001I know. I feel so grown up. We Ready? I'll start. Call to order the Monday, June 16th meeting of the Knesogga Valley Board of School Directors. Want to welcome all of you that are here and those that are joining us online. This is our second and general meeting of the month where most official votes are cast, many of which are listed on a consent agenda which includes items which are routine or have been discussed at our work session last week. Our meetings observe all legal and policy requirements to the best of our understanding ability and all agendas and available related public documents are posted on the district website. Will you please join me to pledge the flag? I pledge alce to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for it
002stands one nation under God. God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Mrs. Martin, may we have attendance, please? We have eight school directors present tonight. Mr. Gensel is absent. We do have a quorum in place. Are there any changes to the agenda for anyone? Any deletions, additions, or corrections? Yes, we had a um update today. The consent agenda item U, the student handbook. The handbook was uploaded today. I'm sorry. Would you give me that letter again? U. U. U. Okay. Student handbook. And then um action discussion item G policy 918 was updated today due to an editing error. If those are the only corrections, can we have a motion to approve the agenda? Mark's not here. Somebody has motion to approve the agenda. Second. All those in favor say I. Any nays or abstensions?
003If not, the agenda is is approved and we will start the meeting with uh board commendations. We would like to recognize and extend a big thank you to middle school par professional Joe Gardner. Mr. Gardner is a par professional in schools foundations programs and assists one of the programs students during band. Mr. Gardner plays the same interest instrument and attends practices with the student. Thanks to Mr. Gardner for handcrafting a stand so the student can continue to play the instrument comfortably. Thank you Mr. Gardner for your outstanding work and ded dedication to our district. A shout out to several prek students in Mrs. Girl's class at Leola. Of the students in her class that were screened for kindergarten readiness, all five were proficient for the overall performance level, three were proficient in their letter ID
004and two were advanced in their letter ID. Congratulations to the Foot students who were the top four finishers in the annual math 24 tournament. Third runner up, Brandon Time. Second runner up, Jason Gra. First runner up, Carter Johnson. And a 25 2025 Fritz Math 24 champion is Lucas Schlotsky. And if you look at that picture, I don't know who is who, but they're awfully proud of what they did. I would like to add one more kudo. It goes out to a group of uh Dr. department, Mel Upton, the A1 task force, and our entire staff. Uh, if you remember, we were fortunate to have Rachel man, a national recognized consultant on uh starting AI an AI in the public schools and uh she came and met with us and in return she was so impressed
005with what we've done that she's invited uh Mel Upton and Dr. Hartman to join her when she uh addresses other school districts. Uh it's always satisfying to know we're doing things so right. Superintendent's comments. Okay. Good evening everyone. Happy Father's Day. One day late for all the fathers out there. Uh I'm going to start out by introducing a few new staff members this evening. I'd like to start with Hannah Chadwick. Hannah, can you stand up and give a little wave? All right. Uh Hannah will be joining us as a first grade long-term sub at Fritz Elementary School for now. Uh Hannah is a CV alum who has her bachelor's degree in education from Millersville. This past school year, she has served as a long-term substitute for both first grade and as a reading specialist at
006Fritz. So, she's a familiar face to us. Uh as well as serving as a building sub throughout the year. So, she's she's been around and we're happy to keep her here this year uh in first grade at Fritz. So, the next two introductions are for new hires who we approved previously, but they were unable to make uh previous school board meetings, so we're we're bringing them in this evening. Uh so, first would be Olivia Hess. Olivia, could you stand up and wave? Olivia uh is going to be joining us as a high school English teacher. Uh she is also a CV alum. So Olivia uh has her bachelor's in English education from Millersville and also spent a semester studying abroad in Spain. She also serves as a girls lacrosse coach for CV and volunteers as
007an ESL instructor for Seeds. So welcome, Olivia. And finally, we have Brody Bonadio. Did I say that correctly? Bonado. Bonado. All right. Brody is joining us as a high school business teacher. So, Brody is not a CV alum, but we're not going to hold that against him. U, he has a bachelor's degree in management from the University of Pittsburgh at Greensburg, where he also played baseball, and he received his mers in business education from IUP. And most recently, he has served as a long-term substitute in special education and in biology with the Connellsville School District in Western PA. So, welcome. Welcome, East, Brody. All right. So, that concludes my new uh hire announcements. I do want to mention to the board and to everybody else, uh just a reminder, the next two days will be
008our administrative retreat. We're very excited uh to have Arbiner Institute come in uh to do some leadership development training with our entire ACT 93 admin team, not just our educational administrators, but our educ our principles and also our operational administrators in the district. So, we're just continuing to work to try to build a common framework and and a common language for for leadership with our team. So, we're we're excited about the next two days. We think it'll be a great opportunity for for our professional growth and to uh get some professional development for the folks who are typically responsible for other people's professional development. So, we're we're looking forward to that. That concludes my report. to the new uh the new hires. We want to welcome you today. Are there any board comments on district
009activities? Is there any correspondence from the secretary? There is not. Well, I have one. I received this from uh Nathan Mays from PSBA just thanking us for joining. I would read it to you, but I can't say for his handwriting. So, you're welcome to try to do that for yourself. When you see this, you'll know what I'm talking about. There are some words I've had that for a couple weeks and I still haven't figured out what some of the words are at this point in the meeting. Is there anyone that would like to address the board on an issue on our agenda? Is there anyone here from CVEA to address the board or any other employee groups? Then we will move on to the consent agenda. Does anyone have a comment or question about anything
010on the consent agenda? I I have just one and I'm not sure. I think it goes I don't know if it goes to Dr. Man whoever uh does the student um handbook. I had a question from that. I'm not sure who to address it to. That's a collective effort. So, just pose your question and one of us will feel the question wasn't so much a question as a concern. Uh when looking over all the various choices for discipline, one of them was a lunch detention. I personally have a problem with the idea of a lunch detention. I think every student deserves half an hour relief from lessons. And in lunch detention, it specifically says that they work with them on their lessons. Uh I'd like you to reconsider that. I I especially the kids that
011are struggling and for some reason the last thing they need is to have to give up their lunchtime too where they can't just relax. Uh I think most of us in our jobs if we they took our lunch away and told us we always had to work through lunch, we wouldn't be real happy. So I I just wanted to mention that uh if there aren't any other concerns, I will uh entertain a motion for the consent agenda or not. Motion to approve the consent agenda. Could we have a roll call? Oh, I'm sorry. Could we have a roll call, please? Dr. Martin. Hi, Mrs. Fiser. Hi, Mr. Hurst. Hi Mr. Tally. Hi Mrs. Capka. Hi Mr. Eie. Hi Ms. Trobridge. Hi Mrs. Grath. I that makes it unanimous. Am I right? That is unanimous. Okay.
012Uh for our action discussion agenda, uh before we get started, I I wanted to uh offer a little bit of explanation. uh passing this budget and the tax is one of the most important as well as impactful things of all of our responsibility. In May, we agreed unanimously to pass a 2.5% budget. We posted it um including we posted the tax rate and we filed it with the state. Sensing a lack of shy among the board, I asked our final approval included review. Second thought, maybe I should have left well enough alone, but that didn't seem terribly honest. What came to us last week was not the support for our decision I had expected, but basically a full review of the issue, which resulted in the a decision change for some of us, perhaps proving
013the lack of confidence in our original vote. Tonight, we are required to make a binding decision. As we've said before, we can change the budget, but what we passed tonight on the tax rate cannot be changed. Considering I can't recall this happening before, I think we need to explain ourselves if we're going to go forward with making a change after publicly posting an earlier decision. I I I just think that's only fair. Unfortunately, we are working with an even number of board members. Now, I have no idea how anyone's going to choose to vote tonight. And I don't expect anyone to cast anything other than an honest vote. Hard to read, isn't it? But there will be no tie vote. I want to make that clear. So, um, Mrs. Hunter, do you have anything to
014add this evening? I just have a few updates for you. Okay. I guess that we need another budget update. May I comment, please? Excuse me? May I comment, please? Yes. On that vote that we did in May, we did that with the understanding that we might want to change that in. I understand. I think I I think I made that announcement at every meeting when we talk budget. Just so you know, it just sounded like you Oh, no, no, no. All I'm saying is this is the first time we ever have done that. Y and uh it's been posted and people have read it and I think we just need to explain. That's all. Thank you. Yeah. And from May to June, we were hoping that we would get some updated information from the state,
015the governor's budget, but we have not at this point. So, so obviously today we have to um finalize our budget. We're required by June 30th and we have the two scenarios as Mrs. Grath said, a 2.5% millage rate increase and a 2.75% millage in rate increase. The um act one index is 4.0%. Uh we are anticipating that to decline over the next several years. assets based on several different formulas that the state has come up with on um basically the lo the state and federal economy. Um what's important to note too with regards to that is that because we are accepting the readyto-learn adequacy supplement, we can no longer file for exceptions that we might be eligible for and that would be specifically special education. So anyway, I bring that up to keep it in
016mind for you that, you know, we always have to continue to look at the budget down the road, 5, 10, 15 years down. And since we just passed another $15 million uh bond issue resolution, I wanted to point out what um um the amount of debt that we do have. And over the next 30 or so years, uh, we have to pay off principal and interest totaling $230 million. Our average annual debt service payment is about $7.9 million. and working with Scott Kramer and Alli Matchy from Raymond James, we are able to the way they've structured the bonds is that if we have some continued um bonded uh bond issues that we need to pass for future renovations or construction projects uh that our debt is staggered so that we can try to keep it
017at that level rate though with only slight increases. So, if you recall last week, I mentioned to you that I had a very um intense hour-long uh phone call with Standards and Pores bond rating agency, and they go through uh a whole scenario of different questions trying to evaluate our management team, uh what our plans are, uh fiscally, do we have a robust policies in place to ensure that we're um investing our um all the taxpayer funds properly? uh to ensure that um we have debt service limitations. You know there are certain parameters that we cannot go above with regards to our debt service. So no matter what we want to keep our um the district in a very very um secure financial condition and they have what they do then is go back and
018about 2 or 3 days later we get an updated phone call an updated report from them providing us with our bond rating. Our bond rating is a double A negative which is still very very strong uh showing we have strong capacity meet to meet our financial obligations and many of our peers uh in the area have the same type of rating too. So uh that is a good rating. The next uh slide I just wanted to provide to you some of their comments uh that they had written in their report specifically stating that we are forward thinking and we uh prioritize long-term planning. We we've have very large documents from back in 201617 regarding our future renovation and construction plans. This uh slide to the next one current and future continued challenges. This is nothing
019new. Um you've heard me uh stating this for the last couple months. You know, um we're still facing you increasing cyber uh tuition cost, transportation cost, and obviously the unknowns with uh the state budget and how much money we're going to get. All of that bringing us uh down then to the scenarios of the 2.5% 2.75%. So since last week, we didn't have any further budget adjustments to be able to make. So, if we increase our millage rate at 2.5%, we have a $1.3 million deficit. And if we increase the millage rate to 2.75%, it's a $1.2 million deficit. And that, as I've mentioned before, is because we're only including 50% of the readytolearn adequacy supplement. We have no guarantee at this point that we are going to receive that amount. That is not taking
020into account any potential cyber charter tuition reform. I we don't know if that will pass or not. Hopefully, it will at some point, but I don't know that it would affect be become effective for July 1st. So, anyway, um what I want to point out, too, when you were looking at the deficit is how do we how do we fill that gap? What where does where do we how do we balance the budget? We currently have a little over $15 million in our fund balance, which we also refer to as like a savings account. So we with each deficit we chip away at that little by little and what the recommendation is from the standards and ports bond rating agency is that our uh deficit should be about 15 to 17% of our total budgeted
021expenditures. If we go with a um either of these scenarios here we are still above the 15% but that's chipping away at us little by little. And to put things also into perspective for you, if we increased our millage rate all the way up to the index of 4% um that would still not balance our budget, our budget would be balanced with receiving the other 50% of the ready tolearn adequacy supplement. So we still have to keep not just this year in mind but the future years and u maintain a very strong healthy fund balance. So those are my comments for this evening. I will certainly open up to any questions. Adele, um, we are earning interest on the 15 million and that's part of our revenue. Yes. Isn't there a loan where we're limited?
022Is that the loans on the building constructions where we're limited to only getting so many percentage interest out? Oh, okay. I believe you you're talking about when we're investing the bond proceeds. Um, yes, there is a um the way we've structured our debts, we have to pay down that um that those bond proceeds within like 3 years, 30 was that 36 months um to be able to avoid um arbitrage. That's what it's called arbitrage rebate. Uh what it means is that when in an in an environment when our interest rates that we're earning are higher than the interest rates that we're paying out on the debt, we're not allowed to make money off the um the bond issues. We have to return that money then to the IRS. So right now we should be pretty
023good with the the last bond issue was um in 2022. We're in pretty good shape with not having to return any of that interest because we're spending down on that. And then the same will be true with um this $15 million that we just but uh borrowed because we'll be using that to wrap up or to pay for the Fritz renovations and and that's a change in the law. There was a time when we did make money off of arbitrage. Do you remember when that was changed? I do not remember when that was changed. There was a time we did quite well with that. Yes. You, you know, borrowed the money at one interest rate, invested at another, and it made a huge difference. Yes. I don't not sure I understand why they object to
024that unless it was being abused. Probably in that case may perhaps there was a school district that was borrowing money and then earning interest on it but not spending it down then you know you're paying the interest to the bond holders. It Yeah, it's probably abused. That's a shame we lost that. Mhm. Do you remember what our budget deficit was for last year? Uh for 2425 it was 900 um just right under $1 million. Yeah. And what my most recent projections are showing is that we're probably going to come in at a $600,000 deficit. Um just kind of dumb this down. So if we keep falling short and we keep pulling it from the general fund to make up that shortage. Yes. That affects our future bond rates for construction. Yes. Okay. And we're already
025looking at $230 million that we're paying back. And that would increase the interest rate. So that would blow that out of the water. Correct. Okay. So there is a downside. Yeah. Pay now, pay later. Okay. We we would have to come down pretty low before it affected our or our our credit rating, wouldn't we? I mean, we have a long way to go before that. And I noticed in the list of things that affect the credit rating, that's about the only thing we can control. There are a lot of things correct that are outside of our control that could end up hurting our our our bond rating. Part of the reason why they um changed us to a double A negative was not anything we're doing at this point but looking at the surrounding economic
026factors and economic influences and also looking too at our level of debt. Let's say the economic factors um stabilize or and but we kept increasing our debt without increasing our reserves, our savings account, our fund balance, then that could uh potentially also cause another um decrease. We we have that pretty much software. We don't we now where we keep our debt level yes the same. So one of the interesting things was when we were going through um all the PSBA policy reviews uh we our we had a policy for debt management and when PSBA came out with their recommendations they did not have a policy on debt management. I made sure that we carried that over and included with another policy and that's one comment that standards and pores really um kind of patted us
027on the back for that that we have a debt management policy. Now I think we have a right to be proud of the stability that we maintain in our budget in general. I have a question. How do we put money into the general fund our savings account? Where does that money come from? like if we keep falling short year after year after year, that's eventually going to be zero. Like where do we get extra money to put in that? Um the only the only way we can maintain our fund balance is just by having revenues here equal expenditures instead of dipping into the general fund. Yes, it's $15 million uh fund balance, but that can decrease quite quickly, especially with not knowing are we going to continue to get uh the same level of funding
028from the state. You we don't know. Okay. But yes, a lot of unforeseen can uh take care of that quickly, too. We did. Um so this year and the previous year in 23 24 uh we intentionally budgeted a deficit. Um our reserves were a little too high because you have to kind of balance that with have taxpayer increases but you're running a surplus. So, we wanted to balance that down and we're at a level those two years. Okay. Three years ago, three years ago, we actually um had some um transferred money into our capital reserve fund uh just to provide a cushion there. We had an excess in our general fund. we transferred it over to kind of level out the general fund so that we could have some um the capital reserve fund building
029up a little bit because of all these capital projects and Ken Johnson could certainly attest last year and the year or this year and the year before we've had some surprise um equipment failures which were rather costly. Any other questions? Okay. Would anyone like to make any statement or any comments before we move on to a vote? Actually, can I ask one more question? You can ask many as you like. In your I asked this last week, but to just make sure it didn't change. In your professional opinion, the 2.75 definitely makes you more comfortable. It does make me more comfortable that that 25 um percentage point difference over the next five years accumulates up to about $796,000. So, it does have an impact. And when we're trying to look at, you know, these debt
030numbers too, it's to me that's money that we um could be trying to Let me let me put it this way. If we don't have consistently um military increases to minimize the deficit, we are going to have a jump at some point. Correct. Mhm. And then now throw in the scenario we can't apply for exceptions because we're getting the adequacy supplement. So if that act one index comes down and it's been as low as 1.9% and that was about 10 years ago but if that index comes down to 2% then we cannot go above 2%. And then we have to start looking at um where what areas do we cut and I my philosophy is to try to build a budget and present you with a budget that does not affect programs at all. That
031index is that rely on the general uh economy. Yes. State is something that we have absolutely negative. We have no control of it. The state average weekly wage is one factor. No matter what we do with taxes or budget beforehand, that will still have the same impact. Correct. And I remember those days of little indexes. Yes. Yes. So now it's kind of a okay the act one index keeps going down but then if our special education costs continue to increase then we can't apply for that exception because yeah I just that that's an issue that we can't impact at all. Any other questions? Any comments anyone would like to make before we take a motion? I'll just make one comment to piggyback on what Adele said, but I cannot explain the budget process the way
032Adele can, but I put my full trust in her. But I just would like to remind the board, you know, the other other thing is we've we've committed to roughly a 4% increase in salaries to to all of our staff over the next 5 years. And that's kind of what brings fear and me. You know, uh salaries and benefits are 85% of our expenditures. So that's the biggest chunk of the pie of what we're spending money on. And we're we've committed to about a 4% raise annually. So you when you're only raising taxes a certain percentage, you can't sustain that by always dipping it into the fund balance. So I that I know that's a very general concern compared to all the intricacies of of the budget. But that's the way I look at it.
033When you look at what our number one expenditure is and what that is increasing on an annual basis, that's definitely a factor that plays in. Just to add to what what Adele shared, I agree on that. I saw that on there and I Yeah. Doesn't Doesn't that percentage come down just ever so slightly in the last three years of the contract? It waivers. It goes up and but it averages out to be about four. Yeah, it averages out to be about the current year was over 4%. 25 26 is going to be below 4% and then it's averages out. Any other questions or comments? If not, what we're going to do to try to make this a little more efficient, I'm going to take a um a a a budget to approve items A, B,
034and C because they all rely on the tax rate. So, we're going to vote once we do one of those, the others are set. So, we'll make that one vote uh depend well, no matter what the motion is. Mhm. So you want a motion to approve items A, B, and C with the mill rate the budget with a given tax increase with the mill tax increase of 2.75. I second it. We have a roll call, please. Give me a second. Didn't I just have a second? Oh, okay. I'm sorry. and she was asking for that. Making sure I got this right. So you're doing the budget and the millage rate all in one vote. You're doing the budget and millage rate. Budget includes tax rate. Yes. Okay. And the next item in B is the
035tax rate and the homestead farmstead exclusion. So it's depends on the tax rate. They brought us two sets of papers tonight. But once we set the tax rate and the budget, the others will be the same. That's why we can take it as one day. Okay. All right. Because all it does basically is repeat the tax rate. Okay. Dr. Martin. Hi, Mrs. Fischer. Hi, Mr. Hurst. Hi, Mr. Tally. No, Mrs. Capka. Hi, Mr. Eie. Hi, Ms. Trobridge. I Mrs. Gra no vote passed 6 to2 6 to2 so that passes at a 2.75 tax rate so you can burn the other set of papers okay that's fine I will say this work that's fine the state comes back with a bigger number I'm not going to forget this yeah I I when we get the other
036half of that of that money it shows up forgive me. Well, do you mind if I comment on on that? Okay. So, with I do so with a one point. So, at a 2 point, it happens. It happens every year. I know. But every year we come back and we we do this and then and then the state comes back and they they want to put more money in the into education and we get this big windfall gain and it's all for not. I I I'm pretty confident the other half of that money is going to be there, too. I I am, too. Yeah. But with um the 2.75% military increase, our deficit will be $1.2 million. If we do get the other half of that ready tolearn adequacy supplement, that'll drop us down to
037about a $500,000 deficit. Again, I think that we we don't know when that tuition cyber charter tuition reform is going to come through, but just keep in mind we pay out $1.6 million in cyber charter tuition each year. In what? Cyber charter tuition. Yeah. I mean, that would take care of our deficit. It would. And we hired people. So, you have two bill you have two uh potential bills out there. Both either of which could solve our problem very simply. Yeah. Agree. Mike and I have more confidence. Yeah. I I get it. You're still within 2% of a $95 million budget. You can make that work. I I I do want to No tax increase. That's fine. I do want to thank That's fine. Punching. I feel good doing it though. and uh and our
038board secretary, Mrs. Martin, for going through all the work it took to do to be prepared to go both ways and and especially after we changed. I know it was a lot of extra work, but I think our due diligence required it. Okay. Okay. Um the next motion I need will cover items both D and E. That is the commitment and assignment of the fund balance and the suspension of the per capita tax resolution which we do every year. Make a motion to approve items D and E on the cassette agenda. Second. Um I think we better just to be safe. Let's do a roll call on this. Mrs. Fischer. Hi. Mr. Hurst. Hi Mr. Tally. Hi Mrs. Capka. Hi Mr. Eie. Hi Ms. Trobridge. Hi Mrs. Grath. I Dr. Martin. Hi. Thank you. Can
039I ask um why have we been suspending the per capita tax in how many years have we Mrs. Cro? It's been what about 10 years now? It's been about 10 years. And actually I remember at last year's meeting you said why don't we just eliminate it instead of going through this again? and that just popped back on my radar last week and I didn't have time to look up what the appropriate resolution will be to be able to say we're eliminating it so we don't have to keep approving this every year. So I did remember that from last year but I definitely will take care of it for this coming for 2627 budget. I I remember when we did that and the idea was we we need to keep that in our back pocket. Mhm.
040You hit hard enough times. Uh we we may have to rely on that other many districts simply got rid of it permanently and there were only a few that kept it and we were one that felt uh it's a small vote each year and we always do it and we would never activate an extra tax except in extreme circumstances. Yeah. uh for the per capita tax, even though it was a $15 tax bill, we got more phone calls and more issues with that than we do about the real estate taxes. That was what was $10 ahead back then. It was $10 and then there's another t um another tax for $5. They just combined them for 15. Yeah. That's why we called it the nuisance tax. It was very timeconuming. It's still more work to
041make that a double vote, so we kept it. Yeah. Okay. Thank you. I want to thank all of you also for uh going through the budget process and I appreciated the challenges too. So thank you. And our next issue is uh for Mrs. Huninger's uh annual raise as part of her contract. That raised that's listed there is 3.63% 63% which is the same as what the teachers contract had. But I will need a motion to approve that pay raise and it's based on her evaluation also. I move to approve item F on the agenda. I second it. Can we have a roll call, please? Since it is a financial decision. Mr. Hurst. Hi. Mr. Tally. Mrs. Miss Kapka. Hi, Mr. Eie. Hi, Miss Trobridge. Hi, Mrs. Graf. Hi, Dr. Martin. Hi, Mrs. Fischer. Hi. That
042was unanimous vote. Okay. First reading of district policy 918. Are there any questions or concerns about the policy? If not, I'll take a motion to approve the first reading. Motion to approve the first reading of Second. All those in favor say I. I. Any opposed or abstensions? If not, the first reading is approved. And the last item is approval of powerhead power hub. Dr. Well, good evening everyone. Um, as Mr. McGraw continues with his team to refine and implement Power School. We're coming across different items that will help us do that and enhance the experience of our our students, teachers, and parents. One of those items is is this power hub and school messenger. And while this was not something we were planning on doing at this moment, as looking through what's being presented to
043us from the vendor and so forth, it makes sense to do this. It's a it's a winwinwin meaning those three groups students, parents and teachers actually and administrators um will really benefit from this new interface. It allows us to uh it supports 130 different languages um as you may have seen in there. It works on uh textable um interfaces for teachers to be able to text parents from their computers and so forth. So it allows enhancement of communication there. It also is u functions a little easier because it's uh part of the powers school cy rather than something outside of it. So that's helpful. Also it'll help us with um integrating a number of the forms and documents that we already do. For example, e collect is a is a program that we use to
044create forms within the system. You probably filled some of the forms out online as parents and didn't realize it, but that's what that is. uh as well as looking at um things like enrollment express and so forth. Another product that will um bring an enhancement is it's called um safe arrival. It's actually an attendance component. It'll allow parents to submit their excuses electronically, doctors and otherwise. So um which is nice. Um we currently do that kind of via email, but this is more secure and um personable this way. So, so it has that enhancement. Um, let's see what else is there to share. Now, there's coming off the the conversation with the budget, there's no budgetary impact this year. While it is an addition, I mean, so it is an addition. It's no budgetary impact
045this year because we're able to work with them to get some money back from um discontinuing a service that we had. So, that's part of it. Another part of it is we're um working on moving the contract with powers school from November to July 1. So we're by making that shift is going to allow us to do that. So come next year we'll see the the cost of this which is in line with currently what we're almost paying for the current product and then next year we'll work on getting rid of that that product. Any questions? Are we currently locked in? Who do we currently use? We currently use um parent link and are we locked into a contract with them? We are. So I think it's a fiveyear contract. Okay. And and we are
046looking at the is it five or it's five years. We just finished up year one, right? And so we're looking into a way of working out of that. Well, we don't know like are we going to be responsible for paying for those other four years? possibly. So, we broke out the that contract includes the website as well as the messaging component. Obviously, the website is the bulk of that um final site contract. We priced out with Final Site. The messaging component, parent link, is about $7,000 a year. I have a meeting lined up with them. We can't get out of it, but they have other options that we can put that $7,000 towards if it's not going to be the parent messaging system. Um, so I had to be lined up with that to see
047what those $7,000 options are. So like in store credit type thing, be able to use it for something else. We won't be losing that paid for. It's just going to be it's not going to be parent link anymore, right? I don't know if it's going to be a website enhancement. Um, so that's what I'm Okay. Any other questions or concerns, more information? Yeah. Just one other thing I just noticed here to share with you. Um, one of the features is called Power Buddy. I'm not sure what they called it yet, but PowerBuddy and it's an AI component which will allow us to uh put in any document we want. For example, the student handbook as as one example and it'll allow parents just to ask questions and it'll give you the information just like that.
048Um so any district uh uh document policy for example, if we load it in and teach the system, we have to teach it. Um it'll help with people being able to search for documents and find information. So that's a, you know, as AI continues to develop, that's a I think a um a good incentive or or at least a good tool for for parents and others looking for information um from the district. Just wanted to mention that. And that will be limited to just exactly what that document says. Yeah. Yeah. we and limit it to our documents. You know, we have to put our documents in, right? And so the functionality of the AI allows people to search our our our document. It's not going out on the web. It's not meaning going out and,
049you know, finding an answer from some other handbook or something. There is an article in the Lancaster paper today about the about something getting people together and all they put their documents in, they hit AI to do whatever and AI put in a whole bunch of change things around to wrong information, right? And and I think it's not to be down a rabbit hole, but I think that's part of the challenge with AI as we continue to um as that continues to advance, you know, there's some shortfalls. I mean, it's not the end all be all. However, it's a powerful tool, but there are things you have to be very careful with. So, what is the actual annual cost of this? There's a bunch of different the actual the the contract reads 74,679. Okay. Right.
050And we're currently paying what? This is over we're currently for um school messenger. We're paying Oh, for apparently it's 7,000 kids roughly 7,000 a year. This is 74,000. No. Um I don't have the contract in front of me. I'm trying to see it. According to this, the three-year total is 91,700. It looks to be roughly 330,000 a year. Is that right? That's in the very first. I looked that up and had up at the top is where I'm looking. Yeah, the top of the page up at the top there. Right there. The total license and subscription fees. I can't it's too far for me to show the the three-year breakdown where it's roughly around 30,000 a year. Okay. So some of that was the for the tool that that replaces parent link but some of
051it's the the um the additional features like the Yeah. Right. It's not just correct there the other features of it. We don't have to use we don't have to purchase all those other features. It makes sense to purchase all those other features because it enhances the product itself. But the messenger piece of it um which is the school messenger broadcast and I believe the school messenger two-way piece would be the the part that's equivalent to the the um Is that what we're voting to approve though or are we approving all of all of it? Well, I'm recommending all of it. Yes. Are you wanting to add the trade services? That's an additional 3,000 at the bottom. No, I believe that is part of um what they will wave for us. Um one of the things
052and Dr. Hartman, maybe you can help me with this. Um part of of Let me try a second. They waved that and there was something else, Dr. Harmon, that that we wanted them to wave, which they did. I know some of when we were speaking with Adam some of the some of the training and implementation costs he was asking some of the setup costs some of the setup cost right because we're already a power school customer right so all these other features other than the messaging part of it we already have in our program though no like like the um the safe arrival we don't have that um the power buddy AIP piece. We don't have that in anything else. Um the power hub engagement piece that that um the tool that helps pull all
053this together, we don't have that um in in anything that we have right now. Um my power hub um that is part of what we own. Um however, we don't have a language piece of it, 130 languages. Okay. So we're asking to go from currently we pay about7,000 we're asking up that to 74,000 to get a better messaging along with a power body the AI side of it right the attendance component of it um and in a two-way is what we currently have that bad to justify all about the $70,000 increase. I know that's that unusable. No, I won't say it's that unusable. It's not that um this enhancement is is that is is good. I'm not going to say it's it's 74,000. I can't say that. But this um in looking at other districts
054that that utilize this is it's recommended. I mean it we've checked with a number of local districts that have gone this way and they strongly recommend they recommend it because of the uh the enhanced interface as well as the um um supports to the to the community and the parents. Okay. It's 30,000 a year, right? Not not 70,000. Correct. Correct. Yeah. Oh, what exact dumb this down. What exactly is this? Is this like on the app you can message parents and teachers and students back and forth like is that what it is? It's part of that. Yeah. But the parents have to go in and physically open the app to see, oh, do I have an alert? Because I will say that's a PITA. So I'd rather get the alert in my email and then
055why have an app when it's in my email? Have it's going to do both. I mean it'll send email. them why why send the message two different ways when an email works. So that's what I'm saying like I don't I don't see the use of this uh part of when when we communicate with parents uh asking parents which way do you prefer to be communicated with and so this gives us more functionality that way you know if somebody prefers an email that's obviously the way we can communicate with them that's what I had an issue with a teacher she said she could only message parents through this and I said well I never I'm not contacting you through So I said, "Yeah, I prefer email." But she never. So I was completely out of the
056loop of everything going on in the classroom. So saying that, I'm just worried about what that should be done, what is actually being done, that there's a discommunication there. Um, but I agree like we already have something worth $7,000. Why don't we continue that contract and then look at this for $7,000 versus $30,000. That's where I'm sitting. But I know through our conversations with Adam and his team, um, you know, and and I once again, Adam knows this like the back of his hand more than we were one of our one of our bigger big picture goals, uh, that that we sort of have tasked Adam with when he came in to his position last year, we talk about it as a cabinet pretty frequently, is we we A lot of one challenge we're facing
057is we we have a lot of things in a lot of different locations in this district. Uh that's a layman's way of saying you know we have this platform for this you know and so we are one of our goals one of the things we've tked Adam with doing is really trying to bring everything under as few umbrellas as possible and I and he this is an his efforts in doing that and I think what they found was uh some of the interfaces with this they found were a lot more parentfriendly than if they just now go into what power school looks like. uh you know uh it it's going to kind it kind of is a hub. One of the things this will allow for is everything to kind of make sense under under
058P school uh with how parents see it. There's more of it like the dashboard that the parents will see is is easier for them to navigate between different powers school tools and solutions. It also we think will eventually allow us to maybe eliminate some of those other outside tools that we're either using uh comprehensively across the district or maybe just tools teachers have found that you know teacher A might use this tool to communicate with parents versus teacher B uses this tool like Seesaw and different things like that that are out there. So what we're see this is more of a big picture trying to bring everything under under the umbrella. uh as much you know I don't think you can ever completely bring everything under one umbrella uh but trying to bring as much
059under that powers school uh you know column as possible because I think after we got over some of our initial challenges last year with powers school and we realized some of those weren't powers school issues maybe as much as they were implementation issues here uh where where Adam and his new team were able to come in and be able to figure things out and troubleshoot things a a little more effectively and we realized, oh, maybe P school wasn't the issue and so now we're discovering some some solutions with Power School that we think now let's give them a chance now that we're seeing some success uh with P school. So, I know that's not a total explanation of every everything this does, but through when Adam came and proposed this to Dawn and I and
060and Dr. Koser, he had a really nice way of of laying it all out and showing how these really lead to a longer, you know, tool of being able to get rid of things like parent link, some of our I don't want to name it proprietary tools, but some of the other tools that we're using in isolation right now, uh, and bringing them all under one house. And I would add that in year one, they're discounting it to the point that it's zero cost um, to us as part of this Can I make a suggestion for in the future? I feel like I need a spreadsheet. Like what do what do all these things really contain? Because I feel like there's more depth to it than what is being said right now. So that would
061be helpful to better understand what all these things can do because I have a feeling the AI tool can do way more than just help parents search something. Do you know what I mean? Mhm. So that would be helpful information to have to justify the cost time limited. Um yes in that um what what I'm asking is could this be put off to the July meeting? The answer to that is yes. I mean it could the the challenge with that is it then is for implementation in the fall may be questionable because of the work that needs to go into setting things up. I mean I I mean it's your prerogative that we can put it off to July and get more information on it. Why don't we do this? Obviously, the administration would like
062this software, but maybe next time we'll put like maybe a one half a page little business case about why you want to have the software in the just in the future. What What's the board's pros and cons? You're just more detail. That's my personal I'm just put Adele through the ringer, you know, trying to pitch every single penny we can and then we're have in my opinion having a hard time justifying, you know, a $23,000 increase a year. That's just my personal opinion. If if they can Well, maybe we put it through the ringer so we could afford this. Yeah, we just increased it the percentage millage. So, this is a rounding error. Could I just get a a quick response? Would everyone like to wait and get more information? Well, I don't know if
063that's going to make a difference or not. Don't look at me. Nod your head yes or no. I'm I'm okay with it. I'm noticing that the subscription period starts tomorrow. But if it can be held off till next month, it can't be. It would just delay our implementation plan for it. But yeah, I think that date was chosen because we and we only have one meeting in July, I believe. If I have no motion to approve it, then it gets put off. You know what? I'm going to make a motion to approve it and then we can do a vote and they'll be either yes or no. Okay. Is that your motion? Is there a second? I'm not I haven't made it yet. Okay. I um I have a feeling we need a roll call
064vote. We will need a roll call vote for this. Yeah, I think so. This is to approve. I go first. This is to approve it. Now, just so everyone understands what the motion is and move on with our lives, can I just comment? My vote will hinge on the fact that Adam has done such good work. If you're going, you don't not allow you to explain your vote. We simply need a a yes or no. You're good. I'm just saying that I've got a lot of confidence in Adam's work and what he said. Like I just said, parliamentary procedure does not allow you to explain your vote. We just need a yes or no. Could we have just a yes or no? Right. But I don't know that. So I have I have a motion
065from Tally and a second from D. Are we ready to vote? Yes. Mr. Tally? Yes. Mrs. Capka? Mr. Eie. Hi, Ms. Trobridge. Hi, Mrs. Grath. I Dr. Martin, hi. Mrs. Fiser, hi. Mr. Hurst, hi. Motion passed 7 to one. I I will suggest this. Uh, since Mr. Hurst is especially interested, and I think everyone else is to some extent, could you still bring us back that detail? Does that Yeah, per perhaps bringing Adam in would be good. Does that make it hurt a little less? At least we'll get we'll get the explanation that we understand betteration and all the backing magic stuff. Thank you for your patience. Okay. Are there any concerns or questions or comments about the finance and operations report? the curriculum and instruction report. Dr. Hartman is anything on federal funds? Not
066this evening. Um I will start with my IU report. I have posted it with I have one uh addition to the training. Uh there's a company called CM Regent that is PSBA's uh insurance company and they are part of what we call our alliance partner companies that that work with PSBA. June 18th at noon they're having a a webinar. Uh it's uh advertised as a safety committee investigation, supervisor investigation, and school administration investigation. I assume that means the investigations they do, not investigating those departments. They didn't make that clear, but I'm sure that's what it means. If anyone's interested in that, please go online. I do not have an IU report for some reason. Um, we've started getting the information late. So, you're always, as of now, you're always going to be one one month
067late on my IU report. and Langston County Academy has not met since graduation. Mr. Hurst, do you have anything for us from Career and Technology Center? Okay. And is there a construction team update? Uh, anything from the vice president? Any other reports? At this point, would anyone like to address the board on any issue on or off the agenda? Are there any board announcements or comments? I would just remind you for those of you that are participating in advocacy that this is one of those three weeks that they're pushing very hard for it. The dates for our next meeting are on there. We will have a uh a retreat next week. Is there anyone that is not going to be at the retreat? Well, Julie will not be there. Phil H will not be there.
068I think I already have your name. Okay. In that case, I would accept a motion to uh adjourn to executive session um to discuss the scheduling we use for staff interviews and uh the board will be discussing its schedule for superintendent evaluation. Could I have a motion? All those in favor say I. Opposed? We are returned.