001this evening as we get out here to get started we will go ahead and call this meeting to order could you all please rise and join me in the Pledge of Allegiance I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America our nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all to you welcome to the Rockwood Board of Education meeting we would like to thank the administrative team and all the staff and students at Lafayette High School for being gracious gracious hosts for our meeting this evening thank you also to the ambassadors who are here from our schools to assist with grading and signing in our guests the purpose of this meeting is to conduct the business of the district hear reports about our progress and listen to the community on important
002issues we want to remind all of our visitors that we expect the audience to remain civil and respectful at all times as the board conducts its business calling out verbal aggressiveness inappropriate language or name calling is not acceptable if the meeting becomes unruly the board may take a recess until such time the audience is appropriate if inappropriate behavior continues by individuals they may be asked to leave the meeting if the audience becomes so inappropriate in their behavior that we can't conduct our business the board reserves the right to adjourn the meeting the sport of Education meeting is live streamed for the community's convenience opinions expressed at the meeting are not necessarily the opinions of the Rockwood School District YouTube reserves the right to Monitor and block inaccurate and misleading content that process is beyond the
003control of the Rockwood School District we want everyone to have the ability to see and have the ability to hear the business of the district reports presented and the comments of everyone who is here to speak we request that all individuals speak slowly and clearly we appreciate your cooperation and that you took the time to attend tonight's meeting could I please have a motion to approve the agenda second motion and a second any discussion I'll lose in favor please say aye aye anyone opposed that passes next could I have a motion to approve Board of Education meeting minutes for April 20th 2023 so Move Motion in a second any discussion all those in favor please say aye aye anyone opposed and that passes and next we have Patron comments before we get started with our
004first section I will read this part during Patron comments Rockwood patrons May address the Board of Education concerning issues related to the school district under our updated policy there are two Patron comment sections during board meetings the first public comment period shall be solely for Patron comments related to items on tonight's agenda the second public comment period shall occur at the end of the meeting order of business and shall be for patrons to make a statement or address the board concerning any issues pertaining to the Rockwood School District please know that patrons also have the opportunity to submit comments and writing to the board at any time each speaker will be limited to three minutes combining time or giving your time to someone else to speak is not allowed only one speaker is allowed at
005the podium at a time the board uses the public comment periods as an opportunity to listen and receive information but board members will not engage in debates or discussions with those speaking other than to seek clarification of their comments a board member may ask that the superintendent ensured that the appropriate staff member follows up in a timely fashion with the individual regarding the information question or concern presented during Patron comments we have a stand with microphone ready so both the board and the audience may hear the patron comments clearly I'd like to remind everyone that comments about individual employees and or students will not be permitted in public session we also expect that you will remain civil and respectful in your remarks and if anyone becomes disruptive we reserve the right to cut your three
006minutes short verbally aggressive language and vulgarity in any form is not acceptable whether you are reading someone else's remarks or they are your own it will not be tolerated the board appreciates that you have taken the time to come this evening and we value both your input and your perspective for your convenience our three-minute time clock is ready we welcome Tom Dunn to step forward hello hello everyone all right mine is on I believe 8.02 which is the testing calendar and assessment plan since 2011 Rockwood has been providing the entire junior class approximately 1500 to 1700 students at all four high schools the ACT test the only other District to provide the entire class with the Texas Parkway Rockwood's lowest average ACT was 22.3 in 1994. Rockwood's highest AGT of 24.3 was improved in 2009.
007currently Rockwood's act averages 23.4 which is significantly higher than the State national average on paper and by the amount of students in Rockwood that take the ACT we are doing better than average however we are five points lower than Clayton four points lower than Ledoux and almost a full point lower than Kirkwood a few years back Marquette wanted to increase the amount of National Merit Scholars the solution offer a test prep during zero hour and the results were outstanding Rockwood should offer a semester-long ACT test prep class as an elective and see if the average score increases this would not only benefit the students as many Merit Scholarships that colleges offer are based on ACT scores but it would also benefit the school district as well thank you all right next we have superintendent and
008board comments Dr Kane thank you president Bayes earlier this evening the Board of Education approved two new additions to our administrative team Dr Carrie Skeeters is our new director of curriculum and professional learning and Dr Jason lovanos as the new principal at Wildwood Middle School they both begin their new roles on July 1st Kerry served as the assistant superintendent of teaching and learning in the Wentzville School District since 2021 prior to that she served in Wentzville as a director of instructional programming for five years a district curriculum coordinator for nine years and an English language arts teacher at Timberland high school for five years Carrie earned a bachelor's degree in English and education from the University of Missouri St Louis a masters of Art and education Administration in supervision from the University of Phoenix and
009her doctorate in education for Maryville University this is a new position that replaces two vacancies one of which is currently held by Renee trotier who's going to be retiring at the end of the school year Jason is currently the assistant principal at kerrs Mill Elementary School a position he has held since 2021. prior to that he served as an assistant principal at Wildwood for six years the Middle School social studies teacher in the Parkway School District for four years and a teacher assistance at Stanton Elementary for one year Jason earned his Bachelors of Science with the Social Studies major two master's degrees in education one with a concentration in curriculum and instruction and one in administration a specialist in education and is Doctor of Education all from Missouri Baptist University he replaces Cassandra Walker Suggs
010who was hurt who was hired last month as the new director of educational equity and access please join us in congratulating these leaders on their new roles here in the Rockwood School District [Applause] Evelyn a West Ridge Elementary fourth grader earned the Girl Scout Medal of Honor for her actions in helping to save a toddler from a pool Last Summer representatives from the Girl Scouts of USA and Girl Scouts of the Eastern Missouri region presented Evelyn with the medal during a special ceremony at West Ridge on April 26th the Girl Scout Medal of Honor is given to girls who save a life or attempt to save a life without risk to the girl's own life this award is reserved for Girl Scouts who have performed his heroic acts beyond the degree of maturity and training
011that is expected of someone of their age congratulations to Evelyn and thank you for your heroic actions this year for the seventh straight year Rockwoods earned a near perfect score in the Missouri State Highway Patrol bus inspection process with a 98.6 approval rate that means 143 of our 145 buses passed the initial inspection State inspectors judge school buses based on a criteria a set of criteria including brake performance lighting steering mechanisms windshield wipers tires and more that is a lot of buses to to clear that hurdle so the dedication of the maintenance technicians and our drivers and our transportation team and how they continually work to ensure the safe and efficient transportation of approximately 12 000 Rockwood students each and every day absolutely should be acknowledged thank you to our transportation team for all their
012hard work and all that they do for the Rockwood students and Families and finally tonight I would like to commend our Rockwood seniors who recently participated in the Project Lead the Way Capstone showcase and stem Signing Day both of these events occurred at St Louis Science Center groups of students from Lafayette and Rockwood Summit presented their final projects and these were projects in the areas of engineering design and development and biomedical Innovations from their Project Lead the Way classes and four seniors from Lafayette Marquette and Rockwood Summit earn scholarships to continue their stem studies at in-state institutions and as we head into these final weeks before graduation we want to take this opportunity to express how proud We Are of the many and varied achievements of approximately 1800 members of our graduating class for 2023.
013we will formally celebrate our seniors at four commencement ceremonies at shafitz Arena which is in St Louis so marquette's is going to be on Wednesday May 31st Eureka High Schools will be on Thursday June 1st Rockwood Summits will be on Friday June 2nd and lafayette's will be on Saturday June 3rd congratulations class of 2023 I personally and this team as a whole in terms of board in this entire School District cannot wait to see what the future holds for you those are my comments thank you thank you Dr Kane any board comments this evening a couple weeks ago I attended the Special Olympics at Marquette High School which was fantastic they did a great job Kerry was there as well and yesterday I received the nicest thank you notes from from some of the students
014and it was so uh well crafted and it really touched my heart because they really they knew my background and what I've done and they thanked me for being there so I this is a shout out to Marquette part of the Special Olympics but also to the seniors who who responded so well and sent me a great thank you note and I want to give a shout out to all of our district elementary Librarians had the opportunity today to attend the battle of the books which is um these students have read all of the Mark Twain award-winning books and they have a trivia it was tough I knew one answer for sure the it is the logistics of putting it together these kids are they're competitive but they're so working together as a team and
015and just think about it they're all reading and and talking about books and they had an author visit by Zoom it was a delightful morning um look forward to it again next year and we're talking about maybe having the board participate next year shout out to all those Librarians that work so hard and students all right well thank you everyone for your comments moving on could I have a motion to approve the consent agenda items as submitted SoMo second motion and a second any discussion all those in favor please say aye aye anyone opposed and that passes next we'd invite Amy Weir up we could I have a motion to approve that the Board of Education proclaimed May 10 2023 as a national school nurse day motion and a second welcome would you like us
016to read the proclamation first sure okay director Proclamation national school nurse Day May 10 2023 whereas students are the future and by investing them in them today we are ensuring our world for tomorrow and whereas families deserve to feel confident that their children will be cared for when they are at school and whereas all students have a right to have their physical and mental health need safety met while in the school setting and whereas students today face more complex and life-threatening health problems requiring care in school and whereas School nurses have served a critical role in improving public health and in ensuring students academic success for more than 120 years and whereas School nurses address the Home and Community factors that impacts students health and whereas School nurses are professional nurses that Advance the well-being
017academic success and lifelong achievements of all students by serving on the front lines and providing a critical safety net for our nation's most fragile children and whereas School nurses act as a liaison to the school Community families and health care providers on behalf of Children's Health by promoting wellness and improving Health outcomes for our nation's children and whereas School nurses support the health and educational success of Children and Youth by providing access to care when children's cognitive development is at its peak and whereas School nurses are members of school-based teams providing care coordination to address the school population and whereas School nurses understand the link between health and learning and are in a position to make a positive difference for children every day therefore be it resolved that the National Association of School nurses celebrates
018and acknowledges the accomplishments of School nurses everywhere and their efforts to meet the needs of today's students by providing and advocating for quality student-centered care and offers gratitude for the Nations School nurses who contribute to our local communities by supporting students to stay healthy in school safe and ready to learn and keep parents and Guardians at work not just on this national school nurse day but in every opportunity throughout the year now therefore we The Rockwood School District board of education do hereby Proclaim Wednesday May 10 2023 as school nurse day in command its observance to all citizens thank you for all you do thank you very much um I keep people keep asking me how it's going and I keep saying after the last two years it's been a breeze so um things are
019back to kind of more of a normal situation for our nurses no contact tracing and all of that which is lovely so we still have had um to date so this is through the end of April 190 visits to the school nurse's offices we have 35 offices collectively in the district so and 45 nurses some of those are part-time some of those are one-on-one shadows in our Early Childhood Program but um it's still a lot of kids handled you know by a few staff um we have had administered 58 843 medications to our students some of those are routine daily meds some of those are you know for an occasional headache or got my braces tightened and my teeth hurt kind of thing 94 of the students who visited our nurses offices were returned to
020class that day um so that's a pretty good you know six percent of them went home and uh that's that's good for keeping kids in class and in the educational setting and learning uh I did the number on the EMS calls it was 0.02 percent of uh visits to the nurse's office ended in a call to 9-1-1 so pretty low number I think I think the actual number raw number was 34. we also have um ten thousand eighty or I'm sorry a thousand to eighty students with life-threatening allergies be it to food insects or latex um 1977 students with an asthma diagnosis so that's something that our School nurses spend a lot of time trying to teach kids how to manage on their own and how to avoid triggers and when they need to come
021see the nurse for help 73 students in our district with type 1 diabetes 2291 with ADHD as a diagnosis we have 140 students with a seizure diagnosis that's another very scary thing if you've ever witnessed a seizure um and 288 students that routinely get medication at school so of the nearly 60 000 medications administered if you do 288 times however many school days we've had through the end of April those are the routine ones um I didn't do that math but um but thank you all for your continued support we we do really appreciate everything um if if kovid taught me nothing else it was that we had great administrative and School Board support in in this District so continue to be grateful for that thank you all and I haven't counted down the days
022how many days do we have left anybody know doesn't matter for me I'm working that question yes exactly thank you Amy so the motion is to approve that the Board of Education proclaimed May 10 2023 as national school nurse day all those in favor please say aye aye anyone opposed that passes next could I have a motion to approve the 2023-24 testing calendar and assessment plan as presented so second Motion in a second welcome Glenn Hancock foreign good evening thanks uh thanks for your time this evening to share a little more information about our 23 24 assessment plan a few updates uh to share with you today some key recommendations we'll share as well as a summary of changes from this current year going to next year with that assessment plan I want to begin
023really by starting about you know why but turn this on why do we have an assessment plan help me find that on switch there it is found uh why do we have an assessment plan and I think uh I was at work in the middle of the afternoon and I was I received the text from my own son that was said that Dan why do I need to take the pre-act I just learned that they were going to take the pre-act at Rockwood as uh Mr Dunn mentioned we also provide the full act for our Juniors and I shared some reasons why it's great for him to take the pre-act but uh it made me think that you know it goes back to you know we really want our assessments and the results we get
024back from our assessments to mean as much to our students as it does to to us as well in there and so taking a little bit of time to just show how we use this information together that we use State Testing that we offer interim testing so we do screening throughout the year in terms of star reading star math and some different assessments and then in the classroom what they see on a regular basis are regular check-ins from their teacher uh our teams of teachers as professional learning communities or you'll hear me say plc's work together to devise assessments and then compare results with each other so that way they can share instructional strategies along the way but those are those assessments that are the most meaningful to students they see them on a regular
025regular basis and we use all this information together because as many of us know we get map results usually three to five months after they take the state tests the Missouri school Improvement program it's in its sixth cycle and it's probably going to have a m67 here coming out here in a few years right and so those things are continuing to evolve and so by having a regular assessment plan that we can go back to on a regular basis it lets us adapt and it lets us kind of be more agile and so we can respond to student needs as we see them not just individual student needs but also as they are in our programs such as intervention or enrichment programs but also in our curriculum in the curriculum offerings that we offer so
026we use all this data to go there to help us improve upon the programs and really respond more more frequently than just using kind of annual state reports so these all together really help us out a lot each of the different types of Assessments we use so we use things such as external achievement assessments we use ability assessments to help keep our our plan balanced and each of these different types of Assessments along the way offer there we go offer we they answer different questions for us so formative assessments that a lot of times are done by our a lot of times done in the classroom these are regular check-ins that help us the students learn what was just taught what should I teach next and it really helps us plan our instruction we can
027adjust in the moment right there and if you think about whenever you're cooking something you might sample it to decide if it needs a little bit more time on the grill if it needs a little more spice or whatever right those are formative check-ins right you're just checking in to see how things are going and what you need to do next along the way we also offer a set of screening options in here I need to be closer to the computer offer a set of universal screening options as well meaning that we check in usually one to three times a year with reading and math primarily and we use an assessment called star to do that regular check-in and it helps us answer which students need interventions which students need enrichment and we can then
028use our programs to help provide and provide that support accordingly and then sometimes as we get the results back from a screener or a benchmark assessment we might need to learn you know what are some specific needs so there are many types of interventions uh in instructions so which are the specific ones we need to use to intervene with and then when we do intervene we provide some interventions we also want a progress monitor to ensure those are working and so this is a little bit of a combination that will double check to make sure our interventions are working but also in the classroom we offer those regular after we taught a couple of lessons we'll do another kind of of check in with students we call those you know common form of Assessments where
029our groups of teachers that are in the same grade level content will share results together and then also share their instructional strategies to make sure if they're seeing a positive success in one area they can share those strategies with each other and they're going to answer those questions we answered such as how are students mastering standards are they on track to meet their goals and interventions are they working along there and then finally uh summative assessments these are assessments to see if they mastered the content so those uh think of maybe a unit test think of maybe a semester test that but those help to certify kind of what learning has happened along the way and if you think back to that cooking analogy at the beginning it's an oversimplified way of uh talking through
030this assessment plan but that's if you were to go an iron chef and you cook something you gave it right it's that's your summative evaluation you don't get a chance to go back and add spice or put more time on the grill to it or anything like that so we use these in a combination together to again get more information and then provide supports for students and our programs along the way in terms of specific assessments that we use the specific assessments we use obviously from the state level we have a set of Assessments we use such as our map testing there's GLA which stands for grade level assessments those are basically English language arts three through eight as well as science and grades five through eight and then I'm sorry five three but five
031and eight it's a grade span test and then math also gets assessed three through eight at the high school level we have what they call eocs which are end of course exams those end of course exams include students taking algebra one biology sophomore English which is English two government and personal finance and then we also have English language learner which we provide a screener so new students coming to our country with different languages their background we'll give a screener and then we also measure English language acquisition using what they call the access assessment and then we also have proficiency assessments such as Constitution Civics uh they're required as part of our graduation requirements and then internally at the district level the district level we use a set of again screening and Benchmark we use star
032and also fast Bridge we use these in combination and these two are highlighted in yellow because I'm going to talk about this here just a little bit in a second but this year there's a new bill with reading Senate Bill 681 that requires some new assessments with reading and those assessments were just released within the past week in terms of assessment systems that were available and so I'll touch on that just a little bit more but that will be a little bit um new part added in and then we give for algebra one we use the NWA and then as we've talked about College and Career we have a variety of Assessments to help students plan and prep for College and Career ranging from pre-act to the ACT and also we offer 32 advanced placement
033courses and exams and then also offer an SEL and climate survey that we do two times a year and then the last two areas of our assessment plan that again using all this information together are our common form of Assessments so those are assessments that teacher teams will work with together and then in the classroom teachers are regularly checking in with students to adjust their instruction as they go forward so a couple of recommendations and Updates this year um so one new thing this year is the kindergarten early assessments this is a new assessment it came out with msip6 in there and basically what it is it's a early assessment we do kindergarten screen already but they require an assessment to be done within the first six weeks of school those that assessment will measure
034five areas physical well-being and motor skills social emotional cognitive and general knowledge approaches toward learning and language and literacy we'll be providing our kindergarten teachers training over the summer deci and the manufacturer of the kindergarten early assessments we'll be providing that training over the summer and into the into the school year Desi provided us with one of three options to use for this assessment we're going with What's called the kindergarten observation form at kof this is the assessment system or the assessment that is purchased by Desi so it won't incur any additional costs along with giving this Administration the other new one that I touched on just a minute ago is the it's new but it's continuing because we've been doing reading screening ongoing that's been part of our assessment plan for a number of
035years so this really hasn't changed the only thing that's kind of changed with it is the Senate Bill 681 requires a reading success plan to accompany students that are more than a grade level behind in reading and we've been doing these plans and we've been providing read intervention already so it's just more of a formality that we're going to continue the one Nuance here that's a little bit different for us is they've just released a set of four different assessment vendors that are approved to meet Senate Bill 681 star is on that list um and star has recently purchased another vendor we use fast Bridge as well and so we're waiting and learning more about the state in terms of any adjustments we need to make there but we're confident that we have the assessment
036system in place to meet any requirements that are part of Senate Bill 681 here the other kind of new parts I should say new or just updates um individual reading record so part of our assessment plan teachers have regularly sent one-on-one with students to listen to them read and do what they call a Bas which is the Benchmark assessment system it also is a form of reading record with our new curriculum we're adopting and the resources there's a fantasy panel classroom reading record and so we're gonna give teachers the option next year to do one of those two because it gives the teachers more option of books with the fonts panel classroom library of options there foreign on our testing calendar if you're looking at it closely you'll see there's a removal of Words Their
037Way which was a word study program in our elementary our new Ela program will have this embedded so we've removed it from the official testing calendar but it's still embedded word study and spelling is still embedded within our new curriculum that we're going to be receiving and then the last thing that will continue to provide professional learning on how these fit together so being able to use the information we get from what we get back from map testing but in combination of what we learned from our Benchmark and also using our classroom classroom assessments and classroom instruction to help adjust from what we're seeing a quick summary for really comparing the two years or next year in our current year that we're in right now we're mostly going to be online really our couple assessments
038that are not online right now are act and advanced placement AP we're looking at transitioning even those two online there's still some more research we're going to do an AP advanced placement continues to increase the number of exams that are going to the online format assess content areas we'll maintain we really haven't added anything new algebra is a carryover from last year that we've been doing State Testing time has increased because we're the addition of the kindergarten early assessments we've increased time a little bit there and in terms of you know extra testing that Rockwood adds uh really it's going to be consistent we haven't added any additional time and when you go back and even look at testing time uh really the time we spend testing and compared to minutes that students are in
039school it's less than one percent of total minutes that we do any type of testing that's associated with our plan now classroom testing and such as you know the formative assessments that you're checking in those happen all the time and that's good that's that's feedback that's how you know if you're on the right track to meet your learning standards that's good in terms of additional formal testing that we've been talking about that's really less than one percent of the time and over half of that one percent of the time is State Testing map testing and such that students are doing inside of there our overall assessment plan costs it's consistent with prior years with a possible decrease there is some eligible funding reimbursement with our reading screen assessments so we'll be looking into that to
040see just how much reimbursement we'll be able to get for that assessment that's a brief summary of our overall assessment plan for 23 24 this time I'm happy to answer any questions you might have I do have some questions um we've approved tonight the reading Horizons which has built-in progress monitoring where will that fit into this assessment plan yeah that's a great question so that'll be part of the instruction as there is a teacher informative piece yes and that'll be ongoing inside their classroom as they're doing the instruction uh as we you know get into reading Horizons and using it if there's more of a formal assessment that's maybe a screener that's also accompanies that we'll be able to pull that out but right now that's not on the approved list of resources for Desi
041so we'll still in addition be doing star reading and fast Bridge did you say star purchase fast Bridge star did purchase um the other question was that I know we've also adopted the the grammar um spelling patterns or pattern power is that being built into the assessment piece at all or is that going to be formative assessments also those would be part of the form of Assessments as the curriculum is rolled out as we move through the curriculum again as we find pieces that we want to formalize and make part of the testing calendar the benefit of having the testing calendars it really ensures that these happen because we can monitor and ensure they're happening and so as this curriculum is being implemented then we can kind of learn from the implementation of where these
042things and you fit formally or as the ongoing classroom portion we just want to make sure that we are meeting proficiency for our students but I do see where it fits into the Pharma tip piece thank you yeah thank you good questions hi Glenn I have a question regarding fast Bridge who typically administers that test certainly yes so fast Bridge can do early it can do reading and math and so with math right now we use that in kindergarten primarily as a screener in the kindergarten level and classroom teachers are doing a lot of that screening sometimes in schools will have counselors also assist with that in um for reading a lot of times it's our reading intervention teachers that are doing the fast version that's predominantly who does it in for reading and grades
043really K through K through two okay um by adding the additional kindergarten testing do we feel like we're going to be testing our kindergarten students too much early on in the year yeah that's a great question and that was one thing we really looked at and that kindergarten early assessment was one of those parts we really started to look at it unfortunately we're still waiting on the observation form to be released on what's on there what we have to kind of glean from right now is prior years form and we're pretty sure that we don't have an overlap right now meaning over testing because we don't really start screening for using fast food reading or Star reading really until winter and so that'll fulfill the need for the state Bill screening in there Glenn in
044reference to formative assessments what type of professional development and or coaching do teachers receive to know how to best utilize formative assessment processes yeah good question so we have ongoing professional learning through you know throughout our year we have four full days right now then over the summer we offer a number of book studies a number of opportunities within the curriculum time whenever our curriculum coordinators and coaches are meeting with teachers to discuss formative assessment give examples even times where we pull teachers together and we can build common formatives or formatives even together even just item banking examples of formative assessment items yeah good question Glenn is the reimbursement possible reimbursement that you spoke about um from Desi a result of Rockwood already having those screening processes in place um and so now with this
045requirement were potentially reimbursed or so it's part of the Senate Bill 681 uh because they're required there are many districts that don't have a formalized screening process that we have in place right now and so it's forcing districts to do that and some districts haven't had an opportunity to budget for that yet so Destiny for this next year is offering reimbursement really for all districts as part of the adoption of the Senate bill 681. right now it's one year only from what I've understood they're looking for additional funding to me to help support Beyond Year One have they given you any indication on when you might see that document I mean they haven't shared and they have not shared when they'll know for sure if there's additional funding in terms of the funding our application
046for reimbursements due in August and so we'll be compiling what we need to submit here in the summer yeah okay a couple questions if I could uh so when we have students who either have IEPs or other uh special needs for testing assessments do we have a formalized way to make sure they get those addressed in the testing scenarios yes and so with each with each assessment we work with our Special Education team to provide us with the accommodations that are needed many times with the online assessments those accommodations are plugged in online and then when the student takes the assessment they receive the accommodations we also have times where students might need a small group or an individual setting and so we work out with again the team of teachers at the school to
047determine you know placement and time for individual setting scribe whatever might be needed for that and as Mr Dunn mentioned I think you know Rockwood giving the uh act to all the Juniors is fantastic uh but many Juniors or many seniors then turn around and take it again a second time trying to improve their score do we track that information to see are we getting a bump from people taking it the second time yes good question and we do we see an increase any time a student participates in act we also receive a copy of their scores because we um also share that whenever we're sending transcripts and different things we help facilitate that process and we do see that score and we do see what you're saying we do see an increase usually every
048time a student takes the ACT they get usually between a one to two point increase we'll have students take act up to six to seven times right before they graduate um sometimes I will say over the past few years the the number of attempts per student has decreased part of that was during the pandemic there were closures to Test Facilities they Limited number of students you can have in a test facility colleges were in universities were sharing that it's not a requirement to get in they want to test optional different things we're seeing colleges universities change that a little bit and starting to ask for a little bit more and it's always been and still is part of scholarships a lot of times that they're asking so we're starting to see that number start to
049increase again in terms of number of attempts the students are taking so so given what you just said that kind of feeds into Mr Dunn's comments during the commentary session should we consider whether we should offer the prep courses here in the school as part of an offering to all Junior so that they get you know yeah preparation before they do that first one so they automatically almost get two if you will yes uh and you know it's funny that the comment was mentioned because we've been kind of talking about that internally we have a team that meet with Dr Jack Shelley Willa and talk about just post-secondary planning and what we can do to continue increasing accessibility and you know positive outcomes for our students and that's been one of the ideas of this
050kicked around and so appreciated hearing that comment this evening okay thank you yeah good questions I have one more question um with the change in our math program where we have more sophomores that are taking Algebra 2 and we know that the ACT is heavy in math and Algebra 2 are we going to monitor that so that we have kids that are in higher math that they're not retaining it am I making sense what I'm asking because they're not in Algebra 2 currently that year when they're taking the ACT yes so so right now we have more right now we're still in the phase where we have more students that take Algebra 2 in their junior year right now and and so that's why we have the ACT where we offer right now is at
051the end of their junior year right now and then students that complete Algebra 2 as sophomores we have the pre-act that helps give a gauge of where they're at currently and then they can individually take you know the act on their own at the end of maybe their sophomore year and then they'll have a second opportunity their junior year because usually that for that first take you get to Tennessee Aries for improvement and you can then study maybe participate in a Tutoring Club or tutoring session to help prepare you better for the next attempt did that answer the yeah I just think that there's an education piece to our parents that we could be educating the students that are in Algebra 2 as sophomores I think we missed the mark with some you know and
052it's more people that have kids that have already been through the process and know that that's the math especially with super scoring and all that goes into it so it's suggesting that you know for instance students that are finishing Algebra 2 right now as sophomores that it would be a good time to give an attempt in the June or July because act now offers a June or July which you know back in the day they didn't used to offer to June July but that would maybe be a good strategy to do correct okay thank you the education piece of it for being a nice it's a good idea thank you any other questions is this calendar posted on the district website it will be after we have formally approve it is there there's a second
053readers not a second but we haven't approved okay so after we get after this evening we will be posting it on our our calendar our website good question thank you all right so that motion is to approve the 2023-24 testing calendar and assessment plan as presented all those in favor please say aye aye anyone opposed the app passes thank you thank you have a good evening and next up we have information coming about the fy24 proposed budget they are coming to give us an update we have Paul Northington and Dean Steinberg coming up hello good evening glad to be here this evening talk about a budget update if you'll recall we started the process with the board with a preliminary update in December and this is a follow-up to that here a few months later
054we have a lot more clarity on some of our Revenue sources and things of that nature so we're here tonight to give you an update on what our 23-24 budget picture looks like and I'm happy to say that it continues to look better each time we look at it Dan and his team have done a lot of good work assembling the budget to putting it together and I'm going to have him speak to it here in just a few minutes but tonight is really just informational only and we want to have a dialogue so feel free to to ask any questions as we go through it this was set the course for the formal budget adoption which we'll ask the board to adopt it to Second June meeting so that'll be coming about a month
055from now and um tonight we're going to spend just a little bit more time talking about our funding sources uh more in particular of our state funding and the funding formula it's uh certainly a topic of discussion at many different levels we'll also talk about the importance of fund balances and reserves and where we are right now in some of the options and parameters that go along with that so that being said I'm going to turn it over to Dan and let him walk you through some of the presentation here thanks Paul good evening and thank you for your time this evening um I'm going to kind of Dive Right into just kind of where we are uh here as Paul mentioned this is an update uh but our budget process starts in the fall
056uh October November is kind of when we start kind of reviewing our estimates for the following school year we provide an update to the board in December and then between January and may we kind of work through our estimates change based off updated information and that's what we're here tonight is provide you what those updates are we have a few slides that kind of show the comparison of where we were in December to where we are now and then we will have that full budget document uh we're working on that through the next board meeting provide that at the June 22nd meeting for formal adoption so again tonight's just an update and in the second meeting in June we'll be We'll be asking for formal adoption on the budget so another quick overview of just
057the district's accounting um we you know we talk about uh funds we have operating funds and non-operating funds so our operating funds are those funds that are supported by our local tax base uh State revenues which go into our school buildings provide our uh you know learning environments support our schools and staff are non-operating which also we can refer to as self-supporting our Child Nutrition Community Education programs uh where it's fee based it's Revenue generating they are considered non-operating and self-supporting we have a Debt Service fund which is based off of a levy as part of our tax rate which goes to satisfy all of our general General outstanding obligation bonds and then through our bond issue we have a separate fund to account for all that and we'll have a little bit of a
058discussion regarding that as well so overall just in the 2000 23 24 so these are some of the kind of the key factors that we kind of focused our budget on uh so from a revenue standpoint we know our local tax base is very strong it's we've increased uh almost 51 percent in assessed valuation in the last 12 years that continues the Outlook continues to be strong from that standpoint we've been able to uh have some extra earnings on our investments with uh with the current interest rate environment so we're actually investing most of our surplus funds up to five percent which is the highest that I've seen here um I know there's been a lot of discussion just in the news about banking institutions and things of that you know from a school district
059standpoint the state requires that Banks pledge Securities against our deposits so our funds are secure and safe so we have been able to maximize our investments for those funds and then we also know that we've been experiencing a declining enrollment we'll have a little bit further discussion on how that impacts our state funding from an expenditure standpoint we've been able to provide competitive salary increases we've been able to implement and address some school safety initiatives which has been part of previous board meeting discussions we know that we're going to be having a capital funding plan discussion in the next couple weeks and then also just we're monitoring the open positions uh our staffing levels as well as the self-insurance funding so the the medical dental insurance Pharmacy insurance we were experiencing High claims so we've
060been kind of monitoring that we'll have a little bit of discussion about how we've been able to kind of assist with that first slide just kind of shows a comparison of our Revenue sources so the First Column there is just our 20 to 23 so that's our current year and since December we've been providing the board monthly Financial updates uh so not a whole lot of surprises which uh where we expect that Revenue to end up uh but 264 million uh the next two columns that's kind of showing our comparison so in December we had based off of our initial budget Outlook we had a revenue of 261 million based on some information uh since then some changes our Revenue has actually increased about three percent or 7.8 million we expect the uh the the
061budget we present to you in June to be have revenue of close to 269 million you'll notice that the the kind of the Lion's Share of the increases are in two sources that 1.3 million is really that change in our investment earnings and then the 6.2 million is directly related to the state funding of how this after we met with you in December and provided you our first Outlook Desi extended a provision in the um State Statute that basically holds districts harmless for any kind of significant changes to their to their attendance rates basically which drives some of our formula so we'll have we have a couple slides on that we'll provide some clarity on there this is just a graph that just kind of shows our percentage of uh that you know 78 of
062our operating funds uh come from local Revenue sources so we're heavily dependent on our local tax base an additional 18 comes from our state funding from an uh expenditure standpoint again uh we'll have about 260 million in operating expenditures for this year again those are changes that we've been kind of communicating over the last couple months through our monthly Financial reports and then in regards to the expenditures for the 23 24 school year you can see that we've had some revisions between line items but overall no material changes to our overall expenditure budget just basically updating forecasts that we had in place and changes that we made based on some decisions that have been made the last couple months so we expect our 23-24 budget that will present in June to be close to 262
063million this is a fun balance uh kind of where we expect our phone balances to end up so again for the 22-23 school year uh we expect our fund balance to improve by 4.3 million um if you look at the two next two columns when we initially presented a budget Target in December we were expecting a very small decrease in our fund balance about 400 000 with the change in the revenue sources that we're seeing primarily through the state funding we've been able to turn that around and we're expecting a very healthy increase to our fund balance of about 7 million as you can see that puts our projected ending fund balance at up close to 85 million at June 30 of 24 which is around 32 percent so we have a couple slides we'll
064get through a few more of these and I'm going to kind of end the conversation on the fund balance piece of it and kind of kind of wrap the conversation before we turn into any kind of questions regarding fund balance so this just provides a very high level kind of summary of where our fund balance has been the last six seven years so you can see back in the 2017-18 school year we were hovering right at that 22 percent which that's our our targets we have the 18 plus the four percent stabilization so for 22 percent and then you can see over the last five years we've been able to increase that so we'll kind of recap where those sources of the the increase for the fund balance has been but again we're projecting a
06532 percent increase 32 fund balance at the end of next school year from a local uh Revenue standpoint this just kind of highlights um you know how dependent and important we are to our local tax base uh 84 of our local funds come from our assessed tax um assess valuations uh and another significant part is a sales tax that's a prop C money that we get that's a pass through from the state uh of about 23 million or 11 so 95 percent of our local revenues coming from those two sources so we're going to kind of talk about a couple of these and first one is the local property taxes so this is based off of information that when we set our tax rate in September of every year we gather information that's the assessed
066valuation is based off of the County Assessors so we have a blended tax rate because we have St Louis County and also Jefferson County so we have two assessors that will provide us information um every odd calendar year so 2023 is an odd calendar year obviously so that's a reassessment year um so I'm sure maybe some of us have been receiving some letters from the county assessor about our assessments so every other year so the odd years um that's when the county assessor does the reassessment so we know that for next year we can expect an increase in our assessed valuation which drives our Revenue sources from local taxes as you can kind of see with 1.7 billion in the last seven years I'm sorry last 10 years our assessed valuation has increased again very
067healthy local tax base there we go so this is just a calculation for the property taxes again for next year we've set a target of our sus valuation which drives our tax rate as well as the the revenue earned on those assessed valuation at 4.41 4.41 you can see our operating tax rate lease is projected to be relatively flat to where it is the school year and because of the increase in the assessed valuation we're expected to our operating Revenue uh for local assessed taxes to increase 7.1 million and again you typically see those increases in the odd calendar years so in the 24-25 budget year we'll be talking about a non-reassessment year so we'll see relatively flat Revenue in that standpoint basic formula so we have a couple slides on our state formula there
068are four factors that are involved with the revenue that is part of this the state formula three of them are controlled at the state level first one is the state adequacy Target so essentially this is the funding level that the state legislature State legislation has placed on providing educational services to our per student amount that amount is 6375. uh we have a dollar value modifier which is essentially just a cost of living adjustment each year that just fluctuates a basis point or two every other year and then the appropriation rate that's just how much the formula is being funded so the last number of years has been fully funded at 100 percent so the one factor that that's impacted at the district level is our weighted average daily attendance this is essentially our enrollment times
069our attendance rate so in under a normal formula funding scenario school districts are allowed to use either the highest of the current school year or the previous two school years so in environments where school districts are seeing an increase in enrollment they're able to capture State formula money in real time based off of the increase in their enrollment so they're able to capture that where for instance Rockwood we're experiencing a decline in enrollment we're able to kind of smooth our impact to the loss of students in a revenue standpoint over at the most three years so a provision that the state has that does he has extended the last two years that's benefited Rockwood because of our declining enrollment is they've allow extended a provision where we can go back to the 2019-20 school year
070and use that average weighted average daily attendance as part of our formula for the revenue that we received so typically after the 21-22 school year we have now to received Revenue based off of that Year's attendance well because of the provision we've been able to use it and we'll be able to actually use it for the fifth year next year so that's driving the change in our Revenue source long answer I apologize it's very complicated but that provision essentially has benefited the district the last two years by about 14 million or it's almost a five percent increase to our fund balance so that has really driven the last two years and the changes have always been made after we presented in December so going into December we expect that fall off to happen and then
071we get a nice surprise after that which we're able to happily report here tonight that it's been continued for the 24-25 school year there you go um so this is just a historical snapshot of kind of the the formula factors at the state level um going back the last 13 years again that state actually Target back in the 2010-2011 was paid at 6124 you can see if you go to the bottom of the graph uh the last five years the state has funded it at 6375 so no increase to that Target um over the 13 years the state funding from The s.a.t standpoints increased four percent but if you put that in comparison to the cost that Rockwood has per student our cost of educating a student since 2010 2011 has increased 26 percent so
072you can kind of see the imbalance related to that so you can see on the on the on the uh the right hand side the the actual funding that we received from the state so the last couple years when the SAT has been the same at 6375 you can see some changes in our Revenue particularly from 1819 to 1920. well that's primarily because we've uh increased our enrollment in the water has increased so that's what's driving the changes in the rut in the last couple years this is a very busy schedule here so this is just kind of summarizing the formula the two things I just wanted to point out um again as I kind of mentioned when we presented the update back in December we were expecting a 6.3 million dollar decrease to our
073state funding in the 23-24 school year but because of the provision that's been extended it's actually kind of reversed that so now we're with some other small adjustments we're anticipating state revenue to essentially stay flat compared to the 22-23 school year but from a budget perspective of what we presented to the 2324 school year it's improved revenues by 6.2 million now the impact of that is now we expect 2425 is when that will decrease and will be kind of forecasting for the revenue to drop in the 24-25 budget here okay as I got to mentioned the other significant local uh is the prop C sales tax this is just the pass-through based on the sales tax collections at the state level the provision for the state statute extension does not apply to prop C in
074the 23 24 school year so we will be paid off of the 22 23 attendance we are expecting a decrease to that we have an estimate of 17 862 so we can see that we are expecting a decrease in Prophecy revenue of about 1 million we do anticipate the amount per water to increase but it's probably going to offset by some balancing to our water so our attendance rate so that 17862 is a very rough estimate based off of some preliminary attendance information so we expect the number to essentially balance off when it comes when everything kind of Settles thank you this is an overview of the expenditures that we expect to present for the the budget in June it's a high level summary by categories so uh the 20 again the 23 um expenditure
075budget that we'll be presenting essentially includes the school safety initiatives all the salary and benefit adjustments that have been approved by the board the last couple months and some other minor changes since December so again 83.3 percent of our budget for 23.24 is invested in our staff so that includes salaries and retirement contributions medical contributions so typically when you see when we have positions that are full I know we have some openings and custodial and some other positions that percentage is really going to be around 85 to 86 percent but because of that we have some openings in the positions we're seeing that percentage but lower but 83 to 86 percent is invested in our staff a quick overview of our self-supporting again these are a non-operating funds Child Nutrition um we'll be able to
076reinvest in some of this equipment because of some of the surpluses it's experienced the last couple years especially as it relates to Federal reimbursements on meals Community Education continues to be strong enrollments registrations and their programs are increasing Student Activities everything at the school level is starting to return as continue to return to normal and even at the preschool program we're seeing increase in enrollments which are driving some changes to services that they're be able to provide at the Early Childhood Center Capital funding again it will I think at the next board meeting we'll have some additional information and details that we're going to be talking through on the capital side of things but just a quick reminder that we will be fully spending our two or April 2017 authorization this summer we have some
077small remaining projects that we'll be completing so those funds will be fully spent currently we have no dedicated funding allocation to provide for cycle maintenance and Technology needs our current debt service rate of 68 cents is sufficient to cover all of our our debt obligations and again we'll kind of dive into a little more detail in a couple weeks about the the dedicated Levy transaction transition and some of the key factors but again one of the items driving that is the current interest rate environment and we'll have a little more information on that in a couple weeks Dan if I could just jump in really quickly so on May 18th we will meet actually here a little bit earlier we'll have a standalone session to focus on what he's referencing this relates to the capital
078funding we need a deeper dive and so we'll make sure you have some documents before that meeting but that's when we'll do that I'll get back to you Dan all right I think I'm gonna round kind of wrap this up here so just overall again our Outlook um you know we continue to look out at a a balanced budget keep in mind of our fund balance policies maintaining our AAA rating we're one of four school districts in Missouri that has a AAA rating um we also know that we're going to have to kind of react to the changes in the state funding because of our declining enrollment um but kind of going back a couple of the slides here just kind of round up with from a fun balance standpoint um 32 percent it's a
079high percentage it's one of the highest uh at least since I've been in Rockwood it's not the first time we've been over 30 percent but it's been quite a while I'm trying to get there sorry um but there's benefits to having a strong fund balance um I may have put slides asleep I'm getting there so again it wasn't just a couple years ago where we were kind of hovering right at the fund balance percentage um so the last five years you can see that's when we really kind of increase our fund balance there's been a number of reasons one is I kind of mentioned the state funding um the last two years 14 million's been ill we've been able to benefit from that standpoint we did have some cost savings from the school closures that
080we've had some expenditure budgets kind of go back into fund balance just because of not operating during those times um our our local tax base continues to be strong as I kind of mentioned Outlook looks good or collections look good um at one point in those years when we were kind of hovering around that 22 percent there was a lot of settlements that were happening back where we were paying back taxpayers uh so kind of our our collections were kind of upside down but that's kind of smoothed out um we've also been able to provide competitive salary increases um as I kind of mentioned from the self-insurance plan we've been impacted by high increases and just claim utilization prescription costs things of that nature and with the fund balances we've been able to provide almost
0816 million to that fund to kind of help stabilize that and what that does though is that continues to provide a rich insurance benefit package to our employees The District covers 100 employee 50 dependent we're able to limit in these times any kind of significant premium increases um and we've been able to limit plan design changes so we've been able to utilize some of our fund balances to kind of reinvest back into our staff to kind of help limit some of those costs overall again just um that fund balance is going to allow us to kind of absorb any kind of changes that we may like unexpectedly have to encounter due to maybe funding changes at the local level some changes from a commercial standpoint at the assess valuation state level if there's any cuts
082at the state level we'll be able to absorb some of those provides a long-term financial plan as we kind of you know this fall we'll start working in the 24-25 budget we already know we'll be working through a non-reassessment here State funding is going to be decreasing but we have the resources and availability to kind of work through react and then also be able to come up with any kind of changes or requests and accommodate those we also know that from a capital funding standpoint at this time we have no dedicated Levy as I kind of mentioned if we have fixed on failure type items where we need to make sure that our buildings are operated this will be a resource to address those specific items HVAC units go out other kind of significant items
083so that would be an appropriate use of being able to use that one-time item for it and then just long range we just know that um if we go through a budget process where we have a deficit spin we just have to know that we have to have an exit plan because a continuous decrease in fund balance I just kind of mention we'll get back into the to the low percentages we're just set up for a great long-term financial plan so with that I'll try to get back but be happy to take any questions thank you for making this make sense to someone that's not a math person really quick question on the SAT when and how does the state determine that amount it looks like it's been very stagnant and we know inflation's gone
084up so how do they determine that amount per student yep and Paul I'll have you jump in here too but it's really part of the legislative process so when the governor sets the budget they go at the state level go through a calculation as to what it takes for funding to establish that Target and to my understanding um that their view the 6375 is their targeted per student funding and then they put them Revenue in there from that standpoint usually that happens between January and March by at the state level I don't know when's the last time that we've had to take out Tans because I know that that's the movement for that fund balance how many years has it been since we've had to do that I can't recall all the time that Rockwood
085has um I've even in my current role and in my previous role when I worked through the district um it's you know price spanning 20 years where I don't recall fund balances have been in a position where Tans have not been required I can't say that it's never happened but the recent recollection I can't see that they've happened it's because you guys are doing a great job thank you just a comment about the state adequacy Target that's why we have the next item listed it's problematic the numbers speak for themselves um and something really needs to change so it's a nice teaser into the the next agenda item and I was going to ask too if you can just give like the most basic um sort of description of what is the difference between Rockwood
086as a formula School versus a hold harmless District um just I know I know that's a could be a very high level thing but I think there's you know I saw your footnote I just think that's something that's really helpful to know especially as we're going into that sorry heat it right up so um there are a couple hundred school districts in the state that are hold harmless so um as they rewrite the formulas typically the formulas have to be revised and um uh drafted differently over time because demographics change things of that nature so when they redrafted the formula in 2005 from the old formula they put a provision in there that says if you whatever you were getting per student under the old formula we're going to hold you harmless to where you
087get at least that amount in the new formula so those districts that are hold harmless we're at a level prior to the 2005 revision they were able to maintain that level until you hold harmless provision now over time that can change you can go from a hold harmless District to a formula District if your demographic changes and you get more money under the new formula then they will pay you under the new formula but those districts that are hold harmless we're getting more money per child under the old formula when it was revised thank you I have one other question regarding the fund balance percentage do you think I appreciate the explanation for the potential going forward and um all the things we need to be prepared for do you think it's wise to have
088a discussion about that percentage and what that is that we keep as our Target is there a reason why we should consider a different number in that scenario given just the climate of ups and downs Staffing there's major major challenges going on in school districts that aren't going to just go away like this so is that a conversation we should be having it yeah I think it's a conversation that we have as we move forward again we've got to consider all the Dynamics as we move forward uh Capital funding is certainly a big component of that discussion and once we get a dedicated funding source for that that also drives on the operating side absent of a capital funding plan then we may have to use some operating sources until we Define that so that
089would be part of the discussion but it does you know the fact that you have a have built up a budget surplus that's a good thing because it gives you some flexibility to have these discussions as we move forward and it it relates to all of our different areas you know our salaries and benefits for our staff can we do something different there are there some other programs that we need to look at so it gives us the ability to have that discussion again and to Dan's point we can adopt some things that have us incur a budget deficit for a period of time but that's got to be planned for and you got to have an exit strategy to where you have that soft Landing where you get back to where you need to
090be but yeah it's certainly worthy of a discussion thank you because what I have heard in your presentation and when I studied over the past few days so we don't know what's going to happen in 24 25 right with that 6 million well here's what we do know for 24.25 and Dan's alluded to it we've got a seven million dollar budget surplus for next year but we know we're going to lose six million of that when the formula is paid under the regular provision so we know a good portion of that's going to go away the other part that we'll just have to keep an eye on is what does a local and state economies look like are we still in a in a good place or are we seeing something different in the economic
091setting so those are factors that we'll have to watch out continue to watch what's going on in legislation and what is the state doing as far as funding uh you know they're getting ready to wrap that up this week matter of fact tomorrow so we should have a really good idea but the the outlet from the state this year looks pretty good they're going to continue to fund Transportation like they did this year uh 100 appropriation hopeful for the formula but those are things that we'll just have to keep an eye on as we move as we move forward I've got a couple of nerdy questions to ask so uh please bear with me and my apologies up front uh but I did want to make a starting comment that I mentioned shortly before the
092meeting and I don't know if it was mentioned in the last board meeting because my memory isn't as good as it used to be but I did want to congratulate the whole financial team for getting their certificate of excellence again uh with uh asbo a good achievement there 18 years running it shows in all the numbers we're seeing here and the whole commentary here so congratulations and job well done thank you um how far out do we forecast even roughly so we're talking about these things that could occur in future years do we go out three years five years ten years we focus heavily on the three-year Outlook but we do it's tensing things out further as you know the further you get out the less Clarity you have but yeah okay uh part of
093the the good news here is the current interest rate is giving us a better yield on our CDs what's inflation doing to us where do we see inflation hitting our budgets well we had the FED chairman speak to that the other day but no it inflations we have seen inflation impact some of our activities already especially after the pandemic and the supply chain disruptions a lot of things especially in Child Nutrition we saw food goes quite a bit but even just general day-to-day supplies so we're having to work very closely with our vendors as we renegotiate in bid and those things that have annual renewals and have that discussion to keep those increases to a minimum but there's a lot of pressure on on annual new items in the in the cost so it's it's
094not uncommon uh to see something that has maybe even a double-digit increase that's even well above inflation so we're seeing it in different pockets yeah I just make the comment to both you all and the whole board you know some of us remember back the late 70s early 80s where inflation got to 10 12 20 percent you know that's why you have that Reserve right so that something like that happens you can weather the storm and come out the other end um do we see an impact on some of the activities going on in Chesterfield and wildwood such as downtown Chesterfield the Development Area there will that positively impact our Revenue um and if so are we you know do we have a line of sight to that or are we completely in conjecture at
095this point no we we stay in continued contact with the assessor office as far as what's being developed we also Dan and his team work with our on the residential side with our developers on any bailout schedules for residential development we visit with them about their their plan of how many homes this year next year Etc so we look at it both on a residential and Commercial side but to your question the um commercial development that we're seeing primarily out in the Chesterfield area there'll be a future benefit to that District some of it is tax abated and some of it is partially tax abated and some of it's not at all but any of the new construction we get benefit from and we're not limited on the amount of growth Dan talked about reassessment
096years and non-reassessment years in reassessment when property values are adjusted we're limited by the CPI as to what we can capture but that doesn't apply to new construction so we get the benefit of all that outstanding when we forecast Dan made the comment that you know we've had some positions open so that's given us a positive variance do we forecast with an open position fill rate or do we forecast all positions filled or all positions unfilled I'll let Dan speak to that some but I know we have taken a partial approach to that we know we're not going to fill all our positions over the next 12 months but we have made some allocations assuming that what Staffing levels will get a little bit better Danny then you want to add yeah we've uh just
097to that point have kind of changed our model the last two years especially so for next year we we have you know Sicilian custodial I believe we have almost 55 60 openings I budget I have a placeholder for uh 25 of that I'm hoping obviously for more uh but from a budget perspective to provide a realistic budget I've added a placeholder for 25 positions for that yeah and then maybe the last question here but maybe I need to Pivot one of the comments that you all made you know very uh continuously throughout the presentation is our declining enrollment rate is that something we need to have a board discussion on is that something we can influence and maybe that's more a Dr Kane question I think we need to strongly consider a demographic study at
098some point so that we have a very firm grasp of what is happening there are subpockets within Rockwood so that we have a very firm understanding of what is in fact like truly actually happening and during the pandemic it's very very difficult to assess that to really gain a true feel during pandemic out of that I think we should be doing that within the next 12 months yeah that's enough thank you hi good questions thank you thank you both excellent presentation all right thank you okay next uh could I have a motion to approve the resolution for the appointment of a blue ribbon commission so moved motion and a second and director cadigan is going to read that for us this evening would you like him to do that first and then speak that's fine
099okay uh so resolution calling for the appointment of a blue ribbon commission to study Missouri's funding formula whereas Missouri funds school districts through a basic Foundation formulation and whereas Missouri funds school districts through a basic Foundation formulation created in 2005 with the passage of Senate Bill 287 and whereas the state adequacy Target sha is a driver of the foundation formula funding for Missouri schools and whereas the s.a.t has been at 6 375 dollars since FY 20 and will remain so through fy24 and whereas The Rockwood School District is 18 funded by the state of Missouri and whereas Missouri funds Elementary and secondary education from local sources at a significantly higher level than the national average and whereas the SAT has remained relatively level over the past decade in current dollars but has declined when ingested
100for inflation and whereas Missouri legislature has altered the foundation formula for it to be considered fully funded and whereas in 2020 Missouri was ranked 49th in the nation in the percentage of school funding coming from State resources 32 percent according to Nea data and whereas since the reinstatement of the 5 growth cap on the SAT in 2016 the SAT has not kept up with inflation and whereas the SAT has steadily decreased over the last 10 years when ingested for inflation and whereas The Rockwood School District has averaged less than 1.9 percent growth in state funding forming and state formula funding over the past six years now therefore be it resolved by The Rockwood Board of Education as follows section one that the Board of Education hereby calls upon the State Board of Education to appoint
101a blue ribbon commission to study the foundation formula and present findings and recommendations no later than November 30th 2023 section two at this resolution shall be in full force and effect from and after the date of its passage and adoption and approved by the Board of Education okay thank you so yes they are asking the board to uh through this resolution to send this to um to Desi and to um State Board of Education and we'll also send it to Dr Chris Gaines at Melville who's kind of leading the charge for Missouri on this behalf if the board so chooses to adopt this resolution there's been a number of schools that have already adopted this resolution I think at last count he last number I heard and it's been several days ago they had over
102100 schools that have already participated in the resolution but basically the premise is this and we and dad did a good job talking about the formula but the foreman was drafted in 2005. it's 18 years old so it's got a lot of a lot of age to it and it's really time to look at it number one number two the SAT as as Dan showed his remained for several years that's the main funding driver of the formula and when it's flat if you're Ada's the same it's no new money and we've been in that uh per in that situation since 2020. uh and there's no uh when you look at it forecasted it's not going to go up within the next couple years so it's really just time to look at the foundation formula and
103the needs of this meeting part of the resolution talks about it was recalculated in 2016 and it was recalculated to really um they couldn't fund it at its current level so now we have what we call a fake formula for lack of a better word if the formula would have been at where it was supposed to be in 2015 it would be in the range of 6700 instead of 63.75 the difference in that for Rockwood's about seven million dollars it should even be higher than that so it's really just time to look as a formula doing what it really needs to do and the formula is the largest funding source from the state level for school districts so it's it's it's crucial to all the school districts within the state so we're just asking the
104commission to take a look at it Dr Kane anything you want to add I think the numbers speak for themselves that that you've shared actually slide 14 of the presentation gives a historical overview to literally show how flat this has been um that number of 49th out of 50 states thank you we are not in a competitive position it's about the most tactful thing I can say and I know that we're talking 18 of the overall budget for this District that's still a sizable chunk a sizable percentage that we need to be mindful of and and it just needs to be readdressed it needs to be Revisited and this does not happen quickly it takes time in order for there to be a significant revision to the um quite honestly the entire formula itself and
105so um this is something I think we need to band together not only uh in the county but across the state because A change is truly needed for the good not only of the students of this state but um also the future of the state of Missouri as well thank you I was going to add to that and Echo what you say because you know while we while you're highlighting the 18 there are certainly districts that rely more heavily and are suffering at a greater cost their students are and so for us to be part of this is very important as a collective so thank you for bringing it to us I'd like to make an additional comment if I could uh I'm I've been in Missouri long enough to remember when the state didn't
106fully fund the formula and the state actually ran out of money a couple times before the end of the fiscal year I think we all know from uh the news that the state has a budget surplus it's good that we have a reserve but the state also has a reserve the state is now actively discussing what they want to do with that Reserve education is one of the great things you can do to reinvest your Capital that gives you a great return on investment every time so I think this isn't just a case of does Rockwood need the formula we looked at to your point Dr Kane I think Missouri needs the formula we looked at and I think we need to be aggressive on this before the state decides what they're going before the
107legislature decides what they're going to do with that Surplus that this can be part of that conversation do we want to invest more in our primary and secondary education systems do we want to get out of that 49th position into a much better position either board comments or questions right so that motion is to approve the resolution for the appointment of a blue ribbon commission all those in favor please say aye anyone opposed thank you that passes next item on the agenda is our agenda for the May 18 2023 Board of Education meeting which is an awards night um that evening we will have a shortened agenda like we have done uh for the last couple of years at this point and we will make a motion this evening to shorten that agenda in order
108to accommodate the board Awards presentation and the celebrations that occur um at that time summer will you be there without anything no okay then we will figure out uh I know typically we have the two new board members present be the presenters that evening so director Becker will still be doing that and then we will look and see who's next in the rotation for that sorry to put you on the spot I meant to ask you that earlier so no I I have a family engagement at Wildwood Middle School thank you so I'm going to read this motion for that that meeting and um that is could I have a motion to remove patrons superintendent and board comments from the May 18 2023 Board of Education meeting agenda to accommodate for the board Awards presentation
109second motion and a second any discussion which I should have done I think we've done it all right all those in favor please say aye anyone opposed thank you that passes and the next we have future agenda presentations and events to attend I should have also noted that that Awards night is right back here at Lafayette High School so this is where we will be um beyond that here comes May so buckle up uh it's gonna get busy check your calendars and check them regularly and please update your availability for all of those appointments within the calendar because it does help us know who is where when and how and all that good stuff um okay it looks like we have a discussion item on here yes okay we do so an addition of the
110December of December 19th of 2023 as an additional Board of Education meeting date somebody give me some background here originally the meeting would have been on that Thursday the 21st but the kids and the teachers are already out for the holiday the winter break so we decided originally a year ago when we scheduled this whole thing for this 20 this calendar year coming up that we were going to just have one meeting in December and then it was brought to our attention that Finance has to do the budget update in December in our other December meeting is an awards night so that wouldn't be able to happen it's an award site it's actually too early in the month of December for that to be done so the audit has to be approved by December 31st
111I would um quite honestly in this order personally and professionally not recommend to us trying to meet over winter break at that point in time that would technically be December 31st but that sounds even hearing it out loud like a horrible idea so this is a pivot and a bit of a compromise for us to meet on ethical Tuesday December 19th Tuesday okay and just talking about it now and making that decision just allows everybody to figure out like the schedule of how that's going to look to get ready for that what's the I don't have any calendar information in front of me what is the last day students are in session that Wednesday Wednesday okay yep and then so then students and teachers are off starting on that Thursday which is why we originally
112went to the one meeting you're talking about this after the budget presentation okay do you need us to do anything no it can be a discussion if you're okay with it we can just go ahead and add it on okay sounds like it's 19. it works for me and I I think if we do it early enough that we can adjust schedules that's the important thing yeah for everybody yes I'm going to cancel that flight right all right sounds like uh the way I ask my kids things at times but okay I think we're all in uh all right and then of course we have our graduation ceremonies uh beginning May 31st with Marquette High School June 1st with the Eureka High School June 2nd Rockwood Summit as Dr K mentioned earlier and June 3rd
113Lafayette High School all at shape it's arena so for those of you who haven't attended before it's a really great week is that on our calendar what yeah I don't uh during one of those days not that I'm aware of I can check to see if we're gonna do something I usually get something from well last year we didn't have them so I'll have to check to see yes yep we'll double check everything and put updates and staying on board double check your calendars yeah there's a lot of information getting put out there right now and just a reminder that the rose Awards what is this Sunday yep and the board should be there the ceremony starts at four so get there before four yeah was the time they put down for us oh yes
114all right great then that leaves us with our second Patron comments section um I will go ahead and read a short statement about that we will now hear from those Rockwood patrons who have signed up to speak about non-agenda items as a reminder each speaker will be limited to three minutes combining time or giving your time to someone else to speak is not allowed only one speaker is allowed at the podium at a time please remember that comments about individual employees and or students will not be permitted in public session we expect that you will remain civil and respectful in your remarks and if anyone becomes disruptive we reserve the right to cut your three minutes short verbally aggressive language and vulgarity in any form is not acceptable whether you're reading someone else's remarks or
115they are your own it will not be tolerated fear convenience our three-minute time clock is ready and for this we welcome again Tom Dunn to the microphone all right it mine's in two parts the first one are there any plans they had a third team at LaSalle Springs right now class sizes highly suggest the 13 based on the Middle School numbers Crestview for example three teams 1142 students Rockwood South three teams 898 students in the sale Springs only two teams and 887 students so that's the first part second part two meetings ago I spoke about how the teachers are exhausted unfortunately there were some people in the community that felt it was their place to criticize my comments solely because of the members of the community that supported my run for school board and their
116assumption that the parents that are criticizing teachers are only from one side that is false parents have different definitions of what public education should be unfortunately if some don't agree with your Viewpoint they attack instead of having a conversation I urge the board cope committee to invite members of the community that have opposing viewpoints at the next cope meeting to start the discussion and understand and move to understand to discussion and understanding of Rockwood's role in public education and move our great District forward instead of fighting after all hope is for community outreach and public engagement thank you next speaker is G schmedeki members of the board my name is G schmediki iuc they pronouns and I'm a senior at Rockwood Summit High School I have spoken here in the past but it's been a
117while since I directly addressed you though I was here last month presenting with my school's prisoner group recently I also worked on a project that involved putting up a bulletin board display about transgender day of visibility which was March 31st as well as the National Day of Silence which was April 14th which caused several issues online I'm here today to properly address those issues what I have spoken here in the past I've discussed the harassment I face in school along with the lack of direct action taken to help students such as myself students who are transgender and queer since then my school has slowly been getting better if not for the sacrifices that my community has made in the time that we have given up to help people understand how dire the situation is for
118queer students in Rockwood up until recently most people have not gotten a glimpse into what my everyday life looks like but that'll change when a photo of my work was put on Facebook and adults in our community decided to talk about it on an extraordinarily public scale if you did not have the honor or privilege of seeing the display that I helped create let me explain to you what was on it a progress pride flag the definition of the word transgender a celebration of genderqueer identities an explanation of what the word queer means to us the meaning of Our National Day of Silence nothing on the display was anything inappropriate sexual or hateful when I first saw the Facebook post I had no intention of interacting with it but that changed when things that I
119said at last month's board meeting were being directly referenced in the comment section along with a link to prisma's presentation and a timed stamp of where we started talking in my time defending my school and my work I was not only called a groomer but I was accused of playing the victim tagged in comments accusing me of forcing sexual ideas onto children and asked invasive personal questions people admitted to trying to enter my school to see the display only to be stopped by my principal one person even asked me to prove that I get harassed at school told me I was hurting children that I was sick and that I am naive and this person claimed to have a master's degree in education when I stopped interacting with the post as the interactions became too
120much to handle the same comments were mentioned by sexual relations misgendered me and mocked my pronouns it got to a point where a principal at my school called my parents to ask if I was okay if you are thinking yourself well this kid should have never interacted with the post to begin with then you clearly have no understanding of how activism works if someone was saying such terrible things about you or your work online wouldn't you try to defend yourself as well members of the board you grew up hearing about queer people zero percent none of the time or only being told lies about us but I'm growing up in a place where queer people are seen But in a place that is also trying to outlaw gender queer and queer people as a whole
121I am unsafe in the state that I call my home can you even begin to understand how terrifying that is shouldn't we at least feel safe at school I begged you last year and I'm here begging you again please do something tangible that we can see to help make trans kids and queer kids feel safe in Rockwood because the truth is we don't thank you next speaker is Beth shmeneke good evening and thank you for listening to my words tonight I'm Beth schmedecky and I'm a parent of five Rockwood students I'm a volunteer and I'm a teacher in the St Louis area I am passionate about my family my students my job my friends and I work hard to make sure that people around me feel accepted a few weekends ago my child gee was
122publicly attacked online by our Rockwood community my family is not quiet about things we are passionate about and that is one thing that I am very proud that we passed on to our kids I wanted to talk to you tonight about being a bystander a bystander is a person who is present at an event or an incident but does not take part when someone is clearly getting harassed and you do nothing you are a bystander when you hear people make racist and homophobic remarks and say nothing you are a bystander when you say someone else will do it and do nothing you are a bystander by doing nothing you are saying to the victim that what they are feeling is not important you have better things to do than to get involved by being in
123being a bystander you are complicit in the negative actions happening around you when I was watching my child stand up for themselves against an adult a grown person that lives in our community it put me in defensive mode I have heard had I have a hard time understanding how someone who is so deeply loved by so many can be hated and bullied by people who know absolutely nothing about them it got me thinking about all of the students and children that I come in contact with and those out there that I don't even know can you think of one child that doesn't want to be loved of course not kids want to be loved they want to be cherished they want to be acknowledged to be seen to be heard to be accepted I feel
124that the Rockwood School District is often a bystander I feel that there are too many times that problems are put off until later we can no longer allow that to happen your students are often under pressure by our community for their identity and needs support I know that if my own students came into my classroom and did not feel seen accepted and loved I failed them I would never want my students to look back and think that I didn't value them it's not my business to understand everything they do but it is my business to see believe in them and give them my attention Rockwood I urge you to stop being a bystander and see your students to our community these students you are attacking need love shame on you to our career Community I
125see you and I love you thank you [Applause] next speaker is uh Chris I think Ellis all right I do not think Chris is here then so that concludes our meeting for this evening meeting adjourned