FHSD Board of Education Meeting-October 10, 2024

001e e e welcome everybody apologies for the couple minute delay um we'll get started with the Pledge of Allegiance IED Al to of the United States of America the Republic for which it stands one nation God indivisible with liy and justice for all we like a motion to approve the agenda for October 10th 2024 as presented director P all those in favor say I I all opposed say no I have it up next we have the student board representative Miss Jes thank you President berand we are excited to introduce our student board representative for October as you know and you hear me say every month the purpose of the student board rep program is to honor and recognize talented students Elevate student voice and provide growth opportunities in the areas of public speaking leadership and

002governance students are selected for this Honor by their principal with input from the student body and they have an opportunity to prepare and deliver a short speech to the board and public that is focused on their school or the district and with that I'll invite principal Rob goof to the pod to introduce our student board rep from Francis H Union good evening board uh it's my pleasure to introduce Jackson srock is a senior representing Fran Al Union this evening as student board representative uh Jackson's the son of Joan Cara srock Jackson attended Daniel Boone Francis how middle Francis how high on his journey to Francis Al Union uh from the first day that Jackson walked into France Union he's just a walking example of respect for other s taking personal responsibility and his work ethic

003is something that we've all noticed uh his mother Cara said that he has a spark back since uh coming to France sou Union uh which is a statement means a lot to us as a staff uh and we're proud to see Jackson where he goes from this point in the future and is honored to have him as our representative this evening so jacksonrock [Applause] uh good evening my name is Jackson s Brock and thank you for letting me be here tonight representing the place that fits me best Francis H Union High School Francis H Union has been a very helpful choice for my schooling making sure I can actually get out and graduate when I was a freshman in high school at Francis Al High I knew that school was not for me I was

004causing trouble and then you know not being a great student not being the best I could be I made it do okay and then when sophomore year hit I had worked the whole summer and didn't want anything to to do at school so I messed around a lot and then wound up in AIP a couple times and then tell them what AIP is Al alternative inter alternative Intervention Program for getting in trouble and uh the last last time I got sent there it required a COC meeting and I mentioned to Mormon that I would like to come try Union Hing it would be a better fit for me and then I while I was in the time I was at Union I came and visited uh Mr Golf and missing a couple times and they

005helped me get in it uh they offered me to stay the last part of my sophomore year I guess and uh I wanted to go back to how and prove I could get it done without causing any trouble and I did that and started my junior year at prin H Union doing the Missouri options program it has been the best thing that's happened to me it's made me way better than what I was seven months ago the first time I got sent to Union and uh yeah I knew that freshman year I would end up here most likely just messing around too much and not being the best I could be um the environment is just so much better they much more understanding much more hope giving than that Francis how was for me at

006least and they see that I'm not College fit I'm I want to go in the workforce so not that you're not College fit but you're choosing to go into work yes okay I wouldn't have been able to graduate if I didn't graduate on time if I didn't come here I would have been held back or had to go to summer school which I wouldn't have been able to do cuz I would have been working too much so now I'm finishing up my last few classes here at Franc H Union so hopefully graduate soon thank you [Applause] [Music] Dr see there you go [Applause] [Music] so Jackson we are glad that you are here uh you are part of this meeting feel free to share observations or questions the only the only thing you cannot do

007is vote but uh you are part of this Gathering representing Fran Union and the rest of the whole school district thank you so much Jackson welcome Jackson up next we have the spotlight for the carpenter youth Apprentice SK for our Spotlight presentation this evening we are shining a light on our carpentry youth apprenticeships this program offers students Real World experience and career ready skills setting them up for success in the trade and the two professionals at the center of this work are Miss Katie Vargas College and Career specialist and Dr Cara Dalton practical Arts content leader and I'll invite them to come forward to tell us more about the work that they're doing uh good evening board and patrons thank you for having us tonight I'm Dr Cara Dalton the Practical Arts conent leader and

008one of our uh coordinators and champions for this youth apprenticeship work uh we had long and Francis Hal offered opportunities for students to learn outside of the classroom and get Hands-On opportunities in their field of study um we're really excited to now be an official US uh Department of Labor apprenticeship site and uh beginning our journey with our Carpenters um apprentices that we are going to honor here here tonight as well as some of our uh industry Partners so for our carpentry program specifically um just to give you a little background on uh what these students have accomplished before they have hit their uh work site these students are um currently in 12th grade they were entering 12th grade when they applied for the program they had to have completed woodworking one woodworking 2 and

009also get their ocean 10 certification which is built into that second year class um to be able to be on the job site and they had to have their credits in a really great shape because they leave uh school early either after second or third hour so they can spend a big part of their day on site uh Carpenters work the same hours that were're in school and so we need those kids to be able to be um on site for several hours to get that great experience and so these students are out with uh a car printer now they are working almost every day unless the weather keeps them in and just getting this great Hands-On learning and um a acceleration to a career path that is really meaningful it's high demand it's good

010wages good benefits without having to um go to college or pursue a degree in something that maybe doesn't interest them uh they're getting a chance to see really firsthand is this for me um some maros they work those couple weeks in the summer that was blisteringly hot where you know some people like me we ran to our cars and were complaining that it was too hot and those poor kiddos were out on site um for several hours working um and learning in the heat they will also be out in the snow so they will uh experience that throughout the year so they're they're seeing firsthand not just a one day or a video or something like that is this for me um without having to put a lot of money in a many many years

011into find that out our students also go through an application process they first go through that with us and we can basically say okay you meet the criteria to be a candidate and then they go through the same application and interview process with company that they would if they were um an adult somewhere off the street applying to the company so they get a chance to kind of do some of those um adult grown-up skills that that we all do and they have to learn somewhere and so for some of them this has been their first job opportunity so it's been a good experience for them uh we want to celebrate we had um several students uh interview with the company five were offered positions and uh one declined because he decided he was actually

012going to heav Machinery so great he had a couple different options in front of him we had two that started in June and worked for the summer and then two that started in August and a couple of those have decided after some time on site that this wasn't quite for them and decided to pull back and take a full load of classes and something else and while in some ways it looks like oh we already had two kids quit those kids got an opportunity to see firsthand is this going to be for them and so they said realize that no this not not quite the right fit for me so um I'm I'm back taking other classes and uh the kid who worked all summer he made some really good money for the summer and

013got some great experience and um is now pursuing something else so um even if students don't complete the many you know the whole year they stay in the the career path for a long time uh this is just a great learning opportunity for them um to explore this in a meaningful way and so we couldn't do this without wonderful wonderful industry and Community Partners um that's one of the cool things about apprenticeships is we we're getting kids out with the companies that um they run our local economy and they they benefit our community so much and benefit our our district and our region and so um this doesn't happen without them and I'm going to let Katie talk a little bit about the roles of those Community Partners um before I talk again about our

014students and we bring them up a little shorter thank you cara so as as Cara said we could not do registered youth apprentiship full stop without some amazing Partnerships that give our students an opportunity and a chance to prove themselves and to develop um those students and and grow them in their skill set so we make sure that when we are selecting industry partners that we know they're going to love on our kids just like we do here in the district that they're going to keep our kids safe and that they're going to give them plenty of opportunity just as they would any other uh employee on their on their p role so we make sure the beauty of apprenticeship is that we as Educators take a step back and say you are the experts

015what do we need to make sure our kids know to be successful before they ever walk onto your job site and then what do what what can we be doing to support you and developing them so they help us with our goals and objectives they um do provide the interviews as Cara stated so that they get a real world experience with a real world employer um they onboard and provide them entry level um skill sets and development and then really what I think is the most valuable and what what I'm most grateful for is that they um provide that onetoone supervision and mentorship on the job site so our Apprentice has one supervisor helping him one journeyman helping him that's that's it that's his whole mty role um so they get a lot of individualized

016attention and then uh the communication throughout the year with us is also important so if there's any hiccups along the way we can um help mitigate those we can sit down and conference with families and parents if needed we can get involved so that we can ensure the success um I would say oops I'm going backwards I think there we go um what I what we want to uh highlight specifically tonight and we will call um Joe Huber up here in a moment he has been instrumental in this work um he's a hiring manager for cont cont was the the very first um industry partner in our region that gave us our our big break as you all know this is our very first registered youth apprenticeship um and these are our very first apprentices

017this is our very first partner and they have been more than gracious with their time and energy um and devoting to make sure that um our kids are successful on the job sites they've been around since I think 1985 um they provide a familyowned business atmosphere and you can certainly see that in all the attention and care and safety they provide for our students this is a unique apprenticeship in that we really have two partners we have our employer cont and we have the carpenters um The Mid America Carpenters uh Union here in St Louis um because again we want to do ensure our students were on the best of the best job sites so we partnered with our Union um Local Union to make sure they were paired with the signatory contractor which kch

018is um and the beauty of that is our students are learn earning a great wage um they are potentially earning High School Credit and they are counting all the on the job site hours towards their apprenticeship Journey men so if they choose when they graduate from high school to head into the Union um as a journeyman they are essentially a whole year ahead of the of the ball game so we um could not have done this without M America Carpenters um they have been patiently waiting for us to develop our wood uh woodwork one and two program to align with industry standards that was six years in the making and we've gotten there thanks to them and um they make sure our students are trained and um issued the oosha 10 certification so they've just

019been absolutely instrumental and we could not be more thankful for their partnership all right uh we went out a couple weeks ago and uh visited our kids on the job sites and took some pictures of them and this was it was a great day one it was beautiful so so not like the hot days that those poor kids are working in the beginning of the school year um was a great reminder for us is kind of why we do this and really getting to see them Hands-On and and working and learning on site and um if we didn't know who they were because we know them um we wouldn't have known and picked out that they were the students they were they were right in with the crew and and working and doing a job

020of a first-term Apprentice um so um Austin's not here with us tonight um but uh he was working on a job site over in um kind of off of briany a new development over there and um as someone who is not a carpenter I'm getting to see them raise the big part of the roof on um now just assure you our kids are not on the roof um first room apprentices don't go on the roof students don't go on the roof but there's a lot of roles that still need to be played important roles in getting all of that up and situated that the kids can be um on the ground safely so um Austin was helping do that that day um never made me realize how little I actually know about instruction until I

021watched this happen um we sat there for a long time because we were just as fascinated um by the whole process big boom big crate yeah really neat um Brian Olen from fhc he is here with us tonight he'll come up in just a minute um they're working on a development over um in is that that Lake St Louis Lake St Louis um sorry I don't know all the okay all the lines out here um they were they were a little different spot in the process um they had the the floor of the the second floor done so they were actually um U moving up and thr some of the framing in the rooms on the second floor so he was up but he was not like not any unsecure um I I felt so

022bad we showed up there and they were actually kind of still on their lunch but he and his crew were both really generous and they realized that I mean they knew we were coming but um the we had arriv during launch no we'll finish up come on let's like GE back up so we kind of got to watch them get all their stuff back on and um they said jump jumped right in new exactly what his job was and um jumped right to it and just treating our kids like um you know just respected employees it was really great to see um kind all that come together kind know the fruition of several years of of work um and see them with smiles on their faces too I don't know if pictures caught all the

023smiles um because they realized they having a picture taken but there were definitely a lot of smiles from those kids when they were out working on the site all right so if we could um over to you um yeah Joe Chris Ryan if you guys want to kind of start heading this way board members while they come up I just um Dr Dalton started by saying that they're the Champions and that really undersell the work that she and Miss Vargas have done that they have been the driving force in bringing these opportunities to the Francis House school district and we were honored to have the Department of Labor here a couple months ago announcing that we were a registered youth apprenticeship school district um I shared with you that Dr Buckman and I got to

024attend an event where Katie and Cara were recognized just last week is now being coordinators for the program and we think about Community involvement this is an amazing collaboration between businesses such as Conta working directly with us um working school districts throughout the county the Department of Labor the department of Elementary and secondary education um The Economic Development Council of St Charles so it really is an opportunity to do amazing things for our students um our mission to prepare students to be lifelong Learners regardless of the path they choose so Jackson shared what his path is what the best path is for him and this is just another another amazing opportunity for our students and so we need to make sure that we thank Dr Dalton and Miss Vargas for all their work with this

025thank you for your kind words very very unnecessary but thank you okay so without further Ado I know this was a very long Spotlight I'm sorry I'm sorry for that um we would like to um thank both Joe Huber and Chris adir from Chris adir from the carpenter apprenti ship program and Joe Huber from Conta an appreciation of your unwavering commitment to empowering youth through the registered youth apprentiship carpentry program we want to publicly express our gratitude and appreciation your dedication to fostering skill development providing valuable mentorship and creating opportunities for the next generation of Carpenters is truly commendable through your support you have not only shaped the future of aspiring trades people but have also contributed to the growth and sustainability of our community your investment in youth education and vocational training to exemp

026simplifies excellence in leadership and Community engagement thank you for being a champion of Youth apprenticeship and for your remarkable contributions to a brighter [Applause] future and then last but certainly not least we do have one of our apprentices here this um Ryan Nolan who was out on the highway in site from Francis Hollow Central and so Ryan has joined here with his parents if he'd like to come forward we'd love to present the certificate to him um and there you are you're hiding you hiding you would much rather be on a job site I'm sure um Brian in recognition of your dedication commitment and skill development in the carpentry trade we commend you for your outstanding performance and contributions to the Francis how School District registered you the prip program congratulations [Applause] the front [Music]

027[Applause] [Music] next we have Patron comments on during patri comments residents of the district and staff members are invited to address the board of education on issues related to the school district speakers are called forward in the order of sign up and each speaker has three minutes to make their remarks please remember that only one speaker is allowed at the podium at a time and comining time or giving your time to someone else is not permitted the board appreciates that you have taken the time to come this evening and we value both your input and perspective I would like to remind everyone that we expect the speakers will remain civil and respectful in their remarks if anyone fails to comply with board policy these regulations and rules we reserve the right to cut those three

028minutes short we welcome Ken Gar Bo superintendent good good evening first congratulations to the Francis H school district for being ranked in the top 10 in the state nice job thank you tonight ask yourself if the following actions have moved our school district forward would you call it forward to engage the a compliant local news media to to accuse use the school board of allowing hate speech thus faning the racial flames of the community without first checking with the district lawyers the superintendent the policy committee every school board member of the district's communication director to see if it were true our school board would never allow insinuate tolerate let alone approve such absurdity considering the safety and privacy of all students would you call it forward to demand boys and girls middle schools locker rooms

029and bathrooms would you call it forward to allow gender reassignment surgery for kids who are 15 years old without parental notification or parental approval would you call it forward to allow gender assignment hormone therapy for kids 14 again without parental notification or approval would you call it forward to Su a school board for potentially millions of dollars for wanting to implement a locker room and bathroom policy that ensures the safety and privacy of all students would you call it forward to use over 90 gender pronouns would you call it forward to have past School Board which allowed every pack but one to speak at school board meetings and then had to be sued so that every First Amendment right of free speech was protected would de call it forward to have a pastor who is

030a school board member State as fact versus opinion that the Bible speaks of oral sex and sex toys would you call it forward to have our libraries mobbed with books with illustrations of teenage girls engaging in sex with each other oral sex with each other would you call it forward for the past president of the fhaa teachers union to engage in an apparent unethical quid proquote conversation with a school board member to secure the Union's endorsement we you call it forward to pay a self-proclaimed expert of critical race Theory $115,000 and then deny the community that the curriculum he produced did not produce critical race Theory would you call it forward to eliminate challenge courses in the name of equity thus denying gifted students of advanced educational opportunities indeed let's truly continue for thank you

031your time is up academic Excellence highest educational standards thank you your time is up next we welcome Chris Brooks good evening ladies and gentlemen was always enjoyable to be here in the board meetings uh tonight I'd like to address uh director Blair's last Amendment for bidding heat speech false science and false history and instruction materials from the meeting two months ago which he just removed last month after I gone through Le in that meeting two months ago Dr Blair Mr Blair had spent sorry Mr Blair had spent the discussion around the previous policy changes complaining that they should have gone through committee and legal review that he I should have had more time to discuss them and wanting definitions uh then a few minutes later he turns around and presents an amendment that didn't have

032any prior notice on the second reading of the policy with no committee or legal review with ambiguous language and no terms defined uh you might want to see a chiropractor about the Whiplash from that that turnaround I suspect Mr Blair was trying to use this as a way to illustrate his opposition to the changes in the challenge materials policy ofinity uh what it really Illustrated was he's interested in playing political games virtue signaling rather than doing the work of the board and considering Ware of students but this is not a game this is serious business and requires serious people to do it right so let's be clear it doesn't matter how carefully you define hate speech false science or false history the phrases themselves are thought terminating cliches what that means is they attempt to

033provoke an emotional response to end critical thought and discussion on a topic look how you even use those in the meeting saying that every right thinking person would be opposed to hate speech right no further discussion needed uh and that's counter to the idea of developing critical thinkers critical thinkers need to be able to examine all ideas evaluating the basis for those ideas whether they're true or FS I'm not sure why this seems very difficult for some people to understand but in a public education environment you can't forbid ideas you don't like no matter what they are you can say you desire to protect students from those ideas but such idea cocooning is like helping break the egg when a chick is trying to get out of it the chick will die if you do

034that because it hasn't been properly strengthened before it gets out of the egg and gets into the world students not exposed to distaste the wrong ideas rarely grow into critical thinkers because the process of disproving those bad ideas is essential to education uh I recall an elementary school project one of my daughters did a number of years ago where the teacher presented in a professional way an intentionally false scientific idea as true and fact and the students had to go through the process of debating and deliberating why that was wrong and how they would determine that under Mr Blair's amendment that instructional material would not have been allowed uh and before the critics of the recent policy changes for OBC material bring this up note the distinction between debating And discussing ideas and having erotic

035elf porn available in school libraries one is protected by the Supreme Court one's not Justice requires lawyer speaking on both sides of an issue no matter how awful the crime or the defendant critical thinking requires discussions of all sides of an idea uh no matter how wrong one of those may be it doesn't require teachers to introduce an obviously wrong back is true but you can't just forbid the idea from being in the material I invite you to get some education on the issue [Applause] sir next we welcome Amy grer we have two Amy G's as Patron comments and it really threw me off at first I thought I signed twice me too girl me too hello everybody um to everyone in the room and everyone watching remotely so remember when board meetings were pretty

036mundane focused on a steady agenda of budget reviews curriculum enhancements and advancing the overall well-being of our students when discussions were focused on facts not feelings when decisions were made based on expertise not ideology when our teachers and staff were revered not repressed those were the days but somehow along the way our Schoolboard meetings became a bit of a reality TV show a spectacle where news cameras await the board's latest controversial policies and personal agendas overshadow the needs of our teachers students and communities it's exhausting and we deserve better leadership we need a school board that is committed to advancing the public the fundamentals of public education a board that is committed to the district mission that used to be prominently displayed of empowering students to be lifelong Learners prepared for the future isn't that

037inspiring five members of this board are collectively driving this spectacle two of their terms are up in April so we've got a choice to make as a community this District faces pressing issues that need all of the cre creative problem solving that we can muster our teachers are in distress overwhelmed and underresourced we lack support staff and can't get enough bus drivers to maintain our routes we're facing a serious funding crisis the needs of our student population are increasingly varied and we are ill equipped to maintain policies uh maintain order in classroom environments where our kids can Thrive and yet month after month the policies you bring forward don't address real problems solutions looking for problem that are also ballooning our legal budget and chipping away a teacher autonomy eliminating our anti-racism resolution creating new

038policy on how our bathrooms are used making it harder for district parents to learn about Schoolboard candidates by restricting electioneering on school premises just as we enter election season I want us to return our board to its rightful place a place where the only real drama is the occasional debate over the best way to empower our teachers expand our students opportunities and improve our schools I desperately want to put the boore back in school board and get back to the work of truly preparing our children for the future we can move away from the chaos machine and create more focused cooperative and informed policies that provide real value my name is Amy Grider and I believe we should be aiming higher for our kids for our teachers for our community I invite all of the

039voters of this District to aim higher with me the election is April 8th thank [Applause] you next we welcome Amy [Music] [Applause] G that's a tough act to follow but I like her all right I'm just going to start off with a quote from chapel rone and for all the queer kids in the midwest watching right now is I see you I understand you because I am one of you and don't ever let anyone tell you that you can't be exactly who you want to be thank you then I brought this DSM 3 because I've been talking through email with a uh Janet Janet that's your name through the dsm3 we've been kind of going back and forth that might have been the curriculum she was kind of taking when she was in college I

040don't know but it would make a lot ofense for a lot of these reasons um but I wanted to go ahead and review an article because in the field that I'm from we use peer reviewed research to make decisions and it makes a lot of sense um and the one that I found most interesting because I'm I'm learning a lot um just about the community and the lgbtq I A plus I hope I got that right but if I need to learn to corrected I will um there is a significantly higher rate of suicide and depression and I just want everybody to know that it is not because of who they are is because the environment that they are surrounded in and there are many studies that are coming out and I brought one with

041you if you would like to see it just by changing the way that you acknowledge a pronoun for a student this was 129 transgender students and this was from just so you don't think I pulled it off of some article off Facebook or I don't know there's like memes that a lot of old people just like oh that's that's real but no um it is an a cited Journal um peer review sorry I'm a little nervous second time up here um the Journal of adolescent Health 2018 October so I'm sure there's a lot more out there but I'm going to be doing more research of course okay so they significantly reduced suicidal ideation by 29% they also reduce suicidal ideation Behavior by 56% so by you guys not taking action and not stepping up if

042anything happens to the students in this Francis House School District the blood is on your hands and I don't care I hope you can sleep with that it's not everybody but I don't think I need to say the names and I'm looking forward next month I'd like to discuss some things like real bored things that can help the district we're just spinning our wheels on this and you're not going to get anywhere we're heading on the right direction of history and where do you want to fall but anyways the thing that I'd like to help the district out with is um looking at um out of District placement I know that costs a lot of money in the transportation that you have to do thank you your time is up I'll be [Applause] back next

043we welcome Anita cooner Ken good evening my name is Anita Keener I am a retired teacher and Patron of the Francis H School District I am still active in fhea as a retired member at large on the executive board I always willing to do whatever I can to make this District great again and keep us out of the media with all of the controversy but you that you but you guys do make that difficult with that being said I am happy um to have received an email from Miss Embry last night that the attorney firm hired by the district agreed with fhaa when we filed uh an informal grievance about retirees sub pay being pre-taxed to pay their premiums I am sorry this took hiring a tax attorney to tell you what we had told

044you using your own policy and literature if not uh the four documents that we were saying was accurate the former C CFO would never have allowed us to do something that was uh would put the district In Harm's Way in addition newly written 4,000 policies were never agreed upon by the fhaa president and the chief of HR after negotiations we would put the language together let me be clear we put the language we would together put the language together that would be that was had already been negotiated these policy changes that the board wants and the 4000s were not negotiated to add to that again I never sat with Miss zkin to agree to newly written policies never if this District wants to move forward we need to collaborate and I know we're big on

045definitions now so collaboration the action of working with someone to create something by the way many of us will collaborate to change the board of education on April 8th we will replace two board members all of you need to decide which side of History you want to be on have a good evening next we welcome [Applause] FHA represent from [Music] thank you my name is Francine Hill and I'm the fhaa president it was very exciting to see the new playgrounds opening in the elementary schools the last couple of weeks we were thrilled to see how the students were enjoying them we know that the staff is looking forward to enjoying fall break which is rapidly approaching fhaa hopes that it will give staff along with students and their families some much needed downtime to enjoy

046life outside of school obligations we encourage our staff to take this time to recharge and relax away from the increasing demands of our daily obligations we want to take a moment to thank our teachers for their continued dedication to our district while trying to navigate new programs curriculum changes and new or changed policies and much more our LMS have been working on understanding the new policies they are continuing to discover new things in the language what that language means when a parent buys a book for a teacher at the book fair the book becomes the property of the school and is logged into the school system would if the teacher changes schools which often happens does the book have to stay at the old school is this something else the LMS will need to keep

047track of we have often heard how parents have the right to decide things about their students education shouldn't that right apply to what what they want to happen to a gift that they buy for a teacher fhaa has always been willing to work with our school district we would never turn down the chance to have input on things happening in our district we have been reaching out to the district about meetings for the 4,000 policies since August 11th and did not receive dates to meet until September 26th at which time we were offered one date only a week away after requesting more dates we only re received an offer of the next day we are teaching full-time with family responsibilities and that time frame is not reasonable we also have been working on Senate Bill

048727 with the district and our decisions have been based on advice from our attorney we will follow our lawyer advice as we're sure you would this is not meaning that we aren't willing to discuss how to follow the guidelines of the Senate bill fhaa is not not responsible for the delay in action um or the district's unwillingness to accept an attorney and senator's understanding of Senate bill over of the Senate bill over desie we are always trying to work together and I just want to reiterate we want to thank Carol for getting that all straightened out with our subs and the P we all know we need them desperately and that was a wonderful thing to find out so thank you very much up next we welcome Pisa good evening president bertran members of the

049board Dr rumus cabinet and patrons my name is Heidi Nixon and I am the vice president for the it technicians for FEA I have been with Francis hell for seven years on Wednesday October 2nd the district celebrated National custodians maintenance and grounds appreciation day this group of hardworking individuals Works tirelessly almost around the clock to keep our schools functioning thank you for all that you do later this evening you will be voting on a negotiated it memorandum of understanding that helps resolve many issues our valuable it technicians have had over the past few years we would like to thank the admin team of Lisa Simpkins Mark Delaney Dr Brian Rich Scott Gowan Julie Walsh and director pusar for working diligently to help us address a number of it members issues items included in our agreement

050our experience pay the creation of professional development for Our IT staff reimbursement for job related certifications and secure workspaces in the school buildings for our it technicians to do their jobs and as we near fall break we would like to again thank our maintenance grounds custodial and it technicians for all of their hard work all of these groups will end up partaking in large projects throughout the district while students and teachers are out during the week of fall break to to help keep our schools running smoothly we would also like to thank our AAS throughout the district who will be working portions of fall break as well many times you are the faces of your schools with both parents and community members thank you for everything that you do thank you and have a good

051[Applause] evening and board I like a motion to approve the consent agenda for October 10th 2024 as presented all in favor say I I all poos say no eyes have it next we have it for individual a board like a motion to approve the Franc Central High School baseball softball bid package as [Music] presented thank you very much so this is a bit of a change up for us in terms of providing this program update just before you hear from our Architects and yeah clickers and microphones we've established okay all right that that will work thank you very much okay so miss heer is loading that up for us and so the purpose of this presentation is to help us all reenter on that which has transpired over the last several months uh dating back

052especially to March 14 that shows you the discussion objectives but I will uh move forward and cover this uh timeline so as noted within the timeline we know that we had a bond issue that was approved by patrons June of 2020 and following that um basically also highlighting that the 2018 project estimates were utilized to inform that budget demand for the bond project uh and that was without design and programming work and that would be best practice uh whenever a bond issue as being considered that you would have some preliminary work that would be done to provide better estimates uh also then December 10th 2020 the construction manager was approved for the Francis Hound North High School December 16 21 Francis H North uh the amended contract came through as we know we've had discussions

053it was 163 m795 276 and the budget at that time was 86,50 architect and soft cost so further reminding you that uh it's been an interesting Journey for everyone involved in dealing with this work here and that includes that Dr rumpus was named the interim superintendent July 1st 2022 and a new Chief finance officer uh came on board following um the chief finance officer who had been in position for a few decades item 6 August 10th 22 the citizens Roundtable discussion occurred where criteria was identified for prioritizing the use of the remainder of the funds there was a survey of additional stakeholders people who couldn't be in attendance that uh was led August 2022 and then Dr rumpus and during a board meeting March 16 2023 presented to the Board of Education the proposition n

054key findings in the go forward plan right after that a few months later rather July 1 2023 our new director of facilities and operations was hired for the district and that's Mr salum ster and then August 1st 2023 I uh joined the team as the chief finance officer so again identifying a great deal of transitions uh that have taken place and um potentially or actually did uh contribute to the delay in getting things moved forward October 2023 through March 2024 a review of all data was taken uh was conducted and that included meeting with internal staff and meeting with Consultants to help us better understand some of the updated pricing of uh what the needs might be and it was during the March 14 2024 board work session that we covered all of those items

055with you and made recommendation for the move forward this sign provide you with the items that were included as projects to move forward and as you will note there are basically three groupings the first on the left is the individual projects that were recommended and that includes the transportation fuel Island and the Hub the wrestling facility at Francis H High the wrestling excuse me the auditorium renovation at Francis H High Auditorium renovation at Francis H Central Francis how Central baseball softball Francis how high tennis courts playgrounds for 10 of our elementary sit Safety and Security and the demolition of building C then we had listed in the middle there is the phase 1 hbac projects Brian middle John Welden Elementary Harvest Ridge Elementary Francis H middle Independence Elementary and then the box down below in

056particular we'll discuss it on another slide but that would be the phase 2 HVAC projects and that would be pending funds availability and so what that did for us was enable us to make recommendation perhaps projects might exceed the original budget allocation that was considered uh early on uh when the the bond issue was approved or as updated for the March 14th meeting but then we would be able to uh be agile and take care of whatever the needs might be so it provides you as a board of education when making decisions that flexibility this is that stop sign slide that was presented during the uh the meeting when Dr rumpus presented it and then we repeated that for you during the March 14th meeting and we've been diligent about honoring each of those moments

057to make sure that you remain uh continually informed through the process we have explained to you that there are some projects though that due to the nature of the project that it's best to go potentially a Cooperative purchase route and seek bids in a different way to where you don't have all those design uh development schematic development um processes so during the March 14th meeting a few things that were highlighted included that um the list of projects for the original Bond issu there were multiple iterations and so we did the best to identify what uh was appropriate for moving forward we classified projects uh into components including items that were completed they were in process uh we were recommending them for future Bond utilization or Capital funds utilization we no longer needed or recommended them

058due to some specific uh scenarios within those projects or projects that simply require further evaluation and also again that reminder that um original estimates were from the 2018 facili master plan work with adjustments to just certain projects based on known work that had been conducted throughout the state so not every one of those dollar amounts was increased for the March 14 recommendation just certain ones so I mentioned before that uh that 2018 pricing did not include schematic design and I want to just further uh comment about that sometimes Boards of Education will authorize a district to spend funds for architectural services to really flesh out what that design work might look like uh in advance of a bond issue so inflation also has diminished the purchasing power and so I have a slide for you

059now that talks about that inflation piece and uh you know it's challenging even when you do a look back there are a variety of sources and data can be very uh different and so this shows you two sources one is Dodge construction Network and those inflationary values represent for the period uh 2018 through 2024 and they also represent the Midwest region so Dodge construction network is uh a well-known entity that provides this type of service the other one is uh I reached out to our one of our local uh contractors and asked about the St Louis region you know how might those look and I'm not offering that there's that large gap between them it's you know who knows all the data that's included within those but I decided okay well let's take the approach

060of going with the lower ones so as you can see 2020 to 2024 Dodge Network construction Network for Midwest region showed a 51% increase in inflation from 2020 to 2024 that's just four short years it it is uh very similar to that which we've experienced in inflationary costs in every aspect of Our Lives I would offer as well uh the other one uh totaling 29.84 for that period of time and then the slide off to the right there shows that if we took that $243 million bond issue um and then considered the inflation that would have been applied to it during that period of Time We Lost purchasing power by 72 m700 3 1,121 so that pulled that 243 million down to $171 Million worth of buying power if you will this next slide uh

061shows you future inflation and I know during the most recent presentation by our holl Miller Architects there was reference to inflation and it is a real thing that everyone who is doing any building deals with you can count on inflation to uh continue to impact your bottom line and what I've shown you here is if you look at a $50 million amount of remaining funds not committed and if we assume that annual inflation that then is a $3 million drop in purchasing power of course quarterly then at 1.5% per quarter is $750,000 taking it down to 49250 uh for the upcoming quarter this slide shows you the status of the projects that were recommended March 14th and we celebrate that we did uh complete the Francis H High tennis courts also the construction in process

062has uh taken place where the playgrounds were really close I actually heard another uh Elementary principal comment that playground their playground had been finished and people were thrilled or maybe it was a staff member someone recently it was yesterday said that uh on the uh design bid and process column as you well know you have been engaging in that process as information has been brought to you during each meeting and uh I did include Phase 1 agac because Mr ster has been working on uh Gathering pricing on that you haven't received it yet but it's in process uh on the far left is the approved prior to March 14 so I wanted to acknowledge that we had projects underway for utilizing the bond funds and I've identified that those completed include the security vestibules uh

063for those needed sites and then also Francis North High School again I'm highlighting for you that Phase 2 HVAC on hold pending the funds those uh five schools that were listed there and then to be determined is the Safety and Security allocation so there's a $2 million hold uh within the props remaining funds of uh $2 million for Safety and Security I do want to highlight I know you know this and so I'm I'm uh acknowledging it publicly that we do continue to provide Administration with the updated cost estimates the project estimates as new information is provided to us we have not been posting that information publicly because we want to protect the bid process the Integrity of the bids we want to make sure that you know if a bid might be coming in

064lower we want to make sure we get that price not that it reaches that potential budget estimate uh that's um been noted and it's not required that we post those um by Missour statute this now takes us uh through the Journey of our projects as I shared before the Francis H uh High School tennis courts have been completed the budget estimate for March 14 was 1.7 million uh I've noted some things I won't cover all the details for this one in particular but we did use that Cooperative purchasing approach for this one and the final price came in at uh 1,220 931 that you approved and the cost is being further reduced by another $20,000 basically due to limited use of contingency allocations that's that's a celebration for the playgrounds uh we had a budget

065estimate of 5.9 million dollar uh you know that we had a third party perform a a comprehensive review and identified all of our deficiencies we wanted to make sure that we're providing spaces for students that are age appropriate accessibility appr appropriate um make sure that uh all the equipment was functioning well not Obsolete and certainly repairable and so the pricing noted there the total was 5,846 31546 this is that Safety and Security allocation and the new uh comment I want to make here uh we know that we are in the middle of a safe schools analysis and I shared well I'll be sharing later actually that those uh gentleman will be on site next week to conduct that review of our physical structures and um also we have ideas of additional cameras and recording devices

066and that kind of thing that we might need and that may uh be the information we receive from the this process but we also are suggesting that uh the addition that is warranted based on the requirement that we have a storm shelter or the wrestling facility that perhaps uh most of that could be carved out uh of this allocation so that would be something that you would consider and I want to highlight also I realized as we were going through this review that we brought forward a recommendation during the September meeting for I I'll say it wrong but it's it's a phones iPhones it may be pronounced differently but those are uh and and also for cameras those are uh items that are in the buildings again it's all about Safety and Security but that

067they technically qualify even though it was [Music] 197,198 it was built in 1975 I've noted some other uh information for you there and uh we had a conversation during the March 14th meeting about the viability of uh improving it maybe using it for other purposes or even considering selling it and I'll highlight for you that the annual utilities of that vacant space are approximately 135,000 structural improvements are estimated at $1 1.75 million to fix some of the issues uh that building replacing the HVAC system would be estimated at $2.2 million and um then also relative to potentially selling that property we rely upon that parking around that building for Francis how high utilization so it will be during the November meeting that Mr ster will make recommendation provide a presentation about how to move forward

068with that and with a recommendation for vote at the December meeting I would also uh identify that any of that Improvement would not address cosmetic needs that would uh need to occur in that building okay so on our HVAC so this represents that phase one listing and to help you understand the bright line between the two phases these are units that are 25 plus years old and many of the systems have parts that are obsolete they are not efficient in for providing energy utilization uh again Mr ster will will provide a recommendation um regarding the move forward on this in November uh and uh finalize that in December so we know that uh amaran has indicated there could be potential rebates I'm not sure the split between the two phases but uh $952,000 could be

069a potential rebate and by replacing these units we could potentially save 280,000 a year in utility costs so again those would be recommended as a project to move forward right away and the reason for recommending it at that point in time would be so that the work could begin as stud as soon as students and staff vacate buildings uh at the close of the of the school year this next list is the one that we suggest be on hold these are the units that are nearing end of life 20 or year 20 or more years uh and uh so for this piece this again would be if there are funds available after you've made all your other decisions we would utilize this 15353 million toward replacing these units in the event that one of them

070was pulled off because we needed those funds to finish out a previously identified higher priority project uh we can always come back and utilize regular Capital funds to replace any of these remaining projects that have been identified as needing to be done okay so now this is uh projects in the design bid status uh project process still and uh this is the fuel Island you'll know the budget estimate originally was $650,000 uh we will be uh issuing the bids tomorrow and a Construction contract recommendation will be provided during the November 24 uh meet 20 excuse me November 21 2024 meeting and uh I also will tell you that we we heard your comments during the last board meeting and the team has been working diligently to Iden ify whatever adjustments might be available for this

071and also uh the transportation maintenance facility so that is uh to provide a maintenance building for our buses as you know our architect team and Mr ster have presented on that a few times uh we currently have um two short stalls where people are uh not able to close doors because the bus sticks out too far when they're working on it and uh maintaining a fleet of 163 bucks buses that presents a challenge we also know that as the bus fleet continues to age then there will be an increased demand uh relative to the work performed by our mechanics there so this one is in conjunction now as you know with the fuel Island P so they both will be uh bid tomorrow and then be brought back for the November 218 this is relative

072to the high school or excuse me Francis H High wrestling and multi-purpose facility it had an original budget estimate of $2.5 million and as has been shared with you the International Code Council requires this facility to be storm shelter rated and that brings additional costs for the building that's what I referenced on the Safety and Security slide that perhaps some of those dollars could be repositioned as a budget allocation here the final design recommendation and approval to let bids will occur during the November uh 21 2024 meeting this slide is for both of the auditoriums and this is particularly where uh you were there was discussion and you made suggestions on ways that we might cut back on some of the scope so that we could work towards staying within budget and the team uh

073has been working diligently on that so again this is for both Francis how high school and Francis how Central High School the original plan from the um Bond project when it was approved was that these would be new auditoriums and these are Renovations that are being recommended instead so replacing a number of broken seats and providing appropriate spaces for um other activities within the school environment for students that one is also uh queued up for final design recommendation and approval to let bids during the October 21 2024 meeting and then this last one which is the one you'll be hearing about this evening uh is our Francis House Central High School baseball softball f field the original budget estimate was 1.8 million we are spending money each year as you all know to convert it

074back and forth uh to provide for softball and baseball and then back again 35,000 annually that cost will continue to grow uh if it's not addressed we did have an office for civil rights claim relative to this space uh and it's not about uh having Turf it's not a requirement of turf but the turf is what affords us the ability to just have that one field for uh using for both types of uh Sports so including lighting for the field allows versatility of space utilization when weather issues would otherwise impact scheduling and again just in a few minutes here uh our team will come up and present this for you uh it was presented for recommendation and bid approval on recommendation on the design bid approval August 15th uh bids were issued September 4 and

075open September 25 so I'll have more information to share in just a moment this is a reminder that each month we provide you with our bond financial information it's posted under the finance and operations uh agenda section of the board meeting and it lists out all of our uh expenditures and revenues that have occurred since the issue originated and uh this slide reminds you that uh the funds that we have available basically it reminds you too of the Arbitrage so Arbitrage again is where we must return interest earnings back to the Internal Revenue Service when we've earned more money than we've had to pay an interest on the debt and that's an interesting thing we're working on how does that work because usually you have to close out the bonds before your Arbitrage calculation is

076officially made in order to close out the bonds we would need to go ahead and spend that 2.78 n million we continued to deduct so that could be another one of those situations where we pull back in another HVAC unit or some Identify some other need in the district to go ahead and spend it we would then though have to pay the Arbitrage uh refund back to IRS out of other funds so we'll get informed by the department of Elementary and secondary education if that's uh to be a general fund uh payment or if it is also to be a capital Fund in in some fashion we have a contingency return uh that's noted as 1, 46857 $690 and that's as of October 2nd and uh the escalation allowance also is 86829 that will come

077back to the district so all of those numbers tie out and result in what we have available here and so as you can see and I know it's tiny print uh we've got all those March 14th projects listed again this appears each month under the financial report as soon as we have a new bid amount approval by the Board of Education authorizing us to move forward and award that project we change the data within the financial report and update it to the final numbers and also um that then provides us our updated total so as of the close of September 30 we have 3,791 available for projects beyond all of those that are listed there including Phase 2 HVAC so this uh just teases that out a little bit more it's the same information just

078on a larger uh for you so the remaining balance of projects not started is 51,5 th000 and uh more to come in just a few minutes so if you have any questions I'd be happy to answer those before the team uh starts their presentation questions boarder okay that's my signal no question get out of the way all right all right good evening board um before you for consideration this evening is a presentation and recommendation for improvements to the baseball softball complex at Francis House Central I will co-present with our hollon Miller Partners uh Justin Durham will co-present with me this evening I will cover the journey uh that's gotten us to the point we're at uh this evening and uh he will cover the bid tabulation portion and then I'll close with the recommendation our

079hope this evening is uh you'll see you'll continue to see the uh the demonstrate demonstrated fiscal responsibility by strategically leveraging of Scopes uh to help with the overall Bond uh program budget so we'll jump right into the presentation again from a project timeline standpoint we just want to create a baseline to remind you of uh where we started and where um we're at today so we uh received approval to explore from the board during the uh March 14th board work session uh schematic designs were approved by the board on July 18th of 24 and uh the board approved us to go out to bid from a design development uh they approved the design devel vment approval and then the letting of the bid package at the August board meeting uh publicly advertised the project uh

080September 4th we held a pre on-site pre-bid meeting on the 10th and uh publicly opened the bids on September 25th and then for the Cooperative purchasing piece we did receive those electronically uh on the 27th of September they weren't publicly uh read out loud um and then this evening obviously we're here here to uh recommend a Construction contract based off of the packages that were released and our goal um is to have the project completed uh by February of uh 2025 right before baseball program would uh would start so our current realities um as Miss Embry has already shared uh we spend about 35,000 uh that's not including any of the labor of our uh internal teams uh to convert that uh field back and forth due to the uh office of civil rights claim

081so this project obviously on bullet point number two would allow us to be more compliant with that by leveraging our resources more appropriately and then including the inclusion of the lights uh for the field to allow versatility and space utilization when weather issues that would otherwise impact scheduling then The Spectator area where the bleachers are uh as we were doing the assessments they don't they're non- compliant with the Americans with Disability Act project delivery method uh so we sat down and I challenged the team to we have to think outside the box obviously inflation numbers have been shared um with the board this evening as well as with the community and so we had some opportunities to strategically leverage how we would deliver this uh project to help reduce the overall uh expenditures to deliver

082this project so what we ended up doing was carving out the uh hard bidding the Civil work fencing and then the alternates that the the board had approved and then we utilize Cooperative purchasing for the lights and the turf on the field so by doing that um and and this is real data from Consultants that we've talked to in terms of if we would have kept the lights and the turf within the uh the hard bid package uh we we reduced our approximately reduced our overall expenditure by about 239,000 um so just again this is the design that the board approved at the uh August board meeting these are the estimates that were provided uh to the board 1.8 million there was at the March 24 work session and then as membri has shared the

083other two estimates were provided to the board uh in close session as allowable by State Statute and I'm I'm going to turn it over to Mr Jus Durham he will present um the bid tabulations and narrate a few unique things within each one thank you Mr ster it's a pleasure to be here tonight um again just like Miss emb's presentation got some nice small numbers there for you guys to read so um bit tabulation we were really impressed with the turnout that we had we had seven bids on bid day so we had seven different biders give us bid packages that we were able to open and read aloud so that was good for us anytime we get more than two three four biders that really helps drive down that bidday cost another thing that

084we were really impressed with on bidday is a lot of the numbers were very close to one another so if you guys can read those very small numbers up there you'll see that we had several numbers that were within a very small range that means that they had good drawings to bid from they had good subcontractor input and we got good bid day numbers um on bidday uh we did go with uh bernon Jones as our recommended contractor um we're doing work with them right now so we do we are familiar with them as a company with Hollis and Miller and they are doing a great job with us so their base bit amount was $1,260 th000 um and then we looked at alternate number three which would be the bleacher seeding so that's what

085Mr stut was uh talking about to bring that area up to ADA compliance uh the bleachers are uh $55,000 of that amount and then after we descoped with Brenan Jones we did our reference calls and checks on them like we always do uh they came to us and gave us a few options that were value engineering type items that wouldn't have any impact on the project so the first one here is just a different type of drainage pipe that they like to use underneath their gravel base so we had designed round pipes if you get to trench in common practice they like to use a flatter pipe it works well with their systems design not having to dig those trenches equal a savings of about $35,000 to the project so we were happy to accept

086that one the second one was in lie of doing the 24t tall fence out in right field because it's a little bit shorter of a distance we wanted to protect those neighbors those uh shed structures in their backyards so in lie of doing that out of a chainlink fence they proposed to do that out of a net system again great opportunity doesn't really changed the design of the field at all and it also saved us $20,000 so that's another thing that we're looking at um and the last one was in the bull pins for the visitors and the home teams we had the removable pitching mounts right the small portable ones um they came to us and said you know what we can pour those out of concrete we can Turf over them they'll last

087forever and then it'll also save you $110,000 so we went back and we did check those portable Ms weren't necessarily going to be moved or used for any other purpose softball can still pitch in that Bullpen as well so they're not going to interfere with either baseball or softball so we decided that we would look at that alternate as well and that's a $10,000 savings to the project so um all those there is is was really good news and then the next thing we did as Mr suzer kind of laid out for us is we decided to and we've done this on a couple other fields and and we discussed this so what we decided to do was think creatively and we took the turf out of the bid day number and we did that

088for a few reasons and I'll kind of go into that a little bit so what we did is we did the base Rock the grading the fencing all of that we put that out the hard bid for contractors to bid that way the competition could drive down the prices for that what we did then is we reached out to several different Turf manufacturers that we've used in the past and you can see their names here and we got Co-op pricing for that what that allowed us to do is go directly to those companies get their best price for the turf and that Turf installation but what we did is we avoided the markup of the general contractor on bid day so you guys all know how the bid process works is a general contractor will

089reach out to several different subcontractors and they'll put all those numbers in a big pot and that's the big number that they bring to you on bid day what they do though is each one of those S contractors has to fall under their bonds and insurance and their liability so they put a markup on every subcontractor number that they get so what we were able to do is avoid that markup by going directly to these Turf manufacturers to the co-op and then get direct pricing so on bid day or when we got the the the contractors um Coop pricing back we actually had five biders one did pull their product because they were not low bid on bidday and they will only Supply their Turf if they do the Contracting work also so that was

090a bit of a disappointment for us but it was okay because our low bid um was still survived um at Sprint Turf there we've used them in the past they're a good company and that would be our recommendation is to go with Sprint Turf for the baseball field the next uh Co-op pricing that we did similar in uh reasoning was for the lighting piece and uh we had two bids for lights it was musco and techline and after reviewing those um we decided to make the recommendation to go with musco mainly for the reason that they offer a 25e warranty on their product so uh we decided to um accept that bid and present that to you this evening and really uh you know as Mr ster and Miss Embry kind of laid out for

091us the lights do a couple different things for us so for game days it allows students to not maybe have to leave early because we can start the games a little bit later so you don't miss that instructional time um uh for practice we can do several different things in terms of you have freshman teams JB teams varsity teams that are all buying for that practice field time right and so by having those lights it allows those teams to get a little bit more time on that Turf of Varsity tight field allows them to have that equal opportunity for practicing every day um weather so when weather does come about um it allows us to either push games back potentially if it's a lightning delay or something like that we can push that back if

092it rains on Tuesday now we can have games on Wednesday and maybe double up um and avoid those weather delays or having to go to a different facility uh to play those games because we run out of daylight and then a big thing too is transportation and we talked about that we actually talked about that with the transportation department a little bit in terms of you know the stress that it puts on them when games change when schedules change finding a new driver taking the teams bringing them back those kind of things and then another brief thing that that we talked about um with Mr suer and myself is just the use outside of school district time right so it gives the ability for outside people to come in rent the facility and maybe use

093it a little more effectively um you know in the 8e 10 year life of that Turf you get to use the maximum amount and it really kind of helps max out the use of that field so um with that I think that's kind of the the bid update and I'll let Mr St make the recommendation board before that happens I want to clarify one thing that Mr stusser said that was not accurate he stated that those estimates were provided in closed session um this has not been discussed there was no special meeting to discuss this during close it was just that the information was communicated to the board thank you for that clarification okay so that gets us to the uh recommendation and so this evening the administration would recommend approving burn and Jones Construction

094for the base package and bleachers and Sprint Turf for the turf and musco lighting for the L connection with the Francis House Central baseball softball complex improvements for a total hard cost of 2 Mill 62,700 uh the project will ensure compliance with the office of uh civil rights claim compliance with the Americans Disability Act and eliminate annual conversion expenditures while creating a versatile uh space that can be utilized when weather impacts Program scheduling and so when you factor in the hard cost as well as the soft cost design fees uh engineering fees uh the total program budget for this project is 2, 374,000 and we do have one more thing to add um from a uh big day stand yeah I forgot to mention that in our base bid number in the 1, 260,000 that

095you saw from Brennon Jones and I meant to tell you guys this on my my presentation I apologize sometimes when we do turf fields we have an unforeseen that we need soil stabilization so with in that bid there's $110,000 to make sure that that was inside the base bid amount we do feel that you know we may not need all of that or any of that so if that base stabilization is not used that money does come back to the district but it was there to protect us and why we did that was we wanted to call our shot we didn't want the contractors to come back and say oh you need to stabilize the the the field underneath your new Turf it's going to be $200,000 so what we did is we reached out

096to several of the turf manufacturers that we reached out to for um Cooperative pricing and we got that number ahead of bid day and we submitted that Within the budget of the project so that $110,000 is inside the base bid number and you are covered if we do need to use it and if we don't use it that money will come back to you so thank you Mr Sor I forgot to mention that I got a question I got a question um when you mention this is pennies compared to what we're talking about here but when you mentioned that you were going to replace the chain link fence with a net ver and save $20,000 it do you have a life expectency on that net yeah so the The netting systems that we will supply

097the polls will last forever the Nets are going to last that 10 to 12 years so what you would be paying for is the replacement of The netting system every 10 to 12 yes okay so that 20 grand yeah so the 20 grand included the footings um concrete footings the tall post and then the Nets so the netting is a small portion of that $2,000 that we would pay yeah got it thanks does the elimination of the wall out there does that that adjust the distance to the plate no so it's the the outside fence the exterior fence the right field fence is still the same distance what we did is because it's a little bit shorter distance it was 305 ft or something like that we had a 20ft tall fence 24ot offense so

098the distance to right field is exactly the same it does not change we just change the height of the chain L to 8 foot and then the net then covers the other 16 ft to go to 24 ft so home run is over the chain link no so you guys as a district can dictate that so you can put the yellow cap on the Outfield fence or you can say it's got to go over the net so you can be Yankee Stadium or paron Stadium it's kind of up to you guys so yeah and one of the things that I didn't think to ask about is is there a batter's eye we did not do a batter's eye no no additional question I'm also going to sorry president ber I'm also going to ask Mr

099Duram just to cover one small a couple of small technical things on the light piece about light shed yeah yeah so another question you guys did ask a few presentations ago about the lighting lighting system of musco yeah and so um we wanted to make sure that you guys knew that we have talked to the city of codville we have outlined that we may be bringing lights to them we wanted to talk to them first before we brought any recommendation to you to make sure that all bases were covered pun intended and so um in their conversation they want to see light shed amounts so that we're protecting the neighbors right we don't want that light spillage to go over into their yards the great thing about the LED lighting system that we have today

100especially through like musco and techlines the one that we went with is they will provide all of that documentation to the city as a deferred sub midle if we choose to move forward with that and what that means is we will not be spilling light onto the neighbor properties it will stay all on Francis House Central site and it will protect you guys as you know if people complain about the lights being on at night or whatever you can always see the lights from a distance but the light will not be going onto their property and that's what we have to make sure that we cover for City permit reasons so yeah yeah those those lights actually do a really good job of projecting where you want them to be projected exactly yes very very

101nice yeah other questions repard all right all those in favor say I hi post say no I have it thank you thank you than you board like a motion to approve the financial report as presented found miss imry good evening again no I got it that's good thank you okay so miss Embry can I take a 30 30 second break oh sure maybe like three minutes although this was really going to be interesting just offering that if you want to save for school Finance for [Applause] Jack we taking minutes minute rest e e e a motion to table the approval of the financial report second session board just made this motion so we can move another item up and then we'll pick this back up off the table um after that's done so could you

102who was the second on that dror Blair we got a first the table this from director cook and the second from director Blair all those in favor say I iose say no eyes have it on board I just like to see if there's unanimous consent to move up the mou so those that need to sign it and be involved can sign it and potentially get some sleep tonight everybody get any objection all right we'll do that board I like a motion to approve the 2024 2027 FEA memorandum of understanding for district it technicians as presented Simpkins thank you president BR just want to say thank you to the team of our computer Tex and and Scott Goen cross from here we had a great conversation we were able to address all the issues and concerns

103from both parties and it was just a great collaborative conversation in the room so just appreciate everybody being there and working together happy to share the memo with you we are happy to present it to you thank you very much any questions for all those in favor say I I I was suppos say no eyes have it we'll now take a quick break to sign the memo thank you [Music] it's turn on SM thank than you all right we will continue with our motion to brew the financial report as presented here I'll make a motion to uh pick the finance and operations report off the table second second oh in favor say I I I I oppos I said it Miss inry okay this will actually be quite short because uh once again we've not

104made any changes i' hope that we could bring some of the budget amendments to you during this meeting but we're holding everything for November so that it can be a comprehensive uh recommendation so this uh basically says None and then I did want though to give you an update on our safe schools analysis I kind of alluded to it before uh we do have these slides that show you no changes to the financial information no changes to the trajectory for our operating fund balance at this time uh we know that it will change because that's what budgets do every every year so the safe schools analysis uh uh remember I was so excited that this is all working out so well and I was also thrilled when I found out that they could actually be

105boots on the ground here next week so we have the cons Consultants coming in on the 15th and 16th we apprised our building leaders this morning that those uh whatever sites they choose to uh explore and check out the physical structures will will occur on those two days and then we also have a team of leaders who are not only Gathering all the documentation and the prese the uh procedures and everything that we currently do but they'll also participate in some of those dialogues and uh the building reviews as well so just that's the update and again uh additional meetings will occur after that and then we anticipate their report 60 to 90 days after all the data collection is completed and then beyond that there are just a couple of slides that give you

106that awareness of all the things that are taking place in finance and operations some of the work taking place and uh that concludes that presentation questions board all those in favor say I I I'll supposed say now eyes have it next you have a motion to approve the bond underwriter as presented Miss imry yes so I'm happy to share with you that we did Issue a bond underwriter RFQ there aren't a lot of um companies that would participate in bidding on that we uh issued the bid on September 9th and um we allow for questions on the bid or it was actually a request for qualifications I should clarify uh by September 19th and responses were due September 26 we did receive three bids uh from qualifying companies and we determined that all three of

107those firms should be interviewed by the team and so the interviews were conducted on October 1st and we evaluated each of the firms relative to Prior experience in similar districts in the state of Missouri also those with experience in large districts 10,000 students are greater we uh looked at the current districts that they serve and also any prior experience of the key staff that would be uh serving in Francis how a significant Focus was placed on the project approach and how they would um work on strategically identifying opportunities unique opportunities and uh strategies to deal with our debt and also that communication process that would be deployed by them I've provided for you following the interview process um uh I did reach back out then once the team selected them uh unanimously and the recommendation

108is that uh the Francis House School District would uh utilize Piper Sandler as the bond underwriter moving forward uh I reached out and they provided their pricing structure I've included a note in here that based on these rats uh provided by the piper samler team that would have produced an overall approximately $140,000 Less in uh Bond fees for the last issue so that just gives you some perspective of what you could expect moving for that's the recommendation if you have any questions I would be happy to answer those questions Bo how long what are their particulars I mean what kind of experience do they have I'm just curious yeah so uh they have varied there were three members uh that were present for the interview one Banker has 17 years years of experience in the

109business um another I believe was at 8 years and the third one I'm sorry I'm drawing a blank okay yeah but but significant and significant Service uh they do uh Piper Sandler it is a National Corporation um they have an office in lewood Kansas but they also have uh they have an office in CL Clayton uh nearby and they uh serve districts through throughout uh this area they've worked on financing teams they've worked with as noted in the information on board doogs with uh 10 of the 18 larger school districts in the state and um and nearly 100 school districts throughout the state of Missouri including those St Louis area districts so uh I have had opportunity to engage with two of the members of the team uh previously and they have provided outstanding customer

110service it because I know we' we've talked about the customer service aspect of it in the past so I'm really glad very happy with the fact that you saved us $140,000 well we could have uh future maybe we'd have future savings okay I'm saying I know you'll find that $140,000 somewhere yes let's do that additional questions all in favor say I I all oppos say no eyes have it we like a motion to approve the purchases as presented second good questions board all those in favor say I I all those oppos say no eyes have it Bo like a motion to approve the revised 2024 2025 and 2526 board staff salary schedules as presented sorry H Miss just a quick change to remove the computer checks off of that schedule as they'll be moved on

111to a fees of negotiated schedule thank you very much all in favor say I I all oppose say no i7 um just for the community there's a number of policy and regulations for first reading so please take a look the districts and the board are happy to have any feedback to to those um and we have couple a motion to approve policy 4520 G as presented so moved second s board those in favor say I I all those opposed say no I have director beram before we leave the policy portion of of our meeting I'd like to make a motion that we add policy um 2116 which is our safety and security privacy and bathroom uh policy to the meeting in November for a second reading vote we have a motion to add 216 is

112this is this a motion privacy it a motion regarding what was what's on the agenda currently no my motion is to put policy 2116 on the November agenda I don't think that's a valid motion because we're discussing poliy 45 well okay 20 G all right I'll wait till we're finish discussing Poli we are which means we're out a policy session um but okay so this is a privileged motion which I can make according to Robert's Rules [Music] that's a point of order question is is this something that needs to happen within the board meeting or is this something where she can add outside the board meeting mean I'm just curious if she wants to add it does it have to happen in the board meeting or I I just don't know I've never does does

113it have to be decided in this environment um if the motion gets seconded it that's good distinction thank you [Music] not looking for a vote on the policy I'm looking on a vote to put in on the next agenda [Music] she could just [Music] better [Music] so looking through this there are five privileged motions call for the orders of the day call the question of raise a question of privilege recess adjourn and fix the time to with then to which to adjourn those are the five privileg motions so youing my motion it would be out of [Music] order up next is superintendent Cates Dr upus thank you president bertran um I'm excited to share that on Monday of this week a team from the wasach county school district in Utah actually traveled um here to

114visit Francis Hall High School um Dr wedlock John Schultz and guidance counselor Christen Adams hosted a group of leaders from their District including their superintendent other district and building leaders um who came to see and hear how Francis H high is embedding professional learning communities into their day-to-day work uh within the building um throughout our entire District we're utilizing plc's um which is our teachers coming together to collaboratively analyze student data um talk about effective teaching strategies and develop plans together to meet the needs of students U Francis H high is recognized as a model school um Nationwide and so that's why this District chose to come and visit and um got to spend time with them and left with strategies that haligh has put in place that we're doing districtwide um to take back

115to their team so it was an honor for haigh and for the district to have them visit um I also want to recognize the Spartan Regiment which is the band at Howell Central um this past weekend they competed at the Memphis Regional bands of America competition and for the first time in school history made the finals in the competition um so out of 24 Elite bands from six different states they earned a spot in the finals and ultimately earned 10th place which is a great honor their first time making it so congratulations to the group and to um Nathan Griffin Drew St and Shannon kreps who are the leaders of that band um we will formally be recognizing at the November meeting but want to announce because it's out there our two Emerson Award winners

116for this year uh Mr Leaf Johnson who's a teacher at Sager Middle School was surprised last Wednesday um with the award um Emerson as you know headquartered here in St Louis recognizes area Educators each year who exemplify excellence in their field um it's the 30 34th year of the program um and we're thrilled to get to recognize him and then also Katie shop Mueller um who has worked at the district for more than a decade and as a science teacher at Francis Hall High School um was our second Award winner for this year so they will both be recognized here at the board meeting and also receive recognition from Emerson um last week we did our first F day meeting with our cohort this year of our citizens and schools um our second group um

117they kicked off with a journey throughout the entire District we get at least a driveby of almost every building in the district we felt a little bit off time this year but tried to um do our best to get by all buildings um throughout the entire Drive they're learning about the history of the district and of our schools um and I think each time you hear the information you pick up some new stories about um really what has made how special and what makes each of our schools special and it was recognized earlier but I also want to acknowledge that um we are excited that how was named on the most recent Niche list um as the top 10 one of the top 10 districts in the state of Missouri um we recognize there are

118a lot of different factors that go into that but we also know that our community values rankings of any sort and we always want to make sure that we're near the top both in the county and in the state and at the end of the day that happens when we're doing what's best for students and meeting our student needs and it exemplifies the incredible work of our teachers and our staff throughout the district and so it's an honor for the entire district and last I want to take a moment and thank our transportation team they had a surprise um inspection from the state this week um so they came in and um inspected 25 buses without announcement and we only had one minor minor failure due to a turn signal light that needed to be

119replaced so they fix that quickly and leads to a 100% passing rate and so it just showcases the team's commitment to Excellence and um having buses that are keeping our students safe each and every day so I want to thank them and thank you you next we have board comments you know I always have something to say are you going um I just want to say uh last evening I attended my first parents's teachers meeting uh since I'm on that committee now uh I am impressed by the professionalism of the staff and the important work that they do for the Francis House School District uh during the meeting we brainstormed ideas for increasing participation in the parents's teachers program and we got better acquainted uh a couple things I learned are that the parents's teachers

120program has been a valuable part of this district for 43 years and last year they made over 8,000 home visits I think that's impressive I think that was the most home visits of all the parents' teachers programs in um in St Charles County so I think that's pretty impressive I just want to you know give him a shout out and tell them how proud I am with them I think they're awesome and they want to get more babies in the program start right when they get born I was GNA just say one thing um today I was uh at McDonald's because um I'm a fancy person and uh while I was there a franch house school bus pulled up and out of the bus came three pairs and a number of our students who have

121uh unique needs and I learned that that's part of the CBI program and that they were on this community Excursion where they went to Snooks to learn how to shop for groceries and they shop for the canned foods they were going to be used at the Franc North canned uh food U Drive and when I was there it was uh not surprising but just also neat to see those three um people the teacher uh Julie Smith and two paas Max hessle and Emily just represent our district so well and the love they had towards those students was exemplary and I just I'm amazed at how many things are going great in this school district that I've never heard of before and just needs a little flashlight here and there to celebrate so I just want

122to celebrate um Julie Smith Ma hle and just CBI program at North and the those at the other high schools as well that exist um I don't know the names of those persons too but thank you all for hearing for those students to make sure each student gets the best education that they need for where they are just really really proud of them thanks president berand I'd like to make a motion this is commentary not motion so you're denying my motion again so you're denying my motion again there's no denying a motion it's not the proper time to be making a motion I'd like to it's come to my attention it's uh that at least at last month's school board meeting someone during Patron comments called me names for approximately 3 minutes uh let me

123explain why calling people names is harmful for several reasons both for the person being insulted and for the overall social environment which in this case includes children that are usually Pro present though they've left early tonight first name calling causes emotional harm by under undermining self-esteem it can hurt someone's self-esteem making them feel less valued or respected this goes this also goes is true for all board members name calling has a mental health impact repeated verbal insults can contribute to anxiety depression or stress this can also negatively impact children and teens who are still farming their identity as they sit and listen to the vitory all that some here have espoused name calling promotes hostility it creates conflict name calling escalates disagreements and makes it harder to resolve conflicts peacefully name calling destroys trust insulting

124someone damages trust and can make it difficult to rebuild relationships whether at work school or home most of all it encourages bullying IT projects a power imbalance name calling is often used to assert power over someone which can lead to reinforced bullying name calling normalizes aggression when name calling is tolerated it can create an environment where aggressive behavior seems acceptable name calling reflects poor emotional control name calling shows immaturity resorting to name calling instead of addressing the issue commonly reflects poor emotional regulation and a lack of maturity name calling affects how you're seen others might see you as rude unkind or unreliable which which can hurt your reputation avoiding name calling promotes respect and better communication though I truly hope that the person that stood up and called any any anybody that has stood up

125and called any either me or any of the other board members a name I sincerely hope that all people who attend these meetings will consider it a learning experience apiz for call I'd also like to go on to mention as debates around Public Safety privacy and inclusivity continue to evolve the FH SD board should be advocates for the passage of a segregated bathroom policy that ensures distinct facilities for different genders now more than ever there is an urgent need to address concerns related to the comfort and security of all individuals using public restrooms by maintaining separate bathroom spaces individuals can enjoy a heightened sense of safety and personal privacy free from the anxiety that can arise in shared spaces this policy reinforces a long-standing tradition of bathroom segregation offering solutions for those who feel vulnerable

126in gender neutral environments increased incidents of harassment and the potential for discomfort in M mixed gender spaces have prompted a reeval reevaluation of restroom policies across the country segregated bathroom policies create clear boundaries ensuring that every individual can utilize these essential public amenities without fear of intrusion this approach also respects the personal choices of many who prefer gender specific spaces for cultural religious or personal reasons by formalizing bathroom segregation we can address growing concerns about safety and establish environments where privacy and dignity are upheld we the policy makers of fhsd seek to balance inclusivity with Public Safety the passage of a seg ba gated bathroom policy presents a timely and practical solution I for one believe that such measures serve the best interest of the public by providing a safer and more comfortable environment for

127all it's essential that this board act now to create policies that respect individual preferences while addressing the legitimate concerns of those who feel more secure in gender segregated spaces thank you Bo comments yeah okay uh growing up I experienced I I had the privilege of having a lot of really good teachers and um I I remember them finally you know each one of them made an imprint of My Life um and I look now and I see the experiences that my daughters are having uh in school one that has just started out in kindergarten the other making her her way through Elementary and and in in each instance um you know with Mrs Stark and Mrs car and Mrs prey uh and now Mrs kig they they've each really had a had a role to

128play uh in the development of my daughters fortunately in Francis how um are my daughters have had the privilege of both having the same kindergarten teacher and Mrs Stark and one of the things that Mrs Stark said to me when when we first met for uh um parent teacher meetings was oh I knew that that was that was her you know isa's sister because they look look the same they look just alike and I said oh hold on a second you know you know don't let the uh the costume Folia this one's the spicy one so um we had a good laugh and and and it was clear to me that that these teachers really do you know take our kids home they really do feel for the kids and that was um it became

129more evident this week uh when uh Kelsey kanig um she's my daughter's thirdd grade teacher um went completely above and beyond and and and um shocked both my wife and I when uh she showed up to my daughter's softball game and it was it was amazing to see the difference in play that an 8-year-old can do when she's on the softball field when it's not just Mom and Dad watching right her somebody that she you know is with 8 hours a day is now there and she's trying to impress her and she's paying attention now and she's she she got you know three hits and and and it was it was amazing so you know if there are any teachers in here that that want to really exemplify what I think Francis H should be

130follow Kelsey KCK and her example she's an amazing teacher um follow Mrs Stark follow Mrs prey um Mrs car is also having a baby so follow her too so um but I do want to commend especially Mrs kig for really showing my daughter and and and everybody in her class and everybody in this District now what a teacher really exemplifies and what what we really strive for our teachers to be here because it does it makes a huge difference and and made a huge difference in in that one day for my daughter it was it was fantastic to see so um I commend uh uh Mrs kaning for for really going above and beyond and and uh hope that more teachers take an active role like that in in in the development and the and

131the um just the the lives of the actual students themselves so thank you Mrs kenning I really appreciate it so before we kind of move on to our strategic plan U work session I just wanted to highlight a couple things number one was the summer school report which was in the consent agenda we didn't talk about it but it's in there lots of good good stuff going on there appreciate everybody that that does all the hard work over the summer for all the kids that need a little bit extra or want want or just just volunteer want to do a little bit extra um I know a couple of those um that like like to just continue their their learning through the summer so that's always a good thing so a lot of good stuff

132there if you get a chance to look to that report and see all those good things and then just want to highlight October is National principal appreciation month so thank you to all the principles um and all the hard work you do um in supporting teachers and supporting the buildings and parents and students um so just want to throw that out there um up next we have our strategic planning update M Joes to present take a take a five minute break perfect we'll have a five minute break and start that up e e e [Music] probably 30 minutes did we were having food at this meeting good for you the only reason I agreed to stay oh yeah you want me to get you I we are is that what we were supposed to eat

133no you eat all it was what we [Music] wait seriously they tget all the sorts like advertising against me this guy's Ser all right why am I in this low chair what is this oh you can raise it up it was a student chair on my back is really will me what do you do I have to do this way I have to go oh okay yes I've had hads like that when I directing music I had a music stand that right I think we have everybody here go ahead and start our working session I'll you over zus thank you president Bertrand and thank you board for being flexible um still I feel somewhat new to the district I don't know whether that's true anymore but my understanding is in the old days um they

134would often combine work sessions with the business meeting so they would get through the business they pause and reset the room and um just to allow the board to engage in more of a dialogue with District leaders around different topics and so we're excited tonight to share an initial highlevel draft of the strategic planning work that we have been doing you know strategic planning for any organization provides a great opportunity to really come together um establishing where we want to be in the future and who we want to be as an organization it's really it is the process of establishing our Direction uh the priorities of the district and ultimately allowing us to align our resources um both human resources and fiscal resources to ensure that we're meeting the needs of our students our staff

135and our community um there are three questions that we've really focused on doing the work um one where should we be focusing our efforts and resources over the next 5 years so we're calling this the 2030 plan for Francis Howell um that we'll use the rest of this year and we'll talk a little bit more about that to finish the detail and then um we'll have it in place as we start talking about Staffing and the budget for um next school year really thinking about what critical work demands are our attention in the district and so every you know we look at data ongoing but every couple years you need to take a deep dive and really think about where you're at and where you want to be and that idea of success of approximation

136and how do we get there um and what problems and opportunities do we have to address um this is a large district there are a lot of things that we can do and the reality is you can't do everything well and we don't have the resources to do everything so again this is our opportunity as a community to prioritize so we're excited to share this initial highlevel draft with you um once we have your feedback we will bring this back to you and pending approval of the plan next month we then will begin the work of determine the specific these specific initiatives and action steps that will fall under the four pillars that you outlined um last year so now I will turn it over to Jen jeles to get us started and really talk

137through the process up until this point um and each of the Chiefs will speak to some of the work that will fall under their area of responsibility um we'll ask if if it works to hold your questions until the end kind of write them down the pages are numbered um just if there's a chance we might offer the answer on a later slide that'll help us get through it and then after that we're happy to engage a conversation with you miss Jes thank you Dr rumpus and as Ken mentioned I'm going to be as brief as possible just to make sure we allow that time to get your feedback and and input um so these are the topics we're going to cover tonight as can mentioned process to this point the timeline for the remaining

138work we're going to talk about the summary of the data that the strategic planning team reviewed the SWAT analys is we'll highlight some of the themes they came up with um and then we'll get into Mission Vision core values and that draft one of the focus areas and kpis for each pillar and you have as Ken mentioned a hard copy of both the slides and then a draft of the document kind of in a a pretty format if you will so we'll go ahead and head in first with the planning process and timeline um you may recall that we started this work you all started this work actually back in January with that board um workshop and uh that developed out of that where those four Focus areas we're now referring to those as pillars

139so you'll hear us use that language but really the the focus areas you identified were academics finances great employees and Safety and Security we then spent about 5 months Gathering input from stakeholders across the district parents students staff leaders and community members and during this phase we launched a series of surveys and round taes where um we again we got a lot of that input we have SE several focus group activities to get the feedback um I know a lot of our community felt survey fatigue during that period per of time because if you if you look at the timelines there there were maybe three or four surveys that went out in a period of of just a few months um we are currently nearing the end of phase three and this is where the

140strategic planning team convened and has been working on the initial draft of the plan that we are going to share with you tonight and we're going to talk more about their role in the specific work that they have done and then um pending your approval of the high level plan we would communicate widely with stakeholders in late November and December and then phase five that's really where we get into the work on the specific strategies and action steps necessary to meet our targets so let's talk about the work of the planning team um before we get into what they came up with advancing both my slide here and this one so give be a minute so in August we engaged a 21 member planning team made up of students teachers staff parents community members leaders

141and representatives from both fhaa and FEA and executive cabinet members served as advisers each member working with one of those four pillars this was the charge for the planning team and you'll see here that this group is both an oversight group really advising through this process through this phase three process and also a working group um they were tasked with reviewing hundreds of pages of data and stakeholder feedback and then using that to develop the priority areas of focus for the new plan that we'll talk about here in just a moment you can see here the series of meetings that this planning team has engaged in they met in person um first with a kickoff meeting at the end of August and had several homework assignments in between meetings to keep them busy um they

142participated in a big picture Vision activity and we'll talk a little more in detail about that in a second and then spent the bulk of the time during that August meeting reviewing data and stakeholder feedback and started work on developing a SWAT analysis specific to their assigned pillar area the group then reconvened about a month later uh to present their SWAT analysis to the full planning team and get some additional feedback uh I'll share a summary of those swats with you shortly and they spent the majority of that meeting in September drafting the priority areas of focus for their assigned pillar and also captur some initial ideas on how we might measure Our Success Through key performance indicators which we'll also share with you during that work too we encouraged them if they were getting

143into more of a tactical level like here's a great idea we should implement we captured those and we would Envision that those would be turned over with the pillar advisors and the teams that will um do that next layer of work thinking about how we accomplish these larger priorities um after that work executive cabinet spent some time finessing the language and refining the C before bringing this first draft to you tonight and so as we've mentioned we hope to capture your feedback today and bring that back to the planning team they have another meeting at the end of this month on October 30th um we'll take that feedback along with some additional feedback from groups and um prepare a draft to and bring that back um at the November 21st meeting would be our goal

144and um hopefully then move to that next layer of the work so here are that um big picture exercise I talked about one of the first exercises the planning team undertook and we asked them really three questions before we got into the nitty-gritty details uh and reviewing the data we wanted them to take a moment moment to kind of zoom out and think about how the future might look different than our current reality so um these these three prompts you see on the screen to consider what our students and employees might need in the next 5 to 10 years so things like what will students of the future need how do we need to think differently about the future of our Workforce and then if successful in five years where do we want to be

145what do we hope to accomplish and how will the district look different today than it does now not will it look different in five years than it does today and you're going to see some of those themes reflected in the final planning document when we talk about Vision uh after the zoom out it was time to drill down so each pillar area was provided a thick binder full of data to review you can see that here on the next slide um they looked at Trends related to student enrollment and demographics student Behavior class sizes Staffing teacher pay staff retention student attendance a lot of the MIP 6 data and academic proficiency um data that Dr Buckman presented last month and then we got through that and then we got lots of qualitative data so you

146remember the um phase two where we collecting lots of survey data focus groups those sorts of things they looked at that as well so here's kind of a summary um of that so starting with the Board of Education Workshop back in January we had notes from that meeting provided to them the culture climate round table that we hosted in February each of those table hosts would take notes about the conversation at the table those were provided and then the culture and climate climate survey results from March um we also conducted an initial strategic planning survey started in March closed in April so that data was provided um we did an exercise with administrators at an all administrator meeting last spring in April those notes were provided uh that strategic planning round table that we hosted

147in May again they they saw all those notes as as well and then the annual stakeholder survey that we presented just a month or two ago um that data was part of what they looked at as well the planning team then got to work on a SWAT analysis based on the data and feedback reviewed and we did stress with them like everyone on the team was really bringing you know obviously naturally bringing their own perspectives into it but we really wanted their SWAT to be based on the data and feedback so that it was really amplifying the other voices in the community each pillar um academics Finance grade employees and safety security assessed the strengths weaknesses opportunities and threats related to their specific area and they presented their swat analyses at the September planning meeting

148and I'll highlight and I'll tell you this next slide it's pretty busy um but we took those four separate swats in each area and I just kind of put everything here on one slide so it might be easier to read with that copy at your table um you might be able to read it a little better so I won't read all of this to you but a few themes to stand out if you kind of look at these individual items the quality of the academ program the breadth of the academic offerings and our amazing Educators and again that Echoes those themes we saw in that stakeholder survey feedback when we ask our community about strengths this is always one of the top things that stands out um many of our safety protocols things like our

149Security vestibules emergency drills and thread assessment processes were mentioned here some of our employee benefits were highlighted such as the sick leave Bank paid time off over winter break LEAP program new teacher onboarding and recent increases to teacher salary schedules were all mentioned as strength here we then um again they also assessed the weaknesses that they saw in the data um some of those include Staffing gaps turnover and key positions upcoming retirements aging infrastructure and capacity concerns at some schools and limited resources whether that's money time training support those were all sort of themes that came up through weaknesses and then for opportunities um we really asked them to look at external factors that could positively impact the district in the future or as is often the case when you're doing a SWAT opportunities often

150emerge as just the kind of the flip side of a weakness that we could improve so you'll see some of those um sort of opposites of what you saw in the weakness here some of these you'll notice are more at the Tactical level and could very well be included as action items in the final plan um but as I think Dr rumpus alluded to there are many opportunities for school districts and um those like us that are committed to continuous Improvement we know we can't do everything and do it well so again want to just clarify that not all of these things will show up as things that we would pursue but you'll see here that some of the themes reflected in the data for opportunities include competitive wages and benefits to attract and retain

151quality staff intentional legislative advocacy at the state level increased collaboration with other school districts and an opportunity to increase Community Partnerships and alumni involvement and then work around culture and climate things like anti-bullying efforts equipping students with soft skills uh ensuring welcoming learning and um working environments and then finally threats um again these are external factors that we need to be aware of that could impact our progress so things themes that emerged here would be funding issues that might be tied to legislation or things that out are out of our Direct Control teacher shortages we know that there are fewer um candidates entering the profession Community perceptions of public schools false narratives and influence of politics and education increase in school violence threats and data breaches and so it's important to note that each activity

152that was taken on by the strategic planning team during this focused unit of work was intentionally designed to build on the next and to really Force us to look at the data and stakeholder feedback and again not just the opinions and perspectives of the individuals in the room the swad analysis for each pillar and form the priorities that you'll see reflected in the plan we'll be presenting tonight and that kind of turns our attention to the other handout that you have with you kind of this designed um version and you're welcome to continue looking at the screen or if would like to look at that document we'll walk through these different components um I think again as a reminder this early version of the plan does not include those specific tactics or the how but

153it's really a statement of priorities to guide our work and then that additional work um around the how would come later after your uh input and approval so first up let's look at Mission Vision and value so the mission here um as you heard someone at the podium read today this let me get on the right slide here for you um this is not changed at all so this is our current Mission empowering students to be lifelong Learners prepared for the future we did ask in that strategic planning survey how the community felt about that was that still relevant and it something like 85% said yes like it's good leave it alone so that would be our recommendation as this we would leave the mission in place um the vision you recall that big picture

154Zoom exercise that we had the strategic planning team undertake so a lot of these statements you see here stem from those conversations so um by the year 2030 the Francis House school district will be regarded as one of the top 5% High performing districts in the state we would be the employer of choice for talented Educators leaders and staff we would be fiscally sound with a track record of smart long-term planning we would be known for graduating well-rounded students who are equipped with the skills and experiences they need to be successful in the world we would be celebrated for the work we've done on culture morale and ensuring all members of our community feel sa safe and welcome and finally we would be trusted by families and the community to make good decisions and to

155do what's best for students so that really is intended to capture where we would like to be um when we're standing or sitting in this room maybe 5 years from now we would like to be able to say look at the progress we've made this is who the Francis House school district is now um the other component of this we um developed some new values for consideration you may recall that our current values are um there's really eight sort of bulleted words if you will some of them have multiple words so really 14 different characteristics make up our current values I think were they were developed during the last strategic planning process um we had some feedback from the strategic planning survey and others that indicated there were really just too many words to remember

156and they didn't have a lot of meaning behind them they were they were great words but um that maybe we could do something a little different so what you see here is our attempt to capture some of those behaviors attributes and actions that we hope to see reflected in all members of the Francis H Community um so we pursue growth in learning we strive to be a little better and a little brighter every day effort and perseverance lead to Excellence for all we focus on what matters people relationships and strategic priorities deserve our attention every day we spend time and money wisely I'm strong stewardship requires thank you try to read through that someone's had requires long-term planning Smart Systems and efficient actions we are kind and safe we act with integrity and and are

157accountable for the things we say choices we make words and actions matter and we embody one how the power of our community shines when we find Common Ground lend a helping hand and work together for a common purpose so we know that simply defining core values isn't enough right it's really about how we live them as an organization so um if this is something we move forward with there would be intentional efforts to really incorporate these things into our culture and our practices and encourage students staff and community members to really Embrace and live these core values now moving into our Focus areas uh we asked that planning team to take their SWAT analysis and consider all the data and feedback they've reviewed and use that knowledge to draft those priority areas of focus for

158the district over the next 5 years we instructed them as you've heard before tonight to keep these fairly Broad in nature and avoid drilling down to that super tactical level at this stage so again you won't see those specific action steps in this particular draft um we also ask the teams to develop an initial list of kpis to measure our success and so um when we get to the draft he minut there are blanks in many areas because we want to get your input on what those specific targets might look like but we've given some thought to um what those areas we might measure could be and and where there was an obvious um um Target to put in place you'll see it but that will we'll kind of get into why there are blanks

159and others and so with that I'm going to actually turn it over to each of the pillar advisers to um talk through their focus areas in kpis and I think Dr Buckman is up first who um advised the teaching and learning pillar group all right so you can see on the document that our overall goal was to rank in the top 5% of all public K12 school districts in the state by 2030 and so when we thought about how we would get there the group really landed on three big buckets of work um you can see the first bucket addresses overall student achievement through instructional practice aligned curriculum with resources and then the skills that prepare our student students for life when we think about what the I think J referred to it as the

160tactics or the actions that would fall into those buckets um the group had a lot of conversation and so we see this work looking like uh a focus on our student groups so those are the students that are identified by Desi as our students with IEPs direct certification Hispanic black are part of our ESO program those five student groups we often talk about we know that some of the students in those State identified groups they're further from our Target and we want to make sure that we're doing all we can to ensure that they are successful the group spent a lot of time talking about that we spent a lot of time talking about our curriculum updates vertical alignment making sure that our assessments are updated aligned with curriculum standards State assessment and then making

161sure that all of our courses have updated resources to support those curriculum documents um we also talked a lot about uh just soft skills and so when you think of that Workforce Readiness report and what our employers tell us that kids need to have those critical thinking class oration um solid communication writing verbal skills that was kind of what we talked about with soft skills and then we also talked about some of those executive functioning study skills where are we teaching kids uh time management taking notes things like that uh we spent some time talking about just the implementation of an instructional model and and what goes into an instructional model the components of that and then uh the team also talked a lot about consistency in grading practices and Reporting systems across content areas

162and AC across buildings we see that as being some of the work in this bucket and then in the surveys there was a a lot of conversation around just technology integration what does digital citizenship like look like how are we um supporting learning and preparing our kids to be successful in a digital world and then finally just implementing that literacy plan that's required by Senate Bill 681 the second bucket it really focuses on in supporting our students to make sure that they're receiving that targeted instruction that addresses the needs of each learner and so when we think about what the work in that bucket would look like it would be that comprehensive MTS uh multi multi-tiered system of support mtss model uh for academics it would look at um increasing student engagement so making sure

163in every classroom all of our kids are highly engaged in what's happening not just physically but cognitively and then more of integration of those soft skills those life Readiness study skills and then evaluating our Alternative Learning programs so thinking about our students in the esol program and the gifted program and the special education program um examining each of those programs and deciding if there's any next steps that are needed and then we wrapped up with a third bucket which focused on our College and Career Readiness so ensuring our students have access to programs personalized planning and then opportunities for those real world experiences and when we thought through what the work in that area might look like we envisioned um engaging students and families in that College and Career planning so how are we incorporating

164families into that planning process there was a lot of conversation about just rethinking how we advise students from middle school all through high school with that four-year plan and course selection and their extra activities and the programs we have and how do you know which ones might be a good fit for you we talked a lot about expanding our College and Career programming so the um Pathways and job opportunities that we have now in 2030 wanting more more opportunities different opportunities additional opportunities for our students and then with that came a lot of discussion around seeing that as an opportunity opportunity to increase Community involvement in some of those programs and opportunities how are we partnering with our local employers and then finally just ensuring that we have strongly integrated those Workforce Readiness report skills

165that our local employers tell us so we often think that our kids are 100% ready for what comes after high school and our local employers tell us that's a little false uh they want to see that our kids are able to think critically collaborate work with others and then those verbal and written skills as they apply to the workplace and so then um we had some conversation about how would we measure that what would that look like um oh thanks there's two different ones um and so we identified some kpis that we would likely track when we thought through what the data might look like and you'll see some of those expected data points the state assessment data some reading proficiency data at several different grade levels we also want to make sure that we're

166watching our students who are in an intervention to make sure that they're showing growth as they participate in that intervention we would look at our students who are on track to graduate credit- wise at the end of 9th grade that's very telling for us and then as part of the work uh the Strategic plan work we develop a portrait of a graduate so what is it that we want to what would a successful graduate look like and then we would take a look and monitor the percentage of students who are hitting a percentage of those portrait of a graduate indicators um and then finally we would develop a survey of sorts that students would take that would provide us with some information about how well we supported that uh College and Career planning process so

167their course selection their extracurricular the college planning the um program participation that they had throughout their fouryear career all right pillar two people and the workforce um it is our goal by 2030 that we will be the destination district and the employer of choice in our region um attracting and retaining and planning for strong leaders strong teachers to support the learning of our students is what's most important so we identified three Focus areas in order to do that first is workforce planning it is really taking that time to consider what positions what functions do we need in this District to assure that we have appropriate levels of Staffing so that we're meeting all of the needs of students um and all of the critical functions of our district to function as a great organization so

168in this Focus area we would be looking at things like having consistent Staffing we have a history in Francis how where we have made Staffing reductions added Staffing made Staffing reductions um and so if we can really focus that time and really plan for consistent saving levels that gives all of our employees that sense of security that they're going to be here for the long term so we'll look at things like class sizes in all areas and in all programs we'll look at the different types of positions that we have to support our employees um one of the examples was um a cyber security team that could focus on some of that work or just different areas challenge acquisition do we have focus a focus area for that work um so really looking at that

169and finding out what are those strategic levels and making sure we have the appropriate leadership in all areas to support the needs of our staff and our families and our students and then as we work through that making sure that our employees have good work life balance and that they're not stressed as they're working through all of the things that are required within their position when we look at staff recruitment it really is all things to attract highly qualified staff to support our students and that might look like our employer brand and really looking at the total rewards package that we offer to all of our employees so of course having a competitive salary um affordable benefits talking about our leave policies whether that's FMLA or short-term disability looking at how uh we can possibly

170get those steps on our salary schedule to equal years of experience because that's important in the field of Education talking about attendance incentives experience on the salary schedule so that we can attract more experienced Educators to Francis how would all be some ways that we could attract quality staff and bring great people to Francis H and then finally our third Focus area was all about motivating and retaining staff um so that they continue to grow and that they can then turn their growth into growth for our students and so we talked a lot about what that would look like and um some of the options or thoughts that came into that was just civility in the workplace being kind to one another making sure people feel safe to come to work feeling comfortable about doing

171the work um timely and relevant professional development around some of the um areas of of focus um whether that's onboarding employees or whether that's just throughout their career making sure it's timely we have started a great how grown Educators program um but looking at maybe expanding that to some other areas how are we looking at opportunities for advancement for our employees are there some attendance incentives are other recognition programs that we can improve on how do we support our teachers when they go through uh student trauma or have trauma within their day and then also just looking at that timely and relevant coaching and mentoring that we're providing because if we can pour into our educators and into our staff um that keeps them feeling valued and appreciated and wanted to stay here in Francis

172hell and then they have the opportunity to pour into our students um in those three areas um some ways that we can measure our success if those are the focus areas and and action steps that we follow um we'll look at at those Staffing levels year toe and make sure that they're consistent in providing that Assurance to our staff that uh they can they can feel rested assured that they have a position here in Francis hell we'll set a standard for class size we've moved that um in the past from looking closer to the minimum of the desie standard to more of the midpoint to just above the midpoint and so where do we want to land as a district and what do those administrator ratios need to look like to really Provide support to

173our teachers we'll think about looking at the percentage of Staff that's satisfied with their employment so maybe looking at a stay survey not so much the exit survey but how do you feel while you're still here um and then looking the percentage of teachers that we're attracting that are fully certified um so over the course of years in order to fill our positions we've had to look at temporary certificates provisional certificates in order to be sure that we have um Educators for our positions and so what are we doing to really attract those fully certified teachers um and then when we're making those job offers are folks excited and yelling and screaming that's really the best part of my job when I'm calling and offering them a position in Francis hall or are more and

174more of them saying can I can I get back with you can and I wait a few days those sorts of things so we'll monitor how how many the First Choice job applicants accept those offers uh we also want to look at how many teachers are leaving Francis how um to go to other uh public schools in the area or maybe they're leaving the profession as a whole because it's it's not doable or they're so stressed or full of anxiety and so we want to monitor that and then also looking at a focus of our teacher attendance just like we do with our students because if our teachers are the most critic iCal person in the classroom every single day and if we can motivate and encourage them to be at work every day we

175know that's going to have an impact on our student performance okay thank you very much okay so while this is an equal pillar I look at it much like it is a very strong support pillar to do all the other things that are needed for our students and our staff uh within the district and so under finance and operations we have identified three primary areas and um this is to help us be fiscally sound and and an efficient organization um you know that this is something that we talk about every single month and so uh ensuring that we have the appropriate Financial trajectory as we identify the needs and reassessed allocations of those resources so uh the first one being resource allocation and we all know that in public education we don't have a lot

176of Revenue growth opportunities you can capitalize on grants but those usually come with more expenditures and so you have to be very strategic and thoughtful about the process you might do that otherwise we're receiving Revenue uh based on particular formulas and allocations either be County or uh state or federal and so allocating those resources in a financially sustainable needs-based manner to support education of all students by maximizing the revenue aligning expenditures to meet our priorities and controlling costs and so um often times I referenced this as a weed the garden section where we maybe did something at some point in the past that was really great for kids uh but as we identify New Opportunities through other processes then maybe we need to reallocate those resources and no longer provide a particular option for students

177and so that would be that aligning expenditures uh to meet priorities and controlling costs um under process Improvement we have utilized cross functional stakeholder teams to collaborate research and Implement best practices for process Improvement and operational efficiency in all areas of the district so this would not be limited to just finance and those operational areas that report through uh my section but it would also include it could involve instructional uh leaders and departments and areas that they're doing things you know maybe we form a stakeholder team to really dig in deeply to attendance and what strategy might we deploy uh through all those processes and and observations in terms of improving that which would ultimately um improve our instruction for kids because they're here but also it would generate Revenue in the state of Missouri

178because we are paid from attendance so um most under process Improvement again uh identifying Champions that would lead the work and U being very intentional and approaching uh how we're looking at our daily business then under service and compliance we obviously always have uh a variety of audits uh Dr rumpus just referenced an inspection that occurred today and we had a great or it was it was this week maybe it was today uh in the transportation area regarding our our bus fleet um meeting that high standard and just working uh very diligently to ensure that we're not only are we providing great service to our stakeholders whether they be internal or external but also making sure that we are compliant with all of those uh parties that would be interested in what we're doing so

179we have a financial audit every year we do have uh bus inspections every year and sometimes surprise bus inspections and there are a variety of other ways that we are monitored through Federal uh compliance whether special education or other things like that so uh under the um the kpis so the team I should reference that the team basically uh we talked a lot about all of these sections and and really these three categories resonated for everyone uh that was participating so we had a great dialogue we we kind of went down rabbit holes a few times and maybe talked a a little bit about uh security or uh academics even it was an interesting uh participation for me um the key performance indicators that uh We've identified at this point in time but we are

180uh looking forward to your um feedback for us we know that we have a um a board policy that indicates that we'll maintain a 15% or higher fund balance percentage and part of the reason that it's 15% is because that is the point where we are covering our payroll until we receive our our uh local Revenue uh more in the months of January and February maintaining a bond rating of double A or greater is always a good thing and that means that we're paying our bills on a timely basis it means that uh there are uh individuals and entities that would be interested in investing in our district by buying bonds if should there be a bond issue and um certainly uh the zero audit findings um no one ever wants to have audit findings

181but uh under that Financial audit perspective sometimes s there can be something that's noted and uh we would strive to ensure that that was maintained uh we have an item here operating expenditures within uh x% of the revised budget so identifying what would that look like and maybe tease that out in a different way x% of future Bond projects make budget in Timeline would be a goal that we would aspire to achieve x% agree the district spends taxpayer funds effectively and so that would come through that uh stakeholder service that Jen joles has communicated recently uh with you about uh I did include in here facility master plan completed by November 2025 of course that date could be uh at the pleasure of the board or maybe there would be other discussion about whether that

182would happen anytime soon but we recognize that we do need to reset in that regard to inform you and the public of the real needs in the district so that we can be strategic as we um move forward in planning all the years out uh excuse me a percentage of benchmarks met for identified standards and so that could be very fluid again we had a number of conversations on on those uh specific areas and that could include processing work orders in a timely fashion or eliminating work orders because we are uh proactively taking care of the needs out in the buildings and that could be technology that can be uh through the maintenance of our HVAC systems and filter Replacements a variety of topics so and then uh the last one noted is a percent

183of equipment replaced within industry standards so again we've got to not only take care of our building assets as we serve our students but also ensure that we're providing the appropriate equipment to meet their needs as well and that also includes then not only within the classroom but our we are running a business here uh and so we do need vehicles and we do need buses and and a a great variety of equipment and so that would wrap that up for finance and operations you don't want this I know what to say read oh oh I'll do it when you that that would be great I'm so good at this all right well that uh brings us to our fourth and final pillar uh to discuss and that's in the area of Safety and Security

184with a goal that all students and staff will be safe and welcome at school and work and I just Echo Miss embry's sentiments uh regarding her pillar uh and the importance of this pillar when it comes to academic success and retention and recruitment of teachers uh if we don't have a safe and secure environment um we don't achieve those other things as well and so this pillar uh we're going to focus on three major areas uh the first one being culture climate and communication and the idea in this pillar uh would be that we work uh that the work is focused on students and their connections uh to the Francis House School District community that could be within their building but also within the district at large that staff and students have the supports that

185they need to be successful and connected uh that also helps uh in that recruitment retention that we seek continuous feedback from all the stakeholders throughout our community our community members our uh the individuals that are connected to us and and help us in in ways not only financially but with ideas about uh improvements on a daily basis and then finally under this Focus area uh that we have positive supports in place to support both students and faculty the next Focus area is kind of in uh a focus on phys physical security and we've done a lot of that work through some of the props funds uh but we know that uh there's always things that we can do to uh create a better environment and so this work will focus in the area of looking

186at our buildings and processes uh to provide safety for all students and staff and so uh that would be things like a continuous monitoring of the safety protocols that we are instituting in our buildings uh that we would be completing safety Audits and implementations of the recommendations that come from those audits uh a continuous review of security Trends and implementation of those uh recommendations and then finally that we would continue ongoing work with our local law enforcement experts one of the things that we know about Safety and Security is it should always change it should always be updated based upon uh Trends or things that have happened and we should learn from the experiences across uh our country and across the world to be honest and then uh Focus area three uh also data privacy

187and protection and this work will focus in the areas to include all aspects of student and staff data privacy uh I think we understand the importance of that in Francis how uh that work might look like training for all staff and students on responsible technology use it might look like the implementation of EX effective strategies to protect uh all district data both student and uh employee data and then it would be continuous monitoring of District systems using industry best practice standards uh and implementing those in the district some of the key performance indicators that we talked about within our group uh things that might measure success of Safety and Security would be the percent of students that feel safe at school the percent of our staff that feel safe at work on a daily basis

188uh a percent of reduction in the number of disciplinary referrals um possibly focusing on those top three areas that we see in the District um a percent of high school students that are involved in one or more activities at our high school that could even pertain to elementary and middle school if that became one of the focus areas of our kpi uh a percent pass rate on physical Building Safety audits we should be continuing to monitor our buildings and and make sure we're providing safety at the highest level uh the measuring the percent of fidelity and executing our emergency drills percent of uh people that feel that they are connected engaged in Francis H so getting some feedback from students staff and community members um and then identifying vulnerabilities in our cyber security scans and

189fishing attempts on an ongoing basis and then finally the percent rate um that the efforts that the community gives us an A or B uh on the stakeholder Community survey that we Implement on an ongoing basis and those are some suggested kpis um that our team uh developed to share with the board this evening at this time I'll turn it back over to uh to uh Dr rumpus or jeles yeah so board um we want to provide the next uh period of time really to answer questions you might have based on the information that we shared this evening um thoughts on the um the specific goal focus areas under each of the four pillars and then there are specific questions around the kpis that we are looking at um you know a piece of feedback

190as M Joel shared that we heard over and over again was that um while the last strategic plan um definitely was Innovative there was a lot of great work in there it was a significant plan it was a lot of new um and again we don't have the resources either human or fiscal to do all of the things um even if we would like to and so tried to narrow our Focus um to these four areas and um we will that will be a continued theme that you will hear as we move forward when we talk about strategies and action steps again that everything we're doing isn't moving us toward achieving these four areas and the goals that we have within them so um we would be happy to answer questions you might have or

191at least take the feedback and work on getting it for you I got uh one for Carol F know my favorite zero audit findings is that attained able well realistic I should say yeah and and uh it it can absolutely be oh I'm sorry thank you um yes I my answer to you is yes it is attainable uh now that's with everything you know we will strive to do our very best and um deliver in all aspects that we would be monitored will there potentially be some things occur sometimes yes but I think it's that would always always be our Focus we wouldn't want to set the bar Lower his no it's always something to strive for but at the same time um being having been involved in audits both at the hospital level and

192at in in industry and carporate world I I can only think of maybe in all my years of experience maybe one or none that that ever happen so I'm just I I understand reaching higher than than your comfort able with okay yes I get it the other thing that I was going to mention to you Carol my belief is that in finance and operations if a person leaves for whatever reason you need that continuity it's not always nobody can just walk into your job can't do it so I would just add maybe a key performance indicator that that continuity occurs I don't know how you would word that but I'm just saying so that nothing is lost in the process more on the system process level yeah succession [Music] planning and you know I will

193say that and I'm sure my colleagues struggled with it too we could have a laundry list of all the all the things that we're really measuring and looking at or all the um processes that we're implementing to to guard against that excuse me uh and so that's that's of interest to me to you know do some things need to come off of the actual published list it doesn't mean that we wouldn't continue to monitor things be speaking of list how's your list it's a slow turn it's a slow just I would just clarify in case it wasn't clear you know we're undergoing the state audit but that's not what you're talking about you're about our yearly annual audits right our our routine audits we hope to only have one of those funny other questions C

194board I have a question um on a vision regarded as one of the top 5% higher high performing districts in state um what number is that that we're aiming for because it's we top 10 in the state wondering uh what the aspiration is on that number uh top 5% High performing District in the state I think those are two different systems that we're talking about so this would be when we look APR um I believe right now we're around 6 to 7% um but those districts that we would have to pass to be in the top 5% um that would be a great accomplishment for us to to get there so what is the metric it's a wide range of items so it's uh when we do the academic update all of those different categories

195we talk about it's all of those different categories combined I think the APR that's APR is the so this is I appreciate that yeah so primary student achievement overall subgroup achievement looking at our attendance and college career Readiness indicators overall student attendance in the district um and then there's also process standard so are we doing our annual survey are we submitting reports on time are we meeting the some of the fiscal thresholds um the difference while again I I celebrate because we all like being ranked in the good news um the niche um US News and those there's a lot of subjectivity and there's other factors that go into that that um are out of our control as well um and I would like to believe that a lot of the factors under MIP um

196and APR we do have within our control thank you staying on that topic of you know one really the first first pillar or check mark in our vision regard regarded as one of the top 5% High performing districts in the state um maybe a technicality but I look at this and I think yes I think we're all thinking the same thing we want to want to grow we want you know our APR scores to improve but um the other districts slip we magically become in the top 5% because the other districts are doing awful I wonder if there's just a way to better Define that that we want to improve we don't just want to be in the 5% but we want to see real growth [Music] here as well [Music] and I realize we're

197not getting into all the weeds but when it comes to the uh the indicators uh the the key performance indicators uh having some place where we can identify parent involvement um seems to be one of the biggest indicators for students academic success so whatever that looks like how do we measure it I don't know what that answer is right now but having some way where we are tracking parent involvement um I think would be a lead measure and student academic achievement would be a lag measure to fall find it I I think I would agree with that I I think that if if you if you probed all of the districts throughout the country and you see the districts that have a higher percentage of Parental involvement those districts are typically performing better and to

198track that to see where we would fall in there and then maybe use that as a as a guide to see all right well last year we were here with parental involvement this year we're here and we're doing better or this year we're lower and we're doing worse that could be a pretty clear indicator as to how to how to project these things going forward if we know that the parents aren't aren't involved they're not paying attention they they you know they're they're not really engaged in their in their kids education at all that I think is a is is a a Big Driver of the lack of success in the student for sure we we all do all we can to make sure that they're successful when they're here with us but at home

199it's you know I know when my daughter gets home it's you know we're not doing TV until the homework is done and if I wasn't engaged it's the homework's not done she gets to the to the classroom the next day so that's that's a really good point yeah I would just offer to both of you I think that's a yes and because I think um yes it's absolutely an indicator and parental involvement is important um it's also a question of what parental involvement means to different families um I'll be very honest that Ken rumus his dad is probably 50% on conferences in the last two years and I've never been to a PTO meeting so I might not check those boxes um but it's because of the work that I'm doing um and so I

200just yes and is it also about what opportunities we're offering and how we're reaching out to parents to engage them understanding that some may never get to a school event but might be reading this and just um yeah so I just think we would need to give some thought to how we might measure that or what that might look like and I got a question for Mr Delaney um you have the physical security Safety and Security part of this uh uh pillar um jayen and I have kind of dug into this and we all have our our our things with Safety and Security but um as far as the the actual phys physical security of the buildings is concerned um how how is the Staffing for that is is that are we there do we

201have everybody that we need is that something that you guys are are constantly constantly looking at I'm sure you are I hope um but um there have been times when we've talked to certain people and they um uh they've indicated man we well we could use some more help we could use help in this building or that building so is that something that you guys are continually looking at as well yeah I would I would just say that part of our sta you know annual Staffing process looks at what building needs are um that that's a piece to it uh but I would also say that like the safety audit that we're we're about to have engaging next week I I think we are depending upon experts in in that area in that field to

202tell us where they see opportunities for growth for us um in addition I think it's pertinent that we're working with local law enforcement uh to help guide us in some of what they see as day-to-day um maybe issues concerns thoughts ideas uh so I would say that and also what is what works for today may have to change next year or two years and I think that's one of the things that uh throughout that pillar uh I tried to convey that you're never done with Safety and Security it's always evolving you have to change you have to adapt and we're going to adapt often change by depending upon experts in the field um sometimes it's going to be uh through what Miss EMB is engaging us with bringing in this uh outside kind of group

203to take a look but it's also just engaging with the daily people that are in our community our Law Enforcement Officers those experts that uh are are connected to our buildings and so um I hope that kind of gives you an answer that yes we reflect on Staffing and those needs all the time uh but I think we also have to engage with the the people that are the experts in that field which are which are is not Mark laning right yeah it's one of the things that I go back to is is you know I just think about you know maybe Mr greez now and how you know just asking him reaching out to him saying hey are you good are you overstaffed are you understaffed is is the Outlook of the safety of

204the district um um where it needs to be in your eyes as well do you need more people that's that's one of my main concerns every day when I drop off my my kids I I just I I I think about that exact thing and and is this building secure is it and they are they absolutely are for sure with with some of the the vestes and things like that that we put in um but that's not it doesn't stop at the veses it goes into someone like Jason G hour and his staff and making sure that they are staffed um enough to be able to cover the entire District so that's that's good that you guys are looking at that too thank you and I to clarify though I don't there be a Mison

205conception that there is no staff there is a safety manager in the district there are leaders over it um and we are very fortunate through our relationships with um local law enforcement agencies to have full-time SRO in many of our buildings but we do not have that in all and I know that's been a it's an ongoing concern that comes up and it was a point of contention in our recent newsletter that went out that stated that and it wasn't intentionally misleading um we do have several elementaries and we don't broadcast that because again Safety and Security but we do not have fulltime SRO at every single building um we do not have one in this building and so um we have been so fortunate when St Charles County you know offered up with their

206um air funds art funds um I know I don't know how to say wrong but um to provide them to us if you had asked us you know three to five years ago would we have made the investment SOS at the elementaries at that time it would have been a philosophical discussion I don't know if we would have definitely said yes um now having them in our building seeing the Rel reltionship they've developed what that does for the community if that's a commitment and we um want to commit to having that in every all 23 sites or what does that look like um at some point the county could say we can no longer afford to fund those and that would be a significant impact um but again it's back to if that's the commitment

207and that's where we want to land with Staffing and we do hope that we get a lot of that feedback from Professionals in the field um through this analysis analysis that we're having done over the next couple of weeks right I wanted to call out what I think is just a really wise uh picture of financial management on the very front page when talks about our vision a fiscally sound with a track record of smart long-term planning U I think in our meeting today we identified how HVAC one um the the first collection of hvacs that are being repaired or replaced uh will produce so much savings each year and I think that serves as a great model for what this looks like every area right is look to see you know what are the

208areas whether it's HVAC or something else that we know or near their in of use right and just being able to be thinking ahead of time um like this says I think is something that can provide a lot of savings that we get a chance to use that elsewhere so um again a lot of the language here is just very well done and so um um for everybody Jennifer for you and everybody else involved I really uh thank you for presenting this in a way that's digestible um and yet there certain ter terms are especially strong and for me this language of financial management that has a track Rec track record of smart long-term planning um is an easy picture to have we've all done that in our in our own homes in our own

209budgets when we plan four years ahead 5 years ahead and I'm just really thankful to see that there in the way that it is I just I know it's a draft of course but a couple of the the key performance indicators I I would just recommend focusing on something specifically measurable and controllable so some of these I think kind of for instance percent of students in intervention will show growth does that incentivize a school tracking intervention programs or is it disincentivize them so that's what I mean is if you if we're focusing does it really matter if we have more students this month this year on an Intervention Program maybe it's a reflection of that's what's needed or some changes needed I I don't know that that's necessarily a good or bad thing but like

210focusing on something be controled the the proficient Advanced those are a reflection I think of is the curriculum working as the teaching methods work is everything working I I think that's more measurable than really an Intervention Program because sometimes they're needed I don't think it's a reflection on the kids or the teachers it's just a point in time and same thing would be of for instance percent reduction in the number of disciplined referrals maybe this year I have more bad apples in the classroom so I have more referrals or something I I don't think you want to disincentivize somebody referring what is needed um so I I you kind of saying how do you clarify that so it's not yeah I mean any referrals but we just chose not to do it goal looks or

211say some of these are does it really mean anything what does it mean are you measuring something else that really impacts that um well I've seen that as a real negative in a school when they are striving to have less dis published so they let things go and I've seen that year after year in many schools I've taught it and I would think that would lead to frustration so I don't want no leg incentivize not referring or not counting a discipline issue yeah Ron I would say it's a good point and I we can continue to look at that um it's interesting because I often say you know we hear from teachers that well they're not in we're having this discussion Monday night right but um we don't suspend kids we don't do this and

212that because we're told our numbers are too high and I asked people who told you that because at least in the four years I've been in this District we have never told somebody your numbers are too high now if we're looking at the system and we see areas where the numbers are high and we need to question do we have the right systems in place are we training our staff well do we have the right expectations of our students and based on that we would expect the numbers to be responsive to that yes but I you know I also say to people you look at our discipline referral data the last couple years it's going up so it's nobody's saying don't do it but your point is also correct sometimes in these you can have

213great systems and the people and the students and it's just the nature of the work that that the numbers don't necessarily come down in that way when you're trying to measure them that way so I would I would just say you could fine-tune some of these maybe you don't need fewer than x% of teachers resigned to leave the profession well if you take care of the if the staff is satisfied a percent of the teachers are hired and fully certified if you take care of the critical items that it takes care of itself so I I would just drill down on some of these so for instance if if we increase the percent of students achieving proficient Advanced if you help the student group if we improve that if you improve the the reading grade

214levels you don't necessarily need to track graduation it's going to improve so you you help the students early on help them with a Proficiency in advance you're going to increase your graduation but I'm just that just may be a little bit we're GNA add on and we're thinking through like there's a still a lot of metrics thinking through like what what are the primary ones which ones are the ones that are really going to do we think are really going to move the needle and still continuing the narrow down and say going back to like Focus like what are those focused ones that we really want to push and really because we also have to think about do we have the Staffing that drive each one of these metrics theoretically should have a staff member

215driving that metric and do we have enough staff members that have the time to Drive these individual metrics some areas we may like maybe in academics we have some more people than we have an HR that can drive so we kind of got to pick and choose and say the Staffing level right for for those goals I would also say like what's the one or two metrics kind of that we would grade the entire District on is that the being the top 5% and then everything else is kind of I don't want to say subservient but all the other goals kind of need to also align like HR like everything else needs to align to that goal as well or else they need competing pillars of different goals um I was wondering about um critical

216thinking skills is that did I miss that in here or do skills refer to that just the word skills student achievement yep you're in the right spot when we talk about the skills we talked about like those soft skills and those Workforce Readiness skills and critical thinking collaboration that all falls in that bucket so well that be written out here it it won't necess our plan at the moment the draft doesn't necessarily have it written out in the goals that you see where we see it coming is the that next layer that Jen talked about the tactics and the action steps that you would see it reflected in that next layer it's the work that will help us okay that's what I was wondering I I saw a segment on TV about Finland their education

217system and it's consistently at the top in the world and um they credit that to starting in preschool where the I don't know if you saw this where the students um they they get information like books or online they they're online a lot uh trying to discern fact from fiction and they credit that with you know critical thinking skills finding the truth at their high achievement levels because of the the thinking skills that they're using to find the truth so you know they they look at all these different things come they give them all these different scenarios coming from different places and they have to figure out what's the truth and that and that when I was looking at what will students of the future need they need to be able to find the truth

218because we are bombarded by lies consistently and constantly and I think I think we need to mention that in here somewhere that we teach students how to find the truth because the future is all about that I think but that's my opinion put name one more thing thank you Carol um on the key performance indicators for teaching and learning uh I think it's a smart idea to identify that's percentage of students reading on grade level by the end of the third grade fifth grade eighth grade and uh it's not just that it's third grade fifth grade eighth grade but it's good to make that specific specific um like the tops uh key performance indicator percent of students achieving at proficient Advanced levels that could include just high school or just Middle School just Elementary you

219might miss like a weakness but being able to be specific on where you're measuring will be able to catch that there isn't a weakness in any of our levels whether it's elementary middle or High School level and um so uh again we're you'll be able to get to all the words and all the verbage that uh cleaner more focused but I think it's really helpful to be specific that's not just all students are proficient or percentage of all students but to track it at different levels allow us to see different problems different alarm bells that might go off thank you along that same point um as you track cohorts there's you know you have a particularly good third grade cohort that says say 65% at reading what are they doing the next year are they

220growing do they shrink to me that seems you're talking about the same students we're not talking about dist group overall there was a a point made earlier about you know what does a successful graduate look like well before I ever was involved in the school district the school board one of the quips that you know that was always I would always read is that you know high school diploma says that we're giving you a piece of paper that says you can read right do math and know the science at a 12th grade level and uh I don't that's the to me that's the bare minimum we're giving this piece of paper that's that tells the workforce that tells the world this graduate can read at 12th grade level and I think that's uh you know

221critical thinking I I agree if you can't read um you you you can't read the facts you can't you know that's the everybody in this room knows the reading yeah but every student doesn't have the ability to do that every student in a public school doesn't have the ability to read at 12th grade level when they graduate they just don't have that fair point I I think a lot more than 60 some off other comments with all that being said I appreciate all the into doing this stuff so for me to come in and just kind of nitpick is unfair but just to consider thank you for this well yeah if that's all we have then good on you guys yeah you're just nitpicking to see it synthesized to four pages seems like oh what

222is this and you know recognizing going back again you know the board established these four key areas last January um you know there were five different opportunities for our public our patrons our parents um students to provide input into the process and hundreds and hundreds of people did um and so it said when we brought together that Planning Group you know there were binders of information and you know yes a lot of it that was qualitative and then we have the achievement data on the quantitative side of pulling that together um so I just appreciate this team doing that the people that came together to help with the planning piece and again everybody Who provided input um at the end of the day this is our District's strategic plan it's not Ken's plan it's not

223you know a pillar leaders plan um to Jane's point that um the structures and processes that live within this in our build should um Outlast all of us and ensure that we're doing great things for our students and our community so you know um when President bertran brought this last January and talked about you know he shared I'd say a different way of thinking about the strategic planning process than we had previously with focusing on these areas um and then really understanding that the next step is building out um the five years worth of plan so we do um a yearly comprehensive School Improvement plan at the district level schools have individual plans um that again should be much tighter um and align directly to these areas so um if we're doing something that doesn't

224fall directly into helping one of these areas and move the needle to the point that was said um should we be doing it and um I think that becomes a good guidepost for us when it comes to resources and the limited time and energy um that we have so um we look forward um Jen Mr shared that we will pull together our group um cabinet level over the next couple of weeks we meet it one more time with the Planning Group at the end of October with with the hope of for the plan to bring um this level version in a more finalized format to you to approve in November um because you know we're really already beginning to talk about 2526 Staffing that leads right into the 2526 budget and at the end of

225the day um both of those should be directly aligned to this as well and so that's the next step of the work but if if there's additional input that you think of in the next really few days we would like that as soon as possible because we are trying to move forward with this pretty quickly anything else board all right well thank you everybody we will be going back into close session we like to have fun like that um I appreciate everybody coming out and joining us tonight I've never and they I'm regurg information doesn't make me smart minutes don't touch Denny don't break it down yes that would be amazing what time are we there tomorrow morning