001we've been we've we're we're slow tonight and we there's nothing we really could do about it but we're slow tonight. Um, if you please join us in the Pledge of Allegiance. >> I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic >> Again, I apologize about the time. I would like to thank you for being here with us this evening and whether you are at home or here in person, we appreciate your time. Um, could I get a motion now to please adopt this evening's agenda? >> I move to adopt the agenda as presented. >> Second. >> All those in favor, please raise your right hand and say I. >> I. >> All right, thank you very much. Uh, item two, the superintendent's report, Dr. Berger. >> Good evening.
002Could we like to offer congratulations to Summit Lakes Middle School volleyball coach Beth Groom on being named the Missouri High School Volleyball Coaches Association Large Class Junior High Coach of the Year. Summit Technology Academy hospitality, tourism, and recreation management students helped to plan and host the first hospitality career fair in partnership with the regional hospitality organizations connecting students with career and internship opportunities across the Kansas City metro area. Extending congratulations to Mason Elementary paraprofessional Malachi Shaw recognized as the April Learning for Life Award winner and Lee's Summit North special education teacher Nicole Muncy recognized as the May Learning for Life Award winner for their positive impact and strong relationship with students. Matt Good, Lee's Summit West High School speech and debate coach was inducted to the National Speech and Debate Association Hall of Fame, the
003organization's highest honor for coaches. So, congratulations there. Congratulations to Claire B from Lee's Summit North, Kyra H from Lee's Summit West, Cooper P from Lee's Summit West for earning national champion honors at the National ProStart Invitational Invitational in Baltimore, Maryland. Students prepared a three-course meal in 60 minutes without electricity, demonstrating exceptional skill, teamwork, and professionalism. Lee's Summit North students delivered outstanding performances at the MSHSAA State Speech and Debate Tournament and the Show-Me District National Speech and Debate Association Qualifying Tournament. At the MSHSAA Tournament, Jake Johnson and Jaylen Jensen came back state champions, plus their teammates' outstanding performances helped the team place second place overall in debate and third overall in speech. At the Show-Me Qualifiers, nine Lee's Summit North students qualified for Nationals, and the Broncos came in second overall for speech, first overall for
004debate, and for the second year in a row, Lee's Summit North was the all-around Show-Me District Sweeps Champion. More than 100 LSR7 seniors earned the Missouri Seal of Biliteracy, including five students who earned the Distinguished Seal of Biliteracy for advanced proficiency in multiple languages. LSR7 world language students from all three high schools earned multiple awards at the University of Central Missouri's World Language Film Festival for excellence in language use, storytelling, and film production. Congratulations to the Lee's Summit High School JROTC program for earning the Distinguished Unit with Merit Award, the second highest honor awarded to JROTC Unit nationally. We had 22 seniors take their next step towards becoming a future educator through the Grow Your Own program, while eight graduates from that program as first cohort will return to LSR7 as teachers in the fall,
005and that was paired nicely with our retirement event, a great evening. Congratulations to the LSR7 archery teams for an outstanding performance June. So, best of luck to those. Congratulations to Lee's Summit West sophomore Colin Chai, who earned a full ride scholarship through the US Heartland China Association to attend a youth leadership forum in China organized by the China Institute. And finally, congratulations to our 2026 graduating class. Our final graduation ceremony was last night. They were all wonderful. It's a joy to get to participate. We are so excited for our seniors' next chapters. Couple of quick updates. Nutrition Services will be providing free meals for children ages 18 and under at Meadow Lane Elementary through the district summer meal program. Free breakfast and lunch will be available on designated dates from May 28th through June 30th
006with breakfast and lunch served on site during scheduled meal times. And our first day of summer school is next Thursday, May 28th. Elementary and middle school drop-in day is that day before, May 27th, if you want to check things out. So, look for information from your summer school principal regarding your building's drop-in time. And that's the superintendent's report for this evening. >> Thank you very much. Our next presentation and recognition is our very own 25-26 student board representatives. And we're going to start with a brief update from each of you about your home schools and then we'll recognize you individually, okay? >> Good evening, guys. Thank you so much for having us today. I'm Haley Barnett and I'm from Lee's Summit West. I just graduated on Tuesday. Um so, I'm very excited about that. Um
007here's a few things that we've had going on at West over the few past 2 months. Um we had a successful prom, um which is with a theme of Fairytale City. It was a wonderful night, and everyone had fun and looked amazing in their attire. Um starting in late April, early May, and um we had an amazing exam season with AP, IB, EOCs. So, every student worked so hard and made the exams and took them. I myself sat for many of them, cuz I'm an IB diploma candidate, so. Applause to everyone, and shout out to Dr. Edwards, our new IB coordinator at West, who did an amazing job running those exams for the past month. Um our theater department has overcome a lot this past year, and they've been doing amazing. We have three Blue
008Star nominations, one for outstanding ensemble, um student uh Titan out Isabelle Folsom won outstanding costume design, and um actor Bro- Brody Smith um got a nomination for outstanding performance by a featured actor. We also have 17 Cappie nominations, and that ceremony is on Saturday. Um if anyone would like to attend, I highly suggest supporting our Titans. Um yeah, and one of those Cappie nominations happens to be for best musical. So, we're super proud of our theater department. They also have posted a wonderful performance of West West Stage Live, which is amazing and turned out really good. Um all clubs at West are doing great right now. Our with a lot of them advancing to nationals and internationals this summer. We had our robotics team went to the semi-finals um on the world championship, and placed
009165th robot in the world out of uh 3,700. Our DECA team had many people going to state this year with five students advancing to international competition. Our hosted department and club organization has five students, five Titans advancing to international competitions this summer in June in Indianapolis. I myself am one of those five, so I'm super excited for that. Our Scholar Bowl placed at district and five Titans are headed to the NAQT Nationals in Atlanta this weekend. So, we're super proud of all of our Titans and everything they've accomplished and we wish them the best at their competitions this summer. Um, sports-wise we've had a lot going on. We've had an amazing year. Just wrapped up with a bunch of banquets this recently. Um, that's actually where a few of our representatives are tonight. Um, that's
010one of the many banquets celebrating them. Our Leisimate West boys track and field were district champions, so we're super proud of them for that. And following the scene following the year we had senior send-off traditions which were so fun. I myself got to participate in all of them this year with our forever Falcon letter opening ceremony where we go back and read our eighth grade letters and meet our eighth grade teachers and just show them where how much we've overcome these past four years. So, that was really fun. We also had a very successful senior sunset where we got to watch Remember the Titans out on the football football field, which was really fun. And our amazing yearbook staff put together a beautiful yearbook which has so many pages. I don't know how they do
011it every year. They do phenomenal. And our film department put together our senior lip dub and send-off um, videos which were amazing. Definitely made a few of us cry, so that was fun. And then like I said, graduation on Tuesday we celebrated 482 students. Board members, you guys did an amazing handing out those diplomas. You guys were like a machine. You were doing great. Um and we had this year we had 13 IB diploma candidates and 19 career program candidates. And entirely we won over $9 million in scholarships and I'm super proud of my class of 2026 and all the great things that are to come from them because of the amazing education we received from the Lee's Summit Seven School District. I've loved being a board member. Thank you so much for having me.
012That's it. You guys want to go? >> Hello. My name is Jackson and I'm from Lee's Summit North. I have a little bit less, I know. I've kind of slacking off today. Um so from Lee's Summit North, um you've kind of heard some of this news already. Miss Munsey was named the Learning for Life Award winner by the district for the month of May. Um our library media center was named an exemplary library program um for the state of Missouri for the fourth time in the world and they are only one of two programs in the state to win that award. So definitely proud of our library this week. Um the LSN social studies teacher, Miss Jenny Buchanan, was named Holocaust Educator of the Year by the Midwest Center for Holocaust Education, a very prestigious
013award there. Um and then as we heard earlier, student Claire Burrows was part of the national champion culinary team at the ProStart Invitational. I did not know that they didn't have to use electricity. That's pretty That's pretty impressive. Um and then finally, our robotics team, um 1987, the Bronco Bots competed at the World Championship earlier this month um and they captained the fourth seed alliance on our divisional field with teams from across the country um and then ended up in fourth place on the division. So definitely proud of them this week. >> All right. Hello and good evening. My name is Lucy Doran and I am a junior at Lee's Summit High School, and I wanted to thank you all for giving me the chance to share some updates that's from what's going on at
014Lee's Summit. Um, I want to thank you all for being here. I know it's been a busy week with all the graduations going on, and I know that we students all appreciate you guys, and I'm now going to talk about all the athletics and activities that are going on over at Lee's Summit. So, I'm going to begin by congratulating three different sports at Lee's Summit High School that took state this year. We had football, girls flag football, and for the first time ever, we had our drum line. And we also took four kids to uh state in speech and debate this year, and our very own Maddie Pressnell placed fifth overall in poetry. And then uh Grayson Helm, he went to a national tournament um NIETOC, and he ended up placing 18th in the nation.
015So, good for him. And now, as previously mentioned, Lee's Summit High School's own JROTC uh won the distinguished unit with merit award, which is the second highest award an entire unit can ever receive. And I am now going to hand the microphone over to Sierra Kiefer to talk about graduation. >> Hi, my name's Sierra. I'm also a junior at Lee's Summit. Um, and I'm sure you all know the seniors have left and graduated. Um, we celebrated approximately 480 seniors last night. Lee's Summit had 11 IB diploma students and eight IB career-related program students. Um, these two programs, as you guys probably know, are some of the toughest and have some of the challenging courses there are. Um, moving on, over 70% of the class of 2026 is continuing their education with college or another post-secondary
016institution. Um, and lastly, to sum it up, um, an angel fund for LSR7 seniors, um, across all three schools, um, seniors' meal balances were completely covered by the community, including the Lee's Summit balance um of around 1,400. This shows just how our community can come together um when we really need it. Um I want to thank everyone for the past year. Um I don't know everyone with the new elections. I will be here next year, so I'm excited to get to know each of you individually and to have some good dialogue. Thank you so much. >> Thank you uh to our student board representatives for committing your time and energy throughout the school year. Your presence presence and input help shape important conversations and decisions, including cell phone usage during school hours and instructional use
017of AI. Your willingness to show up and represent the interests of your peers mattered more than you might realize. We're going to announce your name. Please come up and collect your certificate and wait for a group photo. I'll let Vice President Miller get out here to give the certificates out. From Lisle High School, Lucy Doran. Sierra Kiefer. From Lisle North High School, Jackson Reed. And from Lisle West High School, Haley Barnett. >> LSR7 Support Professional of the Year Award was created 4 years ago to recognize excellence from the staff making an impact on our district and students behind the scenes. Nominations are sent in from parents, staff, and students from across the district. Six support professionals are honored with excellence awards and one is selected as the Support Professional of the Year. This year LSR7
018Support Professional of the Year is Mr. Zachary Prose, a field technology specialist for the district. Mr. Prose has worked in the Lee's Summit School District for 11 years. His positivity, dependability, and problem-solving skills make him an asset every day to everyday life around LSR7. Those who nominated Zach to be honored for this award said his rare combination of technical expertise and exceptional customer service are what set him apart. Zach is also an active assistant with the Lee's Summit West Marching Band and a previous Learning for Life Award recipient. Everyone, please help us celebrate our Support Employee of the Year. Okay, we're going to addendum here. We have a few more student board representatives that just cruised in the door. If you all want to come up here, Vice President Miller is going to make sure
019that we get you your certificate as well. Laila Johnson Casey Worthy Okay, thank you for that. LSR7's Teacher of the Year process begins with nominations from across the district, honoring certified staff making an impact. LSR7 partners with the Lee's Summit Chamber of Commerce to recognize 15 teachers who all have the opportunity to interview for Teacher of the Year. LSR7's 2026 Teacher of the Year is Mr. Chris Walker, a science teacher at Lee's Summit North. Mr. Walker has been a teacher for 20 years, the last 12 with the Lee's Summit School District. His teaching philosophy: Students don't care how much you know until they know how much you care. Among the four students who nominated him for him him for this honor, all referenced his classroom as a welcoming environment. One student talked about his work
020as an advisor for HOSA and medical club, saying, "Because of Mr. Walker's direction, these clubs aren't just something extra to put on a college application. They are places where we actually get to go explore our interests and feel like we belong." Everyone, please help us recognize Mr. Chris Walker. Could our two employees of the year both come up so we could get a quick picture with you? Thank you. >> Okay, item 4.0 public comment. >> We appreciate your attendance and your willingness to speak to the board. Please remember that the board does not respond to public comments during the meeting, but may ask clarifying questions. Your comments will be noted by the board and administration, and if appropriate, we will discuss further action with the superintendent. Only those who have signed up prior to the
021meeting will be allowed to address the board. Pursuant to board policy BDDH, we will be limiting all comments to no more than seven people with a limit of three minutes each. You may not transfer any of your time to other speakers. Your allotted three minutes will be counted down on the screen. Please conclude your comments when the timer expires. Your comments must align with the subject described in your written request to speak and must directly relate to the business or operations of the district. Your comments may not discuss individual employees or students in the in the district regardless of whether your comments speak of them in a positive or negative light. Any such comments should be directed to the superintendent who will then determine if further action is needed. Because the board does not and
022cannot impose impose age-based restrictions on who attends or views board meetings, and because children of all ages frequently do attend board meetings, comments may not include obscenities or sexually explicit content. Furthermore, comments may not include threats of physical or emotional harm or threaten in any way the safety of others. We also remind all those in the audience that board policy BDDH prohibits the use of signs or audible responses. This includes applause, cheers, or jeers. If you are in the audience and wish to respond in some way to a public comment, you may contact the board or superintendent after the meeting. Your comments must be directed only to the board because the purpose of public comment is to bring something to the attention of the board. You may not speak to or interact in any way
023with any person in the audience. When your name is called, go to the podium and clearly state your name and the organization you represent, if any. Emily Seaton. >> Good evening. My name is Emily Seaton. I'm here tonight at the request of my daughter, Angelina. Sorry, this is harder than I thought. She believed that her if her mother spoke publicly, it would be harder for this board to ignore her needs and the needs of so many children like her. Angelina has been accelerated, but it took over a year, multiple administrators, formal complaints to this board and DESI, over a semester of homeschooling, and ultimately legal involvement. I was sent in circles with no meaningful response. Most families cannot endure what we did, and Angelina is far from alone. This district's stated mission to prepare each
024student for success in life. Board President Myers has defined that as readiness for employment, enrollment, or enlistment. I'll take her at her word. If that is our goal, we must be honest about what actually prepares students for those futures. Rigorous high school coursework is one of the strongest predictors of college success. High-achieving students who aren't challenged early become disengaged and develop poor study habits, perfectionism, and fear of failure. They miss the window to build real resilience. By high school, the decision not to push themselves has already been made. We cannot prepare students for life by waiting until high school to finally challenge them. This is the tall poppy syndrome, and the data shows it's happening here in LSR7. Our district has ranked dead last in special education identification among its 15 comparable Missouri peer districts
025for seven straight years. There are likely over 500 qualifying children not receiving services. The result is general education teachers are stretched thin, and students already at grade level are overlooked as teachers are forced to make tough choices. These failures hurt everyone. Our high-income students score 9 to 11 points below predicted performance in math, the bottom 13% statewide. Lower-income students have dropped from the 77th to the 45th percentile in 6 years. Even after this board tripled gifted enrollment, math scores kept falling. Our peer districts aren't cutting tall poppies. They are watering all of them. I ask this board to place two items on the agenda for the next work session, policy IKE and your special education identification practices. Publicly explain why we remain dead last in serving vulnerable students while simultaneously failing our highest achievers. These
026children are not a trade-off. The data proves that. To any parent here tonight or watching at home, if your child has been denied services or proper placement, you are not alone and we are not finished. This fight is bigger than the than one family. When given the choice over the last year, this district has largely chosen to ignore me. Can you hear me now? >> Okay. Um next item on the agenda are our monthly committee reports, board member Haley. >> This month I attended the finance committee meeting and I also attended the graduation at uh LeSueur uh North High School and the SRA and the online academy graduations. >> Board member Sparks. >> My committees are being um imposed on me starting today. Uh and so I'm looking forward to that. But what I will
027say is I attended the supporting and sustaining high-performing education um Zoom call that was hosted by um our National School Board Association. >> Thank you. Dr. Nickens. >> Since the last board meeting, we did have a CAC meeting where we reviewed membership to identify boundary areas that are underrepresented on CAC and discussed the development of a policy to address student walkouts aimed to protect both students and their First Amendment rights. Um uh attended a reception to meet the new mayor and city council members at the LS Economic Development Council. Um attended the Grow Your Own and retirement Ceremony. Very excited to see 22 future teachers sign. That's incredible. A board policy meeting where we reviewed mainly policies that had to do with how the school board itself functions. And four out of five of the
028graduations, which was so much fun. I missed North, which I heard was great because my own kid was graduating from college that night. But congrats to everyone. >> Thank you, Dr. Johnson. >> I've had no um committee since the start of this new season and um attended many of the same activities some of our other board members did. >> Board member Dawson. >> Yeah, I won't I won't repeat, but yeah, all the graduations were amazing. Um but uh I did attend the Lee's Summit Cares board meeting. Uh I was elected the uh board treasurer for the next 2 years, so wish me luck. And uh and my first executive committee meeting for that role. Um also attended the same board policy meeting that Dr. Nickens already mentioned, so I won't repeat that. Um and uh
029attended some other great events this spring like the 20-year anniversary of Great Beginnings. That was really exciting and I got a tour for the first time, so that was great. And uh that's about it. >> Thank you, Vice President Miller. >> Yes, so my load was light this um since the last board meeting. So, I also attended the Lee's Summit Cares board meeting. Um and all the other great events that have been stated by my fellow board members. >> Awesome. Thank you. Um so, I too attended the CAC meeting um that uh Dr. Nickens referenced. Um I attended the business round table uh meeting where the uh conversation was um around uh the the concept of student walkouts and that type of thing. Um I attended government relations and our um guest speaker uh last
030month was Cheektowaga County Executive Phil LaVota. Um and then as well, as has already been mentioned, I too attended the five graduations and the retirement reception. Okay, I think that does it for our committees. Um next up would be the uh treasurer's report and the payment of the bills. I need a motion. Yeah, I'm I'm >> 6.01, right? Transfer of funds? Yeah. >> I move to approve the transfer of $3,867,915.18 from the general fund to the special revenues fund. >> Second. >> All those in favor, please raise your right hand and say I. >> I. >> Motion passes. >> I move to approve the treasurer's report and the payment of the bills. >> Second. >> All those in favor, please raise your right hand and say I. >> I. >> Motion passes. All right, now
031we are down to our consent agenda. >> I move to approve the consent agenda as presented. >> Second. >> All those in favor, please raise your right hand and say I. >> I. >> Consent agenda passes. Item 7.02, contracts ratify contracts $15,000 and less. You got a motion? >> You got to You got to go to eight. >> Oh. >> Go to eight. >> Mhm, 7.02. >> I move that the Board of Education ratify the attached list of contracts that are $15,000 or less per board policy. >> Mhm. >> That's the consent agenda. Consent agenda. >> So, we'll just go to eight. >> Okay, now I'm out of order. Okay, I got it. Sorry. We pulled something, didn't we? 8.01 Mhm, I got it. Sorry about that. This is what I was trying to avoid
032by having it on paper. All right. Item 8.01, um, Behavioral Health Allies Academy. >> I move that the board approve the master services agreement for students attending BHA Academy. >> Second. >> All those in favor, please raise your right hand and say aye. Do we have a discussion? I didn't see a light. No? Okay, let's try this again. All those in favor, please raise your right >> I'm not sure what we're voting on here, quite frankly. >> don't know how we went all the way down to eight. I I'm >> Okay, so you're jumping the schedule, is that what you're >> I didn't mean to jump the schedule, I can tell you that. >> Oh, got you. So, that's all consent agenda. Got you. Okay. Understood. My apologies. >> Yeah, I'm I That's why I
033had it on paper and for this very scrolling reason, but it hasn't really served me well. So, I apologize for that, board member Haley. >> So, you're down to 8.01? >> Yes. >> Okay, tracking. >> Well, I'm glad you are. >> Okay, I'm there. >> All right, let's try let's try this again. Let's let's make this motion again and let's make this is >> Okay, I move that the board approve the master services agreement for students attending BHA Academy. >> Second. >> All those in favor, please raise your right hand and say I. >> I. >> Okay, motion passes. 8.02 the BIS contract. >> I move that the board approve the contract with Cornerstones of Care for $101,600. >> Second. >> All those in favor, please raise your right hand and say I. >> I.
034>> Motion passes. Um the design contract for Pleasant Lea Elementary, 8.03. >> I move that the board approve a contract with Dake Wells for $2,156,000. >> Second. >> All those in favor, please raise your right hand and say I. >> I. >> Motion passes. Thank you. 8.04, the Finalsite renewal. >> I move that the board renew the five-year Finalsite contract for website services and products. >> Second. >> All those in favor, please raise your right hand and say I. >> I. >> Motion passes. 8.05, the Huddle agreement. >> I move that the board approve the service agreement with Huddle for Lee's Summit Highs High School, Lee's Summit North High School, and Lee's Summit West High School. >> Second. >> All those in favor, please raise your right hand and say I. >> I. >> Motion
035passes. Thank you. 8.06, the KVC Academy Services contract. >> I move that the board approve the contract with KVC for IEP services. >> Second. >> All those in favor, please raise your right hand and say I. >> I. >> Thank you. Motion passes. Item 8.07 SUV transportation safety. >> I move that the board approve the purchase of two SUVs for the transportation department for $143,499. >> Second. >> All those in favor, please raise your right hand and say I. >> I. >> Motion passes. Item 8.08 the phone system carrier service. >> I move that the board approve the contract for the outside dial tone services circuit provider in the amount of $99,180. >> Second. >> All those in favor, please raise your right hand and say I. >> I. >> Motion passes. 8.09 Premise Health
036Renewal Complete Health and Wellness Center. >> I move that the board approve the related contract with Premise Health for services at the Complete Health and Wellness Center. >> Second. >> All those in favor, please raise your right hand and say I. >> I. >> Motion passes. Thank you. 8.10 Ready to Go Restroom purchase. >> I move that the board approve a purchase for Ready to Go Trailer Sales for the amount of $77,178.20. >> Second. >> All those in favor, please raise your right hand and say I. >> I. >> Motion passes. Thank you. 8.11 Straub Construction contract. >> I move that the board approve a contract to Straub Construction for the Pleasant Lee Middle School construction project. >> Second. >> All those in favor, please raise your right hand and say I. >> I. >>
037Motion passes. Thank you. 8.12 Technology products and services. >> I move that the Board of Education allow staff to use these approved cooperative agreements to secure the best pricing and quality of services within the limits of the approved annual technology budget. Second. >> All those in favor, please raise your right hand and say I. >> I. >> Motion passes. Thank you. 8.13. I'm not going to I don't know how to say the name of the company, Dr. Shelton, but we're going to call it a forklift purchase. >> Do I need it? >> I need a motion. Probably. Is it Weiss? >> Weiss. >> We'll go with that. >> I move I move to approve the purchase of one narrow aisle forklift for Weiss USA Inc. in the amount of 88,872 for the distribution warehouse. >>
038Second. >> All those in favor, please raise your right hand and say I. >> I. Item 8.14 board committee assignments. >> I move to approve the attached committee assignments as presented. >> Second. >> Any discussion? Um this is Mered, I have a question for you. Um can I table this item until next month or am I committed that it has to be completed tonight? >> If the board wishes to table it, you can. >> The board committee assignments. >> You can make a motion and table it. >> Okay. I'd like to make an amendment to Vice President Miller's motion to uh table this until our June meeting, please. >> Second. >> So, we're going to we're voting on my amendment, right? So, all those in favor of amending and holding off until our June meeting,
039please raise your right hand and say I. >> I. Okay, so do I have to back out of Erica's motion now or it's um it's kind of dead in the water, I know. Teacher you know, sounds and things come naturally. Um So, the original motion had a second. I amended it. We approved my amendment. So, now it's tabled, right? The original motion is just tabled. >> I think we have to vote to table it now. >> Okay. I thought we Oh, so I needed it. Okay. So, then I move to table item Okay, I'm sorry. I I thought I had it in an order, but >> I move to table the committee assignment vote and discussion until June. >> Second. >> All those in favor, please raise your right hand and say I. >> I
040thought I had that simple on that little flow chart, but apparently that's how my day's going, huh? Okay. Now, I don't even know where I'm going cuz my paper's out of order with where we're at. Okay. Well, we've got several items of information. We've got safety and security measures update. We've got a written report on the CCIP as an update. We've got our federal titles program evaluation and we have a professional development plan that we all have received. Uh Do what? Okay. All right, never mind. I skipped ahead. I was getting excited. I thought I had that particular Okay, 9.01 we have a safety and security presentation. Thank you so much. >> Good evening and thank you for the opportunity to provide a security update. My name is Steve Shelton, Associate Superintendent of Operations and
041with me tonight is Ryan Hall. So, it's true and you hear it you hear it a lot when the district sends out a publication after some crisis event that safety and security is the top priority, the highest priority that we have for our students and our staff and our guests and it's true. We have a board policy EEBCA, which uh directs the administration of the school district to develop a crisis intervention plan. Uh and I just want to level set us. There's a difference between safety and there's difference between security. Safety is an unintentional accident accidental type event. Slip on the ice, step off the curb, fall off the playground equipment. Uh those types of things are accidents. Those happen. Uh security is is an intentional deliberate threat or or act of attack, uh criminal
042activity, terrorism, espionage. Those types of things, that's security and that's what we're going to talk about tonight. Uh some of the steps, some of the uh things that we do in our school district to avoid and respond to a security issue. Um couple of uh Board leadership uh a couple of years ago asked Dr. Buck to put together a process action team to look at safety and security. Some of our board members served. Mr. Aley served on that committee. Uh Board member Myers, I think you served on that committee as well. Um and we met six times in the 2024-2025 school year. We looked at four areas, you know, and and safety and security is a broad topic. You can go a lot of directions with that topic. Uh but we narrowed it down to
043safety and security of physical um the physical body, uh social emotional well-being and safety and security in those areas, uh information security, important in today's age, and then emergency preparedness. >> Thank you. Uh so, in 2023, we did a school safety grant and brought in Strategos International, uh which has partnered with us for the last 11 to 12 years that we've done things throughout the district. Um they performed an all-inclusive uh security audit uh of all of our facilities, both physical security as well as security procedures, types of training that we do, and we have been we've taken those audits and we've analyzed them and said how can we utilize this stuff to make our district better? Where are some of the areas that we can areas of improvement and what are our strengths? We
044have two safety coordinators in the district. That is myself and Dr. Shelton. We are the designated safety coordinators. We are both certified as school safety specialist through the center of educational center of education safety through the Missouri School Board Association. So we have both been through the program and training provided by MSBA to be that to be that position. We do focus a lot of our security on that emergency cycle. The four areas of of an emergency, prevention and mitigation, preparedness, response and recovery. >> And so as we dig into that first area prevention and mitigation, there is a I'll say philosophy out there that's called crime prevention through environmental design. CPTED is what it's abbreviated. And that philosophy, that foundation is made up of five subcategories. Surveillance, access control, those are the physical portions
045of of security in our school district. The things you see if you will. Territorial reinforcement, maintenance and management activity support. Think in terms then of mindset and process and procedure. And so to effectively address security in our school district, we need the physical aspect of it, the things we the the the things you see and we think about when we think about security and we'll talk a little bit about that as we get into the presentation. But there's also a mindset that goes into keeping our students, our staff, and our guests safe. Additionally, we have a lot of processes and procedures in place to make sure that's that's happening as well. This is not new. This is not new. This goes back a long way. Prior to the 2020 bond, probably in 2018 and 19
046as we were teeing up to 2020 bond, we were doing this work. 2025 as well. And the teams that work on this are the comprehensive facility master plan team, the citizens advisory committee, the safety and security quality focus team. You know, all these teams come together to provide input into this work in the 2020 bond, the 2025 bond, but also in the 2030 bond as we as we think about that in the coming years. >> Yes, so just a couple things that we've done with some of our bonding and I know this is not all inclusive for security reasons, but a lot of the things that we do like to share. We have increased our surveillance across the district. We almost tripled it. We probably doubled it in in 2020 and then again in 2025
047utilizing again some of that information we learned from analysis of the site audits as well as our our team team involvement and input. Updated servers, clear lines of sight both from interior interior to exterior, exterior lighting, building that situational awareness that they see things that before they happen kind of thing. Access control, we've updated our access control to where it is a network system. So if we need to remove access, it is a click of a button and it's district-wide at once. Things we've been able to do door hardware, intruder resistant glass, so impact glass we've been able to add throughout our buildings. Um scheduled door locks is again that network controlled for some doors that uh we have to schedule for certain periods and things like that. So, we're not having people unlock them,
048prop them open, etc. Um and guided entries are a couple things that we've done with those bonds. And so, that's what we think about a lot of times when we think about um bond projects and we think about security. Those physical things that we talk about we we see. But that territorial reinforcement, that maintenance uh and management, that activity support, those are That's the mindset. Those are the processes and procedures. We can have door locks, but what happens when someone comes to the door? What do you do? And we have a process and training that we take our staff through uh before someone enters our building. We have visitor management systems when someone's in our building um that we ensure that that person is supposed to be there and that they can be there. Uh
049signage and badges. And so, you know, what do we do? What's that custodian do when they're out taking the trash uh to the dumpster and they see somebody on the playground that's not supposed to be there? How do they address them? How do they redirect them to where they need to be? And do we have the signage to redirect them? And so, that mindset, those processes and those procedures uh that we have in place. Maintenance and management. You know, the fact that uh anytime a staff member sees an issue with anything in regards to the safe to to in in regards to security, it's a it's a simple work order system that they can put in and they mark safety and security and it goes to the top of the list of the things that
050we need to address immediately. And then activity support. It's important to understand that the more active a space is, a place is, the less likely that something uh criminal will happen there. And so, not only do we as a district hold a lot of activities on our in our buildings, but we also have a lot of outside users. And the great thing about our community, and I'm going to put this in here, the anonymous reporting system that that we have. Our staff, our students, our parents, our community members are wonderful about sharing information. That old adage, see something, say something, our our community is wonderful at that. Reaching out to us and saying, "Hey, I saw something. It didn't seem quite right." And so, then we get a chance to dig into it and look
051into it further. One of the areas that's important not only in prevention and mitigation, but throughout when we talk about preparedness, when we talk about response, when we talk about recovery, is that we have great student support, and I'm going to say staff support as well. Trusted adults. I mentioned just a little bit ago, our students, our staff, our um community members are great about reporting incidents that seem unusual. But, they have to trust the adults they're talking to. And we have great relationships with our students, our staff, and our community. Additionally, we have great mental health support for our students through Rediscover, as well as our own mental health therapist. Uh tonight, we approved the Cornerstones of Care, the BEST contract. It's to help support our student behavior structures. Uh we have wonderful relationships
052with our parents that I mentioned. Uh we also have a great counseling staff that's available for our students. But, we also have a counselor flight team that in the event there is a crisis, we have counselors that respond to that crisis site and help support students and help support staff. I also want to mention our employee assistance program that we have available to our staff both as in in in prevention and mitigation but also in response that resource is available to to our staff. So I wanted to kind of talk about some of the things we do from a preparedness standpoint. Not only do we have building drills, we do building lockdown drills. We do two a year, that is required for each site. So we do one very early in the school year for
053all new for all staff, all all students. So anyone new to the building will know what to do. Anybody new to the district knows how we respond. As well as we do an officer led drill annually at every site to ensure officers not only know our buildings but also we're getting feedback from law enforcement of what could we do better, things like that in drills when we debrief at the buildings after the drills. Some of the fun things we've been able to do. Tabletop drills. We did We've done one in 2022 and 2026 with LSPD. We did a bleacher collapse at West was one of the tabletop. We did a bus explosion at a at a school and how do we respond and how do we recover from that? We did TSA. So TSA came
054in in 2023 and did transportation critical events around the district. How do we respond? FBI and Homeland Security with coordination of CISA came in in 2024 and did a cybersecurity tabletop discussion with us as well as internal. We did a 2025 cybersecurity multiple critical incident tabletop as well. We did a full scale exercise in 2023. We did a family and friends reunification at Bernard Campbell. So we brought in a lot of a lot of LSR7 staff got to play as actors and how do we run this and we learned a lot not only from how we respond and we set up a reunification center but also the city learned a lot of of having that complex reunification side of it as well. Um we've also hosted a large event uh planning and management course uh
055here at SLC. We had a lot of first responders. We had people that were involved in World Cup. We had FEMA here taking this course and and it was designed for the what we're going to deal with this summer with those large events and uh in situations that occur occur when you're in a a situation like that. So, it was very interesting course taught by uh the Texas uh Texas Tech exercise um center. So, very fun. We also do monthly coordination meetings with our local first responders. So, fire, EMS, uh law enforcement, um all jurisdictions that we touch are invited. Uh we've even brought in Blue Springs because we we don't necessarily have we have we have residents of Blue Springs that that go to our schools. Um Lake Lotawana, Winnebago is invited. Um Lee's
056Summit. And we do a lot of debriefing, not only debriefing situations that we've occurred, but al- also working through coordination of upcoming events, coordination with um how we respond to certain situations and and things like that in the district. Um I will tell you I I really believe that has really provided us an excellent relationship with law enforcement in our community. So, we do regular meetings with even our district emergency command team here at SLC uh as well as our district. And we have have building table top discussions annually with our building teams so they know how to respond to emergencies that are localized to their site as well as the district team in support. Okay, so prevention and mitigation, preparedness, um what happens? What happens if there is is a critical incident? Um Ryan
057mentioned the incident command, the incident command team. And so, the incident command process was built by FEMA. Uh I mentioned a couple of the the standards that that FEMA has built these on and we've gone through this training, the IS-100, the IS-700 training. You know, and this incident command is scalable. Scalable, you know, if you have a small event, you know, it's a small incident. And so, you have a small incident command team manage that. As incidents become larger and more complex, the team gets larger. Um and so, we go through this training and when we have a critical incident, we stand up the incident command team. And once again, sometimes it's small and sometimes it's larger. Um we also work, as Ryan has mentioned, work very purposely in our coordination with local authorities, both
058law enforcement and emergency response from the emergency manager, the the fire departments in in our communities. And so, there are times when we can handle the crisis internally, but there are times that it does expand past the school district and we do bring in law enforcement or we do bring in fire or both in the process. Those monthly coordination meetings help a lot with that, as as Ryan mentioned. We have school resource officers available to us in our secondary buildings. Another important element, a very important element in the in in a crisis event when we're responding, is is communication. Internal, external communication. Uh one of the most recent tabletops that we had, um Ryan mentioned the bus explosion. Um in that tabletop, we had incident the district incident command team in this in this room,
059we had the building incident command team upstairs. Um and what we do is make sure that we have a line of communication because the decisions we make in the at the district level impact what's going on at the building level and vice versa. And you have to have that great internal communication. Additionally, communications department is pushing out communication internally to our other buildings. You know, we're a large district, but things get around if things are happening. And so we have internal communication, and then we have external communication with our families, with our community as well. And so but it's vitally important to have an effective communication system in place. Um and then additionally, a couple of years ago, the district entered into an agreement with Mid-America Regional Council to share resources. If we had gotten
060to us an an event that was so large that it stretched our resources, we could tap into the Mid-America Regional Council, which is nine nine counties in the area, and tap into those resources to get the help and support that we would need. And then once the event the the I'll say the incident in the sense is over, and now it's time to recover. Ryan mentioned the reunification. Anytime you have an incident, you have you have goals, you have objectives. Typically in an an event like we're talking about, um it's typically uh preservation of life and reunification reunification of family and friends. And so we have gone through extensive training in that reunification and planning um to get that done. Sometimes it's building base. If it's a small event, but we got to reunify, that
061means maybe there's a water main break, maybe there's a a gas leak, maybe there's the power's gone out and it's February and it's 32°. We got to send kids home. We can reunify at the building level. But we also in a larger events where we can't where that's not possible at the building, we have four internal sites, we also have an external site uh out of the district that we can use for reunification. Um you know, you don't think about this, but I'll give you an example in that tabletop of of um uh the explosion. One thing that we talked about was the fact we're going to have structural damage to that building cuz it happened right in front of the building. So, now we need to engage our uh insurance coverage. We need to
062uh tap into those relationships that we have with our vendors and our contractors. How do we get this building prepared and ready for school again? And then where else do we go maybe to have school until it's ready again? We have uh procedures and policies in place. I've mentioned the policy that we have, uh the board policy we have for you know, for this kind of work, but we also have a lot of procedures. Uh one very important element of recovery is the after-action review. It's important that after the event is over that we sit down and we we talk about the things that went well, the things that went poorly, and so and use this as a learning opportunity so that we get better the next time. Uh I mentioned those student support services
063earlier. Uh we would definitely tap into them. I mentioned the flight count the the counselors on the flight team, but rediscover, you know, we we would tap into a lot of resources to help our students, EAP for our staff. And so uh just tapping into those resources as we need them. Um and then the last thing here is the hazardous mitigation plan. Uh it's a plan that we have in place that you know, helps obviously as it states uh mitigate you know, hazards and hazardous material, but um another benefit to it is that because we have that plan, that allows us to tap into the federal and state grants that we wouldn't be able to if we didn't have this plan. And so we have that plan in place uh because it's a good idea,
064but also because it allows us uh to get resources if we need resources. All right, thank you. And are there any questions? >> I would like to thank both of you for how serious you take this aspect of the school district. Um I I'm around long enough to remember when, you know, it was the wild wild west, and um I do appreciate um knowing that there there are plans and things in place on the horrible day when something perhaps does happen. So, I I thank you for that. Um I also thank you for keeping the lights working in the parking lots. That's like a Yeah, I appreciate appreciate that a lot. >> Well, that's a good >> Somebody that came in in the dark and left in the dark a lot. What's that? >> That's
065a That is a great example. >> It is a great example. >> of of security, line of sight, lighting, all very important. >> Any other board member? I don't see I don't have any lights on. Uh >> Just a real quick. >> Um Mr. Holland Dr. Shelton, again, thank you. Um but I do have a question. Just for a public reference, if there is a safety concern, what is the proper channel to get it addressed? >> Yeah, so you can reach out to myself or Dr. Shelton. Uh any anybody can reach out to us uh to ask those questions. Of course, there's some things we can answer and we're willing to answer. There's some things we cannot. Um and that goes for not only the community, but also all of our staff. Um we don't
066We We want everybody to let us know how they feel, and we're more than happy to, especially staff, even go to the building and have those conversations in person and and talk through what their concerns are. So, either reaching out to us is uh great. Um also, Kyle Gorrell in facilities, um he he assists in how we design buildings sometimes to include those safe safety and security measures as well. >> Where Where's the public safety information? >> So, so Courage to Report um is a tool that is available around the state if someone has a concern about a person or an event or they can go to courage to report. Um, it's uh, it's very, you know, if you go online, you can find it easily. Uh, but courage to report and then that immediately
067is reported to the district, a number of administrators and building if they if they specify a particular building, then that would um, uh, notify that building administration as well. >> Thank you, guys. Okay, I already mentioned we've got some items for written report. I won't read that list again. Um, any questions about accessing those? Okay. All right, this officially concludes our, uh, regular business meeting. Thank you for being here this evening.