January 22, 2024 Board of Education Meeting

001yeah I think so I call this meeting to order roll call please Miss Donna Mr Garing Miss Miller here Miss Williams here Mr reer Miss Garcia here Mr Foster here miss Lanny here and if everyone could please stand for the Pledge of Allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the for it stands one nation God indivisible and justice for all board if you could continue standing there is a recognition Mean Girls Annie br so I'm Dr Heather rig and I'm the principal at Central and it is my pleasure to introduce Annie bramage to you tonight and I know that when she starts talking she is going to shine all the light on our students that were part of the cast and the crew so before that happens I just wanted

002to make sure that we shine a little light on her as well um Annie is 100% into whatever it is that she puts her mind to and if you have been to a theater production at Central that is obvious um in every way but that is also what she puts into a random Tuesday at Central in any of her classes and um the work that it took to apply and then to load two Pinsky trucks and 100 three Pinsky trucks and0 plus kids um the undertaking that this had been on top of the honor but to give it to the students took so much love and dedication and hard work so I just wanted to make sure that while we are recognizing the cast and the crew that we are also very much recognizing um

003Mrs bramlage and her ability to connect to the community and all of the community support that we have received um we just wanted to recognize that before I turn things over to Mrs okay how long do I have no um first of all it started when they when they released the rights for me and girls I instantly went to my friend and said um Dr rank please what are your thoughts on this we talked a little bit she's like let's do this from the very beginning the support that I've have had at Central is amazing and as we know we cannot do our job without support we have had an incredible amount of of support from the community um various Schools board members throwing um fundraisers so that we could take all of these kids

004down for this amazing opportunity we filled out a 34 page application to have our show adjudicated that just means we're going to come down and see what this show is all about with the chance of being selected to perform at at State at the Music Hall down in Kansas City and fortunately we were the ones we we uh won we loaded our truck up uh or three trucks all the kids parents volunteers food costumes props took it down built rebuilt our show in 4 hours less than four hours performed it twice for every um Missouri thespian which if any of the kids St it was a moment that I will cherish forever I can't even imagine the core memory that it made for these students um we struck the set in an hour 18 minutes

005we had to be out of the Music Hall and at by midnight um and we did it because these kids are so blasted dedicated to the process and and the magic and the family and theater is a community and it's a group where anyone can come and be accepted and loved and and not feel that they can't be who they are if it was magical it was magical I remember final night Curtain Call I am sobbing thinking of what these kids just did I sit back today and I still say I can't even believe we did what we did it was absolutely insane I cherish it I cherish these kids I cherish this family that we built and I could not be as a director more proud of what we accomplished so thank you so

006much I don't have the whole casting crew of 117 I just have about 15 um that said that they could come so on their behalf we are accepting it for our entire theater Family come on [Applause] troops do we gather around okay good do you want to hear from one little dumpling about what the experience meant to them who what who's my little dumpling are you my dumpling okay yes this experience was crazy it definitely a lifetime cuz we grow up especially at our theater lovers we grow up going to the Music Hall seeing these Broadway shows and never thinking that we could perform on that same stage with that big of an audience sold out crowd um it was truly amazing and one thing that I have to give big thanks and Kudos is

007to Annie and all the adults I never saw a time that we were so stressed that we were all all stressed we make stress like a happy stress in some way like we we're going to have fun with it we're going to have stressed but yes it was a lovely experience when I first found out we're were doing Mean Girls I was like this is crazy how are we going to do it we did it so that's very exciting but thank you all for um yes support I think support is like the biggest thing that we learned this year and we found out who we can really lean on and we did and so thank you guys for all the support thank you okay while you're Gathering me again I could really make these board

008meetings like woo let's have a funy um my next member that I'm gonna do no I'm kidding um Mac brought up a really great thing I have an amazing team Sarah McLaren if you know her she's on my team Seth mastan Chris Lake um Aaron York Becky and Jeff C Robbie and Morgan Morton um I have this huge village lanaa and Alex um I call them the woodlan I combined won and Castleman um Mr liping Cott Mr minks like Kathy weeks who played the piano so beautifully like I I don't do this alone and I will never take credit Chris Lake told me my first show I ever um directed he said if you want to have a production that is successful surround yourself with great people and that is exactly what I've done so

009they are my family they are my tribe and they are the glue really that holds us together and makes these Productions happen so I couldn't do it without them [Applause] okay awesome [Applause] congratulations thank you so much for your that is what it's all about that was a highlight of my night right there um okay for business oh nope audience participation first Mike Moore thank you folks that's a lot of positive energy to follow so I hope I make this uh well do this well Hey listen I was with you folks uh probably uh more than a year ago and we were talking about standing up a new diesel technology program at hilard and that's happened and it's off to a great start and uh you know we equipped that program with uh state-of-the-art uh

010training AIDS uh with the help of the state of Missouri uh Workforce Development and uh from Altech and I'm here tonight to uh just really pleased to talk about another business partner that's come alongside us to support Hillyard and this is a big one dinler truck North America is a great partner of Alex um but they're really a premier supplier of trucks um all up and down the highways all over the world and so you might know them by their brand names Freightliner uh Western Star but anytime you're on the highway just take a look for those names and you'll see them um they are no joke they are uh employed 34,000 people and more importantly um they have 700 dealer and service organizations across the country one of which uh is right here in

011town Dave diesel uh works on a lot of freight liners right and so I'm just so happy that they're coming alongside us and that they see the value and the importance of Workforce development more importantly is what it does for the kids I think it sends them two strong messages which is number one you are needed you are needed businesses need you to skill up and hit the workforce and boy we are willing to stand behind it and the second thing is in particular for the Hillyard students it says you in particular are worth just the best state-of-the-art equipment that we can possibly provide and so tonight I would just like to thank the board for their continued support of the programs at Hillyard Tech thank [Applause] you Jeff Lee good evening um as a

012member of the facilities committee um a little disappointed that the boundary issue seems to be tabled again uh for a long-term plan uh my questions come about with this why even take the time to run the scenarios if we were going to push off to a long range plan um the scenarios that that I presented a couple other community members presented were allowed to be adapted in case uh the long-term plan went one way or another the only thing that we didn't uh accommodate for would be a lot of school closings um in my year and a half to two years on the on the facilities committee I've repeatedly asked the question or questions where has it worked closing schools where is it better uh how does it save us money how does it help

013students and if you look Nationwide most of the data is there for smaller more intimate schools if you look at our own data from when we've closed schools has the success of those students went up has the attendance of those students went up has the discipline went down and the answer is not in the favor of fewer School larger schools and that's at the elementary level as well um bigger schools in my opinion they don't don't solve the problem they just hide it and whatever long range plan you come up with you need to show us how it benefits kids and I've said this before where is the value I'm biased but but I admit my bias and we have two camps in this town one Camp wants to continue with the three school system

014and you could say it's not sustainable current way it probably isn't it needs to be tweaked it needs to be addressed one Camp believes that you should cater to a few people and everybody else will be fine and I don't say that from social media that's from the emails they send that's from the things that they say if you take care of this group everybody else is better I don't believe in that I don't believe in that in the classroom I don't cater to one little group I try to bring everybody up I try to do that when I coach that's just just who I am and what I do um I could talk forever on this but I just thought I would just share a few things I I'm I'm so disappointed in this

015uh we need to do better we need to do something and I just fear we're going to go into the same spiral again show me something that's better and I'll be happy to support it but nobody's shown me anything nobody's shown me value nobody's answered those questions that that I've I've brought up I just have a different Vision than a lot of people I want more participation more involvement more ownership more of the small schools our small schools consistently have the highest test scores they consistently have the best attendance over the last 10 years and so look at the data it it supports it as far as the new position of equity now this is my smart alic way but uh Equity is not just race it is socioeconomic status as well and it's kind

016of ironic that the person that's up there up here speaking about Equity more than anybody is a middle-aged white guy and I'll own that I will fight for those kids because they don't have the wealth a lot of times to fight for it themselves I just I'll leave you with this and this is the history teacher and me bad things don't happen from when bad people don't cause bad things to happen bad things happen when good people do nothing we need to do something and I challenge the board I challenge the administration if you don't come up with a plan that the community likes where we went from the community just 3 months ago needs to decide which route they want to go to this is unsustainable if you don't if the community doesn't get

017behind one plan maybe it's time to listen to the community as co-chair with Mr Foster my number one thing on on that I kept saying on that is remember everybody in this town gets a vote regardless of income regardless of race regardless of age let's figure out what the community wants let's develop a plan we can get behind show me the value thank [Applause] you thank you Mr leak and Mr Moore as well thank you approval of the agenda is there a motion I'll make that motion second Motion in a second after you're ready would you call the vot Please Mr f yes Mr rer yes Miss Williams yes Miss Garcia yes Miss Miller yes Mr Garing yes Miss Ling yes and the motion passes 7 zero consent agenda is there a motion for approval

018I'll make that motion I'll Sor thank you David and Mr Foster yes Mr Mr rer yes Miss Williams yes Miss Garcia yes Miss Miller yes Mr Garing yes Miss Lanning yeses EV Z Ro committee reports academics committee Kim would you like to start sure it's not encouraging but we have results back from uh from desie which is the Department of Elementary and secondary education um and it it's released but the data is from last spring so that doesn't include what's happened this fall and improvements made and we were given uh most of those in attendance were given some paperwork that showed our charts and where we rated among the cohorts in this area so some are cohort s that look like us uh some are not so most of the comparisons that were made had

019to do with our cohorts those who were similar in attendance and free lunches and those kind of things so in in that cohort uh we range about the same um I know not everybody likes to have comparisons don't compare us here we don't have these kind of people don't compare us to this but sometimes we need that to know that we have somebody to work with to find answers with if it's working in one why can't it work here so so that's the point of a comparison and having those to kind of give us a place to head or to place a back off with what we're doing so it had information uh about where we stand with math with the English language with science with history uh they're not impressed they're just not impressive

020scores but this Administration those who work with this kind of information I don't know what more they can do to help our students um they have uh though they have programs um Dr laau is the one that does the tallying of our information but right here Lauren Kelly talked to us about one aspect of how we encourage uh learning how we encourage people to come alongside into the school program and it's a program called parents as teachers so she gave us some wonderful data of how the school district comes toite parents uh with little ones even before they reach school age so it's like they they walk them in they teach they come alongside the parents what can we help you with can we give you learning tools can we come in and help you

021figure out uh what your child needs and uh before that child even gets to school very impressive uh parents as Educators because they're the first people that educate their own child before we ever see them so so this is something that we were all given so it's a map of that program and it it breaks us down into our demographics who lives here where that is it also uh demonstrated how many people we serve within this particular program and uh for personal VI visits was 1318 that that's a huge number 139 families are enrolled and attended some of these programs so it's I like it because we have begun a second Early Learning Center so this kind of even prepares them for that um the YWCA comes alongside them they have six full-time parent Educators

022and we obviously we'd love more um there are uh one full-time program supervisor and of course we'd like that number to be larger um but I thought what a terrific way that the district comes alongside our community and help our Littles before we ever get them into school and I very impressive that's a lot of caring for our kids that's a lot of caring so back to our first one there were a couple I like the positives that this group brings to us and we do have a couple positives in this sheet in this booklet of information and one was our College and Career Readiness we're up almost 4% now that doesn't sound like much but it's positive it's a movement the way we want it to go um for those who are taking advanced

023classes we have an improvement of that almost 9% so those are positives that we can at least appreciate GR graduation followup again almost 6% Improvement in that area now that's one page of our information uh graduation rates have kind of been steady not too much of a difference and there's a lot we can glean from this to know how to help our kids how to help our students things we need to Institute things that we need to remove or tweak and ooh but positive now one thing we should know it takes we have 3 years to to gather the information to remain accredited three years seems like it's a long time but two have already passed so we have to maintain a 70% APR to attain to maintain that uh accreditation and we are just

024under so our work's cut out for us but this group who's taking care of the academics is doing everything they know to do we did get the survey back did you want to talk about that no you're doing well the survey back from parents about um I misplaced my uh uh school start the school start time was kind of a mix so it was hard to really glean much information from that to get a preference so I mean it was mainly Elementary um parents are against an earlier start time and then the high school parents are for a later start time and I can understand I can understand each of those points I mean and students are for lat start time well of course I mean but that would be yeah normal so and there's

025a lot of factors in that if there are siblings the olders have to get to school um work schedules and to have to redo all that takes some work and then academics after school and things like that so thank you Miss Kim board members any questions I know a lot of us also attended the meeting you know but I mean everyone was not able to be there are there any questions about the information Kim presented it's a good detailed report thank you it was it was great perfect thank you finance committee before we get there I'm sorry I left off a big piece of information goe of professional development you know the teachers are required to do so much in the classroom but uh the district is offering this professional de development days for those

026who may uh our International teachers our new teachers to the district uh those who just need someone to come along and encourage uh change or uh better thinking strategies so it's nice to know that that's in place and that can take advantage of it for those teachers who need that extra you know there are teacher mentors um so I I think those are valuable to encourage Improvement in teaching because we all can thank you thanks Finance Ken or Whitney I know we have a less deficit than we were expecting and um the health care fund seems to be going okay and I'll prefer the doctor seers I'm just going to say the same things in my report so yeah okay and so we can wait until then yeah did you want to add anything Whitney

027no perfect facilities Rick and David um I don't know how much we want to get into it I know Dr Edgar is going to speak to this at the facilities meeting we talked about um the long range plan um boundaries and the bond issue were kind of the big three but I know uh on the agenda here that Dr Edgar I think is going to speak to those so I don't think I want to get too far into the Weeds on that I'll I'll leave that to Dr Edgar perfect thank you recruit and retain SAR and cim yeah so we had a productive meeting on January 17th we discussed a list of 10 strategies and everyone in attendance prioritized that which is something that the salary committee did um before we did and the results

028were pretty much the same the top three were salary schedule increase increase annual Leaf buyback and grow your own um yeah and we are going to schedule a meeting for February well we'll tackle uh results for 4 day school week and stuff like that did you want add anything um I had a question so I actually have two things first several of the meetings that we've been to I think it seems like we have a consensus of support around some sort of Levy or addressing the propy waiver something like that to address um increasing staff pay sounds like that's something we've talked about and we all tend to agree with um would there be any interest in having the staff um bring us information on that um it's my understanding we'd have to have something

029ready for a ballot initiative by the end of May so if we started talking about that February March finalize something in April I just don't want us to get to a point where we're having to rush to put something forward I don't see why not do you mean like staff survey I like that no not not a staff survey I mean the staff have have said you know in in every um they already spoken yeah I mean and obviously I don't think there going to be a lot of people that are anti raises but we've seen from some of the wage comparability we've talked about the fact that other districts have raised salaries we not where we need to be um but I just don't think we've had like an intentional conversation about it where

030that's really here's the problem what what do we plan to do um I know that the Community Alliance has data about Community Support of some sort of Levy or propy waiver removal um so I just would rather start that now in preparation for ballot language comments about that I like that I think it's much needed I mean otherwise they're not going to be able to get like enough of a raise in order to make a difference in order to want them you know to choose our district over other districts well and I just think important that we've been talking about it we know it's needed um and I think it's important that the staff see that we're moving forward with discussion and potential action you any comments on that no I mean we do have

031I mean there's a couple options I think if you obviously the teacher salar teacher salary schedule uh would be all driven from uh fund one which would be a levy increase um so you would have to put a specific amount on the ballot or we also have a propy waiver uh which is pretty uncommon amongst districts in the state of Missouri and you could put something like that on there and right now it generates 59 cents it fluctuates it it changes every time we um do the tax rate but that 59 cents would generate approximately $8 million over a period of time I mean for for one year over a period of time of 20 years if you took the propy waiver off so I think you have a couple options there and and we

032can definitely put those together for you if you want to see it about how much would uh a Sal of a salary increase with the8 M million produce oh I would say you're probably talking about um I mean I guess if you did it all once I mean I don't know necessarily would do that because it's a Rec we add to the base it's about 300,000 roughly so the math people will figure that out well yeah I mean you I don't have it in front of me but you're talking about 50 what's one cent $20,000 on 1 cent yeah so 120,000 time 59 cents C so th $1,000 increase in base puts about 3 million so 2,000 would be about 6 million be about 2,000 well and I think it just to be able to

033see which which path would make more sense which would you know and I don't want to do something where we only give $1,000 to the base I mean I think we're at a point where we really need to see how how much we can do and and what can make an impact can we get information about 2,000 to the base 4,000 to the base yeah we can run those scenarios and Dr seagar mentions about $3 million uh per thousand but it's that's with over and down right so it wouldn't be 3 M because you don't have to do over and down you only have to do it one time moving near Bay over and down you only have to do that once right I mean that's what would add to the next year yeah yeah

034well and I think you know Dr Krauss has I mean being able to see what other districts are doing I mean that's that's really part of the strategy too is making sure that in Northwest Missouri we're the most highly compensated so Dr K the uh salary schedule increase that we spoke about at the Recruitment and Retention committee was that 500 is that what we SP about um when the last Levy was passed the guarantee by the board was step and $500 on the base so that's what's guaranteed and then we also talked about what it would cost to increase $1,000 versus the 500 okay so I think it's a good idea to continue the conversation for and we'll add it to the agenda we also need just to remind you all we we did add

035thousands of the base last year yes I mean even though 500 is what we we had committed to we did out of thousand last year and was that enough It's never enough well I'm we also need to keep in mind that like ours is always really low I mean everybody's else's is over ours and then as we're talking about increasing like a th000 or to everyone else is as well you know and St and so we're still ending up at the bottom yeah and so I think if you know the staff if Dr Edgar and Dr car and Dr seagar and I just named all of you Dr mcginness can come together with what what a what removal of prop sea waiver would look like what a levy would look increase would look like where

036we really need to try to get um and how we would get there I think would be really helpful but I'd rather start that now so we can have something I mean having ballot language and like the next day having submitt it I'd rather not have to do again now is that a consensus is everyone on the board is that something you guys want to do I can make a motion to that effect if you'd like I think it's important that we have that conversation sure and get the numbers We'll add it to the agenda what AG today no to the salary or not the salary the yeah and if anyone has any more ideas on what they would like add to that just this meeting think you mentioned that the next [Music] meeting it's

037next month right yes we don't have a date okay cool and so um if we're looking at like a timeline I mean are we able to get the information needed by the next meeting you think I think that's a question for Dr yes we can put it together I can put it together in day if you're wanting a comparison to Northwest Missouri and we also look at the Metro that that's something that can be put together fairly quickly yeah I mean we're we're early in budgeting process right now I mean we're doing those meetings right now building by building um when we have a good handle on where Staffing is going to be next year because that's a piece of this too is knowing how many staff we're going to have um Katie Katie starts

038working on those numbers as soon as we finish up with the budgeting process so we're maybe just a tiny bit premature on that but um with what our staffing levels were this year that that's where that $300 Pro or 300 excuse me 300,000 to for every every hundred roughly what we had last year cuz it's looking as if all of us pretty much agree it's only a matter of an amount in how to actually execute that perfect admin reports Dr Ed I'm going to Def defer my time to later on the agenda because I have a lot to talk about so I'll turn it over to Dr mcginness thank you sure I will draw your attention to the Ami plan that I left at your stations this is a link that's online underneath our academic

039Services page but I know some of you like paper copies um so I just wanted to give you the basics of this um last year when we had snow days or inclement weather days we really didn't get to the point of even entertaining an Ami plan um I believe we were around six days um and then I saw some language on social media why is St Joe not using Ami so I just thought I would clear the air here publicly and address it we submitted an Ami application to desie last spring that was approved and we have put together a plan for St Joe that's more detailed here this year um so we have sent that out we've listened to to feedback from our parents our staff and our students that kids need to be

040kids and they need to have traditional Stone days so we've allowed some of that we also recognize we can get to a point where parents may need some learning opportunities for their kids and this would also be a way for us to recoup attendance um so virtual learning I've said this before is difficult it can be difficult for students to engage it can be a hardship for parents if they are working um so we are trying to make our plan super simple um if you look at that paper that document ELC has a choice of three activities that can be completed at home K through six would have assignments in core subjects and then have a choice of their special so that' be music art or PE and then secondary students would have assignments for

041each subject all of those assignments would be about 15 20 minutes a piece and for those students students who do not have internet access or may just have barriers to accessing that learning maybe the parents have to work they would have five days to submit that assignment to their teacher okay so then they could go back to their home buildings and then submit those things and then they would have credit for their academics and their attendance um just to put this out there too we no longer offer hotpots for staff or for families that was a reoccurring cost for our district and I know Jake had mentioned that they had a hard time getting some of those hotpots back after Co so that is something that we've no longer we're no longer providing that um

042the plan outlines office hours for each teacher so that way they would be available for students if they needed assistance with those assignments that's pretty much it in a nutshell I'll take any questions that you might have in regard to Ami and I know I sent this to you last Friday but I just wanted to kind of put it out there publicly that this could be something that we go to if we continue to have snow days since it's early January probably be pretty challenging without offering hotpots wouldn't you say to families who don't have internet or it could be U libraries are an option for families but like I said they'd also be able to go back to school and have 5 days to do those assignments once they touch base with the teacher

043and then they still get credit for the attend get the credit for attendance and academics and if they don't turn in the assignments how much would it affect their attendance that would just be for that one day but we also have in place because all they would have to have is one teacher making contact with the student and then they would be able to be counted for the full day of attendance so um we have some interventionists and some support staff in place that would be actively attempting to engage with those kids so that we could recoup attendance I see it as something that would be beneficial for us in in regard to attendance and it looks as if the teacher is part available all day then they would be yeah but there are specific

044office hours on there where students or parents could reach out if they had questions about academics any other questions for me how soon you said you were going to look into it how soon were you thinking about implementing something like this well since we just pushed this out to principales on Thursday and they're communicating it with uh staff the date we've been talking about is February 1st just to allow staff some time to get things uploaded now I will say for K through six our instructional coaches have already put together three days worth of Ami so elementary teachers will not have a whole lot that they need to do to prepare for that other than have a platform ready how do you decide if it's an a day or like a snow day or that'll

045be something Dr edar and I collaborate on just be dependent upon the situation but it would have been ideal with the water issue that we had at Hyde last fall and with Field closing that one day that would have been ideal to shift to that for those specific schools better late than never question sure could be a little bit off cuz I noticed that there's also an early learning center schedule what do those kids do during an Ami day there's a choice board on there so um DLo has put together a link and I know she had some assistance from one of the instructional coaches and it's it's all activities that they can do at home so it may be counting some objects or writing their name or reading a book it's it looks like

046a t a Tic Tac Toe board and they just like a tablet too then no it wouldn't be a tablet no it would but it's all things learning activities that they can do in the home materials they already have right anything else after that would be it are there any additional questions thank you Personnel report Dr CR all right thank you I left the supplemental Personnel report at each of your workstations um I don't think there's anything unusual in either the Personnel report or the supplemental uh so unless you have questions I would ask that you approve them as presented is there a motion to approve is there a second okay there's a motion second Mr Foster yes Mr reer yes M Williams yes Miss Garcia yes Miss Miller yes Mr Garing Miss Lanning yes

047and the motion passes approval of the bills uh yes you've had bills for a few days um a few of you have sent some questions in we appreciate those um if there are no further questions about those I'd ask that you approve the bills at this time are there any additional questions is there a motion thank you Kim is there a second I'll make it thank you David Mr Foster yes Mr reader yes Miss Williams yes Miss Garcia yes Miss Miller yes Mr Garing Miss Lanning yes thank you the motion passes XO December financials uh yes you've got a packet with a few different things there for you to look at as we go through this um operating fund uh through the end of December we're about we're at 50% of the year at this

048time our operating fund is running right now 53% of expenditures so we're uh right in there about where we expect to be our expenditures are up this year from last year um 10.86 million uh some of the areas that we are up in uh would include salaries and benefits which are up 3.1 million capital outlay is up 3.21 million uh that would include some HVAC projects and then also the Hillard expansion is part of what's creating there uh that that additional expenditure purchase services are up 3.85 million uh that includes uh some of the areas where that's really hitting U purchased instructional services that we've talked about is up 944 th000 uh transportation is up 77,000 uh and then some other purchased areas uh professional development uh some safety grant money uh and some purchase

049maintenance those areas are up um supplies are up 688,000 this year compared to this time last year our revenues uh our state revenues are down 49,000 compared to this time last year there's some timing with some payments there we're still working on that um some a stuff right there and then our tax revenues are actually up 1.35 million um at this point in the year so any questions specifically about the financials before I talk about the healthcare Trust on the certificated salaries that are up is that because of the raises from last year that that all salaries and benefits not just certificated but yes that's that's what it is I mean right here on the back yeah it's because yeah okay I'm sorry I was referring to the number I gave you sorry it's okay

050yes that's due to the raise it's the 2.65% increase and is the the contractual payments for the international teachers that's not in there right that would be I believe that would be included in the purchase Services okay okay uh the health care trust uh at the end of uh December uh including the appr 3 million we have invested we're about 6324 million um we ended November at 6.3 million so we're slightly up from last month uh but in comparison to the end of December last year we're at 5.51 million so we are up uh about 750,000 from last year at this time at the end of December uh the the plan was rning running at a 90.9% funding ratio with a surplus of $77,000 this year so um the healthcare trust is is running very

051well right now um we'll be bringing we've got something tonight we'll be looking at to add some additional benefits for staff um next month we'll have a couple of other things uh tonight we're adding it we can add it right now the uh benefits that we're looking to add for next year uh including some child care reimbursement uh those will be for next year for next school year next fiscal year so um we're in good shape there um we have some some stop loss renewal coming up uh that we'll uh lockt and we'll probably be here to visit with you about or we talk about um but right now things are Turing in a good direction for us there so any questions about uh anything with Healthcare trust okay U if there are any questions

052I'd ask for a motion to approve the December Finance ansers I'll make that motion thank you David and Mr Foster yes Mr reer yes M Williams yes Miss Garcia yes Miss Miller yes Mr Garing yes Miss Ling yes and the motion passes one quarterly investment report uh actually I'm going to give you an annual investment report tonight uh so for the the uh calendar year January to December of 23 um our total uh dividend interest and coupons realized uh is $678,000 $291 so uh we did well with our investments this year U by utilizing some of the increased uh interest rates at this time as of today the liquid rate is 5.3% uh and we have just a little over 8 8.3 million uh invested in the liquid and then we have some other and

053some bonds um the healthcare trust um we had realized some divided interest and coupons 29,000 for the year um you can see there the Investments we have that are some are coming to maturity here within the next month or so um but was a good year for for us um was a good move for us to move some money into some Investments this year um we plan to do that again next year or this coming year calendar year as we start to get those dispersements here January and February any questions about the investment report thank you Dr C is there a motion do we even need a motion I don't think we need one there I think just presented so you have it perfect thank you action items e rate category one Mr Jake all

054right um tonight we've got our annual e- rate um bids e- rates are are federally funded program that provides internet connectivity and um it infrastructure for our schools um I've got two items for you tonight are category one is for internet connectivity and this year we're up for renewal of our secondary um internet connection which is through BL blue sorry Bluebird Technologies um and that one is 1,900 bucks a month through the program um we cover 80 to or they cover 80 to 85% of it um so our cost would be about $190 a month um and that's a fiveyear cycle that that runs on so that's part one part two is a bid that we put out for cabling for four of our elementary schools um this year we're looking at doing scath well

055sorry next year this is for next year scai picket field and Coleman um so we received two bids um one bid was from Heartland uh cabling and it was a total of 566,000 and then the bid that I've brought to you for approval was for um Allegient Technologies and it totals 46,7 um now of that when we look at it eate splits eligible cost that they'll cover and things that they won't cover um the things that they won't cover are like our cable for our phones and some of our office machines and things that don't provide direct access to kids um so those are costs that we're we add in because it's cheaper for us to make all the cabling new and the same and do it all in one swoop rather than pay labor

056and everything to do it on our own separately um so for this project those four schools our eligible costs are 334,000 ineligible is about 72,000 now with the program we look that they cover between 80 to 85% of it um we won't know till we get a bid approved and submit it to the program then they look at all of our different free and reduced lunch kids and stats and things and then they tell us somewhere in that range of what they're what they're going to pay for um and then we can accept it or or deny if we're going to do the project like if they came back and said we're not giving you anything it's not going to happen but it's always a possibility um at 80% um which is the low end

057of what we've gotten every year since I've been here um we're looking at of the eligible we'd be responsible for 67,000 of that which brings the district responsibility on the project to $138,700 so if there are any questions about this if not we I would just like a motion to approve so move is there a second I'll second thank you any questions I did have one Jake y so you said that if you submit the um proposal and they don't decide to pay a certain amount you won't go through with the project yeah if the government comes back and says we're not paying you you know we we don't we're not going to pay you the 80% then we'd say well then we're not doing it but like I said that never happens like that's

058the reason they have the program and with our free and reduced percentage we've been between 80 to 85% of what they pay for every year that I've been here and you know that changes because we fluctuate a little bit between the 75 to 80% free andu number so that's why I would say I just want you to know there's a possibility and at that point we wouldn't do it because we're not budgeting for that we're budgeting for the 138,000 um because this is next year's project anyway okay all right thank you okay you call the vote please just a motion a second Mr Foster yes Mr reer yes Miss Williams yes Miss Garcia yes Miss Miller yes Mr Gary yes Miss Lanny yes the motion passes thank you 7 Z thank you I ready assessment

059PL for Renewal Dr L um this is pretty straightforward it's just an a renewal for our ready a subscription it's k through eight assessment platform so we're just asking to renew this year um on the platform so we have it next year we have a discussion then how much is it it's uh about 222,000 for year for one year and it's less than we paid last year second thank thank you are there any additional questions okay would you call the vote Please Mr Foster yes Mr reer no Miss Williams yes Miss Garcia yes Miss Miller yes Mr Garing yes Miss Landing yes and the motion passes ex one Early Childhood Ada classroom Furniture yes hello so we have been adding our Ada classroom rooms as you're aware of through our Esser dollars and so what

060I'm asking for today is to go ahead and finish out purchasing the furniture that was budgeted in Esser to get us to our 15 classrooms so we currently have six so we'd be purchasing nine more classrooms um we do not have room for all of those classrooms but the breakdown would be we have room for another one at Mark Twain four at Lake and then four that we would put in storage that could possibly go somewhere else and then place as we have teachers so I'm just asking for a motion to go ahead and finish out that Sr budget and purchase those classrooms I'll make that motion I have a motion and I'll take David as a second David second are there any additional questions de you said that um some of this furniture will

061be in stored yes so without having another location right now um we have room in our existing two locations for like I said five of those classrooms and then we have potential at other locations throughout the district um if we had the staff and we chose to then go ahead and um hire a teacher to place in those but we won't know till some other decisions are made where those spots will be the these as dolls have to be used this year yes they have to be spent are there any additional questions okay would you call the vote Please Mr Foster yes Mr rer yes Miss Williams yes Miss Garcia yes Miss Miller yes Mr Gary yes M Lanny yes the motion passes thank you zero and so the next item is also um for

062it's for parents as teachers so with the children's trust fund we have the opportunity for an additional contract if it was signed for a one-time payment um we're already participating in that funding source um but this was a one-time payment that they've offered um if we would amend the contract okay is there a motion thank you is there a second are there any additional questions okay would you call the vote Please Mr Foster yes Mr reader yes Miss Williams yes Miss Garcia yes Miss Miller yes Mr Gary yes Miss Lanny yes and the motion passes thank you Evy director of diversity the equally inclusion job description Dr Ed Dr Dr you job description for director of uh proposed director of diversity equity and inclusion uh Dr Edgar and I were approached um month ago or

063so uh with the idea of this position and to um do some research on what a job description might look like uh tonight all we're asking for is the approval of the job description not the position as such or a person to put in it um a director of diversity equity and inclusion is a common position in districts our size and larger uh It's Not Unusual to have that position um the job description in front of you I looked at a number of districts in the Metro who had directors in this position uh we took the one from Park Hill and then modified it uh to meet what we feel like would meet our our needs if the board U decides to approve this position um DLo went through it and gave some suggestions in

064terms of the ELD program and how a person in this position might assist with that uh Dr mcginness looked through it from the academic Services lens um then another piece of it would be the title $3 that we get um so the job description in front of you we believe if you opt to go with a position of this title would would meet our needs at least a start are there um questions from anyone how long is the job description can you read it or is it several Pages it's two full pages okay well so that figures um have we proposed uh rate of compensation for this position yet now there hasn't been a a specific proposal if if you hire someone in a position of director it would be paid off of the director's

065scale does this job replace or consolidate any other jobs that we're paying for in this District already um it certainly could and I know that uh one of the topics for executive session tonight is to discuss this uh there would be some opportunity to reshuffle and redistribute existing duties uh so that is certainly a possibility yes just if I have my numbers right director position starts at 85 and up or is it bigger than that I don't have it in front of me it's between 100 and 110 oh my gosh yes just where director okay and this this is something we've never had before not to my knowledge no how is this different than um than say our PR position why wouldn't that be incorporated in that of all things to espouse to the public

066our diversity and our Equity this isn't for the public it's for staff and students so how we talk all the time about poverty discrimination and racial discrimination and lgbtq inequities all of those things are things that we're not really intentionally training our staff or our students I just want to know is is this your answer CU I asked you I remember but is this your answer well my answer would be that the position is this your answer yes or no I I will answer your question if you give me a chance Mr reader U my answer would be that the position if you approve it could look however you want it to look if you want it to be exactly as M Landing proposed it could look that way if you want to modify it

067in some other way to to incorporate uh some of the aspects of communication could look like that as well and I I would I would add that I think that uh it's more of the El population that is probably driving the reason behind it if you look at some numbers I'll provide I can't we can't go into great detail because it's it it involves Staffing and names and those types of things but I'll provide some detailed information for you in close session so the position would be both for staff and for students and for families is that correct yes I mean it would include all those things and you know if if it were approved then we can we could twak it and Define it uh as we get a little closer to right what's

068in front of you is our best guess at this point what we would want the position to look like uh it's from the administrative lens you guys are the ones who would approve it if you do and if you want to make changes you make changes uh having never had a position like that here it could be molded to fit whatever the board feels like is the best could you give a real life scenario of what that job someone in that job title might uh tackle on a weekly basis I think some of the things you know when I look at a position like this and positions that Exist Elsewhere and when we talk about you know I think we we boast about the fact that we have what 32 37 different languages we have

069a really diverse student population so I think to me part of that position is going to be able to talk about how do we recruit more staff that speak different languages how do we respect cultural differences how do we respect um how do we identify and address social inequity within our classrooms and our staffing and those types of things so and and may I don't see it in here but with this position position also be a part of the ELD or just work with the ELD it would be part of it okay so I think uh sorry go ahead go ahead no this is a great thing especially considering our growing ELD population um with that being said without knowing what is going to be presented in the executive session which is going to like

070you said it's going to add to um what is it what this might replace or what positions might be Consolidated I don't feel comfortable making the decision well that for me you're not all you're approving is a job description right okay that's fine well and I think the email that you have provided would be that it would be like a cost neutral yes allocation so I I think it's common to approve a job description saying that this is what we value and this is what we want to be able to look at and and we're only approving the job description attached to the agenda it's not approving any unknown anything I I understand that but we're also requiring a master's degree and a preferred a doctorate degree so we don't know how much this might

071cost and we already have a lot of complaints when we talk about salary salary increase and levies how Administration gets paid more than our teachers I don't feel comfortable approving something that's going to be paying a master's or doctorate degree type amount without knowing what we're going to be giving up for that which is going to be which is going to be presented to us at the executive session and I would like a comment from the people who are presenting it to us I understand everybody has opinions but there's experts for a reason I know but they're not able to give us a comment until later right because it involves um classified information that we're not able to present to the I'm not saying I'm not I'm not for the idea I still think it

072will pass without my vote but what I'm saying is I would like to know that information before I make this decision I think so I just want to bring up again because um I don't want the public perception that this didn't happen because it did uh we all received the information that Dr Actor is going to present in close session that it's going to be cost neutral but again we're only supporting a job description so that we can show that there's value to that and with that I'll make a motion to approve it is there a second we're still a discussion then right yes okay is there a second I will second any additional questions and discussion yes quite a few here because the first thing you did wrong is say that's not for the

073public we are the public big mistake okay and then again all a sudden we're taking this new position for what reason we don't have a clue for it so why open the barn door and have our staff waste time about this when it's absolutely uh going to be decided in the back room no we are the public and so um could you clarify you misunderstood it's all right okay no I think it's I think it's important that you explain because without going into personal just go the Chris why waste the time on doing it it's it's uh it's not it's a position waste of a Time I'd rather have two Math teachers or two science teachers or maybe p pa is above minimum wage instead of talking about another director position and why can you

074tell me why we're going to do this it's not another director position it will be cost neutral and there will be some restructuring of current Administration why are we going to add this Vision the only reason I've heard is that because these other districts that have money to waste on crazy stuff are doing it that's the only reason I've heard but you bring up PO you you bring up poverty discrimination you bring we we talk about inequity all the time our people our poor people don't need special handling from somebody paid by the school district okay Dr I'd like to just see how you going to combine those okay before I'm ready to I like the purpose but I'd like to see how you would combine the other positions since it makes it cost neutral

075CU I like the idea but I'd like to see that combination okay okay so there is a motion in a second yeah I want to see how you make something cost Mutual by adding a position this is going to be amazing it's pretty easy okay good maybe we can get some MTH teachers science teachers and pay our par above minimum W you call the vote please since we're pulling stuff out of our house okay your motion is to approve the job description as presented Mr Foster since there seems to be more information I'm going to abstain and I'm not against it I think it could be a good idea uh but if we bring it back up later once we receed more information uh I'd like to take that route Mr reader no Miss Williams

076yes Miss Garcia I'll obate as well miss millerain Mr gar yes Miss Lanning yes okay and that is three yes three abstain three yes a no three extensions motion fails yes and moils Tria chronic condition management agreements Robert yes bringing to you uh a recommendation from the insurance committee uh Tria has what it's called chronic condition management and what this is is provide an additional benefit for staff that is an opt-in basis uh it's totally uh at their discretion and so Tria will identify staff members uh that have chronic conditions such as high blood pressure uh glucose monitoring things like that high cholesterol and there are several different ways that they can help uh those those uh employees manage their health um some of it is through some uh Pharmacy Advocate programs where we could

077create some cost savings uh to optimize their medicine usage um another way that they do this also is they can do what's called remote patient monitoring what they'll do is provide our employee with a blood pressure cuff or a glucose monitor and for example let say I have high blood pressure I won't go to the doctor unless I start feeling bad okay but thank they can monitor and see hey over the last four weeks your blood pressure is is much higher than it was they'll call me and contact me and say hey just check and see if you're taking your medication or maybe you need to get in and see your doctor to see if there's something up um again it's completely voluntary on the employees part um something that what they would only get

078into and then another thing they can do and this is kind of Cutting Edge is called pharmacogenomics um some people are genetically predisposed to some medic don't work well for them some people can drink coffee at 8:00 at night and go to bed at 10 it's not a problem some people drink coffee at 8:00 and they can't go to sleep until 2: in the morning well some people uh me personally I've been on four different blood pressure medications before I found the right one um this might have been a situation where they may have been able to help uh identify that early on so um it can indicate changes in therapy whether it's their medicine dosage or some drug Gene interactions um so it it is a it's a win-win for us it's a win-win

079for our employees with these chronic conditions uh Tria has also given us a guaranteed return on investment um so if if they don't meet the metrics that they have guaranteed Us in the first year they'll write us a check for the difference and so uh this is a one-year contract we're asking you to approve this is something we could start immediately start rolling out the staff they'll they'll market it to staff and again it's completely opt in so um it's a potential benefit for those members who would fall under those guidelines make a motion to approve is there a second second are there any additional questions what's the cost it it's $425 per member per month uh but again if we don't reach the uh if you look there's a slide that talks about what

080their projected uh return would be uh that that slide is at a 23% opt-in rate for those identified members um um even at 10% they they project that we would save $35,000 a year is that kind of their guarantee number if if we do not see a positive they'll write us a check for the difference oh for the difference so it give you any amount of Mone yes y Mr Foster yes Mr reer yes M Williams yes m Garcia yes Miss Miller yes Mr gar yes Miss Lanny yes and the motion passes 7 zero um in structure contract extension and expansion Dr La yeah so this is similar to the last item I brought you um except for that was for our Ela and math um in K8 this is actually a contract we already

081have we're asking for an renewal it happens to be for our grades 9 through 12 and we're going to expand it to science in the elementary um grades where we don't have a Science assessment and we're going to expand it to middle school science where we don't have a Science assessment and social studies at the uh Middle School level where we don't have a social studies assessment so it's helping us to fill some gaps and we had time to assess it's a efficacy see this year um at the high school level and we'll we feel confident in in renewing and expanding just a little bit and so the cost um is roughly $200,000 for a one-year contract and um we can move forward with the professional development right away to get Folks up to speed

082with this uh slight expansion is there a motion excuse me is there a second I'll second are there any additional questions uh yes I do um this um I know we've s through a lot of the meetings you've had with us and a plethora of information comes from the statistics you gather and things and Kim Miller went through a lot of stuff that information you Gathering things and sit through every one of those meetings I was just wondering if this go around besides the assessment would they tell us because I've never heard exactly what are we doing wrong or how do we fix it or what do we do we just hear statistics but never I just wondered if this Services also provide hey here's how you can get out of it here's what you're

083doing wrong or things like that besides just collecting statistics sure so uh they do provide some instructional support for the at the teacher level but as far as professional devel velopment um professional development can be uh we can use the data to decide where our areas are of most need so for example if the data shows that we are lower in math which we've seen in the past we can uh do more professional development in math so the data just provides a compass and then it allows curriculum and instruction and professional development leaders to kind of go in and support the teachers and administrators and improving things let good so let's it back in our court once we get the stats from this uh stuff it's back in our court about what to do or

084where to go ask for help or things like that yes otherwise you're really don't have any information to tell you what where you need to deploy either support for you know professional development or improve your curriculum or look at what's going wrong and instruction so when we are at that point where we are looking for people to tell us how to fix the stats that are good or bad what I mean do we go out and hire somebody or do we employ another contract of a consultant to tell us what we're doing wrong and no typically the academic Services team looks at the data and collectively decides what what we need to do I'll let Dr mcginness speak to that it's also very informative for the teacher because if the teacher doesn't know where the

085students are performing they don't know how to guide instruction and so it's really important for the teachers so that they get that information back and they can say wow this kid's reading at a fifth grade level and they should be at a sixth grade level and so they can tailor instruction based on that student's needs so for example the high school never had a platform for government now they will be able to do that so they'll be able to kind of gauge where the gaps are and then provide instruction to fill those gaps does that make more sense your explanation is perfect and I understand what you're saying but yeah yeah your explanation is good it's hard for teachers when they're Flying Blind and they don't know where the kids are at where they're performing

086and they don't pick up on that when they give test and you got four kids or fs and they can but if you're at middle school or High School even Elementary and knowing where your 28 kids are at in your Elementary level or your 125 at middle and high school is a challenge so if you can continuously assess you get a better gauge of where they're performing and that's as a group of the whole it doesn't get down to individual course does it even get down narrow enough where we can specific Target a spe school or a particular classroom even yes and we how we can see how biology is performing across the three buildings the three build we can see how seventh grade math is performing across all four buildings and so it allows

087us to break it down but it's really a piece where it guides instruction for teachers thank you are there any additional questions would you call the Please Mr Foster yes Mr reer no Miss Williams yes Miss Garcia yes Miss Miller yes Mr Gary yes Miss Lanning yes any motion passes f one okay MO West equipment housing yes uh in November you all approved an mou uh wither Western uh for us to purchase some equipment for the CAC uh in that original mou we had listed the purchase date will be completed by January 31st due to uh really some issues with weather and things like that Missouri Western being closed several days and everything we weren't going to be able to meet the deadline to get that RFP out for the the required amount of time

088and everything so um we're just asking you to amend the purchase date that we are required to do that by and so this puts the date to April one just to make sure it gives us plenty of time but I think we'll be able to have this for you for the February board meeting but we were not going to be able to get that completed uh with the holiday and with all the weather and everything for this January board meeting so just asking you to amend theou with the uh date change to April 1st that we would purchase the equipment a later than so moved second okay are there any additional questions okay would you call the vote Please Mr Foster yes Mr reer yes M Williams yes Miss Garcia yes Miss Miller yes Mr

089Garing yes Miss Lanning yes the motion passes 7 zero clear your classroom addition okay with the uh dollar from House Bill 2 uh we were to use that money for equipment or any kind of renovation uh that we needed at hilard and with the new 22,000 ft Edition it takes care of a lot of our Hands-On programs and uh with that being said there's nothing in the dental wing and so we have uh met with Mosaic and talked about what they needed for the CNA program and anyway went through the bid process and you can see that the bids were uh very competitive again we had five biders uh with the highest being in 387,000 so I'd recommend that the board go with elel Crawford for the Hillyard classroom addition in the dental Wing is

090there a motion I'll make that motion is there a second are there any additional questions okay would you call about this Mr Foster yes Mr reer yes M Williams yes Miss Garcia yes Miss Miller yes Mr Gary yes Miss Lan yes any motion passes EV zero bond issue items okay as we've uh discussed over the last couple months uh we do have um a proposed bond issue for the April ballot and uh there's a this is kind of twofold um I'm going to provide you with the information um give you the dollar amounts on each one of them and then what you will be proving approving is the information that Donna um attached and the proposition St Joe schools that will go on the ballot so let's kind of talk about how we got to

091the final list uh we met with several groups and uh took it to the facilities committee and you know I think there was a lot of consensus in regards to every everything that is on the list U you know there was opposition but you know there's going to be opposition to everything and I kind of broke it down um in two different documents for you the first one um is uh in pods the first pod is safety and environment and uh we're proposing to put the road improvements at Oak Grove the road improvements at Cardon Park the districtwide intercom system hbac upgrades and sidewalks and to give you the dollar amounts that were uh listed for each one of those the road at Oak Grove was 350,000 the road at Cardon Park was 700,000 the

092intercom system was 1.7 million hbac upgrades were 3.5 million and sidewalks were 1 million and on the academic front uh Fine Arts um we allotted 3.2 million for Fine Arts hos expand mention we allotted uh where's that at I think it's 2 million it's not yeah expansion to hos at 2 million and Science and Technology upgrades this is something that was added we talked about uh where we kind of lack in in our high schools and we felt like science and technology was a good area um to do some upgrades in our pltw programs and those types of things and then the last was activities in athletics what was it 1 million for Science and Technology yes and then the last one was activities in athletics which is actually going to be Al co-curricular curricular

093I mean you know the band's going to be able to use these things as well but the turf field and track replacement at Lafayette was 2.2 million the turfield in track replacement at Benton was 2.2 million and the turfield and track upgrades at Central were 2 million and that total gets you to approximately $20 million at this time I would entertain any questions that you might have in regards to the list so when we met last Wednesday and we talked about this list um you had said the HVAC of upgrades would be up to two 12 million it could possibly be if you wanted to put 12 million towards that but I mean I just took the list of everything and prioritize and that's what I just put the the uh difference uh we only

094had 3.5 million left I don't know and and um I think the number was going to be greater act a actually after we talked to uh Snider Electric um he had told us to put a $2 million tag on that but it depends on the size of the building so you could talk about putting $5 million in a larger building and you know we spent a lot of money on hbac upgrades over the last few years and we felt like it would be um probably in our best interest just to fix where we have the worst equipment so this is going to fix uh those schools that had to miss class yes that's that's what we would address first that's the first yep but this does not add um um the expansion of the central

095air for boting it is well it could be you know I if we wanted to choose that then that's why I just said HVAC upgrades so we as a board of education would have to prioritize and vote on what we wanted to do so definitely bod could be so 3.5 is justar for H yes sidewalks what was the dollar amount of test 1 million and did you maybe I looked it but did you say which schools or we have I have not identified any schools at this time I know the one that has been talked about a lot of Spring Garden so I would assume that that's probably going to be a high priority um because we obviously are already approaching uh Piet and uh purgy this spring is a partnership with the city of

096St Joseph do you have any type of idea how many schools would be able to do or would it just be probably one well I I don't know you know possibly two but it just depends on what we're doing and and it also depends on um what kind of cooperation we get with the city as well Gabe do we have any commitment from them at all on their portion of this no not at this time but they they're going to have to be involved in it and they have um you know we've talked and had meetings in regards to that and they're putting a comprehensive plan together for the entire School District so um I think it's going to be a project that they're definitely interested in moving forward with okay then the expansion to

097hosia MH I know that is very important um but when we talked about this in on Wednesday you had mentioned that there was some classrooms that were just not being utilized in the purpose that they were supposed to be utilized um even fixing that issue you think we still need to expand well I I think that uh it is a place the only place we have a trailer um and to get rid of that trailer at this time I think you're probably going to have to do some and that you know $2 million is a small expansion to josia but one thing that I would tell you is that um I don't think you can go wrong by doing it because um as of right now that's where a lot of our population is moving

098and we have a real mobile population so I mean I I can't sit here and make any guarantees but I don't think it's a it's not a bad move for us for sure is there an estimated square footage on about how much that will get us yeah it's about 173 square foot per student you said it was going to be like three classrooms okay yeah okay I mean it could be but I I think that U what we would do is meet with the hosia staff and you know get with those people that live it every day and ask them I I don't necessarily think it's going to be classrooms I think it would be something different uh but they they have a lot of ideas and have provided stuff to us so I think

099it's just right now you're you're putting a dollar amount towards it um but we'll make it right you know whatever they need is what we want to do right so it might not necessarily be three 20 student classrooms yeah the only new one on this list is science and technology upgrades right is that the one we did it yeah that's the only one y we didn't have it whenever we met um and administratively uh that's just something that had gotten brought up and actually we had a assistant principal uh one of our buildings who had sent us some some really good information and detailed information and that's what sparked it and then we're thinking okay you know he's he's spot on you know talked about steam talked about stem talked about science and technology and

100where our weaknesses are and so I mean I you definitely can't go wrong there I don't seems to get overlooked sometimes it does so with this 1 million fund programs yeah we would split it amongst the um middle schools and high schools probably for the most part um and yes it would be programs right now we have some pltw programs frankly that are underfunded and we're not offering you know the topnotch uh education to those students so we had the gifted program at hilard at one time time we still have that we still have it yes so that's U is there any opportunity to expand that or grow within that realm yeah yeah I just know that that was one of the needs when I first got on the board it was it was talked

101about more yeah um so I I guess I just don't he talked about quite as much yep absolutely make me to um as presented I'll a second I just have a quick question so um say this goes to the public and it passes and um I'll just pick on L say there's some band equipment or something that she's excited does she have to come back to us and we approve that at that kind of the same the same process okay yeah and this is and you've I think already said it could be for any of the three high schools is that correct or just yeah okay are there any additional questions yes well is this this a bond what we're doing right now are we just approving this list or are we approving the bond

102language is going to be on the Ballance you'll be approving the language right now yeah which is actually built all around the same thing I just said do you have a copy of it it was attached it's attached do my other questions or do we plan on having I see they're on the TV already beating the band for uh supported this does that mean there's going to be a committee form to uh be try to get the thing passed do you think I have had no conversations with anybody in regards to a committee okay well as indication on all the news yes today was that um volunteers are spping up and we going to help push the bond and usually that means forming a committee of some type I know it's got to be independent

103from us MH but so that's why you technically and all about it but um I don't think it necessarily has to be independent from us I know when we did the levy the 50 recent lbby um there was a lot of teacher support board members who got behind that but the B ballot language and all the literature that goes out has to be neutral it's just be informational only so but you know they get it real close to it's pretty obvious who they're supporting that they are actually supporting but that this is the name of politics I do that that way okay are there any additional questions I'm wondered does anybody around this table here think it uh has a 50/50 chance or do you have any percentages if you think have a chance at

104pass we're only talking 71 days from now things AR going to change that much how do you feel the how do you feel it's going to go guys I'd like to call the question oh great yeah keep the public from the discussion again thank you very much well I think it's got a good need I've called the question you need to vote on whether or not we call the question so we need to second to that that would be to cease conversation and vote on the ballot language I no this is the first time you didn't B in on everybody's call the question I called the question is there a first thing we didn't butt in huh you want to talk I second would you call vote Please Mr Foster yes Mr reer no we're

105voting on the actual no you're voting to call you're voting to call the question so you're voting whether or not to cease discussion and move you're voting I I'll be silent on it because I don't know if it if anyone else has more to say so motion but who second I did course so if we're voting on that then I'm going to retract my vote if I could because I don't I don't want to interrupt anyone else's discussion okay so you're abstaining yes okay Miss Garcia Miss Lanning yes Mr reader no Mr Gary uh I understand I mean if people still to have a discussion I don't we necessarily need to answer questions but I mean if there's a discussion that still need to happen I I don't have a problem with that M Miller

106M Williams yes okay the motion fails are there any additional questions as it pertains to the motion yeah I will ask my fellow board members again in the public so they can hear our discussion about this very serious matter it's very serious because we're going to run something and we get kicked to the curb with it it's all a reflection on us by not knowing what the Public's asking and wanting so again um don't forget my opinion but what do you guys think is this worth is this worth going to the voters and getting a no vote and then we're down to the last chance Texico if we don't pass it in August then the Earth comes to end Al go first I think it's worth it um because number one kids me improved HB

107back in our schools cuz the last time I checked Heat's important another thing expansion at hosia I've got kids in the district and I would I would not approve of my kids being in a trailer if it's not absolutely necessary and it's not fine arts always gets left out of every conversation and it's an opportunity to make some really really really big changes on that whole program of our whole District those are my main ones I mean of course everything else on this list I completely agree with I mean everybody's able to get a little bit of everyone's able to get a piece of the pie I mean it's not all on buildings are all on Athletics everyone's able to progress and that's why I approve it anybody else want next Dr edor you you

108said that this was a poll among the the administrators teachers people in the district who felt like an opportunity to respond to what they thought they needed is that correct yes yeah so it's coming from them and kids in the district as well yeah also were able to give input anyone else well then somehow these folks know more than us so much so that we don't even need to discuss it so Mr aren't we discussing it now I think it's very important to discuss it in public um but I also agree that I think it's going to pass um I know that the district has to get in front of it and not that they have to lobby but they do have to be really clear with their communication and I think as board members

109we have to walk alongside them as well and show our support for it um yes I just think it's important for those administrators and those who did have input in it because they're in the buildings they're on the properties they have a good idea of what perhaps their school their Department needs I'm not in there every day to know neither am I but it's important to me and my constituents that we do have a voice about this and uh express it now in front of everybody that uh we're putting oursel in a really bad position and of course the other nuances you probably aren't aware of in this room the city is going to Cloud the issue if you guys all heard the city's going to put a big initiative Mo on this ballot which

110is going to bring 10 times more people to this election and when you bring 10 times more people or any more people at all the more people come to an election vote no on taxes the more you get out that's why we run these elections in April so they pass cuz the little group can pass them because not very many people turn out but with that City issue on who and they're changing the charter I mean a very major event they're going to campaign right along with all of our stuff for the next 71 days changing the city Charter for Christ sakes and are very controversial Matters by the way so that's going to bring a huge amount of people out it even helps Doom this Bond can try to be more positive and I'm

111not I'm not being negative I'm just stating what's out there I did I did have a conversation with the city manager and the mayor both today and they both felt like it was not going to be anything that would uh intrude what we were putting on the ballot yeah the city treats us real good anyhow and so does the mayor doesn't so the reason why I Tred fix our sidewalk because we're all saying the same thing and some of this is nonsense it's their responsibility they told us to do it are there any additional questions I agree me comments or concerns it might be tough and you know but at the end of the day I think we have legitimate needs and if we put them on the ballot and we stand by it cuz

112I personally would stand by all of these legitimate needs um and I can't predict the future but I can tell you where my heart's at and that's with the district being as successful as we can be I think that the kids um deserve us at least trying this and attempting this okay would you call the vote please Mr Foster yes Mr reer no Miss Williams yes Miss Garcia yes Miss Miller yes Mr gar yes Miss Lanning yes any a motion passes six1 he Dr Edgar boundaries okay um the last topic of discussion in regards to the U is in regards to the boundaries for 2425 and as you know last month we presented uh three options um and two months ago we talked about this uh very same thing and I had stated that I

113felt like it was um necessary to hit the pause button and um take a look at a long range plan so it is an action item and uh Miss Williams sent some information to you as the Board of Education as to why it was an action item for tonight one thing that I would state is that um you know administratively we believe that U we're making some progress in regards to the long range plan and so what I would recommend uh tonight is that we put a halt um to option one two and three um and give the administration the authority to take a look at taking some pressure off of Lindberg Elementary um and I did have a a legitimate question in regards to that um you know the number of students that you

114move out of Lindberg let's say chose to go to Eugene Field Eugene Field does have a different Middle School feeder pattern but one thing I would state is that um they these students that would be moved from Lindberg would go to rivid um so they would not change a Middle School feeder pattern and High School feeder pattern so I just wanted to make that point because there were several questions that I received in regards to that because they because the because of where they live not change if you didn't do it so um I've been the one that's been adamant about Lindberg changing I I don't have a problem with us tabling this tonight I don't have a problem with that at all I think that makes sense given that we don't have a longrange

115plan but I I am very very concerned about not implementing any changes for next year I'm not saying that we need to implement everything that you guys bring forward but I just do not see how we can let students go and staff go another year um without some changes um and again I I can't you know attest to what that change should be um because we don't have a long range plan I just I they need they need some changes quickly I to accept what he's asking the table is there a second I'll see what's the motion to accept gab's a recommendation yeah of what motion to accept administration's recommendation to table the boundary changes until after a motion to table yeah until after when you see a longrange plan then you guys can make

116a decision on how how you want to move forward in regards to that so we see the old plan so so can we um Donna for Robert's Rules should we if we table it is it going to move forward to a February meeting table to a March meeting or do you just want to table specifically to March well the motion is just to accept administration's recommendation which is not to accept any option am I right right not to accept any options I think what she's asking is to make sure that there is a time that it will appear back up well I'm for procedural procedurally are we voting it down because dror is saying don't vote on it or are we tabling it and pulling it forward to the next meetings and then it would

117move forward are so I just need to know are we voting it down or we're moving it to we're moving it forward and if we're moving it Forward I don't want to know when we're moving it forward to 3 years from now like we normally do for next month I would we would not put any anything on the February agenda so it's to voted down yes and that's the motion we yep if that's your recommendation then we can change theing soat what your motion is I repeat uh the motion is to uh postpone or to not accept option one two or three to not make a boundary change for 2425 and to let Administration take a look at uh taking pressure off of Lindberg Elementary and there's a motion in a second are there any

118more questions and discussions so with the addition of Lindberg in the motion are you what's the plan for lber well we we haven't I mean we've talked about it but we feel like it's uh if we don't make the battery changes and it's necessary to take a pressure off a limber and so we've looked at our options we're going to have to identify pockets students and those types of things so uh we would just bring something back to the board that's not anything the Board needs to vote on so I mean we we did it in hosia last year uh we put 49 students from hosia to Hyde and so we would just keep in constant communication with you as to what's going on in regards to that so that won't come back to us

119which is fine I'm saying it's fine yeah it won't come back to you as a as a board decision as an action item but we'll just tell you that we'll we'll get it done Dr add these facilities uh meeting that we had oh sorry uh you had mentioned that you are estimating that you would have a longrange plan by March is that still something that you think is going to happen Okay because I agree I don't think we should do anything with boundaries yet but I do think that we should move something forward I would also agree with that um only issue that I have is that we keep on Kenny says kicking the can kicking the can I bet the can's really tired of us right now um cuz we do lots of talk

120and then we plan and we talk and then we plan and then we change it and then we talk and then we never do anything and so um if we Hal this I want to be able to do something in March you know to help these kids in our staff at least finally Dr are you thinking that you'll we'll do something like you'll have the first draft of the plan for facilities in March and then an informational it what what I'll have the first draft for the facilities in February okay and so you think a vote would happen in March like we'd go informational info potentially yes possibly okay well can I make a motion then just to amend the their uh what they recommended just simply to add that by we will have the

121information from the long-term plan by March I think by the March board meeting I think right now you have motion to table options 1 two and three until the long range plan is in place and let Administration take pressure off of Li I don't think it's table I don't think it's it's not table you're not tbling it you're voting it down if you table it you move it forward to the next agenda okay said the thing is for my decision to be made I need to know when how long is this can going to be kicked down the road I'm okay with March and even April I'm okay as long as we vote now to make a decision in the next 60 or 90 days okay okay but the problem is oh there's always a

122problem there is always a problem yes Ken um is that you're not able to choose in order to make a decision in x amount of days when we don't even know what we're making a decision on Dr Edgar just said we was going to have something by March I'll have a plan yes right so you can approve a plan right I want that in an amendment otherwise but it's her motion you can't amend her motion of course I had you want to amend it we figur out a way are we ready to call the vote or is are there any additional questions okay would you call the vote Please Mr froster yes Mr reer no Miss Williams yes Miss Garcia yes Miss Miller yes Mr Garing yes M Lanning yes and the motion passes six

123zero informational items 4 day school week okay um I apologize for the uh the late presentation I I forgot to send it to Donna and I noticed this today when I was going through all the information that the attachment was not there but you should have an attachment um it is a presentation um in regards to the 4-day school week and what I wanted to do tonight is just uh to create some dialogue in regards to whether this is something that the Board of Education would be interested in moving forward with uh whether that be for uh 2425 or 2526 um I have asked the uh academic Services team to kind of sit in the same area and they'll be assisting me with answering questions that you have um within the presentation I'm not going

124to read it to you but um you have noticed that had 1748 parents who responded um and then on the student side um let's see was all those numbered so on the parent we'll just we'll kind of walk through the parent surveys and themselves uh you guys can see what the questions are um on the parents you either see a strongly agree or you see a strongly disagree which um and it's almost like that on every single question so obviously there's a lot of unanswered questions out there and one thing that I would tell you that we're going to do is that if we feel like there's um some push behind going forward with a uh 4-day school week then we're going to send another survey out tomorrow uh with the calendar attached I think

125there's a lot of questions especially from the staff uh what the calendar looks like we do have a calendar I did not send it out at this point because if it was something you guys were going to say no to then there was no reason for me to provide that but it is very detailed it explains to the staff exactly what they're going to be doing I know there was a lot of questions in regards to that there was 380 students uh that were have that also filled out the survey and it was obviously very positive from a student standpoint um and then from the staff there was 837 respondents and it was also positive there you know just a couple of things in regards to the entire thing I think I think i' I've

126said this all along that the reason why I support it is that I really believe that we recruit and help us retain staff that's the you know 100% that's the reason why I support this uh philosophically if you had asked me five years ago 10 years ago I probably would have told you no uh but it's for a different reason now uh we have a lot of really good staff members but we're burn in a lot of our really good staff members out by the quality of some of the um lower level teachers and um they're having to do two jobs and you know 5 years ago we would have 20 applicants for the social State's position now we have one you know maybe two and those are just examples um of where we're at

127um so you know whenever teachers are having to do double and triple work what's that doing it's affecting morale in a negative way and I think that this this would go a long way as far as morale is concerned um and I would tell you that uh Independence had a 400% increase over 400% increase in the number of applicants that they received so they did it for the exact same reason um within the survey uh you will notice that um among the Hispanic population and the ches population we did not have a very good return so I think it's important that we have some focus groups uh we get those people in to to have those discussions so that'll kind of be the next step um that we will do um there's a lot of

128questions in regards to child care are we going to have child care um we have some Partners out there right now that would like to help us provide child care uh what are the students going to do as far as um is there going to be any kind of learning on the days off uh yes you know that is a possibility but all those things cost money Transportation Food Service um and we'll we'll answer all those questions moving forward and we'll do everything we can for the kids but just know that it's all about staff and getting the right staff and I do understand Dr edar that this is such an important thing to recruit staff my only concern is we're going based off you know obviously Independence is a district that looks similar to

129us they've only done it for a year and they did have an increase in the applications but they have a bigger pool to pull from they are in the casc area where over here in St Joseph we have what Savannah mbuck uh to pull from so although I do think this is a good Recruitment and Retention strategy I don't think it's good academically only 24.6 of the parents said that they believe this would help incre increase their student grades the parents don't even feel confident saying that this is going to help their grades at the end of the day we are here for academics and to teach our kids and also only 16% of the teachers said that they would take advantage of working on that Monday that we didn't have classes so we can't

130guarantee that we're going to be able to offer although I know you said you had daycare providers that are like hey work alongside with you our teachers might not be in for that working that that day that they're not there so academically I don't think that this is going to help us attendance wise it might but at the same time if a kid is sick they miss three days that's four days out of school and then discipline problems again I work at an after school program it's only 3 days but the dis discip discipline problems are still an issue we're still wor out so I would love to support our teachers just in another way I think the levy the buyback all these other things we can do to help our teachers and feel supported

131Dr Ed is this a recommendation from the admin yeah I mean I I think that we're to AC Crossroads as far as um where we're at and the the education that we offer so yeah yes I would say that it's a recommendation from from the administration so I think you know I Dr Ed I feel the exact same way that you do if you would have asked me a year ago if I thought a 4day school week was good for public education I would have told you no um but when you start seeing the real issues that our school district has with test scores with attendance with behavioral referrals with a 20% turnover of Staff the last 2 years years um I think to me this is really um a Hail Mary it is something

132to control the bleeding that we have going on here um I would rather us provide four days of good instruction than 5 days of subpar instruction I do want to say to the staff that is not to say that they are not trying um but we have a lot of new staff um that rely on tenur staff to help them and Mentor them and the less tenur staff you have the harder it is to do that mentoring um research is really not shown one way or the other I think that's because it's hard to duplicate um I know that the Missouri legislature has uh some members of the Missouri leg legislature have talked about uh restricting District's ability to do this I think that that um is unlikely given uh some of the current state

133of politics and regardless I think that we need to be able to show our staff that we're we're going to try to do do everything that we can to keep them to retain them and to provide good instruction to our kids I know that we need to figure out the child care I know that we need to figure out the food access I also know that there are some staff currently that are looking at other districts that are specifically waiting on us to make a decision on this so they can decide whether they leave I also know that there's staff in nearby districts that are looking at St Joe to say what are they going to do because I might be interested um I also feel not to too much like Ricky Bobby but if

134you're not first on this you're last um I understand that if nearby districts go to this in the next three four five years then that benefit to our district is no longer there but that still gives us time to stabilize what we have going on and and if we're all honest with ourselves we know that we have some serious problems that need some serious attention I think Whitney you brought up a really good point that this could be something that's adopted in 3 to four years so long term how is this going going to be a strategic thing of recruiting and retaining staff if everyone is doing it and we're still and we're still lower offering lower salary so that's that's my point so from my experience you know we we did this uh professionally

135at Community Action Partnership um 8 years ago uh to be honest with you we did it because we had a lot of the same issues that our district had we had bad turnover we had bad morale we didn't have we didn't have a lot of things that were good um we could not offer higher wages and I've always believed if you can't pay your staff more you have to make their job easier and so we went to that we went to a 4-day a week model um we don't have the problems that you all have in fact our biggest competitor for staff was the St Joseph School District that's not really the case anymore we get pretty much whoever we want because of the 4-day week um but that allowed us to stabilize recruit and

136ret M and then as we were able to kind of pull other things together we could pay more so now our salaries have raised our benefits have raised um and you know right now I'd say we have three open positions out of a an organization of 175 we have three open positions and those are new positions so I see what you're saying you know in five years if mid buuck if everybody's doing it there's no benefit but that gives us five years to take staff from other districts and kind of get our house in order I think it's really important like I said to retain and Recruit new staff qualified staff but we also want to keep our students there's going to be a lot of parents and although we're not in competition with private

137schools there's going to be a lot of parents that are going to say why would I send my kid to public school if that's 4 days and a private school is offering 5 days and now we have the Bright Futures Foundation which offers free and reduced lunch students and and kids with I APS a scholarship to go to those private schools we want to retain our students as well I think the voucher system though to be honest uh those are predominantly and have been proven that well over 70% of those go to students that are already in those um well I I disagree I no that's just data no I know but I used to work at a Catholic church and everybody that applied got in knew that's excellent I I think the this issue

138remains for us is that we need to do something now we don't have a lot of time I have a question about the actual agenda item it was mentioned about the child care concerns are options on like the hourly staff in order to work on on those days in order to alleviate like gaps and everything like you mentioned a couple of programs and everything like that I know that the programs are not able to take in a lot of kids I know mine's completely I'm not able to take in any more kids right now as long as there's like options at the schools in order to I mean we're speaking upon thousands of kids and I understand that you mentioned it's going to cost money only to feed our kids to transport our kids and

139to take care of our kids on that off day MH I think it's worth the extra money it's going to cost yeah and and one thing that I would answer your question is that uh yes there will be opportunities for hourly employees like I said I 100% support this only for Recruitment and Retention so it's not a money savings so everybody that works 37.5 hours now we'll work 37.5 hours we're not taking anything away from anybody so we will have to find things for par Educators to do Food Service employees and that all has been talked about so you know the detailed planning um has to come after the board makes the decision you know we're not going to spend hours and hours bringing all that information to you and then it get voted down

140so one thing that I would tell you that if this is something that the board is serious about it needs to be voted on in February we can't wait and wait till March wait till uh April I mean our staff deserves to know um um whether we're going to be four days or five days so tonight tonight are you wanting some sort of consensus to move forward that we want that to be an action item in February I was just wanting to uh you know hear what you guys had to say more than anything the information yeah well that's what I'm saying like are you want I I don't think we need to vote on anything well I can I can hear consensus or not okay and only if everybody yeah yeah my biggest concern

141is still going to be special ed students I've talked to a few teachers that have really big concerns with that um also you know students they may not be special ed but they're struggling students um you know the fear is that these students are going to fall further behind because they're not having consecutive uh learning 5 days a week um there's also a lot of Veteran teachers that have the same concern so I share that so yeah can I add one piece yeah because I've read a lot of misconceptions about they're just going to take a day off but desie requires 1,44 hours of instruction so we still have to provide that instruction and it would just be spread out over the four days so that would extend the learning day by 30 minutes that's

142what that's what we are looking at um I just want to make that clarification and then as far as the special education services whatever minutes are scripted in those IEPs they would still be providing those services but I guess in that regard this the fear is still compiling all those the same amount of time within 4 days is not going to be as productive I understand your concern I just want to make sure that's clear that those the hours would be the same it would just be spread over the four days rather than than five and my concern is those kids who need positive contact with the grownup those who may not have it at home those who wander the streets those who just covet the the care a teacher does give even in that

143busy schedule it's somebody who doesn't berate them somebody who doesn't punish you know like just that extra opportunity for a grownup to be interested and they I know there's a it's just that's my concern for those who just need that positive contact with it and I would actually agree with you it's why I think that the fact that the district is D offering options on that off day I mean it would be more of a chance in order to bond even more and it's not as structured I mean the kids are are still able to come and still get that adult interaction and connection I think speaking for myself uh the goal is to try to get the best Educators we can in St J to teach our kids and give them the best education

144possible and and I would definitely uh be open to hearing more about it more into it talking about ERS um how is this going to help our inexperienced teachers um with professional development are they still going to have that day they're going to have professional development so that that wouldn't change either and the professional development days would still be at the beginning of the year so we do a new teacher Institute in August that would all operate the same um and then they also have mentoring sessions throughout the school year kind of sprinkled in so all of that would stay um I I don't see any changes to so the dates I know um some calendar days we they the kids don't have school but the staff does for professional development that would still be

145in place that would have to be on Mondays yeah so that's kind of when we looked at the calendar and R all the Mondays would be off so we typically have Martin Luther King President's Day those things that's when we would also have staff come in for professional learning so and when you do professional development all of the staff is involved typically yes okay so if we had let's say like a daycare or program or something in effect on that Monday then the kids who are in that program on Monday wouldn't have the program because there's professional development they they could because we are talking about having Partnerships for child care so it could be through the y or through inner Ser or other community organizations but do we do you believe they're going to

146provide enough staff to take care of the influx of students that might want to take advantage of the program I think the demand for that the beginning may be a lot but from what other 4day school districts have seen is that trickles off within a year or two and they no longer have such a demand in the beginning as we do in the beginning yeah I I would I mean I'm not a future teller but I do I would foresee that we have a a lot of kids interested in this because we have such a high free and reduced lunch and a lot of our parents do have to work at factories and other places so that's okay thank you okay well I appreciate all the input yeah I have one more question if that's

147possible Madame President go ahead Mr Vice President well I'm trying to going what and kind of got confusing there at the end but I think Gabe you started out with saying that we need to do a thorough look at this and um you suggested I think from the beginning uh geared up do the focus groups on every part of this and gear it up for 25 26 and not try to crowd it in this year I don't know is that what I understood you were kind of thinking and I think it does help another year Shake all the things down such as Independence and also as some of you may know there is legislation uh at the Missouri has already been filed by Luke deer to totally uh do away with it within the state

148well some quick facts there uh of 500 districts about 175 already went to that but almost all of them are rural which makes sense so my understanding from people I get to play with occasionally Luke deer introduced the massive thing that it would apply to everybody but in the long run it will back down and allow especially rural districts where it makes District uh sense to allow the 4- day week will continue but there will be a threshold of a certain amount of student population that he will concede on and say uh all the rules and smaller districts can have it but you of a certain size you cannot because his argument is impacts the poor people and uh people like marginalized because of uh that extra day that they have to do something with

149their child care um it's a financial burden on the lower Echelon of people to go to the 4 day so anyhow I think it's a good idea to go ahead and do as Gabe said from the beginning and look at it up and down and take it off the table so our people do know it's not going to happen next year well that that's not what I said but um okay good that's what I was trying to get out was whether you wanted to do it in 2425 or 25 26 I I the advantages are way better in 24 25 than they would be in 25 26 especially if people you know I don't I just don't understand like St I mean it's going to become a competitive deal and and I I think that

150it's important to get out in front of it because you know once we get people here I think and it's the right mix and the right morale I think it you'll keep them here you know that you want to think that that's your you know that's your business and this is what you're doing to take care of people right and so I think it's it it's in our best interest to do it as quick as possible have we investigated some of the challenges that Independence has has faced due to yeah there's really not a whole lot I mean you you have some but uh I know Dr SE had a good conversation with their superintendent about a month ago and there's just not a whole lot of negativity out there in regards to it you

151said you said there are some um could do you elaborate on that what's that on the issues well I mean his his phrase to me was it's gone way better than we ever imagined it would that was what he said in quote and I will tell you this you talk about the the number of students that would take advantage of coming in on the day off I you would like like to think that that's the case it's not the case in Independence an independence uh they don't you know the there's a it's a real small population of the students that take advantage of those opportunities I guess that's still my concern is I'm I'm just curious the struggling students are my biggest concern so it's not the majority I'm more concerned about the minority in

152this situation U you know the students that if you were to ask me if I wanted to go four instead of 5 days I would have said yes too um so I'm concerned about any long-term effects academically that could come from a big decision like this I think have to rely on the data that's out there and unfortunately I mean the data that's been collected and the research and the studies that have been collected don't definitively say Pro or con um education and I think when we go back to talking about the number one one most important indicator for student learning is who is their teacher um I think can remember the researcher that says if one one year of bad instruction affects you for what four or five years um and again that's not

153to say that we don't have teachers that are trying it's that we've had a turnover rate that is not sustainable for 2 years we lose 250 staff a year the last 2 years tot St that's that's that's not sustainable and unless we do something something pretty drastic we're not going to be able to recover and you mentioned about the teachers um at least I mean I do understand okay about the questions at the capital and what they're attempting to do and all only at least our teachers could understand you know that at least our board is trying to do something to help them is it possible we can have I need to keep adding meetings but is it possible we could have I don't know a possible work session or even if we had a

154list of questions for a district like Independence which which is close to our size um you know to me there are there seem to be a lot of unanswered questions uh we do have you know I like the fact that somebody close to us has done it uh but you know it's a it's a big decision I see Pro Pros but you know I'm personally I'm concerned about uh some of the students it could affect yes we could definitely do that and Robert when you spoke with the independence uh superintendent was he said it went better than expected are you talking about strictly the you already said the retention went up 400% or something is that what he's talking about it went better than expected or did it have any it was not a detailed

155conversation it was conversation but he said that things have gone better than we expected okay that include academics increases improvements and things like he did not specify what he meant by Saints but again I attendance I think we have to keep in mind that they've only been implemented this this past year I I know that so this is not some they don't have a good pool of data to say of course it's going to help with Recruitment and Retention of course and of course I would love to give this to our teachers and I would love to say I'm 100% behind this but like I said academic I don't see the benefits and there's too many unanswered questions not enough data the parents themselves don't think this is going to help their kids academically and

156a lot of teachers are saying I don't know if I want to work that extra day so for me I don't like it but I can see why it's being offered okay are we ready to move on to attendance yeah appreciate it thank you thank you okay um attendance you can see there that we ended December at 80.7 uh down a little bit from November you know one thing that I would make note is that uh we have had stayed above 80% all year long so um to this point we do we are seeing a slight decline um each month you know but I just want you to know that um this is something that we talk about every single day we do have another meeting on Wednesday uh with the County officials um and

157I I don't know exactly what's going to come out of that meeting but uh it's going to be an important meeting and we'll make sure that we pass the information along to you guys as to what that entailed but uh we're fighting a good fight it's just uh it's just kind of taking a toll there any questions in regards to attendance the are do I'm sorry uh does the data show that after snow days it's harder for kids to come back to school I don't know if we have any data like that because I've seen a lot of I've asked my kids how many kids showed up to their class on the day that they actually had school but it was after snow day and they're like barely we barely had a full class I

158would say that one day where we had a miscommunication error on the media that was a hit and I sent that to you guys that Weekly update um this is a rough time anyways just because of illness historically in the winter time so and I think there's some parents that on those days where it's a little iffy if we have schooled it's their choice if they send them or not send them and so winter time's tough um I'm hopeful that we're going to bounce back in the spring with some attendance incentives things like that going on in our buildings are there any additional questions okay Dr seagis Legal Services RFP uh just just informational this is the RFP that's going out for Legal Services uh our contract is up with our current provider this year

159um so this is going out and we will be bringing back a recommendation the March board meeting for Legal Services moving forward are there any questions thank you Dr seus okay item 11 future meetings and events uh February 12th is the 4:30 is a policy committee meeting um February 19th the district is closed February 20th academics committee at 4:15 and finance at 5:15 February 21st 4:30 facilities committee meeting February 26th 5:30 Board of Education meeting and I would also make a note that we will have a recrui and retain meeting and we'll send that information out when we get that set is there a motion to adjourn I make a motion to Executive session I'll make a motion to all second that motion to adjourn to Executive session pursuing to 610.021 close meetings and Clos

160records for three hiring firing or promoting of particular employees and 13 individually identifiable personal Rec performance ratings all in favor oos this me jour