001Good evening and welcome to the Garfield Heights City School District special board meeting work session. This evening is Monday, June 9th. I call the meeting to order. Could I get roll call, please? Yes. Miss Cox? Yes. Mrs. Daniels, present. Miss Thomas, here. Miss Morrison, here. Dr. King, here. Could I get a motion to um adopt this evening's agenda? So move. Second. That was moved by Miss Daniels. Second by Miss Morrison. Is there any discussion? Hearing none. Could I get roll call, please? Miss Daniels? Yes. Miss Morrison? Yes. Miss Cox? Yes. Miss Thomas? Yes. Dr. King? Yes. Now we will have a presentation. I'll turn the floor over to uh well we have a few. I'll turn the floor over to Dr. Reynolds. Thank you so much, Madam President. Tonight we will we're working to to
002remain consistent with updating the board on where we are academically and since this is the end of the year we've uh completed a full year and uh now would like for the teaching and learning department as well as the data and accountability department to partner to presenting you information on how we've done this year and plans for to respond to the data. That is a big push for us not to just collect the data but also have a response to that data. So, uh, Miss, uh, Miss Baser and Dr. Sid will be presenting to you this evening, and I'll turn it over to them now. Okay. Good evening, everyone. Thank you, um, board president King and board members for allowing Miss Beij and myself to present the data and also the ways we're going to
003respond to the data to you this evening. Okay. Okay. So, I want to start by looking at how the district has performed over time in the four major tested areas. Math, which consists of math 3rd through 8th grade, algebra 1 and geometry, English third grade through 8th grade, and then ELA 2, which is 10th graders and science fifth, 8th, and then biology and social studies, which consists of US history and US government. And as you can see that some of the areas there's some fluctuating in. So these students represent this data represent students who have performed proficient or higher. So as you can see social studies has consistently increased as well as math over time. And this is how we have landed this year in terms of proficient hire across the different tested areas collectively
004as a district. This is the different performance level for OST and end of course assessments. The students can land in five or six performance levels. The six being advanced plus. Now this is how we performed in the different performance levels in ELA across the board in all tested subjects in ELA. So third through 8th and then ELA 2 and this is math and to be considered proficient or higher you have to land in advance, accomplish or proficient. So basic limited are considered students who land in those areas are considered not to be proficient. Limited is the lowest um category. Advanced or advanced plus is the highest that a student can reach. This is how we perform in science. More of a stairstepped approach. Our goal is to have all students tested. So you'll see a
005percentage of students untested. The buildings have worked to try to get all students tested. Unfortunately, when the data is all clear, the students who are untested essentially count against the district in terms of performance levels in our PI score, performance index, performance indicator. This is social studies. Again, when we look at students in terms of proficient or high, you want to look advanced, accomplish, and proficient. The data that you're seeing today may change once the report card comes because this represents all students tested that they're only a fraction of the more than a fraction. There are some students who were tested who are accountable elsewhere if they weren't with us for the full academic year. So, this represents all students tested in our district. The reading diagnostic is an assessment that is administered to our
006students in kindergarten through third grade in the fall. So, this data shows that a portion of our students in the blue the blue bar are students who are considered on track based on that assessment. and the orange are students who are considered off track. Our diagnostic is Ames Web. So the students take that assessment in the fall. The students who are off track will receive will be placed on a ramp and then receive interventions throughout the year with the goal of moving those students who are off track to on track during the next administration. So this is what's called improving at risk K3 readers. So I'm going to just flip back. The students in the orange who are off track should move to on track. These students represent students who were off track last fall
007and based on the assessment that they were administered this this current fall. So all of the students in kindergarten were assessed last fall. Then the students were assessed again in first grade to determine if they moved from offtrack to on track if those interventions were effective. So as you can see the students who were off track last year a large portion of them did not remain off track. So this data is broken down to show you the again students who are proficient higher but it's broken up into two subgroups. Our typical learners or general ed students and our exceptional learners are students with disabilities. This show you how the students performed on the different assessments and the is colored to represent if the student if the if it increased or decreased from last year. So
008if this if it's colorcoded red, that means that the percentages are lower this year than they were last year. And parentheses, that shows you the percentage that we were last year for that particular grade level and assessment. So kindergarten through 2 grade, those are our reading diagnostics. So those are the students who were on track. So it was 5, for example, it was 52.1% of the students in kindergarten on a kindergarten reading diagnostic were considered on track compared to last year. 60% of our kindergarters last year were considered on track. So that shows a decrease. If it's yellow, that's pretty much stayed the same from last year to this year. So this is ELA and for kindergarten through seventh graders reading essentially. So you can see there was some areas in which the percentage of
009students were proficient or higher increased from last year to this year and in some areas it decreased. Yes ma'am. Just just cuz I'm visual. So we really want to see all green. Yes. Okay. We want to see all green. Yes. We want to avoid seeing red and this is math. There's no diagnostic that's required for the state for math. That's why the data begins at third grade. Algeb we have algebra one students at the middle school and algebra one. Those are honor students and then also algebra one in the high school. So if you just kind of pay close attention to how our subgroups are performing, you want to see how the students are performing overall, but we also want to pay attention to how our subgroups are performing. Meaning our typical learners compared to
010our exceptional learners. So the the percentages for the exceptional learners are based on that subgroup alone. So 14% of all exceptional learners were proficient or higher. So it's not taken out of a larger population. It's just specific to that subgroup. So green is good, but we also want to work towards increasing the percentage of our students who are proficient or higher. This is our performance in science and more students a higher percentage of students were proficient or higher during this year's administration of all the science assessments. The exceptional learners kind of stayed the same in fifth grade science, but there was no, it was not a decrease in social studies. So this is the cohort. So this is data showing how the students performed last year compared to how they performed this year. The previous
011data when we looked at this year compared to last year was just that grade level. It's not the same children, just students in that particular grade level. This is showing you the how the students performed from one year to the next. The same group of students, give or take a few who may have transferred in and out, but the vast majority of students should be consistent across both years. You see there's a a mixture some. So if it's red, that indicates that the stu the performance for this cohort is lower than it was last year. If it's green, it was a little higher. Yellow stayed the same. So ideally, we want our cohorts to perform the same or better. We don't want our cohorts to um fewer students in the cohorts to perform proficient or
012higher. We want the same or more question. Yes. Yes. Sure. So the percentage in the second column is not the percentage of increase or decrease. That is the percentage of that same group of students. Correct. Y for example if we look at third third through fourth grade. So 39.2% that was the percentage of students proficient higher while they were in third grade. In fourth grade, the same students, well, give or take a few, it was 31% of the students proficient or higher. Okay. Yeah. So, it's not a rate of change, just looking at how they performed last year compared to how they performed this year on the ELA assessment. And this is math. Looking at cohort performance is easier from third through eighth grade because they consistently take the same assessment. When you get in
013high school, the assess the end of course exams fluctuate according to grade level. You have nth grade algebra 1, five assessments in 10th grade or four and then one in 11th grade. So it's easy to look to follow cohort data if they're consistently taking the same assessments over a period of time. So for algebra 1 middle school that was the students in middle school who took algebra 1 last year those students are in geometry in the high school this year. So 75% of the students during the algebra one assessment were proficient or higher. The students who remained in the district who took the geometry assessment 54.5% of those students were proficient or higher for an example. to give you a better understanding. So some instructional implications based on the data over 50% of the students
014in three out of the four content areas were performing at the basic or limited levels which indicates there is a concern with core instruction. The percentage of students reaching professional higher increased in math showing some instructional gains. But again, because there was growth does not mean that's where we want to stop. We want to continue to grow our students to ensure we have a large majority of our students who are proficient higher. The number decreased in English language arts highlighting that there's a potential of structural weakness somewhere in reading and ELA. Our exceptional students are not showing consistent growth in achieving proficient or higher levels, suggesting that there's some issues with their core instruction, the students being um exposed to grade level content or the core instruction not being aligned to grade level standards. So
015that's what the data um those are some of the implications that arose when I was going through the data. Do you have questions for me regarding today before I allow Miss Beij to talk about our next steps? Just explain the to what core instruction to core instruction. Yes. Yes. So core instruction is their main curriculum, the grade level content that the students should receive on a day-to-day basis. So that's the the information, the content that all students in that particular grade level should receive. If one finds that there's some students struggling with the main curriculum, that's when they provide interventions. So that's grade level standardsbased instruction based on the particular grade level and subject. Yes, ma'am. So as we say that um there may be a concern with court instruction that doesn't necessarily mean that
016the instructors are not doing the job. That means that they may be teaching core instruction to a group who is not prepared to learn that grade level content. It could be actually a combination of both. If the instructor is not providing adequate core instruction to the students, it's an instructional problem. If the instructor is providing core instruction and the students have significant learning gaps and it's not being addressed, then that's when that's the problem with particular interventions. So, it could be both, but ultimately it's up to the instruct instructor to deliver high quality core instruction to all the students and be able to identify where there may be some holes or gaps and address those holes or gaps. But because there are more than 50% of our students limited and basic um shows that there's
017an issue across the board with core instruction somewhere whether it's how the teachers are delivering the instruction or how they are addressing students who have learning gaps. Thank you. You're welcome Madam President. I'm not sure if this is um a question for Dr. or Miss Fasure, but I know that over the years to my recollection, we were having some growth in the ELA. Do you think that the new government mandated reading curriculum structure and us getting on board with the science of reading and those things have been mandated by the state of Ohio? has that impacted our district and kind of set us back because we had to take a different course. I'm gonna let Miss address that. Do you understand what I'm asking? I'm not sure if I'm asking it properly. Absolutely. Good evening
018everyone. Thank you Dr. Stick for putting together all the data and I know you have lots of questions. So hopefully with the instructional component I can answer those questions for you. Okay. So I'm going to get to the exact question that you just posed. So, if we go back to this chart here, our three-year trend data, I want to kind of focus on where we're at with these components. So, the math, we barely went up, but we showed upward gains. ELA, we did go backwards. And so, I want to address that in the next couple of slides around the um science of reading. Um our science and our social studies, we continue to trend upward and we want to keep that um trend going forward with our students. So in response to the data, English
019language arts, this is the first year of full implementation of the new statemandated ELA curriculum. That's what you just asked, Miss Daniels. Okay. Aligned with the science of reading. Um so with that piece, we have heard and foundations for K to 5. That's our core instruction. K to3 wit and wisdom is the core reading instruction. K to4 ELE education is also the core reading instruction. And then grades 9 through 12 my perspectives. All implemented within the last year. So, we did a little bit of a pilot at the end of last year and this year was the full first year of implementation for all those programs. Certainly, there's a curve to that component of things. Um, our teachers work diligently to understand the new curriculum and implement with fidelity, but as you'll see in our
020plan going forward, we're going to support those fidelity checks within the next year as well. Um, all these grade level content materials are also provided to our exceptional learners and especially those in self-contained classrooms. So, that's where you'll see some of that dip and that decline for our exceptional learners because we want to make sure those students that are in the self-contained classrooms are also getting that same core instruction that our other students are getting. Um, one thing to note as well too is on the math, science, and history tests, um, portions of the Ohio State test, students have the option of having the test read to them. So, you'll see our students with headphones on while they're taking the test. It's being read to them. So, they're not being asked to be readers when
021they're taking the other exams. they're listening and um comprehending that information and digesting so that they can answer the math questions, the science and the history questions. So that's a little bit of a difference. And so you see that gap back where you looked at the data. We certainly need to increase the reading instruction and we can see that. Um for mathematics, this was our second year um years two through four actually of implementation for our revised curriculum. Um we continue to support with professional development and we have a focus on early fact fluency. Again, fact fluency is a key component to our students um having those skills operationally at the higher grade levels. And then for science and social studies, we continue to support the adopted curriculum. That's been within the last five years.
022So what I put those numbers there so you could see the gain. We're talking about year one of implementation. And then you look at the science and social studies, that's like upwards of year five. So we should be trending that way going forward with our curriculum. So next year, what's our focus? We're going to lead with literacy. What does that mean? We're going to use our data to guide all our conversations about student learning. Um we kicked off those data conversations just actually today with all of our um principles. They came together um as a fellowship and we looked at all the data that Dr. Stit presented around the content areas. We looked for trends. We talked about things we can do going forward for next year as they're planning their mission and their vision
023for their buildings. Our reading focus and content areas is going to be explicit vocabulary. So that makes um our students understand what the vocabulary is. We're teaching them to explicitly understand that vocabulary. So the high school started this about a year ago and they went through the whole core um curriculum piece with showing how vocabulary is um part of their everyday um assignments etc. They're teaching them exactly how to understand the vocabulary and use that when they're um reading and testing all those subject areas. middle school next year, we'll begin that same roll out. Um, and again, starting with those core content areas and really reaching forward, but we're going above and beyond that, even in our special areas. And then elementary support, that vocabulary right now is in their tier one curriculum, and we'll
024continue to support that with professional development around the new curriculum. And then we'll have vertical alignment, which means conversations across all grade levels and subjects to ensure coherent progression of learning. So that's that up and down progression. What's happening in this grade level to the next grade level? If you saw the data around um the early literacy piece and you're like, "Well, I had 96% of first graders that were not on track after kindergarten." When we give the Ames Web Assessment, which is the diagnostic screener approved by the state in kindergarten, they give its letter names and letter sounds. So, you're just identifying letters. And then in the fall of first grade, you have to be reading. It's oral reading fluency. So, there's a big wide gap between that because some of our students aren't
025quite yet those readers. Um and it's a timed passage for them. So that's where some of that discrepancy comes in. But again, we need to get our kindergarteners to be readers by the time they get to first grade. Um so next year for ELA K to3, um we're going to monitor the fidelity of Heerty and foundations. That's our tier one again that we discussed. Fluency checks for um decodable readers, monitoring what students are doing for fluency. And that's where I'm saying that discrepancy is between kindergarten and first grade. Um, we're going to continue to support our professional development, um, and integrate daily writing. Making sure our students are writing daily. So, when you breathe, um, inhale, it's reading, and you exhale, it's writing. So, we want to make sure they're doing both of those things
026daily with all of their assignments. And then program expansion. So, for intervention, we're looking at um UFFLI, and it's an intervention program that's going to support our um struggling learners in reading, and it's also going to give us a baseline for the tier 2 and tier three students, and that's our MTSS process. Grades four and five. We're going to continue to work with them. We brought foundations in Hegerty up to four, five this year. We realized some of our learners still needed that. It's about a five 10 minute piece at the beginning where they review all of those components of foundations integrity with those students. Um we'll continue with EL education support and then we have a just words program which is a Wilson product that we're using in our intervention programs. It's a much
027more fluent piece for our fourth and fifth graders to get them to understand those basic um components of reading. And six through 10 will continue to support EL education um for six that's um sixth through 8th. and then my perspectives um for nine and 10 and actually we took it through 11th and 12th grade so we're using it all across the high school to be consistent um interventions I said the word study with just words etc was supporting our students and then this year our sixth grade students will be on rimps so any student coming from fifth grade that has a reading improvement and monitoring plan will carry that to sixth grade and we'll be supporting them with intervention some of the things we're already implementing are the co-eing model so for next year in
028grades six through eight we'll have 90minute blocks of at least ELA and math. We're trying to work in all the content areas. Um, and during that time, that last 20 to 30 minutes is that small group instruction. We're going to be making sure that we hit every student with that. The intervention specialists will be in the classroom and we're adding two additional title teachers to the middle school. So, they'll also push into that instruction and support intervention. Um, we have a product called Inmentum that uh utilizes an exact path, which means wherever the students are at with their learning, it gives them a pathway. So, it starts from there. They gives them the remediation, all the supports that they need. And that's um kind of self-supported online learning. Teachers make sure that they're monitoring all
029of that, but the students can work to their potential. And then lastly, we're going to monitor. Um monitoring is a huge component of what our district um is doing currently and we want to continue that process. Weekly data conversations um happen in TBTs. That's looking at the most immediate data of the students, where we fell short on the standards and the teaching of the standards and how we're going to support that. We're having quarterly data meetings. Um, I put the entire grade level because that's really important for everyone to understand. That means everyone's at the table. Um, all hands on deck. So, that would be the intervention specialist, that would be the counselors would be there, um, the deans, anyone working with the students. We want them there to see and understand the data so
030that they can have those conversations whenever needed to support that student. Um the components we use again as web is our diagnostic screener and we use that for K to8 ELA and math. Um the upcoming year we're going to use Ames webb 2 for our social emotional learning screener. We're going to use that to support um kind of what satrop pulse was doing last year to give that baseline data. The good thing with this is with Ames web it can also connect those trends to what's happening academically with those students. So it will it will give that through line again. and admentum benchmarking and progress monitoring with the pathways grades 9 through 12 at the high school. Uh we have credit recovery as well too. So that supports our students that are missing some of
031those credits. We need to get them caught up on that and it has an they have an opportunity to do that. Um another data piece is CRS. We use the benchmarks and the checkpoints. That's from the state reporting system and that gives students an opportunity to practice test just like the OST questions near the OST etc on that. Um, and we do those as benchmarks, which is three times a year, and then checkpoints in between. And then post assessments, and that's really testing standards mastery. We're always making sure we're testing the mastery of the standards so the teachers can go back and retach. With all of these components, we're really trying to pull together what the data said to us. We're responding to the data. We're finding where our students need more support, and we're
032putting those supports in place for them going forward. Next year is the teaching and learning team will have weekly meetings um instructional kind of huddles per se where you're coming in and again all of those um instructional leaders in the building will be at those meetings so we can see what supports we can provide to the students. Um we will have coaches again in all five buildings and they're going to be content specific. So they'll still be in their buildings supporting those students but one will um be an expert on the EL curriculum, one will be an expert on the elementary math, secondary math. So then that way we can get very targeted with our professional development throughout the year in the district. And then focused walkthroughs. So paired walkthroughs around the curriculum. That means
033you're walking with a coach, a principal, someone possibly from teaching and learning and you're really looking at the curriculum. So you're seeing what um we're working on, if there's a miss on something, if you need a fidelity check, and then we're going back and supporting that professional development. And then time timely conversations for targeted support with teachers and students. Again, we feel like we're that uh immediate response is really what's happening with um in the classroom everywhere throughout the building so that we can support the students and we're going to continue to grow with Barfield. Any questions around the data that you saw or the response to the data that we are going to be providing? Madam President, Miss Cox, the coaches that are in all five buildings, are there metrics in place for them
034as they work in each building? There are metrics. Um, they do impact cycles. That means they work with teachers. They monitor those impact cycles and they also use the same data that the teachers use for their high quality student data. So, they're constantly looking at that data and monitoring. Any other questions? Miss Thomas, thank you. Um, the Ames assessment, is that a statewide assessment for all students in Ohio, no matter if they are in public, private, or charter schools? It's an approved diagnostic screener. So, everyone that um receives state and federal funding has to do the diagnostic screener. So, we chose AMSA because that is one that is approved. And Menum's also approved. So, we're looking to see if we could use that for the ontrack to not on track piece going forward. since there's
035a huge discrepancy like we said in Ames where they're asking for letter sounds and names in the beginning and then or reading fluency for first grade. So essentially a student who um comes into our district from a charter or private school they may not have that historic names with data. They should have some type of historic data we would hope but if they do not in the first 30 days we're mandated to give them the screener again so we have that data that baseline data. Okay perfect. Thank you. And then one more question. Um, looking at some of our numbers, it looks like something is happening between the fifth and sixth grade. Any ideas? If you don't mind, please. So, so that's something that I I've noticed uh not only just for this past year,
036but in the years leading up to now. Um, so we had a meeting about two weeks ago uh with our uh with Maple Leaf and with the middle school to try to figure out what's happening um because it's it's it's very distinct like there is we're losing kids right in that transition and even our numbers when I when I first started here even saw the numbers decrease from fifth to sixth grade not even talking about academics I'm talking about bodies um so what is happening so that is what we've been sitting right here in this room having discussions on what is the difference between the two one is a little more freedom That's one of the things, a little more freedom in the building. So, we need to create some structures to support kids in
037that transition to meaning um not allow them all the freedom of middle schools until we talk about those expectations. Uh additionally, we're talking about so you saw something where said we're going to extend the amount of time that's in the classes at Maple Leaf or uh elementary. They have a large amount of time focused on ELA and on math. So, we're uh changing up the schedule en sure that we're responding to that amount of time so we can be consistent with that time as well. So there are a few things that we've already talked about different programs that we want to do to to really teach them how to be middle schoolers. Um but it was very important for us to meet to have a discussion to find out because that is very um showing
038when we see that fifth to sixth grade that we're losing and and one of them I believe was ELA it was dramatic. It was dramatic in decrease. So it was important that we had that discussion and if you want to add to that that was that was something that stood out for us. Uh ELA in general was an area that stood out and fifth to sixth grade was also an area that usually we see a a struggling transition from fifth to sixth grade and then from 8th to 9th but fifth to sixth is the one that is that needs attention needs to be prior. We are using the same curriculum. So EL education is grades four through eight strategically because we didn't want them to have a huge change going to middle school. So it's
039the same curriculum with a through line. We know there's other factors involved there that we have to take care of and that's why we're making changes to the schedule. Um I think there's some alignment of where the classrooms are. So there it's like um a digital footprint is a little bit smaller for them to move around the building and really get them settled in so that they continue their good learning from fifth grade. Madam President, Mrs. Davies, um, one of the questions I do have is the coaches in the buildings and those things of that sort, are we sustaining some of the work we kind of did with the TSL grant to support our teachers? Is that part of that? We are sustaining that work. Yes. So again using the same models um but our
040professional development is all in-house and that's why I said content specialist because we need to keep that in house with our folks so that it's like you have the same person working with you. We don't have the outside providers coming in. We know that structurally it's more sound and we're able to support the teachers quicker than we would be if we were waiting for someone to come in from the outside. And I don't know how if I'm phrasing this correctly, but I know that this data is based on standardized testing and benchmarking that we're doing with our students um through the method of standardized testing. Does this data align with like GPA that we're seeing our students have and their success in the overall classroom and assignments? I know we have this data that we
041rely on, but I'm just wondering if this fully looks like what the our students dayto-day work look like every day. We're moving to a better place with that with standards mastery. We're really working to emphasize that with our staff. So, you know, it's your um grade should reflect what you're seeing on the diagnostics. The support should reflect all of those components as well, too. Um we're going to be doing a fidelity checking grading next year as well talking about you know um working together to see um you know correlating the grading. What does that look like? Making sure everyone's grading the same way excessively and moving forward with the grades. So again we see some correlation not enough. So that's another area we want to work on and focus on. Okay. Thank you. Um, did
042I hear you say we're moving to block scheduling or it's a a hybrid of a block? Um, it it's somewhat block again. We just need to work in some components to make sure that they're getting all the other classes, especially at the secondary level, but elementary, they're always getting that 90 minutes for ELA and math right now. Okay. Um, I think that that's all I had. the other questions were answered and I like the lead with literacy and how you're going to implement um and utilize literacy across all content areas and you know both horizontally and vertically. Any other questions for our team have one more question? This may be a field general question. Um, how's the state financially supporting us with this new mandate on literacy? Are we getting um the necessary resources to
043both prepare our students and our teachers for this demand? Um, funding wise, no. So, the state likes to implement new curriculum initiatives. um they give us like small dollar amounts. So I think last fiscal year we were given $125,000 to purchase all the curriculum. Uh and all the curriculum costs close to $200,000. So um it comes back to that state share cost. Um and then they are providing professional development training for which we get reimbursed. So, our teachers, all teachers, administrators have to take the science and reading training, which I'll let the academic folks talk about, but the state re um reimburses us on the back end. So, there's no, we front the cost up first out front and then we go back, send it to them, and they reimburse us for the full cost
044plus all the retirement costs. So, we get that. Um, but as for the all the materials that they're providing, we take a loss financially. I don't know about academic wise what it means on that front though answer your question and and that means we're really maybe we do the best with the resources that we have and what we're able to add to but we truly are not able to fully fund it ideally to completely support our students to kind of push them to the success. I mean I'm sure it's more we could do if we had the finances. So I would say it's not that we're not funding the science of reading. It's that we're we are funding it to the the mandate the state has which is in which would therefore take away funding
045sources from other programming or opportunities that we've had that that we'd like to do in district if the state fully funded it that they would provide all the PD all the curriculum all the necessary training and implementation in the out years because it's one thing to reimburse us for initial PD re uh give us a stipen for curriculum But what if it doesn't work in two years? You know, that's a $200,000 adoption. And then if they say, you know, we're just going to let the district choose and we want to choose, then, you know, the board would have to adopt another $200 $300,000, you know, curriculum adoption. So, it's not like they they don't really look too far forward. It's just we fund it fully for the curriculum, the adoption, the PD upfront, but it
046does take away those dollars from other areas of support if that makes sense. Yes. So again, we're trying to be fiscally responsible with everything we're purchasing. Um, however, a curriculum is a curriculum and we'll continue to use the curriculum supported by the state, but we're teaching to the standards as well, too. So, you know, the standards are what drives our instruction right now. Where is that standard being hit in the curriculum? making sure that we go through and put that in the right scope and sequence. So, we're always driven around the standards and student success. We're not going to let something like not having enough funding stop that success for our students. So, please know that that's always at the forefront. Mr. Oko knows I'm very frugal with my budgeting and making sure that we
047get the resources we need. Again, nothing should stop the education for our students and we're not about to let that happen. Thank you. Any more questions for Mrs. Dear and Dr. Stit. All right. Hearing none. Thank you very much for your presentation. Great job. Um now we'll move on to our next um presenter. Yes. Uh today we will be hearing from uh coach Michael Cruz. He is our athletic director. uh in light of uh our challenges I got you fiscally for our school district um he will be proposing a uh pay to participate plan uh to respond to u our struggles um he's used a lot of of data from other school districts to develop this plan and he'll be presenting that to us tonight thank you Dr. Reynolds and thank you to the board
048for allowing me to speak today. Um, obviously this is not a conversation that any athletic director wants to have. I I know that I am very much opposed to pay to participate. I know Dr. Reynolds and all of you guys feel the same way. Uh, unfortunately, um, this is the financial reality of where we are right now. Um, and so certainly just trying to make sure that we have a plan in place. Uh essentially on the back of the sheet that was just passed out to you is some of the schools that I was able to collect um data from as far as um schools that have done pay to participate um over the last several years and what they were charging. Um as many of you know we have a lot of athletes or
049people that are in the band and choir and different organizations that participate in more than just one activity. Um, so I wanted to make sure that uh we were not only um responding to what participating in one activity would look like, but multiple. So if you participate in one sport or activity, um the charge would be $150. If you were to participate in two, um the total charge would be $250. So there would be a $50 savings from one to two. If you were to participate in three activities, um it would be $300 in total for the year. So obviously dropping it considerably um from the original price of one activity and then anything over three activities would would be included in that $300. So they would not get charged anymore. Um the aggregate total
050uh was about $172 from the schools that I was able to get the information from. So we would be on the lower side of that. Um, again, I would like the the number to be what it currently is, which is zero. Um, but obviously we have to respond to to our financial situation right now. Um, I also put in there that hopefully um when the levy passes in November, um that we would have a contingency plan in place to immediately eliminate pay to participate. Um we what my plan is is for any uh funds that are collected in the fall um we simply would just not cash the checks and would be able to return those um checks to our families uh if we passed it in November uh because obviously it wouldn't be fair
051for our our November families or excuse me not our November families our fall families um to have to pay and then everyone else not have to. So we do have that in place as well. Um yeah does anyone have any questions? Unfortunately, it's pretty straightforward then president. Um, so are these fees for both middle school and high school? Correct. Okay. Yes. And the fees per student or per family? Uh, per students. Okay. Yes. Thank you. Any other questions? And I did look into that too. Um, most of the schools do per student unfortunately when they're in this situation. So my only question is is the only way that we will accept the um payment by check. Um are there other options? Yeah. So I I think just to try to keep things as above board
052as possible. I thought the check would be the best way to go about that. And in talking to other athletic directors, that seems to be um the preferred method. Um just because everything is obviously as a paper trail versus cash or anything like that if something were to get misplaced. Um you know, again, that that's just the feedback I was getting from the other districts that have had to do it. I'm certainly open to whatever it is. Hopefully, this is something that's just temporary and and we don't have to deal with after November. Thank you. Miss Thomas had her hand up this time. Thank you. Um if this is something that we have to do when we say checks made payable um just a recommendation like maybe we add some guidance into what kind of
053check like maybe it could be a cashier's check or you know something like that because a lot of um parents and people my age don't have check well I actually also don't have checks too so I I get like it's easy for us to be like hey I need to go into the bank. Hey, I need three checks for my account. But that's not if you don't sure, you know. So, just some guidance to that. Um, and how will we monitor rosters or like at what point in participation will parents know that they are responsible for? Yeah. So, it would be the first uh uh competition date, right? So, obviously every season they have a a game, their first game of the season. Um, not scrimmage, it would be their first actual game. I did
054put that in the policy that if a kid were to quit uh removed from the team for you know disciplinary reasons um that they would still be responsible obviously for that payment. Um there are of course we all know exceptions and so I did put that in there as well. If there's an extenduating circumstance that that would be heard on a case-by case basis. If a kid in the second game of the year blows out their knee and can no longer perform obviously we want to make sure that we're uh reimbursing them because that would obviously be unfair to the kid and to the family because they can't participate for something out of their control. Um, but yeah, so that would be it would be the first um and I'll make sure to include that
055that the season officially begins on the first competition date. And just to be clear, most of our sports um have about a 3-week time frame from the first official practice until their first game. Mrs. Davis, um I did have a question. What is our normal method at the school district of receiving fees? because I know we do receive fees for seniors and things of that sort. So what is the normal method in which we receive fees? Easy pay or cash? Yeah. So um easy pay and then I I also believe that Infinite Campus has a portal to pay it through. The question though is if we were to take um electronic payments, they automatically get deposited into our bank account for the district. then we'd have to hold those records and if the levy passed
056in November, which when it passes in November, we would have to refund parents, the district would have to refund uh most likely via a check um deposited out. Um it gets a little sticky. I know that this district has issues in the past with refunding, but that is something that Mr. Cruz and I can work into because checks are not um they're becoming rarer and rare that we see, but um we can always look into that. I would prefer not cash. The only reason is it's um harder to you know deposit things. Well, I mean I think that we should probably follow, you know, our normal and maybe do it through Infinite Campus and also probably just offer refunds because even holding someone check for a couple months, we may become at a loss as
057a district. those funds, you're not, you know, absolutely be available. Um, and I think, you know, being able to refund it, um, that'll be, you know, I mean, probably just the best way to maintain the payment. And and if we do those direct direct deposit type payments on campus, um, I mean, one thing we could consider doing is just not collect collecting anything until after the levy. Um, I mean, that's obviously a possibility if that was the route you wanted to go as well. Yeah, we might not have to use the funds. I mean, you know, they'll be available to refund. Yeah. Um, our students and will you guys be drafting a formal policy that'll be reviewed by legal and in order for us to implement this? Um, will the board be required to just
058kind of wave some of the readings so that this is in place for the next season? Yes. Um, what we're going to do is just to make sure that we're dying all eyes crossing all the tees and ensure that our legal department has opportunity to take a look at that. We want to just make sure that we're consistent, but I just want to make sure that it is very clear that this is not something we want to do. This is not something that I would have expected us to have to do in in our school district, but we're at a point right now where again um just quoting them, this is our um reality, our fiscal reality right now. Um, we are very confident that the levy, once we decide that we're going to put
059it back up, we're very confident that our parents will support the levy, um, our community will support the levy because we're trying to do what's best for kids and pay to play, pay to participate is not something in my mind that's best for our children. Um, I, as a former athlete, a long time ago, my family wouldn't have been able to afford it or would have put us in a buying. I know it's $150 and some folks say $150. Okay. But no, not my family. My family would not have been able to to to handle that. And we had three boys. There were three boys. Um so we are not just kind of throwing this out here lightly. This is something that we are we have to do. Um but we don't want to do
060this thing. So we are hopeful that in November the levy will pass. and we are we're convinced that the levy will pass with the support of this community and the support of our parents. But I just wanted to make sure that we went on record that this is not something that um we plan to keep once our levy passes. But this is one of the options and we'll provide the the board with all the um the adjustments that we've made, all the cuts that we've made in the last couple of years and the anticipated cuts um after November as well. So, we'll provide you with all that information and that is one of the options there for the adjustments we're making financially um to to make sure that our um our school district is fiscally
061healthy. So, yeah, participation in athletics and activities is has risen. We've added new um sports and activities as well over the past couple years. So, certainly it's definitely not what what we've been trying to do. I have one more um question or comment. Do we and you guys have done a great job with increasing activities and we also know um that the impact that athletics and our co-curriculars have on our students academically and just preparing them to be good citizens. um our school district, especially the high school and middle school, give opportunities that's not available anywhere else to engage our students, you know, in structure activities. And so, I mean, our athletic and student activities is very just not vital just for the school district, but it's vital for the community as as a whole.
062I mean, we probably keep a 100 kids off the street after school, engaging them after school in these programs and now being forced to make this decision for pay to play so that we can sustain the district um due to the lack of support in the past. Um do we project that we will begin to lose a lot of our students just because they cannot afford Yeah. to pay, I mean to play and just not even may lose them also to some open enrollment districts that don't have this issue. Yeah, I think I think um I think it's very reasonable to say that we could lose up to half of our of our student athletes and and other um students that are participating in extracurricular activities. Uh there's probably a handful of sports um just
063off the top of my head that would be in serious jeopardy of not being able to feel the team um just because of obviously this potential situation where they're going to have to pay to participate. So yeah, I think it's could potentially have a very negative effect um on our athletic and activities programs and unfortunately we would lose a lot of kids in that process and also our leaders, you know. Yes. Yes. And keep in mind the the success that we've had in some of our sports and even with the ability to recruit um talented coaches as well. We've done a great job with doing that and now we're at a point where we are um creating we have other challenges now. We have other challenges now that is pushing us in the in the
064direction that we were we were in a upward uh trajectory when we're talking with athletics. And for me and I keep bringing up my experience. I would have been one of the kids up and down the street walking up and down the street because I had nothing else. But I had football. I did have football. And yes, it develops our leaders. A lot of the leaders have come our students who are doing very well or either athletes or in the band or in the arts and so on. So when we're looking at cutting certain areas and we are looking at the challenges that we're facing in c certain areas, it is impacting the community as a whole. Not just our school is impacting our community as a whole. We need help. We need some assistance.
065Yeah. Over 70% of our top scholars this year um at the end of year banquet um were actually participated. Um when I was speaking I had anyone um who who was either involved in sports or some sort of activity or extracurricular and over 70% of our kids our top scholars are currently participating in something after school. So, I think it has a very very uh big impact obviously in our ability to field sports and competitive teams, but I think even more importantly in terms of helping with the school culture um and keeping kids on the right track. So, this is this is a a very very big deal. Um again, it's not something that I ever hoped that I would have to talk about. I know as he mentioned none of you did as well,
066but um yeah, hopefully hopefully uh it will be temporary um and in November we can we can continue to move forward with the the great progress that um that our coaches and student athletes and other participants have have made. There any other questions for Mr. Cruz? When we plan to communicate this to our families and communities. So, um I have been in contact with our coaches just letting them know that this was a possibility obviously after we got the results um but as soon as this is board approved um I already have something ready to go um you know for our coaches to make sure we're getting that getting that out to our families immediately. That was also one of the reasons I wanted to make sure we didn't have a um a stringent deadline
067um because for some of our families $150, $300 um you know you mentioned multiple children in the district. I mean, that's that's a that takes financial planning. And so, that's why I wanted to make sure we at least, especially for this first year, gave them that extra time. Um, you know, so that we could try to have as many of these students participate as possible. Any other questions for Mr. Cruz? Thank you, Mr. Cruz, for your report. Yeah. Thank you for your time. All right. We're going to move on to um tenative agenda review. There any questions, comments, concerns on our tenative agenda for next Monday, June 16th. U Mr. Okco has taken care of on the um website the um under 21 the board dates for upcoming meetings. So that will be um corrected.
068Mrs. Daniels um can Dr. Reynolds maybe speak to 14.2 to whatever capacity that can be discussed. Um I don't know if there's anything you can discuss here or is that going to be discussed in executive session? Um specifically discussed in executive session. Um however it is a part of our response to working on this court is response to that. Thank you. Yes, Madam President. Miss Cox, can you speak to 18.4 Medicaid? No need to. Um, so Medicaid school program, it's what we use to get our Medicaid receipts for our students. So every year we have to do it's a similar audit to a financial single audit. We have Zuka and Associates do that audit as well. So they take data from our special education department. They test it um against what the receipts we get
069from the Medicaid school program and then um they submit the reports to the auditor of state. So that's just renewing our contract with them. Um it's pretty similar in cost and scope. So it's just a simple renewal for the next I believe three years with Zuko. I could and this might be Mr. Whan um question 18.7 atte bloated. It's very hard to navigate. Apptog is another website provider. What we're basically looking to do is move away from our current provider, do a refresh. They'll also put us into the app store for both Android and iOS with an app for our parents. Most of our parents walk around with phones now. So, the idea is our phone, our website's going to be built from the ground up to basically be an app. It will function on
070a computer just the way a normal website does, but for our parents who like to interact with that, it'll scale and they'll be able to set notifications, see calendars, updates on events that are going on in our app. Um, it'll have a feed um and also feed directly into social media from the website platform. So, if we post a news article, it goes right to Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, all of the um places. So, it'll be a consistency of communication across all platforms. So that way we're just making sure that we're hitting our parents where they are at. Um the other piece that we'll take care of, we are currently using Blackboard Connect to send out emergency calling for our staff. We will be able to do that from our website platform. So a consolidation of
071platforms instead of having multiple different platforms. That'll be a savings of about $8,000 a year um by eliminating that and moving that process. So some of this is a cost savings measure, but our website needs TLC. Um, we did, uh, when I started here, we did a window dressing change to it. It's the same platform, but we changed the visual presence of it to highlight some of the things that we're doing really well communication-wise. We've just got a lot of bloat in our website. There's a lot of pages, subpages that need to be eliminated and cleaned up. And in this process, it'll do it. It'll also provide training for our internal staff just to make sure that everyone's well trained on how to update the website so that way we continue to stay current across
072the board. So offers a good opportunity for us. That was going to be one of my questions was is there a cost savings? So you take that for us. Madam President, Mrs. Daniels, um Dr. Reynolds, can you speak to item 19.3 workbased learning agreement with bone fatigue? Yes. This was brought to us by our special ed department. is another opportunity for us to bring work experience to action for our students. Uh we've been doing quite a bit of that uh through our special ed department and also through our uh educational advancement department. What we want is for our kids to to get this experience before graduation so that they have some some opportunities once they graduate. And this would be um hospitality. Yes. Yes. This is hospitality. Yes, ma'am. Any other questions about our agenda
073for Monday? All right. Hearing none, we will move on to our next agenda item which is board of education training and travel update. Are there any um board of education training updates? Okay. The other thing that I um have listed is travel update. um just due to our fiscal um place right now. I want our us to be mindful of that as well. In terms of board travel, um I think that we all should attend the um um capital conference. But as we move forward and we look at OSBA and um OSBA, NSBA, COSBA that we maybe either none of us go or we limit it to one person going to represent the district. So just wanted to put that on the floor and have some discussion around um that topic. Madam President, Mrs. Um
074I think with the fiscal state right now right now I don't think there's anything pressing other than what happens at capital conference that could be going on in any of the conferences that would be necessary for the board to attend right now. Any other discussion? All right. But we will um as a board limit our travel so that we are being fiscally um good stewards of our taxpayers dollars. All right, moving on to policy discussion. Vacation buyout. Phil, do you want to vacation payout? Vacation payout. Sorry. Yes. So, um, for certain administrative contracts, there has to be board policy to administer vacation payout under Ohio Revised Code. Our attorney's worked up policy and a resolution that would have to go into effect before 81 of 2025. So, the board needs to adopt that before um
075I would say the regular July board meeting um is when we usually get all of our new contracts for administrators um up and going for 81. So I think the timeline for this would be maybe to look at the policy committee looking at this having the sec first second readings and then we can get it done either at the July special meeting can adopt it so that we can make any necessary changes in the July regular meeting that can go into effect for August 1st. But um right now we we're not in compliance. So we just have to get this uh policy passed so we can be in compliance. That make sense? Yes. So the next step would be for the policy committee to have a meeting. Do we have a tenative um time frame
076that we sooner rather than yeah I would say um if possible we can issue one before our board meeting on Monday this upcoming Monday if that works since we'll have folks here my two policy committee members. If you like I can do that. If not, we can always set some other times up. Miss Cox, you are you all right with that? So, we can have the policy committee look at that um next Monday evening and then we can get everything ready to go for the July special meeting to wave and adopt. Yes, that works. Yes. And we can maybe move into first reading on that June 30th. Yeah. Yeah, we do have that special board meeting on June 30th to close out the fiscal year. So, if we need to take further action on that,
077um I know Miss Cox will be there who could represent the policy committee. So if that would work, we can do first, second, adopt or we can do first and second on that special meeting and adopt on the special meeting in July and then the policy can be adopted at the regular or the policy can be adopted at the special meeting in July and then any contract that we need to look into getting that language change can be done in July's regular meeting. Yes. Does that make sense for everyone at work? Thank you. Yes, of course. All right. Um, at this time I will like to entertain a motion to adjourn into executive session. Phil, I don't have my specific words. You don't? No, it is. Oh, do you want me to read it for
078you? Yes, we will adjourn. I would like to um accept a motion to adjourn into executive session for the reasons stated by Mr. Oo. Yes. Uh to consider the compensation of a public employee or or official by division G1 of section 121.22 of the Ohio Revised Code as well as preparing for conducting and or reviewing collective bargaining strategy by division G4 of section 121.22 22 of the Ohio Revised Code and there will be no um action taken after our executive session. Is there a motion? Second. That was moved by Miss Cox and second by Miss Morrison. Any discussion? Could I get roll call, please? And the time is 7:07. Could I get roll call, please? Yes. Miss Cox, yes. Miss Morrison, yes. Mrs. Daniels, yes. Miss Thomas, Dr. King, yes. We will now enter into
079executive session.