001e questions on the agenda all right takes us to our first of our two public comment sections for the evening uh we have a very packed agenda and a full uh list of things to go on to you tonight so I'm going to hold this tight to the time frame on this uh I know a lot of people here lot of people here for the same thing so if someone is up there is going to say something that you agree with pleas just raise your hand and agree with them we don't need to hear the same comment or I agree with them 30 times all right so first person Wendy Pisa field Cress Court Watertown Wisconsin um you're going to hear a lot of opinions tonight from this um very packed house um opinions are
002lovely we all have them I'm here to just remind you of the law the moms for Liberty Group that's here has uh an interesting um perspective on the law I'm going to share with you a couple very easy to read fact-based articles that are from reputable media sources including the Journal Sentinel I'm going to pass those down if by some chance you would like something a little bit more legal there a 20 pce 20 page thank you article on case law I did not think you wanted me to kill that many trees but if you would like that citation please email me you have that um their claims that the national moms for Liberty lawsuit prevents schools from enforcing Title 9 in regards to transgender students is false what their case does is that schools
003that are on the mom's through Liberty list says that parents cannot apply to the US Department of Education to have the Department of Education asked to intervene what it does do is say that parents will then need to go to the courts to ask the courts to intervene on the part of our students now what those of you who keep up with case law are finding is that the courts are standing up for our children in the case of earlier this month in elorn a judge in the state of Wisconsin said that the elorn school district could not prevent a trans student from using the bathroom of her choice so as you are considering policy as a taxpayer in in the district of Watertown and as the parent of a trans student I'm going to
004ask you to make sure that the policies that you are writing are not going to cost me a taxpayer money if we are embroiled in a lawsuit which we will lose as a school district so in other words please do not write policies that the moms of Liberty Force you or bully you into writing which we will lose in court our trans students and our gay students have a right to be in our schools they have a right not to be bullied and they have a right to exist and use the bathrooms and the locker rooms of their choice if you have questions I have lots of resources for you again as a taxpayer I know that our legal representatives are expensive so I offer you my expertise please feel free to useage thank you
005for your consideration thank you next we're agreeing sorry thank you any other comments I'm bar I attended one of the strategic planning session meetings I was impressed in how well it was run I am extremely disappointed to learn that the board has chosen to ignore the work of the people who attended those meetings as retired teacher I can tell you that attending meetings putting in the work only to discover that my input has been ignored is one of the most Manning results for a staff member diversity inclusion are important to several groups within our district others will speak on those concerns I will address two groups that are particularly important to me shur school is a bilingual elementary school that celebrates diversity in this District you might wonder why a white female cisgender would be
006interested in that well it's because the fact that my daughter became fluid in Spanish probably saved her life I won't go into details how that particularly happened but I would discuss it later if someone needed it Charlotte had two and a half years of Spanish at whs before she became a exchange student in Australia that particular school did not offer Spanish but there was a student another exchange student who was from Peru she had that student promised that he would only speak with her and only allow her to speak with him in Spanish she returned a year later her Spanish teacher at the high school was amazed at how much her Spanish had grown her vocabulary had exploded her fluency was like a native speaker that is the gift that the Spanish speakers at sh
007spring to the rest of our students we need to recognize that as a gift and part of the reason we do that part of the way that we do that is with our language and our language and the Strategic plan should recognize that diversity so I asked that that be included in the Strategic plan as a retied special ed teacher I was appalled that the word inclusion was deleted from the Strategic plan inclusion is personal to the students who High had CL privilege of working with on a daily basis to these students inclusion means they are valued a person and give the same educational opportunities as everyone else research has shown that inclusion benefits not only the special education students but every student in that classroom I became special education teacher because an experience I
008had as a student also here at whs I was a big sister to a teenage resident of bethesa Lutheran homes at that time she should looking back she should have never been in a residential facil she should have been living in the community that is a slope a slippery slope that we should never go down again and by removing inclusion from the Strategic plan it becomes much easier to not authorize resources that are needed for inclusion and we need to recognize that that those students bring lessings to this District that you cannot imagine one of the most important lessons of inclusion is that we need to care not only for our own needs but the needs of others is that not one of the most important lessons we want our students to learn restore diversity
009inclusion to the St statements to say to those students and those families we see you we value you and we honor the strengths you bring to this community thank you thank you you have anyone else my name is David burn I'm from Watertown and um my 17-year-old son wanted to come tonight but his three sport athlete he doesn't plan always and so he's unavailable he he sent me a text here and he asked me to read it to you I told him that um well let me read it first I don't know if I'm going to read it I can't promise to you but this this is what it says it says hi all my name is Julian burn and I write a quick statement about my great experience in Watertown public school system and
010how diversity has played an important role in that I started out in private school but later decided to go to Riverside Middle School for wide rangei of broader education and that is what it has given me and what Watertown High School Contin used to get me I have been able to pursue things like music engineering and a multitude of information from all different subjects but I wouldn't I wouldn't have been able to do this if it wasn't for the diversity diversity in the students teachers and staff in their viewpoints backgrounds where they're from and what they've experienced diversity in students has taught me important social skills like empathy similarly diversity in teachers gave me a rounded education instead of one-sided and gave me the ability to form my own opinion on any matter my quality
011of education has been high because I've been able to experience a divver of people and ideas here in Watertown thank you for your time thank you all right all right that's be first public session we will have second public session later on tonight I said got a full agenda here so the next item we have on the list we have no announcements and recognitions will be the governance Workshop attorney glad to be here with everybody tonight and thanks for inviting me so this evening we're going to talk about two really critically important issues um and I'm going to give you an overview because we've only got about 30 minutes but we're going to be talking about uh public records and open meetings law and you know I love coming and talking to boards about these
012topics because I think they're so important to the important work you guys do uh both to ensure transparency but also to you know make sure that the district and you as individual board members are not subjecting um either to unnecessary liability so in your board package you guys have an outline I'm going to be going through the outline Loosely um but I would encourage questions or anybody who has them um because discussion often helps um lead to some good uh some good answers questions and answers so feel free to shout those out as I move through the materials so we're going to start with the first part with public record SW um and I think the takeaway for both public records and open meetings is really um one of transparency there's a presumption of transparency
013under the law and not only do we have that through very ious Court decisions various attorney general decisions but we also have that expressly stated in the statutes which you can see there on page two of the outline with regard to a few definitions um I think it's important to understand what an authority is so I'll point that out um an authority most of us think of an authority meaning um a body or individual who has um records in their possession um to typically be the school district itself but it's important to remember that you as board members are also authorities as individual elected officials and that you can see that right there in the definition of authority um as far as what a record is I think here it's important to understand that a
014record a public record for the purposes of public records law is not determined by its format but by its content right so um whether it's electronic whether it's a text message social media post um whether it's uh Maps charts of the things that are identified here in the statute all those things can be public records and it's really dependent on um on what the content is and the content um if it relates to public business and it's something that is maintained a record that's maintained or created by the district or by a public official on behalf of the district on behalf of District business that's going to for the most part be considered a public record and we'll get to in a second how not all public records are necessarily disclosable but it's under it's
015important to understand that definition um there are a few things that aren't public records under the public records law um and you see the bottom of P page two you'll see drafts notes preliminary computations things of that nature um the real question there is whether or not those items are being shared and if they are being shared um who they're being shared with so for instance a lot of people think well if I take notes or I draft uh I put together a draft of a document as long as I label it draft for instance it's not going to be considered a public record and that's not necessarily true um and so we should be conscious as we create records um and as we distribute records if truly the record or the document is something
016that should not be a public record it's really something uh of your personal nature personal notes to refresh your own recollection perhaps um for instance uh administrators might share it with their Administrative Assistant um those types of things would not be considered public records they would be considered drafts but if you distribute it more broadly um for comment or input often times those things will lose draft status I won't go through each one of them here but there's number of other exceptions to what a public record is um including things that are unrelated to District business you see they spill over there on page three materials that have limited access due to copyright Etc um a reminder there at the top of Page Three as well as I said before it's really about format so
017emails text messages social networking um sites and posts all those things can be public records um you also see in the middle of the page there on page three definition of legal custodian so in addition to being authorities you're also the legal custodian for your own records as an elected official and this is important because um some districts uh you have board members who um they might be using private accounts for district business um which is not a best practice they might be um failing to retain some of the records that they are generating such as text messages or social media posts and really that's problematic because as the custodian of the own records they have an obligation to maintain those records and then in response to public records requests um if there are response
018of documents that are in their possession it really doesn't matter if it's on a private account a home computer for instance a private uh device those are things that could possibly be considered response in public records depending on the request so um I think that's an area to emphasize because it's an area where a lot of public officials slip up also when your District gets a public records request it makes it a lot easier for whether it's the IT personnel or whoever is compiling the documents responsive if everything is done on um your your District account for instance so keeping emails on your District account or the very least forwarding those um personal emails or personal email accounts um documents that might be related to District business forwarding them to your District email address um
019at the bottom of page three you see a number of potential issues associated with electronic communications um so just really quick here there's a few things that oftentimes I see from boards and board members where um they they fail to control the information flow and it creates confusion among the public and it can create confusion with regard to um electronic communications and public records as well so one is members who are creating documents this is especially pertains to social media for instance where it's not clear whether or not they're speaking as a public official or in their individual capacity or on behalf of the entire board um another issue is mix messages to the public so without identifying whether or not you're speaking as an individual um oftentimes there's confusion as to whether or not
020you're speaking on the on behalf of the entire board um and that can cause confusion and misunderstanding among the public so let's talk a little bit about access to records um so again the presumption is that unless there is a statutory um exemption um or the public policy balancing test runs in favor of non-disclosure which we'll talk about in a second um the presumption is one of access to the public to the public records there are a few limitations that are identified and listed on page four of your outline um and so things like pupil records law enforcement records Trade Secrets um employee records and Personnel records that you see on page five those are some of the more common ones that you see listed as statutory exemptions um there's also certain information about you
021as public officials um local public officials that can't be disclosed so for instance other than your address um personal information like your personal email address your personal phone number Social Security numbers um credit card numbers account numbers things of that nature that you'd expect would be confidential those are afforded some privacy under the public records law I mentioned the public policy balancing test so um when we review requests that come in um we look to see if there's a statutory exemption that might prohibit disclosure and then if there's any question about whether or not something should be disclosed in response to public records request we look at the public policy balancing test and that test really weighs the interest of the public in disclosure versus the interest of the public in non-disclosure so notice those
022are both public interests um some people think well if there's a confidentiality um question related to a certain person's reputation or information about a certain individual that that automatically would be afforded some sort of um um protection from disclosure and if that falls under one of the statutory exemptions I mentioned that might be true but otherwise you've got to balance and you've got to balance whether that public interest favors disclosure or not so a good example is Personnel investigations or even investigations into board member misconduct I see a lot of that um recently as people are requesting information um about board members and so sometimes you'll see that you know there are damning allegations for instance against a particular Personnel uh member of Staff or elected official um but the law says that overall um
023it's likely not going to have a chilling effect on someone who um files a complaint to release that complaint um and provide that information and the public interest in disclosure typically outweighs the public interest in non-disclosure except if there's a health or safety um question there so if if releasing that information might result in someone being harmed um again that that that public interest might outweigh but for the most part the public interest says disclosure is the rule um this you see on the page six um there's information about retention and access to electronic records I mentioned before that as elected officials board members must maintain own records um and this can be challenging when it comes to for instance social media posts um or other items that might not be within your full control
024and we can talk uh in in Greater detail at some other time I'm happy to provide some guidance on that Nuance um there in the law but um there are retention requirements now while you have retention requirements the retention requirements don't necessarily stem from the public records law um you have your own retention schedules that are adopted by the board um by state statute and you have other requirements by law but the public records law itself really only has um a requirement with regard to the retention of documents or records once a public request is made and you can see that down at the bottom of page six where it talks about um maintaining a record until at least 60 days after the date that the request has been denied or until the records have
025been provided in response to a request but other than that we look at retention schedules which is a separate area of the law and mostly governed by policy the final aspect um on public records that I want to discuss is enforcement and penalties um I often get asked you know what what kind of liability does that look like for the district or even for individuals um when it comes to public records because it's an area that's often disputed when we talk about public records and open meetings there's really a lot of gray area a lot of room for interpretation which is one of the reasons um that the attorney General has provided such detailed guidance when they're able um because it does leave a lot to dispute on a case-by Case basis and so one
026of the questions I get is well what if we get it wrong um what if it ends up that someone brings an action and we find that we either didn't disclose the records we were supposed to or we were we U we provided them in a delayed fashion for instance first as far as enforcement um it's important to understand that the mechanism for enforcing the public records law is an action for mandamus and that simply means that either an individual can um ask the court themselves um that the um in this case the school board or the district provide the requested uh records and then they go to court and petition the court um to file an order in that regard or they can make that same request the attorney general or the local da
027to do that on their behalf um to file for a mandamus action either way the mandamus action really is saying okay Authority whether that's um you know the again the district or a particular official um we're going to require that you provide those documents that you're withholding or we're going to determine that you've delayed um unreasonably in your provision of those documents and so um generally that comes with certain damages attorney's fees um damages of not less than $100 um court costs um punitive damages if it's an arbitrary and capricious denial of access um and some of these attach to the individual as well as the district um so certain forfeitures up to $1,000 um and you can see at the bottom of page seven there's even in some circumstances criminal penalties available um when
028there's alteration or falsification of public records that have been requested or destruction or damage or concealment of public records with an intent to injure or defraud um so just be aware that you know when a public records request comes in some are simple and small in scope um others are more complicated and others are require balancing competing interests and so it's really important that um you know you as board members seek guidance from your Administration and assistance in that regard to go through that analysis um oftentimes working with legal council to see what is the potential liability um what are our obligations under the law to balance that transparency with some of those other interests we mentioned um but either way it's uh whenever you get a public records request as an entity or as
029an individual it's important to to pay close attention to um to how to handle them so before I move on to public or open meetings rather are there any questions on the things I covered I know that was very quick sometimes I do workshops they a full hour on just that topic um but are there any questions on that high level overview yes so you would say that a board's member board Member's First Amendment right is it's their First Amendment right as long as they identify um that they're speaking on their on account sharing their own opinion and that they're not taking an official board position or uh action of the board and they're not sharing privileged or confidential information but they have the right to speak to the public to speak members of the
030of their constituency and or also even media yeah it's a good question one I get a lot especially you know the last few years is especially as there's been a lot of hot topics and controversial issues come up before boards the answer is you don't relinquish your rights as a private citizen just because you're on a board you do have the opportunity and I know there's a big strong desire to be responsive to your constituents um because that's why you were elected I do think that needs to be balanced with the best practice of what makes the body um as a governing body the Board of Education efficient and effective and some of that does come down to information flow like I said before so um clarifying that you're not speaking on behalf of the
031board not uh making comments that might undermine um the the the board and its um and and you know its charge of the of looking out for the best interest of the district um but certainly you don't lose your right to respond to constituents it's just really the manner in which you do it um and making clear that you're speaking as an individual that I think are the key components okay anyone else allow to ask I don't believe so all right then I'm going to move on to open meeting's questions okay so that starts at the top of page eight and really the same Concepts right we start from a place of transparency um the people have a right to see the government's business at work um now that you know we'll see in a
032second when we talk about public comment for instance and we a lot of people show up tonight for public comment um that you know that doesn't necessarily mean participation although often that's the case um but it certainly means that people have a right to come and witness government action um as it's being played out um so we look and and again there's not only is there a presumption of transparency but the laws expressly are to be liberally con and that's right there in the statutes um so what's a governmental body um that's subject to the open meetings law well certainly a board not individual board members right because it has to be a governing but subunits as well your committees um would be governing bodies and they're subject to that um certain advisory commissions um
033really it comes down to what Authority created the body and what means was used to create the body and you see at the bottom of page eight we have a statutory definition of governmental body um and so it talks about boards commissions committees Etc created by Constitution statute ordinance rule or order so those are the two questions you ask when you're trying to determine look you know is this maybe it's not the board that's an obvious one but is this committee or is this advisory Comm we've we've developed is this subject to open meetings those are the questions you ask what Authority created it and by what means so a meeting um has to have two elements and if you turn to the top of page nine you see that those elements are one a
034purpose to engage in governmental business and that can take many forms that can be discussion it can be decision making it can be information gathering and then the second component is numbers um there has to be a number of members of the of the governing body present so such that they can control uh or determine the course of action that that body takes um so you'll see there in the middle of the page under number two um if one half or more members or quum of members are present um there's a presumption that it's there that the body has gathered for the purpose of exercising the responsibilities and Authority um of the body um but there's sometimes when for instance you'll see a negative Quorum the definition of the negative quorum you don't necessarily have
035to have just a quorum a negative Quorum are those that might be less than a majority but nevertheless they have the opportunity or the authority I should say at a meeting to um to to address or impact the uh the course that the the body takes so a good example of that is if something before the board um requires a super majority there's something on the agenda that requires a super majority and requires a two-thirds vote and you have onethird uh show up um that could be considered a quorum because they have the opportunity albeit a negative quorum to um direct the the um actions or the course of the body maybe the most important thing I talk about tonight is uh under 2C which is a walking cor and this is also another area
036that a lot of public officials and a lot of districts um get into some hot water so a walking Quorum says that um no we might not be gathered as a body but we're communicating in a way um that resembles a gathering and is making decisions as a body without being physically present so the old um example used to be you know a game of telephone um you have the board president for instance um calls somebody up and says how do you feel about this issue that's coming up before the board and then they call up the next person and they call up the next person and by the end of all those conversations they understand or have discussed substantively and and the issue that's coming before the board even before the board has had
037a chance to meet in a properly noticed meeting and that's called The Walking forum and if you look at the next item the electronic communication as a meeting that's really the context we see it in nowadays most often um and the courts haven't addressed this in in much detail the attorney general has um and the question becomes when you're looking at whether or not a walking Quorum exists from email exchanges does it look like do does it look like an inperson conversation had some of those same elements and you see them listed here you know what's the number of board members involved um is it is it a majority is it a quum um or is it just a one-on-one conversation and it ends there um what are the number of email messages that are
038going back and forth what's the time frame does it look more like uh instantaneous messaging such that you're having a conversation is it conversational in tone or is it something more like old school written correspondence where it's you know somebody says something somebody says say something a week later um none of those are determinative by themselves but certainly that's what a court would look at um and that's what the Attorney General looks at some of those elements when they're determining if there's an illegal Walkin Quorum taking place um on to page 10 Open Session question about that um so I me uh I've attended a couple of different um workshops on this and that question always seems to come up you know there are many different Bo sizes through all the throughout the country throughout
039the state some of them are like three member boards and uh they have a question about whether or not um just contacting another board member about let's just say schedule you know would that constitute an open for that sort of thing yeah generally not so really there's got to be an issue that's would otherwise be within the board's Authority um and the attorney there is some attorney general guidance that says discussing um whe for instance whether or not an agenda item should be put on an agenda rather than substantively discussing the item itself there's a distinction there and the former is probably not a violation while the latter likely would be um so you know it's not necessarily communication so for instance you know a lot of districts I'm sure you do it here your
040superintendent probably sends out some updates once in a while right and when they do that they send it to the entire board and that's why it's so important that the board not press reply all not start debating these issues but just the fact that someone's communicating or even if the board president sends something out and says you know hey here's something for informational purposes um you're really only get in trouble when you're talking about back and forth regarding a substantive issue that's within the jurisdiction of the board okay so page 10 Open Session um just like the public meetings law and the presumption there that um or the public records law rather just as there's a presumption that records are going to be disclosable and open for the public inspection um open session is the
041rule right um closed session is generally um only reserved for certain times and we'll get to those in a moment but um the default is that meetings are um open to the public accessible right held in a place where we're holding it here right in the district so that people can show up we make accommodations if people need accommodations um rather than in a place or time that would be um inaccessible uh to most people so um you know most boards are are are compliant with that and it's not an issue but once in a while if you talk about like board Retreats I have some clients where their boards want to do a retreat and um it may be you know out of the boundaries of the district and the question comes up as
042to whe you know whether or not that's acceptable whether not they have to post it and so those are all issues you want to think about accessibility when you're thinking about um typically non-traditional board meetings right so what is the response there on Retreat sure so it depends it depends on what it is that you're doing at The Retreat if you have a quorum however and that Quorum is dealing with issues that are um you know again within the jurisdiction of the board that there could be decisions made based on that even if you're just gathering information it's best to post those um and it's best to have those um somewhere where it's accessible to the community um generally within the boundaries of not always and that you know it's not a requirement that they're
043within the boundaries but I think that's generally a good guide poost as to whether or not it's accessible to your constituency but steing clear issues that could come in front of the board as a matter of discussion would be a good point good something to St clear of certainly certainly on like professional development something like that yeah and I always air on the side of caution right I mean it's one of the reasons we're doing this Open Session tonight right you know a lot of a lot of when I whenever I do these workshops I often have board members say well can we do this en closed you know and the answer is no right unless unless we meet one of the statutory exemptions we're about to talk about this just you guys gathering information
044and learning about these topics is something that needs to occur in open session so everyone can see what's going on they hear the same information you and that's why we're doing it any other questions before I move on okay um so you'll see page 10 we we talk about public comment during Open Session now there is no requirement that you allow public comment now in practice um you know because board members want to hear from their constituency um oftentimes boards do that um most boards do that um but it looks different right in some communities you can get up and you can talk about whatever you want other communities you have to stick to agenda items some you have time restraints and because the law doesn't require that a governmental body have a public comment
045period generally uh the the law has shown difference to how a board wants to handle that and its regulation now you can't regulate speech for instance based on its content right you can't discriminate on Viewpoint you let people talk but you can you can certainly maintain order um you know you don't have to allow threatening or harassing behavior um anything that disrupts the meeting those kinds of things so um that's outside of the open meetings law because it doesn't require public comment but something to keep in mind um when you're talking about what speech is appropriate and what Authority does the board have to regulate that speech um one thing I do want to mention though that's highlighted um under D3 on page 10 is that the attorney general has addressed whether or not open
046public comment on any topic would be an appropriate place for a board member one of somebody sitting in your seats to raise an issue that's not on the agenda and the answer from the attorney general is no that's not appropriate because you as board members have access to and an opportunity to influence the agenda in a way way that the rest of the public doesn't right so the public may contact you and ask for something on the agenda but generally policies of school districts will say it's really up to you know the the board president in consultation with the superintendent or you know perhaps a board member can request it but um but I've never seen a policy that allows a member of the public to do it so um the the lesson there is
047because you have the ability to impact that agenda you shouldn't be raising issues that aren't on the agenda as a board member in in a open uh public com for the Attorney General says that would not be a proper use of that all right so let's talk a little bit about closed session um like I said um closed session there are statutory exemptions it must unlike the public records law we have a balancing test there's no balancing test for open meetings though it has to your topic of discussion has to fall under one of these exemptions in order one of these statutory exemptions in order to um be AER close session so you know generally you post the closed session you can see the requirements right here on page 11 you post the closed session
048um you know you you announce why you're going into closed session you vote on it um you have to take all those actions in Open Session you always have to start an open session um to do those requirements in order to come into a properly constituted closed session meeting um and there's a few reasons you can do that we listed here um under 3C at the bottom of page 11 um so one is when you you as a board are acting in a Judicial or quasi judicial function right there's some things for instance um if you're discussing uh if you're dealing with a grievance procedure or you're dealing with um an expulsion um right where you are sitting as the judges for lack of a better term um that you're serving that judicial or quasi
049judicial function that would be a time when you could be in close session for deliberations concerning that case now that's not to say that all those things are necessarily inclosed session as your as far as the hearing um although student expulsions of course would be but it does mean that you can deliberate in a closed session discipline and discharge of um Personnel um that's one of the exemptions um compensation and evaluation of personnel as well um the key takeaway here is that it's not just for instance take compensation you can't just talk about um larger issues like compensation structure um right or suppl compensation in in um in closed session it has to be specific to uh certain employees um and you're discussing their compensation specifically now there's a lot of debate about whether or
050not that can be a small group of employees um one category especially when those employees might be um personally identifiable by addressing their compensation and um you know but overall uh the thing to remember is that you should have someone in mind or some group of employees in mind rather than an overall discussion about compensation another area that sees compensation um that specific point I'm trying to grasp my B that when you say group of employees let say it happens to be a compensation of study on you know uh noncertified staff and in that particular case should that be an open open meeting so generally if you're talking about a comp study if you're using it to make determinations for those specific employees that's different if you're talking about it because you commissioned it and
051it's going to in just inform in general it might be open session it really depends on how you're using it what you're using it for um a case by case basis I'd say is is really how you have to evaluate that one because I've seen I've seen situations and I know I don't have much time left but I've seen situations where you have um comp that are going to inform for instance collective bargaining with a certified teacher stent and in that case that hits on our next one you know competitive bargaining reasons in closed session you might be able to go into a closed session based on that comp study if it's going to inform your bargaining um on the other hand if you've issued or if you've requested the comp study and it's more
052General in purpose because you have want to have a better idea of where other people are other districts are and how they're um in general but it's not forming any particular decision about a group of specific employees that might be different is there a way um is there a way that a district can reach out for more specifics on those typ questions uh like for instance like a staing plan you know sometimes sometimes individual um staff members can be uh identify through just the discussion of Staffing plan however uh perhaps maybe a St that should be discussion for all session yeah it depends on I think you hit the nail on the head are the things we're talking about are they identifiable to a particular even if you're not naming them by name are they
053identifiable to certain individuals um who then you would be discussing or disclosing information about those specific individuals employment with the district I know I just have a few more moments left so I'm going to run through these um pretty quickly so um number five and number six there number five on the top of page 12 um you're discussing things that could be potentially damaging to the reputation of the subject who you're discussing in Clos session that's another time that you can uh so for instance if there's a investigation about allegations of misconduct um we also use this one for um student expulsions oftentimes as well you're talking about information about a person or historical data um behavioral data that might do harm to the reputation if discussed in Open Session and then finally conferring with
054legal counsel note that conferring with legal counsel it's not enough just to have your attorney sitting in the room you've got to be discussing litigation that you are involved in or likely to be involved in um so again it's a real Case by case analysis whether or not you're likely to be involved in litigation due to a certain uh topic but just know that it's more than just having legal counsel there um I'm going to skip down to the bottom page 12 taking action in Clos session um that is generally not the rule usually you're going to come out a closed session and take action in Open session however it is permissible under some circumstances if the reason for your vote if the vote is so tied to the reason for going into closed session
055that you would jeopardize the Integrity of that closed session by voting in open you can vote and closed um confidentiality this is a big one I see a lot lately too um there's nothing in the law that requires board members not to talk about um about Clos session matters that being said is one of the most detrimental things that I see and damaging things I see to boards that want to be efficiently operated establish credibility with each other and establish credibility amongst their constituency and usually it's a policy violation I haven't looked at your policies but it likely is um so my advice to all of you is when you're discussing things in Clos session they should not go outside of closed session there's a reason you're you're triggering these statutory exemptions and you should
056honor that as a way to to build trust and to be an efficient uh governing body um I'm going to skip notice requirements and I'll say the last thing uh on page 14 that I'll touch on um remember subunits uh of of a parent body are also subject to um open meetings law and there are certain all I'll say is there's certain requirements for posting that are specific to those especially when members of the full body are going to be attending um those committees if they're not members of those committee so just remember that there's certain posting requirements and attorney general opinions that um impact and guide those types of meetings um and then lastly I'm just going to end by saying um there are similar penalties uh to the public records law for open
057meetings violations and so any board member for instance that attends a meeting in violation um can uh be subject to a forfeiture of between 25 and $300 per violation and it's a similar process right a complaint is filed with your district attorney um the Attorney General um and there's certain private action rights as well um but ultimately the lesson is you know rely on your administrators they're working with Council oftentimes if they have a question about posting um and if something doesn't feel right you know you want to readdress it uh and with either the presiding officer or the administration to make sure that we're in compliance all right thank you Bri questions quick one so let's say Mike and I knew each other before we got on the board we're both in labor he's
058Union I'm nonunion but we get together for coffee and then we routinely besides talking Economic Development and labor we start routinely talking about Schoolboard matters and by default form a voting block and we always agree to vote the same Mike and I don't do that but you made me nervous for a second if we did where does that us we're not negative for him we're not walking for him right it's not ACH it wouldn't be a technical violation it is it would be a terrible practice that would put you at risk if you do that on a regular basis with anyone else and you gota look at the Optics too right so much of public trust has to do with making sure everything uh is above board and and looks like it's above board right
059and it actually is and so when people start and I've seen this lately with especially with private social media groups for instance um you know and and members and these private groups commenting for instance um it just does you know it's got it doesn't look like open government I don't do it exactly thank your question got answered my question got answered only because I know during the whole uh members of boards all over the place were either on or running a private Social Media Group one that would look like they were discussing policy action and everything else prior to meetings happening that those policies ended up coming up on just what kind of guidance do you have for our board in relation to either their membership of those and or even running those kinds of
060Facebook pages or something like that I don't know how much that exist anymore but a lot of that happened progam I'm just wondering thoughts are I think there's all kinds of issue and I think that Co caught a lot of people unprepared and a lot of ways but that was one of them is they didn't understand how do we conduct business and you know I think I think I think the author you know the powers of be probably cut a little slack because it was unprecedented but I can say that there's a lot of people who are involved in those private groups and you know they think well it's only it's only a couple of us but the Optics of it looks so bad I've seen a lot of complaints filed with local district attorneys
061that say there's a private group and they're talking about public business and we can't get in or we can't access it and most of the time it's turned out to be nothing but sometimes there's something there and sometimes just the Optics do so much damage to public credibility of the entire institution of the governing body that it's an issue itself not to mention all kinds of problems with public forum you know creating a public forum discriminating against people by not letting them um comment or be part of that private group based on Viewpoint discrimination all kinds of things you don't want get invol [Music] any other questions right thank you thanks everybody next have on the agenda is the bullying data update what happened to the rest of public comment we have another people who
062make com public comment section at the end of the meeting yes thank you very much um we uh we always start with gratitude so I want to thank the board for um sharing looking at some data and also for the support of a new data sharing model um just appreciated just a reminder about that new model that we discussed at a planning committee in June I believe about a different and new data Shar model and tonight's the first attempt at this right and uh really involves Chris and I sharing three to five minutes of data around coh longitudinal some notable Trends and then next steps and then 5 to 10 minutes of Q&A and so this is our first attempt and next month we we're gon to reverse course a little bit and show you
063some things about why we'll get back to I think it's also important to note that questions prior to uh us presenting are appreciated just allows Chris and I to make sure we're answering the questions that problem and weave it into the conversation so those those are appreci um I think it's important to note that we're a journey around being student driven but data informed early phases of that journey and this is one step in that Journey Chris and I will navigate this this new model throughout the year and we'll look for feedback in the spring about what went really well in this different model what revision IDE have to change it and we'll use that feedback for next year sh we want to we want to use this platform to continue to share tonight we're
064look at buling and this is a mandatory report that we'll share with the board annually so this is something that we great for every year um our our data digging boing has already sured a couple things one is that there are inconsistencies in the way we reports and behaviors and we also know that the way we uh it's connected but the way we report bullying and the way we report harassing needs some clarification and these are being addressed in a number of ways one is that Sarah is doing wonderful work of systems for behaviors and reporing behaviors Chris and I will with principles once a month for 30 minutes kind of replicating this very thing data and their keep it fresh with them and an example of some of the conversations that are occurring that
065the high school gather think Thursday this week to talk about some of those inconsistencies up with st so those things are in place continue work chis here she's a phenomenal data Guru and a more phenomenal human so attitude that I share with Chris never be enough so thank you Chris and um I think Chris and again we're GNA talk about cohort longitudal Trends and then next step so you guys have had time to look at the data I just want to kind of talk you through some of the pieces of it and then we'll be open to questions at the end um you only have three years of data because in until 2021 we had ins skyed harassing and bullying together so I can't separate unless I read every referral written um in years past
066so um the 2021 school year is when we first separated harassing and bullying in our sty and that's how I'm pulling them the data is how it's entered into cyber by the person that um enters the referral or the behaviors um another kind of small hole in the system that we definitely want to address is the that bullying has entered into Skyward and there are three categories the three you have recorded here um bullying by race bullying by disability and bullying by gender those are not all inclusive beliefs that you can bully a student but there are currently no other options in Skyward for us um I have checked with our Skyward Guru and looked at the possible ones we can do and we've discussed maybe creating our own but we need to make sure
067that does not mess up our state in by adding something that we want that isn't already set up because Skyward really kind of usually has it set up how the state wants it so it's a piece we're looking into um most of the ones then that would not fit under those will be then stored as a harassment behavior um for it to be bullying versus harassment we are looking for there to be an imbalance of power between the student that is being bullied and the person that is bullying them so that is going to be the key difference between when it would be written up as bullying one is going to be harassment example of that would be like a senior bu a freshman notably size and um maybe influencing the school it could also
068be a group of students foring the single students there's going to be an imbalance of power in that situation um the student without disabilities bu a student with disabilities that maybe doesn't have the ability to defend himself physically or verbally in the way that they should be get to um so clarification as I just gave you to the difference is something that the high school is really looking to do the um people the administrators are always looking for those and they can change it if they disagree talk to the teacher about how it right now but having everyone understand the difference between those is an important piece so when we look at the data then um I looked at it as looking for Trends in the data that we could look at trying to fix
069one of the big things that we you can see is that the class of 2027 last year's freshman this year's sophomores have had the largest number of buing referrals all years and I pulling the data from um this was not really um used for the high school staff um or the Middle School staff that had them before them they have more referrals in every area not just that area but definitely something [Music] that year per day per week per student yeah no the y axis is total number of incidents for the year for the year so um then if we look at it um also then another piece of data that I kind of didn't have here if it didn't figure is sending to the administrators students that had referrals multiple years so they bullied
070in 2022 and then they bullied in 2023 they've done it more than once this is a patter behavior and then if they do it again the consequences need to address the fact that they have done in the past and with students moving buildings it's important for someone to kind of be pointing those students out to them so they can be aware of that so doing that communication for them um and then obviously the other pattern that I kind of pointed out is that the increase in the buling by race color national origin has gone up each year um again I three years of data I don't know if we're going to see that kind of level out maybe it's just actually starting to get reported accurately versus that first year of data when people didn't
071even know that they could report something as bullying and we're still putting under harassment I'm not sure but a data point that I thought was um important for us to recognize um I think that I want to open it up to questions right away because I think you had enough time to look at it oh there was another question that us before that I did want to address in 2022 23 so if you're looking up the red bars for the cohort data if you add them up and then you add up the red bars for the incidents it doesn't add up completely because some of the kids that committed those have graduated they were in the class of 2023 do that makes sense to you so they would be in 13th grade right there's three
072bullying incidents and and I just didn't include them in the coh DAT they are gone and no longer um students that we were um looking to address the we are we removing the data from any of the students that are leading the district no it's still stored no it's completely in our system for my point is you may want to call that out in the data that you know here's number of incidents but the students don't okay yeah absolutely yeah um other questions about the data that we haven't discussed I tried to get a lot of them that we have ahead of time so when you have bullying and you have harass so we also are keeping track of harassment cases so where where is who's deciding is it in both or is it in
073one of the other it's in one or the other okay um and some of these you know especially protected class and it has it both so you can harass someone Bas by on their race or you can fully them harass they have buet from there teacher has to choose on it is there an imbalance of power or um bullying should be a repeated Behavior so do we so is there no record I know sky but if someone is BU outside yeah we have really no record of we have record of as a harassment Behavior where and I mean it can be noted there but we can't pull it that way from the system okay I think that's what I'm positive looking at identifies gaps and that's the exciting part for me is that we're identifying
074and do something about it which is why a big passion of rewriting the policy was this is great to know you know I'm noten policy specifies that we would call out Bing instances in all situations um so not just individual classes also any other cases so while this might be comp with State there's the additional step that we take comp support Poli I agree no no we agree it's something I've been trying to contact hey is there a code that we eliminated is there a code that we can get in there and trying to figure out that piece as for the same you guys question we identified why last 27 and or other behaviors you know like it's not just that they have um been a struggle in middle school and their first year in
075high school we hoping they grew up over the summer but I think it's important to know again as we said we'll meet with principles once a month and we have a list of possible data topics to bring that this would one of and we just want to keep that fresh and talk is there record of reports I know we have like the anous report um on our website really long time where can report do we have record anybody holding on to that or who's looking at that on a regular basis well there's the don't know I will ask questions and find out I think it's probably house in building but then it's probably hous like a place where I don't have access to it I spreadsheet that they created in each building for those or
076something and I will find out if they do have those and if I get my hands at them but then they're also just because it's reported doesn't it's verified as was reported and there an official consequence or it would so it doesn't just go sit there and be uned so our policy says records will be maintained on the number and types of reports made and sanctions sanctions imposed to incidents found to be in violation so my understanding is according to our policy those need to be maintained also because I think are getting repetitive reports even though it's only been one time let's say they're doing it to 10 different kids someone needs to talk 10 different it's still competitive and that all right thank you next item on the agenda is the act update um
077just a quick review I know this is something that we have touched on quite repeatedly at services so we get asked for a full board meeting um to review the different pie of act 20 just as a reminder Act was a law that was passed um in July of 2023 and we have been um working diligently for the past year to implement the various pieces of law tonight what I'd like to do is just highlight where we're at with certain pieces of that and just be available for any questions um first and foremost act 20 um really outlines what the curriculum instruction early literacy should look like it outlines exactly uh which pieces of instru included that um specifically actually does Outlaw or prohibit Outlaw is the strong word the use of the three queing
078instruction um this is something that our literacy coaches have been working really diligently on with the last three years um with our teaching staff um so we are currently as you know undergoing a review of our curriculum uh for elementary literacy the curriculum that we currently use uh does use the msv however like I said our literacy coaches have been looking over the past few years to transition our teachers away from using that as the primary model of instruction um assessment I know that Mr bu our assessment calendar and you are aware that we are using um as web that was announced in July as the Hing single reading screamer across the state um because of the date that it was announced the fall screaming is not a required screening uh again we are working
079with literacy coaches um to learn more about a web we have used it in past in other areas that's not completely unfamiliar to us um but the first screen of that will be um in the winter screen period um I should note that families are not able by law to act out of this um so this is a little bit different than like the ex families do have the option to have that um we do um have to do a diagnostic Reon assessment for any child shows up as at risk below the 25% F on that um our coaches and Title One teachers are uh working very diligent to outline what that will um families do need to be notified of the results of the reading SC no later than 15 days after the assessment
080is scored um and then if the assessment um indicates the child may be at risk we do need to provide information about how to make a special end referral information more information about this one area that we are waiting for additional information from the state about is the personal reading plan and again this goes back to that screener the student scores below the 25th percentile we do have to create a personal reading plan the state just uh issued guidance as of I believe last week about how that interacts with the students who would have so Sarah and I will be working together with that um there are some Provisions about transitioning from third to fourth grade If the child has not yet exited their personal meing plan and that does include some intensive summer school
081work as well um I know we have working on our retention policy and we should be getting some guidance from the state they should be releasing a sample uh guidance policy for that one area that I like we have made the most progress with is that required reading training as you remember the board did invest some of our exra dollars she support training our K or 5K through fifth grade teachers um using keys to literacy our teachers engaged in that over the summer um dozens of hours per teacher have been uh implemented with that and our teachers are will continue that work throughout the school year so I can tell you that our teachers should be complet with that by the end of the 20242 school year um it is only required that we start
082that by July 1 of 2025 however we felt really strongly if we were looking at new materials we wanted our teachers to understand the why behind new materials it has been fabulous because in those trainings they've been discussing what they've been learning taking a look at our current curriculum and saying where does it meet where does it not meet um to build a better understanding of that um our principles I'm proud to report have been doing their training to the aim Institute um I know when they're done because they very excitedly share with me their certificate that they passed to their test um so our teachers or principles will be our elementary princip be completed with that by July 1 of 2025 um finally we do have some reporting that we have to share with
083the state um and you can see all the different pieces of information that we will have to share with the state by July 15th 2025 um essentially explaining which of our students not fing but how many of our students I should say um we're identified as at risk um what assessments that we're using and then what type of progress we made with um those interventions that we've done so um if you have any questions at all please feel free to share them with me but I do think it's important to keep you up to date to where we're at with that um it has definitely been um a great learning experience for our teachers over the summer and um it is not Rand learning um but it is certainly reinforcing what we've done in the
084past and what we really appreciate about that training is that it focuses specifically on in our classro um will this at some point as you're going through this and things like that it sounds like there a summer school component so then will that be kind of leaved into how we're looking at summer school um yes and we need to be sure the law stat C that there's intensive instruction offered to students over the summer there is no requirement that we make students attend that so yes it will and the law is very specific about students going from third fourth grade are not quite at but I think we know the importance of that summer instruction for students with literacy and I will say that I think that we've got done a lot of work postco
085with um those classes to ensure that we have high quality instruction happening for students who may be struggling when's the next uh is the course set for this year the Die Cast is there another checking is there a course correction or we just uh doing what we're doing we agree to do what we've agree to train the curriculum we have P set until we report on July 15 or should this board or at Services uh expect an update or any type of changes in how we're doing things between now and then or we're pretty set those look like we're set but we're set with checking on ed services that it relates specifically to the curriculum adoption I think it's fair as we dive into the data to you know update the bo with how manying
086plans have we [Music] or imag [Music] any other questions all right on to our next item tonight the Strategic plan presentation so so I am here but I can't show my face or share the screen has to be enabled for me can you hear me l or no I can hear you Jared can you hear me well just second we're trying to uh get you on the screen in the room here perfect do you have sharing capabilities share her screen sh capabilities too so sh your presentation it sounds good okay so that worked here we go okay we can see screen perfect let me just make sure I can turn on my video then for you there we are hello everybody and let me share my screen again so first of all I just want
087to say again how grateful we are at the diamond group that we've had a chance to partner with the the school district to embark on this journey that you all are in in terms of redefining where you go as As you move forward as a school district over the next three to five school years here and I want to share with you the process that we've used and our goal for tonight is really to share out that that proc process and present to you the main components of the plan based on all the hard work of your community members staff and families and then outline the next steps that we will take to implement the plan want to make sure I give you an opportunity to ask any questions but ultimately we're seeking board approval
088to move forward with the main components of the plan to lend us the next steps in terms of operationalizing the plan so I think it's always good to start with why do we do this again and we we we talked about this at the very beginning of the process when I first came to you and said we do strategic plan because it's a great opportunity to gather everybody around the different um groups of your community to have a collective Focus around why why do we exist as a school district what's our role it provides intention and focus moving forward for continuous Improvement and it'll guide decision making over the next couple years often we will be po posed with questions about what step do we want to take do we want to pursue uh a
089new strategy that's in the educational landscape and sometimes we can just pause and go back to our strategic plan and ask ourselves does this meet our priorities and what our community has told us is important right now and that helps shape the next steps we'll definitely set some specific actions for progress and once we have those actions set it'll allow us to monitor evaluate and adjust as we need to moving forward that's why we do this plan and here are the steps that we've taken over the past couple of months and I will end to say you know working with other districts across the country with strategic planning I have been most impressed by the Watertown Unified School District with the level of Engagement and the sincerity in the work as we've brought people together
090over the course of the summer months to to put together a new plan the steps that we took we we took opportunity each meeting to kind of assess the state of the district like what's working what's not where do we might want to grow uh we developed a new Mission and a new vision statement which we'll present to you tonight and we did this work by identifying where are we strongest and areas where we need to improve what are some opportunities out there that we might want to take advantage of in our school district and also have a lens on what might be threatening to Our Success moving forward we also divine define core values that we hold for our students and we hope to see reflected in the adults that are working with those
091students and ultimately it's about meeting needs right like if we can understand the the needs that our students our staff and and facilities are facing that helps us determine the priorities for us moving forward and once we have those priorities set then we can start working on that in terms of goals to meet those needs so that's the journey we've been on and we're I would like to say we're at the end but really this is just the beginning because now that we have a plan now that the real hard work comes uh so let's let's go through the plan we will start with the mission statement and when we worked with your community members and staff we asked you know what are what are these three questions what three question questions here um these
092three questions will guide what your mission statement should be and we talked about the mission as it's our why it's like why what what are we doing today with our students our staff our families and answering these questions what do we do whom do we serve and how do we serve them so after several evenings together and working with a very large group with diverse perspectives and thoughts I'm very pleased to present to you a a drafted new mission statement and just for fun we're going to read it we serve our students by providing educational opportunities to promote academic excellence and a lifelong love of learning and so we came forward after our last meeting with your work group and combined everybody's feedback into a synthesized statement from there we talked about about that statement
093as a district leadership team and then we brought that sample or draft statement to your planning committee and in the end this is the result and I think it captures the the as the aspects of all different groups that have come together for the best interest of our students the next thing we focused on was our vision statement and our vision statement is where we going it's our tomorrow it's our future and so if we if we actualize our mission if we are doing what we say we're doing in our mission statement then we will have success in the future with inspiring Learners with st student- centered education strengthened by Community involvement and we're using this tagline tradition Innovation and transformation as a way to Brand our strategic plan moving forward we know that water
094town is steep in Tradition and we are are focused in our work right now in innovating and making ourselves a a district that has its own Niche compared to all those other districts in the state in your neighboring area and if we're focused on continuous Improvement we'll change right it will change for the better and we'll I mean that's the goal of most educational entities is to get better each day and with that comes a transformation we continue to get better so that's been our driving force and then we look at our core values and what we did here is we asked all of your participants of your work group to prioritize their top values that they hold for students and again we want to see reflected in the adults who are working and serving
095with those students and the top ones are listed here for you and they're in alphabetical order U but I will tell you that the number one value that came out of the group was empathy uh so that was if there if it was a race empathy one the race and you can see here the definitions that were set again through a collective effort from all those who participated and identified these core values as their top values then were asked to Define them in their own words and then we were able to synthesize that in these lovely statements here for you after our leadership team and again planning committee had a chance to to read through them and make sure that they fit the context of the Watertown Unified School District and then probably the most
096important piece depending I guess on who you talk to but I think this is the most important piece is our priorities what what's going to guide our work moving forward outside of that mission and vision and we landed on five different priority areas and they I think they cover all all aspects of education and and our why so the first one is really focused on our students in terms of their performance and growth so we are we want to have inspired academic Excellence for all of our students we want to see growth in each and every one of our students so that speaks to education our teaching and learning all in team represents our people you know everybody who comes together to uplift the work of our students to make sure that our students have
097success it's our team so this is your Educators your staff um everybody who pitches in to make sure that our students have the best experience the third one is connecting as community and the community is heavily invested in the school district that is evident and so looking at ways to lean into that as a school district moving forward by creating deeper connections deeper levels of Engagement and supporting our our students so that they're ready to be active individuals in the Watertown Community um while they're in school and while once they they leave graduation stage the next one is intentional resource allocation this is about leveraging the funding that we do have and looking at the ways that we can make sure that operations are sustainable uh to make sure that we can continue to protect
098the services and programs that we offer to our students to give them that student experience and the last one is about Innovative facilities and use looking at different ways to use our facilities in ways that maybe are more relevant and meaningful for our students and our community and thinking about you know do we need to do upgrades to those facilities do we build new or do we just need to rethink the way we use our facilities so these these five priority areas guide the work then moving forward over the next couple years so if we pull it all together I'm happy to share with you a draft of just visually how we can pull this all together with that lens of tradition Innovation and transformation this is still work that we're working on once we
099have your approval board we will finalize this work but I wanted to give you a sense of how this all pulls together in a visual representation to share with your community your audiences and individuals throughout and I think what's really important for us to do is take some time answer any questions that you may have but our next steps are we really would like you to consider this plan moving forward and we'd love to have your your action in terms of approving a Mission Vision the core values and the priority areas so the main components from there we will go deep into developing a series of communications to roll out the Strategic plan so we'll do simple things like creating a news release and some social media posts about the action to move forward with
100the plan we'll help the district create a specific web page for the Strategic plan as well as creating VIs uals or signage in terms of posters back sheets that you can use in your work across the community and with other stakeholders and we'd like to create a brochure that you can use to market the school district and showcase the great things that the district has to offer to students and families in the community with the with the approach and lens of the Strategic plan so wrapping those two together into a nice uh deliverable that you can use in many different ways as well as a video that works to do the same thing to promote the school district as well as share out the Strategic plan and talk about why you all exist there in
101your area for students and families with that then comes the hard work that I alluded to before uh it's time to operationalize the plan once you take action and what that means is we'll take each of the priority areas and set goals for students it related to those priorities areas and with each priority area we determine certain tactics that we're going to deploy each year to guarantee success for those goals that we've set we will also identify who's responsible for overseeing each of the priority areas and those tactics to make sure we are making progress as well as being able to come back and and share progress with you all in a number of ways I Envision you know some quarterly updates if not more frequent updates to the board about that progress we've talked
102about creating other tools to share progress with our larger community and we'll do that by identifying what what does success look like if we're being successful in the area of Allin team with a particular strategy of maybe hiring the best staff that we can we can do if that becomes our goal and a a strategy that we need to or Strate that we need to develop for that goal then we want to report out to you on how we're doing in that particular area so it's important that once the plan is developed and we have our actions set that we keep coming back to it monitoring evaluating and responding and and that's the real hard work that's ahead of us as we continue on this journey so I'm going to stop talking and I welcome
103questions from the board and and or any extra comments from those who participated in the process I know Mr Bull is there to maybe perhaps assist with that so I'll turn it over yeah so um obviously we're basically two-third the way to we we still need to implement goals tactics top RS responsibilities and indicator for Success cre temp for you but all that work is predicated on how you sit as a board right now with what has come to what you saw in mission statement vision statement our priorities our core values came to you through a meeting of the planning committee um and they took in all the consideration of all of the um meetings we had with our public um you know the different work group sessions and other things that came in as
104well as emails uh conversations with the superintendent I shared the board all of those uh pieces of information they took together and they finalized a dra Mission uh stat statement core values and priorities what the administration needs to know from you um is some voice activation that that is the path we're going down now I realize that in the end right we'll bring you the rest of the goals tactics and everything else that go along with that in the end you may say we we need to finalize this by tweaking the mission statement Orion statement and if you do tweak it I may have to go back and say okay that's to change but in order for us to really continue moving forward with the staff we need to know that your next 8 99%
105behind what has been drafted to this point so that we can continue forward realizing that in the end it's all done that's when you put your approval on it and make it a resolution of aard so I'd like to hear from the board are we 99 98% the way there with the Mission Vision Values and so on or is there still discussion that the Board needs to have on that so that we can move forward order Mr President would be appropriate to recommend a resolution on this so that we can actually do a voice Vote or do you just want a discussion on it I want a discussion on it I purposely didn't put a resolution on the agenda for tonight because I didn't want us to micromanage the plan every time brought forward to
106us to have another resolution a resolution for the whole thing but I do need you know I do need to says I will say Jar's nothing is set in stone until we do that resolution last year instead so we can come back we can change anything as we move along the way because we see the goals come up well this doesn't align we want to change this that left it open so we can have those discussions so other um yeah I I felt like I support the recomendation to keep this as committee discussion consideration everybody's perspective and came up with a neutral um mission and vision statement I support that couple things so I need or whatever um I know during our discussion in the um committee as you know kind of going through discussing
107different things regarding the vision statement you know in second look at this um when I take a look at Lor can you pull the vision statement back up I sure can yes I no I went back and I got like the um we the previous um so when we take a look at that and just comping it to you know what is what we're looking at right here and I know there was discussion as far as like okay Val University and tradition and you know working with the school pride and you know those kind things um it you know I brought a question about that and comparing the two the draft version kind of pulls me in a little bit more as far as like being more like water tone as far as that's concerned
108it gives me a little bit more meat it feels like um the one that we have in the the document tonight feels a little bit more gentle it kind of feels a little like more sted kind of thing um the reason I gave that some more thought as far as you know I know we talked about you know diversity um and I guess the reason that I appreciate kind of some of some of what theft had in it is when I think about the diversity of who we are as a community and who we like our schools our elementary schools for example like I know we're very proud of you know we have um leap and we have um stem and we have traditional when we have you know like we have all the different
109choices there and I know we're very proud of that and I know we're proud as far as the um the different um programs that we offer we've got and we've got you know stem in the middle school and then when it comes to the high school we just have all these different Pathways and so I just I feel like keeping some of you know whether it's position or I don't know I'm not a work but taking a look at those pieces I just feel like that represents a little bit more of water town and helps me feel a little bit more connected to really about who we're about what we offer and who we serve because we have all those options because we serve you know different needs and things like that as far as
110the students in the population um so that's my that's my thought as far as being stat do you have any suggestions I know I I was like okay how do I Wordsmith this in here um I wasn't able to come up with a specific thing but I certainly can do that yes's with vision St right now we had discussion on that because I felt similarly um we have a very program very strong in language like that and through some of the wordsi you know me um what I hung up my hat on that student education hits those pieces we're never going to get rid of inclusion in our school it's here by the we are diverse that's I went and I looked at about 20 other mission and vision statements across the state of Wisconsin
111to see do they have words of inclusion do they have words of diversity do they have words of things that we naturally do in education and none of them did so that's where I went to see are we missing the Mark or are we not and I thought whether it was like I was one of the first to say in our I didn't want to lose what the community came up with but at the same token we do have to wrap ourselves around that as well so as I looked at other statements not saying we have to do what anybody else is doing just does our statement compare with some of the others and it's there's a lot of similarities you know a lot of those key words so with it we went with the
112approach of being a bit more General to be all-encompassing and then what's going to happen with that the goals and other things [Music] areic come in I know we talked about our facility stud we're going to have our dual language program we're going to have our EG program we're going to have those things that LE you know is you know all those pieces are still going to be part of our district we're not losing that that's where the tradition comes in and so one of the things we're smiing is okay that's piece of our tradition we're not losing our tradition it states that out almost everything we do tradition Innovation transformation and so through that conversation I'm only having that now recap for the public too where that there was a long discussion through that
113that we didn't want a paragraph for each of these that this does Point Blank we hold true the Traditions that we have and we're not going to lose that and as a board we stand behind that and that was the conversation I think there were eight of us present at that meeting seven or eight and it was consensus through that that The Stance was there for those pieces coms what's next okay um um my next one thank you um as far as core values are concerned what are we gonna do with those Jason is it gonna be like Jason do you want to share your idea for this I think there are a number of things that we can do with this one idea that as Dr mentioned we're getting some feedback about goals now
114part of the next steps and one idea that um we bringing forward to the internal team on Thursday is to use those code values as the foundation of our student engagement surveys and so we' ask questions around empy honest those core values and begin to gather data around those very things another piece that I've seen districts using their CL values is what they call touchon and so we work with Community Partners to have those core values really through our community you go to the local Subway you see those core values up there and our students know we're in Partnership so those things will come come around and discussions and see that as part of our goal setting process questions I one question what's a under empathy what's a caring and school community REM yeah yes
115I'll take care of that I think that happened through our word smithing as a planning committee a long meeting it was which one one more same thing here in the priority areas the priority areas sorry thank you it's a little hard to hear facilities and use should it be Innovative facilities use it's no I think right I think it's important to have them separate because it could be use or it could be additional or new facilities as well all right um only other question I have is discussed vision is there any discussion on the mission that division so Tina made a statement I commented on that statement do we have a decision based on where to go we have do we have acclamation on leaving it as is seem we seem to agree with Diana's
116description of the intent behind it stand coming from you know as far as that goes and at all I'm just concerned with kind of assuming it's encapsulated it makes it more thoughts I think it's unlikely that we're going to the law stop you know providing Ela services or anything like that I think it work well every staff member in this District strives provide love dignity and respect to every student so bu divis yes thank you um and I will tell you I struggled with the word one of inspire Student Center education but I think the devil student centered education if we say diverse Learners we have to Define what's diverse Learners and if we just say learners that's all and we have all burners the Student Center in education I think any adjective that we
117put in front of that um shrs that and again that's just where I'm going with that and I looked and try to figure out where we put that but again to D's Point Student Center education really that's what we do that's what we ke on from you know our IEPs from our so learning programs all these things we have you know language program all of these things are students Center I think that's the that's our start do people outside in educational environment know that that's what that is if I read that without my you know inner knowledge you know I'm like student centered education I focused well and and to that point you know we're just you're it's hard sometimes to just look at the mission or Vision without the context of additional language or
118explanation and so when we talked about putting together like a pro a brochure or a video that's where we get to go in detail and share what do we mean by student centered education um so that that will be lost I don't believe I think it's just hard sometimes to look at this without the whole context this partas that I didn't want to discussion tonight but not have a specific resolution because as we go through as Jason builds out the rest of the pl get other St this we can back you know what to TW a little bit and I didn't want us to lock in this as we move forward until we got done so the whole thing said yep we're good with this so I mean if we're good just generally moving forward
119in this Direction with this that would be good enough for tonight and they can keep moving that's what we're looking at but we're not locking anything in until we get that final resolution that yeah um any comments on Miss statement before all right then we have a hearing General acclamation from the board will move forward with this Jason continue the work on this with the rest of the administration and to the idea of presenting the final Le draft to us for a resolution that the board will along the way in that discussion so as we see we can make changes and adjustments as we go yes I agree pardon me um I'm sorry um in the as far as going forward piece um you know when we're looking at priority areas I did I just
120wanted to make sure as far as that that part of it um being on the HR committee we did like the employee satisfaction survey and did you know different things that are really important to staff and you know recruitment attention all those things that affect the educational environment um so I just as far as like as we're determining those priority areas different things like the employee satisfaction survey is that going to be part of determining those pieces and how we perform to be able to bring those together yeah so I would say that that would be one of our measures of success you know but also we get to like the area of all right that our work HR retaining anding up staff working together as it focuses towards student learning and so any uh
121goals area certainly come HR depart in relation to how we going to take sta to supporty you'll see some action areas in that and ways to measure in our current Strat we have am I correct in my thinking that our PRI are there five of them they will replace those three General buckets so now we have five general areas that drive our decision making that is correct correct so you'll have goals under each of those five action steps who's responsible and how what is most prob more dat Community everything you're help us that what's the most important as we do with General operations least you'll see that you you'll see what kind try keep those goalss so we've already started our ad team this year's goals moving as fast as we can students even in
122draft form but we're going have three to five years so um my goal started tomorrow cery is to go over with the draft of our and oure values talk all right all right to the next thank you everybody facil stud update Jack ward he I don't want to end up walking off with your list would it be okay if I put the signing list just right here so we don't accidentally Gra paper just on accident I want that to happen ready all right hi it's so good to see you all again be back with you I think the last time we were with the board was in June so we're excited to be back with you um uh this evening we're gonna just do a real quick round of reintroduction and so our um team
123with you here this evening um it's a pleasure to be back with you Melissa Thompson I work for PR as a director of Education strategy also joining me this evening is Nick Kent who's a partner in the education stud Studio as well as Devin Cat who is also a partner and both of them are also educational planners so we're excited to be with you um we are ready for slide if you are is there something did you want me to drive uh I'll drive okay good we're good to go there we go thank you so we um earlier this spring uh went through the first two steps in our process process with you and so tonight we're here back kind of with the second half of the third step and so we're here with you
124this evening to help uh reaffirm the direction you gave us in June as well as identify top options for further development from those choices pricing uh kind of next steps as well as next steps for Community feedback next please so the process to date as the board will recall is that as we said we have been through a full facilities condition assessment of each and every building in the district we've also reviewed all of your school sites for educational space adequacy and then in June we formally commenced concept development and that is kind of where we are today and we're going to start shifting towards 4 perhaps by the end of this evening a little bit so with that we're ready for the next as well um if just to refresh yourselves I know board
125members you had this in advance and it was posted on board docs but if you want wanted to refresh yourself with any of the prior reports the first one we did was the step one report and that was um for fiscal management committee and that is linked to the actual um presentation in board docs the same is true with the second one and then the full presentation that was provided to the board on May 20th and with that we are ready for next all right this is where we actually get to turn the page and start to talk a little bit more about what the future could look like what some ideas for the future may and that's options development so as we go through this de's going to take us really through really the
126fun stuff um we're not going to see renderings we're not going to see plans we're not going to see designs for buildings we're a long long ways from that what we're really looking at are big ideas and we're going to talk about are any of these ideas things that we want to carry forward and develop further and gather more input on so if you click that slide please before we jump in we just wanted to refresh everybody's memory we're going to go pretty quickly through these first slides but this one is kind of important this is capturing uh the work that we all did together back in June at that uh Retreat and of critical uh critical memories here are really what the board parameters were uh that that we left understanding and I'm just
127going to touch on these real quick one um we heard maintaining status quo is is really U not an option right we need to do something other than just continue to maintain status quo discovering and implementing fiscal efficiency for example grade level alignment is something that we wanted to explore as we look at our facilities maintaining the E and dual language option um but remaining programming should be studied so we're going to keep that we heard that that was a critical piece that's has to remain consolidate Elementary Footprints combine middle school and high school to one campus was something to explore ultimately have a one campus model for all schools via grade level centers um of not less than four grades per building if it helps get down to a one campus model that was
128something to explore and then the long range facilities plan this kind of dubils with what you all just talked about the long range facilities plan really needs to sync with the dis the district strategic plan okay so very quickly we've already seen this information but a very quick review the middle and high school buildings in review and we picked these two because they will Factor um into some of the options as we go forward so again the existing conditions uh report at the Middle School uh we had some some needs uh and various elements of facility but it has a great great site click the total cost of maintenance if we did nothing to that building um for the next 20 years and today's dollars was just under $23 million for that facility so again
129all that detail is in the reports that are online cck uh of most importance here is that piece of lamp right so you can see on that site the Orange is the current building uh the red is where we have parking or pavement and all that purple space and this is in your packets is available land that we we can build on there is an area towards the South that is wetland so that's a place that we need to to stay stay away from but this is a very good site for the community to think about what the future may hold uh the high school the newest in the district so here again we saw less maintenance because it is the newest facility uh in the district with really accessibility being our highest need slide
130please um this is the biggest number but it's also the biggest build by far the biggest site so over the next 20 years we are looking at about $ 45.3 million and somebody might say that's our newest building how is that possible this newest building is now over 30 years old so things to age C that slide here we have truly the blessing of size and land with 110 acres uh give or take this is actually your site so big it doesn't fit onto one slide it splits the north part is on the left the South part is on the right again with the orange uh being your building now we have a lot of a lot of land here to work with we have some zones that are really not usable particularly the area
131to uh the East um we have Wetlands we want to stay away from and we have an area on the North side the left side of the slide we have a lot of topography we have forests it's an area that we really want to stay away from as well we do have several areas of large tracks of land that can be considered uh for use in the future slide uh this is an interesting piece so as we study the land particularly nor of endeavor drive you see lots of open space there's a lot of topography about 40 ft of elevation change when you look at that Hill that actually exists within within those trees so this is just something that we want to be cognizant of as we think about what we may or may
132not want to consider building um on these sites at some point in the future all right up next is our options response um to the board parameters um I'm going to go through a bunch of different options again these are big explor ations everyone right that you charged us to go through um all pricing Beyond maintenance which we've already seen are benchmarking costs okay uh that's not what it costs today tomorrow 10 years or 100 years from now they are benchmarking numbers uh from me there are people that are more experienced in this um but what I've done is attempted to give you a cost in what all the dollars would be um in 2025 um that said the numbers will change um um typically when you do any kind of project of kind of
133the magnitudes that we're just right again exploring tonight um there will be some cost overlap and then reduction right if we're taking over a whole bunch of Maintenance well maybe maybe a little bit of that is an overlap because we are improving uh an elementary school program at a site right this might be an a program at a school site so we don't need to do that maintenance because those Renovations already include um uh that cost uh and then also some assumptions uh needed to be made right so um we're expecting a demography study to be concluded so that might weigh into um some of the discussions um and U also uh construction type that's another layer of detail that I'll save you all from right now um but could also factor in so numbers
134as you've seen them already here is um here's the the different levels for all of our existing buildings and the reason I'll really kind of sit on this slide for a minute is I want to explain this graphic okay so the top line of buildings that's our current state okay so they're all a light gray we've got all of our elementary school buildings on the leftand side we can't think about forget about where we are tonight at the ESC and then also Riverside Middle School and the high school when we move to the next line the darker gray that means that we're addressing maintenance needs needs at those buildings the little numbers and everything that are within them that's the grade level configuration um in this option where we just do maintenance that maintains and
135is the same next slide please here since we haven't already Revisited these maintenance numbers on our elementary schools there is also need there just like there is at our other school buildings these ones are a bit smaller though so um you can see the total impacts and again over over a 20e period next slide please so you asked us to look at a couple different options one was a single campus solution the other was um beginning to look at a two campus solution so each one of these improvements or Explorations they have a cost range again right this is based on assumptions and all the caveats I told you about just a moment ago in this option two campus solution option a um we go from existing down to the uh yellow line phase one
136so in this option um we would explore consolidating uh from five to three Elementary Schools maintenance to the middle and high school um if we look at taking this building we're in here offline or or utilizing it for something else um we'd have a addition onto the high school as we see that as our most available land or most receptive to receiving a building perhaps of this size and then we're also um targeting some dollars um to restore other um Elementary School sites to a green field site okay so there's cost parameters to each one of those um as we look at the graphic again because you're seeing something new right I talked about an addition onto the high school for the ESC so that's shown in yellow as we move over into phase two
137right these these different phases they they might be 10 20 30 it might be 40 20 60 years to get into phase three on these right we don't we don't know what these are we're trying to forecast out the the steps and these phases can get broken down even more because right we're talking about large dollars um that your your community um would likely need to choose to support to do some of these or all of these moves okay so we shipped over to phase two here you're now seeing a diagonal hatch line okay that means heavy renovation heavy renovation would include um providing um the needs to meet the learning targets that are established through conversations that we've had to date that look out into that future forecasting and align with your strategic plan
138um in phase two what you could see is um renovating let me start with the second bullet actually move the middle school or create an addition onto the high school to receive middle school students wow you're looking at that dollar amount that dollar amount also includes um improvements to High School uh CTE ha as well as um the Arts so um digital uh uh ceramic 2D that kind of thing okay um just want to give an example of that because it isn't just a middle school solution so what happens to Riverside then well that would be um renovating that to be a Five Section Elementary School and this could be set up as a school within a school so we still had a stem program we still had an a program right we learned about
139all that available land we could still have schools within the schools so even though configuration of buildings is changing the programs uh potentially can even be supported um and C even more and then you'll see a dollar amount there for taking um a building offline and again whenever we're addressing that um it would be to restore it to a green field site for the for the community or for other development in phase three then to get to a true two campus solution um we look at building or constructing a new Five Section Elementary School it really it could be on the middle school or it could be on the high school site as Nick mentioned before there's available Land north of endeavor arrive there or as we know it north of what is Riverside Middle
140School at this time okay I'll go a little bit quicker because I had to explain the graphics and everything so now that that's all out of the way uh again two campus solution option b here's a a a larger step um that impacts the elementary schools differently but again I mentioned schools within a school celebrating existing programming um here here it would be taking um those buildings is listed as well as the ESC offline moving the ESC to the high school maintenance to the high school and constructing a new Five Section Elementary School again either at the middle or the High School site so that could be phase one phase two is U moving middle schoolers over to the high school site again talking about sharing and supporting curriculum that can be um utilized by
141both uh all all each of those uh grade level communities um and potentially even sharing staff at those schools as well um then renovating the existing Riverside middle school to be a Five Section Elementary School and then again at that point um you could move on um from the other two elementary schools it's listed there next slide options C sorry this is a lot right uh there's only three more so including this one um but there could be endless Solutions right so again these are exploratory thoughts um that we're we're progressing through with with a bit of detail but still assumptions behind them so again moving from existing down to phase one um create an addition on the high school uh for the middle school students as well as the ESC and that's that yellow
142box the high school then receives that heavy renovation hence the diagonal crosshatch to support high school students as well as the middle schoolers um in this one we would renovate the middle school to be a Five Section Elementary School you're seeing here there's two different cost options so one is kind of a a fullon renovation of that the other one is a little bit lighter of a renovation it still costs money it's commercial construction um I apologize but as soon as we have to get the state involved um and US stamping drawings it just it cost it costs more money um it is what it is so um and then the line item at the bottom in blue is um take the elementary school or take the ESC excuse me offline as well as the
143three listed um elementary schools phase two um in that one we're we're doing a little bit of less work um it would be constructing a new 5section elementary school again on either one of those sites um or as another kind of wrinkle um we could build um that same Elementary School potentially on property to be determined where is growth in the school district boundaries is that something that we want to look at is that something that should be captured if there is a new development or of housing of some kind coming up online how do we make sure that those kids are coming to Watertown uh next slide a single campus solution so hopefully in Nick's site utilization diagrams that he shared you can understand this is maybe a little more challenging right so you
144mentioned how much land we have at the high school um but there's a lot of fields we need those for activities Athletics as well as physical education there are some underutilized areas there are also some areas that um just can't be utilized because of steep grade because of flood plane because of wetlands that are on the site the disc golf course the the the hill that's there that's over 40 feet tall um there's some existing impediments on that site so one campus option D um build a new Five Section Elementary School uh on the High School site so this would be north of endeavor Drive uh more than likely maintenance to the middle land High School ESC would um be an addition onto the high school that little tiny block um and then take off
145the the other buildings as listed offline again restore those sites to a green field um and then in phase two of this um where again as I mentioned this might be able to be broken down further um right as you start to see lots of bores um in the explanation um could expand the high school um to also include middle school students um so perhaps this is a a lighter touch this is something we need to explore much more um expand Elementary School that we constructed in Phase One um or uh build a new elementary school and the High School site to hold a total of 10 sections so that's something different than we talked about at this time how big is the right size how big is maybe too big or how big is
146just right ideal um for the land that we have and what's available to us how many parents um and kiddos we want come to one site so and then uh in blue again is um what we would do with the other the other buildings there including taking the Middle School offline one campus Sol solution option e so phase one uh move the Middle School oh sorry yep uh thank you Nick Mr Kent uh move the middle school and the to the high school site renovate the middle school to be a Five Section Elementary School and then take those buildings as listed offline uh phase two construct a new Five Section Elementary School and um then move on from from uh the buildings that uh those kids um would now come to um and then phase
147three could be either expanding um that elementary school or constructing a new one and again we're looking at a a which would likely be a larger um elementary school and then again addressing the existing buildings that you have um in the district portfolio we want to make sure that right we're planning at least that if you were to move on from a building that that site would be restored um and there wouldn't be a vacant building in town next slide okay so just a quick notes on those options that were were developed we didn't we didn't set off just to move people around and move classes around and recombobulate campuses just because it would be fun this was all driven really as an exercise in efficiency to Study efficiency so so if we develop any
148of these further a really important piece of this will be understanding operationally why are those efficiencies right from a from a day-to-day annual budgeting standpoint what are we really talking about because those are some pretty significant Capital Investments long term uh to get to those but I just wanted to put that out there that that this wasn't just kind of willy-nilly there's actually an idea of how do we consolidate and create these these inherent operational efficiencies in the buildings Okay so um moving forward so for our work to continue to progress we have to have a little bit of a discussion about what we just we just talked about and how do we refine these options moving forward so you could click like oh that's amazing how that works um we have two different buckets
149that we want to talk about here tonight the first is the maintenance only approach so Devon started by showing you know what we can have we have all these buildings right and we've talked about this before there is a there is an option that says we're just going to keep them all and we're going to start to tackle the the maintenance $106 million I think in total maintenance across all those facilities so I guess the first question that we need just some confirmation on we've talked about this in our work session is maintenance only off the table or is this something that we want to continue to look at so I'm gonna wrap it in a little bit with our next agenda item which is ref discussion discussion because this is something that goes hand
150a little bit we've been talking about operationally we'll need to go we are forecasting short calls in the next years what we decide on the facility maintenance or going from keeping all of our buildings and maintaining at6 million projected over the next 20 some years for moving into a model of more nutrition buildings um that would be either new or buildings and a reconfiguration of our structure if you do that you get some efficiencies meaning we would be able to go out to operating referendum for a lower operating cost referendum than a higher operating that's something that we have to consider because if we're forecasting that we're going to go into an operational you're going to hear um Sarah and I come to you with two different possibilities one that is a lower operational C
151for predicated on our ability to engage the public and talk about how do we get more efficient um through closing some buildings and working a plan to put all of our students into more efficiently operating buildings or we continue to leave all our builds online open but that comes with a higher operational cost um because we can't reduce Staffing sizes and everything else because just not Mak sense um which comes with a higher operational I just wanted to put those two ideas in your head because what we choose and how we choose move forward will impact both those scenarios in that discussion the 106 I'm looking at here for the maintenance only uh I'll say Sarah jar ni first of all what duration is it inflation adjusted what's our current maintenance budget how much we
152are we or we have set aside in deferred maintenance stuff that we haven't done how does this I mean is this new to the district this 106 over 20 years or whatever the number is or this a surprise Sarah based off of what you see based off of our budget I I just what's our current operational budgets capacity for maintenance so um first of all you said it in the statement that you said we have defer maintenance how much M um a good part of that6 million no maintenance at all think ask how much is our but our ability to keep up abity believe how much Curr spending on me it would be more like that's including purchases that's our total current it's 400,000 a year current budget so answer your question you're going I
153think is no matter what we're going to need some kind of facilities referenda in our near future the question that we're asking is do we talk to our public about keeping up what we have which comes with a higher operational b or we talk to our public about possibly reconfiguring to get into a more efficient mod and what I wanted to clarify is the let's do nothing or let's keep on doing what we're doing doesn't [Music] work doesn't us a better situation we can't you know can't fix ourselves to success with our current budget no we've been in that model too long and just a quick note you asked about inflation so the numbers are projected 2025 we have not inflated that out 20 years and this is a 20 year number though it is
154yes if we took all 20 years worth of in today's correct thank you other comments and questions um guess guess I look at it you know based on the conversation that David's having about 20 years worth of Maintenance I look at um option D which is a single campus solution and ultimately two mtion of what we're settled with um plus we get the benefit of moving towards um a single campus solution so that might be the lowest cost option and longterm the most efficient option ises what's there um compared to the 6.2 million okay that's a big chunk of change ask but it's a necessity so that that doesn't get us any improvements so looking at options a through e is what are the Improvement costs and when I look at the Delta you're put
155that 106 in there anyway for maintenance what's the delta mean what's the Change option D is the cheapest in it and my question in it is do all of these options afford US the same or similar improvements to the educational structure is there one other uswhere I don't want to put milim right do you understand I think it um I think it depends on if uh you were considering does a it is a is just something that's new better than something that's renovated and or expanded um if that was a a case then no I would say they're different otherwise I would say they're they're the same um in in how they're presented so my other question is looking at the high school there's a lot of land there but that land a lot of
156it's utilized as atic Fields yes and so if we build on that land where do those athletic fields still because right now the high school baseball team has to travel and for those varsity players that are don't have their driver license that's difficult currently we have football soccer lacrosse other things there that are all grade levels not just those in driving age and so where are those places dis I'm not saying that athletic should drive this but we're displacing that and if we're holding to traditions where does that go and I don't expect a solution have we thought about where that displacement is going to be I I think that's a great point because we need to to make sure that we're thinking of the entire learning community at each one of these campuses right
157if you're bringing middle schools over to high school that affords some other opportunities for that correct demand correct but it does impact those Playing Fields so I mentioned assumptions um at at this time um where the middle school might or could go right all right heavy caveat right um you would have to U move an athletic field so if you move one Athletic Field then more than likely that might be a domino because perhaps the athletic fields that are closest to the existing high school that's where they should be so then you might be moving a practice field on top of that as well so it's great to bring that up the dollars for those fields are not included dollars for playgrounds for little kiddos those are included in the numbers of what does this
158include dollar for gymnasiums because if we're cling down facilities we have a gymnasium of one size or another the elementary school the middle school and we know that gym space is premium if we're cutting down those does that include build new on um So within um but right if you're you're potentially going from five down to two would you have the same number of gym spaces um no but they're going to be in a different configuration is that going to be more conducive to community use or less I I don't know but it's great to hear um about things that might be a priority and I think as we begin to step into the the next round of conversations that's going to help influence and as we've heard already there's a cost of doing nothing
159or just the maintenance and and how much does that cost it's also a cost to what if we do the improvements and if the community is saying I also right we need these gym space um to support our entire Community throughout the year um there's also a cost to that as well yeah and it's not just gym spaces or athletic spaces too think performing spaces HS at every Elementary at the middle school we have multiple programs between choir and band and Orchestra we have all these things where if we build different spaces you're going to have to either structure how those are staggered or we can figure how we handle those prrams as you oper because you're comb you don't have oper that's I and if I may something for us to consider whether we
160think about one campus or two campuses or whatever whatever the solution is it doesn't mean you have to lose the green space that you own at other sites right a potential solution was or buildings right you could you could potentially keep portions of buildings if you wanted to keep um say part of the middle school as the pool um everybody loves operating a pool um or the green space around that right so it doesn't mean you have to lose that space it just means it's no longer potentially an operational School my Solutions leave the pool intact let that be said other comments questions yeah so when I look at option b here um and makes the assumption that we we're going to maintain provide maintenance in Phase One to high school and middle school um
161but then okay so we're building a brand new elementary school um guess that answer the question we're we're providing the meance to those particular buildings right away and um providing an addition so we're question was toward when we go through these um Solutions uh my caution would be your concern would be why are we uh we wouldn't be just throwing money away in the maintenance process of build days that's all taken into consideration in in your recommendation we have to look at everything very strategically to ensure that you're not be the best Steward is possible the maintenance cost or the maintenance cost that's no longer required go to the capital Improvement plan the maintenance is presumably avoided there appreciation or not depreciation money you should set aside for repairs but we touched on jar you
162said operationally operational cost benefit there is none of that in any of these numbers if I can down from 10 second grade teachers to eight no it's not in here I can save a bus rout it's not purely Capital costs this is all capital and maintenance not operations right Bri and but it will have a operational question adjustment for instance we don't have solid figures yet we're still working on but if we were to go to a operational just to keep the the buildings that without the maintenance cost that you um million over maybe three differental ref um of course that number go up because we know that inflation happens for our next uh referendum over a course of four years operationally we would be around about 8 million a year asked to try to
163keep that sameel we have right right you know to to try to try to keep us going through the next four or five years right if we scale back and we start um with the predication that um in the next year we we have to go to a capital referendum to get to a more efficient model right we have to start one of these phases we can take that $8 million to around five prob right um but what what that is on a continuing uh rate is a big difference right um and over time you save money um that you put in because you're not having to do a lot of maintenance on the up front so you get some more um you know aspect of change there but but it does really help us
164thats like certainly some Balan so want to be respectful everyone's time I know you have a heavy agenda and we've got a couple more things to talk about back to the slide that's on the screen right now we started with the question is maintenance only an option to carry forward or are we really moving our conversation to around something on the right side where it's maintenance and improvements so my my opinion when you look at maintenance only if we did maintenance only we're going to be stuck with what four buildings five buildings that are pushing 100 years old or older and we've maintain them and now what other challenges are up if we go to a maintenance Plus M plan the because bu are noer 100 years old that we're trying to maintain I see
165an expert in to has probably maintained a couple 100y old buildings and it's it's not a cheap to your point should point out the average age for schools in the state of Wisconsin is 49 years um yeah so bouncing off what you talking about with costs what am I correct in perceiving that even like taking off taking schools off offline you're already reducing the amount you putting in forain just by doing that because it's 5 million versus I don't know versus like 11 15 million so you're already you know discussion in favor of Maintenance only think we can move forward with the maintenance plus Improvement so it gives us some direction um I'm not sensing a strong preference here tonight one campus versus two unless I'm just not so question you see one campus versus
166two what is the difference if you have uh if you have an updated at the high school and you build an elementary north of the tree line yep is that two campus is that one campus one campus okay so what's the distinction a certain amount of miles between them what is that no it's it's either um having the high school only or it's the high school and the middle school R side sites sites that's what we're talking about so is the basically is um the middle school going to the high school so we have a 612 uh campus and then over on what is Riverside right now you would have two elementary school buildings or one of those elementaries is over to high school so that you have an elementary on both kind of sides
167of town if you will all the element and to either you have the Middle School site and the High School site that's your two side option correct one site option is everything eventually end up in that 100 acres yes at the high school yeah one provision is one of the options that allowed for us to search out available land in the southwestern part of our correct because um until we really get the information from our population for offers in September we don't know but we do know from the Planning Commission um at uh you know int things they're talking about any further development is happening that way right now it's not happening at all if we if we were to want to seek out something to do that that may a future option great I
168mean I I've been an advocate for one campus moving toward one campus solution entire time I think that um you're going to have intrinsic benefits that probably build away when it comes to uh being able to be more efficient with the maintenance St busing being able to just snow you know trying to clear arkot your staff is all in one place not running all over the city right you know uh Stu with with Administration like uh only need one principal at your Elementary School obviously St other Shar resources those are going to District you something um yeah I guess just the off chance that $250 million fails um in order for this board for you to make a recommendation I mean whether it is not just the maintenance the teachers the the uh the busing
169the resale and putting these properties back back on the tax roles uh how how much mapper economics you put into this that say hey yeah this is what we really want but you're not going to be able to for it why don't we go Cas six in four middle schools and push in Four elementary schools push the Middle School to the high school and put on a $15 million addition and maybe we can get that $25 million referendum push through because we're not going to get the 250 and I don't want to go through every single possible scenario tonight allthough I do uh you you present just five options there's 100 correct and and how you help us narrow in on the one that's going to be most palatable to our shareholders because right I
170don't see 250 happening and I didn't that softball you guys step for do you want to hit that sure and I think there are a couple ways to answer your question I think uh one way to answer your question is actually the second way I'm going to do so but you know I think that's why you know tonight it's been great to hear your conversation and to start to get some feedback around affirming maintenance and improvements and then you know I think this is if if my former teacher self had a chalkboard or a whiteboard right now I would have drawn a funnel and at the top would be this first one about how many campuses if we start to hear from the board we really want to explore one campus that starts to give
171us feedback to move in a direction that helps to get at some of the detail you're looking for right and then the same thing if we were to hear it's not one campus right because maybe people decide that's we want to look at two or maybe we still want to look at both options of one or two then we're still developing out based on what you're talking about kind of those pieces so I think hearing what you're giving us so far this evening is helpful but more refining is what we're going to need to really be able to set you up with a level of detail and then continuing to partner with your staff to get at those operational efficiencies and modeling what for instance option A would maybe offer you know in fiscal efficiencies
172or the same with b c and d as best you can project because um while I appreciate the $250 million question I think we were all probably seeing it as some phasing right um for various reasons one is cost two is to allow um one of the toughest parts of school construction as I know you all understand very well is that we're trying to you know proverbially build the ship while we're sailing it right so we can't just shut down school for a year it's nice to have phasing to allow for some of those strategic moves and again charged with your um one of your big parameters to us was really to figure out how do we help support the district maintaining fiscal efficiencies as quickly as possible and really the way to do that
173is to look at some of those buildings where um you can gain that by starting to concentrate particularly the elementary school and whether that's some of those programs keeping them you know like Devon was sharing there's so many different awesome ways this can you know play out based upon what the community would like to see so a two-phase model or is a two campus model youel absolutely you could yeah you could I think you have a lot of right because we're talking about such a long time frame right it it's really like we're just getting the general direction and then you could um be able to go either way at the time right you're letting time and your constituents tell you what the direction is the only hesitancy I have with phased approach like that
174especially if we want you know go to the two campus and go to the one campus is I don't want us to build something new that is a stop Gap and then you're not going to have for the long if going to build something new that should be where we're going to be that's our and if that's we're going to add on to the high school and that's where school's going to go for are fine but I want to buy build a you know a five stop mid Elementary at the middle school and then 10 years now say okay now we're build the 10 section middle Elementary at the high school so where we are now is coming to the conclusion of what we've asked PR to do which is to go through our facility
175study bring new ideas and options um if we want to continue if you want click um thank you uh one more we want we want to talk about next steps um we will talk about how we get there but um in our RFP process stages one through three uh were engaged with P stages four and five were not um because we wanted to know where we were going in the end because if it was maintenance only we kind of knew um but it sounds like you're going to go past that um so I would be recommending in the future that we continue in stage four with them that will come a cost and you'll see that but it'll go through the stages going and so on um but if we're interested in that we need
176to share with P our interests and depending on our timeline they may need to get going sooner than later on some of these things so I'll leave that to you to discuss what stage four looks like and next steps into possibly stage five but for you guys do you want before we hit that real quick I just want to have one other bullet point that's up here there's another piece of the team that we'll be talking about as we go forward and that is the potential engagement with a construction manager won't spend a lot of time on it tonight but there may be a question why would you engage a construction manager we don't even know what we're going to build this is not a general contractor this is not a builder this is a
177construction manager and this is often a team member that we will engage with in school districts to help us understand better real-time market pricing Logistics around phasing how we actually Implement things so if we're going to renovate expand move what are construction timelines um this is not bidding out trades this is not construction this is another adviser that comes as part of the team so we'll have more conversations around that as we likely I think move forward in this process um but we want to put it out there that that we will be talking more about that right and that's exciting and a real nice segue if you wouldn't mind advancing to the next slide please because oftentimes a construction manager brought in close to where we are now or in the near future helps
178a lot with it it brings them up to speed on the process right so then they have all the backgrounded information as we're going forward not just as a trusted adviser but they also often also have a team that helps support Communications and Community engagement so listed on here is step four which is survey and I just want to call out that really we focus on community feedback with that we have a lot of s's as you'll see in all five but realistically Community feedback is what we're after so survey can mean a lot of different things it can mean everything from working with the district to host focus groups it can be doing community conversations just to bring people the whole Community up to speed almost like we did tonight right on where have
179we been where are we going it can be also um oftentimes districts will contract with a third party provider to do a CommunityWide survey so that could Happ at different phases of where we are now versus in the future a lot of people end up putting um a question to the community in the form of a survey that that gets at tax tolerance do you think this is the right longrange plan for the district what kind of phasing might you be comfortable with really to advise the board and and administration on making some of those decisions but also it could be used preemptively just in general um before you would get to that point you know because we may have enough time in a Runway to consider doing more than just one survey um prior
180to the board choosing to put a referendum on the ballot if that would be the board's choice so we would love to continue to work with your District it's such an exciting time it's an exciting process you have many opportunities ahead to celebrate we got a chance to be a part of the strategic planning work early on and also to listen to your discussion tonight and really do want to support the direction through this process that you're headed as a district and make sure that you're building and grounds can support exactly what it is you hope to fully realize through your strategic plan I guess like to see does it make sense to make a a decision right this second when it comes to moving forward with these particular options iing for that more discussion
181keep keep that discussion going we have the community feedback before we narrow in on any of the specific ones I think the biggest question we would have for the community right now is two campus versus one campus and and seeing how that feels so I think there's a larger discussion you know funnel I think we're still the top there no I I I agree with you um but I just at some point I I just want to know if we're not just putting a card before the force um to try to even understand feedback from the Community First that whether or not there's been any type of appetite to move forward with with any type of idea like this well that would be a good starting question we want to look at this like no
182keep what you got and then we have to you know back and look at what we have I think looking at you know we take the litness of the community out take you know we're looking at changing things around maybe they don't want to have us have anything to do with Riv side because of the whole situation with parking and driving and picking up and dropping off there like look let's just get rid of that and let's move on but we don't know that I think that's part of that larger discussion start with those big questions and then you continue to refine yeah so to to kind of continue blending both agenda items because they they really well together moving forward on our timel for we we know that um within about three years we're
183going to be at a short fall with our fund balance we're already operating under a shortfall each year we get there the reason our F balance is where it is because the last referendum and our ability to really be phally responsible within that last referendum um some of the federal dollars that came in some the federal expenses that came all of these things right um over the last few years have put us in a good position and we can extend it out for the next two to three years right but in three years that's going to be G so we would like to engage the community on talking about what operational looks like in the future if you want to go to a more you know one of these options that would um take instead
184of putting M dollars fors maintenance and put them to Capital Improvements that's going to C the higher cost t on the capital Improvement side which means uh for us uh you know more for Sarah in the business office but for us administratively we've got to come up with a solution that's more Balan which means we would be asking for a smaller operating referend to start and if the community says we know that that's going to happen because the next year we're going to then go into that Capital phase to start phase one we know our answer if the answer is no we don't support going into a capital phase we like our buildings the way they are we just want you to maintain them then we have to say to the public then we need
185to go for a higher operational cost because it's a lot more expensive to operate these older buildings and in the configuration they are would be to get to a water so all of that's going to come and all of that discussion has to happen between now and Bic November early December because you have to have a resolution for April no matter what so so what you're suggesting is that at this point because those answers I'm saying if you choose to look at the possibility of going into AAL configuration yeah we need to get contining their work if you say no hold on wait time out we just need some time to talk about this then I'm going to tell you that's fine but you know then we're going to have to ask for a higher
186operating our friend that will give us the time to have those conversations because we'll stay in the old model okay um or or I shouldn't say old mod the current model that we're in right um and and that's fine but again I I need you to know and I I need our either way we have money that's an operational need it's going to be a higher cost operation if we see configuration we're in um and and then a lower a lower Capital maintenance question or we're going go a higher Capital maintenance question and a lower operating uh question right and those won't be at the same time right we're not going to put them up on the same ballot with each other um and the reason I know that is in working with bar what
187we've done so far bar would suggest we go out to operational referendum this April um but we have to decide which model we're going to look at and then whatever we do with capital uh will come in 26 and the reason it comes better in 26 is because we have some debt falling off and that will equalize the mill rate for people a little bit better okay and so advantageously be would say let's put it there otherwise um our our public is going to see a huge increase and then a drop off in that instead of just a a level or mate which would be more advantageous for the consumer me being one of them I don't want to tax and then you know I just want to just them a little bit more level
188okay now I can't say they will be exactly level because if we go with one of the phases that has a really large Capital there's only so much we can do on the operational side we can't we can't go lower than some of those numbers I've been talking about like we just can't we we we are operationally behind schedule why we capitally behind schedule maintenance and curricul work we've been' doing def on more than just we've beening curriculum' beening professional development question that we've got you know two and three phase plans here but we could break this up into multiple phes we could have you know Capital phases smaller increments a lot of different ways we can do this it doesn't have to be two or and that's part of that next phase of development
189refining it further this was intended to be responsive to the board you know trying to see what that biggest fiscal efficiency impact up front could look like with combining some bigger phases right so looking at sensing the board is looking to go ahead with the pance plus Improvement starting to look towards phase four which would to J Point reduce the operational ask in April with the N towards a 2026 for a capital ask and what that Capital ask will look like will be dependent in the detail between now and then and as for our policies we'll be bringing to you what base four uh cost and pricing look like it's not going to change from what they gave us earlier RFP but because it's above $4,000 we'll share that with you um and then um
190we'll be able to do that September as well as resolution to form forward until see sh so acclamation to the board for that all right thank you very much [Music] sitas you know um regardless we're going to have two different asks we're going to have an operational ask Capital as depending on where we go it's going look different um but Sarah and I mostly Sarah is our working very put together numbers for you um to ask what those look like I will tell you though um if we go for a small operational Mas that is going to be coming with some budgetary accounts um our our administr staff already knows that for next year's school budget not school that we're entering into uh next we the 25 26 budget we're asking the administration to cut
191and we will be doing that the next years million and a half operationally over the next three years the the only we get around that is we stay in the same model that we're in and just really ask for operational what we need to do um but in order to get to some of the capital dollars we have to reduce some of the mill rate for them and more than $500,000 year will be a big impact in the school district even 500,000 is going to be a huge impact but we know that we have to make some more steps to getting fiscally conservative um because if we're going to be asking for more mate without doing anything um that I think is dising there are some things that we can do to try to help
192myself and other taxpayers in the district to make sure that we can still offer good programming but at a rate that all right moving on to the next item on the agenda which would be our reports um we start with the superintendent report J you don't get the full 20 minutes here full 20 minutes what okay I'll go quickly as possible so um just a a picture of of us at the administrative retreat was held um over at the collective building was great space got to talk about also trying to do myself so I um I watch a new know of a new opportunity a celebration Le got another Grant $110,000 in the open educational resources Grant um this is going to be focusing around um increasing Agricultural and educational literacy lessons from Early Childhood
193age three through grade three um and they're going to kick that event off in October and it will coincide with Wisconsin's F week but they um work really really hard to try to find every resource they can you saw that in other slides and I just thought it was a good celebration to talk about opportunities um we uh of course heard this earlier that we went through our fourth Community strategic planning work group session that was on July 23rd again there was so many people there in attendance 53 were attendance of those for new attendees even at the last meeting I will tell you that um one of the greatest things that brought joy to my heart was that meeting we gave a message really take a message to staff just sharing with them how
194much support the community has for them and process and I know this um in the end not everybody was happy with all of the outcomes but uh in the end I can I can say this we really had feedback from everybody um and and in the end uh we will serve all those we serve in the way we've served them uh and we will keep to look at new ways to serving them in in a better way and uh we will have a continuous Improvement we'll get there that speaks to tradition Innovation and transportation um and that really is our J uh uh back to school uh online registration opened uh on July 29th so far as of this morning we had 247 students that began their registration process or completed it um we just
195want to remind families that that process is still open and we know there's still students out there who need to sign up um more information can be found on our web page so this is just one more kind of Public Announcement time to do that um so that opportunity is back to school is here next week uh welcome back it's tomorrow for staff August 27th that will be at the high school lunch is going to be served from our awesome and amazing uh Food Service staff uh they're going to be prepairing our lunch this year from 11:30 to 12:30 in the Commons and then afterwards the ceremony will begin or we celebrate staff on their years of experience anywhere from one year of experience 40 years of experience and staff will participate in all safety
196uh school training just a little bit taken by police dep after that celebration um also as part of our administrative Retreat um we um talked about topics related to the Strategic plan educative Effectiveness this is where we talk about not only um our staff and how we evaluate our teachers and their performances but we talk about how we evaluate our performance and um talk about how we're we're changing up uh how we're going to be evaluating our principles um to be in line with building RS and other things and how we're going to use that process to really uh continue on our continuous Improvement journey I shared with them at that time too that you as a board are also engaging in educative Effectiveness when it comes to evaluating me and how your strengthening that
197evaluation with me and how we discuss that evaluation how we can get to continuous Improvement through um my employment uh with you and your direction as to how I get better with how I lead uh and then um we also talked about and participated in um something that we got the goose chase um goose chase was basically um a get to know your community and know each other better um scavenger hun that went around and had us going around with our cell phones you may have seen us on the rooftop building seeing pictures and so on yes we had to try to convince people to do that um I my team actually convinced libr um but we had a whole bunch of we had to answer our find historical markers and other things to know
198our community better as as those we serve so it was just really fun activity some of those pictures there on the left are from the goose chase um and we just had a really great time getting to know each other and our commun be better that's some important reminders to you first day of school middle school and high school it starts September 3rd Elementary hases SCH third and fourth the first full day of uh elementary schools on 5th uh we've got committee meetings list there the one that you need to be aware of is fisal management and change date and time uh to September 16 and that's deter time I guess there attendance any questions uh next up we have our committee reports again I encourage everyone try to be brief and some draw mostly
199at those committee meetings and we spent enough time Services sure uh Services about on August 13th all committee members were present plus others um the discussions that day are going to result in three resolutions uh today uh one was to adopt the special education procedure which is more more or less a copy of the DPI procedure but if you have questions on that there's notes and Sarah can update you on that uh Jason B gave a good update on the Wisconsin guarantee uh program which is different than the direct notes are in the minutes um Jenny began what would be the curriculum review cycle I when we going to look at math when we look at Social Studies science Etc in all the grades uh no resolution but we're going to revisit that uh I
200believe in the first quarter again just to make sure that we're still on pce as much as it leads into the budget for the following year when approvals have to be made to purchase curriculum so we want to make sure we line those two up um and then we have the draft assessment plan and the Renaissance contract that will result uh mostly that was just an update but there's a couple of small resolutions for the star assessment and the fast R assessment which will be later on the agenda tonight and then lastly uh we spent most of our time on the Panorama contract and although there were several benefits to it there were also several I don't want to call them unknowns or concerns but there the general U Timber of the subcommittee was that
201uh we could probably do better or do better for less and therefore since we're not in a position as a sub subcommittee to make a decision uh we put uh an agenda item on tonight's for a uh approval for a nonrenewal so a yes vote means we won't be renewing Panorama otherwise there' be no way to get the vote to the board and we as a committee can't make a decision like that without the full uh input for the board um and we adjourned at 10 o'cl next meeting is on September 10th uh I shared that for Fred as payback for missing J [Music] ju all members were FR was sorry Mike was abent um there were no purchases over 20,000 but one was close to it and that was the AP rooms system which
202is a communication communication communication communication software uh for teachers parents students staff and um there's still a little bit more information that we're going to get on that I think that was it Melissa was going to bring some information on that either to the next fiscal and or to the full board depending on uh where that sat however it doesn't require board approval it's just one of those hey we should let you know because it was close to 20 um otherwise uh there were several updates um from uh Kevin and others visitor management system the DNH Transportation contract which uh parot right ways is going to be a resolution tonight and then we also uh as this part of the course uh look at the budget and the fiscal management calendar um and then there
203was no questions on the uh monthly expenditures uh adjourned relatively quickly compared to other subcommittees U and next meeting that is September 16th all right are we met on Monday August 19th some of the big that we had excuse me we have the 2025 health insurance renewal um we did spend a good amount of time as far as aler representative um let us know that there was 9% renewal rate um you know we were looking to just from the fiscal responsibility standpoint we wanted it to be closer to seven so you will see a resolution tonight um in what our uh recommendation is to be able to um mitigate some of those things kep the um company itself the same but you'll see that there's a small modification in um deductible and then also employee
204contribution um we do also have a consent agenda um as far as that goes we're looking good thanks to Margaret and her team's work um everybody who SP um hiring things like that we're looking good going into the school year um we just also take a look at the preliminary exit and turnover report um if you want to see the details of that um you can go ahead and go back to the HR committee meeting um there's charts um the employee satisfaction survey action plan um that um as far as that goes that we have recommended one of the um items coming out address student behavior and so um Sarah o uh provided us with um some details as far as the process and a plan to be able to address of those things because
205that was one of the number one concerns on the employee satisfaction survey um start of the school year you're all invited tomorrow as board members to welcome staff um with future meeting planning um we did go into closed session um that you will also see um a resolution regarding that tonight I believe it's resolution e um regarding that um as far as our next action items um Margaret will come with a we got the one theme for the employ satisfaction survey we had previously talked about 2 or3 so we're going to come the document as far as that goes um and then we have the um resolutions and um we also be number five we prepare a board resolution for the educator competition on the certification oh okay all right there you go our next
206meeting is September 16 it was not our meeting for our month to meet this month we had two subcommittee meetings one of which we discussed theion Vision which you heard about earlier tonight and the other one was a very short under 30 minute meeting just talking about three possible budget scenarios looking at referendum we go SE 11 we met Wednesday August 14th and allers there maret as well as you better our attorney yes so uh the admin we discussed a little bit about the administrative guidelines regarding transgender students uh the draft was um provided uh for the administrative procedural guidelines regarding transgender students um there was concerned by the committee that there was not a mother policy to this particular policy um and we had a discussion regarding that uh not policy guine RS up
207to correct okay correct um was policy I just policy the next discussion point was that we agreed to accept the parental rights portion of guidelines um but uh however felt there was more work that needed to be needed um rest of the guidelines um the committee also would like to see a second ver of guidelines to compare with the draft um so those two versions would be placed in front of the board at some point determ which direction we want to go so uh that will be brought back to the committee during the SE September meeting then we also discussed the non-discrimination equal equal employment opportunities and staff ethics so we decided that uh we still need to do a little bit of digging regarding First Amendment rights in in that component specifically pertaining to
208compelled speech and uh that in conjunction with recent Supreme Court rulings how those would impact both that particular policy as well as the transgender guidelines um the committee also discussed um staff ethics and that is also on your agenda tonight that um we would be replacing the ne of points with the district the previously the previous District's policy on uh the code of ethics for our staff there was a question about drug free workplace and removing language curbage from that particular policy um it's it was determined by the committee to accept the policy as a is um to first read her tonight uh with that language stri the employment of the superintendent uh there was just some confusion on that that need to be clarified that's also coming for us tonight uh then we had
209uh two groups in Neola policies U policy group 3000 group 4,000 um that you'll see on the agenda for first read zero a number a number of policies for first and second read um if you have a chance to go through them that would be great our next meeting is September 9th Monday September 9th at 5:30 all right on the is the consent agenda this includes the minutes committee summaries Personnel Staffing the first and secondary policies um I notic there are no builds to approve this time [Music] all right so do I have by second by Craig comments questions discussion on consent agenda none roll call please Johnson yes Sam yes David yes yes yes Mike yes Lor C yes Diana johnon yes the motion passes next item we have our action items the first
210of which is the wsd special education procedures I a motion second by Diana comment question this none roll call V Mike Lauren yes okay so next is the resolution for the discontinuation of the Panorama education as D pointed out this is to discontinue and go yes will mean that we will not continue using Pama can I get a motion please by Sam second by Dan comments questions Tina so by discontinuing this that means that the staff needs to come up something different or what does it mean so the staff brought this forth as recommendation excuse me as recommendation so this states that we're not this is not taking the recommendation of the staff and they want to come up with something different that's okay other comments questions call pleas J no Sam yes dve sh
211yes Dan bman yes Craig whon yes Mike Higgins yes Lor yes Fred yes Diana Johson yes next item is the treny of Officer [Music] contract com questions call please Tina Johnson yes Sam a yes David Sher yes Danner yes Craig wman yes Mike haens Lor H yes FR yes Diana Jackson yes motion carries Mi up is the school resource officer contracts can I have a motion please second this support the current resource school school officers that we have school the high school I am working with the city um at hospital Elementary resource officer um it's in the very initial stages of City budget and of course the city budget goes on the calendar year school year Sarah and I are putting in um a temporary hold in our budget for a half year because that's
212what our budget but if it those pass the cities I will be coming back to you for a half year of Elementary resource officer but we are setting aside M budget yet if we don't do that working joint we've been talking about that over last couple years and I'll have data and everything else the why whatever I just want you to know if any of you hear some of that that's happening at the city and you're wondering what you're passing I want you to understand question yes Sam yes David yes Dan yes Craig wman yes yes La yes yes Diana Johnson yes certification adjustment Prestige and language Pathologists this came out of the HR committee um just clarify on this did you make a statement on this point um yeah that's my I mean the
213there's the recomended action you'll notice that there is also a piece of the administrative content as well coms or questions call vote please T Johnson yes Sam yes David yes Dan yes craigman yes Mike Higgs yes laoren yes johnon yes and the motion carries next item up is the health insurance renewal plan design change I get a motion motion Mina second by comments or questions on this roll call vote please Tina Johnson yes Sam a yes David ster yes Dan Boler Craig wman obain Mike HS yes L yes yes Diana Johnson yes motion carries last item up for tonight is the purchase of Star assessment and fast Bridge assessment through Renaissance Learning so the next item up is the DNH Enterprises contract com question roll call vote please Tina Johnson yes Sam o yes David
214Sher yes Dan bman yes Craig Wartman Mike ha yes Lorie H yes BR y yes Diana Johnson yes the motion carries last one for the night purchase of Star assessment and Pass Bridge assessment through Renaissance please Tina Johnson yes Sam yes David Sher yes Dan yes Mike yes yes yes Diana Johnson yes this brings us to the second of our public comment sections for tonight multiple comments please go on but come up and address be sure to sign in so we have a record of that state your name and address for record please um staccia Studio Main Street Watertown um I too as taxpayer I'm concerned about my money in the district um my children are minority children children Spanish speaking home and they want to be able to go to the locker rooms and
215the bathrooms and be respected my girls also have a right to feel safe in school have a right to go to the bathroom have a right to take a shower and change their clothes and this whole in the the the inclusive part is excluding the majority of the children so trying to rewrite policies for a small percentage when you're excluding the majority just doesn't make sense that's all thank you thank you any other comments inclusion isn't just a word it's a lifestyle it has nothing to do with politics and I don't care what political side you're on inclusion means everyone is involved growing up with the disability it it was hard to feel included all the time but I had parents and Educators who fought for me such our voice and making accommodations to the
216schools so that I can fully participate if we discount the word inclusion it creates a loophole for people to not actually practice and follow it for marginalized groups of people who are already living in a world that wasn't made for them let's not make ignorance Easier by excluding such a meaningful work inclusion only happens if we actually focus on making it happen please put yourself in people's shoes and think about how you would feel if a part of your identity wasn't acknowledged thank you else Mike cedarberg Hilltop Road watert wiscons it's real interesting to hear the uh because I think one of the biggest themes or concerns that the public has is bullying and we had a bullying update today and uh um what's the definition of bullying and I was interested that it said
217um um a Mis um what was it a imbalance of power is a definition of bullying between harassment and bullying um and then I was interested to hear that one of your major goals is empathy um I would like to just mention that empathy can be a slippery slope what are you basing your or building your empathy on what are you basing it on on because the rise of bullying could be found um in your definition of what is bullying the the 27 class is as a rise in bullying is that correct maybe it can be found in what your definition of bullying is are you considering the CH the child's non-compliance of forced pronoun confessions this is a classing this is a classic bullying of a Christian Child if you define imbalance of power
218as the Del delineating quality between harassment and bullying what bigger power stands against a small child or a young adult or a teacher for that matter than the school board or other adults gathering together and defining that you must use pronouns that when somebody looks and says no I don't agree with that because of my fi or my values um that's uh that's bullying the core foundational values it would a Muslim uh child even be forced to do that the other bullying that a young Christian uh girls can be subject to is the allowance of biologically and scientifically defined males to use the girl's bathroom or lock room consider this a young girl is coming into to comb her hair and a young man comes into the bathroom how is she going to feel her
219privacy is lost her Comfort is lost is that an injury I would say plus that young man is physically more powerful than that young girl is as we've seen in the Olympics if you can um remember that and what is more significant than powers that has been given to him that that young man and the permission to invade her privacy comes from your decision you have that decision to either remove his permission or to allow his permission to enter into that bathroom and invade that young girls privacy just know that bullying goes both ways when you begin to redefine reality due to empathy will you allow Christian children and teachers or even Muslim traditional value holders to be bullied and make them deny their faith their values their Common Sense by forcing them to use
220pronouns not scientifically and biologically true think of that young child who sees and then he's not supposed to believe what he sees that's that's that's bullying and that's quite detrimental to the mindset of the children will you allow your empathy to cause and bully a young woman not only Christian but also Muslim or Jewish or young ladies that just don't agree with this forced privilege and favoritism to be forced to share a bathroom or a locker room with male students empathy you could wrap it up please what's that W it up please yeah um lastly uh I think we can see it all in our world today did any of you see the Olympic opening ceremony was that bullying of Christians I think so thank you good evening uh my name is Jim dwater resident
221Watertown I've spoken at multiple school board meetings um I had a couple things written down before I'm kind of going to throw that in the garbage for right now um I want to talk about a couple things so first and foremost we just heard an awful lot about hypothetical bullying situations that happen in our schools here's real Bullying happens in our schools my daughter getting called a Dy school that didn't get reported that's not even part of your statistic because she doesn't feel included she doesn't feel like anything is going to happen about it she doesn't feel like her diversity matters because our school board has decided to go against what our community got together and said was important we saw the core values there of empathy I remember that slide from being at that
222strategic planning meeting and diversity and inclusivity were on some of those core beliefs and they had some of the highest votes in that slide I was there many of you were there I know because I saw you there I know because you were at my table and spoke with me I know because you spoke with me personally after the meeting I remember you were there and so you know that when we all stood there and gave our input to the you know draft vision statement only two tables had anything negative to say about it in any way shape or form one of those tables had someone who participated who felt like they got steamrolled over by the other people that were at the table because we hav't done an icebreaker to separate people out based
223on their beliefs it's ridiculous I am beyond upset and I'm beyond disappointed in every single person who's going to sit here and abide this this is ridiculous I sacrificed my time many other people in this room sacrific their time I have to be less than six hours because I've sat here to give you my opinion I have given my opinion at other school board meetings I've given it at the strategic planning meetings and I'm done you want me to vote Yes on a referendum to fund these schools I'll be damnn before I vote Yes on any referendum for a school board that's not going to support my children my children I'm done my name is Linda oal I'm from Watertown I would like to thank the board for keeping our district goals so far neutral
224and free of radical political ideologies I feel really bad about this because I worked in the schools I've worked with special needs kids I love them I love the students I don't even have animosity for the people in the front row here my heart broke for the one lady's testimony I feel really bad about this and I think that there's a fundamental problem here with definitions we kindly like to re reiterate that small groups of unelected people at the Strategic meetings even if they are the majority in that room should not decide the overarching goals in place of thousands of Voters with an opposing view who won a legitimate election the meetings produce data partly from faulty data collection methods such as QR surveys and I've said this before that could be filled out numerous
225times by anyone anywhere there were also sticky dots used to show support for different ideas written on sh paper it would never be right for 36 people in the Strategic meetings with dots in a special meeting to effectively to effectively override over 3,000 no Dei voters that clearly won in a legitimate election if someone would expect if someone would expect that a majority of 36 in a meeting equates that they get to keep Dei in the statements then certainly a 300 majority in a legitimate election voting against Dei would certainly get to keep it out of the statements getting Dei out of our district is what the broader Community legally voted for and want Dei was put at the bottom of the polls in Watertown just like it has been put at John Deere tried
226to supply Harley-Davidson and the University of Texas at Austin are we saying that those people do not want inclusion for handicapped people special needs people that is not true there's a fundamental problem here with definitions Public Schools should not be pushing any political ideology or rule view on other people's children ever I have never done it once I have very strong views very strong beliefs very strong World Views all of it I have never once done that in 14 years of teaching here the majority of citizens in Watertown don't want their money being used for social justice activism and it's why parents are pulling their children out left and right it's not merely the birth rate if I may share an example when I see the word run we all know what it means when
227I see the word run along with the words walk bat ball inning we all know I'm talking about baseball the words diversity Equity inclusion transformation authentic Justice words that just happen to show up together like a gang on the slide deck are also part of something bigger and it isn't baseball what is it all one needs to do is look at the Panorama survey resources thank goodness they're gone one of those resources that Panorama suggests two Educators that offers social emotional remedies for low-scoring children includes those same words you will find them all diversity Equity inclusion Justice transformation in that resource suggested by Panorama and do you know what else is there side by side with all of those words Pages after Pages hundreds filled with content such as this and this is where the
228problem lies no one is against inclusion of people that don't have the same opportunities and they have challenges no one is against that we all love those people I know most of these people in this room back here we all we do not have animosity toward any of these people we truly care about that but this is what is side by side on those pages next to diversity Equity inclusion do a Google search put all those words in at the same time don't just put diversity in put them all because this is what you find from Panorama Pages filled with content side by side such as this dismantling white supremacy supporting youth activism that is what has been going on it's almost like there's a weaponization of Education with other people's children yep I'm almost
229done thank you I submit to you that the students didn't bring politics into the boardroom somewhere along the line it was allowed in the classroom and the citizens are opposing it and we do thinkk the bo for listening I'm respectfully reminding you of over 2500 people representing the no DT voters and I have for you over 700 updated signatures and more coming from our students who want leftwing political ideologies out we are not talking about what we've been hearing tonight we are talking about white supremacist action activating the youth to be activists no that is where this is stemming from from our side I hope you can understand why we would feel so passionate about this we are asking you to keep our school Valu neutral if you don't know what's going on with social
230activism and justice social justice uh social justice uh activism you need to find out what it is research it I'm sorry for that I want so far over thank you for listening thank you for your work I know you put a lot of work in here are the signatures I would like to bring up to you please thank you the Reverend Katie Vander Lindon from eaner Moravian Church a very proud Christian a very supporter of all people we talk about the word inclusion we talk about the word diversity we say they're bad words I want the most diverse church ever I would love for people in my church to all look look different sound different act different behave different I want that wealth as part of my background we sit here and we say want
231inclusion well apparently inclusion has limits that's what the last speaker just said inclusion is limited to things that we choose are worthy of being included it's okay for a kid in a wheelchair to be included but not a kid who chooses to act or say or look different whether it's a choice or even not a choice that's not inclusion that's limits that's limits on what is acceptable you know what I'm a Christian and the first person got up and talked about how Christians need to say this and Christians say that you know what I will call you whatever pronoun you want to be called because that's what you that's what respect is actually sat through all four of those strategic planning meetings I was on the pictures today I saw myself twice and I know
232I was that all for because the first one almost everybody in that room was faculty or staff or you all and everyone was invited and what that tells me is your faculty and your staff they're the ones who are engaged in this they're the ones who put in the time and effort and what happened is Little Words leaked out to these folks that said hey you need to get there because they're talking about stuff well you know what the people who matter read the first one and those people I think are being heard because 75 to 80% of them voted in one way and you took the words out of their Ms and they don't get to vote because they might not live in this District so they might not have voted you in but
233they are the people that matter the most your students your staff and your faculty it's not your taxpayers it's not your taxpayers I don't send my kids to public school because I'm a taxpayer I send them because I believe in public school I believe in a right to education and I believe a right to education for every single kid no matter what they look like or what they act like and I will tell you my kid has best friends who are of different backgrounds and they hear those words that you talked about on the screen that bullying every day you know why because the leaders won't stand up the leaders in the school won't stand up and put things like diversity matters in language coming from the top you might say inclusion will be there
234forever and I hope that's true but I also thought Ro be Wade would as well so until you tell me that it's in your language until you tell me that it's what you support our kids will keep getting bullied because you know why the leaders don't seem to stand up for us why should we stand up to it I hope that you do better I hope that you listen to the people who came to all four of those meetings I have four pens I there we want these words because they do matter they matter to your faculty they matter to your students they matter to my daughter who refused to come tonight because she didn't want to face you all because she knew the words that were taken out and she was at all four
235meetings too so what she learned in this is that her voice didn't matter thanks for that education hi my name is winteral 317 south8 Street first of all I'm going to be talking about diversity I think it's kind of ironic that uh we showed so much diversity by excluding uh taxpayers from their um importance in caring about issues in the school district I don't think that's very diverse to exclude taxpayers average taxpayers who maybe don't have time or don't always know what's going on at school board meetings because they have jobs um all right so I think that the mission statements curent neutrality when it comes to Di is a good thing and this is why these words are not benign and this is why the public cares about it and that is why as
236Linda stated John Deere Harley-Davidson and Tractor Supply have Al jettison this language from their companies I'm going to be reading something on the definition of diversity here so many people are figuring out that the critical social justice movement tends to use words deceptively it tends to use words with more than one meaning with non-standard meanings let's start with diversity so the word diversity sounds like it means something everybody wants it really does it sounds like oh we're gon to have people with different backgrounds different sorts of expertise different perspectives we're going to bring them in and we're going to you know get it to be a diverse environment but that is not specifically what diversity means within the ideology of critical social justice critical social justice uses the word diversity to meet commers or aaric
237or in other words people who are trained in and believe in ideology you can read this explicitly for yourself for example in a diversity equity and inclusivity program that has since been jettisoned that was being installed at the University of Tex at Austin where they actually write what they actually write is that when they're looking for people to hire under diversity what they're looking for is people who are trained in diversity not necessarily people who look different have different racial or ethnic or sexual backgrounds or different disabilities the reason that this is the case in soci critical social justice is that it believes that identity comes with a certain experience of life and that and that certain experience of Life confirms privilege or oppression and when you live that experience privilege or oppression that there's
238an authentic understanding of that so if you speak with that authentic so-called critical Consciousness then you have skill in diversity but if you deny that specific definition then you don't have an authentic expression of diversity and so you aren't actually diverse you're the wrong kind of diversity or something like that and so diversity means hiring or engaging people in your company who believe in critical social justice ideology otherwise it is not considered diverse um and it doesn't matter they they might or might not happen to look like different or come from a different background and I just want to say a second comment really quick Riley Gaines I saw her speak recently she's a former Collegiate swimmer who was forced to share a locker room with Leah Thomas a biological male who chooses to represent
239themselves as a woman if you could finish up please yep and they were allowed into the women's double NCAA swimming team in an effort to embrace diversity equity and inclusion as testified by Riley Thomas was described as showing signs of getting excited in the locker room gains that her fellow female teammates were unable to express these concerns without repercussions forced into silence and that is why this language matters in the school board this language is not only allow these situations to take place on multiple occasions in multiple different sorts of Arenas but arguably and more importantly it prevents women from saying anything about it when it occurs thank you all in favor