001Do you think it was college credit? Oh, I guess it worked. >> What did he do? >> Yeah. >> Okay. >> Was it or did you take a picture? Well, his that I think we're ready. Good evening, Black School District, and welcome to the April 9th regular session of the Black School Board of Directors. Would you please stand also? Mr. >> Yes. Thank you. Uh, Mrs. Klein >> here, >> Mr. McMillan >> here, >> Mr. Sch here, Miss Smith >> here, >> Dr. Sprinker >> here, >> Mr. Van Lynch, Mr. Wy >> here, >> Wisner >> here, >> and Mr. Zwitz. >> Okay, seven present, two absent. We do have a quorum. >> Thank you. Agenda item 1.4. There was an executive session prior to tonight's meeting to discuss personnel and safety and legal matters.
0021.5 is solicitor's report. >> I have no report this evening. Thank you. >> Thank you. We will move on to our administrators and superintendent updates and will we start? Great. Thanks. >> So, we have 29 more days for seniors and 32 days for the for everybody else. So, there's a lot happening. There's a lot going on. for next Wednesday and so go to that. Um, spring sports are in full swing and everybody is doing their sport and having fun. TSA will be access from the 15th to the 18th for the form where I wanted to actually they schools for a countywide festival. Um we had students this week and go to Vince for college there as well from April 16th to 19. So if you have tickets already tomorrow academic games is two weeks a
003mile and there are I believe four or five students going down to Charlotte to participate in that competition. And then today was the AP or CHS class today and we have students the students in AP and cate competition with a bunch of other schools to debate a topic. And then at the middle school they had two students who each home room for partic and and they are they have this opportunity represent our school at the normal chair academy or sixth grade annual meeting which is May 6th. at Central Valley. Um Paul was the winner and J was all those and then at Harrison had several successful events recently including career day at schools that was major success every participated. The story walk was also a very big success thing and YouTube was asking them and
004all that. They decided to be happy educational trust and always help out with that. And like I mentioned before, we had a bunch of French students and students and teachers or had chosen to choose in language and they taught theater in fourth grade, third grade basically everybody K through four and then finally found it out the high school students also came down to the school for agricultural literacy day and Thank you very much. We will move on to our winter sports update, Mr. Radio. So, boys basketball finished the season with an overall record 6-6. Uh very tough five session. Marco tied to the boys all square. >> Yeah, please. >> Our boys bowling team won session championship with Michael Martell were all individual qualifiers. Uh girls bowling team a second session Julia Novak were all
005individual qualifier as well. Jim, I don't I don't think that that I think last time somebody used that podium microphone, it didn't record well. So, let's avoid that for the evening until we can look at that. >> Thank you. >> Yeah, I think so. I think Yes. Thank you. >> Okay. Um, we Okay. Girls swimming finished seven season one. Uh, Jesse Walls qualified for the W championship game. Boys swimming finished nine and four and the relay teams of Gabe Callahan, Jude Dorcowski, Jake Francis and Ethan Holiday qualify for the Bley relay and the relay team of Gabe Khan and Jorski. Jake Francis and S. Morgan qualified for WP 200 free relay and S Morgan also qualified for the Psy and 100 free. Uh, our wrestling team had one qualifier for the WPO in Bryce Tuna.
006Our unified watch team won the regionals and finished fourth in the state. And last, but certainly not least, our girls basketball team finished the season 25 and two with two tough losses of the Catholic and WPL championship game as well as the semi-finals in the PIAA. Aubrey C recorded, thousand career rebounds. Uh, one last item, uh, a pause note, uh, sending out the surveys for the winter sports, the to the athletes, we received approximately 40% of them back and over 90% of those were positive. So, uh, really, really good news. The athletes that I spoke to that actually, >> thank you. >> Thanks for the appreciate it. We will now shift to a skills science standards presentation this evening and we'd like to welcome Mrs. Dr. Mrs. and Mrs. and if you need additional microphones
007please let me know Okay, it's on. Okay. Uh, this school year is a very significant year for science instruction in the state of Pennsylvania. So I brought some exemplary science teachers with me tonight to discuss some of those changes with you and how laptop has prepared for those changes. In 2022, the state board of education adopted the steel standards. These replace the science standards that were written in 2002. So a big gap. SEO stands for science, technology, engineering, environmental literacy, and sustainability. and the districts have until the year 2025 and 2026 to transition transition to these standards. The new steel standards really shift the focus from memorizing facts involving science and really going into in-depth inquiry exploration and looking at much more complex concepts at a much younger rate. In addition, one of the terms
008you'll hear when discussing skill standards is crosscutting concepts. And really crosscutting concepts is that there's overarching themes in education that are in math, science, technology. They include patterns, cause and effect, scale, and that these shouldn't be studied in isolation, but richly among science instruction. So I'm going to give you an example of an old standard from 2002 uh describe the earth's features and processes that changed the earth. Now in the seals the way that standard looks is construct an explanation based on evidence for how geoscience processes have changed the earth's surface at varying times and spatial scales. So you see that math component and you can see it's a much more inquirybased challenge than the original standard. So, what I'd like to do today is talk about the different levels, how we've prepared, what we're
009excited about, what we're concerned about, and I also want to show you some of the questions on the test because this is important this year because our science PSSA fifth grade, 8th grade, and our biology keystone in 9th grade is all based on steel standards. So, they've released some questions that we can anticipate, and we want to show you some of those tonight. Before we get into the different levels though, I want to say that this process started long before I was involved in this role and I really need to credit Mr. Pushkis because Mr. Push he was Mr. Pushkis was a scientist before he was a teacher and he really spearheaded the implementation of these standards and did a lot of the ground level work that made it possible to be where we are
010today. So I just wanted to give him that shot. So, Mrs. Mesh, our high school department chair, you want to come up and just talk about a little bit about high school prepare. Good evening. Uh, in 2023 when Mr. push just came back. Um, we started looking at the curriculum, the way that the curriculum was written and we started to prepare for the new curriculum to be implemented in this school year 2025 2026. We started that process in like October. Um, all the biology teachers got together. We looked at the old, we looked at the new, and we started revamping things and figuring out what we would need to move forward. Part of that process was replacing a textbook and materials that had not been replaced for uh I believe the the copyright might have
011been 2006 on that textbook. Um, so it was it was quite quite old. So we needed some updated materials. We looked for updated materials that were going to be aligned with skills. We chose updated materials that were aligned. They gave us some of the technology based questions that we were anticipating to start looking at um how to get our kids prepared. The new materials we started using last school year even though we weren't fully implementing steels until the beginning of this school year. In addition this to to that in this school year, we also have available to us the Firefly uh test. The Firefly is a test that we can give to students that's going to test benchmarks rather than looking at grade level. Those benchmarks tell us where our students are and where our
012students might need some remediation to get ready for the test. So far, we've given that benchmark test back in early November. Um, and we still have a lot of curriculum to to cover to see where our kids are. We're going to re um administer that Firefly here in the next few weeks as we finish up curriculum and get ready to start reviewing it for the new Keystone exam. Hopefully that Firefly is going to give us good information about where our kids are and where our kids need some extra help prior to the test in May. Um celebration. Our department has worked very hard at keeping our kids prepared and ready for Keystone exams. That started way back when Mr. questions was still in our department as a biology teacher. Uh our teachers work really hard
013to get our students ready for those keystones and our kids did well from the very beginning. Um we regularly meet, we talk together about where the kids are and what the kids are doing. We share materials and it's a very very much an environment where we all work together to ensure that our kids are all getting the same instruction maybe not the exact same way but they're all getting the same instruction and the same level of instruction across all um all classrooms that >> yes out of 13 districts in Beaver County Black was number three last year in biology It's anyone else's job. >> Thank you. Uh things we're concerned about. This is a high stakes test. It's always been a high stakes test and it's very unknown and we the the poor biology teachers
014don't like that feeling of unknown. It's very uncomfortable to us because we know that we were preparing students well the la over the last however many years the keystone has been in existence. And now it's different. It's new. And we don't know how our kids are going to do. Um, we know our kids have the right curriculum and the right background. We're just not sure how that's going to come out once they take this new kind of test. The released items for the biology keystone were not released until the beginning of March and they are very difficult. they are at a level that I would compare to teaching my AP bio CHS kids. That's the kind of level we're now expecting our kids to be able to do. And we did not see any of
015those until March. So, had we had them in August and September, we could have started earlier to prepare our kids for the level of questioning. So, we're a little bit concerned about that. We're going to do the best that we can, but we're worried about that. And um we also in looking at the steels curriculum now are also looking at some things that we don't traditionally teach in the biology classroom that we're hoping that we can incorporate a little more of these higher level types of questions and instruction in the ninth grade health classes moving forward to help better prepare our kids in the future as we move through the keystone the new Keystone exam. Okay, this is one of our sample questions. There's no way I can read that because I can't. Um, but
016it's it is a very difficult level of questioning that our kids just aren't used to seeing and not used to having to do. It involves a lot of reading. It involves a lot of vocabulary that isn't necessarily important to answering the question. So, what we're going to have to start doing more of as we move forward is teaching our kids to look at the question and not immediately be nervous and shut down because there are things in that question that they've never seen before. We have to be able to teach them how to take a test like this, how to ignore or replace the big words that they maybe don't know what what they mean with a word they do know that will help them to be able to decipher the hard stuff that's going
017to trip them up. So, that's kind of where we have to go moving forward from this school year into next school year. Thank you. I want to point out that this biology question is one that will be like this will be taken by every student in the state of Pennsylvania. This isn't for advanced biology students. This is not this is what's expected at this level. I also want to point out that this is true with PSSA is when they get multiple choice questions, every answer that is not correct is a misconception. So it's not like there's one answer you can just kick out and be like, "Well, it's definitely not that." It's a mistake that a student would make if they calculated wrong or kind of misunderstood a vocabulary term. So it's tricky. Okay, Dr.
018May, if you could share that. Good evening. I teach science here at High Middle School. So at the middle school, we have been preparing since 2019 for the introduction of steel standards. In 2019 2023 we went through a process of researching new curriculum materials. We were in a similar mode having very old outdated materials. Um so we researched and selected curriculum materials and added them grade level by grade level year by year between 19 and 23. Um and then from 23 to 25 we work on our curriculum documents goals language and alignment. And then this year, um, just like the high school did, we gave the Firefly test, which was to measure student progress towards reaching those new skills, learning goals. And this spring, in just a couple weeks, students in grades five and eight
019here at the middle school will take the new science set based on these new learning goals, these skill sets. That was uh that test used to be grades four and eight. The state changes to five things. So both those tests will be here. So celebrations um we are very glad to have um new updated curriculum resources in all grade levels 5 through 8 here at the middle school for teaching students in an investigation style which aligns very well with the way skills were constructed. Um, and we've also piloted new questioning strategies to train students to take on what the state called the three dimensions of assessment, which is not just do you know the thing, but do you know how to apply science and engineering thought processes to this thing? Do you understand larger themes
020like cause and effect related to this this idea, this content? Um, our concerns are that because we added new curriculum resources grade by grade, one year at a time, this year's eighth grade did not experience that investigation style learning in all four middle school grade levels. They had to do three out of four. Um, this year's seventh grade will have had all four of their middle school science courses learning in this style. uh and they will test next year as eth graders. Very similar to the high school, a concern is that the uh the released items were not released until March. So, we've had very limited time seeing exactly the way those those questions have been structured. Um, and also the more time we've worked on this new curriculum, but the more we've realized the
021level of complexity that it has built into it as far as the way students are expecting. And so that's that's something that concerns us and that's challenging. So this is a sample question that was released for the eighth grade science. As a teacher, when I see this question, um, I just, um, I I see a graph on the left side that students need to interpret and make sense of. And the question below, if you can't read it, it's it's having students think through, if you were to draw that graph in a different way, what would it look like? And so there's there's really nothing in this this question is about faces of the moon, but there's nothing in this question that students would have had to memorize other than knowing that the moon has faces.
022It is all can you make sense of and interpret that graph and think through how would you draw that in a different way using like shading in the room or not shape. So these are these are the things that are important are expected to engage with. >> So probably the two happiest people in the room tonight are Mrs. Sowski and Mr. Aras because they're no longer upgraded or exam. >> Hi Sowski. I teach third grade. Third grade we are still teaching all subject areas. So in our classroom we're covering science and social studies in addition to ELA and math. We started aligning in 2023. We have to incorporate our teacher who is a special our computer teacher and our classrooms to kind of do the standards at our level. Um there are a lot of
023standards for that we had to split up and it covers a wide range of topics. Last year we completed our final um by the fact there's not much that we talked before the science standards that turned over to steel um units not butterflies anymore in their life cycle like so many of us did before. Um, we tried a couple different curriculums last year to see what worked best. This year we decided on studies weekly. It is a newspaper that provides information on the topic and also hands on experiments the students will do with the celebrations um that is more hands-on than our previous curriculum was. It does align with the skills between us and the same teacher and computer. We have covered all the standards. We also work with fifth grade through fifth grade. So
024we had to collaborate with fifth grade to make sure that all the standards didn't just follow them and that we were preparing to some concerns and there was a lot of standards and I'm going to lie in third grade. we're still getting to read and do basic math. So, science can sometimes not be our main focus and it's not the only one subject we're teaching. So, we are splitting our time between a lot of different subjects and so it's a little bit harder for us. There are also very limited resources. Last year, we tried two different resources that were very time consuming. one lesson for the one program was 45 minutes to an hour and a half that they were expecting us to devote each day for the units and we just don't have the
025time or the attention span for our kids to be engaged in that type of activities. As you can see, there's been a lot of time and effort put into this transition. Uh this is going to be a learning year. Um until we get the results of the test back and get feedback and see uh where we need to improve, what we need to work on, we're just kind of flex. But why skills matters is we're not just teaching science anymore. We're preparing future innovators. Thank you teachers. >> Thank you very much. Um any uh questions or comments from the board about the standard implementation? Thank you, Mrs. Broy. And um to the science community teachers, thank you very much for your time tonight. We really appreciate. It was very informative. Thank you. Um I would
026now like to invite Dr. Vana and Mrs. Blueornne to speak to the budget presentation for this evening. >> Certainly. Thank you very much and thank you everybody for taking time to come. Um Dr. Bane, Miss Mench, Miss Sowski, you guys did a great job. Thank you. Thank you so much. So, um is the season for budget and um as as April, we have state um federal gets a little bit more attention just because if you remember last year, um there were some concerns um with federal funding and um the federal department of education. So that that usually gets a little bit more attention than usual. But um of course we always start, you know, when we when we're thinking about budgeting, why are we here? And what are we doing budgeting for? We're budgeting um
027for our students. We're budgeting um for Blackhawk. And that brings in our mission and our vision and our values. And those are the things that we take into consideration uh when we make these these huge decisions here. um the preparation that those teachers put into with science and the SEAL standards. That's a huge lift. That's a huge overhaul. Um and there are resources that need to be budgeted for that. Um so that's a very tangible thing that we have an example to u for all of this. So these are some of the highlights here. State um state of education, federal um and Aaron and I will we'll kind of go back and forth once we get into our local stuff. So, if you remember um funding and its impact on Blackhawk, it's a brief little
028history lesson that I have for us here. Um our federal funding u it's about 5% 11%. Um it's not a lot of federal funding that Blackhawk gets. Our state funding is about 38%. So, the remaining funding about 53% comes from our local sources primarily through property taxes. Remember, we talked about this a little bit last year. um because we don't have a significant business corridor like some other districts do then if you can consider those some other districts be verontour west alagany um that it comes to the local aspect uh so we need to be very mindful of those aspects with funding few years ago you may recall that PA public education funding was deemed unconstitutional and underfunded In 2023, the Commonwealth Court declared it uh an inequitable or inadequate uh funding system. So, they
029put in different funding sources um to try to make it a little bit more adequate. They're called adequacy funds. The Blackox School District receives adequacy funds, and we'll talk about that a little bit. But the importance of these advocacy and tax equity supplements is that they help the districts through various readyto-learn block grants and other aspects to balance out that. Um there's around $565 million across the state that goes to that. There are some districts that don't get any funding. And um the the fine point of this is if your uh if your mill is too low, you won't get that funding because the state says well you can you can raise the funds elsewhere. So it's a delicate balance um to make sure that we get that funding. Another fun fact about advocacy funding
030is we cannot there were times where you could ask to go over the index. The index this year is 4.7 for a black book. So you could vote to go over that index. We did not do that. If we did do that, we would not receive our adequacy funding. So we need to be mindful of those things too. Um the ready tolearn adequacy. Sorry about the typo there. I speak now. Um that's uh we get uh funds for that aspect which we'll speak to in a little bit. But that is to help with this gap as well. millillage I spoke about a little bit. Um these are the districts within Beaver County. You can see where we are um within that millillage. And then the state budget proposal does get a little bit small. Um
031if you remember last year, the state did not pass their budget until November. that cause a specific um crunch and some anxiety with some school districts. Usually state budget is passed over the summer. Um they are supposed to pass it also by June 30th, but it doesn't usually happen that way. But um they did add some funding to it. If you see these numbers, um there's extra funding in basic education, special education, ready to learn, u mental health, career and tech, transportation, uh receive some and early intervention. Uh those were some main areas of significant funding in the state budget proposal. State and local funding, if you think about the nation as a whole, some are funded by state. If you see Pennsylvania there, as I've already spoken to, we're funded locally. And by you
032can see by the shares by school districts if you find us we're a little blue around a bunch of green. Uh so you can see that some of us some of Blackhawk is a little bit of green but the majority is blue there. >> Why the difference do you think? >> Um it's why the difference on state or local? It's based on usually um economic factors. So in the more rural areas, very very rural, think of the middle of the state, right? They get more state funding. Poor school districts generally um receive more state and federal funding. Those that have a little bit more fluency or middle of the road are rely on local. can't see because of the uh the line in there, but um if you think, well, hm, what about the white
033ones? Those are kind of in the middle as well. Um if you think about some other just regional school districts, maybe special education, there was about $40 million increase to special education funding. Um that was significant. I truly appreciate the state's assistance, as I'm sure Dr. Houston does as well and trying to fund special education and increased that. It was flat for quite some time. Um that is going up. Our special education population hovers between 17 and 20%. Um so any funding that we get helps significantly there but there is still a significant gap in those funding expenses. You can see what the expenses are. those are up um but the gap is up even more so as more and more students um are identified and um receive and have other needs. Just another view
034of sharing the expenses. You can see the state uh funding of special ed, the federal funding of special ed and then the remaining share that goes local funding special. Any questions on that slide or that funding mechanism? Speaking of costs there, um, think about mandated, um, mandates, mandated mandates, I guess, costs for schools. There are some things that school districts and the state says schools have to have. Um, we are required to have these things, but sometimes they're not always funded. Those are called unfunded mandates and those add significant costs to our budget as well. Uh if you look at this slide here, the revenue increases um have no comparison to the mandated cost increases. Um charter school reimbursement, there has been some modification to charter school law which helps a little bit. Um but
035it still uh taxes the districts uh in many ways. pension costs um and then adjusted special education costs are usually the the main drivers for these mandates. Again, you can see that in the millions um the increases basic education funding and then the mandated cost gap which is a significant gap there almost 50%. Ready to learn block. talked about that when we were talking about advocacy funding. Um that is going and is proposed to continue to go up. Hopefully that that continues to happen through the next few years and that helps us offset costs. top challenges that school districts across the state said obviously budgeting um they talk about um the mental health needs of students and for the first time um in a long time facilities and concerns about facilities have crept in to
036the top three. So those are the three biggest challenges that schools across the state state that they are facing. Um the Pennsylvania Association uh will send out a report as well talking about some focus. Career and techn technical education is receiving um an uptick funding. We do receive funding. We have a CTC program here. Our students obviously go out to Beaver County CTC, but we also have our agriculture program which is qualified as a CTC and we do get some funding for that. It's an important thing to continue to keep going for us. Mental health and school security, there is funding for that that Blackhawk, we apply for and we get those grants annually as well. That is continues. School infrastructure there. We spoke about that grant earlier in the winter. We applied for that.
037Um that is not a guarantee. that is a competitive grant, but hopefully um we're the state's starting to see that there's infrastructure there and early childhood learning. Um that is a focus as well. There are some educational recommendations from the state as well. Um I'm proud to say that academic mastery, habits of learning, contemporary skills, and community skills, we all uh do these things. You've heard Mr. Ford speak about a portrait of a graduate. Those are soft skills. um you firm handshakes, looking in the eyes. Our students do that well. Um and our teachers um produce that well as well. Federal update um our title and IDA and Head Start, those title funds are are coming through as they should. Um there's it's really antilimactic um with this, but I made sure that it was
038in there just in case anybody had any questions on that. federal vouchers. Um there are some states that have adopted that. Pennsylvania has not made a decision. Um there's not a lot of anxiety on that. Vouchers basically mean that you would get a credit to go elsewhere if you so choose. Um there's isn't any formal decision on that. And then we get into ours. Um some other things that that we want to mention as we go through this. Um, so we've gotten some great accolades and rankings throughout um, the year. Our PSBA, we spoke about that. Our music education again, um, high school award again, and the League of Innovative Schools acceptance are some great accolades that are a testament to all of the hard work that everyone is doing here every day. Our strategic
039plan, we can't um, continue to move forward without thinking about that. that focuses us and we have four goals there. Our diversified educational opportunities, our safe and secure learning spaces, um our well-being and social development of students and staff, and um our comprehensive communication aspects. So, who are we? We're about 35% free and reduced, about 17 to 18% special education, and 504 um around 9% as well. So Erin, do you want to take over at this point? Sure. >> Uh, as we discussed, plasma, our 2526 budget is projected to come in at about a surplus of $1.2 million that we continue to finalize as we get closer to this school year. March 10th the holiday time crunch to really update that forecast. So, we're still compared to a deficit with the budget of 769,000. So,
040that's that's a nice um what we're proposing, what we recommend is that transfer $500,000 of that surplus to the side for technology purposes. um 500,000 to our capital fund and then the rest of that general fund. Um we do get a lot of grants and you know it's important to note that we have support from various sources um not only our governmental ones our IDEA title ECCD but we use access funds and we do get private donations as well. So that that does help um especially fun that would normally do if we didn't get those monies. For 2627, we're looking at proposed revenues of about 23 million in local revenue, about 22 million in state revenue, and just under $700,000 in federal revenue. That's just an act one refresher for anybody who wants some some
041fun reading from school code if you if you so choose. >> We're a little higher than that at 4.7. So far back here um again our assessed value did decrease this year over last year. So we're looking at loss of tax $38,000 to the current and 4.7 then we would be increased by $885,000. So every now is about 17. So >> with the 4.7% maximum index our county would be 11.209 and would be 18.827. You can see here our expenditures by percentages always are our largest cost and benefits that makes up almost 70% of our total expenditure expenditure budget. Um the next highest one is the services which mostly includes tuition and transportation. specific areas of increase this year. We're looking at 16.5% increase in healthcare. That's as part of the disclosure. Um we don't
042have a lot of control over that other than what we offer and that's part of our contracts. So the rate that we increase this year is less than the rate that we increase last year. So that's a bit of good news. Um but we are driving significant increases for the next several years to keep up with cost. The other area we have energy contracts in our electricity contract um buildings power and light renewed in December. So there was a significant increase to the charge per kilowatt hour. You know, that's not a whole bill, but it's a significant portion of it, particularly in the larger buildings, and those about 15% areas. So, overall, we're looking at projected revenue of just under 45 million and projected expenditures of about 46.7 million. So, that deficit is 1.675 675
043million that is not a tax increase. So when you look at that compared to where we raise the goes from 1.67 million deficit to just under $800,000. questions on that one talked about balances if everything falls into place as we've been forecasting and projecting for the next year. Um our restricted account fund balance will be 44,000. Our sign fund balance will be 3.5 million made up of 1.5 million for debt service 1 million for charter school 500 million and $500,000 technology our 3.1 million reserve for our capital fund we would like to recommend that $70,000 of 500 transfer to the unit of 2627 for various items listed here small projects that go through most of our city funding has been proposed for the laptop totals about $738,000. And if we apply that in this and
044we get a budget that we are supposed to, then we could potentially be pretty close to a balance budget. We don't propose in there because it's not it's not so we're not yet. So being physically cautious and perspective. So we look at how a raise to the index impact the average property tax. Um, we take the rate and apply it to our median home value. And when it was calculated out, it ends up being about $10 per month of an increase. Um, we do have options for some tax relief for dogs. So yeah, there are things for those that are 65 and older, disabled veterans, and there's always the homestead if you haven't the fund tax and it is it is pretty significant. I think about last year. So that is a lot. Of course,
045we'll continue to refine what we're looking at for expenditures and and look for any additional revenue that we can. So thank you. Do you have questions? So Erin, the reduction that we had just because the assessment and everything was reduced was 30 and what >> 305. So I I guess what I'm trying to say is if that didn't happen even in a better place. So that $300,000 we have no control over, but still we have the potential of of coming into balance. um if other things come up, right, which something that we kind of haven't done for a while. So, that's that's a nice a nice aspect. I know that Aaron has worked really hard working on this and um we'll continue to whittle away and refine and see what we can possibly do um
046to bring us in as as close as we possibly can to to the mark. Any other any questions or comments for either one of us on on any of this? Could you review the timeline for us? So, we'll continue to look at reform numbers, I imagine, over the next several weeks and at what point will we need to be voting on and making decisions? >> So, if you look on the very last slide, the budget, >> it's okay. It's it's there. Um, so obviously April is starred and then in May uh the board will propose the final budget. So, we have about a, you know, month, three weeks of work left to do with this budget, um, for the final budget, the proposed final budget. It still can be worked on through May, but um,
047we have to put it in the May 7th in order to make uh, the vote by June 11th because of the 30 days it needs to be out, I think, >> and that will go on display after the May 7th meeting. Okay. And and it's pretty common, if I understand it correctly, that it's we're in a place right now where we're still refining that larger budget. Is that correct? So most schools across the Commonwealth are really working on this process, right? Doesn't just happen quickly, right? Okay. Thank you. it um also more so as we find as we end this year we're still learning about what's happening so we can then maybe make adjustments for that >> I have more maybe just an observation than a question so even if we did increase our millage
048rate to the 2 point or 11.209 209. We are still going to be in the lower half, I would say, of Beaver County as far as our millage rates are concerned. And when when I take a look at that and then compare it to the map that we saw above that we count more on local funding maybe here in Blackhawk than anywhere surrounding us, I really think it's kind of a testament to the way that our finances have been managed and budgeted over the years. So, um, you know, the fact that we do count more on that local funding, but yet we are asking maybe even less from our, um, homeowners than than some other areas, uh, in Beaver County. Also, I want to say that I'm just very pleased to see that we are
049putting money into our capital improvement um uh fund because just like we saw on that uh chart with the concerns that schools across Pennsylvania have, I think we share that that that our facilities are in need of update. And the fact that we're planning for that years out, I think is very important. So, >> okay. Thank you. Thank you all. >> Comments and yeah, thank you for the the detail. Um I really appreciate how you use those numbers easier and um to grapple with when we understand all the pieces. So thank you for that. I know it's quite a puzzle. So thank you very much. Okay, we'll move on to our recognition section. I'll turn over. Thank you. Blackhawk takes great pride in our students achievements and the extracurricular opportunities available across all grade levels.
050For most up-to-ate information on school's happenings, please visit your school's website. We would also like to congratulate Easter who will be advancing to the PMEA all states for choir. I believe that is and that's just a a great thing for him. Um all right and moving on to 3.2 public comment on agenda items. We have two people who signed up in advance. The first one is Barb Brown from Chipua Township on item 9.3. Hi Barb, could you please use the uh handheld microphone? Thank you. >> Thank you. >> Hi, my name is Barb Brown and I live in Chip. First, I'd like to say the budget presentation was great and I understand a lot of stuff about it that I didn't understand before. Tonight I'd like to speak to you about an item three on
051the agenda which is a crack off agreement your contract. I have several questions and concerns regarding it. First, when was the last time the district published a full annual report and who was responsible for completing it? Additionally, who initiated the request of tonight's agenda and did the board specifically direct that this work be outsourced? I'm concerned about the post cost $500 for proofreading and editing materials that are already being compiled by the district. It seems reasonable to ask whether these tasks could be handled internally by existing staff. More broadly, this also raises questions in light of the district's prior engagement with EHM squared, which cost us $9,763. That work included an analysis of things that we needed templates standards presentation highlighted video from the beginning of the year last year a mini annual report and
052a website redesign. Given that investment it would be better to understand the outcomes. The website redesign remains difficult to navigate still require additional work. The mini annual report are expected by September of 2024 does not appear to have been widely received or readily accessible. The opening presentation and video completed was for a one-time presentation. So it really had no lasting value. This leads to a few important considerations. What processes are in place to ensure the district receives the full value of contracted services? Are we fully utilizing the internal capabilities before turning to outside veterans? How are we evaluating the effectiveness and the quality of the completed work? I certainly could give some suggestions. At the same time, the district is facing a projected budget deficit next year of almost 800,000 even with raising taxes to
053the max. That in context is especially important to carefully evaluate discretionary spending. With that in mind, I'd like I would appreciate clarification on how this proposed contract will be will directly benefit students or meaningfully impact their educational experience. And of the current financial constraints allocating an additional $5,100 for work that could be completed in house. I know many programs within the actual high school that could handle this does not appear to be the most prudent use of resources. I respectedly urge this board to take these concerns into account when considering a vote and vote no for this. Thank you. Okay. And next we have Mike Martino from Patterson Township on I think that says 2.4. >> Yeah. Casey. >> Okay. >> Yeah. Michael take time too much. I uh with uh with the deficit that
054we're in with the school district, I uh I was wondering if the property if the school tax is going to if it's is going to go up and it's if it's in it's definitely going to go and then uh I was just wondering how the school district actually got the deficit it was in. Yeah, that's pretty much it. Thank you for those comments. If there were if those questions aren't answered necessarily tonight during the budget presentation, we're happy to reach out and we'll call you and contact you and go over that in greater detail in the near future. >> Thank you. So, you just want to stick around after and give us your >> Thank you, sir. >> Mr. There's no report. >> Thank you very much. Do you have a VCC update today? >>
055Thank you. >> We do not have a media report and I don't believe we have anything from the horizon. Is that correct? Thank you. We're going to move on to the 21 and I'd like to make a motion to approve the board meeting minutes for the March 19th, 2020 session. I have a second discussion on the minutes from our voting session. >> Okay. I >> oppos. >> So yeah, I guess tonight is like all finance and budget and stuff. So um we have lots of lots of line items in um in the finance section. Um so uh we have our a lot of these are are agreements that we have both with energy companies and like infrastructures uh like uh internet connection u things like that. Um uh item 9.5 is about recycling and technology
056items and um uh 9.4 uh update and implementation proposals. I don't know, Aaron, did you have anything you want to talk about with those at all or >> I can give you a quick so the upgrade is to our student information system. Um that is a requirement going to upgrade that. Um and then the other part is the financial side. The program we currently use is not being developed but not anymore. Is there any questions on those? >> Moving on to 97. Uh that's just another residential assessment uh settlement. This was negotiated with the county. Um monthly bill payments and then the uh March 2026 financial report. And then I would Erin, I would like you to comment on 9.10 10 which is corrected bill payments from February 2026. >> Yes. So, we're just asking
057that the bill payment uh attachment be approved because last month um there were some scanned I think was not there so this is just detail So, um, moving on to 9.11. Uh, I'd like to make a motion to add finance consent items 9.1 to 9.10 to the agenda for the April 16, 2026 voting session. May I have a second? >> I'll second. Do we have any uh questions or discussion? Uh would the board like to um have any opportunity at this point to speak about 9.3 asked you to consider? she >> Mr. Show or speak to that um at this time or >> I I don't have much to add. I mean I do know a little bit about um the uh annual report. Um we have been discussing it. I do think that what
058I have seen in these annual reports to the community, it's really for the community's sake. Um, we I I I guess I believe we have a responsibility to show output of everything that we have going on. We have these meetings. We don't have very many people here. We never do. That's okay. Um, we do have this thing online. People can watch it. Um, I hope they do. Um and then we have so many things going on in in our school and with our students and it's not just sports, it's academics, it's uh uh like all all the just projects. We have a huge amount of things going on all the time. But I do think we have a responsibility to share that with all of our our community and our um you know, everyone that's
059here, parents, the students and and take pride in that. And the examples that I have seen of um these annual reports from other districts that have been done by this agency are I I guess something I don't believe we have the staff in house to do something like that. I mean they're very professional. There's a lot of work that goes into them in in in the preparation and editing and gathering uh all of the um uh photos and content that um >> I think it's u but um it's a very professional thing. I mean I I think there's a big difference between having someone who um who could put together a presentation and doing something like this. And so um you know it's it's similar to what I have seen in the business world in
060that you know we have annual reports like we have a marketing team that puts these things together um I could have engineers do it it would not look the same um all the content would be there I promise you would look very very different and so I I I I know I am not a marketing person um and so uh that that is what I think we're really looking for. We're looking for something professional, very nice that is just an example of what we're trying to achieve in school. >> You know, I think it's also important to add um you know, as a board, we have talked about this fact to move forward with um producing something that could showcase our our district. And we've talked about a lot of different options. um this being
061one of the ways that we thought would be um maybe most helpful to celebrate um and showcase our school. So I just wanted to add that too. In the past this is this has been done it was board driven. I think in the past this way with it being district driven I think it will be quite a bit more professional and really showcase um Blackhawk in a very positive light which I think is important. Um you know with a with a price tag of $5,000. Yes, that is $5,000 out of the budget, but I do think when you think about the, you know, the PR that we can get from that and, you know, attracting people to the district, I I I can definitely see the argument for it being money well spent for that.
062How many copies do we receive of the program? >> It's it's digital, so copies would would be extra with that, but um we'd have to see it be something that we can send out. Um, Parent Square has been quite successful. It can be sent that way. It can be also you know published and sent out. I would recommend us getting some copies um putting at various areas um preers with our local municipalities. Um when there are certain events mean many times it'll have budgeting information, academic information. Um it it shows off the the district to some community members that may not know much about what's going on in the district. So that's the intent of it. uh you know and and can we continue to figure out different ways to do it? Of course. But
063maybe for the first time someone can show us how to how to go about and do it differently. >> And then I think utilizing it well once we do receive it, you know, as far as using it on social media and using it really to promote the district is is an important component of that. And I I trust that that's going to be done. So thank you. >> Any other discussion on any of the um items 9.1 through 9.10. Okay. So at this time um I do know that we have a motion and a second. Um if there's no further question or discussion um we will call for the vote. So all in favor >> I >> opposed. Motion carries. >> We will move on to first a second. >> I'd like to make a
064motion to approve the human resources report for April 9th, 2026. May I have a second? >> I'll second. >> All right. >> Thank you for a second. Um do any questions or discussion on the HR report? I do believe we we owe a congratulations to a retiree if I read that correctly. >> We do have >> Yes, we have a uh a building secretary who's been there for quite some time and um I don't know Mr. Ford what you're going to do but hopefully you can still function without her. >> Congratulations to Michael Lee Nimssworth. Yes, congratulations. >> Okay, so I believe we have a motion and a second there. Do we have any discussion on all in favor? >> I opposed. Motion carries. We'll move on to the education section of the report tonight.
065Uh 11.1 is the na national history data safety competition um followed by the athletic games national competition um for both the high school which is 11.2 and the middle school which is 11.3 and then moving on to the quarter have a connect STEM design challenge city competition. Wow, they're have been really busy this soft and um so those are all um competitions um that engage in and then 11.5 even from the CDC agreement is um an agreement that the board has already previously agreed upon um schools as adjustments. So, it's coming back to us for a second vote. So, that's why you're seeing that here tonight again. And at this time, I would like to make a motion to add it on through 11.5 to the agenda for the April 16th voting session. May I
066have a second, please? >> I can second that. >> Thank you, Mrs. Klein. Any discussion or questions on any of those items hearing? None. All in favor? >> I opposed. Motion carries. We do not have a report tonight for support services. Do you have anything for athletics activities? >> Nothing to report. >> Thank you, sir. Uh for Mr. Report. >> Thank you, sir. Um we will move on to additional business 17.1 and we would like to invite the public to comment on any non-aggenda items. >> Hi, my name is Markipl. As you prepare to vote next week, I urge you to take a step back and carefully consider the broader financial and policy implications of this decision. Item 9.2 reflects the same category of spending that was discussed in the audit board meetings regarding the
067request purchasing purchasing new purchases. Since that time, the district spending trends have continued to rise in concerning ways. Legal fees alone have increased by $90,000 from 2024 to through 2025 and substitute teacher expenditures are already slightly exceeding where they stood at this point last year. I think they're $7,000 ahead. These patterns raise legitimate questions about whether ESS has delivered the level savings that was anticipated. There's a notable reduction of $59,000 to substitute nurse spending, a possible outcome that may reflect the impact of increased wages. This stands in stark contrast to the ongoing and highly visible loss of pair professionals. Their routine underpayment remains a serious issue in the district and one that threat impacts students and support services. Want to spend $5,000? Give the Paris rings. >> Thank you. Do you have any other 17.2
068school directors? The next meeting of the Black School Board of Directors will be next Thursday. I would just like to note the time change of uh 6:00 p.m. um because our meeting will be a session and it will be meeting just a little bit earlier so that um be available to attend that. So looking forward to that perform at this time please ask for a motion for that motion please. >> Thank you very much. Do we have a second? >> I'll second it. Thank you, Mr. Wisner. Uh, any discussion on this motion? All in favor? >> Motion carries. Have a great night. >> Thanks. That was a rough one.