001Uh good evening everybody. Thank you for being here tonight. Uh at this time we will call to order the May 19th Indian Hill Central School District Board of Education meeting. Um we would like to start with the Pledge of Allegiance. If our students would be so kind as to lead us in that effort, we'd greatly appreciate it. I pledge allegiance to the United States of America. And to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice Thank you all. Mr. Davis, roll call, please. Mr. March? Here. Mr. Schweiker? Here. Mrs. Sang? Mr. Tallis? Here. Mr. Warfel? Here. Uh thank you. At this time can I request a motion to adopt the regular meeting agenda? So moved. I second. Second. All in favor? Aye. Aye. Thank you. Uh with that,
002Mr. Davis, any public commentary tonight? None this evening. Very good. We will roll on to correspondence, recognition, and announcements. Uh this will be a fun one tonight. Yeah, I'm Thank you. Um can we please start with our monthly Lead It Now video? Hi Braves. I am Dr. Melissa Stewart and I'm the Superintendent of Schools. And it's May. You know what that means? It's senior time. It always makes me a little sad that we're going to be losing our seniors, but I could not be more happy for them. In front of you here, we have our seniors who were student ambassadors as well as senior class officers. I'm Marin and I'm going to High Point University. I'm Mia and I'm going to The Ohio State University. I'm Molly and I'm going to The Ohio State University.
003I'm Mia and I'm going to the University of Notre Dame. I'm Sophia and I'm going to Cornell University. >> [music] >> I'm Aiden and I'm going to Johns Hopkins University. I'm Ethan and I'm going to the University of Notre Dame. Okay, seniors, I'm very curious. What are you looking forward to next? I'm looking forward to take advantage of all the opportunities college has to offer. I'm looking forward to making new friends and meeting new people. I'm super excited for Notre Dame football and just being around all those nice people I've met at the university so far. >> [music] >> I'm so excited to have the opportunity to take classes and subjects I've never studied before. I'm looking forward to moving to New York and for very snowy winters. I'm excited to leave the state and
004learning how to be more independent. I'm excited to grow as an academic scholar and of course for Notre Dame football. All right, next. You guys, what's your fondest memory of Indian Hill schools? Beating Mariemont during the tournament for soccer. I'll miss all the school spirit and going to football games. I've loved all the opportunities I've had to travel with my classes like choir and Spanish. Our Wizard of Oz pep rally as well as prom this year. Getting our two-peat in Wooster for the tennis state championships. I'll miss the away game bus rides with my baseball team. I'm going to miss all of my great teachers and the opportunities I got through the experience ships program. Okay, last question. What piece of advice would you give your younger self? I would talk to Mrs. Richardson and
005open yourself up to as many experiences as possible. My advice would be don't wish high school away and enjoy the time that you're here. My advice to myself would be to trust in yourself and your abilities. I would tell myself to find the balance between school work and social life to make the most of the time you have with your friends. I'd say to stay true to your self values and to be involved as much as possible. Never change who you are for anyone else and take advantage of every opportunity this school gives you. Loved those answers. Also made me a little tearful at the same time. These seniors are the best. Let's send it off to Mr. Johnson at the primary age. Thank you, high school. [music] Recently at the primary, we had our
006extra special night. And that's the night where our families came into the primary school and experienced our specials. Why don't I take this opportunity to hear from our ambassadors about their favorite specials? Porter, what's your favorite special and something that you've enjoyed about the class? >> art because I like that you get to make clay and art and [music] creative stuff. My favorite special is library. Reading is one of my favorite things to do. My favorite special is PE because you get to do fun activities. I also get to try new sports and games that I've never played before. My favorite is Play Studio because we can all find something that we like to do there. I personally would go with the Maker Space. Well, of course we love music and Spanish, but as you
007see, I've only got four ambassadors with me. So, we love you music and we love you Spanish. And this night gets me thinking about this simple fact. You guys are second graders, but that also means that you are about to become third graders and go to a new school. How are you guys feeling about that? I'm >> [music] >> looking forward to a bit harder and more difficult math in third grade. >> I'm looking forward to a loving that time. I'm looking forward to making new friends and meeting a new teacher and a new building. I'm looking forward to learning new things with new people. Well, thank you guys so much for sharing. I can't wait to see you blossoming at the elementary school. Let's send it off right now because that's where these ambassadors
008are going to be next year. Thank you, primary school. Welcome to the elementary school. We are here today to talk about our PBL. Mr. Bobby Slattery, who owns 50 West, is an alumni and a district parent and came to help us launch our sports [music] franchise. So, Rodrigo, can you tell us more about it? Sure. The sports franchise is a project that we got to create our imaginary team. We got to pick the location and city. And we also got to like design mascots. This PBL project helped us become better entrepreneurs. What was everybody's favorite part? My favorite part was creating my team mascot and choosing our colors. My favorite part was working with my friends and having good teamwork. One of the things Mr. Slattery taught us was great things take a long time
009and patience to make, always adding new changes and new things. I learned that it's good to make money with a business, but also with a business you can also help out the community. I learned that Mr. Slattery said >> [music] >> to have a reason to wake up every day and go to work and be happy. That's all we have from the elementary school. Let's send it off to the middle school. Thank you, elementary school. So, earlier this spring we had a chance to host a mental health teen wellness fair. >> [music] >> And so, now we're going to be talking to some of the eighth grade leaders about their experience on the wellness team. So, Yana, tell us about how the event was funded. In order to fund the event, we applied for a
010grant from the Joe Burrow Foundation and got a thousand dollars to fund our fair. So, Molly, tell us a little bit more about the event. Okay, so the wellness fair was um just kind of like practicing mindfulness and wellness and good mental health. And we had a lot of stations and just stuff like that with like coloring and stickers and put a photo booth. It was really fun. Maggie, what was your favorite part of the wellness fair? My favorite part of the wellness fair was seeing how different stations catered to the needs of different grades. That's because different age groups are dealing with different things. So, Taylor, why do you think this event was important for the middle school? As a wellness team, we have been working really hard all year to make this wellness
011fair. It was designed for middle schoolers in general because it's the transition from elementary school to high school, which is a stressful time learning how to be adults. Thank you, wellness team. That's all from the middle school. I'll send it back to Mr. Johnson. Thank you, middle school. Braves Nation, here are some important dates to keep in mind. >> [music] >> On Tuesday, May 5th at 7:00 p.m., you can see our high school band and orchestra concert live at the Zoo. Of course, we want to give a special shout-out to all of our Braves moms. As we know, it's Mother's Day. Happy Mother's [music] Day, and make sure you come out on May 12th at 6:00 p.m., where you can catch our elementary school band and orchestra concert at the Zoo. And on May 14th,
012our middle school musical showcase is from 6:00 to 8:00 p.m. Of course, we have so many special events happening this time of year at Indian Hill High School to celebrate our seniors. Visit the IHHS website to get those details, along with links to live productions of the events you can join virtually. Back to you, Dr. Stewart. All right, thank you, Mr. Johnson. Well, here's what I would say. Soon, you're going to be going from students to alumni. So, what we like to say around here is that we are and we always will be Braves! Group hug. Group hug. Group hug. There's a lesson there that it's always Mother's Day. I like that lesson. How was that, Ethan, sitting in the room and watching yourself on the big screen? A little uncomfortable? Yeah, I get it.
013I get it. All right, we have lots of things to celebrate. Let's see how we can get through this. Um, this is the 27th year that the Best Communities for Music Education has given out a word for those communities that are able to show support in all things related to music education. We are one of the school districts that were able to get the this dedication um based on our current and ongoing efforts related to music learning in a well-rounded um education within the music department. So, congratulations to all of our music educators in kindergarten through 12th grade. Next, we probably celebrate Grace Wynn for her service during the 2025-2026 school year as a representative of the Ohio Student Safety Advisory Council. And let me just say that I received a personalized letter from um
014the executive director of the Ohio School Safety Center that said, "I want you to know, Dr. Stewart, how impressed we are with Grace. She comes across so um thoughtful and articulate and like she's going to do great things in the world." And so, it was really, really great to be able to hear all of that. She's one of the students that's chosen to actually speak at the annual school safety summit, which takes place in June 2nd and 3rd in Sandusky, Ohio. Grace, will you stand up quickly? Grace, is Grace here? No, she's probably practicing for her speech. Okay. Next, we want to celebrate DECA um and on the international stage, um DECA helps us think about the international career development conference, which was held April 25th through 29th in Atlanta. 16 of our students competed
015among thousands top performing peers from around the world at the highest level of competition. We especially want to acknowledge Christina Dos Santos um for her exceptional performance in hotel and lodging event, advancing to the final round and earning recognition as one of the top 20 finalists out of 150 competitors who were there. Her placement distinguished her among the top performers globally and marked her as the only Indian Hill student to reach the finals at this year's conference. So, again, I don't see Christina here. Mr. Gruber, are you giving too much homework to students at this point? All right. We also want to celebrate students Ardisha Thawani and Grace Yang for being recognized on a national stage for their commitment to service and leadership through the eighth annual Community Service Impact Awards presented by the United
016Nations Associate of the USA and interview. These students are being honored for their meaningful difference they are making at home and beyond. In addition, the Kroger company recognized students' efforts through its Zero Hero Awards highlighting youth leadership in building communities free of hunger and waste, while Serve Ohio honored outstanding volunteers across the state addressing critical needs. So, do we have any I don't think do we? Where's Ardisha and Grace? There you are. Stand up so we can give you a round of applause. So impressive. So impressive. All right. And in front of us, we have the Indian Hill High School Academic Quiz Team who captured the Division II State Championship on Saturday, May 2nd at Olentangy Berlin High School in Columbus, marking a historic achievement for the program. So, when I say your name, will
017you please stand up? I want to recognize Andrew Who? Ricardo Gomez Nieves Ethan Brown and Carolyn Winks. My understanding is that you were the four who were um who led the championship effort. Is that true? All right. And then tell me you're senior senior senior. Okay. So, you're leaving and I will be really transparent. I tried to bribe them with pizza to join me for a trivia night, so like we could take home first prize like if I had them in the room with us. Um the additional members of the quiz team and stand up when you hear your name. Jackson Kurt, Hannah McParlin, Drew Galey, Jackson Revis, Owen Vandehaar, Rocco Cardersey, and Devanshi Ritella. Eduardo the person that he added but he left the room. Oh, I'm sorry. I'm sorry Ricardo. I'm sorry about
018that. O- Eduardo, I'm sorry. Okay. Oh, so I see we're stacking the team with siblings. Harper, I see you back there. Get ready. I know. She'll be She'll be in the high school team soon enough. Okay. Uh would one of you be willing to just give us a statement about like this incredible championship that you won? Well, we'll ask you to go over to the microphone and turn it on because there's thousands of viewers at home. Ethan, go ahead. Yeah, go to the podium. Ethan, who's that little button? >> green. There you go. Give us a statement, Ethan. Uh well, there's a lot of stiff competition that day. Uh we answered all kinds of questions about all different topics. You know, history, art, literature. Those are the common topics that come up in a quiz
019team. So, we we gave it our all and we came out on top. Ethan, one question for you. Um so that I can feel really, really unintelligent. Give us a Give us one of the tough questions you guys got that you answered. Uh some of them are uh some of them are a little tough. Let's see. I hate We We We get We get asked a couple hundred questions a day. Does anybody remember the Richter scale or the Mohs scale. Some The top thing about quiz team that actually so locked it on the pre-question that when you are the next person you focus everything else out of your mind. So when you do that essentially like The power of Well, Andrew is one that he can share. Or concern with us. I mean I got
020like I mean the one question I remember from a while it's like echoing. Okay, the one question I remember from that tournament just cuz it was like something that Emerson was like I got hurricanes off the first sentence just off of the advanced Borax scale. They mentioned that. Um, which that's something that I plan to study in this college related to what I plan to study in college. So it's kind of like cheating almost. It's not like something I actually learned by like the flash card sets in quiz team. So but it was something that I was interested in so for sure for sure. Um, definitely that. I thought if I was right the answer there would have been Mr. Marks. They all would have been difficult for you. Well, that was slide. I I
021also think we have one of our coaches here. Yes? We'd love for you to say a word. Yes. My name's Missy Hardy. I coach this group of amazing student athletes. Um, they were incredible that day. I told them the moment is not bigger than you. Every single one of you is capable. All you do, you listen to the question, when you know the answer you buzz in and you say it. The moment is not bigger than you. You've all done this before. You've all been the hero in a match at some time or another. And and that's what they did. We had to we had to come back and beat the team that had put us into the consolation bracket. We had to come back through the consolation bracket to meet them. That was Oakwood
022from Dayton. We had to meet them and beat them, and then we had to beat them again in the advantage final. And each time we met them, we we got better, and they got tighter, and we ended up winning and came out on top. And I'm so incredibly proud of this group and can't wait for next year to see what our seniors will do, and also see what our underclassmen will do, and and hopefully possibly repeat this excitement. Thank you. Congratulations. >> Thank you. >> [applause] >> Much care. Good job. We're going to take a Let's try to take a picture. Get together. Take a step back. Yes, we're going to get together. Missy, thank you for everything you're doing for this team. Do we take a picture? Take a picture of this. Let's go
023in. All right, next we'd like to celebrate the 17 high school seniors who are planning to pursue futures in the arts and military. These students were recognized during the annual arts military signing day on May 1st. The students include Noah Copman going to Harvard University, Finnegan Crosby going to Miami University, Kendall Higgins University of Cincinnati, Vivian Jenkins Smith College, Michaela Koroski University of Buffalo, uh Maddie Lanfear Belmont University, Elise Longbottom The Ohio State University, Kayla Love Kent State University, Kiera Morris University of Cincinnati, Kyle Peterson The Ohio State University, Max Vilata Cincinnati State Technical and Community College, Janisha Rana The Ohio State University, Aaron Scott Oberlin College Conservatory of Music, Caroline Winks Miami University, Alister Woo University of Vermont, um Tan Ya- Ya- Sorry, Tan. Tan Yavuz, the University of Cincinnati, and Grace You, The
024Ohio State University. So so proud of all of those students. Congratulations. We celebrate Indian Hill High School students Josie Ruff and Kira Morris, who have been recognized as the finalist in the 2026 Upstander Awards presented by the Nancy and David Wolf Holocaust and Humanity Center. Um, Josie and Kira were recognized for their work through their initiative of JoJo and Kiki helping Cincy, which supports individuals experiencing homelessness, promotes mental health awareness, and organizes community drives, and creates service projects that directly benefit people through the Cincinnati area. Josie and Kira have been invited to like the gala that they have at the Holocaust and Humanity Center as one of the finalists for this award. We are proud to announce that Indian Hill High School junior Jane Holbrook has been selected as a delegate to the Buckeye Girls
025State this June at Bowling Green State University. Sponsored by the American Legion Auxiliary, Buckeye Girls State is a prestigious leadership and citizen program that provides high school students with hands-on experience in government, public service, and civic engagement. Congratulations to Jane Holbrook. Super excited for her. Now, let's transition to a little bit of talking from all of us. Every year, we have some Board of Education awards that we like to present to some of our community members. And so we're going to start that process. Mr. Marks, would you like to go first? Sure. What we'd love to do is have the recipient come up to the podium, share a few words, and then give you an opportunity to share anything you'd like. So, our first award is the Brave Champion Partner Award, and we'd like Dr.
026Carter Randolph to come up, please. >> So, uh Dr. Randolph, I put some notes down here. Uh-oh. You are [clears throat] uh So, I want to share from two perspectives. One is as a as a board member and the second is as a father. Um we as a father, we take lots of field trips, our kids do. And inevitably, and we're we're excited also cuz uh Meredith, Leslie, um your daughter, correct? I hope so. Yeah. Right. Uh this this transition to our to our executive executive director there. So, I'm speaking a little bit to both of you as a dad. Um inevitably, the Green Acres trips are always the ones that sell out uh in terms of the parents signing up. Um and also, no matter what age the kids are, they're so thrilled um
027to be able to have that opportunity to go there. And so, that leads into what I want to share. Um tonight, we're honored to recognize Dr. Carter Randolph as a recipient of the Brave Champion Partner Award. This award celebrates a community leader um who's got unwavering commitment and support and a lasting impact on our district. Often, I have the opportunity to talk to other school districts um not only in our region, um but throughout Ohio and Northern Kentucky. And when they hear that Green Acres is is truly our neighbor, um they are very envious um that we've got such a unique partnership. Um what's amazing is that every student is impacted um by the programs at Green Acres, and that wouldn't be possible without the dedication of Dr. Randolph. He embodies what it means to
028be a true partner in education, from the science to the arts. The programs at Green Acres under Dr. Randolph's leadership have been extremely impactful. He established the Green Acres Foundation in 1988 and became its first employee. Um, he's been involved for over 35 years. Think about that, 35 years in leadership. And um, as you all saw, I'm not very good at at some of those quiz things, but I did a little math. And uh, doing a little math, I calculated the number of students is probably somewhere between 6 and 7,000 students um, that you've impacted um, with us here in just our district of Wyoming. And so we're extremely grateful for that. Um, great partners don't simply stand alongside us, they lift us up. They challenge us to grow and to invest in our shared
029success, and Dr. Randolph, you've done exactly that. His support has strengthened connections between our schools and also the broader community in Cincinnati. Helping ensure that students are surrounded by encouragement, opportunity, and care. Because of leaders like you, Dr. Randolph, our district is not just a place of learning, it's a place that's thriving, and it's a community that's connected. Um, the values of Indian Hill schools are that we see every student as a learner, as a doer, um, learner as an individual, and learner as a whole child. And I can't think of a better partner in these values than you. So, thank you for your steadfast commitment to our community, to our school district, and for being a true true true champion for our students, our staff, and our mission. So, if we can give a
030round of applause to Dr. Randolph. Congratulations. Thank you. You want to say Sure. The The last time someone said, "Do you want to say anything?" It was an hour and a half before I shut up. So, >> [laughter] >> but I'll make this really short and sweet. Greenacres wouldn't be what it is if it wasn't for the partnership with Indian Hill. Gary Corn who was a principal of primary or elementary elementary he guided me to hire one of our first naturalists. So, it's been a very close relationship. And in the general community, if Indian Hill schools don't continue to excel because they raised the bar, and that bar is the envy of all the other schools, which means if Indian Hill schools get better, everyone else has something to strive for. So, the impact of
031this school district on the Cincinnati community has been much broader within the community here. It's statewide, citywide, countrywide because it's such a great school district. Thank you very much. >> I think that >> [applause] >> And now we'd like to move um to our next recipient. It's all right. Yes, can I please have Linda Clement Holmes come up to the podium? It really is my privilege to be able to recognize Linda as this year's recipient of the Superintendent's Student's Award. This award honors individuals who demonstrate outstanding leadership and who actively champion our district's vision and promise and promise and that we make to our students every day. So, I'm going to go off script and say I've actually known Linda for a long time. A while ago, I used to be the principal of the
032elementary, and I had the absolute privilege of being part of her two sons' education. And right away when I talked to her, I knew that this was someone that was really special. And as she continued in her career working 35 years at Procter & Gamble in an executive role, she never missed an opportunity to pick up the phone and answer a phone call from me or a teacher, that she can generate some conversation with us about what we could be doing better and differently at Indian Hill schools. Um, she does not have to give her time to us now. Since her retirement, she really exemplifies stewardship in every sense of the word. She leads with purpose, integrity, and a deep commitment. After serving as the chief information officer at Procter & Gamble, she dedicated her
033time to a variety of boards, including the Jack and Jill of America and the YWCA. Um, I think that's only just two of them. I think there's more boards than that that she's serving on. Her dedication continues with Indian Hill schools, especially in the athletic department. She is always there to lend a hand and to offer some good advice. I think when I think about Linda, what comes to my mind is that often when we think about leadership, we think about it in the terms of an official um position that might have some power behind it. Linda is the type of a leader that she doesn't have a position here at Indian Hill schools, but when she walks in the room, you know that she's there. And it's because she carries all of that with
034her. It's the integrity that she carries to everything that she does. And it's how she dedicates her time to us. And I know for me personally, I am a better leader for knowing Linda Clement-Holmes. Yeah. Linda. She Oh, you got it. >> We'll get it. Okay. I'll get it. I'll get So, I um, most of the kids know me. I'm the school sports photographer. So, I prefer being behind the camera. Um, but I do love the district. I've been in this community for 28 years and I've been associated with the school in one way or another for 25 of those 28 nonstop. Um, and I do it because I do love the district and I always tell everybody, anybody I can talk to, that it's like having a private school education, but it's a public
035school. How cool is that? Um so it is easy to talk about because it is such a great school district and my boys uh exemplify that and they they grew up here. Their friends are here. Um and I see in them what the district did. So I couldn't be prouder to be part of it in any little way that I can. I can't I got a girls lacrosse game to go to here. Um but thank you very much. I am I am more than humbled and honored to receive this. Ruth. >> [applause] >> Tonight, we gather not only to honor excellence, but to celebrate someone who shaped generations. Barb Watson is our recipient of the Brave Team Career Achievement Award. For 37 years, Barb served the students and families at Indian Hill with unwavering dedication
036as an elementary music teacher. Her classroom was far more than a place to learn notes and rhythms. It was a place where confidence was built, creativity was nurtured, and every every child felt seen and valued. Now, Barb's professional journey was grounded in exemplary academic foundation and expertise to teach, but it was her passion and her heart that made her truly exceptional. She didn't just teach music. She inspired a lifelong appreciation of the arts. Now, her contributions extended well beyond the classroom to performances, programs, countless hours of preparation. Barb created experiences that brought students, families, and our IH district community together. And throughout her career, Barb was recognized for her dedication and professionalism, and the impact on her students as well as her profession. And her greatest achievements, and I was speaking with her her sister
037Susan, who's here, are not measured in awards, but it is in the thousands of lives that she influenced. Former students still carry her lessons with them today, not just in music, but in the confidence, the discipline, and joy. Her love for her students, her passion for the arts left an indelible mark on this district. Now, Barb Watson's legacy is clear. It lives on in every student who found their voice because of her, every performance that sparked pride, every life she quietly and profoundly changed. Well, maybe not so quietly. But, it is my honor to recognize Barb Watson with the Brave Team Career Achievement Award. And here, accepting on her behalf, is her sister Susan and her husband. So, while she may no longer be with us, her impact continues to resonate, just like the music
038that she loved so much. >> [applause] >> colleagues Oh, my. Bittersweet moment here, but um I would just like to thank everyone um who bestowed this honor to my sister. She took her job so seriously. There was just never a day she wasn't caring about her classroom or how she was going to put a show on or is it going to go okay? Is you know, um sorry these tears are of joy. Um but I just want to say thank you to the district. It is an amazing district that she taught in and I saw the care, compassion, warmth and dedication from every faculty member here. And I came to her shows so many years and those kids I just she had such a special gift. And I was so glad she was able to
039share it with the Indian Hill district. So, thank you so much for this award. >> [applause] >> Um tonight is my pleasure and really an honor um to recognize Dr. Dean Karyacus as a recipient of the Indian Hill Alumni Connector Award. Um I say it often that the district this community makes us unique. We talk a lot about why we're uniquely Indian Hill and the the strength of our community at large and in particular the strength of our alumni who step up to give their time, their treasure back to the district really takes us from a phenomenal school to whatever it is is above a phenomenal school. Um and Dr. Karyacus lives that. Um this award honors an alumni who remains deeply committed to our district. Those who continue to give back and engage and
040strengthen the bonds between our students and the world at large. Uh and there really is nobody that I can think of who more appropriately fits that than Dr. Karyacus. Um for those who don't know, um, and hopefully most Dr. Kyriacou is the president of Christ uh, Hospital Heart and Vascular Institute, medical director at the Christ Hospital Research Institute, and a professor of clinical medicine at both The Ohio State University uh, and the University of Cincinnati College of Medicine. Um, he is in every sense of the word a world-renowned cardiologist who has uh, make his made his professional stake in our community uh, with my own family um, and many others. Um, but we're here tonight not to talk about him being an excellent doctor, but about him being an excellent alumni um, in our community.
041Um, Dr. Kyriacou has never forgotten Indian Hill High School or Indian Hill schools. He's a graduate of the Indian Hill High School class of 1971. Um, and importantly his connections to this community have now gone down two further generations. Uh, his children David, Andrew, Nick, and Jetta uh, all went through Indian Hill some around my vintage. Uh, now he has grandchildren um, in the district with my own daughter. Uh, so it's a it's a really personal family thing for us. The Kyriacou family has been an Indian Hill institution for a long time um, and his commitment to our schools is is present everywhere you go. Um, if you go to the high school, you can see the um, I'm sorry, I lost the the the digital arts lab that him and the Brendamour family his
042his brother-in-law also class classes everyone graduated generously funded um, back in 2019. That is used all the time by our students in our cutting-edge technology programs. Um, his mother in fact, fun fact, his mother was involved in the original development of Tomahawk Stadium. Uh, so a good fact even before his time. Um, and being currently serves and is an active member of the Indian Hill Foundation Board of Trustees. Um, our alumni like Dr. Kyriacou, they they create a really powerful bridge for our students to help develop outside of this campus. And as we have leaned into as a school, things like the experiences we offer, the Usher Nurse Center, and all the else, that that can only happen with committed, dedicated alumni. And Dr. Karyopec's work provides for our students, and it provides an example
043for other alumni to step up and say, "I have some talent. I have some time. Let me see how I can help this district, how I can help our students." Do you realize it as a student that you're lucky to be here? As a board member, and more as a parent, you really feel that. It's with the strength of our committed alumni who really take us to that next level. So, Dr. Karyopec, on behalf of the Board of Education, on behalf of all of our students, including mine, including your grandchildren, thank you for your generosity, to your dedication to the school district, and your unwavering commitment to all of our Braves. We are proud to call you a Brave. We are grateful for everything you done for our district. >> [applause] >> Chris Well, thank
044you. Thank you very much. I'm extremely grateful after this distinction, actually humbled by this. And I promise going forward to work very diligently to be worthy of it. I've always considered Indian Hill system to be the crown jewel, if you will, of public education, not just in greater Cincinnati, but really the state of Ohio. And I think all of us in this district must really do everything it takes to keep it that way. So, I couldn't be more proud to have three generations here. It's been invaluable to us as a family. And I just want to say thanks. Thank you very much, Dr. Stewart, board members. I appreciate it, and we'll keep it going. Promise. >> [applause] >> Uh We'd like to just get a quick picture of the award winners. If the four award
045winners could exit out of that door right next to Mr. Davis. And then after that, you all are more than welcome to stay and listen to the balance of the meeting. Um we certainly understand that that's not on your bingo card of fun things to do. Susan, would you be comfortable being in the picture? That would be great. We're all in. So, could we guide the plumbing and your seat? Not tonight. That I resent your PC my new device. It's in the town here so I meet you in this. So nice boy. This is our executive team. So glad you all see you Thursday night at graduations. Yep. Yeah, we got to find out who is the county mistake. I want to see the fighting. I already checked the driveway out here. I'm good. Yeah,
046you lost I'll show you. Good luck with my son of your sequel out. Why did my wife like it? Yeah, it's okay. My pillows take one of these stuff. Oh. How many dress? Go back. That's a plan. How many things do you do? What do you think? And I said Great. But now, what someone's cheating? That Olivia teeth. It's that What's the rabbit out here? Now this is what family is all about. Really Chris stop with I know this. Hopefully we're going to start this about it. What means August? >> Miss Aiken, have we got all the pictures we needed? We're good to go. Is it okay if we go ahead and get started again? Okay. Uh next I'd like to invite Mark Richardson, the director of innovation and technology, to talk to us a
047little bit about the state of technology. Just lifted off with everybody leaving, but I also feel like a teacher. I feel like to say, "Okay, everybody move to the front now." So, we wanted to spend a little bit of time, and thank you for having me in here, um to share some of the things we've been doing on the technology team this year and what we have planned for this summer. So, wanted to go over some of the things. These are some of the highlights of this year. All right, there we go. So, this summer, um, we're going to complete our display project. Over the past 3 years, we've been rolling out big displays in our classrooms that are interactive. We also have 720 new Chromebooks coming in and because of some flexibility from our
048treasurer and some anticipated cost increases that we were reading about in the industry due to hardware going ever up because of AI and how all the companies are changing their manufacturing. Because of that cycle change in purchase, we were able to save $133,000. We have a new data warehouse coming up that will be very helpful for our teachers and we're pleased to, right after school is out, welcome our high school tech intern that we have every summer that is funded by the state for us. Oops, wrong direction. We've also had a team of teachers, administrators, and at the end of the year, some high school students joined us. We have been talking a lot about AI and how we can use AI from the teaching perspective and how the students, because we know this will
049be their way, it is their world right now. We know we need to be doing some things with our students. So, the professional learning has taken place in every single lab classroom that we have. Each teaches how to use these tools. And really all the way down to even kindergartners, we know that they have to know about AI. So, they're not necessarily using AI, but they have to be familiar with the technology to where all the way where we go to the high school where we're beginning to give instruction on how they can use it effectively. Um, because we know it's going to be something that they're using in their careers. Something else that we've been monitoring is some of the national news related to screen time concerns. We're keeping a close eye on that.
050There's more and more articles. There's been some state legislation and some big city legislation that are starting to limit the use of screen time. It really hasn't started in Ohio, but we're aware of it and we do monitor how our how our teachers and students are using their screens. Oops. A little too aggressive there. So, we have a couple ways that we try to address this is we have as you know in each building we have an innovation coach and that coach has coaching cycles in which they work with teachers to put together well-thought-out high-impact lessons and where appropriate they use technology in those lessons. We also have our administrators giving their evaluations. They're always looking for impactful use of technology. So, I'd like to say that we do a very good job using technology
051and we're very intentional and purposeful about it. I wanted to show you I seem to have a problem with this. Some additional things that we have here at school. So, we we work with our teachers trying to bring them up to speed. We also have certain tools. Because we receive money from the federal government, we do have laws that we have to adhere to and we do have like all schools and a filter for for students that we have a control of what we can open and close at certain categories so kids can't the games you might see them playing at home they they can't play here at school. And that program we have is called securely. We also have another program because sometimes parents will reach out to us especially for our students that
052take one of our devices home, that they have a concern that maybe their child who they want to be working independently, they say they're doing their homework, but maybe they're not doing their homework. We have a program called Securely Home that they can get through their counselor to install on their phone an app that they can then see um what their kids are doing when they're working at home, turn off the internet if they need to, and things like that. We also have a tool that all of our teachers have access to called GoGuardian, which I think of it as a deterrent, that um the students know that a teacher has an app that they can open, and they can see every screen in their in the class, so that they can see is everybody
053doing what we want them to do, or is someone kind of gotten distracted and doing something that they're not necessarily supposed to do. And what they what the program allows them to do, which is pretty slick, they can send a little message, it'll just pop up on the screen, and the teacher can say something like, "Are you doing what you need to do?" The student will look around almost startled and close that tab and refocus. And for those students that don't necessarily do that, the teacher can just click and close the tab to bring them right back to where they're supposed to be. We have a new piece of software that we've been using to help us make sure that all of software that we use is licensed properly and has a data privacy agreement,
054and this software, because they're aware of the screen time concerns, does have a new dashboard that allows you to monitor uh the screen time of your students during the instructional day. So, we ran some recent numbers of our last 3 months of activity, and as you would expect, our primary school has the lowest usage. It's about 4% of their day or 17 minutes. The elementary school goes up a little bit to about 57 minutes a day. And then I asked some of the schools to include some some different projects that they do that are high-impact uses of technology. I think this one might even have been featured in a board presentation before. Fourth grade does an endangered animal research project. And part of the product that they do beside the research is they create a
055website about that animal and then ideas on how to make it a safer world for these The middle school, as you would expect, little more sophistication. They go up to 19% of their day with just a little bit over an hour. An example of something that they use at both the high school and the middle school with a high-impact technology are Spheros. Spheros are little balls that are robots. You can program them, you can code them, you can put all sorts of different high-level math variables in them and apply the math in action and actually see it do things. So, we've had these used in a lot of different classes. High school goes up just a little bit. It's actually a few less minutes but the same percentage, about 19% of their day. Something else
056we wanted to talk about because it's in the news and it seems all the time. Um it's not it it's every couple months I get a a letter in the mail that says I have free credit monitoring because some service that I used that I didn't even know I used had some sort of breach and I can get that free protection. So, we have really, over the past couple years, as have most schools, really targeted um increasing our professional uh ability to keep our data safe um and our systems as secure as possible because the research that we get from the groups that we work with say that K-12 public school systems are among the most targeted sectors of cyber attacks cyber attacks nationally. So, we have a couple different ways that we break this
057down. We try to be proactive about it and we and this is probably our our best way to prevent it. We're proactive in that we have um new type factor authentication just like you have with your bank. So, anytime somebody logs into their account, they need a second device to authenticate and they get in. We also have what some staff members might uh comment as a ridiculously long password and um structure to it that it it is a it is very hard um to get our password. And our based on the coaching that we have, you take one password and that's the password you have forever. So, we do not have password changes because the password is so long and complex. We also have a couple other things in place that are helpful for us.
058We do monthly staff training. Those staff trainings are on fishing and they're also on different um activities related to cybersecurity and data awareness. We also have a new tool that we've been using that all of the data on all of our district devices are encrypted. So, if someone lost a laptop, if someone stole our laptop, they would not be able to access any of the data on those drives because it's it's all encrypted. We also focus on uh response and recovery. There's been some recent legislation about that that requires schools to do certain things. I'm happy to report we've kind of been ahead of the curve on that. We have an incident response plan that is based on the NIST standards from the federal government, and we update that on an annual basis. We work
059with a cybersecurity partner that does an annual cybersecurity assessment with us, as well as our insurance company that does an annual assessment with us. Cybersecurity insurance, we've never had a claim, fortunately, but each year they want they have more requirements for what you need to do to keep your insurance from going up, because if you follow the news, there's more and more of these all the time. Um lastly, I'd like to talk about some of the things that we've been working through that Kirk got us started on our path with um getting some outside verification of our system. So, we're we're a member of a group called COSN, and it's a school networking group, nationwide group, and they have something called the trusted learning environment, which is five different areas that you comply with artifacts
060and some contextualization to tell how you're doing the things aligned to their standards. Happy to report we just received our uh business practices certification. It's about a 6-month 6-month process that you go through, and we're very close to getting our classroom uh instruction and our professional development certifications well on those. Putting together all those and making sure that we have the right policies and practices and training for teachers in place. I ran through that very fast because any of you guys had a lot of recognition tonight. Um are there any questions that I might be able to address? Have we set up, Dr. Stewart, Mark, a good AI policy? Well, I'm sure we have it. I just don't know what students uh instead of writing an essay on their own, they ask ChatGPT to do
061it and turn that in. How do we address that particular aspect of white? We do have a policy. We've actually had our second revision of that policy. Um last year we had a policy related it was in the old days policy related to the usage. This year the state actually put in place a law that all schools need to have a policy and they had a template that you could use. And there is an academic integrity connection that AI cheating, if that's where you're going to, is related is treated the same as any other cheat cheating. We're trying to be as proactive as possible about um AI usage in the classroom. The high school, which is really the only place at this point that we have it on. Everywhere else it's off. We can turn
062it on for little bits if they want. But um they have a whole thing in their teacher your handbook where they go through with the kids and basically per assignment do like a stoplight system that if it's a green assignment they welcome you to use AI. In fact, they want you to use AI because they know you're going to use it. But there's certain things that they'll have a red light, which is like this is a no-go, right? I need your thinking, not the AI's thinking. So, it's it's addressed as any other academic integrity issue. Mark Gober spoke >> this one that off your top of the head. What is I was a little surprised to see that they're only just targeting uh sectors lately public schools. What are they looking for or what are
063they targeting there? Um it's it's public schools and it's small government institutions because they they are you don't go where the money is, right? Which are the banks because the banks have the most money, they also have the most protections. And I think that they just assume that schools quick, easy win. Do a lot of schools for a little amount of money, they're not going to have the infrastructure to protect them. The thing that's fascinating to me about this the whole cybersecurity as we learn more and more about it. In certain parts of the world, these are legitimate business ventures that they um they try to offer you a certain level of customer service that if you pay the fee, they will actually do what they say they're going to do because they want to
064know that the next time they hold somebody's data for ransom, that they're going to pay it and they're going to get what they want. So, I think they see schools as an easy target. So, it's a softer target. Yes, so Mark, I did hear at a recent seminar from our insurance company that another reason why schools are attacked is because a fifth of a 5-year-old social security is quite valuable on the dark web. Agree. Well, and one of the things, thank you Nick for that. Um to add to that, we don't have any student social security in any of our systems. Um the other thing is with one of our cybersecurity partners, which is a company called Expel, we have an additional service as part of our contract with them that they do monthly dark
065web scans. So, when we get notification that one of our students and one of our staff members is out there in these lists that basically are bought and sold online, we will look at when that breach took place and then if it took place after the person last changed their password, we disable their account until we get verification that they've changed that password. Anything else? Is this something we could summarize and put with Heather's help in a message out to the family. I think a lot of people would find this comforting to know what we're doing proactively. Yes, we've talked about summarizing it in an email that we can get out to families, but we would also like to hold an in-person technology training moment for the community this September, late September, early October where
066we can talk about screen time. We can also help people to understand what AI is, help them understand how to prompt it, how we're using it in school. We'd like to have that happen in a face-to-face manner as well. So, I think the key is going to be communicating many, many times through many channels. I would, I mean, just as a parent, I would welcome that. I mean, I'm I mean, I joke about it with my kids, but I feel like I'm now at the age where they're past me on technology. I'm pretty good with technology and to know what's out there, it's it's overwhelming to try to keep up on it, know what they're doing, and they've got the devices and the computers and it it I think leading on this would be helpful
067for a lot of families. >> Mhm, absolutely. Hea- Heather does a a safety message at the beginning of the year that talks a lot about physical safety. We've already talked about how we can add some of the data security and safety as well to that message. >> I think that using it at the year, I think it'd be really I think the community would really appreciate having that. Right. Uh two two thoughts. One, um all the passwords I have, my Indian Hill password is definitely the longest and the most complicated. So, for anyone out there that is I was like redoing it and I was like, I think it's like 25 characters or something. It's only 20. 20, okay. Um but the second thing is I just want to commend uh the curriculum folks, Mr.
068Gruber, you. I love the fact that we are ethically embracing AI and that we're thinking about how we use it and how to be productive with it, right? I think there's a lot of folks that are so far removed from it and saying, "Man, it is like the you know, uh scary thing out there." And I think there's a healthy balance, which I think you shared, which is we want to protect, we want to balance, we want to be ethical, and this is the future of where the world's going, and if we aren't preparing our kids to use it, one, they'll be at a disadvantage, and then secondly, if we're not preparing them to use it ethically, then they're open to exposing themselves to something really bad. So, I I think that's really important that
069we're taking that look or paradigm around how AI is going to impact our school system. So, thank you. >> Absolutely. I'll just add one more thing. Right now, we're in the midst of having conversations about setting up all of our goals for next year, and one of the things we've talked about when it comes to AI is really thinking about it in the terms of what a student needs to know, what do they need to be able to do. What do our teaching faculty and faculty need to know, and what do they need to be able to do? And so, when you start to divide that up by age and what you expect students to know, there are some things that create a sense of urgency. So, we probably all are aware that there was
070some recent headlines of students from another school district that created um material um by using AI of students within their school, and those students now have, I think, like 49 felony counts against them. Um and when we think about that, is that because no one ever talked to them about how serious this would be and that it wouldn't be a joke. And so, right away, we met with um Dr. Gentine at the middle school, Mr. Gruber at the high school, and held an emergency meeting and said, "We have to get to our students right now before the for the summer so that they understand that the way they choose to use this has consequences that are very, very serious." So, I think developing that curriculum so that we know exactly how we're going to teach
071our students about the use of it is a goal that we will probably put in place for next year. If I'm not over speaking, Mr. Richardson? Absolutely. Okay. Thank you. >> very much. >> [applause] >> With that, move on to the superintendent's Yes, that item A is proposed reemployment of retired employee. So, this is Debbie Friend, one of our bus drivers, who's going to retire and has asked to come back as an employee. And according to um our legal obligations, we have to post that on a previous board mem- previous agenda. People are allowed to speak about it, and now this is going to be the final vote for it. Moving on to item B is personnel actions, tuition reimbursement, and professional meetings. And then you'll see one is a long list of renewal of
072limited employee contracts for the next school year. If we could look through that list and then go on to item two, approval of certified staff contracts for '26-'27, I'd like to just highlight a couple of people. Mindy Sabo is coming to us to replace Elizabeth Rebouché as the innovation coach at the primary school. We're thrilled to have Mindy join us. She comes to us with experience as an innovative coach, which is a rare thing to find. So, we're really pleased to have her. I also would like to highlight Caleb Caleb Hilton, who will be coming in to replace Angelo Sylvester as our high school choral teacher. Angelo, who has been with us for 2 years, is moving to New York City, living the big life in New York City. And so, Caleb will be coming
073in and taking that position. That was a very um robust um system that of interviews that Mr. Gruber and Mrs. Clark ran together that included initial interviews and then singing and playing the piano and working with students in front of us in a demonstration lesson and a meeting with our education music teachers so that we made sure that they would all work together and we are really thrilled to have Caleb join us. I think he's going to be a wonderful addition to our music department. Um, I also would like to highlight the approval of administrative contract, which is item three. Heather Robbins, who's going to be the high school assistant principal. Heather is here with us in the audience. She comes from West Clermont school district where she's been serving as an assistant principal at
074their high school, um, which is quite a bit larger than our high school. We are really thrilled to have her just as we did with the music program. It was a really robust and quick process. She came here a lot and worked with students and work with other administrators and worked with teachers to make sure that that she that she would approve of us as well. And I had the opportunity to go to one of the graduations for the Great Oaks. And as I was sitting down, um, a man leaned over and said, um, do I have you right? Are you are you Melissa Stewart? Are you the superintendent of Indian Hill schools? And I said, oh, I am. It's nice to meet you. And he said, well, I'm the principal of West Clermont High
075School. And I said, oh, I'm sorry. I'm sorry. And he said, you just really got a really good one and I'm so glad she's going somewhere where people are going to you know, make sure that she really enjoys her career. And Heather, you will really enjoy your career with us. We're so happy to have you. Welcome. All right, moving on. We have approval of classified staff contracts and again, because he's in the room, I'd like to introduce everybody to Taylor Snyder in the back there helping with everything related to technology. Um, he'll be coming by and picking up our computers very soon. Item five is approval of classified staff contracts. Item six is change of contract positions. So, this all happens when one position opens and people decide that they want to try to have
076a different assignment teaching a different grade level, including Jennifer Tyce Smith who will in the audience and be returning to the second grade classroom. Item seven is approval of classified staff change contract. Item eight, approval of Can I interrupt >> Yes, please. Please. Um I just want to highlight a couple things on this change of contract position, Tammy Miller from first grade teacher reading teacher. >> Mhm. Um and there's lots of stories like this, but I think it's important sometimes we just cruise through. Um I've had the pleasure of um my youngest being in the classroom with Mrs. Miller. Um also had the privilege of her prior to that um doing some intervention work. And uh that is a powerful first grade's going to miss her. >> Oh, yeah. >> Um having her transition that
077role as we think about all the students that we get um including mine that need additional support. Um so, I just think there's really a lot of uh power, right, in the opportunity for people to shift and move and continue to grow and develop and also to be able to give their best gifts forward to the district. Um and again, Mrs. Miller's just one of many. Um but I just think that is really important for people to know and I'm really excited that we create those opportunities cuz I think it serves our students really, really well. I agree with that. Sure. I think that there are some teachers who will say like I started in the second grade classroom and I would like to end my career after 32 years in that exact same classroom
078teaching second grade. >> Correct. And there are other teachers who would like to have a change. May be it's important for us to be able to hear that and let them to be able to show their talents. And a nice suggestion is for second grade, you should request Jennifer Ty Smith. I hear she's really good. All right. Um then we have item seven, approval of classified staff change contract. Item eight, approval of classified substitute staff contracts. Nine, approval of continuing certified staff contracts. 10, approval of classified substitutes. And those are bus substitutes. Let's see. My papers got Did you want page 11? Like Here we are, right? >> 11. Yeah. Nope. Sorry, everybody. There we go. Item 11, thank you, Nolan. Item 11 was [clears throat] 11 is classified employee contract recommend recommendations. 12, approval
079of administrative salaries for school year. My apologies. I inadvertently left off Mr. Hayden from last month's agenda. So, that's why he's on this individually. Item 13, approval of classified staff salary adjustments. Item 14, approval of supplemental personnel service contracts. Item 15, certified non-renewals. 16, resignations. 17, tuition reimbursement. And 18, third-party payment. I'd like to move to approve the superintendent's report A and then B 1 through 18. So, I guess You suck. Yeah, but I Mr. Warfel? Yes. Mr. Tullos? Yes. Marks? Yes. Schweiger? Yes. Thank you. Welcome, Board Heather. For the treasurer's report this evening, I would like to approve the minutes of the April 21st, 2026 regular meeting. Approve the financial reports for the month ending April 30th, 2026. Item C is a resolution accepting the amounts and rates as determined by the budget commission.
080This is the final process of the um events that we started back in December with the budget, the annual budget that we approved was sent to the county county auditor, county treasurer, and then they approved it, sent it on to us to accept those amounts and rates. Item D is to approve the establishment of the following student activity accounts. These are the two accounts from the Big Pitch. Money will be moved into those uh accordingly. Item E is the approval to participate in special programs for the '26-'27 school year. We have one now then invoice for the month of $3,000 for costumes for the middle school spring play. Item G is a list of contracts that we have. Uh most of these are um year-over-year. We have Cincinnati Children's Hospital, the Mio Business Group again,
081Instructure for Canvas LMS Cloud and Support, the Hamilton County ESC on behalf of All Saints. This is money that is managed by the district for All Saints that is sent from the state. Item six, very similar, same contract for Saint Vincent Ferrer. The Hamilton County Educational Service Center. This is our early childhood special education program. Uh Frontline Technologies Group. Uh this is for financial planning analytics and comparative analytics budget management software. And then Hamilton Clermont Cooperative for our voice over phone services. Uh July of 26 through uh June of 31. Um item H is the approval to purchase a uh of a van equipped with a wheelchair lift from American Bus for for $95,035. Item I is the approval of purchase of two maintenance trucks from Cronin Ford $59,773.12 each. And item J is the
082acceptance of donations. Uh one from the IH Boosters for baseball uh $1,000, one from Greg Deutsch for athletics $780 and one from the IH Foundation to the middle school STEM program for $1,000. As always, we appreciate all our donors and all they do for the district to help supplement uh the wonderful education that our students receive here. Are there any questions this evening on the treasurer's report? I make a motion to approve uh 8A through J3. I second that motion. Mr. Marks? Yes. Mr. Schweiker? Yes. Mr. Warfel? Yes. Mr. Tallis? Yes. Thank you. Uh thank you, Mick. Um Dr. Stewart, you want to do a quick summary of the school fee change summary? Second reading. Yes, there is uh with the exception of um a technology fee at the prime elementary primary, there is very
083little change in the fees from last year to this year. The only changes that took place are ones that are mandated at the high school based on college board and taking advanced placement courses. Do we need uh this is second Second reading. Mhm. So, we need a motion to approve. I'll move to approve the second reading for the uh school fee change summary. I second that motion. Mr. Mark? Yes. Mr. Shweikert? Yes. Mr. Mr. Warfel? Yes. Mr. Tellus? Yes. Okay, we're all we're almost there. A few more items. Um next item 10A is a resolution to accept the settlement agreement that's been discussed. Do we need a motion to approve, Greg? Correct. I got a motion to approve the settlement agreement. I'll make a motion to approve the settlement agreement. Second it. Second. Mr. Mark?
084Yes. Mr. Warfel? Yes. Mr. Shweikert? Yes. Mr. Tellus? Yes. Um on item 10B before we vote on it, I'd like to let Mr. Marks give a little intro as to what this is and why it's being um presented this way. Yes, so with 10B in a in a minute uh Tim will share a little bit more from the operations committee and I'll add a little context uh with him, but in our work in the operations committee, uh we've been looking at an overall facilities plan and really bucketing things into different categories. One of those categories is safety and security and one of the things that uh we felt was very important was putting a secondary placement at the high school. Um if you look at our other facilities, we have a double door and then
085once you come through the double door, you then go into an additional area that allows authentication to happen, right? So, identification, who you are, you, why are you here? And while we have cameras and a button that pushes at the high school, it's hard to really do that authentication of who that person is, what's their business. And so, this would be installing an additional piece of glass in so that once you get through those double doors, essentially now you're not free to go anywhere in the building at the high school. You're contained in that area. So, now you can be authenticated by our our front office staff. And then they then you go through a door after that. Once you're authenticated, then you have access to the building like the other That's correct, just like
086the other schools. And so, um And so, the team um you know, Mr. Nichols and Dr. Stewart and Mr. Davis have done a lot of work with our partners to figure out Hey, we feel like this is something that's really relevant and important and that we want to get done. Um and so, from a timing perspective, it may push a little bit, the work might push a little bit into the fall. Um but we want to be able to get moving on that so we can have as minimal um disruption as possible um for the students. And so, um this resolution um will provide the ability to and I'll read it here in a second for us to um not have to go into the competitive bidding process um which would cause it, you know,
087potential delays. Tim, is there anything you want to add to that? No, I think you you covered it well. I think uh uh we identified this is something that was a top priority and we didn't we wanted to uh utilize the downtime during summer uh to put the security measures in place. I'll read the resolution. Uh resolution declaring urgent necessity for the security, protection, and accessibility of school property, and authorizing the superintendent and treasurer to proceed with the replacement installation of entry doors and access control improvements into high school without competitive bidding pursuant to Ohio Revised Code section 3313.46. Um, any questions or comments, anything Mr. Davis or uh Mr. Nichols you want to add or any board members any questions? No, thanks. I'd say thanks for putting this together. >> I know you're going
088to preview this but the operations committee what they've been working on sort of a schedule triage almost of what we need to do now versus what we plan for and accomplished down the road and um as we always say anything security related get moved into that immediate call. So, thank you for identifying it and more importantly finding a solution. So, when you Second vote. Second mention. You had the second, yep. You had the motion. All right. Mr. Marks? Yes. Mr. Schweikert? Yes. Mr. Warfel? Yes. Mr. Petolas? Yes. Uh, thank you. Uh, next is the summaries as we've been doing now we're having a little more of a robust committee schedule and asking each of the committee heads to report back to the entire board what's been occurring at the committees. Tim? First, do you want
089me to start? Uh, Nolan. And then you can add. Yeah, that'd be perfect. >> So, we've had two uh operations committee meetings uh since our last board meeting on April 29th and May 13th. Um, what we have done uh and Nolan talked a little bit about this is really assess all the needs of each of each of the uh uh school facilities um, understanding what potential repairs, upgrades are necessary. Uh, we prioritized those in four categories, safety being the first which we just talked about. Second, uh projects that uh potentially could have a negative impact on the operation of the school. Third, uh where we thought where we we evaluated that there um could potentially be a return on investment on doing the project now versus postponing that project. And then the fourth category being
090um uh things that we would like to do, but aren't essentially uh necessary to do. So, that is that work has all been uh finalized. Um the attendees of those meetings was um Melissa Stewart, Dr. Stewart, Allan Marks, myself, Jim Nichols, um uh Mick Davis. We also had some out outside consultants, uh Chris Petech and Amy Benetti from MSA Architects, uh and Nicholas Morgan from Stillwater Consulting. Uh Nicholas will be putting together a full report on uh listing out what each of those projects are by uh by each uh school building, along with the estimated cost uh of the project, as well as what we see as the timing in terms of when the project would be uh needs to be implemented everywhere from uh this year all the way out to 2030. So, that
091report will be released uh mid-summer. Uh and that will be available to the public. That work will then be married with um the work that we're doing with the finance committee so that we can have a uh construct kind of what our expense alleys would be with the building and marry that with the financial projections. Nolan, anything to add? Yeah, uh um it's been really powerful work looking at that, and this goes with their overall theme of just good financial stewardship, and developing that master's facilities plan so that we are way more proactive and reactive. Um the other thing to add is that we invested um at Mr. Davis's recommendation in a software um that does capital asset planning. So, we have loaded the overwhelming majority of all of our capital assets into this software.
092What that does is allows us to look at the expected life of something. So, as an example, our turf field, right? When we do a turf field, we load that into the system and then based off of standard usage, where we live, kind of weather we have, we can expect to get X number of years out of it. That allows us then to take all that data, furniture, all kinds of different fixtures, load it in so that that can be tied also into the master's facilities plan, but then also circle back to the work we're doing on the finance committee. So, that what we're trying to avoid is getting to a position where all of a sudden in the coming years, we have a situation where, wow, the life of this is over. Um with
093this software, we should be able to avoid a large majority of those that pop up. There'll always be things, um but it's a proactive approach that Mr. Davis and then uh Mr. Nichols has been part of of really putting us in a in a great place. That's great. That's a great segue into the finance committee um meeting looking at how we pay for all these things. Um so, on last Friday, May 15th, we held a finance committee meeting with myself, Nolan, uh Melissa, Jim, and Mick. You didn't have any guests at this meeting, correct? Just us. Um and we went through um and look at it. Mick had prepared we always do the five-year forecast, but he had taken that out and put together a 10-year forecast, which is you know, we're asking him to
094predict the future 10 years from now, which is just impossible. Um but it is as educated of a prediction as we can get. And what that shows us, what we can use the data with, is as we plan for um potential capital projects, facility projects, a line item over our budget is expenditures for facilities replacements. And as we look out to the future of what we need from an operational perspective, if we were to do some type of bond issuance, that could take some expenses out of the day-to-day operations and roll them into a dedicated fund to pay for that, which helps the long-term operations budget. So we started looking at what would a potential ask of the taxpayers look like? And I think where we left it and there's options. You know, we talked
095about the ability to ask them for an income tax. We looked at the traditional bond levy process. We are not at the point where we're saying we need X dollars and we're going to ask for it in this manner. What we're doing is sitting down now, studying the information the operations committee report has put together. Looking at what we think is the community's appetite for asking for additional dollars and what that would look like going forward, keeping in mind the first and foremost goal is always to prioritize operational expenses, teachers, educators, but facilities they are right there behind that. So we started looking at, you know, various options. It's it's no secret it's a difficult climate right now climate right now in public education. There's an article in the paper just today about what CPS
096is experiencing and the challenges that are coming out of Columbus, the challenges that are coming out of the seemingly never-changing real estate real estate tax valuation and collection methodology. So there's a lot to be considered. But as we go the other part of it I should have mentioned is here in the near future we will be reporting out on on the cost-saving mechanisms that the administrative team has been tasked with looking at. We We to make sure before if we do go back and ask our taxpayers for additional dollars that we are doing everything possible at our house to make sure we are operating our budgets properly. Uh, there have been expenses that we have saved just in the past few months and this continued to be uh, evaluated as we go over the summer
097month. That process will ramp up. Uh, but we'll be able to report out hopefully some cost savings, but you know, it's it's no secret. It's very expensive right now. Um, filling a bus full of diesel fuel is a lot harder than it was 3 months ago. And that inflationary pressure has continued uh, with everything we do, energy bills to every Uh, so it's just a very challenging environment. But we're continued to um, look at all available options uh, starting with how do we spend the money we're given uh, as best as wise as practical, understanding that education is an investment and it's an expensive endeavor, but while that may be. Uh, so um, I I'd imagine over the coming months the finance committee will continue to work uh, closely with the operations committee um, and
098to assess you know, what are our priorities and then how do we fund those priorities as much as possible and efficiently. And the only the other thing I would add with that great job there is um, is also looking from an academic lens on you know, what it what it what can we as you shared, what kind of cuts can we make? Uh, where can we be good stewards and at the same time thinking through the financial side and the operational side, how does that impact academics and arts and what does that look like from a student perspective in terms of providing the greatest opportunities um, for our children. Um, and as Barry's point, we're in a ever-changing landscape from our enrollment um, growth to inflationary pressures um, so we're we're doing a lot of
099work to really map out strategies um, for the long term. Next Okay. All right, at this point uh I would like to uh move for a roll call vote. Whereas the public board of education may hold an executive session only when a majority of the quorum of the board determines by roll call vote to hold such session and only at a regular or special meeting for the sole purpose of consideration of any of the following matters and under the Ohio Revised Code 121.22 G1 number eight, investigation of charges or complaints in this instance regarding a supplemental employee, and also applying G3, conferences with an attorney for the public body concerning disputes involving the public body that are the subject of pending or imminent court action. So, I will second that motion to move into executive
100session. Mr. Wilson? Yes. Hot? Yes. Whyte? Yes. Yes. Exclusive coverage on the Indian Hill Television Network has been a copyrighted presentation of the Indian Hill High School Video Department.