, Lancing Tech. That's the one that is at Hill. Is that right? Correct. Um, for the people at home by way of vocational school and other trades. Um, can you just talk to us again about what is at Hill now? I know several of us remember Mr. B doing cosmetology and some of us remember culinary class and all of those things. and um it looks a little bit different than it did before, but there are still great things happening. Could you speak to us about it? Absolutely. Thank you for that question. So, I really, you know, everybody knows I'm not from here. I'm from New

046York. And when I got here, one of the things that I really was so just blown away by and loved was this sense from Lancing of like we do the work. you know, we had the Fiser auto body and we have the GM plants and there was this real sense that like working with your hands was a good thing. It wasn't seen as a negative and I appreciate that and that voc vocational education is really a positive thing. Sadly, historically, Voke Tech had been used to take kids who people thought weren't college ready or were other and kind of shift them aside. One of the things that we've been able to do with Lancing Tech, which I'm really proud of, is that we have really great vocational education and really great academics all tied together.

047So, they actually at Hill at Lancing Tech are taking their math class, their English class, their science class, their social studies class in the same building with the folks that are also teaching them culinary arts or medical science or what have you. And the really great thing is imagine learning to building trades, right? And you know you're taking geometry. I like math. Not everybody liked math, but imagine taking geometry class when you're trying to build a house and the geometry class is actually about building the house and not just some kind of wrote boring thing. So what we're finding is that students that are really interested in learning like vocational education. And so the four programs we have is we have culinary arts which is awesome. I've had their Alfredo. It was super tasty. Uh

048we have the building uh trades. So kids are learning carpentry and plumbing and all of that. We also have medical science. So children are getting also PCT, EMT, all of that. Um and then we also have computer science. And so kids are actually learning, you know, how to program and how to do that. So if anybody's learning listening at home, they want to do those vocad and have highlevel academics, Lancing Tech is really a great place for you. And we've seen this uh over the last two years. You know, we've only had two years of it, but we're already starting to see uh some really great changes for those kids. So hey, if anybody's interested, let us know. Are there any other programs that are on the horizon for the school that people might look

049forward to? Sure. So right now the way that Lancing Tech is built is each of those four programs have 25 kid spots per and then each year it's a hundred per grade. So Lancing Tech itself is built that way. However, we currently have other CTE programs that the district runs. We have a wonderful relationship with the fire department. So we just was at the fire department graduation for our children. So they can go straight into the fire department. We also have um design and uh and technology. So we have that program and we are always looking for new and different programs that we can bring in and not to forget that we also have a wonderful relationship with both the eaten and the Ingram uh ISD. So if kids want to take welding that something

050that we can't actually offer because it's super whatever they can actually do that uh as well. So, we're always on the out the lookout for something that is um new and innovative that kids want to do. We can't necessarily offer uh full programming if we don't have so many kids. But right now, it's those big four and certainly the fire science, uh the design, uh PCT, EMT, all of those things exist. Thank you. Alrighty. Vice President Lopez, did you have something you'd like to lift? Yes, it's it's an observation here of the folks that donated to the Latino Advisory Council graduation celebration. Uh at least one of them is a builder. Oh, wonderful. So when we talk about the trades and the other one is an engineer. So I think that people are looking at

051uh the offerings that we have and are happy to to help students and so that they may look at uh at those uh trades and professional settings. So it's it's very important that we're doing that. So it I just want to make that observation. Thank you. We invest in our students. Thank you so much. Thank you for lifting all these wonderful questions or discussion. Um, all right. With no more questions for or discussion, I Trusty Herd has something on the tip of their tongue and I can Well, a major concern for me, Mr. superintendent has been school safety as of late. And uh I wanted to ask you um in this medium because it's televised if you could help me set the record straight about some things that have come up as of late um

052with since this is your report. Um and really setting the record straight in our community that our schools are very safe places to be. And partly of that has been um the reason for my um questioning about all the innovation that we are doing um here in the schools and the opportunities that we are providing for the students in this community. Um in a nutshell, I have more things to say later in the meeting, but in a nutshell right now, could you set the record straight for the people at home that might be considering sending their babies home to the Lancing School District, but might not think that our schools are the safest place to be? Sure. No, I really appreciate the question and certainly, you know, I would only point to the person to

053my right who is uh about to send her children to the Lancing School District, which I think is pretty indicative that if a board member is choosing to do that, that is a great indication that schools are safe. You know, sadly, the truth is schools are the safest place for both adults and children these days. Um it is true that there were two really uh terrible incidents of um of weapons in schools. one, and again, I have to be really careful about what I can say because of ongoing investigations and things like that, um, but one, it looks like a child took a weapon from a parent, um, and, you know, wanted to, you know, be cool or whatever it was and with not the intent. But the issue of course is um we really

054need to make sure that families are really careful about weapons they have at home. Um you know the a case of a of a of a young child, you know, getting access to a weapon to show it around. You know, that's something that we really want to make sure that families are locking up their weapons, that they're doing their things. um you know, nobody was hurt, nobody was threatened, nothing happened. Um you know, at least again, these are the reports that I'm given. Um and so, yeah, it's really unfortunate. It's really not okay. And the access to weapons and the access to guns for even our little children is really unacceptable. Uh but again, you know, it wasn't, you know, the school itself, it wasn't used. Uh nobody was was hurt, nobody was uh there

055was no indication of any of that. And then the second issue, what happened at Everett is even more kind of unfortunate is something happened in the parking lot and you know we were trying to just um you know protect our protect the child to bring them inside and then of course uh we do search and we and we found something. So again nothing was brought in that we didn't search and find you know. So, you know, the truth is with metal detectors and with the searching and with things like that, our schools are actually pretty safe. Um, I hate that we have to do this. Uh, but as I've written before and I've said before, my job as a superintendent is to treat our kids as if they're the most powerful, richest, most amazing kids

056in the world. And you know, when you go visit the rich folks, they've got gates and they've got metal detectors and they've got people that protect them. You know, that's why I think bringing what we did to Dwight Rich, um, you know, I got a lot of parents honestly email me saying thank you. They've been wanting this for a long time. Um, so, you know, I think that the community needs to recognize that there are a lot of guns. You know, there was a shooting at the Meridian Mall. Those weren't our students. Those were somebody else. That's just violence in the community, right? There was a gun found in I think Center High School or something like that near Detroit. you know, th there there is something that we as a community need to address

057with gun violence, but just honestly access to guns, right? Neither of these issues, the Dwight Rich one or the um Everett one were incidences of somebody using it of e of threatening with it of it was it was it being there. And I think we've got to really address how do we make sure that these things don't come in. And again to Everett's credit, the child was brought in, searched, and found that way. In fact, we're doing exactly the right thing that we should be doing, giving an indication that the school itself is actually super safe. Um, and you know, the community, it's it's tough. And I really urge all families, and I know we might talk about this later on, but please, if you have a weapon, make sure it is locked. If you

058have a weapon in the house, make sure kids know not to play with it like it's a toy. And please make sure that they don't have access to it so that they could show it around and kind of, you know, make it make it a game or to look cool. We've got to make sure that they don't even have access to this. And then again, we do have metal detectors and they work and that's one of the reasons why we were able to find what we did and and we have historically found things. So far, knock on for Micah, we haven't had the issues of them them being threatened or being used. So, I really appreciate you asking that because I do want people to know that our schools are really inside incredibly safe. And

059if anything, the indication of when we found the weapon forever, it's because we didn't allow it in the building and we were actually searching kids and actually doing what we needed to do. So, you know, it's a sad day. It's certainly something that we don't want to um think about um but we have to and you know I'm really proud of the work of our public safety officers. I'm proud of our schools of our kids of our whole community kind of rallying against but if you are thinking hey where is the safest place for my child to be it's actually in school you know it's it's not necessarily the street. It's not even at home it's actually in the schools because there are a lot of supports there. There's a lot of guidance. There's public

060safety. there's support, there's metal detectors, all those things. So, I appreciate the question. What I wanted to follow up with with that and to to ask you was with that, first of all, thank you. Second of all, what can we do? There must be something that we can do. Um, you're our superintendent. We're the board of education. What can we do beyond that? That's only one pong of it. What can the community at large do so that we can empower you to do everything within your power to protect our babies? They are our babies after all. First of all, thank you. And and I mean, if anybody's gotten to know me over these last four years and read read my kind of weekly newsletters, all I ever ask or try to do is what's the

061action step? And so, the fact that you're asking that is really quite powerful. I think there's a handful of things and certainly I don't want to speak for the board but I appreciate being asked so I can say a couple of things. One is what we need from the community and from everybody is please please keep your weapons locked up. And if that means that we have to offer free locking devices, we'll do it. If it means that families need training, we'll do it. But the biggest issue is access to weapons, especially from young children. That is huge. And if the way that the community can be supportive and the board can be supportive, if maybe we do public service announcements. I mean, the the the sheriff is actually in the audience for no no

062reason about this, but I think that he he would certainly agree with me and knows full well that the most things we can do is convince the community to lock their weapons up in a safe way. because that kid who sadly would use it to commit suicide or the kid that just wants to look cool or the kid wants to play around with it. You know, there was an accidental shooting the other day, accidental shooting. Nobody meant to hurt themselves, but they did it. And so I think that one of the things we have to do is what can we as a board, as a superintendent, as a community? How can we um activate people to really uh lock up their weapons in a safe storage way? You can have your weapon, have it legally,

063do it the right way, but make sure that people don't have access to it. I think the second thing we can do, and we've started to see it with the metal detectors, is really make sure that we're using the metal detectors, right? That we feel comfortable with them, and that the community doesn't think that we're doing this because we think our kids are criminals. It's the exact opposite. It's the fact that we want our buildings to be as protective as possible, just like all those powerful rich people. Right? when I go to the, you know, when I go see my friends in their gated communities, they ask for like a DNA from me, you know, and I'm the superintendent. I'm probably not going to hurt anybody. I mean, you never know. But the point is

064is what can we do to protect our buildings? And so I ask this board and I really commend this board is allowing us to have the metal detectors for the high school, allowing us to have it at Dwight Rich. And I think we need to have a longer conversation together around how we can do not just metal detectors but other ways of protecting our buildings. You know, cameras are really helpful. Um, and then the other thing too from the community is and I know this sounds tough, but like if you if you know that there's a kid that is in trouble, let us know. We have guidance counselors. We have school social workers. We have all the people at in our buildings to help. But you know, if you're the parent, if you're a cousin,

065if you're just a friend, if you see a friend of yours struggling, let us know. We're there to love them and support them. But if we don't know, it's hard. You know, depression, it's hard to see sometimes. You know, you look at somebody and they're smiling and they're laughing and then they're in trouble and something's happening. We won't necessarily know that no matter how great our relationship is. So what I urge this entire community, this this city of of 100,000 plus people, if there are kids in need, if there are kids at risk, reach out to us. We've built systems. We have people. We've done so much. But when that kid's playing, you know, basketball on the court with a couple of friends and somebody says something, let us know because we can go out

066there and support them. So I think safe uh storage for guns. I think education that we can do. I think um you know more safety measures like metal detectors and um cameras but also relationships with the individuals. That's huge. And then again if the community hears of something please please let us know. You can always call us. If you want to do it you know anonymously we'll take it. Although it's a little hard to act on those kinds of things, but you know, the more we work at this together, the more these things really won't happen. But again, I do want to assure the community that what you saw in those two incidences was not about danger to the building. There was no danger to the students. It wasn't danger. It was about, you know,

067somebody that we took in, searched, and found. And another thing was, you know, basically, you know, a kid, a kid trying to be cool. And you know, we really don't want that to happen. So again, I really appreciate it. It's sad that it was what, the second to last week of school, but I do hope that if people are really looking back on the last four years, where we were four years ago and where we are now has been dramatically different. Um, and it's not perfect. There's always more to do. And the last thing I would ask the community, this board, or whatever, if you hear things, if there is an issue, we will act on it. We just need to know. So, thank you. All righty. Trusty Lopez. Vice President Lopez. Thank you. Uh,

068and I'll refer to Trusty Herd's comment. You know, get the story straight and we certainly can't depend on the media because they don't put the the information that needs to be out there. I I regret even talking to that reporter because I said something similar to what the superintendent says. Let's get the community together. Let's get our parents together. Talk about issues that may be happening. Superintendent has a a a parents uh round table. Come to the meeting, talk to him about it. Uh talk to us as a board as well. Uh we need to get the local agencies that work with kids to form some sort of you know leazison kind of thing between each other so that we can be prepared. But you know the other thing is that we can only control

069what's what's in school. We're going to control what's outside of school. And as it was said, the um metal detectors are helping. Now, if if if people are concerned about the metal detectors, maybe maybe everybody that goes to Macy's is a uh a felon or or a bad person because they have metal detectors. J Penney has metal detectors. Anywhere you go, there's metal detectors. that they're not visible per se, but they're there. So, just to have metal detectors in our schools is is a good idea. And I think that that that's helping a lot. But I'll tell you that uh I'm disappointed that the news media reflects on the negative and not really giving us actually information. So, I just want to again, you know, go to trusty herd that uh that's the reason people

070are are concerned. They hear that in the news and they said, "Look, what's going on?" And it's they need to hear the whole story. Yeah. Thank you. I have Did you want to um I mean, I was just going to say, look, I I think our job as a superintendent, as a board, as a as a district, is we're always going to be there to support and help our children. And if people have ideas of how we can make things better, we certainly want to to hear it. But we do want to make sure that people understand that there is a lot of safety at our schools. In fact, they are the most safe place for our children to be. Um, and so I appreciate everybody saying that. And and look, we are not perfect.

071We are not perfect. Um, but things are, you know, certainly much much better. And, you know, we're always happy to answer up to what we're allowed to, right? I don't want to jeopardize anything for an investigation. Um, but we really want to make sure that the community knows um, you know, what's what's happening. So, thank you. Yes. You're welcome. Trusty Stro, did you have a question? Thank you. Um, it's not really a question, just a comment. I think for me as a parent with a child in the district. I love to hear the conversation surrounding the detail um, and deaf and giving that spit of safety. What I do hear is that we do care about our students, that we're not um using these mechanisms to incriminalize our children. But the biggest thing for me

072is I also want to be very clear that we also have zero tolerance for violence. Period. There are measures in place, but you have to know that accountability will happen. So, we need to urge our children and in the community to stop and get the help that they need. So, we talked a lot about the safety and the well-being of our children, but we also have to put accountability back into the hands of the parent and say absolutely this is a zero tolerance issue. Kids should not have access. And I'm saying that from the seat of I am a program manager for the juvenile justice division. And with our youth come to my desk, a lot of those things that are happening, if we don't stop it here, it's going to go further and jeopardize

073the trajectory of their future. And so the biggest thing is, yes, we talked about safety. Yes, we have the things in place and measures, but let's not even get it to the door. There has to be accountability and a zero tolerance of acceptance and parents will be held accountable and should be held accountable. And I'm not speaking to investigations. I'm speaking to the seat of where I am within government. Things happen. And so I think it's a great expectation for people to understand that as a district, we have to hold each other accountable, but get the help that you need before it gets here. Thank you. Thanks, Trusty Strode. All righty. At this time, we're moving on to our new business. If there's no more further questions or comments, um the first item under new

074business is approval of our uh fiscal year 202526 tax levies resolution. Is there a motion on this at this time? Madam President, yes. I move that the Lancing School District levy 100% of its 2025 school operating taxes on July 1st, 2025 in the city of Lancing and in the city of East Lancing and 50% in each township Delta Dwit and Lensing in which the district has prior agreements to levy such an amount and further that 100% of the district's property taxes shall continue to be collected in December. 2025 and the remaining townships Delhigh, Watertown, and Windsor located within the LC school district's boundaries. All resolutions are part of resolution in so far as they conflict with the provisions of this resolution B and the same are hereby rescended. Thank you. Can I have a second?

075Second. Oh, trustee or uh Treasurer Kavanaaugh, is there any discussion um on our um tax levies resolution? Yes, Trusty Ninsky. Yeah, this system that the district has in place, it sounds like for decades troubles me. Um I I don't like the idea that uh as a board we are telling you know property owners in Lancing and East Lancing you need to pay 100% of your taxes in July but in surrounding areas in the district you can pay half of it now or even 100% of it later in the year. I think business owners everywhere struggle with cash flow and I think if we have a policy it needs to be uniform. I recognize if we don't adopt this tonight, that's not going to be good for the district. There needs to be time to work

076with these municipalities. Um, this was something I learned about, you know, when I was on the board last year as a new board member, and it just does not sit right with me, that we would have differences, particularly when the difference is essentially suburban surrounding areas get a different arrangement, which I see as a better one financially for them, and the city of Lancing doesn't. So, I'm a no vote on this tonight. I don't know if others would join me on that because I realize that would cause problems. If it would, I think we need to have more discussion beyond my one no vote um on timelines and what that would actually look like. But if going forward, I really think we need to have the conversations and and do whatever steps need to take

077place to make that transition so that whatever our policy is, it's the same for everyone in the district. I don't think certain property owners should have a different arrangement than others. Thank you for that. Uh, Trusty Ninsky, Trusty Herd, Trusty Ninsky beat me to the mic um on this and part of it was I was going to ask a question. Um, these sorts of things are not necessarily my forte, but I did not understand some of the same things that he said. I wondered if someone um could explain to me and perhaps somebody at home why this is. And I know if we've been doing it for eons as a preamble to my question, just so that I don't get the trusty herd look in my eye, just because we've been doing it forever does

078not mean it's right. So if as long as it's something beside that, is there a reason why this is the way it is and what can we do for a more equitable lancing uh thing here? No, it's a great question and I appreciate both of you bringing it up. I'll defer to Kim in a second, but I'll say a couple of things. one is it has been done for generations and so the way that we have created our budgets historically is based on this and so I appreciate what um Trusty Nitzky said about why he is not in favor of it. My ask for this uh wonderful board is to make sure that the finance committee addresses this as quickly as possible. Um, but because of the way that our budgets have been written for

079this year and have been for decades, if this doesn't pass today, there's going to be some serious concerns. But how how we should move in forward, I agree. I think that there needs to be deep conversation as to why. Um, and maybe there's something better. I think the answer as to why the district's done this for generations is that you've got a need for money during the summer when we don't get the state aid. And so it kind of fills up our bucket when we're not getting it filled. And then when the money comes from the state, we've already taken it from the locals. And so now we're able to run throughout the year. the number of dollars that we get from the small places like the Delhi's and the water towns and the Windsor

080those are very small dollar figures that's not going to impact our overall $200 million budget and I think that that has been you know something that they've done Delta uh Dwit and Lancing townships again there is some money there but the big money we get is from the city of Lancing and the city of East Lancing I also think it has a lot to do and I'll defer to Kim is how the city of Lancing does their books and how the city of uh East Lancing does their books, too. But Kim, if you want to go into more detail, I'm happy to to to defer. Certainly. So, yes. Um, this predates me. So, more than 27 years ago, as long as I've been here, we've been doing this. So, I don't know what the method

081is of changing it, but we can definitely investigate that with the finance committee and likely with Trun. Um, what I will say is, as Ben mentioned, for any given fiscal year, we receive state aid from October to the following August. And July and August helps cover the district's costs through June. So I believe that the reason city of Lancing and City of East Lancing is 100% summer is that is almost $25 million that they are providing us for July, August, September costs. If we didn't have that, we would have no income coming in to help cover our costs for July, August, and September except for fund balance. For the years prior to CO, as you know, we were a declining fund balance district. There is no way we would have been able to operate without

082a school aid loan. We've been very fortunate, knock on for a micica, that we have not had to go and get a state aid loan. We've been fiscally responsible, fiscally solvent. What I will also say is that the taxes that we earn through property taxes that are paid by our taxpayers is 30.3 million for the current school year. Of that, 25 million, like I said, is from the city of Lancing and the city of East Lancing. Delta Township contributes about $76,000. Dwit Township 1.4 4 million Lancing Township 3.9 million and then as Ben mentioned Delh High Water and Winds are very small 21,000 50,000 and 5,000 respectively. So I believe that is why we do what we do but we can definitely investigate. I would also like to mention that we would need to explore

083the potential impact on the taxpayers because if they're accustomed to issuing payments or having deductions made to pay their tax bills by a certain time, perhaps changing that might be detrimental to our taxpayers. Yes, Trusty Ninsky, did you I think I'll just add I guess for my clarification that we're talking about levying taxes here. It's on the non-h homestead properties and it's on the bonds. Um, these are operating revenues that the district specifically levies. It's not the state education tax that everyone pays. So the state, yes, the state assumes that we collect the first 18 mills and then they give us the additional money on top of that. Yes. So, this resolution is setting the date when the state's education tax is collected or just what the district is collecting in bonds and the non-homestead

084revenue. Can I defer to Chris, please? Yes, feel free and introduce yourself for the record, sir. Indeed. Good evening. Christopher Marina with Trun Law Firm here on your bond question, but uh have a little bit of experience here that might be of assistance. Um one of the reasons why the differentiation in timing of tax levy is very historic in that in the cities there was a steady revenue in the rural areas the townships uh most of the revenue for townships was coming in after the growing season was over. So that's why you had summer taxes in the cities and you had winter taxes in the townships. Now, obviously, our economy has changed a bit over the decades and and centuries, but that is still in uh Michigan law. So, uh I can't speak specific to

085uh why this one was done. But you also have another element in that since the townships often are levying only in the winter, if you decide to advance to a summer collection for those entities, you may have a cost that is going to be incurred by the school district because they don't typically do a summer collection. So, you might bear that cost. I don't know whether you do or you don't because I didn't come prepared to answer that question. I apologize. But that's something that you would want to examine. You would then also want to examine, okay, if you wanted to then go the other direction, maybe you're not collecting in the summer for the city areas. Do they already have a winter collection? If they don't, then maybe you've got a cost there. So,

086I think you your board would want to have an understanding of what are the cost implications of a change. And so, a bit of time might be helpful to allow those answers to be teased out so that you're working from hard data. So again, my understanding of the documents we're approving, it's for the non-homestead collection and the bonds or millages that we've approved and the voters have approved. It's not uh the the it's not going to impact the homeowner uh in this collection. Well, the b the bond the bonds are levied on all properties that are taxable. So that would be both your your homestead and your non-homestead. Uh you're operating you're absolutely correct. That's only levied on your non-h homestead properties. Your sinking fund is like the bond though and it gets levied on

087all properties. Okay. So I I guess again my feeling it's certainly in the district's best interest to collect 100% in the summer for all of our jurisdictions and gets all of our cash upfront. In the past apparently a board has decided to let certain townships out of that agreement for whatever those reasons are. I know I was able to look at a few of these and the and well the ones we're doing 50% are certainly leving in both time periods already. So there's not a cost there. it would be those three that are only collecting in the winter to look into are that is that the only time they're living and would that require us to have a special collection. Um but again I just think we have to get this to be equal across

088the district. Um yeah, thank you. And I I think that's a great idea and I would hope that the finance committee, you know, at the next meeting we can do it. And if I'm hearing the board uh asking the superintendent to do some research and figure this out, I think we would love to and I'll probably call Mr. Marino uh and we'll get as much information as we can quickly because I agree certainly the equity uh you know across all the jurisdictions that we do is probably the right thing. So thank you for bringing that up. All right. So are we ready to vote on this motion? All right. All in favor all in favor signify by saying I. I. Any oppose? Motion. Okay. So, we have Oh, I we we have 62. 62. Motion

089passes. All right. Moving on to the second item. Um, under new business is the budget amendment. Is there a motion on this item? Madame President? Yes. Yes. I move that the board of education approve budget amendment number two as detailed in the attachment. Second. Okay. It's been moved by trust trust uh trust trustee Kavanaaugh and second by secretary Nveras Martinez. Um is there any discussion at this time? Okay. So are we are we ready to vote on this motion? All right. All in favor signify by saying I. I. Any oppose? Motion passes 80. The third item under new business is the consideration of the bond sale ratification resolution. Is there a motion on this item? Madam President? Yes. I move that the board approve the resolution ratifying the sale of the district's 2025 school building

090and site bonds series 2 as presented by bond council. It's been moved by trustee Navier Martinez. Can I have a second? Second. I second. Oh, I second. Second by Vice President Lopez. Um, is there any discussion at this time? Alrighty. So, are we ready to vote on this motion? All in favor signify by saying I. I. Any opposed? Motion. Motion passes. 8 Z. Moving on to the fourth item under new business is the consideration of potential future nonvoted bond issues. May I have a motion on this item? Madame President, yes. I move that this board approve the resolution as presented authorizing the reimbursement of certain project related expenditures associated with the potential future non-voted bond issue and that the secretary of this board be authorized to sign the same. All right. It's been moved by

091Trustee Kavanaaugh, second by Vice President Lopez. I think there's going to be some discussion on this item. Oh, we have our I I I just, you know, unlike the last one uh which was basically we sold bonds, thank you so much. Th this one is a little bit more kind of unique or not more unique, it's either unique or not, a little bit more difficult. So, if uh uh if our council wants to speak to this, it might be a good idea. If not, you know, I just don't I want the board to know what they're voting on. This one is a little bit more complicated. Be happy to. Thank it's my understanding that the district is considering a potential non-voted bond issue related to some building improvements under the Internal Revenue Code. Uh if

092you if you make expenditures before the bond proceeds are available, you have the ability to reimburse your general fund for those expenditures, but you can only look back 60 days from an official board action to do that reimbursement. So the problem is there's still uh some some detail to be teased out here. So what we're asking the board to consider is this resolution that would authorize the reimbursement should this move forward out of the bond proceeds so we can relieve your general fund of some of these expenditures if in fact you do move forward with a bond issue. So really it's it's just a a bit of a housekeeping measure to allow you to do that reimbursement since we do have kind of a tight time window under the IRS rags. Wonderful. Thank you for

093that explanation. All righty. So it's been it's been moved by Trustee Kavanaaugh and second by Vice President Lopez. Um are we ready to vote on this motion? Just one question. Yes, Trusty Ninsky. So if we didn't approve that non-voted bond, this wouldn't have any impact then? it it would have no impact whatsoever. This really only becomes effective if the bonds are then issued. All righty. Any further discussion? All right. Um all in favor signify by saying I. I. Any oppose? Motion passes. 8 Z. Moving on to the fifth item um under new business is our food service renewal recommendation for 20 2526. Madam President, I move that the board of education approve the Sedexo food service contract renewal. Second. It's been moved by Trustee Williams and second by Trustee Kavanaaugh. Are there any discussions at

094this time? Yes, I have a discussion um thought. Um, I really would love maybe I question uh uh cuz my attendance record pray for me. Um, did I miss a presentation by Sedexo since I've been on the board? When was the last time presentation? Uh, I don't know if you have. Um, so just for some clarification, the board will do RFPs uh over a course of years that they then agree to and then within that contract, there are years in it and we just kind of re-up it. Um, I think it would be a wonderful idea to have presentations on this. I think this is really a continuation of the one that the board did a big RFP and looked at, etc. But I'm happy to turn it over to Christina for specific questions, but

095I don't think you've missed anything. Uh, Trusty Herd. I think that this is just the the first time that's happening within your uh your time on the board. Thank you. Yeah. And I do plan to vote yes on this, but I had a couple of questions um about one um is there a student kind of advisory council that we make up outside of junior board um that gives suggestions about the food, that gives suggestions about things they'd like to see, outside of things that they can't have because it's against the law. Um, uh, are there times where we could have, um, a presentation about what are our babies eating? Um, I made a point to have lunch, um, with a with my students, um, because I'm the liazison at Everett High School and, um, made

096a point to go eat with some of our artists. And you know, I got an earful and I know I gave this board an earful when I was on the junior board and some of you were on the board then and I gave you all an earful back then about real suggestions. And you know what they did was they had Sedexo come in and they gave us the junior board samples. And I remember looking at my classmates at the time saying, "When are they going to give us this food?" It was excellent. It was off the chain. Reminded me a lot of like the kind of food that we eat here as board members. Meanwhile, our scholars are looking at us like, "What in the world is going on here?" Now, of course, for the

097low low cost of free, you might say, "Hm, but I I I wonder how many students, Mr. Superintendent, are opting out of eating at all." I'm going to vote yes, but you know, they are our babies after all. And I I wondered if we could just talk about maybe how is the food prepared and educating people um where they know that we really are dedicated to providing the best for our students even though it's free. Yeah. No, I appreciate it. I also, if you ever watch me in schools, I tend to eat their food as well. Um and you know, I I enjoy it. I probably have a different pallet than most. Um, but I think the point that's well really well taken is can we incorporate student voice more uh in not only the

098decisions of what food but how. Um, just as a reminder to everybody uh because we are part of the federal food program, there's very clear kind of guidelines both in terms of cost as well as what can be presented and what can be uh provided. Uh the other meals that are served don't necessarily have to follow those standards. And so, um, thanks to the great Ronald Reagan, tomato sauce is a vegetable. And so, there's a lot of things that happen in terms of what we serve that a pizza is actually considered four servings of vegetables because of the amount of tomato sauce on it. So, there are some things that are a little odd, let's just say. But the the point that I think is really important is we want our students to feel like

099we care and to not just feel that way but to be real. And so I certainly will defer to Christina who kind of oversees a lot of this what we do now and what we could possibly do later. And I think that Sedexo has always been very thoughtful around trying to be supportive within the confines of the rules. Now, one good thing I can say uh to the community is over the last couple of years, we've spent millions of dollars redoing kitchens and redoing um uh cafeterias. So, all three of our high schools, Sexton, Eastern, and Everett, have brand new or very new cafeterias. We're also bringing in new equipment uh throughout the district. And so, you'll start to see, especially with our newer buildings, let's say better facilities in terms of the food we

100serve. that's still under the kind of rules and regulations. But Christina, if there's anything you want to add. I'm just waiting for it to turn on. Thanks, Ben. Um, I think he hit on it mostly and I think you're alluding to it, too. There's lots of rules we have to follow, but that doesn't mean we can't be creative and get student voice in how we follow those rules and maybe a different way to get four servings of vegetables sized tomato sauce on a pizza. Um, and outside of the junior board, we do not have another voice unless, to be honest, several student groups within schools will write letters and get together and work with their teachers and principles um, and make their voice heard, but I think there's a way to do it a lot

101more formally and get more students involved across the district. So, thank you for bringing that. Alrighty. Yes. Again, thank thank you, Sedexo, by the way, and um, of course, Jod and I go way back. Um, and she loves me. Love you, Jod. Um but I I wanted to bring back to this how are we perceived the things and this is a question I've been putting back in my mind a lot madame president I wonder as we are we've been talking about showcasing alumni we've been talking about showcasing innovation you know I I think for me an action step that I want to submit to you is really um empowering our media team to really beef up um yes our social media media presence, but in a very um impactful and and intentional way. I would

102be interested in in seeing maybe on channel 21. I don't even know if that's a thing anymore, but that used to be our our district's uh channel on cable. Um to for our our team to go into one of our kitchens, meet a couple of our cooks. How is your favorite spicy chicken patty made? And this is the care we take to wrap it up for you before you come down for your lunch hour. Did you know that you know your ranch packets that you love so much come out of this box? And the smiling faces because a lot of it is also um relational and if I know who's making it, I can meet you know the local lunch lady who slides you an extra sandwich because she sees that you're extra hungry and

103to show these kind of things. I think it the perception might also I don't know. I mean there's some restaurants that some of us love a lot. Um and they ain't no good but we go anyway because the perception of it is that that place is a place where we gather. It's a place where we eat and if we can talk make make our lunchrooms into the gathering places for scholars and really make it into a hub for community. Um, I think that there is a way and I just want to be able, Christina, to throw my weight around as one of nine on this board so that those letters that get written don't find their way into a file um, in the dust bin of history somewhere. Um, I was on the junior board

104a very long time ago now, even in my youth, and here we are talking about again, but I'm not on the junior board anymore. I'd like to see change. Thank you. Thank you, Trusty Herd. Alrighty. Are we ready to move on this motion? All righty. All in favor signify by saying I. I. I. Any oppose? Motion passes 8. All righty. Moving on to the sixth item under new business and that would be the board of education approved the change order. Oh, excuse me. The um MHSSA renewal form for 20. Did I miss something? Yeah. No, you're right. The Lux Oh, Madam President, I'm sorry. Yes. Yes. Yes. The the Lux change I think I pronounced that wrong, but change orders. Yes, please. Madam President, I move that the board of education approve the change order

105as presented. Wonderful. Okay. It was moved by Trustee Kavanagh, second by Vice President Lopez. Is there any uh discussion about the change orders presented at this time? No. Okay. Wonderful. Did you have Yes. Uh, trusty, can we just quickly have a highlight on this? I think it was good news that one was under. Absolutely. And I don't want to steal Christina's thunder, but I will I I'll say I'll say start and then I'll let Christina go. Um, for those of you watching at home and certainly in the audience, uh, we won this really wonderful $2 million grant uh to redo the Hill, sorry, the Hill basketball court and gymnasium. And what's been great is we budgeted it at a certain dollar figure. Um, but the bids actually came in lower, which means we still have

106the $2 million grant. So, we get to spend it on more stuff. And so, what you're being asked to vote on is that more stuff. And that's why it's a change order because the original bill came in lower than we had thought. So, now we get to buy more stuff. So, Christina can walk you through why these things and where it came from. But, it really is good news. And again, the relationship we have with LAX as well as all of our construction folks has been and if you look at this historically over the last couple years, our things are coming in just as good but cheaper and quicker because we've been working really really quickly uh closely with our contractors. So, thank you. And I appreciate you keeping it kind of vague so I

107can didn't steal all of my thunder. Um so we had about $480,000. Um, so out of a $2 million grant, our bid came in about 75% of what we were expecting to pay for redoing the gym floor um at Hill um including putting the new logo on there for the Lancing Tech uh students. Um and we were putting in new um seating um there as well and then also doing HVAC. So putting in brand new HVAC uh to that area. So since it came in so low, we've got a couple of large items here. There are other change orders I'm allowed to approve based on dollar amounts that you're not necessarily seeing, but I can go into those as well. So, these two larger change orders is one um as most of you may know,

108we have the Southside Community Center at Hill as well as our Lancing Tech High School. So, this is a partnership with the Southside Community Center doing spaces for the community and for the school. So for the $60,000 for aluminum storefront and hardware, that is to put in some additional doors in the hallways to help further separate the community center from the school. So the very delineated areas that this is the community center area and this is the high school area. Um and then for the dollar amount for the 129850 is for new motorized basketball hoops so that we can do additional um different fig configurations there, potentially host space uh basketball tournaments. Um, so it's a use for both the school and for the community center. Um, some other things that we're also doing is

109we're actually uh the board did approve a couple of meetings ago that we were redoing um the glass that's in the gym. So there that's one other change order that we've also already approved for this project. Um we are also looking looking at doing some additional flooring in the community center, painting um in their game room and in their main office. Um we're also doing some upgrades to some of our um additional doors to just do single door replacements across the facility. Um so we're really excited to make that a new bright and freshened up space. Um that's for the community center portion. The other large one is to do a change order. We are currently doing work at Dwight Rich um School of the Arts to add two preschool to GSRP classrooms um at

110that school. Um, we're also adding a new playground and fencing for them as well, but that's all stuff that has been previously approved by the board. Um, and one of the things that we were able to do as those projects came in cheaper as well is to add on um, a secure vestibule to Dwight Rich. So, Dwight Rich is currently one of our schools that does not have a secure vestibule. Um, when you get buzzed into the school, you're in the school. A secure vestibial allows you to bring them into a staging area um, where they can be greeted by the principal or other staff in the school and then let into the school area. Um, so this is would allow us to go ahead and add that on. Happy to answer any questions. Vice

111President Lopez, the secure vestibial at Whitebridge. That's a it's a weird kind of building. Where's it going to be? Sure. Um, yep. So this took quite a bit and that's why it's costing a little bit more than it would normally cost at a at a tradition more traditional looking elementary school. Um, so one of the doors, so when you first walk into Dwight Rich, um, there will be a wall built on just on the other side of the first hallway to the right and doors put on that first hallway of the of the parking. Nope. Off of the front entrance of the school, off of the street. Off of the street, main entrance of the school. So when you first walk into the school, you see all of the storefront. Um, and then the office

112is just on the other side of that hallway on the storefront. Right. Just to the right of that office is the one of the first main hallways that would head uh I'm directionally challenged west down the school. And then to the right is the auditorium. So we will build a wall just past um just past that hallway that will have a double set of doors that you would need to get into to go to the auditorium. You'd have to be buzzed in a double set of doors to go down the hallway. So again, you're not you wouldn't be allowed into the main school, but you would be able to be buzzed into the office. And then the next set of doors is all the way down to the left before you get into the new

113kindergarten wing area. So there's another set there. Um so with this because it's such a large vestibule area, even though it is large, all of the space that's encompassed is the entire office space for Dwight Rich. So that they wouldn't be able to get into any other space. Um but with that being said, because it's so much larger, we also have to extend our fire suppression system because it is such a large area. So, we'll be extending our fire suppression system from the kindergarten wing into the secure vestibule area due to how large it is. What about the entrance off of the parking parking lot? That will not have a secure vestibular right now. The only students that come in through that entrance are our students with IEPs who have special transportation that are greeted

114by their teachers at that door. Um, so they the teachers go out, they greet those students. Keeps cutting out. Sorry. um they bring them in through that entrance or we do have some family members who also have needs um handicap accessible that sort of thing then they would be buzzed in but we would have a staff member go to that entrance and walk them through the building. So right now that is not a free entrance into the building. Okay. Thank you. You're welcome. Are there any more questions uh regarding the change order at this time? Are we ready to vote on this motion? All righty. All in favor signify by saying I. I. Any opposed? Motion passes 80. Now we are at the seventh item under new business and that is the um MHSS oh

115MHSA renewal form um for the 2025 2026 school year. And this you were you gonna say something? Oh, okay. And this is just our membership resolution for our referees, right? and our coaches and all not coaches but you want to speak on that a little is it Jessica you want to speak on it a little good evening we all can but Jessica grab the mic I'll start and then I'm happy to tag you in so uh we are asking the board to approve the membership um form that you have in your packet this evening and basically what this means is that it allows us to participate in the tournaments and games within the MHSA and then it also lets them know which of our schools will be participating in the membership So you have kind

116of the list of enrollment of the schools at the bottom and then it also lets uh MS we're basically saying to MHSAA that we will be participating and that we will be following all their rules, regulations, qualifications, procedures, etc. Wonderful. So this allows our students to participate in those tournaments. Thank you. Thank you so much. May I have a motion on the floor? Yes. That's okay. a renewal form for the 2025 2016. All right. It's been moved by Trusty Williams. Second. It's been second by Trustee Kavanaaugh. Any discussion about the renewal? Trusty Williams. I do have a question. Um I high schools were listed. How are we uh displaying the learning hub and the uh Lancing Tech? Are they included in that rationale for sports and things of that nature as well? because I didn't

117see them listed. So they they actually don't need to be listed to participate because they're co-opted with our other high schools. And just to go further, so one of the great things about our alternative education programming is they are allowed to play sports with our other teams. Um now Lancing Tech, um when they become a full 4-year high school, uh we are looking at them being their own entity so that they would have their own team. Uh but currently because they're only in ninth and tth grade, they join the other stuff. Um so but yeah, it's it's really great. All of our children, even our online children can play sports. So if that was something keeping you from going to the online school, if you were interested, you can still play sports. Wonderful. Uh Trusty

118Herd, Mr. Superintendent, can you help me understand the um the schools that are kind of attached on the back? Do they go with the form? So for example, Patentale um they can play sports as well or is this is this first line meaning that once they get up to this number of students then they can participate? I just didn't quite understand what I was looking at. It's a great question and it's something actually we spent a lot of time talking about. So, um, one of the things that's really important is that kids who play in junior high school, they need to know where like their feeder programs are. Uh, there's some issues, of course, not that we would poach from our own district, but they want to make sure that if it says like the

119junior high school that where they are and where they play. So, that's what you're seeing here. But again, I'm happy to turn over to um, Cordelia or Jessica or anybody. I know that uh you know Stephen's on uh on speed dial if we need but you know the good news is you've got your high schools and then you've got your junior high schools because we do have junior high school teams now which is kind of awesome. So so because we have sixth graders uh there's a box above the um where the all of the schools are listed for B and that really covers our middle school sports. So, because we are now really investing in middle school sports, which we've been super excited about this year and presented on when you had Steven Draper here,

120this also includes our sixth, seventh, and eighth grade um students in those programs. Clarification. Yeah. So, oh, and the ant. Yeah, thank you for that. The anticipated participation. So, it's the number of students in those grades. We have to put the total number so they know who to ant the number that they could anticipate. So we put the the total number there so that any of our students within those sports that would like to participate would then be eligible under this form. Got it. And it's just basically because there's not enough space on the front, we added them on the back. Yes. Cuz I wouldn't have been embarrassed if you had just said that, Jessica. Well, actually, but but I think I didn't know that was the rationale either. But but the good news is,

121you know, typically districts don't have as many schools and so that's why we're so proud that all of our schools have so many of these different teams and hence why we had to have an extra page. Got it. Yep. All righty. All righty. All righty. Are we ready to vote on this motion at this time? Oh, nope. Vice President Lopez has something for us. Yeah. Well, I'm just happy to see that all the schools are mentioned there because they will then start to feed the high school and they will uh hopefully have a a more robust uh high school teams in the in the future in the near future. Doing good things with our athletes. All right. Wonderful. So, now are we ready to vote on this motion? Wonderful. All in favor signify by saying

122I. Any oppose? Motion passes. 800. Thank you everyone so be for being so patient in the audience. All of our individuals that are here to make a comment. At this time, we're on to public comment on non-aggenda items. Can I have Mr. Wigglesworth please come forth and join us at the podium? You have three minutes to uh speak to the board. And we typically don't respond, but we're glad to see you. All righty. Do I need to turn this on or can you hear me? Yeah. Is it on? So Scott Wigglesworth, Thingham County Sheriff. I'm not here as the sheriff, though. I'm here as uh to do two things. One to say thank you to the board and administration for what you do to kids or for kids. Uh I sat on the whole board

123of education for six years from 2007 to 2013. So I know how it feels to be up there, but uh amazing job for what you do to kids. And secondly, congratulations. And you're probably wondering why I'm saying congratulations. So I am a member of the Holt South Lancing Rotary Club. And every year we hold a fundraiser at Texas Roadhouse in the spring. Texas Roadhouse donates all the food and re we raise money to give scholarships out to graduating seniors from Everett and Holt. And for the past several years, I have been a member of the interview committee for the students at Ever High School. Uh we did this about six weeks ago and I wanted to report to you three things. Number one, the five kids that we interviewed collectively this year were uh I

124would say by far the best group of ever kids we've interviewed for the scholarship. Secondly, I had the opportunity to um be involved in the best interview I've ever had with a high school kid this year with an Everett kid. And I do a lot of work with Holt Public Schools. I've sat on this committee for the past several years and I do a lot of work with Eat and Rea as well. And one of your Everett kids, I'm not going to name anybody by name, but one of your ever kids this year by far was the greatest interview I've ever had with an Everett or with a with a high school interviewer. And I also had the uh fortune to hear the greatest answer to an interview question that I've ever heard. And that

125was this year from one of your students. And you may be wondering, what would that answer be? So, one of the questions we ask, and I'm watching the time here, one of the questions we ask is, if you could have dinner with any three people alive or who have passed away, who would they be and why? And without missing a beat, one of your students said, "Well, if I'm inviting people for dinner, I want to make sure the food's good. So, I need to make sure that uh um I invite Gordon Ramsay, so the food's good." And I was like I stopped and I said that might be one of the greatest answers I've ever had to any interview question and I said are you sure you're not a you're not a college senior as

126opposed to a high school senior. So I wanted to make sure I came here tonight to let you know congratulations on that these five young people. We came in with $7,000 worth of scholarships to hand out. Typically, we hand out three $2,000 scholarships and then a $1,000 scholarship to somebody that's involved in CTE or the I'm sorry, the trades. And um we decided this year we took a little executive decision and we handed out two $2,000 scholarships and three $1,000 scholarships. So, all five students left with either a th000 or $2,000. So, great work. I appreciate what you guys do for kids and I wanted to make sure you guys heard that from me. So, wonderful. Yes. Thank you for investing in our students, in our scholars. Wonderful. Eevee Nation. All righty. Next, we have

127Clinton Mar Morales. Thank you. Good job. Good job. No worries. You have three minutes before the board. We typically don't [Music] respond. Thank you. Uh, so thank you. Um, I've heard a lot of really good things tonight. Um, a lot of good things that I'm very happy about and a lot of things that I have questions about. Um, I do want to say before I read this that I'm so thankful to hear all of these really good things that are happening in the Lancer School District, but nothing no uh, beautiful flower grows without rain. And in rain, it is dark and gloomy sometimes. So, you got to take the good with the bad. So, uh, good evening members of the board. Thank you for giving me the opportunity to speak tonight. I'm here as a

128concerned parent to share some troubling issues that both of my daughters have experienced in their schools. Issues that are beginning to impact not only their academic performance, but their belief in the value of their education. My daughters have repeatedly turned in assignments that were either lost, never graded, or returned so late that the feedback was no longer useful. In some cases, group projects have gone ungraded for over six weeks, and my high school daughter has received credit for work she's completed. My young daughter submitted my younger daughter submitted multiple assignments that remained ungraded for over a month. After we encouraged her to speak up and follow follow up and follow up to the teach followed up with the teacher ourselves, the teacher admitted that she may have misplaced the work. Uh these are not isolated

129incidences. They point to a systemic problem. Students are being held accountable for turning in assignments and many but many teachers are not being held equally accountable for grading and returning them in a timely and transparent ma way. And without receiving graded copies back, students have no way to check to track their own progress or understand what's missing. What's worse is the emotional toll. My older daughter recently said to me, "Why should I care about my education if the teachers don't?" That question cut deep. She begins, she's beginning to internalize the idea that her efforts don't matter. And when students try to speak up, when students try to speak up, they often aren't believed because the teacher's word is automatically assumed to be true simply based on authority. That dynamic sends the wrong message to our

130youth that their voices don't count. I am not here to blame teachers. I'm not here to blame the Lancet School District. I know that we the teachers uh face immense pressure, but I am asking for more accountability and communication. This is me taking my accountability coming before you today. Our students deserve to know that the system supports them, values their work, and respects their voices. And without that, we risk not only academic decline, but a growing sense of disconnection and discouragement among the very children we're trying to lift up. So, thank you for your time. Thank you. Alrighty. Alrighty. Next, we have Alicia Elliot. Alis, did I pronounce your name correctly? Alicia. Alicia, don't charge it to my heart. Okay. Okay. You have three minutes. I just want to say u my name is Lisa

131Elliot. I I am in 10th grade. I attend uh Eastern High School. And I come to you today um to say school is not just for education. School shapes people. Um school shapes students into people that we that go into a society who work and cope on the daily. As a student of Lancing Public Schools, I have noticed and been a victim of authoritarian um authoritative abuse from administration, public safety officers, and even teachers and support staff. Teachers who um sorry, teachers who encourageful who encourage spiteful or hateful behavior, staff who are meant um who are meant and paid to support us as children, as as a child from a multicultural home with friends on the same page. um school often views students with mental instability, home life difficulties and so on are punished are

132often punished um pushed to the side and viewed as a problem child. Um even even as school advertises themselves to support um for all kinds of things me mental, physical and financially. Um Lancing schools also push themselves to be a good or positive choice for students while teachers abuse and take advantage of students without accountability. As a student who plans and um will shape schools and future um and the society around us, we encourage our staff, students, officers and so on to show the change um Lancing schools for all that we want to happen. Um, and I'd like to also say that I don't also I um as a student I don't I don't want to have to like go to school every day and have a fear that my teacher is going to shun

133me for asking a simple question about a task I did not understand. Um, I also have a hard time going to school and fearing that my teacher is going to talk badly about me to other students or view me in a negative manner because I do not learn in the way that the curriculum is set up because students do learn differently especially as many people everybody's different like we all have like maybe the same like we all have a brain obviously but everyone learns differently and copes and we all grow in different like situation. Some people grow up like the students were talking about homelessness. Some people grow up financially unstable. Some people grow up while their parents have their own personal issues. Um so school should like have was stated earlier, school should be

134a safe place for not just students but the society around us. Um and I also believe that we should continue to encourage that but also take accountability on the efforts that we show forth for our people. Um, thank you. Well, thank you. Thank you. That's right. It took courage to get up here and say that. Thank you. Alrighty. Um, Sonia, if I pronounce your last name wrong, come up. All right. Three minutes. We normally don't respond, but thank you for coming. Hi, I'm Sonia Villaina and my daughter goes to Sharon Road Elementary. Um, I came here to originally talk about her and then I sat here and listened to everybody else's stories and it saddens me that it is not as isolated as as as I had thought. uh one out of every four students

135is bullied and I just think that following protocol needs to be a necessary path to take during the bullying that my daughter has incurred since the pandemic that everyone is aware of from the school cafeteria employee all the way up to the superintendent. Nobody has paid any attention or followed the protocol. A lot of people will say that they did but I keep great records and nice paper trails. I also have read the student handbook. There are supposed to be a certain level of accountability for the staff, for the school, for the student, and for the students parents. And there have not been any of that because of the bullying that she has put up with and had to deal with in Sheran Road Elementary through Mr. Briggs, through Mr. Lola, and now through more

136poor Miss Griffin who started out at the bottom. I'm pray to God that she can make some type of a change. She's a wonderful woman. Um the only people who have really stood by them would be Mr. Nelson and Allison. This has not just changed my daughter's life, but the trajectory of her life. She came from um Guyer Park Elementary where she was helping to teach students, she was helping to watch classrooms. She was someone who other who younger grades were going to. And since she's been a student at Sharon Road after the pandemic, you can tell her education has gone down. She is now failing. She was not able to participate in any of the final year at Sharon Road activities because she no longer thinks anybody cares. As this young lady stated before,

137everybody has been told. I wrote on a yellow legal notepad a 504 plan that I was supposed to be implemented. And guess what? There's no record in the hercinogy program, which I found out Tuesday after another bully situation uh from Miss Griffin. I am not understanding why my daughter why it's okay for my daughter to fall so hard to the point where she not only has physical scars of cutting herself emotional scars that she can't ever get rid of. You don't you don't know my daughter. I can show you pictures of her from then to now. And you can see her light drop, her weight raised, and her education plummet. She couldn't go to any of the after school things. She now for the first year ever has to go to summer school ever. This

138is not my daughter's fault. I have been involved. I have talked to everybody. I have sent emails. I am now in in communication with someone else. But this is ridiculous. My daughter now doesn't even want to go to college. And she did. She had her whole future planned out until she became a victim of the bullying and systemic crap that's gone on the Lant School District that everybody says the safe environment. It is not safe. It is not comfortable. And my daughter is not the only one. I've spoken to all kinds of people. Some people I've reached out to actually have the nerve to have an attitude in your school system. Thank you. Thank you. Okay. Alrighty. Um, are there any comments from the board members at this time? From our board at this time?

139Any comments from our board at this time? Madame President, if I may. Yes, Trustee Williams. I had the opportunity last week to uh attend Eastern's IB um senior class awards and I have to say prior to that, Nino at 7 o'clock that morning, God bless him, gave a perfect address to the students during breakfast. But I was really amazed at how many students received collars, courts, scholars. I was really drawn in because I saw a lot of young men being honored, a lot of young men putting forth the effort to mentor, to tour. So, congratulations to all of the 2025 seniors at Eastern who received awards and who was there. But to all of our programs, um I know Levante is going to come back with the final word, I'm I'mma I'mma get you today.

140So, while we were at um graduation, the adult, no, Lancing on Lancing Tech online, the final speaker, I think he was a principal maybe, he was giving out awards, but he stated um the 5Ds to destiny. And I thought about that and I've been thinking about that and I want to share that because maybe that's the way we as a board should be operating and looking at and how we're using what we're doing in the district. Um the first one was discipline. Are we disciplining ourselves enough to get into what we as a board should be doing to make sure that our students, our staff, and everybody is successful? What is the determination? Are we determined to see that every child has the uh first class education that they need? No bullying or anything like

141that. How much time and dedication are you putting into the selective schools that you have? Are you meeting with the staff and talking to them and just talking to our kids in general? They need to know that outside of their family that they are loved. I tell people I have 11,970 kids plus. What direction are we going in next year? Because each year we should be looking at how we can tra take ourselves to that next trajectory level. So what direction are we going? And then what is the final destination that we have in mind for each one of our babies? This should be our five days of destiny for each one of our children in this district. Thank you, Trusty Williams. Um, are there any more comments from board members at this time? Trusty

142Hurt. Um, yes. I I as a freshman member of this board um have was Oh, I I can't really even describe the emotions that I felt. I've been a teacher in the district and um I must have attended I don't know how many graduations probably as a performer most of the time and you always get that feeling around commencement but it was different as a member of the board of education with every hand that I shook not in my mind I'm saying I don't know who you will be and some who I had when they were in elementary school who are now graduating from high school, some against all odds, some situations I know very personally. And to have seen them all dressed up in their cap and gone with the extended village there to

143celebrate them for me was um not a flicker, I would say just a a a ray of hope for a more excellent Lancing and a more excellent school district. I know we have many more things um to come. also would like to congratulate Everett High School on a job well done in Florida. I know you were back. I'm sorry we weren't able to get you to come and sing for us. Um but it's something I know that in the future we will do. We've got great talent here in Lancing. And also, um, I just wanted to say that, um, in lie of a a of a more excellent Lancing school district, your presence here, families at home, is what makes us more excellent. It gives us the ability to, taking the quote from our superintendent,

144do our job. Um, to provide highquality education. Yes, we we've got top tier teachers. Yes, we've got top tier administrators, but also we have top tier students here in the Lancing School District where your baby can come and be a part of that community also. So, if you have been teetering about whether to send your baby to Lancing schools, I know you're thinking about enrollment right now. It's about time that you come on home. There's a lot of wonderful things happening. Come be a part of it. Thank you. Thank you, Trusty Herd. Yes, Trusty Ninsky. Uh I just want to share that I was uh fortunate enough to be able to chaperone on a field trip out to the Ebersol Center with my son and just a wonderful experience we have there and to highlight

145how fantastic that is to have that facility uh to provide that free for students is just phenomenal. I know there's still uh some openings I think for the older age camps in the summer. So I'd encourage anybody who's listening um to check out those resources and sign up for a summer camp. again, just a an extracurricular opportunity that many students don't have that we're offering as a school district. Just phenomenal to do that. Wonderful. Thank you. Uh, Vice President Lopez, thank you. Well, number one, I think that the school district based on the presentation this afternoon from the students, we should outlaw plastic bottles in the district because they're bad for the environment. So, so if if our kids tell us that, I think we should uh really do the recycling very very hard and

146and together. I know all the schools have recycling programs, right? Yeah. And I I'm sure we do too somewhere in here. But no, the the other thing is is is uh there's a lot of good things happening in the Lanc School District, no doubt. And as the superintendent has said before, you know, we're doing good, but we can do better and there's more work to be done. I mean, you know, we don't take things like everything is is right. You know, we there's still a lot to grow and a lot of things that that we need to continue on top of. and um but it takes um a combination of a lot of things you know parental involvement teacher development uh etc etc. So uh I think that that we need to you know keep

147keep steady and keep growing and uh doing the things that we need to do for students and our community. So, I just want to say that that uh we're doing a lot of things right, but we also need to tackle those things that are not where we need where they need to be. So, and I thank the superintendent, the staff, and all the teachers up and down the district for the work they're doing. And um hopefully those that need help are getting help uh to do a better job and to understand certain things that that affect the child's learning. And um I think we're working on that too. So every day I see in my correspondence there's a training for teachers or a teaching moment or things of that nature that I know they're happening.

148And I hope that teachers do take advantage of that. And also again I I don't know if the superintendent wants me to say this but he's got a parents round table. come and visit him and tell him what you think about what he's doing. Uh so that you guys can have some sort of understanding on a face-toface uh kind of situation and I'm sure that things can be resolved if there's communication. So um thank you for that and I'm ready for Saturday a full day. Oh yeah. Yeah. And uh that's to me that's the best day of my board uh responsibilities. Yes. Yes. Is to be there and and see all those people graduating going to do great things. I agree. Thank you. I agree with you. Yes. Uh Trusty Stro, did you have something

149or you did have something? Okay. Just uh re-echoing as this is uh the final week of school for us elementary uh parents. And so tomorrow is a half day of school and the last day of school. Um just stating we made it through. We made it through as parents, as educators, as supporters. I am thankful for the district, as alongside as our great administration and uh superintendent even today in the address and transparency with communication surrounding the events that have occurred in the community. And so I re-echo with our vice president stated to get involved, make your voice be heard. he's already ex acknowledged to call have conversation get the information that you need and before you run with something know what is happening so I'm excited about the last day of school tomorrow and

150I'm excited about graduation and congratulations to all the graduates and uh thank you to all of the great presentations today and uh saving the turtles is what the kids were telling us with the plastic so I will never forget it and they were very very confident. Uh the Post Oak group, I said they're ready for government. They were speaking so poised and well and so we do have great things happening and I just want to echo and champion our kids for that. Thank you. Thank you, Trustees Jo. And the vice president turned his microphone. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I it came back because I don't want to get in trouble. Not that I would anyway, but I just want to congratulate our granddaughter Valencia who graduated from kindergarten from postto. So congratulations to her and to

151all the other kiddos who graduated from kindergarten. Yes. Yes. Yes. Alrighty. Very. Yes. Secretary. Yeah. So I want to highlight that nationwide this weekend educators and um folks who are concerned about gun violence in our schools are wearing orange for um gun violence awareness. And so at our graduations I'll be wearing a orange ribbon for um uh for it. And so I encourage folks to do the same and um get involved and learn about um um the organizations that are doing that work. Thank you for sharing that resource. All righty. All right. Well, at this time, may I have a motion to go into close session on for strategies and ne negotiation sessions connected with the negotiation of a collective bargaining agreement if either negotiating party request? Wait a minute. I messed that all up.

152I thank you. Can I have a motion to go into close session? I'm going to need two. How about that, Madam President? Yes. I move that the board of education recess into close session for the purpose of considering material exempt from disclosure as it is permitted in the open meetings act section 81c for strategy and negotiation sessions connected with the negotiation of collective bargaining agreement if neither negotiating party requests a closed hearing. All righty. Also, yes, that the board of education recess into close session for the purpose of considering material exempt from disclosure at is permitted in the open meetings act section 81H considering material exempt from disclosure under another statute which includes reviewing attorney client privilege materials exempt from disclosure under FOYA section 131G. Wonderful. It's been moved by trustee Strode. Can I have

153a second? Second. Second by trustee Kavanaaugh. All in favor? No. We are now going into close session at We have Oh, can I have a roll call vote, please? Thank you. May the clerk, Dr. Kavanaaugh, yes. Mr. Herd, yes. Mr. Lopez, yes. Mrs. Moore, yes. Dr. Navarus Martinez, yes. Mr. Noisque, yes. Mrs. Strode, yes. Miss Williams. Okay. Um, motion passes 800. We are now into in close session at 8:19. Okay. Are we back, Ryan? Oh, sorry. We have now returned back. Oh, wonderful. Back from close session at 9:28. Alrighty. And here comes our superintendent running in. All righty. I do want to um share with the um board that our beloved um trustee uh Nino Rodriguez is in Guatemala um for his granddaughter's graduation. Grandson, excuse me. I hope he's he's probably listening. Grandson's graduation.

154So, we miss you, Trusty Rodriguez. Um all righty. With no further business before the board, um the meeting has adjourned at 9:28. Have a wonderful evening.