001[Music] n [Music] a [Music] n [Music] n [Music] he a [Music] good evening everyone we're going to call the meeting to order this is Monday February 3rd 2025 uh this is our liquid board Board of Education meeting um at Garfield Middle School and uh to call the meeting to order uh Mr Zan can you call the role Mrs katsen bger hi miss shanesy I miss Clark Sutton here Mrs Callahan here Mr do Mrs dotman Mr Callahan sorry about that President Mrs here we really we are all dropping the ball tonight and then would everybody please join me in the Pledge of Allegiance [Music] it pledge allegiance flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one nation indivisible with liberty and justice for all before we moved on to
002some of the rest of the business of the meeting there was a statement I read at the we had to tidy up a uh some of the business from earlier in this month so I read it earlier and I wanted to read it again before um all of our folks that are here tonight would be leaving so um I'm going to go ahead and do that um here at Lakewood we take pride in the fact that we work with our students family families Educators and Community to ensure that we do everything in in our power to protect the rights dignity and well-being of our students and staff kindness and respect have always been a part of our values and our vision of a liid ranger as you may be aware the Ohio State Legislature has
003passed and Governor dwine has signed a number of bills that have the potential to affect our students well-being as well as the way we operate our schools these bills seek to affect our transgender students possibly remove some of some students from school for religious instruction and More in addition the incoming administration at the federal level has issued a number of executive orders that seek to use the threat of removal of federal Educational Funding to influence educational programs and policies that protect and support transgender students affect the way we teach us history eliminate programs that promote diversity equity and inclusion and even allow immigration and Customs Enforcement to enter our schools local control has been a Bedrock principle of public education in Ohio for many years and these actions are designed to undermine this principle local
004control of our policies and programs has ensured that Lakewood city schools have been a place of acceptance for everyone we are a community that Prides itself on being a place where all students belong and feel welcome in Lakewood our main purpose as Educators and as a community is to protect the safety and well-being of our students so they can focus on achieving their goals both as students and as human beings please know that as a board and administration we are working together and with the advice of councel to interpret these state and federal measures as they are issued and to determine what actions they actually require schools to take how these actions are monitored and what consequences are involved in some cases legal measures preventing the implementation of these bills might prevent the need for
005immediate action from schools in the coming weeks as we learn more we will continue to update you in addition we will issue a board resolution regarding some are all of these bills and orders if necessary and applicable until then and going forward as I said earlier we will continue to work with our students families Educators and the community to ensure that we are doing and will continue to do everything in our power to protect the rights dignity and well-being of our students and staff kindness and respect have always been a part of our values and our vision of a Lakewood Ranger and that's not going to stop now thank you thank you very much um I would invite my fellow board members if they have anything to add so please feel fre you um just
006along with that please make sure that you're paying attention making sure you're saying aware of things both uh state level Federal level I saw something today that there was a bill introduced to disolve the Federal Department of Education and just so you understand what that provides to us right special education our title programs um grants Head Start programs the free introduce lunch program so we would we would lose quite a lot um in not just here but everywhere and unfortunately we can't really count on the state as they have proven to not really be friend to public education with expanding School vouchers um funding for Charter Schools things like that so just please make sure that you are aware we remain aware and just speak up when you can um I just I wanted to
007call attention to something that bothers me which is that parental rights lately seem to involve parental right to restrict things to restrict access to ideas to books to being who you are and I believe Lakewood will continue to be a community in a school district that sees parental rights as the parents right to um ensure that their child has a comprehensive and factual education and that it's an environment in which every child can Thrive and can be comfortable and can be safe and I think that's what we're going to do and we're going to stick with it I'll just Echo um Mrs Katen Berger's uh words were um we' looked at them before we met and we are all in solid agreement we are watching we are listening we are um here to represent you
008we are here to hear from you um our country is um operates as a federalist system uh which gets a little complicated in terms of our involvement and um and we're representative democracy so we don't get direct say on particular laws but there are ways for us to be involved there are ways for us to um make our voices heard um for and against any of these issues um it's a little complicated but it also means that we have multiple avenues for involvement and thank you very very much for being part of this awesome place called Lakewood I appreciate uh president Katen Berger's comments and and those of uh my my fellow board members um certainly support them and um there was mention of a potential for resolution so we'll continue to be to be
009vigilant there and I I look forward to to to seeing that process through and um you know as we continue so thank you thank you everyone uh now we will move on with the business of the meeting um next we have the adoption of the AG of the agenda do I have a motion to adopt I move adoption of the agenda is presented second any uh discussion seeing hearing none Mr Zan can you call the role Mrs kinberger hi M shy hi Mrs Clark Sutton hi Mr Callahan hi Mrs D hi thank you uh next we have the approval of the minutes uh do I have a motion to approve so moved second it's been moved and seconded uh any discussion hearing none all in favor I I uh the move uh the motion has
010carried uh and that takes us to the superintendent's report good evening president catburger vice president shaas SE distinguished board members Mr Zan it is my pleasure to introduce our amazing principle from Garfield Middle School up to the podium this is April Patton you just make sure the slides are ready here uh good evening president catsen Berger vice president shaas distinguished board members superintendent Ned wikii and Treasurer Zan thank you for the opportunity to highlight Garfield Middle School tonight on behalf of the entire Garfield staff I am honored to begin this evening by recognizing the hard work and dedication of obviously several students who are here this evening but first I am going to start with our resilient Ranger Cole Rogers Cole will you please come join me [Applause] we recognize Cole as Garfield's resilient Ranger
011as he consistently demonstrates thoughtfulness patience and kindness towards his peers making him a positive presence in every environment his maturity is beyond what is typically expected for someone his age as he navigates success and challenges with great composure one example of Cole's maturity is how he handles his success in wrestling after a victory he remains humble never boasting or diminishing others while still allowing himself to take pride in his accomplishments his ability to balance confidence and humility is admirable a quality even many adults strive to achieve this weekend at the middle school wrestling Conference tournament Cole earned an impressive third place finish in his weight division congratulations Cole Beyond his character Cole is also an incredibly hard worker he puts forth consistent effort every single day when even even when tasks are challenging rather than
012giving up he demonstrates perseverance and a willingness to push through difficulties additionally he understands the importance of self- advocacy when he needs support clarification re or resources he confidently speaks up for himself in uring that he gets what he needs to succeed Cole was recently recognized as one of our second quarter Spotlight students where his teacher Mr Holmes described him as a quiet leader who leads by example rather than words while he may not seek the spotlight or even speak often Cole's actions clearly show his leadership qualities he consistently puts in hard work stays focused and helps others without drawing attention to himself Cole's combination of kindness maturity work ethic and self- advocacy makes him truly a remarkable part of Garfield Community and our resilient Ranger congratulations Cole hi Cole I just on the behalf
013of the Board of Education I just want to give you the certificate and congratulate you for all your hard work and your accomplishments thank you so much and who do you have here with you tonight wonderful well uh we're thank you and welcome and we'd love to have a picture over by our lovely Lakewood backdrop with your folks so sound good [Applause] all [Applause] if I held it the right way then down would go the right direction holding it the wrong way all right so I am going to get into a little bit of our building report I have lots of students here who I do want to highlight tonight um before I get into that I also want to recognize Mr Smith our assistant principal is here this evening and he is constantly working
014behind the sces to make sure our students are being the best versions of themselves so all of this hard work that goes into all these things you know I definitely want to recognize that he is a big part of that in terms of the building report I'm going to start with the boring part first um we set goals every year for ourselves I started the school year with this information to our staff uh it really hasn't changed but amazing things come along the way as the school year goes on and I'm going to highlight that in just a moment in terms of our building goal goals we always set an academic goal uh won't look much different than where we were last year but really establishing structures in place for us to have a data
015culture to dig into Data to promote data analysis to accelerate our math in ela scores this year with staff we have focused on analyzing all possible sources of data uh we dug into value added last week we really focused on growth data uh students may be able to speak to this some not yet but we have been util uh utilizing IE time to provide that remediation and enrichment but also to have conversations with students about where they are growing um and how they can continue to grow so we just finished our winter where we're in the process of finishing our winter I Diagnostics and I can tell you that on that diagnostic for the building 55% of our students in the building made made more than 100% growth from where they were in the fall
016and 44% of students in math made more than 100% growth from where they were in the fall these things need to be celebrated and students need to know when they are making growth so our teachers are really trying to include them in that conversation it's not just for us to know it's for them to know and when we don't make growth what do we need to do differently from now until the next time so those are conversations that are happening right now in the building our teachers are really focusing on using that information to plan and deliver instruction with intention so what are we doing every single day to make those improvements to gain student growth uh we do have students right now who are working with uh Mrs Fox our school counselor they're working
017on creating smart goals so any student right now that's at risk from first semester they're working on creating goals for themselves in order continue to make growth and progress our second goals for the building we always focus on our vision of a Lakewood Ranger and one of the goals I put forth this year for the building uh was looking at Global awareness and citizenship last year through our de deib committee we started to build a deib calendar making sure we were paying attention to all the different holidays celebrated uh different Heritage months we've continued to build and grow that through that Community U committee we also have a lot of community organ ganizations and Partnerships with eth grade we did our typical holiday uh visits to the nursing home so the eighth graders do a
018lot of community service projects um and again trying to engage staff in that we started an international Culture Club this year run by our new elel um isgi we started an explor Ranger science club and again just continuing to build all the capacities for our students in this area our second goal aligned with the vision of a Lakewood Ranger is growth mindset at the very beginning staff meeting I put this on here in the bullet points looked a little different for our staff because as we came into the school year we knew we were starting a lot of new initiatives we had a new Middle School schedule with ie we had new Ela curriculum to put in place there was a lot of newness to this school year and I needed my staff to make
019sure they had a growth mindset going in and the biggest thing to that is as obstacles came along the way they did that they continue to promote and model that growth mindset for our students that these setbacks we can overcome and we can move forward from them so we really tried to focus in on that growth mindset this year no matter what goals I set for the building or what goals we establish for ourselves something comes along the way that just sort of blows my socks off and that's what I'm going to share with you tonight so last year we had staff and students put forth all kinds of ideas I presented bridg bridg bites to you last year which is our prevocational program in bridges this year and I always listen to what the
020students have we might have a craft fair coming up in the fall we're working on that one now um but I had a student this year reach out to me a sixth grader Emily can you come up um it is Emily's birthday by the way happy birthday Emily I did say if I had some confetti I'd be throwing it right now but I don't have come on over Emily so Emily emailed me Emily is a sixth grader in this building Emily emailed me on September 30th so very early on in the school year about a newspaper that she started when she was at Roosevelt she sent me a sample copy of it and she said I'm really interested in continuing this at Garfield that email that she sent me went out to the staff within
021two days I had four staff members Mrs gromack M SP Miss bble and Mrs French reach out and say we will take on this project so very very quickly an email that was sent to me became something that is quite amazing tonight I'm here to announce and represent all of our students and they're not all here but many of them are here in our newest after school club which is the Ranger reporters which is our first ever School newspaper students come on up teachers come on up as well so all of the things I could have put in place or talked about in terms come on come on come behind me come come over over this to talk about ideas that I had or that staff has for embedding the vision of a Lakewood Ranger
022into what we do every single day none of those things could have amounted to what this group of students has put together and it is phenomenal we sent the first edition out so September 30th was the email October 2nd I think the teachers were like yes we'll do it December 6th was our first edition of the Ranger reporter I can share that with all of you if you don't have a copy you're going to get a copy of tonights or be able to get it and last Friday was our second edition so in that little bit of time this group of students behind me has done something quite tremendous so I'm going to let Emily talk first and tell you how this all started and came to be and then we're going to have some
023students come up and tell you all the ways that the ranger reporters uh hit on all of the competencies of our vision of a Lakewood ranger Emily hi I am Emily and I'm excited to tell you about how the ranger reporters got started in 2023 I started a newspaper called the sparkle times it was a small newspaper that I distributed to friends of and family and I never expected it to grow into anything bigger over time it improved more and more I was even interviewed for an article about it for the plane dealer once I got to middle school I wanted to continue the sparkle times at Garfield so I emailed our principle Mrs Patton asking back a store a newspaper Club soon after the ranger reporters was created so we are going to go
024through all of the ways that this latest version and all of the work that the students are doing tie into our competencies but before we do that if you would like to view our latest edition of the Ranger reporters we do have a copy for everybody over here Emily do you want to pass out one of those if not you can scan the QR code and feel free to see the amazing work that the students put into this Edition the first competency we're going to hit on is empathy and Ezra is going to talk about how the ranger reporters supports empathy hi I'm Ezra the ranger reporter says helped me grow in the area of empathy learning about different cultures and interests around the community so learning how different people celebrate different holidays like the
025Chinese New Year and uh uh you know Hanukkah and stuff like that and you like traditions of holiday traditions like the hide the pickle on the tree and like put candy in the shoe outside for St Nicholas Day and we help readers see how other people celebrate holidays so we offer people to see different perspectives of how they do things because we're all different can you tell us e what you do for the reporters I write the advice column [Laughter] so uh Better Than Ezra [Applause] all right Lucy is going to tell us how the ranger reporters supports growth mindset hello I'm Lucio Jones and I'm a part of Ranger reporters here at Garfield being part of Ranger reporters has helped me grow and growth mindset because instead of seeing challenges as scary I see
026them as an opportunity to grow and learn stepping out of my comfort zone helps me be more resilient for example when I wrote my first article about the girls basketball team I felt that writing an article about them would be hard however it was the opposite since all of the team members were very understanding and provided me with provided me with good information I've learned that by putting effort into something consistently you are gaining more confidence in your abilities because I've written two articles with my co-writer nurella pasai and one article on my own I found more confidence in my writing abilities thanks to the teachers and my other co-writers who have provided me with feedback additionally I used to be afraid of asking questions but now I've learned that asking questions is okay and
027it increases my knowledge overall range reporters say has help me think more positively about my [Applause] abilities all right and S is going to tell us how the ranger reporter supports communication hello my name is s and I just wanted to say before I present everything thank you all so much for being here and supporting this Comm uh the ranger reporters helps communication because it teaches active listening and like we have to communicate with each other to get our ideas across to everyone in our club and uh I do I did a part on the article this a song column I didn't do anything else because I kind of joined late but I I collaborated with Ezra we had to communicate like songs to put in there and I had to communicate with m Vil
028to uh put our song column on there and another way it helps it promotes feedback and revision and they did a word search and I thought it would be helpful to look through and see if there are all the words on there and also lots of other stuff like the feedback I accidentally put too much songs on the list so I had to remove some and that was something Miss Vil told me to do and basically all right elma's gonna share with us critical and creative thinking yeah hello I'm Elm and this um Ranger reporters has has helped me grow my creative and critical thinking skills partially through research so I have to learn how to evaluate uh reliable sources and fact check which actually has proved a bit difficult for me um and assess
029The credibility of certain sources ver versus others in creating articles and it's also helped me make informed decisions about what to put in articles or what to ask in specific interviews and this also plays into ensuring accuracy and reliability within the newspaper like we double check each other's articles before we uh before we like publish them and making sure that we have good sources and grammatical mistakes and everything are corrected and preser in the best interests of school culture uh within the newspaper like make perhaps making uh it more unbiased or less opinionated I'm going to let Emy speak thank you um so yeah same with me factchecking and credibility for sources has been hard for me because Google is not reliable on most accounts and so I have to look for more with credible
030resources and things like that and my critical thinking has um improved I've always been creative so um the critical thinking I live I love to write but filling in spaces where I have left out things that might have been important or not added enough or I added too much I have grown and been able to point out where I've made mistakes and be able to fix that before it gets published thankfully so yeah and nurella is going to share how the ranger reporters supports Global awareness and citizenship hello my name is nurella posha and I'm in Ranger reporters I have grown in global awareness in citizenship by getting to interview people I wouldn't normally talk to such as for one of my articles I interviewed the health teacher and I wouldn't normally talk to the
031health teacher outside of Health it it's helped me grown by learning about new subjects such I when I was researching about winter holidays I learned more about like Quanza and three King's day and Hanukkah and I also learned behind a bit behind the signs of handwashing on my handwashing article uh I also got research many like different parts of the world like for my uh winter holidays article I researched about like um about Hanukkah and Three Kings Day and like where it came from and I thought it was really like interesting I look forward to learning more about the world through Ranger reporters all right and for our last competency Sheamus is going to talk about collaboration um I'm Sheamus and I do the comics in Ranger reporters um and so there's like of basically
032in Ranger reporters there's actually like a lot of collaboration like you can like talk to your friends about like oh yeah do you like this thing I made for it to should I add new stuff to it to um and they can maybe also even like add like tell you to add more stuff and build upon your thing um and you can also like you also like interview people a lot and like kind of talk to them all right Miss Bacher is going to come up and tell us the future plans of the Ranger reporter um what started as a amazing idea from Emily has quickly blossomed and our students are constantly coming up with new ideas um of other things we can do and generate um some of the big ones that we've talked
033about doing our schoolwide polls to get more students involved um and to hear from our peers more as well as some competitions um right before Christmas we did an ugly sweater we've talked about doing some more um we've also talked with news crew gfi's news crew is to potentially collab with them at some point maybe do some United work together um we definitely have many ideas for Grant proposals and gaining some better materials because we are starting out with whatever's in our classrooms at the moment which has been great but the kids obviously want some more things and to um yeah spread our wings um we also are hoping as the teacher end that we would can do do some tighter publishing dates we'd like to have even more um availability for the kids to
034get their their ideas out there and there's so many great article ideas that we'd like to generate them quicker so they can do everything they want to do um and then eventually our goal would be to push off and let them lead the editing and Publishing piece um so we can be a little more hands off and let them learn even more ways for formatting and yeah so thank you and the last time I was in I think Mrs gromack you were telling me about a story for the next one the kids want to do yes stud questions and ideas which is how our articles start so Nella wanted to do an article about the fact that for the first time lakewood's history we have a majority of women making up our city council we
035also have female mayor female municipal judge so nurella and I have been working on sending emails so she can interview these City officials and build an article around that just like how our article about no sros was um instigated by Emily and Elm are part of the team and they want to to write more about it so we're really collaborating with the community and giving a students a chance to practice their interview skills outside school and it's exciting to see that awareness happened you all spoke so eloquently at the beginning about the importance of being aware and informed and I was really thinking about the work our students are doing in that regard which I think is remarkable so thank you for your support any questions for us I have a comment I was very
036happy to hear about how important U fact check and um was to you and making sure you uh are reporting accurately that's not necessarily a given these days in the media um and I think that uh having that kind of journalistic Integrity from the get-go is hugely important and I commend you for uh for doing that from starting now and I hope you carry it through to where what wherever you take your journalism careers if you pursue that it's really important I appreciate that so there was no goal I was going to set this year that did this this is amazing and when the first edition came out I was estatic and I just I'm so impressed by this group of students the teachers that are supporting them and I was up there last Thursday
037and I was sitting there I was like oh there's so many things happening at one time and so many things going on I mean it it is quite impressive so congratulations to all of you I thank you for bringing this to Garfield Middle School I just um wonderful I mean just wow and um I Emily I remember reading the article about you um and I I was part of a team a group of friends that started a newspaper in my middle school and then um started a newspaper in my high school so um I have a little Affinity um and affection for you and then I loved all that energy and the fact that you peer edit and um proof read for each other is so important and that is a skill that you can
038take with you in all of your classes and everything that you do so um congratulations and continue to have a great time and happyday yes and teacher while they're doing that I'll just add that there is another body of elected officials that is majority women in the community that wasn't mentioned it's a joy to serve with them and uh we don't like it just and one other comment this GMS uh this GMS playlist is absolutely amazing there's some there's some bands on here that are older than me let alone older than these kids uh so I I uh commend them for the uh how eclectic that is this is very nice I couldn't treat you know having students here is always the highlight of our meetings and you know um I have to give credit
039again to our teacher leaders that allow for student voice and our principle that allows for choice and voice so very important and it's the life skill and that's why we have the five competencies that ensure that as we graduate that you can collaborate and communicate and critically think um and you'll continue to do that because you're already doing it now so um thank you Mrs Patton for doing a great job teachers thank you so much and students excellent job very it is hard to present in a form like this and you guys are rockstars thank you and so I am so very sorry to the vice president of Regency who always has to follow a student presentation Mr Scott Wagner is here tonight with an update on our uh projects that are occurring with mems
040in our welding building and Franklin School of opportunity and we're excited about the progress and my goodness it's already February and it'll be here and almost finished soon right Mr Wagner absolutely it's um always a tough act to follow but I'll do my best and congratulations to all the students that's phenomenal before I got into construction I worked in broadcasting for five years so everything that you're learning now you will take into your careers and and it'll go a long way with whatever you decide to do so that's phenomenal get those skills so with that I'll get into the uh construction update it's been a little while we got cold it out last update so unfortunately I know the board had an opportunity to uh walk through the space here about a week or so
041ago so some of these photos will be you know um things that you've already seen but um it'll give us some um updates as well let see they were there I don't blame him well while they're getting the technical worked out you know overall we're in in in pretty good shape as the um tour had shown um through the renovations you know we've now started on the mems as well in that renovation um with the cold got us a little bit behind on the overall on the addition but we do have weather days built into the schedule which will help mitigate that that loss of time um I can't sing or dance so I'm sorry being outside did make us more sympathetic to the people doing the work so it was it was windy and
042cold yeah yeah but yeah we did have the yeah I was going to say we did have the the exciting uh experience of getting to do a little bit of a walk through and seeing some of the progress and it was really amazing how quickly and and also some of the classes have already been added to the curriculum for the fall and I heard they're already they were doing some um recruiting for Westshore and a lot of people are really excited about welding specifically so I think that's going to be a big hit so it's neat to see neat to see see that the all everything's coming together yep yep oh and here we go here we go so the in the we'll start with the welding addition so uh this is the concrete pore
043so this is all the the slab the concrete slab which uh will make up the the first floor of the building um then going to fso so this is the metal stud framing so this is all the wall framing that um makes up the fso uh renovation area additional photos of of the the framing this is all the metal studs which makes up the walls you can see the window openings on the right as well uh we also once the walls are up or the the metal studs and we'll get a lot of the uh MEP ruins which are mechanical electrical and plumbing Ruffins so these are um a picture of the electrical Ruffins so the outlet box you know folks are are used to seeing an outlet that they plug everything into but you
044know these are the wires and kind of the behind the scenes in the box that that where all that magic happens um some more photos of a lot of the conduit running through those walls which um connect each each P um box um or Outlet back to main panel much as you see in your house but on a much larger scale uh the hbac ruins so these are in progress as well so this is all the duck work for the heating and cooling uh as it goes through the space and rerouting um for the new layout uh within that space you have the main Square on the right which is the main trunk lines and the branch which Go off into each individual office in in room um with that there's also piping um so
045a lot of this is on a on a water system as well um so that is the piping that accompanies all the duck work more photos of the hbac uh the welding Edition um going back outside so once we have the slab in uh we also B by the foundations have a drain so that any moisture or water that would come up there uh would would would leave the foundation uh on the right is the start of the the walls uh the and the block walls that are going up so those are are pieces of rebar that tie the the walls into the foundation uh to keep it all stable uh back in the fso this is wood blocking that goes in the walls so these are locations where we'll have Cabinetry wall cabinets and
046then also base cabinets and then on the right um are more for restrooms and whatnot so you have the stability in the wall and um to support those once those are installed um prior to the slab being poured was all the uh electrical so in the prior photos on the inside we saw them in the walls this is a lot under under the welding Edition slab so every piece of conduit what you see there is electrical feed so a lot of the welding Edition uh takes a lot of electrical to uh run the welding equipment and whatnot so this is all the the pre-play that goes into that uh to make sure that all the conduits are run where they need to go before that concrete uh slab is poured um can't forget about Plumbing
047so these are uh photos of the plumbing in the fso so on the left you have the water lines the copper water lines and then we have the sanitary lines as well in the vent piping uh for the Plumbing Systems and after all that was complete and we do our inspections and get everything signed off on then uh where we're at currently is the insulation and then putting up the drywall so then it's starting to look like a finished space um as you saw on your on your walk through so making some good progress there um where before we just had a lot of the um the all the way through so now that picture on the right are those same windows that that we saw previously but now with the drywall on it starts
048to really take shape and you get a feel for the sizes of the of the spaces um prior to the drywall as I mentioned uh was insulation uh that goes into the walls for for sound and also for Comfort again more drywall uh back outside for the masonry Edition so this is um what the used to um to mix up all the mortar for them to install the the block walls um You probably see out there a lot of the just the scaffolding with with some plastic on it and why that's in place is to heat uh so there's temporary heat that's run into that Contraption for them to work in the cold and also it prevents the uh block from from freezing so the mor can cure cure properly and and not have an
049issue with the strength um so so that's both on the the west side and the South Side are are being installed currently so this is a photo of the inside where you see the wall taking shape and and coming up almost to the top on the west currently and then that's the um temporary protection on the South Side as we're making the corner um now that um we're into February we were able to start the mems renovation so that's happening actually have workers there currently because that's happening after school hours on the second floor of the high school so this is some progress photos of that that work that's happening with the framing uh so this is the wall framing with the door frames uh again some of the wall framing uh with the the
050window openings shown and along with the the framing we're also starting some of the mechanical electrical um and plumbing um ruins as well as we move through so what can we expect as we move forward throughout this month um and the welding Edition we're going to continue the masonry and have the brick on the outside of the that West Wall uh that West Wall was kind of unique and that we had to build build it a little unconventionally because we were so close to the neighbor property line so typically you'd build just the block wall and then you come back and and put scaffolding on the other side to build the brick but because we're soak um constraint on the size of that property line uh we had to build both the block wall and
051they're putting up the brick in the same at the same time so from the inside so it's a little little unconventional but um we're making great progress there uh the door frames are installed in the Ming walls as they are are built so those are going in as well as the in wall electrical and plumbing so on the inside we kind of saw that happening after the studs were put in but in the masonry walls the electricians will work with the Masons and put that conduit in as the wall goes up so that it goes above the ceiling and then we'll connect with those other other conduits that are in the in the the floor um the goal by the end of February so on that southide is where the second floor Edition will be
052so the goal would be to have the it's called pre CL pre cast planks so those will be set to make the second floor um floor structure so we should have the bearing walls up to that point where we can then put those um those on and then continue up uh for the to complete that side uh in the mems uh we're completing the um the metal stud walls and and setting the door frames there's also some structural supports that needed to take place uh for the new uh mechanical rooftop equipment so it's in a different place so you have to um secure the structure and put up different um supports in for the structure for that and as I mentioned the plumbing and electrical roughing will continue as well as the hbac and the
053fso um continue to to finish the drywall and then we'll start finishing the drywall so uh that's all the buing and taping so it looks like the the Smooth Wall that everyone's used to seeing uh we'll install the windows and what's called the storefront glass so the glass and and all those window openings will will be installed uh the hbac equipment will be installed as as well as completing all the uh hbac overhead piping and uh set start to install the temperature controls which will be your your thermostats and how that area is conditioned so um making good progress as I mentioned overall on schedule um we're we're making good progress on um mems and also fso uh Welling addition we were slightly behind because of the weather uh we kind of lost the entire
054week there but um we have some some days built into the schedule and we should be able to get on track here so with that I'll open up to any questions that you may have so just as a reminder this was the work of um the first task force when we started a couple years ago or a few years ago talking about a decline in enrollment uh the decline had already occurred and we knew we had capacity at the buildings we also knew we have Franklin School of opportunity that needed a new home um due to its structure and so you know working for a couple years to and wrote a couple grants obviously for the other programs at the same time to capitalize on this work for our students our middle school and high
055school that go to Franklin but also um our high school students that will be able to take advantage of the mems and the welding uh Mrs uh borino L had a chance to walk through with us last week sent uh Mr Zeman and I just you know this thankful letter of thank you for seeing you know that we needed a new space and they're seeing it come to fruition now um very excited and she'll be taking her staff through shortly um so they can see the progress of the work but um appreciate and I also appreciate regency's um efforts that they're the only ones that don't want me to call a snow day or a cold day but um they've been very flexible too about um you know switching the times people work in the
056evenings and the days just to to stay on schedule so really appreciate um your business and the work that you've done for us thank you appreciate I was going to mention I when we were doing the walkth through in addition to the fact that it was later in the day and while we were leaving folks were showing up for work because they were trying to not disrupt the school day for the because the mem's program is going into the middle of the high school building and then also all the effort that went into salvaging items that can be reused like drawers and other fixtures that aren't old so they don't need to be discarded or anything and you know when we're trying to be as we keep saying good stewards of our um our physical
057the physical aspects of our district that we it's been a good effort on your guys part so it's good to see that thank you you're welcome thank you thank you thank you so just to finish out my report I wanted to share that we're halfway through this year it's hard to believe that it's already February and um just an update on the task force itself that we started back in August um we have now finished the community survey and um impact will be compiling all that data for us looking forward to that we're also looking forward to bringing our task force together in the next few weeks to provide to them the next level of data that they've been asking for some of those data points that came out of our community conversations and then
058in addition to that I have met with all F well with five of our elementary buildings I have one early tomorrow morning and then another one next week to ensure that the staff are getting the same information that we have presented at Community conversations and also to offer them a spotlight for asking any question um that they may have as we continue to move forward I think one thing that um gets lost in the shuffle is that um you know we have consistently stated that nothing would be done until the earliest 2026 2027 and as I stated that that first task force um was very purposeful on what we needed and that's why we set the elementary conversation aside to make sure we have plenty of time to have those conversations I shareed with you
059know staff members worry about of course their job and you know I remind them that we have done due diligence about right sizing through attrition uh felt very strongly about that uh Mr Zan our our directors our cabinet level people on ensuring that we do that over the years uh so we're not in Dire Straits when we would need to right size immediately if we ever needed to um so we're in a good place with Staffing as I shared with them that we're in a place that it's really hard to make any more transitions due to our configuration so the conversation is about that collaborative commun communicating out and looking for suggestions and ideas and then continue to work with our task force for any nuances that they may come up with too any questions
060no it just sounds like when the task force comes back together that there'll be enough new information to really fill in some of the questions and generate more more discussion I'm sure based on the new information but um absolutely going into the community conversations we they already had um many questions um you know of course we came to our task force in August like you would with any meeting with draft ideas um it's really hard to start from scratch so that's what we we did we also at that time asked the task force um throughout those four meetings um share with us any of them should we bounce any of these out do they not work and they didn't have enough information at that time yeah and so I feel really confident that our thoughtful
061group of people will continue to um ensure that Safety and Security is our number one priority we hear that often about our walkability we want that too we want to make sure the least amount of kids have to pass over our our major thorough fares we have kids doing that now but we we don't want to exceed the number um so you know that's not that's not a Tak line we do Safety and Security every day be it walking or in our schools through threats or any other situation that occurs and then with that our task force wanted um to see um the maps that would show our current students and where they are walking to now and then the so that's using all of our data for our last few task force or our
062first task force we had multiple years of data coming into to it we work with this data day in and day out so we went ahead and did all the data based off of one researcher so then people you know would have an easier time to cross reference made all the same assumptions across the board um just so it'd be easier to communicate that I know at the end of the last task for me Force meeting before we went into the because we always had the phases of task force meetings Community conversations and Survey then back to the task force meetings based on the feedback we got from the community and and new whatever new information we got I know one of the the task force meetings one of the things that came out of
063the last task force meeting was um a desire to see sort of updated numbers from um future think and and that that was something we went back to them with and did you mention that we have some correct they are just finishing up on that I think we I'm not sure if we received it yeah right at the end of Janu like last week sometime yeah so that will go to the task force all that information um in fact you know though we're going to Archive and we'll keep in on our website all the information archive what's up there and then develop a new um folder for everyone to see so we've been very transparent whatever the task force sees the community sees um but I think something also that's been super beneficial is that
064when there's been um outside conversations or questions having a you know a meeting of a small group um with myself or Mr Zeman to sit down and talk through things um and again sometimes I think what's really important in being in this career for over 30 some years is that you know we may not agree but at least I've shared or been truthful about the information I'm presenting um I shared with the building staff is this probably isn't the highlight of my career I was a kindar teacher there's some highlights down there um but it's the right it's it's what the job is is and the job is to ensure that the community and our task force and all of you have the right information and enough research to make the best informed decision for
065your community did the teachers have any um concerns that or any like looking forward to something changing that we haven't considered in the task force so I um they they had concerns on would they have a voice on if they had to move a building similar to the appearent concern you know so we've asked open-ended questions and you know 400 people responded to different portions of different parts of our survey so we have to really dig into that but some thoughtful responses and I shared with them the same as you know during our community conversations it would need at least a year to delve into a teacher a staff group and not just teachers all of our staff to discuss if we have to make a decision that you know you may have to move
066to another building what makes it best for you what what could we do to make this scenario um as as good as it can be and that would be the same for our um parents and our students so that was the probably their biggest question I think too they they know that over the last couple years I think at convocation two years ago I I shared the um the enrollment at that time and graphs at that time so they know that conversation's been occurring it's been occurring in our occurring uh throughout the community but they also wanted to know what we've done um to ensure that we don't have as I began with a large amount of staff to have to deal with and I shared with them how we through attrition 36 positions have
067been eliminated across the board uh to ensure we're right sizing that way so people can be fairly comfortable and confident that they'll still be working if they want to correct correct and you've met with five of the seven elementaries with five of the seven one had to be rescheduled because of the cold days um but everyone thought that was okay did and the union is involved in the process along the way correct oh absolutely all three of our unions have been part of the conversations for years now um to also help us to devise plans to ensure we we do this effectively I think you know in all honesty one person said to me um so I'll have my job and it was uh support staff I'll have my job in two years and I
068said even if we weren't doing that I can never guarantee I never know going to happen in two years I you know I don't have that magic ball but what um you know what I can say is that we've done our due Dil diligence to ensure and we know projecting out any other retirements but honestly things that happen from year to year you know a spouse gets moved out of state and that position opens there's so many unfortunately somebody gets sick and we we have a position available so so many variables and and outcomes happen within two years it would never I would never be able to project out a single position right right and we just don't know that's the bottom line we still don't truly don't know what the place nice thing about
069it you know when I it's nothing's on fire you know so that that's a good thing yeah um and right now we do have the luxury of time and that's because of the research that's been done not just by myself you know prior to me being in this job Mr Zeman over the years in his position um so have time to be thoughtful good so that concludes the superintendent's report thank you you okay um so at this point we would be moving on to uh Gite discussing agenda items on giving reports and we usually take a pause here that if we've already had some folks move on yeah kind took a the front row printed out um but if anybody else wants to ever of course everybody's welcome to stay but if anybody else wants
070to uh take their leave that's totally fine and um we'll take a couple minutes to do that and then we'll move on to individual reports this is really nicely done it really you know I really want to I want to QR codes out in the back the back they have the um this I want to know I want to see some of those submissions that would really cool I'm okay great it is I was really ex I think they were mistake okay moving right along I think we will move on to the finance Report with Mrs Clark so there's quite a bit of detail here um okay I'll just start reading um uh Investments purchased and matured December 2024 the tables um that matured during 20 December 2024 as well as outstanding Investments of December
0712024 investment earnings for regular board funds for the month of December totaled 7,898 72 bringing the year-to date total to$ 1,800,000 um for the month of December 2024 our general fund receipts totaled 2,824 4 and general fund expenditures totaled 7 mil 5,343 the fiscal year 25 summary for now um our revenues year-to date actual and projected revenues through December show a positive 845,000 variants compared to the 5-year forecast interest income is exceeding fiscal year 25 estimates contributing to the overall positive variance our expenditures so far year-to-date actual and projected expenditures through December show a negative $35,000 variance compared to the 5-year forecast this is because salaries purchase services and other objects are trending slightly under forecasted amounts supplies and materials are trending slightly over forecasted amounts and benefits are exceeding the 2025 estimates however this
072variance should be reduced by fiscal year end we are transitioning from the Great Lakes Council of government from the Suburban healthc care I'm sorry we are transitioning to the Great Lakes uh Council on of government from the Suburban healthc care Consortium um so that we created a short-term cash flow variance when it should be resolved by the end of this fiscal year cash reserves are sufficient through fiscal year 2026 uh the financial summary is provided to show monthly and fiscal year-to-date cash position for the non-general funds maintained by the district appropriation modifications will ensure the district is in compliance with the state auditor's office and the County Fiscal office all accounts have sufficient funds available to cover the increase in the Appropriations the amendment increases allow the district to legally encumber and pay funds up
073to the amounts appropriated so those are all the details to we're good so far still and that concludes my report thank you and now we will move we would normally have uh building sites and major purchases but having no report for that we'll move on to the education Report with M right um we have the waving of tuition tuition for non-resident Senior aood High School senior has requested that she be allowed to complete her senior year on a non-tuition basis for the 2425 school year following her familyes moved to Brooklyn Ohio there's a resolution to adopt a course of study the courses of study for Middle School English learning has been developed collaboratively by representatives from the English multilingual learning department and the department of teaching and learning it's an agreement between the Lakewood Board
074of Education and Recovery resources the agreement indicates the recovery resources will work with Lakewood city schools in prevention and intervention for substance use and positive decision and coping skills for the 24 25 school year non infrastructure resolution for the safe routes to school Grant application Lakewood city schools will make an application to the Ohio Department of Transportation for a 2-year Grant in the amount of $120,000 in order order to support active transportation and promote student safety for those choosing to travel to and from school in this manner this resolution is a requirement for the application process um and then we have a resolution to approve a student Club the Swifty Club at Harding Middle School the purpose of the club is to unite Taylor Swift fans of Harding Middle School these activities will include various
075crafts games discussions watching videos and listening obviously to Taylor Swift music and then there is a gift to the City Schools uh Dave Harper donated an HP laser jet printer to be used in the engineering program at westore career attack and that includes my report we taking names of adults who want to attend the Taylor Swift Club I have a hting student I can just pop in just pop in um okay thank you Mrs dman uh next we would have policy but having none no report on that we will move on to human resources and Community Services with Mrs shus thank you we'll have four resolutions the first certified resolution dealing with certified employees has a total of 175 actions um leaves of absences appointments and special compensation the classified uh resolution has a total
076of 52 actions classified nonemployee coaches and advisors known as ECE total of five um actions five appointments and community Recreation and education will have a total of 52 actions in AC Aquatics athletics events staff fitness facility and programming and that will be voted on in two weeks thank you um next we have the communications portion of the meeting um do we have any additional comments from our board memb oh me me Lisa M dman so uh the rack basketball season started and for the first year in many years the girls have a fifth and sixth grade league so I want to thank super Wiki and Mr Walter who really pushed for that um because they should absolutely have the same opportunities that our boys have and be able to develop those skills and really just
077have fun yeah learning all those things but I also wanted to just say I've noticed at the games I've attended at least that a lot of the parents from both teams are really rooting for like all of the kids not just the ones on their team which is really really refreshing and maybe a little bit un common but these are all our kids and they're all going to the same place so it's just really nice to have a place where like everybody's cheering each other on while it can still be very competitive um and I want to shout out coach work the high school girls basketball coach who comes uh the travel season just concluded and she was at their their games in the tournament this weekend and she shows up to practice and it's
078they really appreciate having an adult that doesn't need to care about them like show up and and show interest and I think it's really I I just commend her for it I I love when she shows up the kids love when she shows up that's great awesome does anybody else have any additional comments just encourage people to continue to attend um various events in the school district the calendar is pretty full um and the weather's crummy so you don't necessarily want to be taking walks but if you can bundle up enough to get to a building there's some really um very talented um students doing some really interesting things after hours yes so Comm in the Lakewood project on their recent concert the women who Rock concert is all female artists music and uh it's
079pretty cool um and uh they're already starting on the music for the next one and there's a lot of concerts and basketball games and all sorts of fun things going on so you're absolutely right um any other comments okay so we were we are going to move on to the uh public comment portion of the meeting and we have several folks signed up um I just wanted to mention that um it's typical and if you haven't commented before it's we don't usually engage in a back and forth we listen to public comments and everybody has their opportunity to speak um if they've signed up ahead of time um all you have to do is uh mention your name and the street you live on you don't have to give an address or anything um and
080we take your comments very seriously and and but we won't won't respond at this time we could respond at a later date um and we'll display the 3 minutes up on the the screen so you can know you have each speaker has three minutes to speak um and then uh that's sort of the limit U we don't usually we're not we won't be extending it past three minutes and the microphone will cut off at that point just out of respect to the fellow speakers and the the other people in the room so I just wanted to make sure people were aware of that so they can they see the clock ticking down they can wrap things up before their time is up so that being said I believe our first person who signed up is
081Katie Solomon good evening thank you for allowing me the chance to speak this evening my name is Katie Solomon and I live on Clifton Boulevard I stand before you as the fourth generation ledite a proud LHS graduate and a mother of three children in our elementary schools while I'm sure it's easy from your position to write me off as an angry parent that doesn't want change I can assure you that my concerns about the issue of potentially repurposing elementary schools run deeper than even emotions but rather a pervasive unjustness that does not align with lakewood's values my main concern about the issue is the timing and the lack of proper engagement the task force was a assembled to review seven scenarios from an outside consulting firm not generate their own Solutions based on a set
082of data the task force is stacked with District employees and also board members who will eventually be voting on the issue which which clouds the process early on you have declared that the four corner elementary schools are safe essentially disengaging those parents from opposing the issue as they can wipe their brows and declare safety we see through that we are here United and working together in support of all of our elementary schools I am not aware of any proper data collection on the community demand for a centralized prek ere Center either currently or prior to arranging the seven scenarios around those very ideas and as of the November Community conversations the teachers had not yet been engaged and yet presentations at the time centered on the quantity of teacher shuffles and sharing resources barriers it
083didn't seem that the teachers had feedback in any of those scenarios then the community feedback survey postcards were sound out approximately halfway into the entire process how does this make sense and what is stopping an individual from neighboring subur from filling out the survey pretending to be a Lakewood resident when is the traffic study coming when is the data collection on how many Walkers versus drivers coming where is the urban planning input from the city the questions continue yet the seven scenarios have not changed given these factors planning for a decision to be made in May of this year just plainly feels rushed the cart has been put before the horse in almost every point along the way and residents are feeling completely disempowered please halt the process of repurposing and let's instead work together
084to focus on the passage of the upcoming Levy I promise you will not find more passionate and hardworking parents than in the City of Lakewood in the midst of all the information being evaluated I re reiterate the Board of Education policy of making the well-being of students the fundamental value of all decision- making and actions they are more than just numbers thank you for your time thank you next we have Kelly Moyer signed up thank you for giving me a time to speak today I'm Kelly Moyer of Lakeland Avenue a parent in Lakewood of Ford children three of whom currently attend uh District school second grade kindergarten and preschool and I'm currently the president of the Lakewood Early Childhood PTA as well I'm here to talk about the district's plan to potentially repurpose one or
085more of our neighborhood schools I'm recommending that you Hal this process until more data is available we look at the real effects on our student population and we can utilize the creativity of everyone in Lakewood to solve the issues the district faces first of all I want to address the fact that the Schoolboard task force and administration have been working with outdated data the enrollment study was done with enrollment data through 2022 and birt data through 2020 almost 5 years ago I know I've had two kids since then personally uh looking at actual numbers enrollment has flattened in the last couple years I think that it's irresponsible to have come this far in discussions without seeing those updated projections I'm glad to hear tonight that you now have the updated data uh based on this
086but I really think that this should have been in hand before the task force convened and the community conversations occurred Strongsville schools just south of us closed two elementary schools in recent years and are now scrambling to found classroom space due to now increasing enrollment they have students in mobile trailers and are trying to figure out what to do to get more space with a levy that just failed do we want this for our Lakewood students I'm asking you all to sit down as individuals and truly think of the pros and cons and the effect this will have on the fabric of Lakewood and our youngest citizens who really don't have a voice in this matter at all families flock to Lakewood for our walkable neighborhood schools truly walkable according to studies is 87 miles
087any repurposing plan will put a majority of children outside this range with any repurposing families will experience longer distances to school forcing traffic congestion before and after longer pickup lines and if a centralized preschool is created parents rushing to and from buildings to make sure that their kids can get to school on time I currently have a three-year-old in District Preschool paying more for inconvenient hours just because it's easier for me to send all my kids kid to one building and I know many other families that feel the same if a centralized preschool was created my son wouldn't be in Lakewood preschool speaking of the children we are now looking at creating long-term effects that will follow them their entire academic careers not only will they experience social emotional difficulties and these are kids that
088all had to live through covid but studies show children who attend a school that is closed suffer from higher absenteeism lower test scores and lower graduation rates I asked the board the superintendent the treasur is this really worth it an average $500,000 a year savings is it worth this effect on our children you assembled a task force of intelligent caring and capable citizens why not let them come up with Creative Solutions instead of assembling them for hours of their time to rubber stamp scenarios that were presented by a thirdparty firm lastly I understand that some boundaries will need to change but as has been repeatedly stated including tonight we have time to make these changes so let's do so with the smallest effect on our students change the boundaries with the in kindergarteners much thank
089you thank you next we have Dan Kirk hello my name is Dan Kirk I live at in Northland Avenue with my wife and her 5-year-old daughter who attends Grant Elementary School in kindergarten I want to briefly Focus my comments tonight on the school district's community service survey while the intention to gather input from the community at large is a good idea the execution has been lacking some questions on the survey are very clearly biased to bring about a preferred result two questions in particular ask parents one How likely are you to send your child to Lakewood city schools preschool if before and after care are available and two How likely are you to send your child to Lakewood city school's preschool if the location is centralized on the surface those both seem like sufficient op
090options and it seems likely that people will answer favorably to them however what those questions conveniently leave out is that in order to open a centralized preschool with before and after care an entire Elementary School would need to be closed and repurposed and also the district's currently provided Early Childhood Early Child Care options at five neighborhood schools would also need to go away as someone who works with data every single day I often see data misunderstood and misinterpreted for example I could ask my daughter tomorrow night if she would like a cookie for dessert she would certainly say yes Dad but what I left out was that there was ice cream in the freezer if I had told her the cookie comes at the expense of the ice cream she would almost certainly have a
091different answer therefore it is my I belief that the results of this survey will not accurately reflect the views of parents and community members of Lakewood I am concerned that the results will still be used as a means to convince the task force to move forward in recommending the closing repurposing of an elementary school our superintendent has said on multiple occasions that we are not in a hurry with this process in fact tonight I heard a couple of times nothing is on fire and we do have the luxury of time so knowing that there is no hurry and that the enrollment projection already proved to be incorrect and possibly indicating that enrollment is stabilizing I ask the board to Halt this process and focus on the larger priority which seems to be to me passing
092the levy in the meantime the city school district and Community should partner together to figure out the best ways of promoting and maintain marketing to families in the region and Beyond what very well might be America's most walkable School District thank you thank you uh next we have Katie slay rustad oh I'm hi I didn't actually prepare anything so I'm channeling Lucy when she said she's doing something that makes her uncomfortable to you know expand herself a little bit cuz I'm very uncomfortable right now um I live on Lake Avenue I have four kids uh three of them are currently in the lquid schools one of them is at the Godard school um I didn't even look into sending her to Lincoln for preschool because she was already thriving in God School we're getting year
093round full-time daycare and as most parents of small children know early childhood is all about Transitions and I wasn't about to trans positioner out of a place where she was thriving to even send her to the same preschool as my the same building as my other children it just wasn't worth it to me um so to me that was the first red flag of this whole plan is this is based on the need for a centralized prek program um it's it just seems like a little bit of a fallacy to me and if you wanted to do a centralized prek there's already a prek program at Lakewood High School and that is at what 57% capacity can't we increase there there's Taft there's a pre there's a prek program at Taft what if we move
094the board of vet out of Taft and there's just other ways to do this besides closing elementary school and then I'm also a big numbers person I deal with numbers a lot in my job and when I see that we get a 6 to 1.2% budget savings from closing a building you're reducing your schools by 14 to 28% for a a minimal budget savings this just doesn't add up up to me I don't understand the why to me this um it just doesn't make sense and so that's why I'm standing here very uncomfortably talking to all of you to let you know that um I wrote an article in The Observer kind of outlining all of my thoughts on it and I can't tell you the response I've gotten from other parents not just from
095the three closing schools but all the schools saying I thought the same things you you articulated my points um and especially from the four corner schools saying but I have to admit they're not closing my school so I kind of disengaged and I think that's really um disingenuous to start off giving those parents a pass because this is our community this is our culture um I grew up here my parents grew up here my husband grew up here his parents his whole family our Aunts Uncles we are entrenched we love Lakewood we love Lakewood schools when we bought our house in 2010 uh it was a different Lakewood Lakewood has changed exponentially in those 14 years a lot of people asked us well where are you going to send your kids to school and we
096would say of course we're sending them to Lakewood schools and now it's not even a question you wouldn't even people come here for the schools and the schools have always been awesome um and we haven't failed ly in a very long time and I don't think that we would fail this next next Levy regardless of what you do but I think closing a school is going to be a hindrance to that um I think we need to lean into our unique culture of neighborhood schools and celebrate it and and rally around it and not shy away from it thank you thank you very much um uh Brian uh V was it to be determined oh great sure well you have three minutes Brian Vanos I live on Parks side um just a real quick question
097I'm not affiliated with the um the outspoken groups here um but I just wanted Dave I got a lot of very good thoughts the question I wanted to POs to the superintendent of the board um I don't know how the task force was actually assembled would you be willing to engage formally representatives of the um save our school group just to be involved in the remaining uh task force assessment process I see them as a value they could really understand maybe the other perspectives and it's not just a group think uh perspective of how the task force is being assembled so that's my ask thank you thank you um and our last speaker is and Ang jger Jer hi I'm Angela joerger on Arthur Avenue I have two kids in the district and I'm really
098grateful for all of you who serve our community by doing this work that a lot of people don't want to do um I just want to say my kids have had a top-notch education in Lakewood um and I do work at a really nice different school um I really love the opportunities they've had the high standards and I appreciate that Lakewood plans ahead and is getting like feedback about all these changes and you know some districts are not so lucky a nearby District close their elementary schools and put all the kids in one building so I'm grateful for that that you guys do this and I'm really happy that there's so many people organized around preserving schools because um we're going to need everyone in the fight to protect all public schools um there's a
099highly organized and very well-funded effort in the state of Ohio and at the federal level um to defund public schools and dwine has even said himself he's refused to commit to fully funding public schools and has said that difficult decisions will be made so um many of us parents have already been writing to legislators to um to fully fund the public schools and to fund the third phase of the cup Patterson school funding plan cup Patterson school funding plan which I know gives districts like 25% of their income um that and we're also asking uh our legislators to reign in the school choice initiatives which are you know the voucher system that was designed to help kids in failing districts that is now funneling a billion public dollars a year a billion dollars in our
100state sending that money to private schools so um I'm I'm just I mean I empathize with folks who are um whose kids are going to be shuffled around I actually graduated high school from two different high schools because they closed it in the 90s in the middle of the gang epidemic and sent me to the Rival school so I get it like it's I want to avoid that for our city um but we only have one high school anyways I just want to say many of us are really here to support liquid schools we want to help make sure the levies passed I invite parents who are active and really care about preserving and protecting public education to join the effort to um to really combine efforts to stop the war on public schools that's
101happening that's all I wanted to say thank you guys thank you you and I believe that concludes our public comments um next we will move on to Other Board business uh Mrs chesy thank you um we have three items uh the first is a uh certified um action a resignation for the purpose of retirement for two people and um the Administration has requested approval on one reading so I would move um adoption of this resolution second it's been moved and seconded um Mr Zan can you call the RO uh Miss cassen bger hi Miss shanesy hi M Clark Sutton hi Mr Callahan hi Mrs do hi thank you um the next item is also a uh they've requested approval on one reading um these are two classified um actions to resignations and I move adoption
102of the resolution second it's been moved in seconded um Mr Zan can you call the role miss kenberg I miss johness I miss Clark Sutton I Mr Callahan I Mrs do hi thank you and the third action is a resolution accepting the resignation and adopting an employment separation agreement and release um it's been requested that we approved this on one reading and I move this resolution second it's been moved in second end Mr Z can you call the RO uh Miss catburger hi Miss shanesy hi M Clark Sutton hi Mr Callahan hi M dman hi thank you yeah concludes by thank you um I believe that concludes the business before us so uh can I have a motion to adjourn motion to adjourn second all in favor I I I any opposed this meeting is
103adjourned