September 9th, 2025 - Alpine School District Study Session and Board Meeting

001solution students problems not every student's problems we can't deal with most of the things we deal with as a whole district solution they all are nuanced to the needs of the individual child so we've started with and I I want to shout out a couple of our board members that came and joined us. We started with my leadership team, my full group leadership team at the in the district. We are doing a book study and I threw it up here so you can you can if you would like jump into it if you want to know what I believe about culture and special education. It's easy to find in this. It's right in the title. SPED is not your students my students and we lost it. It is and our students it is all of

002our students. Sorry about that. I don't know what it did. Get back on board here. >> I'm Skyward. >> Is it Skyward's fault? That's been the common response. We can keep moving on for time sake. It's just the spinning wheel of death. Um, >> here. See if I can write it. I've got it right here. >> If somebody else can throw it up, that would be great. I don't want to waste time on technology because I know your time is very valuable. But in this book, your students, my students, our students, it really just sets the tone for culture and I would invite anyone interested. It's a quick read. Um, we started there. Why? Because I wanted us all working in the same direction and that direction is really to build around the idea of

003inclusion. And what does that mean? Um and so that is that is uh where we're going as far as as that is concerned. Oh no. >> Yeah. But now my computer's completely frozen down below. >> Thank you board member. >> I got you. Mine's just spinning too. >> So I don't know if you lost. >> You know what you're seeing. Yeah, I don't know if we lost >> the next the next slide that you'll see or that you would see if you're paying attention would be this would be a document that we shared with all the principles and it's really something I created years ago. Um to to really kind of create a rubric if I can use that language. Um so go down two slides there. Is that superintendent? Is that you? >> Jason.

004>> Oh Jason, thank you. So there you can see it's it's it's basically a a rubric that just talks about how can we improve and this has been my invitation to every principal in our in our opening this year. And that was take this look at where you're at. Where is your school? Where are you at with your IEP goals? Where are you at with your as an administrator and with your culture? Where are you at with your sped teachers? Where are you at as a general ed teacher? And when it comes to what you believe in, just be honest, self-reflect, and then wherever you're at, try to move one step to the right. Try to do one thing that can make you a better school for the students that we serve. And so really,

005it's just a simple road map. It's not meant to be anything that is lifechanging or super complicated. It's very simple and it's very straightforward. So, as a board and leadership, I would encourage you take a look at it. If you want to know what is the next step, just find out where we're at and then find one thing. Pick one thing to make us better tomorrow. Know better, do better. That is something you'll hear me say all the time. We We have time to do that today. If I know better today, I can do better today. I don't have to wait for next year. I don't have to wait for a committee meeting. I don't have to wait. I personally can do better myself today. Um, oh, sorry. See, I control this. Thank you. So,

006this is our mission and vision. I can take no credit for this. This was done in Alpine School District by the sped department with a lot of input over the last three or four years is my understanding, but I've gone through it and it is just to the place now where there is no reason this shouldn't be public. So, we've got this on our website. I give it to you guys because there's nothing in here that doesn't align with what we believe and really in our mission it is simply to identify students needs and provide meaningful educational benefit for them. That's at the heart of special education. So that's what we are focusing on. You can see our vision, you can see our values. Um those are all things that that you can see. Um

007we we'll skip over the next slide in the in the in just in the to maintain some time. But one thing I do want to talk to to you about today is while we're preparing for the future, we want to thrive today in the present. We don't want to spend the next two years just focusing on after the split. We want to be getting better every day right now in Alpine. And so to do that, we are we are really really fired up as a department and we are out, you know, knocking on the doors trying to get as much airtime as we can with our schools trying to really address practices. So we are doing things at the highest level we possibly can that we can have critical conversations that we can see change

008happening that we don't forget we have close to 13,000 students that need us to provide quality services for them and their IEPs and they need us to do it for the next two years and then seamlessly carry carry that through. So to do that that requires a lot of energy and a lot of effort. Okay, these are our essentials that we're focusing on. We've touched on these a little bit already, but in the process, we are trying to establish strong leaders, not just in our own department, but we are working feverously with our principles and with our principal supervisors in one-on-one conversations, uh, any professional development that we can get ourselves into. Any opportunity we can, we're trying to move the needle, and that needle is trying to move to more effective, more appropriate services

009really focused on inclusive practices. and inclusive practices doesn't just mean putting a student with an IEP in a classroom with students that don't have IEPs. That's not what it means. It means creating a learning environment where students that have specific learning disabilities or any other type of learning disability have the opportunity to find success in in a way that is as close to their non-disabled peers. And when you walk in a classroom, if we're doing this right, if you walk in a classroom, you won't have a clue which student has an IEP, which student doesn't have an IEP. We have a classroom full of students that are having their individual needs met at high levels to maximize their potential. And we're not leaving it up to the educational lottery as to whether or not they're

010going to be successful. That is our goal when we really get down. If we're doing this really, really well, if we get to a granular level, granular level, sorry. We want to again build capacity for inclusive practices, align our services so they support that inclusive culture. Strategically allocate resources. We're not just allocating resources to allocate resources. We're allocating resources with purpose. And the purpose is to improve the learning opportunities for our students. and we want to engage our families and build community trust. We're in the process of trying to develop in each one of our will be areas um steering committees for special education specifically to be able to have a direct access to parents that can help guide our decision-m that can help us understand what is the reality of a parent with a

011student that has an IEP and how can we better facilitate and meet the needs that they have. So those are some of the things that we are we are doing that are essential for us. So I'm I know whenever I present it to boards this is always a question that is left. How can we support you? How can we help you? Because without you and your support everything that we do just becomes really something that we're just trying to do in isolation. It's not the will of the board. and as a collective group, you have all of the potential. And I know we have future board members in this room as well. And I I would invite you to remember this for us that are trying to do the work to support the will of

012the board. How you support us makes a difference. And so for us, some of the things that I'm I'm specifically asking for is number one, individually champion inclusive culture. If you don't know what that is, if you're not sure what that is, I would welcome a conversation. I will do everything I can under the direction of the superintendent to support you in that any way that I can. And my team is is ready, willing, and able to do that as well. Prioritize the stability during the transition. We This is important for all of our employees. This is a big question for them. for them to be able to do their job well, they need to feel supported and they need to not be worrying about do I have a job, do I not have a

013job, where's it going to be, what's it going to be. We need to get beyond that. And so any stability we can offer as leadership that just helps that process to happen. Invest in capacity building. I cannot stress enough how much I believe in professional learning. We have lots of very talented professionals in Alpine School District, but there is not one of us that can't benefit from structured focused learning. Every one of us and when it comes to special education, this is one area that everybody needs support. Support comes, it requires resource, time, time requires funding. But if we want people to do better, we have to support them and make sure that they are confident and on their front foot, not on their heels wondering if what I'm doing is right. And that comes

014with professional learning. Um, ensure compliance infra infrastructure. This one I think is a is a just a foregone conclusion. We have to maintain that compliance. It has to be a smooth transition. And then model long long-term commitments. If we if we are only thinking to 2027, that makes the work that we're trying to do only as durable till 2027. And so we're trying to to to to look beyond the transition to things that are real and true and good. And if they are, they should be enduring. I want to call spe special attention to this one in prioritizing stability during the transition. Um, this is one that we want to focus on heavily and with the board, this is one that we need manpower to do. So, I'm going to leave you with something to

015think about and consider for our department. Can you jump? Thank you, Jason. This this slide right here, if I can call your attention to it, this is this is a slide that basically compares um the central office staff of of these districts across the state. We're using this to to be able to make recommendations down the road to the new boards on what we think and what what say department should look like from a staffing personnel. I want to call attention to two numbers if you can see them. This is our current administrative staff. It is 5 people. We have the largest district in the state at 85,000 students. That equates to an administrative staff per student of $41. There is not another district in the state that comes close to that. And in fact,

016the average staffing is $81 per student for administrative staff. Why I bring this up and what I'm asking as as a parting favor or a consideration rather from the board and leadership is that for us to do the work that we want to do and thrive over the next two years, we need a little help right now for a couple reasons. Number one, there are a lot of one-on-one leader to principal conversations that have to happen. We need to be out in the schools and not in an office answering phone calls. We have to answer phone calls because that's our responsibility as well. But if we don't have enough manpower, that's all we'll be doing is reacting and not being proactive in the work that we do. We also need to ensure that we have

017leadership that has the capacity to step into three new districts. And sped leadership is not like any other leadership. We need more people. You will have at the end of if we don't change anything, you will have five people, four people technically that are prepared to step into that. So with that, I'm asking for the consideration of two additional administrators added to our staff in both the preparation for the transition and also to help us thrive in what we're doing right now. With that, I just want to conclude by saying thank you again for the time uh to be in front of you and as appropriate questions if they're appropriate. Board members questions or we can if you have we can collect those and get to Dr. Karen and respond again. We'll be following up

018in October with more indepth >> um presentation. >> Maybe I would just offer a thank you. Um, for everybody that did not get to be in that all staff meeting, I had never been in a meeting that was like everybody like all my teacher friends over there, you know, that sometimes it's hit or miss how people are engaged in PD and everybody was so excited to be there and so I loved going with the book and just listening to them generate ideas and it was just a very I thought an incredibly strong start. So, thank you for starting our team out that way and we're excited to see what else you do. >> Thank you. And I appreciate you guys support. Do >> you have anything? >> No, I love working with you >> with

019Dr. Darington. >> Stacy's trying to figure out how many times she can say it, so I had to say Dr. Darington. >> On the record, I hate the Dr. Darington. >> So I I like Yeah. Call me Roy, call me Vicki. Right. >> Exactly. And I would be to not introduce Thank you for the support. My team, if you guys will raise your hand so people can see who you are. They are working so hard and big. >> Okay. Um, next up we have Matt Dougell with STEO. I'm just going to take about 10 minutes and give us a little report on the lease revenue bond success of of uh this year. So Matt, take it away. >> Superintendent. Thank you so much. I thought you said 90 minutes. I thought we going to go

020through >> nine bond math. >> Oh, it was nine. >> Nine. >> Okay. Where to start? No. Thank you. What a privilege for me to be here. Thank you so much for the great opportunity to work with you fine people in your fine district. And I'm happy to do some showand tell today. And I'll I will be brief. I won't take 90. I promise. I won't talk about bond math. Um I do just want to report on the success the district had on the recent lease revenue bond issuance. Uh these projects matter. Uh we we we talk about bonding, we talk about basis points, we talk about interest rates, and I just want to report that the district has been a tremendous steward through its bonds and is uh very strategic, analytical in the development

021of its capital financing plans. Um and second to none actually. And so really quickly as we review the process that goes through we issue bonds and it all starts with a legislative process and it goes through a development execution stage. I did want to hit on bond ratings and then we'll get into the fun stuff the bond the bond pricing. Um but again being brief uh the Senate Bill 188 was the legislative genesis as this group knows for the issuance of the bonds and appreciate the board uh meeting a couple times to go through uh statutory process for the issuance of the bonds. The board met in March uh for an intent resolution and again in April to approve a parameters resolution and a public hearing was also held in April. Um, so that that

022process was fallen to a tea and then getting into the actual bonding process. Um, as a kid I used to mow lawns, mold lawns when it was done looked great. I figure now in the bond market we're cutting grass with uh we're looking at every blade of grass and I'll I'll speak a little bit more to that, but it's a very uh involved process. And as we all are familiar with corporations doing an initial public offering of stock of bond issuance is every much as complex and involved um uh as as that process and the district does a tremendous job for that. There's a lot of analysis that goes into it. There's planning uh there's development and um really the the business team was so responsive and responsible through this process. Um and let me

023speak a little bit to that. Uh one of the nuances for this particular issuance uh in uh through the lens of the reconfiguration was whenever you issue a bond just like any of us getting a personal loan uh the lenders look at our credit strength and one of the question marks that the credit analysts had with the district was what will the reconfiguration look like especially as it pertains to the west district and uh with this particular lease revenue bond and so we hosted Moody's rating uh analyst list here on site back in March and took the time to drive them throughout the area so they could get a a general sense of the the economic picture, get a picture of the facilities that the district builds. That was a very positive experience and I

024think led to a very successful rating process with with Moody's. Um we held we held um meetings in April and a lot of their focus again was on the reconfiguration. we were able to point to SB88 for some of the uh process and procedures and uh hours and hours. I actually went through my personal uh work email about 708 emails um hours and hours of conversations, follow-ups and so again appreciate uh the team being so responsive but with successful outcomes. Uh the bonds were rated double A+ by Fitch ratings and double A2 by Moody's. Um these were in line uh the Fitch was in line with the district's outstanding lease revenue ratings. Again, the the district is AAA rated by both Fitch and Moody's on its general obligation bonds. With lease revenue bonds, there's a

025builtin one notch um uh decrease from your AAA just due to the appropriation um uh risk they call it, the the the legal nature of lease revenue bond. So, it's it's rated one notch naturally for for every district. um from their geo rating. Um Fitch held us at the double A+ movies too, which both are tremendous ratings. Um and uh the double A2 for movies was specific to just the transition risk and they'll readress it um in in 27. Um but I I was very pleased with the outcome and again appreciate all the work that went into going through that process. Um as we go through as you plan for bond issuance, you want to be as strategic as you can. uh none of us can uh predict the future with perfection. Uh but we

026honed in on the July bond pricing uh due to some historical data and uh again appreciate uh the district's team for working on this specific timing when you sell bonds in July. A lot of people are on vacation in July. A lot of your counterparts right throughout the nation. And so historically, you can see from this chart, this is just a bond volume chart. we can generally see that bond issuance is down in the months of July historically. And so we specifically targeted July knowing that the team would have to work in the summer months. Um but where you have low supply, you have higher demand and that was the strategy and and that played to our favor. So again, thanks thanks to the team. Uh we we looked at supply. We also looked at

027interest rates. Of course, none of us can predict it. But I will say um that uh if if I were to map uh historical interest rates and when the district enters the market, for some reason uh and I'll just credit it to the good people here in the district that whenever Alpine's in the market, interest rates cooperate. And so you can see as um uh as as we look at this historical interest rate graph and perhaps some of you in the audience are familiar with interest rates as you look at mortgage rates and whatnot, but interest rates are higher than they were during the pandemic. And that's a function of of of market forces. Um, but you can see uh along this graph, specifically April 2025, you see what looks almost like a heartbeat. That

028is uh the volatility that was brought into the marketplace due to the tariffs, the tariff situation. And and our market, specifically the bond market, froze um substantially in April. And our market prices um u a lot of bonds every given week. It can be up to 2 three billion subweeks, even higher. It can be up to 9 10 billion and there was probably up close to 20 billion in bonds in the market that did not get priced in the first week of April. And that supply uh the bond market works efficiently, but when we have a log jam, that means that supply then has to work itself out over the ensuing weeks. And so you do have increased supply. And so we were aware of that. We were aware of those factors and and we

029we planned for that and I'm I'm pleased to report that our strategy worked. You could see that dip that that small dip. Again, every basis point matters. Every blade of grass matters. Uh we priced at the dip um in July and and I'm really pleased and again congratulating the district on that. Uh but what does that really mean? Um uh let's actually skip maybe two pages. Um again, as I mentioned, a bond sale is every much as involved as an IPO of stock. Maybe page nine. Um, and what's interesting is when a school district sells bonds, it's not just like one loan like we get for our mortgages. There's actually principal. If a district sells 20-year bonds, there's actually principal to be bought in each year along that 20-year horizon. And different investors buy different

030years. So, you may have an investor in year one, year 10, year 11, year 20. And so, this represents the actual results of the bond sale. Um, and it may be hard to see on the screen, but there's horizontal black lines which represent the principal amount that was available in those particular years. And the colored lines uh represent the actual orders for that principal. And so we like to see we like to see that exactly what you're seeing is orders over what's available, which means that there was greater demand than there were bonds available. And where you have greater demand than bonds available, that means then you can further reduce interest rates, which which is exactly what happened. And I'll show you the details on that. But also this I love this picture because it

031really represents that the district bonds are are very uh wellreceived by the investment community uh the investor community. You have hedge funds, you have broker dealers, you have uh bank trust departments, you have separately managed accounts. You have some individuals. There was an individual that put an order in for about six and a half million. I don't know who they were, but thank you to that individual. Uh, someone must have a rich friend somewhere. Um, insurance companies bond funds. >> Um, so this really represents a very successful bond sale and again uh appreciate the underwriter Morgan Stanley for the good work that they did. And where we see this this great demand uh the district was able to further reduce interest rates. Um, page 10, some really great names came in. Um, very sophisticated investors

032came into the bond sale. Uh, we've heard of a lot of these on on the list. Um, you know, the Black Rocks, the JP Morgans, the News. Um, so solid investors and a lot of investors. So, very successful bond sale again. And so, um, you know, as I mentioned, um, you know, mowing lawns in each blade of grass, maybe skipping to page 12. Um, as you go into a bond sale, you have to do a lot of analysis on what investors are willing to lend at what interest rates, but you really don't know until the bond sale itself. Just like when you sell a home, uh, you can look at other recent home sales, but you don't know what your home's going to sell for until you get your offer, right? And it's very similar

033with a bond sale. And so going into the bond pricing, uh we had good feedback from the investor community, uh the interest rates you see here, and this this is probably hard to see, but um you can see that again each year there's principal and there's a yield in each year. And that follows a unique yield curve just to the district. And going into the bond sale, we uh anticipated rates based on comparable transactions to be X. And then we had the results of the bond sale. And the far right column shows how further we were able and working with the underwriter to reduce those interest rates to reduce the cost of the district. Um, and I'm calling that uh the board during the uh the parameters resolution delegated to our board president, superintendent, and

034business administrator um the charge to uh accept the final uh bond uh results. And so I'm calling the far right column, the the the KISS column, the King Smith and Sunbird column, uh their great work um in being involved in that process to deliver a real a very low interest rate, 20-year uh at 4.2%. Um and I will say that that is a lease revenue uh rate to the district, but was actually less than another recent Utah school district's general obligation bond issue. So um again wanting to be sensitive to the time but page 14 shows the final results and the final payment. Uh again the the bonds were structured for a level payment 2029 through 45. You can see the uh interest payments in light blue. So for the first few years as we

035get through the reconfiguration in the first uh year of operation uh of the new districts um what the payments look like and then thereafter 29 through 45 uh fixed interest payments. Uh the bonds were sold with an embedded option to refinance um in in 10 years. Um most Utah bonds are sold with that 10-year optionality which is why oftentimes we see refinancing opportunities and those are done for interest rate savings. So I do foresee um 10 years from now we'll be able to refinance these for further savings reduction in those interest cost. Happy to answer any questions a quick quick review but again just congratulations for a very successful lease revenue bond issuance from from start to finish and very much appreciate the opportunity to work with your district question Matt. So if we see

036I mean I think they just barely the feds had lowered some interest rate just barely I mean low percentage if we continue to see that are you still you can't refinance unless it's been 10 years you even if interest rates drop you can't refinance normally you just have to wait that 10-year period >> you you do have to wait there are um and and the district has done this in the past um the ability to refinance in advance of those dates was taken away as part of the the tax reform package in 2017 on the federal level. We can issue taxable advanced refunding bonds and the mathematics for that are a little nuanced. Um so you can actually issue taxable bonds if interest rates are favorable escrow those funds until that 10-year call date. So

037so that opportunity does exist. Um, and I will say that all of the district's general obligation bonds now and lease revenue bonds do have uh upcoming refinancing opportunities, 2027 being being the closest. Um, actually some quite large refundings um on the horizon, but the district has uh refinanced every bond that has has issued and every opportunity has been taken advantage of, especially during that interest rate trough we experienced during the pandemic. But yeah, you're exactly right, sir. >> Okay. So was the payment uh crafted just for our transition with the interest in the first three years? >> It was. Yes. Y so that that principle would be deferred. >> So that's questions from the board. Okay. Um just Jason, do you have anything you want to say? >> Sure. Um yeah, I just want to

038thank Matt for being here and for all of his work. He's such a great partner and Steel the whole team there of making this work. We couldn't definitely not do it without them and with our bond council also and we worked with him many years. Just I was just thinking about you know this is I think this is the fifth lease revenue bond fourth or fifth that we've done and then you know geo bond stuff. Lots of um great work that he's done and his his team. So really appreciate >> Thank you, Matt. Thank you. Um we uh value the partnership and uh you've done great work um for the board, the the staff and the taxpayers of Alpine. Thank you. All right. Um let's move on to our next if we if we can.

039Let's move on to our next um study session item and we have Boyce Campbell and Carrie Milner and they are going to share with us our early learning plan. Thanks. >> And we're excited to hear from you both. >> Jason, >> I disconnected. If yours doesn't work, I'll connect back. >> But I do have it if you need me to All right. I'm Carrie Molner. This is Boyce Campbell. He's gonna sit apparently why I divide portion stand there awkwardly. >> Yes, that's great. So, okay. We're presenting on our early learning plan. It used to be um by law that we needed to present to board during a board meeting and have it approved. Now um that is no longer, but we do need to present to the board and let you know what we're working

040on and what we're doing. So every year in June, uh there's a team that comes together. Vicki actually joins us with this team. Um I should have put your picture up there, Vicki. >> No, but thank you. So, it's uh the directors um and then our lead content specialists join us as we work together to develop a plan for literacy and math in our district. Um and there's a few things that have changed with the plan recently and I'll and I'll let you know as I come to that. So, the first thing we're going to look at is what last year's plan and the goals that we needed to submit to the state. They required three goals. Um the first goal is given to us and that was 60% of our students will make typical

041or better growth on a cadence math in grades one through three. The other two are local goals. We could choose between literacy and math or we could do um math because things have changed with literacy up there. We chose one literacy and one math goal. Um our literacy goal was 65% of our kindergarten students when they took a pill or better growth on uh acadians and math was um that first grade would increase in proficiency by 3%. So we're going to report on those and then uh how we did so on our local growth goal. So this is is each student growing with instruction. So in kindergarten our goal was 65. I wanted it higher, but the state came back and said, "No, that's too high. You can't do 70." But we showed them because

042we did 71. So, um, yes, it's very good news. So, uh, they told me to take it back to 65. Our kindergarten, they met back with 71% of our students made typical or better growth. So, that was good news. Um, our first grade team, um, first grade, we Oh, this is still kindergarten. We made some district goals along with what we needed to get to the state. So we made a district goal for kindergarten to um increase in proficiency. So it's every student where they should be at the end of the year. And our goal was 20%. We did not meet that, but you cannot beat 19. That's pretty d I mean we can but that was pretty good. We can beat it. But we were so happy about 80% of our students being there

043as they leave kindergarten. So we had a um oh I wanted to bring this to your attention which I I found this interesting our kindergarten students this is our beginning of the year um Aadian data that's coming in and we are coming in lower it's the trajectory is down and whether that's whether kids have access to uh preschool whether parents can afford it whether I mean I don't know exactly why maybe more parents are working and they don't put their children in preschool maybe they're Greens more. I don't know. But what we're what's happening is our kindergarten students are coming in lower historically um every year. But the good news is is that we are increasing in proficiency as you can see from the last uh four years. And also this is what's amazing to

044me. The growth um has almost gone up 20% in the last four years. So, our kindergarten teachers are working hard and whether that's we have full day kindergarten, whether it's um you know, all of our kindergarten teachers have gone through full day kindergarten training with um the member of my team, Daniel Bid, like it could be a combination of things, but we're seeing great outcomes in kindergarten and we're happy about that. So, I just wanted to share that with you. We had a district uh proficiency goal for first grade that we would increase by 6%. that was met and they increased by 7%. So the end of the year data was 71% of our students were at or above benchmark. Um and this is on a screener. A screener identify students who are at risk

045for reading failure or reading difficulties. So second grade we did not meet that goal. Second grade is tricky. It always has been. We're working on it. We're looking into it. Are kids in complex text as much as they should be? Are they reading as much as they should? um we are going to focus in on that and try to uh at least maintain in second grade. So uh third grade our goal was 4% they went up to and ended the year 72% um it is more difficult as the kids get older. Um but I still feel like we're working the right direction. So those are our those were our proficiency goals. I did want to bring this out. We have looked a lot at um implementation science this year because we implemented letters you know

046around instructional practices for teachers. We've also adopted new curriculum and anytime you implement something you usually will see a dip in the data because it's really um you know it takes three to five years for like these instructional practices adjusting routines uh for teachers to get kind of in the new groove. But I think we're not seeing dips, which is exciting as we continue. Our te our teachers are doing very very well taking on new instructional practices and learning. And um we're just we're excited about this. So I'm just excited to see as we go forward what this looks like in 2027 as we reconfigure and go into free strong districts. We're going to it's going to be great news for these new districts. Okay, looking forward for this year, um the state no longer

047requires literacy to um submit goals to them. We still have to fill out an early learning plan, but they don't require something happened with the law. It's kind of silly, but we don't have to report to them, but we do still have district goals. So, and I'm going to show you how these goals are set. So, with kindergarten, we're looking at a 20% like we did last year. Our kids are currently at 56. So that only puts us at 76. I know they can. I know they'll get 80 or I know they will. So first grade we're want to increase proficiency by 7%. Second grade we're looking to maintain at 76% and third grade we want to increase by 4%. And if this can happen I mean mid70s it is looking good. Our trajectory we

048were in we were in the 60s we are moving up. And so we're excited about the potential of this happening. So, um, I wanted to tell you how this is calculated because 20 might seem a lot for kindergarten, but you take the average of the last three years, the difference between beginning of the year and the end of the year, and you uh, add 3 to 5% for rigor. So, that puts them at 20%. And that's what we've done. That's how we came up with all of the numbers. If it comes out zero, an average of zero, then we want to maintain. And that's why second grade is a maintenance goal. So that's where those numbers come from. So okay, um we're asked to um identify the curriculum that we're using. We are using Wonders

0492023 for K through uh well it's K5 and study sleep for sixth grade but early learning plan is for K3. This is a comprehension a core comprehensive program. It's going to cover all of those components of literacy, you know, phonological awareness, phonics, fluency, vocabulary, comprehension, and writing. Um, we use a cadence as a screener that identifies students at risk for reading difficulties. If a student scores below or well below, we give them a diagnostic test. We're currently using 95% intervention diagnostic. And that helps us to identify the foundational skills that the student needs intervention for. So those are current assessments there to help our students and um that may have reading difficulties. um interventions. We are currently using 95% intervention um schools that have interventionist, they're identifying those students and helping them with those uh

050skill-based lessons and then they practice them in decodable text to help them obtain those skills and become better readers. So, um what we currently have as resources is we have district TSAs. We have seven of them. We're lucky to have them. Each of them is a grade level specialist. They are phenomenal. They can tell you anything about the grade that they uh study. They're doing great. We're lucky this year that as we adopt Wonders 2023 that we have professional development with every single one of our teachers um to talk about instructional practices and routines and to help them take on the new curriculum. And we have PLC coaches, one in every building. And we currently have 26 elementary um reading interventionists in our district. And last year with the help of Dr. Carter, we went

051through and um looked at the three new districts and tried to make sure that we distributed those 26 reading interventionists equally. So, everybody's always begging for a reading interventionist and I wish I could get one. So, okay, I'll turn the time Oh, do you have any questions for me before I turn the time over to math to go through his goals? And this is really impressive, Harry. Thank you. Thank you. It's the work of our teachers and teams. >> All right. Thanks, Carrie. Um, just going to review again just like K did, but we'll go for with math first. Reviewing our goals. Our state growth goal was 60% growth uh in grade levels one through three. And you can see uh we made a big jump last year. We didn't get quite as high this

052year, but we still met that goal. just barely by the skin of my teeth at 60% growth. Um, our local proficiency goal was with first grade students and um, I put up the historical pieces so you can see how much of an effect it makes when we focus on one grade level and really give them specific training. Um, you can see that our our goal was to do at least 3% again following that formula that Carrie introduced. Uh, but we our first grade teachers knocked it out of the park with 6%. Um, and you can see that's that's a big improvement over previous years. Um, and then we our district goals that we did separately, we did district goals as well. This last year was the first year that uh our kindergarters ever did were

053tested in Acadians math. It was required by the state beginning last year. Um, and so we set a goal to increase that percentage uh from beginning of year to end of year by 5%. Our kindergarten teachers did a great job at meeting it with uh 7%. I want to brag on our second grade our second grade teachers for a second. This was our goal two years ago. Um was second grade. Second grade had been had been falling had been uh in proficiency from the beginning of year to end of year in previous years. We made it our goal last or two years ago and they did it by 3%. We made it our goal just to maintain and they knocked out the park and then that same momentum has continued where they they jumped by

0547% this year and a 64% growth which was huge. So, big kudos to our second grade teachers. They've been working really hard. And then in third grade, our uh our uh our goal was to increase by 7%. We didn't quite make that goal. We made it by 5%. But we're going to work on third grade this year. You'll see that in a second. So, our goals for this year, as Carrie mentioned, we do have um couple of things that were made differently with our goals. First of all, they all have to be in math. Now secondly, um there are in previous years the goals were set around composite scores and acadians. This year they've given us the flexibility to set it around one measure if there's a specific measure. So you'll see um that we

055that's what we've done with kindergarten. Um and also for our early learning goals, the ones that we made for the early learning plan with the state, uh that they are a range now. They they've set those as a range instead of a specific number. still using that same formula. So our early learning plan goal that they make for us again is 60% will make typical or better growth. Our other learning plan goal is with kindergarten and we're going to increase that. We're going to focus on number identification fluency just like in reading they need to know their number their letters and sounds uh that they need to know their numbers and we found that uh that that is that is a struggle. We haven't focused enough on that. We want to really focus on them

056getting to know their numbers. And the biggest problem is just knowing those from 11 to 20. Those dang irregular ones that are different than all the others. Once they get once they get to 20, they can just keep on going forever. But focusing on those from 11 to 20. So that's our plan this year is to increase that by 1 to 3%. And that particular measure. Well, I'll show that in a minute. Um and then for first grade we want to increase on the on the uh measure of advanced quantity discrimination which is just recognizing which number is more and that's we want to increase on that by 3%. For second grade we want to increase on the specifically on the competition part by 3% and then for third grade this will be our early

057learning plan goal with the state we know we want to increase that percentage by 7 to 10%. So here just specifically with those early learning plan goals as as I mentioned number identification fluency went down a point where while the composite score went up by seven uh we know that the number identification fluency knowing their numbers is going to impact other measures on the test as well. So we're starting there with that one to really get that solid and know their numbers then they can know which number comes next and identifying other numbers. And then the other one for our for the early learning plan is for third grade. I just put the history up there so you can see how far they've come, but they've they we haven't specifically focused on third grade. We

058focused on the lower grades and so and you can see that. So we want to make that increase by 7 to 10%. Um and we want to hit you can see we haven't hit our 60% growth goal at all in in third grade yet. We were close last year, but so we really want to knock that out of the park this year. And our curriculum we're using is still it's I Ready Classroom Mathematics 2024. Uh this year we've updated scope and sequence and embedded number sense routines in there to help the teachers out. Our assessment we are using the math as a screener and then we have the I ready diagnostic as well as district benchmarks that are aligned with the standards. Then for interventions we have uh like I said we give the cadence

059mask screener and I ready diagnostic and then uh teachers use uh different tools from I ready uh to to give those interventions and best practices and number sense routines and that is all any questions about math or literacy any for either of Carrie voice just thank you awesome and um a lot of work that goes into that with targets that move with new curriculum standards etc. So thank you. Um our last um presenter tonight will be from Joy. So, thank you. Welcome. We're going to talk about libraries and I went through the presentation earlier and it's fantastic. Um, and Joy is at Sage Canyon Middle School, I believe. >> Yes, I am at My Joy Peterson. I am at Sage Canyon Middle School. I'm also the district lead librarian for Alpine. I was the library

060coordinator last year, so I was able to do all this um this research on libraries, but I've taken a position at Sage Canyon, so I'll have a job when the district. >> But I'm so excited that I have the opportunity to be able to talk to you about libraries. >> Um, first of all though, I want you to think about your librarian when you were growing up, when you're going to school. >> Um, what kind of library was it like when you were in middle school? When you were in high school, did you visit the library? I didn't set foot in my high school library even though I loved reading. Reading was my favorite thing. I was terrified of He was so mean. He was the meanest, stern, grouchy librarian. You couldn't make a sound

061in there and it was dark and it was just not a welcoming environment at all. And it I never went in there. Um I just want to let you know I want to give you a little info about our modern day libraries now. They are not like that. They are vibrant learning hubs. Um they're no longer those grim silent spaces that are precided over by hushing librarians. They are loud. They are they're exciting. We there's a lot of um fun that goes on. Um they're considered that safe third place that's not home. It's not school. It's not a classroom, but it's a place where they can feel seen and be supported. Um and I we wanted you to know that librarians are educators. Our librarians see every student in the school. They teach every kid.

062Um they even our elementary librarians spend an average of 700 hours a year teaching students and their potential impact on student learning is enormous and I in my opinion it is underutilized. We can use our librarians more um because they're critical instruction partners and they can collaborate with teachers to design lessons that further classroom learning and strengthen literacy. So now I'm going to show you uh the data I collected. I just want to describe it what you're going to be looking at really fast. Um I collected um we analyzed physical book checkouts and ebook checkouts for this past year. Um I reviewed library budgets and the colle the age of all these collections in our different schools our 85 schools. I conducted library sur librarian surveys and collected 10 years of historical checkout data for

063secondary schools. And then I compared those findings with national school library data. um we can collect it at monthly and the original reason why I wanted to do this was to compare the physical book checkouts versus ebook usage what who's checking out more like what what are they declining what's going on and then I wanted to see if additional factors like funding or the relevance like how old the collection is does that affect whether they get the books get checked out and um the data you're going to see is um collected from our Alexandria software it's our library checkout software that's the for the ebook for the regular books print books and Sora it's our online reading platform for um for schools that's our ebook data um I also collected budget data from the librarians

064and from school finance secretaries and did a collection age analysis with a company called title wave they um do a they analyze your collection the minute they analyze it tell you how old and you know the age of the collection and And then I got the national comparison data from the National Center for Educational Statistics. So first these are our elementary libraries and the checkout data. Um you can see the blue this is a stacked bar chart. So the blue um numbers that is physical books and the reds are the ebooks. And you can see elementary kids check out a lot of books at average of 31 per student per year. That's that yellow line. That's the average line. And there's a lot of good reading happening. They definitely read more physical books than they

065read ebooks, but they still it's the numbers surprise me at about how many kids read ebooks. Um so in our libraries we have about 14. Our elementary libraries is about 14 books per student. The nationwide average is 20. We make that up with um with our ebook collection. So they do get about 20 books per student. Um, our current age of our elementary collections. So, this is how old the collection is. The average age is 2009. That's a little too old. It's 16 years old. Our goal is to have it only be 10 years old. A school library collection should be relevant, should be current. We're not museums. We don't keep archives of books. If it's old and it's not checking out and it's outdated, we need to get rid of it. We we want

066to we're encouraging our librarians to get to weed these old outdated books that don't check out so they can make room for new books that kids will want to read. These are elementary library budgets um for this past year. There there's a average of about $7,000 that the elementary libraries get and that's averages to about $9 per student. Our nationwide average is $16 per student. So, you know, there's just some room we could uh we could do a little better there, but you can see they kind of vary widely based on the principal and probably how the principal the principal's librarian that they had when they were in school. Um, these are some of the biggest challenges reported from our elementary librarians. Um, time is a challenge. depending on the size of their school, they

067might struggle with having enough prep time. Um, they struggle with having enough time to order and catalog books. There's only one of them. And elementary librarians are paraprofessionals. They're not teachers. They're not um credential teachers. They do amazing job. And they educ they're educators, but they are not credentialed teachers. And running a library is a very technical job. And these librarians are often hired without classroom experience or prior library experience. So there's a need for continual training to help them build these skills which we provide at the district level, but we they could use they could just use that continual training. Cataloging new books is a struggle for them because they lack the expertise and the time to do that. And there is a lack of equitable and consistent funding. But despite these challenges, our

068elementary librarians are amazing. They have a great love for their kids and for the work that they do. Now we'll move on to secondary schools. So first I have the junior highs and then I have the high schools. You can see there's quite a difference from the 31 books per student. In junior high we move down to 13 books per student that get checked out per year and in high school it's about four books per student. You can see again it's a stacked bar chart. You can see the blue is the are the physical books. The red are the Sora the ebooks that they read on Sora. They're reading a lot more ebooks in secondary school, but even so, um, in high school, you know, kids are busy. They're reading books for English classes and

069maybe aren't visiting the library as much, but we would love to see those numbers go up. The um, average books per student that we own in our high schools are in junior highs are six books per student. The nationwide average is 14. Frankly, we don't have room in our libraries to have 14 books per student. They're they're just not built big enough to hold that many books. We make up for that with our ebook collection and you can see a lot of kids are reading ebooks. Our collections in secondary, they're older. Again, 2009 is the average age and 2015 is our minimum goal. I presented this to our librarians at the end of the year last year and they're like, "Oh, okay. Well, it's eye openening. We need to we need to do better, guys.

070We can do better." And I was wondering if there was a correlation the age of our library collections and the number of checkouts that we receive. So I created a scatter plot and it's um so it's a little so the bigger dot the dot is the older the colle the more books they have that are old. So it's a little uh deceiving because it seems like the bigger should be better but the bigger is worse. So the bigger the dots, the older the collection. And you can see that the fewer checkouts they have. So they have less than 2,000 checkouts per year and about 1,400 books that are aged. Whereas these this school has about 14,000 almost 14 13,000 checkouts per year and they have less than 200 aged books. So correlation is not causation,

071but I thought that was interesting that older collections don't check out. These are our secondary library budgets. So, they get an average of about $13,000 a year. Again, it varies widely, but that equates to about $8 per student, and the nationwide average is 15. So, we could do a little better there, too. All right. For our secondary librarians, their biggest challenges, I asked them all. This is a survey. I surveyed all of them. What would you like the board to know? What are your biggest challenges? Um I there's a loss of time and role clarity due to non- library duties. I think there's maybe a misconception or a misunderstanding between faculty and even admin about what the librarian supposed to do. What what what's their role? Librarians they should they're teachers. The second in the

072secondary school we hold teaching degrees and we are teacher librarians. We should be teaching we should be teaching more and we should be utilized as a teaching partner. There's so much potential there. Um, secondary students don't have that regular built-in library time like they do in elementary school. And I think that's why those checkouts go down. Um, libraries are often closed for CCRs, for testing, for meetings. And we added it up and it equals to about 12 weeks a year that a secondary library is closed. That's an entire quarter. So that could also account for some of those low checkout numbers. Um, and like I said, there's a librarians can teach. I as a librarian, I I've taught English classes, history classes, science classes, drama. I've taught um the only class I did not get

073in was math. I taught every single other curriculum and and I was determined to get math in. I will I will at Sage Canyon. We're going to get math in. Figure out how to incorporate math. But um not all of our librarians get those opportunities to teach. They need to be proactive as well at at going out and and finding those teaching opportunities. We only teach if other teachers let us. So, but it's a val we're a valuable teaching resource. We can we can help. We can provide these experiences for for our students. Um, finally, uh, legislation around book banning has left many librarians feeling disheartened and unsupported. It's better now. It's better. A lot of our libraries did not have any of those books that are being challenged. They but at the same time

074they feel like they're villains and they've been you know a little disheartening but like I said it's better. They understand it's getting better. So here's our 10 years of circulation data. And so I I collected this is just for um secondary. I didn't I wasn't able to get all it was just too many to do for elementary school but I want to do it for elementary school too. Um, you can see our physical book checkouts are represented in the blue and ebook checkouts are the red and I I added a trend line so you could see the trend. It's going down for ebooks or for regular books and up for ebooks. We had about nine books per student in 10 years ago. In 2014, we're down to about four and a half books per student.

075This is our junior high. In high school, they averaged about four books per student uh 10 years ago now to about one book for students. But our ebook um the kids are reading on Sora more. And this was like disheartening to me when I saw this. I was like, man, this is not great. Um and I did present this to our our librarians too and they were really surprised. This surprised all of us. I added when you add your books and your ebook numbers together, it's not so great. They are still reading. Kids are still reading. That's represented by this yellow line. Um that the trend is still going up. Kids are still checking out books. They're reading. They're just reading in a different way, different format. So, of course, when you collect data, you

076all have have a bunch of other questions you want answered. So these are all of the questions that I would like to dig in deeper um and have find out the answers to. Um are the physical book readers and the ebook readers the same kids, same population? Are they two separate groups of kids that we need to figure out how to reach? Um is there a correlation between checkouts and literacy test scores? Are elementary schools that have really high library programs or their literacy test scores higher? I would like to know that. Is there a correlation between libraries they're funded really well and book checkouts or do they check out more books? Is there a drop in checkouts for eighth graders after December? 8th grade is when most kids get their cell phone and I

077anecdotally I've heard a lot of librarians tell me January they don't check out hardly any books. >> Is that the reason I would like to do that study? Do large library displays and big activities equate to more checkouts? And how does Alpine's library in info how does our library data compared to other school districts in the state? I'd like to to compare that as well. As any good librarian should do, I included my So there's the sources. You can look and see where I have my my information. And finally, that is my presentation. Does anyone have any questions for me? >> Thanks, Joey, for your presentation. Very informative. I have a question. Do our high schools do they partner with our all of our city libraries with Sora? >> Um, no. Sora is you can

078with Libby. Libby is the public um library e-reading platform. Sora is just for >> and do you have any data on that of how many of our students are possibly are reading? >> I don't but that would be a good study to collect. Second question is um can you tell us a little bit about professional development that our librarians have since they were teachers? What do they do in our district for PD our librarians? I I provided PD days for them. >> And when you get together, do they come up with ideas or I'm I'm focusing a little bit more on secondary, specifically high schools, but do they share any innovative creative ways that they are trying to engage students in the teaching classroom or working with teachers trying to jump in there to see

079if they can take some time? How is that how do you do that? >> We're trying to encourage them to do that more. I think, oh, I think that, this is just my opinion, but that for a long time, you just think you go to the library, I I check out books. I'm a, you know, I I manage my collection. I I I curate this great collection to provide for the students to check out. But I'm trying to get them around to the mindset that we are teachers, guys. We are teacher librarians. We have so much to to provide. there there are so many good librarians that do teach, but I'm trying to get us all on board doing that. >> Along with that, since they are certified teachers, um are there any electives that

080are coded throughout the state that aren't typically taught by librarians? I did create a library media literacy class that I was able to get approved by the state that I I taught with my kids, but but so I did I did have a I have a a course that they can teach. >> Could you share just really briefly the district media center and its purpose? >> Yes. And that's probably a topic for I could go on. I was going to include those slides, but I'm like that's too much. Um, so we do have a district media center where we check out learning kits to everyone in the district. Um, we have it's very heavily used and that's a question we get a lot like what's happening to this place when when the district splits. We

081have over, you know, $500,000 of assets that of of it in our collection. We have like an asteroid. We have these star tints. We've got alpine pickle ball uh games that we check out to to schools around our district that they teachers borrow when they schools can't afford these big things. We have them here. So, we plan them out. That's a a good question. When we're we're we're wrestling with and debating of how how we're going to >> always creating content there. >> Always creating content. Um we're I'm big on learning kits. Like that's what I love to do as a librarian. bring bring classes in and then we we do hands-on learning activities. We we go around and we you know they're learning about uh mountainmen. Well, we're we have a mountain man kit

082and we have burs and we've got tracks that they can identify. We've got around their library like so many activities that's hands-on. That's what we want to encourage our librarians to do. That's what we want our libraries to be are these hands-on learning centers and good hangout safe hangout places and just you know Joy this data is fascinating. Thank you for compiling all of it. I mean the background you had to do to get all this information is kind of overwhelming. Um, when you talk about that piece towards the end about comparing our library info to other districts in the state, do you know of other librarians who have compiled this sort of data, whether that's in other districts or is this kind of like a unique thing? >> Um, I don't I I want

083to I know everyone collects like yearly checkout data, so that's what I would like to see. I don't know the 10 year like that little bar chart that took me the entire year. The stupid little bar chart takes so much time. That's most of my year to make that one little chart because it is very timeconuming to collect. But um uh I I'm going to reach out and find out that information to see where we stand like are we is this a problem across the state? Are we losing our our physical book checkout? You know, >> how's Sage Canyon? >> Well, it's it's going great. I'm I'm trying to educate my principal about the role of the librarian. I mean, he's great. He is great, but um you know, I've been doing a lot of

084Chromebooks, so I I can do this. But but but but look what else I can do. I can be a teacher. Anyway, >> I have a question. And I'm it's not like fully formed but so when I was growing up a lot of times in secondary school when I would go to the library it was to learn how to do research right so is a lot of that getting moved to the computer and so like is that something >> I librarians teach research like on something we teach how to find the information on the computer. >> Yes. Absolutely. We It's the number one thing librarians are great to teach and do. >> I like it. It's fun. >> Joy, I have a question. >> Your library uh data $9 per versus $16 and that was

085from FY23 and CS >> 24. No, that that is from 2013. That is the most recent data we have from the National Center for >> 2013 and >> that that is $16 10 years ago. >> That is the most recent data that we have. They need to do another data a study on librarians, but they have not. Yes, >> that was that was intriguing to me because we have a lot more current data but the data was that we don't have it on library spending. >> Thank you. So I really appreciate all your work on this. Um we have been revising our sensitive materials policy for the district. Is there anything you've seen as a librarian that needs to be tweaked in that or are you feeling okay with the way it is? >> It's

086great. Yes, we feel comfortable with it. Yes, I worked with ballad Al's done a great job with it and I think um there's you know I'm against censorship as a librarian but I am for age appropriateness and that is exactly what it that we we call age appropriateness exactly what and and like I said it's not really we rarely have it's not this big problem that it was made out to be we don't have those books >> and I think we looked at recently. We've only had maybe two or three incidences over the last couple of years. >> three over the last couple of years >> and two were in World Book, right? >> Right. >> Yeah. rule book was yeah anyway there's only been three over two years so it's not the problem >>

087it's not the problem that >> it's not made up thank you for confirming that and balance thanks for giving us >> thank you so much >> okay thank you Joy very very much appcate Okay. So, um we are at the end of our agenda. So, we are going to finish our study session and then we will be back to the board meeting at 6 o'clock. Thanks everybody. Okay, it's six o'clock, so I am going to call the meeting to order. Um, we're going to begin with our agenda. The first item is the pledge of allegiance, and that will be led by Craig Brinkerhoff. Um, and that will be followed. Then we'll have an inspirational thought by Mark Mik Larson. Please repeat the pledge of allegiance with me. I pledge aliance to the flag of the

088United States of America and to the republic for it stands one nation indivisibley andice for all. I really appreciate the opportunity to uh share this with the board tonight. Um I took some time to think about what I wanted to share and the history teacher came out. So I hope that you'll uh bear with me or I guess permit me to take a minute and share a little history story with you. Um about the same time as the American Revolution in Japan, there was a big famine and it was all over but especially it hit hard in northern Japan, kind of the north part of the main island. um where the tsunami hit a few years ago and uh the people were really struggling. There were economic downturn, there was famine and lots of people

089were suffering and um some of the people that suffered were kids and when the families would lose a child they would uh carve a little doll without arms or legs um just very simple and they put it on the mantle piece to remember that child that they had lost. It's called a Kokeshi doll. And when you go through that area of Japan these days, you can find these dolls all over the place. They're kind of souvenirs. Um if you look them up online now, they have like Star Wars ones and stuff like that. Um it's super cool. But they're all over um and you can get them as souvenirs. So these Keshi dolls are there. Um except in one little area. There's a valley um they're right in the middle of northern Japan where you

090can't find the dolls. Um instead they have these uh And I I wondered about that. I was like, "What does the what does the hawk mean? What does the chicken mean?" Um because they don't have the keshi dolls. Well, come to find out, there was a uh there was a leader there uh in the late 1700s. Um and he took over at a time, you know, lots of political unrest, lots of lots of hardship. And he he made some really hard decisions u to help people. And what he did was he instituted some economic reforms. Um he cut government salaries and said, you know, you guys have been making a lot of money for a long time and so we're gonna we're gonna stop that. Um he actually made them be part of the public

091works. They'd go out and build roads and aqueducts and stuff like that. Um they farm. Uh he took the leaders and made them kind of the servants. Um one of my favorite things that he did was implement uh public education. He brought education back and said, "This is important. We're going to teach people." And so his reforms uh really made a big difference. It was it was a big deal and he took a lot of heat. A lot of people didn't like him. Um but over the course of the few years uh it made a difference and that valley didn't lose kids and that's why the Keshi dolls aren't available in that valley even to this day. Um it's the hawk that represents him and his leadership. It was hawkish, right? He had to make

092some really hard decisions. and the chicken that represented the prosper, excuse me, prosperity that they experienced at that time. And uh I just love that example of somebody stepping into a hard situation and saying, "We're going to do what's right for kids." Um I look at this board and say, "You've got you've got some hard decisions to make in the next in the next little bit." Um but we do what's right and we make hard decisions for kids. Um and it saves lives, right? We don't have we don't want to have any Keshi dolls here in Alpine for the next year and a half. We want to make sure that we create a really strong environment. Um it may be hard. We may have leaders that are out there fing the fields with us. U

093and I know we do. I know we have leaders that are that are doing that. Um and I I just want to say thank you for taking on those hard things, making decisions that help kids live. So, thank you. Thank you for sharing that message. We appreciate it. Um, next up we have our recognitions. As the board of education, it is important for us to recognize various accomplishments made by students, employees, and patrons from throughout Alpine School District. As we honor the individuals and groups this evening, we acknowledge the families and others who have helped them achieve their goals. Thank you for the support you have offered to those we've recognized this time. We appreciate your attendance here tonight. Um, Alpine School District is thankful for so many teachers and staff members who excel in

094making a difference for students, parents, colleagues, and others. Tonight, we would like to recognize nominees who have been selected to receive the Alpine School District Rise Award, which stands for remarkable, inspiring, selfless, and encouraging. Board member Clement Great. And uh so Mike, if you'd like to come up again along with uh Cheryl the Staint Shore and Ruthie Cheeseman. Um Ruthie has nominated Cheryl the librarian at Grove Crest Elementary for this Rise Award. And uh so uh we just like to read this uh this commendation that uh that wrote, "Cheryl shows remarkable patience and compassion in her work with students. After a student damaged a bulletin board she had worked hard to create, she chose to make it a teaching moment rather than just a consequence. She guided the student in understanding the harm caused and

095then provided an opportunity to repair it. Because for a calm and encouraging approach, the student not only restored the damage but also learned a lasting lesson in responsibility and respect. TR consistently students while holding them accountable in ways that inspire growth. Thank you so much. Okay, if I could have um Dana Cotch as well as principal Mike Ericson and Angela Duke come forward, please. This is what Angela wrote about Dana. Over the last few years, I have watched Mrs. Cotch put her heart and soul into teaching the BTS art program at our school. She collaborates with teachers, connects everything she does to the curriculum, and provides meaningful learning experiences for the students. Mrs. Cotch also puts on a very successful art show every year for each student to be recognized for their hard work. She

096does all of this while working from a cart and a hall for her storage. We are so blessed to have her at our school and want her to know that we see her hard work. Thanks, Dana. I'd like to invite Diana Herman and Emily and Principal Brian Ridge to come up and she was nominated by Emily. Emily wrote, "Mrs. Herman is a teacher every parent and kid hopes for. She is so kind and caring about each student. She takes the time to get to know each of them, even with large class sizes. She celebrates them, their little wins and progress. She sees their effort and cheers them on. She creates a space that kids The class itself is like a little family. She took time to come to come to come to my daughter's play.

097Her care extends beyond their year in her class as well. When she saw my daughter was emotional the next year for the first day, she came in to give her a hug and encouraging words. Thank you, Mrs. Herman. We'd like to invite Carly Fain to come up as well as principal Joel Miller. Um, Carly is a PAR educator at Silverlake Elementary. Ailen wrote, "Carly is very patient and compassionate towards the kids with a heart full of love and respect for the children. She treats each one of them as if they were her own, creating a warm and supportive atmosphere. Her gentle and steady patience make her not just a parah but a trusted friend and comforting figure to the kids and their families. She takes an extra mile to help these kids with disabilities feel

098that they belong and are well loved. Okay, next up we would like to invite Dr. Vicky Carter and Dr. Valon Thomas to come forward. We would also like to welcome Amaya Mueller from the Southerntherland Institute to present the partners in learning certificate. Good evening everybody. My name is Amaya Mueller. I'm here representing Southernland Institute. First and foremost, I just want to thank you for the invitation to be here tonight. It's good to come out and be in your district and to have the formal opportunity to present you with the partnership. Um, in our eyes at Southerntherland, education's at its best when parents and teachers are able to work together. We believe in the parent teacher partnership, which kind of leads us into why we created the partners learning certificate. Over this last year, we did

099a thorough review of all the different school district websites in the state to kind of figure out, you know, what curriculum do they have on their websites, what links do they have available, putting on basically the goggles of a parent, what do we want parents to have access to? Al is one of the school districts that really stood out to us as being kind of the gold standard in terms of, you know, website materials, access to curriculum, stuff that, you know, we want parents access to. So, we wanted to come tonight to present formally the partners learning certificate as well. appreciate the opportunity to come and be with you guys and just mention if you're interested in the full details of our certificate feel free to go to our website.org and you can kind of

100study that we did there but thanks again Thank you. We appreciate Dr. Valen Thomas and all the members of the curriculum team for the efforts to empower and engage parents in it as active partners in education. Is Joe Hayes and Eric Woodhouse here? Please come forward. We want to extend our sincere appreciation to Joe Hayes for his tireless efforts in bringing Alpine School District into full compliance with the new state guardian program, which requires a minimum of two guardians in each of our schools from bell to bell. And this in of itself has been no small task. In addition to his regular responsibilities as operations director, Joe has worked closely with the Utah County Sheriff's Department and local police agencies to ensure every school guardian receives the required training and then keeps an accurate record

101of each guardian's requirements. His dedication, professionalism, and commitment to student and staff uh staff safety have been exceptional. No other district in the state is as close as ASD to being ready to implement this program fully. Joe, we want to thank you for always being ready. Congratulations. Next up, we have community comments. We have up to 30 minutes set aside for public comments. This opportunity is allocated for patrons living within the Alpine School District boundary. A signup sheet was available prior to this meeting, allowing up to 10 patrons the opportunity to speak. Those living outside of ASD and those who were unable to sign up before all slots were full can submit written comments at alpineschools.org/schoolboard. Scanning the QR code in the lobby will also direct you to that form. As you are called up,

102please introduce yourself by stating your name. You will be given up to three minutes to speak. While the board does not engage in a discussion during the public comment period, they may arrange for a staff member to communicate with you later. Personnel issues are not appropriate discussion items for an open meeting environment. If you have a personnel concern, please contact a member of administration or put your concerns in writing and address it to the board of education. So, our first individual to comment tonight is Mindy Quist and she will be followed by Candace Jones and then Katie Schnatz. I'm sorry, I can't read the handwriting. I apologize. Mindy. >> My name is Mindy. I live in Lehi and I am a candidate for the Aspen Peak School. And why that's important is I'm here to

103urge you um to consider starting the process of using the property in Lehi for building the new elementary school as soon as possible. Um not only North Point right now needs that relief. My my own kids, I have three kids that went to North Point right before River was built when the student body of North Point was 1400 students before they moved into River. And let me tell you, it was miserable to have that many kids go to that school. Um, not only were the facilities just so overrun, my daughter was a third grader and the entire third grade was in a satellite um behind the school and she used to joke that she wasn't sure she was a true navigator because she never had to go anywhere within the school. She barely went inside

104the normal school. Um and it's not just the facilities with lunches and assemblies. It's really the culture of the school suffers when the student body gets that big because um there's just no in all of the specialties, all the extra things that make going and being part of an elementary school really special. Plus, it's hard to even invite parents to join. So, when a school gets so large in their student body that you can't invite members of that community into your own school, then children are really suffering and really left out of an experience. They really lose part of their school culture when that happens. And I just think that rather than being behind the growth of that school as it is already large, we get in front of it. And I would urge you

105to consider starting that process as soon as possible and not wait for the new school board to be seated. Um because it will really be the kids at North Point that um suffer because of that growing population and the on the part of this board to rectify that situation um to to really give relief. So, thank you. So, next up we have Candace Jones, then Katie Schnatz, and then Gene Marie Burrows. All right. Good evening, members of the Alpine School District Board and Administration. Um appreciate your email, Rob, today. Thank you. Um, my name is Candace Jones. I've been a parent and community volunteer in Alpine School District since 2007, five years in ORM and the last 13 in Lehi. My husband and I both have raised our six children here for graduated from Lehigh

106High and one is in 11th grade currently and our youngest is in sixth grader at North Point Elementary. Um, tonight I want to speak about three purposes. One is to urge immediate action of the construction of Cold Springs Elementary. two to highlight the severe overcrowding and concerns at North Point. Two or three to request all West Leigh schools are included in the boundary study. Um Cold Springs Elementary must begin construction now. North Point has 1,140 students, larger than many of our junior highs and equal to the size of ORM High. Overcrowding has changed everything. Traffic and safety around this school has become a huge concern. Classrooms are beyond capacity. We have seven kindergarten classes with class sizes 27 to 28 students with no classrooms to spare. And we have now entered the era of adding

107portables upon portables. My own child rides her bike 1.2 miles along 2300 West, a five lane road with no safety shoulder. Teachers are stretched to their breaking point, and families are leaving in droves for charter schools with smaller class sizes. This school should have been started three years ago. The boundary study is helpful, but while that concludes in November, the board must act now to finalize funding in October and move plans forward immediately. Um, North Point is not the only crisis. Dry Creek is nearing 1,200 students. River Rock is just under 1,000. Snow Springs is over 800. Willow Creek is also bursting. These numbers are unsustainable and they create real risks for safety. student success and teacher retention. We cannot solve this by simply throwing more staff into overcrowded schools. Buildings must be built, boundaries

108must be fixed, and relief must be prioritized. Now, third, each West Lehi school has unique demographics and needs. Lehigh Elementary footprint serves families who require smaller community and more directory support. River Rock has lost families to charters due to overcrowding. These differences matter if the district serious about student connection and success. Boundaries and buildings must reflect the real needs of each community. I know funding is always a challenge, but with a change in cap regarding lease revenue bonds, there are solutions. The capital exists. We cannot keep blaming the failed general obligation bond. I personally advocated for that bond and our city voted for it. With the lease revenue bond increase and other funding schools, the money is there. I respect the work that the board does, but Tonight I'm asking for more than words. Families

109are leaving. Teachers are at their limit and students and family feel the huge deficit that could be in our schools. Um it is your responsibility to act and the time is long past you. And thank you for all your hard work. So our next speaker speaker is Katie followed by Jean Marie and then Julie Myers. Hi, I'm Katie Schwarz and that was my bad handwriting. Apologies. Um, I am a parent of a first grade and a fourth grade student at Vanilla Elementary School and I'm here to talk about the split class structure in our district. It's impacting my currently my daughter's fourth grade class. Currently from 8 a.m. to 11:30 a.m. my daughter is in a class with 37 students. She receives literary instruction and reading intervention and then they split classes and her classes

110go down and in the afternoon the fifth grade students spend three hours of their day with 36 students. These are critical instruction hours and it makes it nearly impossible for our children to receive the individualized attention they need. Particularly those like who are behind in reading and they need the attention. Um, now last week I met with Principal Hall and her supervisor, Mr. Beckram. It was a great meeting. They took the time to walk me through the district policy of why we're in the situation that we're in. And I understand that when enrollment numbers fall between thresholds, the district's default solution is to create split classes, combining two grade levels into one classroom. Manila decided to avoid putting two grades in one classroom and therefore they came up with a new solution which is the

111one I'm in now. I'm personally working with a number of parents who are here with me tonight to speak with our school council about moving forward with this solution. But split classes in general and having this be the default for our district I think hurts both students and teachers. It puts extra burden on educators. It reduces personalized instruction. It creates learning gaps. Um, I I'm committed to working with other parents to better understand this issue in our district. Um, and I want to be a part of the solution. I'm asking you as the board to revisit the policy on split classes and how many there are throughout the district. And I want you to consider alternative solutions and better support for our students. Our children really only get one chance at the fourth grade. And

112I think we need to give them the best possible environment to uh thrive. Um I'm going to continue to rally parents on this issue and um I would like to discuss split classes and class sizes in our district and I would want to know what our options are to make meaningful policy change. Thank you. Okay, next up we have Jean Marie and then Julie and then Monica Corey. My name is Jean Burroughs and I would also like to talk about the Springs property elementary school. Um Mindy and Candace have presented great information. I don't have any students that go to North Point. I won't have a student that ever goes to North Point, but I am a Lehi community member that has spent hours pouring time and love into this Lehi cluster community. And I

113have seen the effects that it has had on not just the North Point community, but all around us. I I know you're not going to be speaking about about opening a new school today, but you will be talking about the elementary boundary adjustments in Lehi. And I think that this goes hand in hand. And I would like to present this now so that you can think about it as you discuss that we do need a boundary adjustment. We need major boundary adjustments. Candace presented numbers that show how imbalanced our schools are. But I do not think that it would be good for our students to adjust these boundaries just for in two years with the new school district if they decide to build Cold Springs when they decide because it it is needed for the

114boundaries to be adjusted again. I think that we need to push building the school immediately. We need to be able to help ease the pressure off the north point and then decide on our boundary changes so that our students aren't tossed back and forth a couple of times. I don't think it's the best interest of students, our community or our teachers. Thanks. Okay, Julie Myers. And then we have Monica Corey and then Heidi Corey. Cedar was the lied valley. You guys need to give us enough time to put into all the to shut down. It's not fair to us. They're already capacity and our kids have not had to deal with our Not just because there's love. Some of them have been there. Teachers are all working together to put into a spot where we

115can have another school big enough Please give us a few months and sending our kids to mountain trails is going to be exactly like it's not elementary junss. I don't want him in a bunch of schools. He's already a 504 students and what valley is elementary school based on district when he said elementary school. Please think we have Okay, we have Monica Corey, Heidi Corey, and then Rachel Hos. >> My name is Monica Corey, and I'm also here to address the issue with Valley. I would like to thank the board for allowing me to speak a few words today. I am a resident of the White Hills community which which attend Cedar Valley Elementary and I've been there for over 14 years. This month we are more aware of two things. The first one is

116the need to serve others. Students and staff at Cedar Valley Elementary serve each other and the community and the community. Sorry, having served as a past ETA president for two years and in many hours of volunteering through classies, school field trips and fundraisers, I have seen the involvement of students and community working together towards many I have even had teachers come out of school hours to family events because my children have invited them to come. At CBE, you are more than a student. You gain an identity as an important member of society and learn that you are valued and appreciated as the special individual that you are. We We know each other by name. This brings me to my second point which I have been thinking a lot about lately because it is suicide prevention

117month. students at CBE learns grades based on how well we teach self identity or self worth at you matter I've had the opportunity to Valley Elementary knows I wish that every valley is booming. We know we won't be able to fit all of the children coming into our school boundaries into our present school as it is now forever. But let's do things right. Let's take the time to consider those students, the heritage and culture they come from and represent. And in the right time, let us build upon it the right way and preserve it instead of tearing it down. Thank you for your time. So, we have Heidi, Corey, then Rachel Haw, and I think it's Alex Carter. >> Hello, my name is Heidi Cory. I am currently a junior in high school. I went

118to Cedar Valley Elementary for kindergarten through sixth grade. Cedar Valley Elementary is an amazing school. If I had the decision, I would not have gone anywhere else. The teachers and staff are so kind and compassionate, and everyone at the school is wanted and knows. Those memories I made at that school with friends and teachers. The field trips we had with the entire school and how everyone knew everyone else. Everyone is included. Those memories I will never forget. I remember so much from just going back to the school and walking around the school grounds. Remembering the good positive vibe there. All the memories made friends I made at the school that I'm still amazing today. Cedar Valley Elementary will be greatly missed. If I had one word to describe school and atmosphere, it would be family.

119It has amazing teachers, some of the best I've ever had in my life, and a great student. Thanks, Heidi. Uh, we now have Rachel Haw and then Alex and then Joy. My name is Rachel and I'm also here to talk about Cedar Valley all the time so bear with me. Um, I have two sons that attend Cedar Valley Elementary and our family moved to White Hills two years ago. So, I don't have the history of being at Cedar Valley, but I did want to share our experience with you as being a new member coming into my son who is attended two different schools. He has ADHD and some behavior problems and in both schools he struggled in class and recess. Um the second school that he was at, there was significant bullying towards and I

120soon found he didn't want to go to school and he was at school often going to an unsupervised room and wasn't getting a lot of education and it made me really worried about his progress. And then in the middle of third grade we moved to Cedar Valley. It did take But I noticed early on that the teachers, staff, and administration cared about my son. They took time to get to know him. And when some of his behaviors manifested, they were handuced. to make room for a new school. Last night, my son said, "It isn't about the individual students at the school. I'm leaving to junior high next year, but it's just the school that makes it great." I took this to mean that the teachers, administration, and support staff along with the student body work

121together to create a culture where everyone is valued and it shows. It would be a real tragedy to move forward forward with closing Cedar Valley Elementary at this time because it will not allow for that culture to continue. Instead, we should look at the growing community that we have and build Cedar Valley up to support a larger student body and it will probably take us building a new building in our area. But that way we can support all of the students coming into our community going Um, next up we have Alex and then Joy. >> I'm Alex Carter. Um, I moved to Cedarport four years ago. Um, we took our kids from Pleasant Grove and we were really worried about bringing them there. In fact, before we moved there, we went to Cedarport, looked around,

122and we talked. We said, "We're not sending our kids to this school. There's no way." We called Black Ridge, they rejected us, said no. Um, we called a couple other schools. I don't remember the names. They rejected us. Said no. Um, so my wife said, "I'm going to go down there during school and look at it with kids around." And she came home and she said, "I think we're going to be okay. I think it's going to be all right." Um, one of my kids, our oldest, was struggling really bad. Um, and uh, he couldn't really get along. He was uh, he was failing um, in some areas. And, uh, he went to Cedar Valley and things changed. And every one of our kids have excelled. And I've got three that have left Cedar Valley

123now and gone into junior high. And I'm telling you, they do a great job. They prepared them for junior high and they're succeeding. one more that's still there in fifth grade. Really love her to be there next year. It's it's a big deal. The school is different than I've ever seen. It's I mean I went to Alpine School District. I wouldn't It's It's not the same in Cedarport. I promise you. And uh they do a fantastic job. Um I would beg you please don't close it down. Leave it where it is. Give us some time. Um as was mentioned earlier, I think we've got some solutions. great piece of land right next to Cedar Court. We can build a new school there. We could keep, you know, the traditions going. Um, I think there's some

124great options moving forward, but closing it down could break my heart. You've got a bunch of other schools that have already rejected our kids initially that would have to soak them up. You've got uh some complaints that were made earlier for other schools that are overcrowded. You got no complaints from me about Cedar Cedar Valley. Leave it alone. It's doing great. Um, so with that, thank you. >> Thanks, Alex. And our next comment is Joy. I'm joining you, Kirk. I am a parent and I'm here elementary. Um, I agree with a lot of the parents what they've said. Please don't shut our school down. I four of my own kids go through Cedar Valley Elementary. My aunt years ago was one of the first teachers. This was before a lot of the development happened out

125there and she lived right there just up from the school. Um we're over populated like it was mentioned in Eagle Valley. I actually work at the middle school in Eagle Valley and we are constantly getting new students in. I know the new school down in Brandon Park is being built. All of the overcrowded. Um, our school is not. And if you've never been to a small community school, you all are missing out. Your kids are missing out. Um, we love our school. Very involved community. Everybody knows everybody. Um, there's lots of support, lots of fundraisers are going on, everybody joins in. If happening at the school. Like it was mentioned earlier, the teachers come back out once they go home. They come back out or they'll stay there for longer hours to support our children

126in our community. We love our small school. We know it's probably inevitable that you're going to shut it down, but please give us time to figure things out. Our kids need this environment. And my youngest granddaughter, well, not my middle just started kindergarten there. She is loving school. She has struggled going to preschool. She didn't like it. She loved her second year, but now she's in elementary. Her older sister's there in fourth grade. They just love it. They're happy. They're thriving. Um, please give it thought and don't shut us down. >> Thank you for your public comments. Um, that is the end of comments. Um, next on we are going to move to the uh approval of minutes. >> Do we have a motion to approve the minutes? >> I move that we approve the

127minutes. >> I'll second. >> Okay. So, we have a motion by board member Clement and a second by board member Baitman. Do we have any discussion? >> Seeing none, all in favor, please say I. >> I. >> Any opposed? that passes unanimously. Uh, Superintendent Smith, the claims. >> You've received the claims in your packet. There's quite a few. Um, and would recommend that you accept the claims. >> Okay. Do we have a motion? >> I move that we accept the claims. >> Okay. Do we have a second? >> A second. >> Okay. So, we have a motion by board member Bon and a second by board member Wilson. Any discussion? >> Seeing none, all in favor, please say I. Next up, routine business. Superintendent Smith. >> The routine business items include a budget summary, uh,

128the Alpine Foundation board summary, personnel hiring and releases, as well as LEA specific licenses, and we are going to be looking at a few modifications on LEA specific licenses. So, there's a couple of holes that will get filled in. So those be more complete in the future and would recommend the board approve the routine business. >> Superintendent, do we have a motion to approve the routine business? >> I move that we approve the routine business and a second. I'll second. >> Okay. So we have a motion by board member Wilson and a second by board member Peterson. Any discussion? Seeing none, all in favor, please say I. >> I. Any opposed? Okay, that looks like it passes unanimously. Um, next up, we are moving to discussion and action items. Superintendent, >> we have five items

129uh tonight and uh it looks like Derek's queued up. Um although I think you're item four, so you're going to be sitting there for just a minute. Okay. Um we have a couple of policies. would invite Craig Brinkerhoff to come on up and review uh military leave policy 4164, military policy 4414, and then a homeschool policy 6048. Great. >> Thank you, Superintendent. Um, as mentioned, we we've been looking at the military leave policy. We wanted to make clarifications in this military leave policy. Um, one of the things that came up is that um, sometimes military leave is not done consecutively. It can be broken up into different time frames and our policy was more focused on consecutively. So, as part of an effort to clarify that and correct that, uh, we wanted to make sure

130that we were allowing did not have to be consecutive and that's what brought this policy to light and brought it to the policy committee originally. As we were doing that, we made a few other corrections and clarifications to try and make the policy better. We also compared our policy to the state required code. State required code does not apply to the school district in this instance, but the state allowed for 15 days for pay for military leave. And as a school district, we allow for 11 contract days or 15 calendar days. And so that's the way that the policy currently reads. In our policy meeting today, we talked about some possible changes to that to expand it even more than we currently have drafted. Um, but uh that's something that I think board members on

131our committee will have a discussion with you about happy to accomodate as you'd like. >> Okay. Do we have a motion regarding policy 4164? I move to approve policy 4164 with the following change. Remove of the consecutive um 15 consecutive dates or 11 contract days and change to 15 contract days. >> Okay. We have a motion by board member Lincoln. Do we have a second? >> I'll second it. >> Okay. Uh with a motion by board member Lincoln and a second by board member B. Do we have any discussion? >> I'd like to speak to my motion. I just appreciate the um opportunity we've had to work with the associations and work with our military teachers um to really make sure that we value the service that they provide to our communities. Um and so

132with that, we would just like to match what is guaranteed to other state agencies. Any other discussion? Seeing none, um with a motion by board member Lincoln and a second by board member Bon. All in favor of approving policy 4164 with the um uh suggested amendments, please say I. >> I. >> Any opposed? >> Okay, looks like that passes unanimously. Um I I think the this is classified and certified. So, did you need to speak differently about this one, Craig? >> No, same same changes, same reasons. Okay. To 44. >> Perfect. Do we have a motion um to approve policy 4414? I move that we approve policy 4414 military lead with the amendments as previously noted. With the previous amendment. Thank you. Yes. Uh and do we have a second? >> I'll second. >> Okay.

133So, we have a motion by board member Wilson and a second by board member Lincoln. Do we have any discussion? Okay, seeing none, all in favor, please say I. I. >> Any opposed? That policy appears to pass unanimously. Next up, policy 6048. >> Thank you. So, this policy is uh with regards to homeschool. There was change in legislation this past year with regards to homeschool and the affidavit home school. So, parents in the uh to do a notorized aid and provide that to the school. They had to do it annually in order to homeschool their child. Legislation changed that allowed parents to just give the school a notice of intent to homeschool. It didn't have to be notorized. It didn't have to be an official document that way. And that document lasts until the parent

134no longer wants to home. They don't have to do it anymore. So, we brought this policy up to speed to match with that and um make sure that it was in compiance with those changes. Thank you, Craig. Do we have a motion to approve policy 648 or we can leave it as a discussion item as well? I >> I move that we approve policy 6048. >> Okay. So, we have a motion by board member Clement. Do we have a second? >> Second. >> Okay. And then a second by board member Lincoln. Um, do we have any discussion regarding the policy? >> Okay. Just wanted to indicate, sorry, board chair. Um, there is a a link at the very bottom of the policy that you can examine the form that's required. And again, it's it's only

135required once and it's the duration of your intent to homechool. Any other discussion? Seeing none, um, with a motion by board member Clement and a second by board member Lincoln. All in favor of approving policy 6048, please say I. I. Any opposed? Here's that passes unanimously. Um, this is now where Derek gets to sit in the hot seat. Derek and Eric. Uh, first I just want to make a couple comments. Um, one, I appreciate and have a lot of respect for the individuals that have uh, not only showed up in person here to make comments based on these boundary adjustments, but also the individuals that have taken time online to let us know. I've gotten through almost every one of those comments online. There are quite a few there. We also had an opportunity as

136an operations team to go out and visit Cedar Valley Elementary, interview all the faculty and staff. I'm pretty sure almost every one of them. It was great to be able to get out and see that community and a lot of what you guys spoke about today as well. So, I appreciate the time you comment. Boundary adjustments are tricky. Uh they're never a popular thing. The difficult thing for my capital planning uh team is that we really weigh the balance of this district is unique in that it has almost as rapid growth as it does. And the way that you manage those first is by always doing a boundary study and those boundary studies always contemplate sometimes building a new school. It also contemplates doing a boundary adjustment. That's fiscally responsible. Sometimes it also contemplates the

137closure of the school. So as we weigh those two competing things between growth and decline, we really want to try to figure out what makes sense for that community. And as we go forward and we try to make sense of what the best decision, the most informed decision that we can give the data to the board to make public comment is always an important part of the process. And so as we move forward and especially as Derek talks about the timeline, pay specific attention for those of you who are listening online to when you can come and sign up and make And if you feel like you can't make it here in person, we read every one of those comments online, too. And we also go out and do personal visits as well because we

138want to feel for ourselves what what those decisions make that I appreciate the time that you've all taken to be here tonight, but also rest assured that as a team, we will study every one of those options. It was I mean, North Point, for example, the one that we're going to do right here, it's nuanced the timing of it. There's just a lot of variables that we need to take into consideration for this one, but it's clear that we need to do something to address it. The timing on this is one that we just can't read. And so that's why we're bringing it here today for a formal boundary. We informally study these schools all the time. But when we do a formal study, that means that we have to make out to the public

139to let them know that there could be action taken on your boundary process and there are legislative actions that need to for us to be able to do that. So even though we informally study schools, we don't usually formally study it unless we're pretty sure there needs to be a change and this is one of those that we really need to make sure that we're taking into consideration. So for that we really want to study these four schools to this point. So North Point, Lehi, River Rock, and Snow Springs. And as we get deeper into this, if there's other schools that we need to add at that point, we can do that along the way. This could take into consideration the potential opening of a new school could also take into consideration a boundary adjustment

140or a combination of both of those. So as we get into it and we start looking into the data then as a board if you direct us to continue to look even deeper into specific variables then we can do that. The timeline for this study is Derek. >> Thanks Eric. We're opening that first part there. We're opening uh the study if you vote uh to do so and notification goes out to families uh this week on that. Uh then we move to uh committee meetings. Uh members of the boundary committee include the principles of every affected school uh district staff from various departments uh and administration as well as uh parents from each of the schools that potentially impacted by the study. U will meet at least twice uh to develop some options for potential

141boundaries. Those will be posted online in October. Uh and an online feedback form will be available uh if I can get to it tonight, it'll be available after the board meeting. Otherwise, it'll be first thing in the morning and uh that'll be online. People can start giving uh feedback and then of course once the options are are available, families will be notified so they can get additional feedback on specifically on those those options and those specific Um, as for the opportunity to comment publicly, as Eric mentioned, uh, there will be a public hearing October 14th, uh, specifically for this boundary study, as well as at any of the board meetings that people can comment, an open house will, uh, we'll have in October at North Point Elementary. Uh, that's an opportunity more so for people

142to have discussion and get get answers to questions as they they can come and ask staff about the potential boundaries. Uh we'll wrap it up with a committee meeting if we need to refine those options to make a final recommendation to you as a board. Then November 18th anticipated final decision if you decide to make that at that point in time if we need to make some adjustments that might get bumped to a future date. But that's the timeline as it stands right now. Following the process I can that we follow a process through this. This isn't willy-nilly. Um, but one, we want to be thorough and give you the best information that we can so we can make the best decision possible helping students in their education. At this point, any questions that you

143have on that? >> So, I I just want to I guess have a little bit of clarity. I know that there have been comments about um taking the money starting the lease revenue bond process and I know that we discussed this in capital planning as far as the timing for the build. So can you speak to that as far as I think there's concern about does the boundary study delay a build if a build ends up being approved for lease revenue bond. So, can you speak to the timeline about it a little bit about how much time we need to build um and then like when the money comes and like because realistically regardless if we do a lease revenue bond now or in two months the school would open I mean if that gets

144approved the school would open in 27 regardless it wouldn't it wouldn't fast track it to open next year. >> That is correct. So, one of the things that we've tried to do is depending on what decision the board makes, we we didn't want to do anything on the capital plan to hold that up. So, that includes civil uh architecture, we want to make sure that we have started commissioning that. So, in the case that the board does pivot to building on Cold Springs, we didn't want that to be delayed. So, if we start that uh 18 months is a good timeline for my staff to be able to build an elementary school. Any less than that, we are really pushing it. school that we are currently building. We are going to be very hardressed to

145make sure that's there on time. We will, but it's very challenging. So, in this one, we want to give our uh our team plenty of time to be able to make sure that's viable, but we've started the process to make sure that should you decide to build on that property, we'll be ready to go. >> Thanks for clarifying the timeline. >> I just wanted to ask Eric if he has a full cast and crew helping him on this boundary study. >> I've got a partial cast and a full crew, but they did not cause the cast if that's what your question is. >> Okay. Do we have any other uh questions or comments for our operations team? >> Okay, seeing none, I will entertain a motion regarding the notification um of the elementary boundary the

146potential elementary boundary adjustment. I move to initiate the notification process to parents as required in the Utah State Code that the school board is considering school boundary changes for Lehigh Elementary, North Point Elementary, River Rock Elementary, and Snow Springs Elementarymber. Do we have a second? >> Second by member Baitman and a second by member Lincoln. Do we have any discussion regarding the motion? >> Seeing none, >> sorry, I looked So, I just want to clarify a couple things based on the many uh communications that I've gotten over the last several weeks. So, the schools that are on this are contemplating a boundary study. It does not have to impact the new build of Cold Springs, though it can. The reason that Lehi Elementary is on here is for consideration of boundary changes. This is not

147contemplating the closure of Lehigh Elementary. So, just one more time, this is a boundary adjustment study. The board can choose to decide in the future that we would like to build on Cold Springs and anything beyond that would be up for consideration. Do we have any other comments? Okay, seeing none, we have a motion by board member Baitman and a second by board member Lincoln. All in favor, please say I. I. >> Any opposed, please say nay. That looks like that passes unanimously. Okay, next up the notification for potential elementary boundary adjustment in Saratoga Springs and Eagle Mountain. >> Yeah, again busy season for the team. Uh this is another one specifically Thunder Ridge Elementary. Brook Haven is also large. These are all in consideration for is there a potential black thunder express lake to

148look at those boundary adjustments to see if there is anything that we can do to relieve those schools that might contemplate uh without the building on Mount Santo. Whenever we contemplate the building of an elementary school that's an expensive proposition $40 million in study session today and we go out for a lease revenue bond kind of we are very good going out for those bonds and getting a good interest rate on those. But you can also see how much interest that costs. And so it behooves my team to make sure that we are looking at all these different options before we look to move to build a new school. One more note on this. I think the challenge of balancing high growth but also decline in a school district is you see on both ends

149if you build these schools and you build them too close together and too quickly and all of a sudden that pivots and you start to see school decline then all of a sudden you're contemplating school closures and that's a whole other ball game too. So we're trying to look in advance you know 60 70 years down the road when these schools and these communities continue to decline we built them in a geographical to be able to keep these up so we don't have toate school. So that's the idea and sometimes boundary adjustments are needed to be difficult right now but in the long run that could be a very good decision for those communities in the future. So those are all considerations that we need to take in particular this one right here. So with

150that in mind we would like to move forward with the specific timeline rather than repeat everything this is exactly the same as the timeline except the public hearing is on October 28th in this instance for this boundary study. So um the uh I guess the other thing that's not mentioned on the slide but the open house will be at Thunder Ridge in October but the the process we're following making sure we're thorough and giving you the information that you need. >> Thank you. Do any board members have questions for our operations team? >> I guess I just have comment. Um, in general, you know, in in last November, um, the West area and the current Aspen Peaks, the, uh, Lake Mountain and Aspen Peaks, um, voted to become independent school districts. And I understand that

151there are current needs. Um and but when we talk about potential builds, um the south area is kind of building rich and that's kind of a a two-sided coin because these are old buildings that we rich in. So at at one point I was assured that that payments on these LRBs would be coming from the west portion of the capital fund and just when I hear um discussions of additional builds I don't know that that can be assured um with two LRBs and anyway as a representative of the south I have to say that we have significant uh needs that we are going to have to fill before July July 1st of 2027. And so whatever is done needs to be approached in an equitable manner and we need to have that discussion. Okay. Any

152other questions for our staff? Okay. So I will entertain a motion regarding the notification for potential elementary boundary adjustment in Saratoga Springs Eagle Mountain. I move to initiate the notification process to parents as required in Utah State code that the school board is considering school boundary changes for Black Ridge Elementary, Brook Haven Elementary, Pony Express Elementary, Silver Lake Elementary, and Thunder Ridge Elementary. Okay. And I will second the motion. Um, we have a um motion by board member Lincoln and a second by board member King. Do you have any discussion on it? I just want to speak to the motion that in an area of the district that is growing, I'm just excited that we are still looking at at making sure that we're meeting students needs today and tomorrow that we're taking care of

153students in 2025, 2026, 2027, and continuing on. And I just am excited to start forward with this process of looking at boundaries and seeing how we can best meet the needs. Um Eric, just one point of clarification. This means that Black Ridge is a part of two separate boundary processes at this time because the other one that we're doing regarding Cedar Valley, uh mountain trails, desert sky, all that kind of fun stuff. And then now they're part of this boundary study as well. Correct. >> Yes, that is correct. And even if it might impact just a small sliver of a boundary, we have to include them. So we fully transparent in exactly what ways that can impact and especially when parents and community are looking for specific information. We'll make sure that our website is

154updated so they can go to that website and getting the information that they need, but they're also free to reach out to us as well if they have questions on why their school is included in a particular boundary and what that would mean for them. >> Okay, thank you for that. Any other comments? Okay, seeing none, all in favor of supporting the motion made Board member Lincoln and seconded by board member King. Please say I. >> I. >> Any oppose say nay. Okay, it looks like that passes unanimously. Um, next up, uh, superintendent, we have our membership report. Looks like it's still on. Okay, so uh, you have your membership report that is post Labor Day count. Couple of highlights. Um, some of the schools noted in the studies are growing. Um, our elementary enrollment

155is sitting at 41,647. Um, it's a little bit lower than what was projected, but still more than last year. Junior high, uh, the enrollment is sitting at 20,822, a little bit higher than projection. in our high school numbers are sitting at 21,730 also a little bit higher than projection and uh for a total of 84,659 or about 128 students more than what was projected. Now that will change a little bit before the official count but that's where we're sitting and again some of the hot spots um were noted by our operations team. It is now time for board member and superintendent reports and information items. All right. I had a few things. Um I shared this earlier in study session but I wanted to share it board meeting for those who may not have been

156listening. Um board member Lincoln and I went and attended the uh sped all hand staff training at the beginning of school and it was beginning of school is excited exciting anytime. Um but to have all of our speech language pathologists smart BCBAS the area directors in one room it was it was just a very cool opportunity. The dialogue was great. Um the planning just you know also being able to the board is very aware of your your case loads and the other things you um have to take on and Dr. Darington really just did a fantastic job. So, we're really excited to have him with us for the next uh couple of years. The other thing I wanted to talk about is um Frank Pulley and his incredible physical facilities team did some amazing things

157over the summer. Um and I just wanted to thank them for their projects. We have four fields that had track and turf uh replaced Lehi Jr. for those of you who been around long enough to There used to be two grass mounds and during the course of the year the students would wear all the grass away and then when summer would come they would come and recede it and it would grow and then we would just rinse and repeat every year and now it is even and it's all beautiful concrete and uh it was no small task. So just really appreciative to them and their efforts. And then the last thing I I wanted to share is um it's always as a board member always trying to find that balance with the number of people

158that want to reach out and have a conversation and who we can get to in And so just a thank you to the North Point community. We had a great visit with them last week, great dialogue, and I just anytime we have a really engaged uh school community, it makes us all better because they're able to share the things that we don't get to see every day. We're able to kind of share from our perspective what happens in our community committee meetings and then in our discussions with each other. So just very appreciative of everybody that shows up to help kids and to be part of the process. Oh, and was the Swing for the Stars Alpine Foundation golf tournament. Uh Tyler Big, our foundation director, did a fantastic job and Karen as well. It's

159it's a fun event to watch everybody come up come out and show up for kids. And while we appreciate their um financial contributions, we really appreciate the dialogue. So having community partners that may or may not have kids in our schools, but coming to support um this tournament helps to fund our stars reading program in the summer, which is targeted reading intervention for students who wouldn't otherwise have that. And so just thanks to all who came out and made today a great day. Just want to say how wonderful it is to uh begin that process of uh attending school events, the the S the PTA meetings in particular. And I Wanted to do a shout out to all of those parents who have accepted leadership opportunities and are knocking it out of the park. We're

160not talking about gathering with, you know, four or five people in a room. The the meetings that I've attended so far are 15 to 20 people, fully staffed rosters. People know what they're doing and the meetings are so well organized and or and so well conducted. I just want to say hats off to our PTAs and if you haven't already, join your PTA whether you can put in the time or not. They need your support and they they need they need you uh with whatever you can bring to the table. I just wanted to give a huge shout out and a thank you to all of those who have helped make the start of the 2526 school year so successful. for the teachers, the education support professionals, including but not limited to paras drivers, kitchen

161staff, librarians, um sped professionals, administrators, counselors, district staff, crossing guards, parents, and students. It's been so exciting to have students back in the building and to see the excitement as learning is occurring. And so, I just wanted to thank everybody that's been had a part in that roll out. Um I just wanted to uh extend gratitude. We had uh multiple legislators who met last week and I wanted to thank um Representative Grecious, Representative Shepard, Representative Hansen, res Representative Shallenburgger, Representative Christopherson and Senate Bald Senator Baldy um for meeting with us. I think whenever we can have legislators in our schools who see the phenomenal work that our teachers are doing, that's always a positive experience and I appreciate them taking time to invest in public education. Um, also wanted to e echo what Stacy was

162saying about our physical facilities. They fulfilled more than 2,000 work orders this summer to the tune of about 11 million worth of projects. I think sometimes we think of physical facilities being new builds and yes that's a piece of it but there is an extensive amount of um work that goes on behind the scenes whether it's replacing carpet or fixing um updating gyms and auditoriums there's a high level of maintenance that goes into our schools and our physical facilities goes above and beyond so I'm incredibly grateful for that um I also wanted to thank Karen Coats she is one of our teachers at Sage Canyon who has um been very focused on making sure that all students have a phenomenal experience and she has uh all of her classes have like 40 students in them.

163She's very very popular. Um and I had the chance to be in her class a couple of times last week and in one situation when you have 40 13 year olds focused on a teacher and just enthralled by her that's a magic I cannot communicate um what that is to have those kids so enthralled with their teacher and what she's instruing. She also has created um an adaptive ceramics class to make sure that students of all abilities have access to art and I was able to witness the way in which she is so intentional about exposing all students and helping them um achieve and fulfill their IEP goals. And so I'm grateful for that. And then also want to just give a shout out to all of our teachers who will be celebrating Constitution Month

164with our students this year um and putting forth the effort to do that. So I just want to extend my gratitude to them in advance. Do we have any other public Can I do one more? Um, I want to thank DT, our district leadership team, and our supervisors. Um, I tell people that working in public ed is like choose your adventure that you don't actually get to choose. It's just every day is a fun surprise. Um, and I have just been fully impressed with the way we've had some things pop up that nobody planned for. Um, and just the speed with which our superintendent was on site, the board members on site, we have leaders on site. It's really remarkable how quickly that they can get where they need to be to support um the

165leadership in the building and get what needs to be done. And um I think they're kind of this unseen leadership team that just goes around making things happen. And so I just want to say thank you to all of you that are all over the district all day um every day. And um we appreciate everything you do for our students and our school teams. >> So we do have need Oh, >> no. I'm just going to jump in. I don't mean to prolong the meeting, but um I have a few thank yous I want to share. Um thank you uh to the board for the opportunity and the privilege to serve. Thank you to the parents who came tonight and shared your thoughts. We partner with you in the education of your children and it's

166a privilege and honor to to be part of that. And so thank you for that. um a thought I'm going to share tomorrow morning in our captainsmies, our student leaders in our sport programs and athletic programs. Passion passes and I want to acknowledge the passion tonight and thank you for it. If you didn't care, you wouldn't show up. And so, thank you for caring and showing up. Passion passes, but resolve endures. And so, thank you to our students and to the one that stood up. Courage is not always loud. It's steady and it's consistent. And thank you for coming and sharing with us tonight. And um yeah, I think that's pretty much all I got to say, >> superintendent. Appreciate that. So, we do have need for a close session. Um I will entertain a

167motion. >> I move that we go into close session to discuss personnel property litigation. Yes, ma'am. Um and do we have a second? >> Second a motion. >> Thank you. Okay. So, we have um a motion by board member Wilson and a second by board member Clement. We need to do a roll call. Um all in favor of board member Wilson I. Board member Lincoln. >> Hi. >> Board member Clement. >> Hi. >> Board member Peterson. >> Hi. >> Board member King. I board member Baitman. >> Hi. >> Board member Bon. >> Hi. >> This meeting stands adjourned. Thank you.