11/3/25 Board Meeting

001[Music] Yes. [Music] Heat. [Music] Holy Spirit. [Music] Heat. Heat. [Music] Well, then he's got to unmute them. We're good to go. All right. Good evening, ladies and gentlemen. Like to welcome you to the Penman School District Committee of the Whole for Monday, November 3rd, 2025. The next scheduled meeting of the Pen Manor School Board will be held on Monday, November 17th, 2025 at 700 p.m. in the large group instruction room of Penmanor High School. An executive session was held prior to the committee of the whole meeting for the purpose of discussing personnel and a student matter as detailed above. Mrs. Rhodess, may we have a roll call, please? >> Or Mr. Beaks >> here. >> Mr. Her >> here. >> Mr. Lombardo >> here. >> Mr. Straw >> here. >> Mr. Swigert >> here. >>

002Mr. Warfl >> here. >> Miss Word is absent. Mrs. Napiger >> here. >> Dr. Fullerton >> here. >> Eight board members present. I would love to entertain a motion to approve our minutes of October 6, 2025 if we can remember back that far. >> So moved. >> Thank you. A second. >> Second. >> Thank you. Any further comment or question? All those in favor. >> Eight affirmative votes. >> At this time, board development opportunities and reports. Any reports from the water park? Mr. Lombardo? Sure. What all do you want to know? >> Uh nothing about the water park. >> Well, good because I didn't go to it, but um it was good. Uh it was a good experience. Uh I went to a couple trainings about a a couple about AI and education. I found

003those insightful. Also went to uh about construction and avoiding pitfalls of that whole process. That was also um good. I do have to say our learning facilitators and Dr. Dr. Gail put on a presentation which I attended super wellreceived, very well done. Um, and they were I was speaking to a lot of school board directors and even some superintendants from across the state who very impressed with what's going on here and and how that all works. So, it was they did very good job and should be praised for it. >> Thank you. And and Mr. Lombardo is referencing the PSBA conference that is held at the proper name is the Kalahari >> Resort >> Conference and Resort Center >> and also after the the conference I had to do the the delegate duty. So I

004voted on like the upcoming agenda for PSBA's congressional uh agenda, I guess, for the year. >> Do we know what that's going to be yet? >> Uh yeah, I I can send it out. >> Okay. All right. Are we are we having new items or are we going to rehash the same thing we've been rehashing for the last five years? >> They kind of just made modifications to it. >> They cut out some like things that weren't really applicable anymore because of like new law that came up. So, they cut some of it out. >> Okay. >> That was the bulk of it, but it's pretty much all the same. There's nothing really new. >> Okay. >> Well, thank you for attending. >> Thank you. >> We appreciate that. >> Any other board reports, Mr.

005Strong? Yes sir. Thank you. The uh CTC meeting uh from October 23, 2025 at the Will Street campus and uh we did have of course our enrollment report which reflects currently a weight list weight listed students of about 599 remembering that that can include students on two different weight lists. So actually uh the students that do are not in a program are 330 and seats opened 1999. So again little better alignment would help that weight list as far as some of the seats open uh you know a little little better uh usage of some of the uh program availability and uh but the other uh we do have 1557 seats filled with students ready to go. So, >> I think that's uh fantastic. And Mr. Beats will be and is a member of the expansion

006uh program expansion committee and uh some meetings coming up and I know they're going to make some inroads on the weight list. Maybe not solve the problem completely but but certainly help. So we uh also one of the things that is not a weight list issue but is uh a student co-op position. They've started with two students being hired with the working with the communications coordinator at the CTC. So there's two students that work 12 hours per week, $12 per hour for 29 weeks for the year. So, and I think they're going to look at other uh similar jobs with the CTC that can be done by students and uh create some some more co-op positions, which they're doing very well. We have already co-op openings. 47 uh students were ready to start last week,

007and that is almost double the amount that at this point in time last year. So that's uh tremendous for the hands-on opportunities that exist there as we know. Uh there is also the approval the meeting of the limited enrollment list which is the list of programs that the homeschoolers are not permitted to apply for enroll until after the uh sending school students have had every opportunity for those spots. So they are the it's the list of the usual programs that are fully uh stocked with students. Auto tech, culinary, carpentry, the medical assistant programs, welding of course, heavy equipment operation and then majority of the introduction half day programs. So that is been the case for quite a while to CTC. That is a policy of the Lancaster County CTC that homeschoolers are given uh the

008opportunity but only after the sending schools students are given the first opportunity. Also, we had on I attended the uh on the 28th of October the general advisory committee GAC committee in Brownstown. And uh that is a group of uh Langster County folks from various businesses, hospital positions, u heavy equipment, BR Krider uh folks are there, but we did a tour of the heavy equipment program there is all unbelievable program. and the amount of equipment and they have a a large area in the back at Brownstown where they're able to operate everything and and make uh you know these students are really coated when they complete that program and most of them are out on co-ops at least for the second part of the year and the uh the individual from BR Krider who was

009there said the the students are fantastic and one thing they know is where to be and where not to be. So, from a safety standpoint, we're not to be found. So, uh the other program that we took a a quick tour of was the materials handling and logistics program, which we've talked about before. And this is a a program for students that have some limitations, uh but the ability to do this kind of of work, which is really plentiful in Lanster County with all the warehouse work. and they were actually out or would be going out that morning uh to Henry Shine and do on the job training and uh it's I'm not sure how many Pen Manor students we have there this year but generally we we have a few that attend that program

010and uh it's it's one of the few I think in in the state of Pennsylvania that is particularly related to material handling and a good career for for those students. So, thank you for that. That's my report. Any questions at all? >> Thank you, Mr. Stro. And and if memory serves, that's was your last >> That was my last meeting. Yes. >> Yeah. They don't have one in November. >> No, they don't. >> So, >> Mr. Peaks will be taking over the reigns there. be jumping in. Yeah. >> Yeah. >> So, >> we'll be tagging somebody to be the function as the alternate, you know, um when we do our updates for that. So, thank you, Mr. Stro, for >> you've been doing that a long time since you remember. I Yeah, you were when

011I was you were there. Yeah. >> So, very good. >> Thank you. >> Any other reports? board opportunities. >> Sure. So, um this Wednesday we have our board breakfast at 8:15 at Mardik Elementary. And then also, um coming up in November, Tuesday, November 18th is the Saxon and Stump legal breakfast at 7:30 at Lancaster Country Club, complete with an omelet station. I'm bummed I can't be there, but if you have not RSVPd yet, >> tonight, you need to let Mrs. Rhodess know or you will not be getting the omelet station. and also educated on education law for an hour and a half. >> Right. >> Going. >> Are you going? >> I'll let you know. >> Okay. >> Before the end of tonight >> because I've only heard from three people. So, six of you

012need to let me know tonight. >> All right. Okay. So, let's move into item number one. Dr. Egan, we have some new teachers here tonight. >> We do. We have three new teachers and administrator that >> we have joining us this evening. If you guys could come forward at the podium, just introduce yourself and go from there. >> Um I'm Skyla Taglearyi. Um I graduated from Montana State University and I've been teaching for 5 years. Um I'm super excited to start teaching kindergarten at Konesoga Elementary. Um, and one of the draws to Pen Manor is the fact that I graduated from here in 2017. Um, so I'm super excited to be back. And since I've started teaching, I always wanted to teach at Konesoga. Um, I grew up just right down the road from it.

013And so I can't wait to be a part of their little community. Thank you guys. Hi everyone. My name is Cassidy Cutler. I am a 2014 graduate of Edinburghough University. Um, coming mid November, I'm going to be transitioning into the itinerary learning support position that is split between Ashelman and Pacway Elementary School. Um, I chose Pen Manor simply because it's the best. Um, it's just known for being a great place for students and staff to grow and I'm really excited to be a part of this school community. So, thank you. Hello, my name is Emily Worley. I teach fifth grade math and science at Konosoga Elementary. I graduated from Alverie University in May of 2024 for early childhood and special education. And the reason I chose Pen Manor is because within my first couple interactions

014with administration here, I felt welcomed, but I also felt like I was seen and appreciated and I knew it was a place where I could grow professionally and personally, but also help my students to do the same. So, I'm so excited to be a part of the Pen Manor family. Thank you so much for the opportunity to be here. >> Hello. Good evening. My name is Alex Demarzio. Um I graduated from Millersville University and York College. Um I'm the new assistant principal at Central Manor Elementary School. Um after coming from about 10 11 years in the CTC realm um coming into the academics of Pen Manor. Um, I've heard nothing but wonderful things about Pen Manor. And when I applied, the interview team was nothing but gracious and very kind. And it, um, really opened

015my eyes to the wonderful environment that Pen Manor creates here. Um, and it really helps too with a three and a halfyear-old being 15 minutes away instead of being in Lebanon County. So, um, that really is a big positive. But I look forward to serving, um, all our stakeholders um, and working with all of you. So, thank you. That's all, Dr. Fulen. >> Well, thank you, Dr. Egan, and thank goodness not one of them mentioned the Cleveland Browns, although Edinburgh University. How'd you end up way up there? >> Um, I don't know. I grew up in Fairfield County and I started at Mercyhurst and then just ended up transitioning to Edinburgh. >> Oh, so these winters here are very easy though. >> Yes. Yes, they are. Very good. Well, thank you so much for being

016part of the Pen Manor family. We we certainly are happy to have you and look forward to the great things that we know you're capable of doing. So, in your first uh order of business now that you've met the board is you've get you have a choice. You can stay and enjoy the rest of this wonderful board meeting or you could leave. Wait, you put that you put your bag on too fast. Thank you very much. >> That was a that was a little quick. >> Yeah. >> Well, you had already called her out in front of everybody. >> Well, Ed, have you ever been to Edinburgh? >> No reason to go there. >> The snow has snow, right? >> Right. >> So, Dr. Gail, we have Mr. Eie and Mr. Beal today here tonight.

017>> So, as Mr. Eie and Mr. Beto coming forward uh tonight. We're doing this a little bit earlier than normal where we're looking at new courses for next year just because of some of the logistical changes that uh Mr. EBI and his team, well really across the high school staff have been working on uh to prepare students and give opportunities for students as we continue to evaluate our programmatic needs uh but also really to to provide our students with uh some unique opportunities but also to fulfill some of the requirements that we have. So uh we thought we felt it was best to have Mr. Eie uh and Mr. Be will present tonight uh so that we can have this approved so as they continue those conversations with teachers, with staff, with parents, and with

018obviously the students that we know that this is the direction that we're heading. So, Mr. Eie, it's all yours. >> Good evening, everybody. Thank thank you for this opportunity uh to meet with you uh to give a quick update about the high school uh what we've been working on as well as to give some our proposal for some changes to our master schedule for the 26 27 school year. Uh to give some context, I'd just like to take a few minutes to uh share with you what the high school's been working on the last couple years. three years ago um we came into this position um with students coming directly out of some challenges with lingering effects of COVID is also coming through some challenges with the construction project and quite honestly there were some

019things that we needed to um be very intentional about there's some systems some structures some expectations that we wanted to make sure that we were clearly working with our building to improve and I started the year with an analogy uh a construction construction analogy and we're continuing with that. And our theme for that first year was just to establish a solid foundation which to build. And so we spent the year making sure we're being very intentional about how we communicated our processes and our procedures in order to establish a foundation in which we could build on. About halfway through that first year, we started the conversation of with our staff of looking at what do we value and what can we build on this solid foundation. It went through a number of different things but

020we just stopped. We talked. We discussed we said like how can we engage students at high levels. At that same time we were ending about a year and a half committee where groups of teachers were analyzing our current block schedule. It was a partnership between administration and the association where we spent a lot of time just processing our block schedule. But as you know, our schedule at the high school for more than 20 years has been in this block format where students have four classes in the fall and four different classes in the spring. Our scheduling committee finalized and and and made the recommendation that we like the block scheduling. It is something that's beneficial for our students, especially in the electives classes. It's beneficial for our AP students. It's beneficial for our students in

021any hands-on class. And so we didn't want to make any massive changes, but the scheduling committee as well as the teachers that got together and started to talk about how do we engage students at high levels ended that we value opportunities. We didn't want to drastically change our schedule, but we wanted to make sure that we provided more opportunities for our students both inside the classroom and outside the classroom setting. And so at the start of next year, continuing with that construction analogy, the start of last year, we started to explore what these opportunities could look like. We spent time developing work-based learning where students had opportunities their senior year to participate in internships, had opportunities to participate in extended work study placements outside of the building. Our teachers organized over 470 field trips last

022year to give students uh experiences outside of the building. We also brought in more than a 100 guest speakers to speak to our students about their careers and the impact of their careers on different content levels. Through all this, this is where we ended is we found that we valued opportunities. We valued things for our students and we wanted to make some slight adjustments to our schedules. So we found value in offering what we're calling marking period or half credit courses for our students. Now this would not be something that will be all half credit courses. What this would be would be an opportunity for our students to maybe have 10 different course offerings instead of eight throughout the course of the year. We continued with this building analogy and we've been reviewing course curriculum

023standards, scope and sequence documents to develop half credit course offerings that could be offered to our students for the start of next school year. Our half credit options will be offered to students in a marking period 45day time frame. For example, a student may have three blocks in the fall semester. They would their first block, their second block, and their third block could be full credit courses, but their fourth block during marking period one could be a 45day half credit course. And then during marking period two, there would be another half credit course. Again, giving our students the opportunity to have probably 10 experiences a school year instead of just eight. Now, our amazing teachers over the course of this last year and started this year have identified 23 existing courses that we could be

024restructured, reworked to become a half credit course. This occurred after analyzing the standards, the current curriculum, and being creative to develop these opportunities for our students. Inside your folders, I provided a half credit course proposal that outlines the departments and the courses that are being adjusted to offer these half credit courses. An example of this, last year we had 117 students that requested to take an FCS or a family consumer class that we had to say no to because we lack space. Our family and consumer science teachers have been working hard the last year and a half to readjust two of their courses, a ninth grade uh FCS skills class as well as a living on your own class. And the thought process to this is if we could make this full semester course into

025a marking period halfredit course, we would drastically increase the number of students that would have the opportunity to experience this course. >> Mr. Mr. Eie, if I can just interrupt here for a minute, the the document that he's referring to, there's actually two documents in here uh in in tonight's folder is one is the half credit course proposal. Um and then the other one is the the new half credit proposals and those are the course descriptions. So, easier to see it and to read through it than for Mr. Eie to fully explain it. Thanks. >> So at at this point, what we're hoping to do is to take 23 of our classes and move them from a semester long to a half credit course for the start of the 2627 school year. In addition to

026that, what we would like to do is to offer our students additional opportunities because when we talked through our conversations last year, as we talked through from a scheduling committee, where we ended is we said we value opportunities for our our students and we want to increase those opportunities for our students. We would like to offer six new half credit course proposals for next year. How we would like to pull this off is by creating margin with our schedule. Every year uh for example, we offer about five or six different uh sections of economics. Half of the economics curriculum will now be moved over to financial literacy, which will be a state requirement for next year, giving us the opportunity to take that economics course and move it from a full credit to a half

027credit course. And in so doing, we would be able to create margin within our master schedule. That margin would be able to be used to offer our students some increased opportunities. When you take that same logic, not just with economics, but with a couple other uh classes throughout the building, we feel that we'd be able to provide a system and a structure where we could offer our students these six new classes. The first one there that is introduction to weight training. Our our physical ed department would like to offer a class. It would be designed for students in 9th through 12th grade, but mostly 9th and tth graders as they come into the high school to experience and to learn what our weight room offers. It would be a course that would prepare students for

028additional courses, more rigorous courses like our fitness classes that students in 11th and 12th grade take. Our PE department would also like to uh start with an advanced competitive sports halfcredit course. This class it would be designed for 10th, 11th and 12th grade students who want to engage in high levels of physical activity and competition. It would be again a half credit course. Our business course is is going to start an introduction to business or business and action class. This would be a a course that would go over uh some of the basic essential elements of business. We were hoping to offer that to all students in every grade level, but realistically, we feel like they would be mostly ninth and tth graders that would take that course prior to taking the marketing or the

029advertising or some of the other business courses that we offer. Next year, we will have a financial literacy class. The ACT 35 will require all students to have as a graduation required to be a standalone half credit course um starting again in the year 2627. That's going to live within our social studies department. two the two other additional new courses that we would like to propose is a global trends in modern history. This would be a social studies half credit class. Uh this course will investigate conflicts and diplomacy uh throughout the world ranging from world wars through modern society and the connection that it takes over the last 50 to 60 years of history across our world. And then the last class that we would like to propose is a history, excuse me, is history

030of sports in America. This half credit class will expose the role of sports in shaping American history, culture, and society. And it was explore the evolution of sports and their impact on social and political movements over the last 40 or 50 years. Again, we value opportunities. Through the scheduling committees, through the last several years of our conversations with teachers, we landed that we want to provide more opportunities for our students to experience different types of content. Instead of going as really deep in a semester long, it would be more of that half credit. One thing that we had to significantly change is our structure to our social studies as well as our structure to our physical education department. And I asked Mr. Beexel uh who heads up putting our master schedule together to come share

031with you a little bit about what that would look like starting next year and some of the changes in the sequences that will occur. So Mr. Beal so as Mr. Eie talked about um already our our scheduling process is a massive amount of puzzle pieces uh and what this is doing is this is adding quite quite a few more. Uh, so when he says, "I I get to head the schedule. I get to figure out where all those pieces of the puzzle fit." Um, but there is another document that that you guys have that I think would help kind of show exactly what this is going to look like uh for a student as they go through our schedule both uh or through starting in grade nine and working through grade 12. Uh so if

032you look at the make it happen half credit structure document, uh as Mr. Eie said, there's going to be the two major departments that really have the most changes. It's going to be our social studies department and our PE department. Now, what's change what's not changing in social studies is that you students are still required to get four credits. Um, however, the way in which they go about that is a little bit different. Uh, their freshman year, they would still have the four opportunities to take US history. That could be in the career prep, college prep, honors, or AP. Uh, it would be the same thing in 10th grade with world history. And then in 11th grade they would have the four levels of the mixed of the civics and government half credit and the

033financial literacy half credit. Where they can get the fourth and where they're able to differentiate is by those other additional credits. Those courses that are becoming half credits such as um economics such as our criminal justice or social psychology as well as the two new courses. So anywhere starting in 10th grade, students are able to double up in social studies. So somewhere from 10th grade to 12th grade, they have to find two half credit courses or those higher level students could potentially take the fourth or fifth um AP class that they oftentimes take. And what we've seen over the years is students typically take numerous social studies credits, four, five, six credits at some at some times. Um so this is just allowing a little bit more flexibility with the way in which those students

034receive those four social studies credits. The same process is happening in PE. Uh the requirement that students are are need to get two PE credits is still going to be there. In 9th grade they have two half credit courses that every nth grade student is required to take. And then in 10th grade there is an additional half credit. Again, where we can differentiate a little bit is how those students get that additional half credit, making the two full credits. Uh, and this is where what the PE department is coming up with is a lot of variations. Uh, a lot of different ways in which students can can go through gym class. Uh, again, you can look at some of those students that are our athletes that want that competitive environment or some students that maybe

035don't want to be surrounded by a bunch of competitive, sweaty people. um and and want to just experience and get that additional credit um at a little bit more relaxed environment. Um so both of these again that there's no change in what the requirements are the four social studies credits uh and the two PE credits. It's just differentiated giving more flexibility to students schedules and giving a a better opportunity for students to decide how they go about getting those credits. What questions would you have for us? Uh any of our proposed changes to increase more opportunities for our students? >> So, just so I'm understanding correctly, in 10th grade for fizzed, they would still need to take two in 10th grade. They couldn't take one half credit in 10th grade and one in 11th grade.

036They could. Okay. So we don't care when they get that second half credit >> for 10 like what what is traditionally 10th grade which is now PE and safety ed is one marking period and then they can take that second half >> whenever they want as long as they do it before they graduate. >> Uh majority of students will complete that during the 10th grade year. Okay. Uh but we are giving some flexibility from the after the PE10 and safety ed half credit uh to differentiate the options uh for those students. So if they want to take social studies in 10th grade and PE in 11th or what, however the class is filled, there's flexibility. >> Yep. And so what that could look like is a student in the 10th grade during marking period one

037could have that PE safety ed and then opposite they could have a class like introduction to ceramics or introduction to guitar or the social psych course. A number of different classes and as we build the schedule that's the rationale why we would structure it that way. So ultimately, I'm just coming from a parent whose child chose to have a very difficult schedule that drove you insane. >> Um, this could actually in some ways allow children or allow students to take classes that they wouldn't have been able to take before. >> It would, >> right? It's it's opening up the door. >> It would give them the opportunity to experience something in a short time frame. For instance, if a student always wanted to try an art class or a music class or thing, they would

038give it's 45 days. It's a half credit. We'll try it and maybe they'll love it and be able to expand and continue with courses within that department or maybe they'll take that 45day uh introduction to guitar class and find out music is not for me. Um, >> but they've had the experience. >> But they have had the experience. Yeah. >> One other question. Is there any consideration to allowing a half credit service learning or internship? >> Mr. Beto and I were having that conversation just last week. We were talking through uh we haven't finalized a decision. Uh part of our hang-up that we'd have to work through or challenge that we would have to work through is just the uh the system that how long that takes to to secure a service learning placement. Uh

039but we are looking at possible like a half credit work study. Okay. Um, possibly. We didn't finalize that yet. >> Thank you. >> So, uh, if I'm understand this right, 23 classes that are currently a whole credit are going to be a half credit. Um, is that going to be a a challenge? I'm not criticizing it, but like to to compress that into a a one, you know, one marking period or uh a challenge from a curriculum uh >> for the >> standards. >> Yeah. >> To some extent. Um across the building, there are some courses where it just works. For instance, uh in the FCS course, living on your own, approximately half of the content that they would teach in there will now be taught within the financial literacy. And so that's a really

040easy transition to do it. Um ceramics, it's a fairly easy process to reduce it because you're just giving the broad level skills. uh where it is a challenge and where the teachers have been doing a fantastic job working through looking at standards analyzing the scope and sequences are for courses like uh social psych where it's like where what do we value and what can we teach that teach the standards but maybe not to the depth that we did previously that is a challenge but our teachers are doing a great job with it >> thank you >> I would applaud Mr. Evie and uh his team as well as the teachers here at the high school uh for making the groundwork and and and really making the progress that they have in going to this direction.

041Uh not to sound like the old guy, but back when I was high school principal, uh I was tasked by uh Dr. lick later to begin to look at our schedule because at that time uh we had been in the block schedule for close to 15 20 years and we were to look at uh you know what are our offerings? Can we incorporate opportunities for students and that discussion that we had through the course of the year the biggest the largest hindrance was the physical building at the time and in some cases that catapulted us into the conversation about what we now have as a new high school. I did not anticipate this happening as quickly now that we're in this new building. Uh we've only been in in the building for four years. Four

042four years is a good amount of time, but this has been a conversation that Mr. Eie has been having with teachers for some time. And I think that's what's providing these opportunities that teachers have looked at what they are teaching the different subjects the curricula that is able to make some of these adjustments and and to again the move to having students have the opportunity for additional classes is something that we have looked at but we haven't been able to pull it off because of really physical limitations. the curriculum work that they're doing, the idea of changes, uh, and and really to come back and say, uh, these are changes that we're going to make to classes. We're going to boil this down, but then to add the six new half credit courses, I think

043is really complimentary of, uh, the classes that we've had, but also the direction that the high school team teachers are really looking to to provide for our students. So tonight, uh, if you can go back a couple slides, Doug, to where you're just listing the classes, what we are looking for is a motion to have these six classes, because they are new classes, to be approved at or to be put on the agenda for our November 17th meeting. But thank you, Mr. Eevee. Thank you, Mr. Beto, for your work on this. I know it's been uh conversations that you've had with not only our teachers, but our students, our department coordinators, and even trickling down into the middle school to make sure that uh our our middle school teams understand what's going to be taking

044place for our students. >> Thank you. May I have a motion to place these six new half credit course proposals that are on the screen on the agenda for our November 17th meeting? >> So moved. >> Thank you. Second. >> Second. Any further comment or question? I would I would just ask if as we are pondering this, should the motion pass? Do we present questions to you in >> Yeah, you can present them to me and then >> I'll go to Mr. E with to find out the answers. >> Perfect. >> Any other further comment or question? >> All those in favor? >> Seven affirmative votes. >> Opposed >> and one opposed. >> Okay, we'll move on to item number three. Uh as we know the we still do not have a state budget and

045we received a request from uh PSBA to adopt a resolution to uh urge the Pennsylvania General Assembly to end the state budget impass. Not all of our brethren across the Commonwealth are in as good a financial shape that we are and have had to start to borrow money in order to keep the lights on, so to speak, which is um in my estimation criminal that taxpayers are going to have to pay the interest for that money as uh whenever the funds are released. So, uh, in our board folder is the resolution. Um, there was an additional part about cyber charter funding and so on and so forth. And quite frankly, there a non-starter. So, uh, we asked Dr. Gail, myself and Mrs. Nasser asked Dr. to remove that piece of it because we want to

046stick to the issue of passing a budget and its impact on school districts and more important more importantly the students that all of us serve. So I am respectfully asking that we um and I know Mr. weeks. This is one of those ones where it is not for November 17th, but it is for today. My apologies. This came last minute, probably out of the PSBA conference. Um, but I would respectfully ask for a motion that we uh adopt this resolution and send it into uh our governor, our Pennsylvania General Assembly. >> So move. >> Thank you. Second. >> Second. >> Thank you. Any further comment or questions? Dr. or Mr. Fory, I do have a question just um I know I had had a conversation with Dr. Garrett earlier and you know initially we thought

047we were losing $40 a day in interest but that number has changed. Can you update the board on that? Well, because I think that's important for people to understand as we're trying to put pressure on our legislators to do their job. >> Yes. So, as of the end of October, the district is owed approximately 11.65 65 million from the state which means that we are losing $121 per day on interest >> alone >> earnings from that >> and do you know what that total number is as of today like the interest lost >> it would have it it's changing because they keep owing us more so I'm not sure every day >> thank you >> any other questions All those in favor >> post. >> Six in favor. Two. >> Just the process, not the

048>> Thank you. Item >> understood. Appreciate that. >> Thank you for being consistent. >> Correct. Can't fault that. Uh item number four, Dr. Egan, enrollment update. >> Thank you, Dr. Fullerton. I apologize in advance for the n the barrage of numbers that I'll be uh sharing with the board, but we uh will be providing a a comprehensive overview of our enrollments just in in hopes that you have a better understanding of our students. And we'll start off by looking at where we ended last year and then uh transition to this school year. So as we look at our mission uh specifically through the lens of enrollment, it's important to keep two things in mind uh when looking at enrollment. Those are trends and resources. As a public school, we have absolutely no control over our

049enrollment. Uh so it's really important that we look at multiple years of trends when it comes to looking at our resources and and based on those trends we look at how we allocate how we shift and potentially eliminate uh resources. So last year um PM manner uh ended with uh the 56th largest enrollment in the state. So there's 500 school districts across the Commonwealth and Pem Manor was the 56th largest. So that puts us in the top 11% of the state, which means that Pemmaner is not small. We we are a large district. Uh, and when looking at Lancaster County enrollment trends over the past 15 years, when we take a close look at Pen Manor specifically, you can see that our enrollment was as low as 5,69 in the 1213 school year and as

050high as 5,500 students in the 2223 school year. And that that's a that's a 500 student swing which is equivalent to Manor Middle School's uh total enrollment over the course of 10 years. So enrollment es and flows. Uh and so when when we compare our ourselves to our neighbors school district Lancaster has the highest enrollment. Hempfield second with about 1500 more students followed by Mannheim Township which has about 500 more students than us in our enrollment. Uh and then Epherta is fifth. And again when comparing comparing the the school districts Epherta has uh just under 1,400 students than than we do. So that that's equivalent to three of our classes. So if we took the 10th, 11th, and 12th grade class out, uh that would be Ephroda's uh complete enrollment. So here is our enrollment

051as of October 1st, 2025. We use the October 1st number as um our our kind of line in the sand when it comes to reporting our enrollment uh to uh the state and federal government. So we have 5,271 students as of October 1st. Last year we ended the year with 5,387 students. So that's a difference of about 100 students. Uh and the reason for that is last year's senior class uh was close to 450 students and uh the incoming kindergarten class was significantly lower than that. Uh so that explains the the swing. But as you can see, most of our classes average in the 400 to 425 range. However, when we look at our kindergarten, first and second grade numbers, they're they're significantly lower. Uh I will say last year at this time kindergarten was

052so last year at this time kindergarten was sitting around 340 students. Uh so we do capture quite a few students going from kindergarten to first grade. Uh but this is a trend that we're uh certainly keeping a a close eye on. >> Dr. Hen, if I can jump in here, obviously looking at our kindergarten, you know, this year we do have some classes that are smaller in different aspects of the district. It's a it's a disadvantage when we look at our community schools. It's hard to have uniform or equalized classrooms uh because you know we might have more students that live in the Konosoga area than we do at Central Manor and we're not going to make those changes. Uh I think as Dr. Egan just mentioned, we do see a considerable growth in our

053class s our classes when we go from kindergarten to first grade because we recognize that there are parents that are looking for a full day program. I think it would be something that we would consider as a full day program if number one we had the space. right now we don't have the current spa the current physical space to add any type of classroom because in essence what you're doing is you're doubling all of our kindergarten program. The other part that does cost that would be a significant cost is we would have to then add in addition to our classrooms for kindergarten the teachers there we would also have to add some of our um our >> cultural arts teachers uh to provide those those resources for our students. So I know a number of

054our neighbors are adding or have moved to a full day kindergarten. we have two significant barriers that uh we have to overcome before we would consider that. >> Thank you for clarifying that Dr. Gail. So again K1 and two are a little bit lower but third through 12th uh those numbers at at 425 or more is really pushing our capacity uh and space at at our different buildings. So, here is a map of Pen Manor with all of the ele all of all 10 buildings listed. Uh, elementaryaries listed in yellow, school's blue, and the high school is the salmon color there. And just want to uh point out that uh if we look at just the numbers of students uh between Central Manor and Hambrite, that is almost equivalent to all four southern end buildings

055combined. And to get a better idea of how our students are uh distributed across the the district, I think it's helpful to look at the elementary boundaries. So uh if we take a look at Mardik, the southernmost uh southernmost school, and Mardik has the largest attendance area uh with the uh smallest uh enrollment. Uh we have pushed the elementary boundaries as far north as what is reasonable uh without significantly having to uh alter uh our busing routes and what we've been accustomed to. And just to put it in perspective, 25 years ago when when I was hired, uh Mardik had 500 students. So, uh, it wasn't that long. I mean, I'm not that old, but it wasn't that long ago that, uh, and and the the the enrollment, uh, area boundary was much further south.

056Uh, in fact, uh, Lakewood Estates attended Pekway Elementary School back then because, uh, there was such a high concentration of students. So, we've really seen that uh as we've talked about before, twothirds of our students live in the upper third of the district. Uh which has has really that so our student population has shifted, but our buildings have remained in the same location. Uh that's have it made us have to one uh look at our our attendance boundaries, but also get really creative about how we're making sure we're trying to keep class sizes as low as possible. And one of the things that we uh have done and the board has has given us the authority to do so is is identify swing areas uh around the district. So if you look uh between Kanesoga

057and Pekway, there's like a little Vshaped area um that that's a large swing area. So any new family that moves in the district in uh in that general area uh we look at cla class sizes and determine u where where the student would attend um help make sure uh and to balance class sizes. So, speaking of class sizes, uh, one of the metrics that we look at is our oversized classes. And the criteria for an oversized class is, uh, students in kindergarten and through third grade are considered oversized if there's 25 or more uh, students assigned to that home room. And then, uh, 27 or more for students in fourth through sixth grade. So this year, as of October 1, we have 15 oversized classrooms. Uh and as you can see, uh especially four, five,

058and six, uh grades four, five, and six, uh those uh spaces are on the northern end. Uh as Dr. Gail just mentioned about um a little bit ago, uh if we look at fifth grade at Echerman, there's 29 students uh in each of those fifth grade classes. that that class alone would be a candidate for us to consider adding a third class, a bubble class, but we just do not have the space to to do so. And we've stretched our attendance boundaries uh with Echelman uh as well, I'm sorry, not stretched, we've made the attendance boundaries a lot smaller for Echelman uh than we have in former former years. When we look at our middle schools, the average class sizes there uh between Manor and Mardigville are 24 and 26. And and we we found

059over the past uh couple of years that our middle schools have consistently been at capacity. 25 or 26 does not sound that that large. Uh, but I would encourage all of you to go into a middle school class uh and try to be responsible for helping teenagers uh focus in on um the Roman Empire. Um and uh it's it's a challenge, right? So, uh we've really been pushing the boundaries of class sizes uh that are conducive to learning uh pretty consistently at the elementary or sorry, middle school level. uh and for example 10 years ago uh the average class size between the two buildings was 22 and 21. So uh doesn't sound like a significant shift but uh four five less bodies in a classroom makes a big difference. >> We also take in the

060factor the total number of students that a middle school teacher in the academic areas would be seeing on a day basis. I mean they're seeing 24 time five. >> So over 125 almost 130 students total basis >> on a day-to-day basis I should say. >> So just to clarify on this because I know this seems a little heavy but from a future perspective we are addressing this. >> That's our goal >> with with our goal right and one of the goals Dr. Dr. Gail has this year >> is to look at how if we add the new a larger middle school how that would change the boundaries which would positively impact >> Yes. >> this correct. Okay. >> Just so that people are listening aren't thinking they're getting a doomsday message. >> Yeah. For sure.

061Uh and and the ripple effects of that of that decision will will completely offset some of some of these and put us in a much better position. So thank thank you for bringing that up >> down the road. But this is >> correct. It's coming. Yes. hopefully. Okay, so we just looked at our numbers. Uh we're going to shift gears now uh and look at uh the makeup of our students. So here's a really big graph. And again, I'm sorry for all of the numbers, but this is a breakdown of our English uh learners and the past six years. So from 2020 to the 2425 school year those first five columns of numbers uh they represent the endofear numbers uh so for uh you know sake of brevity I encourage you just look at the

062bottom number there uh across the board and so basically our our English language learners uh have that those numbers h have grown uh the numbers represented in the 2526 is as of October 15th of of this year. Uh so uh we're certainly trending in uh the direction of um the way we have the past couple of years. Uh and just want to highlight Hamrate has uh 73 English learners. that that's that's equivalent to uh three very large home rooms of students uh who are eligible for uh English language uh services. These this is a list of all of our home languages that are spoken uh that are primary languages that are spoken in the home other than English across uh the district. Now just because a secondary language is spoken in the home does not

063necessarily mean that that student is eligible for English language uh learning services. Uh but the these are the various uh languages that are spoken uh within PM manner's uh demographic. So it really helps to to demonstrate uh that not only are we large but uh we are growing in increasingly diverse and just for fun um does anyone know where uh the language of Tagalog is spoken without you can't cheat. >> And you were gonna ask did you ask? >> Okay. No big cookie for anyone. All right. Uh it is a small island off the Philippines. Uh interesting. So uh when looking at our shifting gears now to special education, uh when we look at uh this number compared to 5 years ago, uh we we've seen uh a pretty big jump. and and um when

064we look a little bit closer uh here are reports that we send uh or get back from the state um so we on the left we have December of uh 2020 uh and then our most recent report uh from last year was December 1st 2024. So LEA uh stands for local education agency which is PM manner uh and then it uh the final uh or the column on the right represents the state. So this each chart represents a breakdown of distributions of students uh with IEPs and the various categories uh that their disabilities uh are labeled as. And uh so again um LEA is PM manner uh and then the other column is the state uh and and what our numbers are are okay in this regard with the exception of autism. Uh when we

065look at uh comparing the 2020 numbers to 2024 uh having 35 uh more students uh is is pretty significant. uh these numbers these students uh require uh much more resources and and definitely have more complex learning needs. Uh and to have 35 more uh students identified with autism uh does pose um a a challenge uh for our department to make sure that uh we're accessing uh their needs and and allocating the appropriate resources. Did I get that right? Okay. Thank you. >> And before before Dr. Egan leaves that slide, if you can go back, the one thing I would point out, as we were talking about in the item beforehand with the state budget, if you'll notice, look at the state percentage, 20.7% of our students across the state are receiving special ed services. As

066we've looked at in terms of special ed funding, we know that that is well below what we would need to really be providing those services. So, not only are we advocating for a a budget to be passed, but we need to be advocating for the the funding in these services to be appropriate. And this is not just from the state, but it's also federal government as well because a lot of special ed is IDEIDA, a federal mandate. Thanks. Okay. And shifting gears, uh our home when we look at our homeless numbers. So, uh, back in May of 2020, we had 95 students. Uh, this year, as as of October 1, 82 students have been identified as homeless. To pro to try to provide to put this in some perspective. Uh, last year, we ended the

067year with two 207 students identified uh as uh being homeless. So, uh, this number will will continue to rise. uh but we are trending a little bit lower than we did last year. Our free and reduced uh percentages have um uh have kind of stabilized in in in in essence. Uh last year we we had 49% of our students uh were uh eligible for free and reduced lunch. Now, the state did raise the threshold for uh eligibility for free and reduced lunch, and I think that could explain why we saw a little bit of a dip. Uh but 46% of our students as of October 1 are eligible for free reduced lunch, uh which is a pretty significant number. And the final piece of data that we'll be sharing with you tonight is uh our

068external uh enrollment. So looking at students who live in the district but attend cyber home school or a private school. Uh we're delighted to see that our cyber school numbers have uh dropped pretty significantly. In fact uh the leadership team was talking today and uh we're almost >> Yeah, I have updated numbers. >> Uh So these were the numbers uh as of October one, but that has uh changed. >> Yeah. Commonwealth Charter Academy added 70 students on October 2nd. >> What? >> They just failed to turn them in before then. >> Imagine that. >> So I found out this afternoon, didn't have a chance to update it here, but >> have so many things. >> Yeah. So that I'm not delighted to hear that. And um that that puts us right about where we were

069then um in 2020. A little bit more. >> Way to go, Dan. >> Way to go. >> Sorry, I have a similar slide that >> Danny Downer. Um so um when we look at our homeschool numbers, uh now the these numbers have continued to rise uh since uh since 2020. uh and uh even uh looking back uh 10 years uh we've almost doubled uh that number. Uh our private school numbers are down a little bit. Um but uh one thing to keep in mind uh for from from the board's perspective is if uh when we look specifically at our homeschool numbers uh the overwhelming majority of the 492 listed there are elementary students. uh if if they came back uh even even just the just the elementary students uh came back uh that that would

070be equivalent uh to one of our small elementary schools uh that we current we we would that would be a challenge uh for us to to uh create learning environments with that. So, uh it's just something to to keep in mind uh as uh we consider uh potential plans uh for construction in the future. So, uh Dr. Fullerton, this is where we stand with our enrollment as of October 1 and uh welcome. Any questions? >> Any questions for Dr. Egan? Dr. Egan. the enrolled students the the definition I guess of an externally external enrollment they're not captured in the other number >> correct >> and then back on like slide number seven where you circled kindergarten through third >> um you said we're watching that trend is what what does that mean uh is That

071does that graph look the same with smaller enrollments in kindergarten first and second five years ago 10 years ago? >> No. >> When you said a trend those are decreasing in recent years. >> Correct. They they are decreasing. >> So then Okay. So that ties back to your comment about the homeschool students being the majority of them being elementary and them coming back into the district at least as a pattern >> and and we have found that we we start capturing some of our home a greater percentage of our middle of our homeschool students in middle school but even more so at in the high school level uh they start coming back. Um, so, so it's again it's hard to predict uh what next year's kindergarten will look like, but if we were to to

072look at trends, we'd probably gain um 30 to 60 students uh from kindergarten to first grade uh which would put us closer to that average class size, but uh it's it's hard to say what what what exactly that would like. >> Thank you. >> I have a question regarding kindergarten. So currently noting that we have families that are choosing to go elsewhere for whatever reason, some of which I think we can attribute to needing full day services. >> No doubt. >> Currently we offer the RAP program. Correct. But that is only if you go to morning kindergarten. You can do a wrap in the afternoon or before and after school hours like the rest of the elementary kids. >> And and only and only in certain buildings because we do not have the space to

073accommodate it in all seven. Right. So my next question is if we have that space in the afternoon, do we not have that same space available in the morning and could we not talk to the Y about offering morning wrap which would then allow more accessibilities for families? >> Is there a reason why we can't? >> We have not explored that. I think more from the wise perspective, it's a staffing concern than it is >> okay. >> A space that they they've done a a great job staffing us and and and being a >> uh partner with us uh with with the YRAP. >> Uh but but the spaces that we have allocated towards RAP are not great. Uh like most are on stages. >> Okay. >> Um because that's the only space that we

074have left. So, as we look at elementary schools, that's another consideration we could look at. >> 100%. >> Are there other vendors, not that I want to get rid of the Y, I want to be very clear because I agree, they've been a great partner, but if staffing is an issue for them, are there other vendors in other districts that do similar programs? >> That is not something I've explored. >> Okay. Can we put that on a list of things to >> Yeah, we I mean, we did look at an outside vendor. >> It was >> probably It was not cost >> six years ago. >> Yeah, it was not cost um it was not >> it was costamilies. >> Okay. >> I was just curious about families to switch from what the Y provided.

075>> Okay. >> I mean I don't know where it would stand now but it >> right. And the Y offers financial assistance for a lot of folks. >> Correct. >> Okay. >> M Mr. B. >> Yeah. So going from kindergarten to first, we have about 65 less students in kindergarten than we would have in first grade, attributed to many things. Um that's been relatively consistent throughout the last five years trend >> that that kindergarten's low the that kindergarten class is lower than the other classes. Is that what you're asking? >> Well, I I understand why kindergarten is lower right now, but over the last five years trend has that roughly been about the same 60 students or so between kindergarten to first grade difference is that >> it's been the same >> it's been between

07630 and 60 I'd say 30 for the classes that you know the third and fourth grade class um and then so I'd say that's the range >> we did have this projection like if you look at the kindergarten off of some of the projections that we've been working off of both from the state as well as um our the our architect's projections because right now the birth rate is is lower for these years. >> Think back five years ago, >> right? >> Yeah. >> Uh so there there is a drop in the birth rate in this general area. So we knew that was going to come. I think we would say that 310 is less than what we would have anticipated. Uh, but we knew it was going to be smaller. All right. So, my

077my I guess my real question is is that between first and second, I'm sorry, between kindergarten and first grade, we really don't have a whole a huge amount that's not attending kindergarten here already. Is that correct? >> I'm not following. There are there are a number of we we generally have again like between 30 and 60 students who enter the district in first grade that didn't attend for kindergarten >> because they're seeking like a full day program or something like that. >> Correct. >> And that that number's been like between that number like 30 to 60 >> across the seven elementary school. >> Thank you. >> Yeah. Not a new trend. >> I'm sorry. >> Not a new trend. Is that what you're getting at? >> That that's where I was. >> So it's Well,

078thank you, Dr. Egan. >> Yeah, thank you. >> Appreciate it. >> I I actually have one other question. I'm sorry. >> Sure. >> Um with our um slide 16 English learners. Um we have 222 this at this point this year. Then last whatever 15 days. Um do we expect that to increase to the last as that's typically what happens between >> yeah that's been the that has been the trend over the past several years that throughout the year we we more and more students need those services. >> Is that along the lines that um we've identified them later in the year or is that just moveins or other >> Okay. Thank you. >> There there students who need those services are identified at registration. >> Okay. Yeah. >> And figured out, but I suppose right

079away >> based on questions they asked or that they're asked at registration, we have to provide services. >> We we assess them right beyond just initial meeting, >> right? >> But it triggers an assessment. >> All right. Thank you. And just more clarifying on those numbers and also the homeless numbers, those numbers are students we've served throughout the year. So this 222 could change tomorrow to 221 and the next day to 225, but you're going to report to us the total number of students at the end of year we served, whether they were here for two weeks or 180 days, right? like we don't see the you're we're we're seeing the total number of students throughout the year that were served >> but they come and go >> like >> these are these were students

080that are currently receiving services. So if you look at last year >> the 2425 school year there's there was 277 students who are eligible. Now that number does not if if a student moved out a family moved out that is not reflected in this number. >> Right. That's what I'm saying. So that's at some point during the year we served 277 students but some of them could have left >> at the end of the year we were serving >> 277. >> So that was the the actual number of kids at the end of the day. So that was not okay. That's what I wanted to make sure I was understanding. >> Whereas home homeless is you you're identified you you your house >> right? >> I don't wish this upon you but your house catches

081fire and you're displaced. You you are on that you are part of that number for the entire year then. >> Okay. That's what I wanted to make sure I was understanding. I know they're looked at differently. >> They are. >> Yes. Thank you. >> Yeah. >> Okay. >> Thank you everybody. Great discussion. So we'll move to item five, a preliminary budget update. And if this is as wonderful as the last piece of information you gave us, I think we'll just skip it. The good news is that Dr. Egan had more numbers in his presentation than I have in mine. >> So that'll be >> neither of you had the right numbers yet. >> Well, I have improved numbers that were late breaking. >> Um so again, you know, we do have a mission. we are

082trying to work uh you know to help students and and really part of it you know everything that we've talked about tonight has to be paid for and so we're going to look at at where I believe we're going to end the year um and what that looks like. So the audit work uh all the field work is completed uh a few weeks ago. The auditors are finishing their uh inoff reviews. uh we'll schedule when they're ready at the end of November or so a uh an exit interview and then we're working to have the board presentation our meeting in December. Tonight we're going to uh take a look at the 2425 budget versus the preliminary or unofficial um results. I don't expect much change with the numbers, but because they haven't finalized it, they're

083still unofficial. Um additionally, we will take a look at our fund balances or our savings account. where are they at and what's the plan for that moving forward. So, we'll start off with the good news. Um, uh, revenues for the year were 5.3 million over budget and the majority of that comes out of the first three line items. If you remember, uh, last year the budget was approved in July and some significant funding changes occurred that didn't happen before. And so ready to learn uh special ed and our cyber charter subsidy uh some of those were new or over the budget. So you see that makes up 3.1%. Uh we start to look at some of the others. Interest income continued to outpace budget. Um but we have started to see that to drop. I

084do expect from everything that I'm seeing and where we're at so far this year that we should be fine on 2526 budget numbers in interest but uh clearly we'll take a look at that as we move into 2627. Uh Pasers was under budgeted. It's not that they gave us extra money there and so that's just uh the subsidy that comes through in the state. Uh the good news it does appear that our uh we had strong revenues in our transfer taxes. So, anytime a property is sold as well as our delinquent taxes, meaning people are paying their back taxes higher than expected. Uh, so those were both contribute to that over budget. The other uh good news for the district as a whole is that our earned income uh was over budget. And what that

085is is that's the uh the earned income tax that that we pay into the county. Um it's then tracked uh across and we those estimates were based upon the information from the tax collection bureau and and uh the county as a whole saw similar experiences there with us being over uh transportation subsidy. Uh another one was an insurance claim that was not expected. So those came in. The other news, expenses were 5.7 over budget. Um, and you can see from here that the primary driver to this was our um special ed costs. Now, we'll get to it and and look at it a little bit more in detail later. The majority of that special ed overages is associated with our IU13 contract. Um, there are a few things that contribute to this. If you remember,

086I think last month, Miss Galen explained and Dr. Egan shared this evening that our special education student population has grown and it has grown in a higher need, higher cost areas. Secondly, and we'll see in the next slide as we take a look at is that we've probably been underbudgeted and trying to make up ground in the special ed area and that has not happened fast enough. The third thing that contributes is um the way that the special ed IU13 contracts is that the contract is signed with an estimated cost per student in the classroom placements. They finalize that cost at the end of the school year in August. So in August of 24 we received money back because costs were less than they had estimated. This August we were charged a search charge. The

087difference between those two two years alone in the return and the search charge was $770,000 difference. Um so that's what they bill us. Um, so we'll see where we go and we'll talk more about that when we look at the trends. The other thing to to notice with regard to the uh expense side, you'll see that um cyber charters is one that's outside of our control. We'll look at a trend on that. Healthcare, we are over budget there. Um, the good news is is that we would have been within the $750,000 uh surplus if we needed it. Maintenance is probably one of the ones that's been most challenged by our aging buildings, but also the most impacted by the inflationary pressures on both supplies and utilities. They're really getting hit on both sides of that.

088Um, additionally, an area that was overbudget is tuition to other schools. And you may ask, what does that mean? Well, when students are placed in placements uh because of uh services the student may need. Um, sometimes outside of our recommendations, it's what the family may see or some could be incarceration. uh we get build from whatever local education agency they're in. And so that has ranged from $280,000 to $580,000 in the last three years. So trying to figure out where that target is. Um the last one that's important here is although it's 5.7 million over, if you remember in June we moved a million dollars to the capital reserve. So essentially we moved it out of the general fund to the capital reserve. So we didn't spend it but it counts as an expenditure on

089a balance sheet side. And so that shows and that's where that that comes from. Now on a positive note because these aren't all positives. Uh on a budget of $42.8 million for salaries. So $42.8 million. We were within $15,000 of the budget. >> Good work. So, it's nice to hit a target occasionally. Okay. So, looking at special ed costs, like I talked about, we have seen we've seen this divergent. Um, like I said, we really got hit by that triple combination of lagging behind of seeing our enrollment grow and grow and higher needs and then really the escalating cost with regard to the IU contract. As part of Dr. Gail's goals. As we look at budget goals, we as a team are looking at some cost-saving measures, and we'll bring some more information to you

090in the not too distant future as to how we think we might address some of this. I do fully expect the IU contract cost increases to to continue to outpace other increases as we move forward. So, we have some things that we'll work on and we'll talk about that in a few weeks. This slide looked really good until about two hours ago. Um and so I did not get a chance to talk to Dr. Egan this afternoon um and and thought that we were in really really good shape and then disappointed to find out that we really weren't. It's the fact that the cyber charter decided to bill us for July, August, September, October and all of those in the last few weeks and correct their numbers. So interesting, you see that our enrollment is

091down from our peak in 20 21. Um but we are slowly climbing back up in the wrong direction. Um the other challenge is is that even though the enrollment dropped, you'll see that the cost has outpaced the increase of the enrollment because the cost that we have to calculate by the current uh process. One of the factors that is feeds into that is the cost of cybercharter school. And so the higher the cost of cyber charter school, the higher the tuition. Therefore, the higher the cost of cyber charter. So, it's beating into itself. There is legislation to look at some of that. Uh but that's right behind the budget bill. So, we know where that is at this point. Medical expenses um medical expenses are are very unpredictable. Um obviously as we provide benefits to

092our um employees, no one chooses uh significant illnesses. Um and and we cover the first $225,000 of that. You'll see that um through my time and through Chris before me, it's always been a battle to figure out where do we make the budget? And you can see that a few years ago the budget was significantly blue line above the actual. And so we made some corrections to bring it down. Interestingly enough, I looked across this time period and said, what if annual health care costs went up 2%. Every year, it really fits, right? It pretty well fits what our trend has been. Now, with that said, the national average in the last 10 years has been 4.8 8 to 6% growth annually. So even though our costs are going up in comparison to the industry,

093in comparison to public education, we are below any of those averages. So yes, there's ups and downs. We try and figure out how that fits together, but our our average annual increase is right around 2% over the last uh you know, 15 plus years. So we're we're good there. will continue to work and look how we can what we can do to flatten that more. So, we've talked about it, right? So, our budgeted uh we can see what our budget of revenues and expenses were. Uh the huge portion of those budgeted were that we received over $3 million more from the state than any of us knew about when we came to last year's budget. Um, we fortunately that allowed us to cover those expenses and it also we made some transfers to capital reserve

094that we wouldn't have done if we hadn't known that extra revenue was coming in. So, what does it look like with our fund balance? Well, our fund balance, uh, we do see about a million dollar reduction, but I thought it was important to include here, you can see what happened to our capital reserve. So the million-doll reduction in the general fund balance really just moved the money over to the capital reserve and put that in a much better place than it has been for the last number of years. So when you look at taking out the million dollars that went to the capital reserve, the reality is is that we had set aside $750,000 in contingency and we ended up being $115,321 above when you take out the transfer uh expenditures and um revenues. So

095you can see what that does to our balances and I think it's important to look across the categories as we've done here. So what are the recommendations? There's some board policy. There's past practice. We try to look and say, "Okay, where do we assign uh funds?" And so what we've done the last number of years is about 7% of our unassigned funds uh based on last year's expenditures. That puts us at right around that 7.8 uh86 million revenue with that ex line. um our committed fund and we'll talk about what we mean committed is right around $14 million. So we we take the rest of those fund balance and we assign a commitment to it. So the recommendations that are here this evening that we'll uh look at next meeting was uh to try and

096match some things up. So I think last year we had a million dollars in potential healthcare. It seems to make sense to match up if we are putting $750,000 as a contingency. Well, then we should match that up to $750,000 as a committed fund balance for those healthcare expenses. Uh, and then the rest we would leave in the plan for future repairs. Um, right around 14 or 1355. That makes up our fund balances. So, that item for this evening would be to place that on the agenda for two weeks. questions on any of the slides this evening? >> Any questions for Mr. Fory? >> Yeah, just to clarify slide I think it was slide five. Um I mean we show obviously we're showing 5.7 over budget but in reality it's not cash out the door

097over budget. 5 point it's >> right it's 4.7 4.7. So from a cash standpoint, we're >> it just went from one savings account to >> another savings account. >> Wanted to clarify that. Thank you. >> But I wanted to show it that way because when you see the audit, it's going to show 5.7. >> I I just wanted to clarify for everyone that it's >> Yes, >> that wasn't cash out the door. >> Correct. >> That much. Thank you. >> Any other questions? Any other questions? that. So this slide showing that 155 students enrolled in cyber charter cost the taxpayers $2.4 million. Is that am I reading that correctly? >> Yes. >> Cool. Sorry, that was sarcasm. I'm just doing the math. >> Yeah, the numbers on the right are millions. >> Yeah. Right. So

098>> that's the blue line and the numbers on the left are >> cost significantly more than a brickandmortar school. >> It it does. >> Yes. Okay. Just making sure I'm understanding those numbers correctly. >> Yes. With >> what what is our cost >> with less accountability? >> What is our cost per student >> traditionally? >> So if you look at students across the board and you it gets calculated a couple different ways, right? So if you look at it from the state perspective, they back out the bond payments. And so it's right around $15,000 per student. Um if you look at it, total budget divided by students, it's about 17,000 per student um if you counted the bond payments in there. So that's why you'll hear like why where did the $2,000 go? Well, do

099you count the bond payments or not count the bond payments? So am am I along the lines of Mrs. Navsinger's comments was the cost at cyber school about 135 a student >> for regular student >> six years ago and today it's 177 per student. >> No because cyber charter has they have different tuition. So we're just over 13,000 right now for a regular ed student, about 29,000 for a special ed student. >> And >> so what's Can you Do you know what the mix is? >> Um I don't It's about 2/3 oneird >> 2/3 special ed one. >> No, no, no. Two the other way. >> I I don't have the numbers in front of me, but I can look those up. >> The The issue comes Well, go ahead. Go, Mr. Well, I'm just

100hearing some of this, so I'm sorry. >> No, you're fine. >> If a third of the students in Cyber Charter are special ed, >> right? >> Those are naturally the higher cost students to educate. >> No, absolutely not. >> No. No. >> They are the lowest special ed cost students to educate. >> Correct. >> In our in our system. >> Yes. >> Correct. >> The majority of those special ed students have speech IEP. I was just going to ask you can >> and so the cyber charter gets a premium of 16,000 per or whatever 12, right? >> Yeah. >> 15 to $16,000 to do speech education a year. >> You have to slow down for me. >> A student that needs special ed needs speech support for special ed >> costs less than a >>

101an average student. >> No. Costs less than what they charge us for. If we were to educate that child for speech pathology, we could do it for significantly less because they're charging us a flat fee no matter what the special ed service is. But my understanding is that they don't typically have the services for high need students. Is that >> accurate? So they're they're taking low what we would consider low students but charging a premium. >> So on the ban of special ed students. You're saying they're >> they're taking our >> mild mild >> if there's a degree of it. They're taking the easier >> mild. >> Yes. >> Okay. >> Because you I mean you think of a practical standpoint, I'm not sure how you would educate a multiple disability student online. >> That's

102why I was kind of surprised to hear it was a third of the students. >> Yeah. And I can I I'll get you the exact count where we're at today, but >> Okay. Thank you. >> Any other question? >> Yeah. Um >> yeah, >> have we asked why we waited until whatever the date was for all of the reporting from the cyber? Do we have any rights or abilities to question push back? >> They get to do whatever they want. >> I mean, it was I mean, so we have no idea why. We just >> they got around to it. Okay. >> Okay. >> They were at their on their boat in the inter coastal for a board meeting. >> So, it sounds it was kind of expected that there would be more coming. Well,

103I I think now we have an accurate number. >> Of course, we had to report to the state October 1 and they didn't give us the numbers till October 2 or three. >> So, but I think 140 students that we currently have as November one is a more accurate number. Yeah, they have very different rules than we do. And that's the that's why you'll never see cyber charter reform. It's too much money. >> I said it and it's on YouTube >> for for at least a year. >> Yeah, it's too much money without the same level of accountability. >> I'll say that. Seeing no more questions for Mr. Fory, may I have a motion to place this committed fund balance recommendation on our voting agenda for November 17th? >> Move. >> Thank you. A second.

104>> Second. >> Thank you. Any further comment or question? All those in favor? >> Eight. Affirmative votes. >> Thank you very much. Anything else for the committee of the whole? Seeing none, I will adjourn the committee of the whole and I will call to order our school board meeting for Monday, November 3rd. If you would please join us in a moment of silence and place to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands. One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. The next scheduled meeting of the Pen Manor School Board will be held on Monday, November 17th, 2025 following the committee of the whole meeting. An executive session was held prior to the committee of the whole meeting for the purpose of discussing personnel

105and a student matter as detailed on the committee of the whole agenda. Mrs. Rhodess, may we have a roll call, please? >> Sure. Mr. Mr. Beaks >> here. >> Mr. Her >> here. >> Mr. Lombardo >> here. >> Mr. Straw >> here. >> Mr. Swigert >> here. >> Mr. Warfl >> here. >> Miss Word is absent. Mrs. Napsiger >> here. Dr. Fullerton >> here. >> Eight board members present. >> Thank you, Mrs. Rhodess. At each of our uh board meetings, we offer our citizens two opportunities to address the board. We have reached the first opportunity which will pertain to items on the voting agenda only. Do we have any citizens comments at this time? >> Hi Leah Bacon Manor Township. Um so this is related to the voting agenda and that it's related to the

106PSBA resolution to the state to pass the budget. Um, first I want to say I'm really pleased to hear all the discussion this evening of the details of the cyber charter funding. Um, you know, clearly there are a number of people in this room who understand very well how it works. There are other people who are now learning better how it works. Um and it's an important topic for us all to understand as it is one of the significant topics of disagreement between uh the Democratic le house and the uh Republican le Senate as they have this budget impass. Um news uh came out about 8 days ago about a compromise offered by the Democratic le Pennsylvania House um on the cyber charter funding issue. you know, as we look at the way funding is

107now, um, which the the baseline Republican budget is keeping the same, uh, versus what Shapiro, uh, proposed, a flat tuition rate across the, uh, Commonwealth that would bring costs way down for most school districts and therefore, uh, you know, would take some of that money that's currently flowing to cyber charters and keep it in the public schools. Um the cost difference there in that original proposal was about $600 million across the Commonwealth. The compromise proposed by the Democratic leadership in the House about 8 days ago. Um is uh something that would still save public school districts about 173 million of those dollars. Um it is not going to be a flat rate if it is adopted. It would be a proposal to um increase the deductions that districts can take for expenses that they offer

108that the cyber charter schools don't. So, for example, busing. It basically allows them to take the calculation of the per pupil expenditures and subtract certain things from them before they make that tuition payment. And so, um, I want to encourage you, uh, to do what I think you're leaning towards towards doing already with adopting the PSBA budget resolution that you've got on the agenda. Um, but I want to additionally ask you um if as individuals you can contact your representatives, your state senators um and as Republican- elected officials, particularly the Republican ones to ask them to compromise. Um, I know I will be as a as a public-f facing Democrat, I will be contacting the Democratic leaning officials to thank them for the proposal they offered, encourage them to compromise on any remaining issues in

109the budget impass. But um, you know, it helps us all to move on and I think we move on by both sides being willing to compromise. Specifically on the cyber charter schools, I want to say it is my understanding that state senator and head of appropriation Scott Martin is a huge huge fan of cyber charter schools and therefore resisting any kind of cuts to their tuition. And I think that there's a huge tension between that and what you guys are seeing as school board directors and the funding that the public schools need. So, um, I can and will be contacting Scott Martin's office, but I think it's even more influential for you guys to additionally be contacting his office to press what you see um as fair. That's maybe not what we're doing right now.

110For example, in the the specific instance you guys were discussing with the speech students who are getting funded at the level of $29,000 a year, and that's not what we're spending to educate them in pen manner. So, thank you. >> Thank you. Any other citizens comments? >> Seeing none, may I have a motion to approve the minutes from October 6, 2025? >> So moved. >> Thank you. A second. >> Second. >> Thank you. Any further comment or question? All those in favor? >> Eight affirmative votes. >> All right. Dr. Gail, superintendent report. Thank you, Dr. Foron. Uh, tonight, uh, we are reporting back from the start of the second marking period. Uh, so one quarter of our school year is, uh, already completed. And tonight, I want to begin with some congratulations. First, I'd like

111to congratulate five of our, uh, chorus students uh, for their performance at a recent festival. Uh, and these five have moved on to continue in the competitions. Uh the the five are Kennedy Failen uh and Noah Tulle, Ryan Andek, Matthew Palmieri, and Aiden Whitfield. Uh so they will have the opportunity to continue through into the district and possibly go on into regionals and states. Also, Eliza Meyer uh ranked third on piano, which qualifies her to be an accompanist for the county chorus festival that will take place on January 3rd, uh at Hempfield. So, congratulations to those six students. Also like to congratulate our girls soccer and field hockey teams. Uh field hockey team has uh won the district championship on on Saturday. Both teams are in uh competition tomorrow night in the first round of

112states. Unfortunately, our girls soccer team is heading out to North Alagany on the other side of the state whereas our field hockey team host a game tomorrow night. So, we wish them well. Uh we know that there's hopefully some more hardware coming our way uh in their accomplishments. A couple of updates from each of the different levels. I do want to thank Mr. and Miss Napsinger uh for giving their time. Uh a few weeks ago here at the high school we held our junior achievement real life day. Uh this is a day when our juniors two days where our juniors go through experiences and budgeting uh and how do you use your money wisely. Uh today also was our previously uh back in early October after our last board meeting, we had our super Wednesday

113which are uh juniors and seniors in some cases had the opportunity to take part in the PSAT and SAT testing day uh that was done in school. And then today here at the high school uh and thank you to Miss Napinger for being here. uh we had the our education day which is an opportunity for our students to meet with college admissions counselors and representatives from various work uh places in the area. Uh so we're this is to give o to give students and their parents a chance to learn more about what is available to them outside of uh high school once they graduate. And then one final note from our high school, uh, uh, our fall play, A Fox on the Fairway, uh, will be, uh, working on that and there will be performances

114the end of, uh, the week of the the 21st, 22nd of of November. So, that's our fall play coming up. At the middle school, we had a team from uh, Mardikville that competed in the construction wars. This is a a competition that our local construction uh industry puts on for our students to go and learn and also compete in the dynamics of construction. And then uh thank you to former ADA Janie uh oh I just drew a blank on her last name. >> Swinhart. Thank you. She's a neighbor. That's pretty bad. Uh she did a a assembly with our students on the dangers of the internet. uh this is something that she has done before and it's it's it's very impactful uh for our students to hear uh and we really target our students that

115are in seventh grade uh through this presentation. And then finally uh tonight uh Dr. Fullerton, I would like to give a special thanks to all of our elementary PTOs. uh this is the season of fundraising and in each of the different schools the fundraising that has taken place uh I think exceeded everyone's expectations uh number of different uh people were involved uh but really is a strong support for our schools especially providing some resources that we as a district are not able to our PTO step up and they do a tremendous amount of fundraising and it's very impactful for our students so we appreciate all the efforts that they put forth. >> Uh that's all I have. Dr. Forson. >> Thank you, Dr. Gail. Any questions for Dr. Gail? >> Okay, move right into treasures

116report, Mr. Fory. >> So, the treasures report for September of 2025. The balance sheet as of the end of August shows total assets of 63,48,95953. And as discussed earlier, as of the end of October, the district is owed approximately 11.7 million from the state. Uh tonight, there are September bills that are awaiting ratification as presented. >> Thank you, Mr. for you. Any questions? May I have a motion to pay our bills? >> So moved. >> Thank you. Second. >> Second. Thank you. Any further comment or question? All those in favor? >> Eight affirmative votes. >> Okay. Let us review our board meeting agenda. Item two, A and B. Any comment or question? >> Item three, A through J. >> Yeah, I'd like to pull 3H. >> 3 H. Okay. Like pull it to vote on

117it separately. >> Yeah. >> Okay. >> Yeah. I'd like to pull two. >> Pardon me. >> I'd like to pull 2B. >> 2B. Okay, thank you. And then item four, A through J. >> I need to pull F. I just realized I have a conflict with a coach. I have a relative on the list. >> 2B 3 H 4F. >> All right. Okay, let's move back up to item two. May I have a motion to approve item 2 A? >> So moved >> and a second. >> Second. >> Thank you. Any further comment or question? All those in favor? >> Eight affirmative votes. >> And may I have a motion to approve item 2B? to move. >> Thank you. Second. >> Second. >> Thank you. Any further comment or question? All those in favor? >>

118Six affirmative votes. >> Those opposed. >> Two opposed. Okay. May I have a motion to approve item 3H? So, >> thank you. Second. >> Second. >> Thank you. Any further comment or question? >> Yeah, I just like uh looking down through 3H, I've been uh one that has um consistently questioned quite a few things. This time I did not see anything that looked like it should have been a specific taxpayer expense. So, thank you to the uh Patter Education Foundation and all who have done things to put this into effect. But one question I did have is uh field trips to Gettysburg. Is that going is that in part of the support of the sixth grade field trips that we kind of talked about back in um at the retreat? And then also is the

119current shutdown affecting any of the scheduling or anything of that nature that we could be concerned about? Uh, didn't think about that part. >> Sorry. >> Uh, >> but it's not that's not till May. So hopefully. >> Yeah. >> Oh, okay. So >> if we're still in a shutdown in May that we're in bigger trouble than >> bigger trouble worried about Gettysburg, right? >> So it's not as >> but that that's the Gettysburg trip is for eighth grade or middle school students. >> So that's Mr. Ben Fender and Mr. Mr. Mask have manner that they do that. >> Okay. >> Dr. Gail, we do have a couple sixth grade trips this year that are going a couple different places. I believe that um the George is trying a different place this year. >> Franklin Institute

120>> and I think Mardik and Peek might feel like Mrs. Marsh was telling us that they are headed to Gettysburg. >> Did she mention that today? >> She may have. >> Yeah. Um, so there there we we continue to search for what is the best trip for everybody um as we try to work what's going to fit curricularly, what's going to fit into our school day and what's going to fit into the budget over and over. So um you know Ellis Island was fantastic last year but that is not going to be able to be replicated um on on an annual basis. So, I know they're trying a couple other things. So, um we we'll keep working working toward that and there is a a group that goes from Manor every year, but we continue

121to continue to explore at the elementary level who we can get where. So, we're going to keep on working toward moving everyone in that fashion. I don't know that the older students are quite as interested um unless at this point we haven't been able to fit that in. So >> I I know when um well my oldest was going through middle school they went to the American Revolutionary War Museum. Is that something they still do in middle school or >> from down at uh Martyville? >> I cannot speak to that directly. They I don't believe in eighth. Was that eighth grade that he went there? >> It was. Yeah, I went on it. It was great. I I didn't know if that's something they continue. >> I don't think they went there last year. I

122can I can say last year they did not. >> That sounds like a fun one, too. >> Yeah, it's a really good one. >> Any further >> Philadelphia further comment or question about 3H? >> Seeing none, all those in favor? Eight affirmative votes. >> Okay. May I have a motion to approve items 3 A through G and I and J? >> So moved. >> Thank you. Second. >> Second. >> Thank you. Any further comment or question? >> I do have a comment regarding um the strong and healthy grants. I noticed there's no request for dual enrollment. Um, and as Dr. Gail mentioned, I've been in the building twice recently. One of the things that students have brought to me is that dual enrollment is a challenge for them mainly because of the cost. It's cost

123prohibitive for them to take advantage of that. So, I know that's something from my involvement with the Ed Foundation in the past that we that they did fund. So, I'm just if we could >> explore that and find out. >> That's a mistake. Sorry. >> Okay. >> It's on there. It just doesn't have a cost with it, >> right? It doesn't have a cost. So I was assuming that >> there is a cost. >> Okay. Um so whatever that is, I would also suggest that we have students that don't realize that that's an opportunity for them based upon conversations I've had in the last month. Um so if we could >> encourage, >> give me one minute >> that conversation somewhere, I think it would be well received by our students. Uh, dual enrollment should

124be 6750. $6,750. >> Okay. Thank you. >> Okay. Thank you. >> Seeing no further comment or question, all those in favor? >> Eight affirmative votes. Okay. May I have a motion to approve item 4F? >> So moved. >> Thank you. A second. >> Second. >> Thank you. Any further comment or question? All those in favor? >> Seven affirmative votes >> and abstensions. >> And one abstension. Thank you. >> And may I have a motion to approve items 4 A through E. and G through J. >> So move. >> Thank you. Second. >> Second. >> Thank you. >> Any further comment or question? >> All those in favor? >> Eight affirmative votes. >> Excellent. We have reached the second opportunity for our citizens to make comments on any district business. Hi, Tim Guy from Mayor Township.

125Um, I appreciate the discussion about kindergarten. I just want to throw out uh some extra information that wasn't shared about the RAP program, specifically the cost for families. uh for this year looking at it, if you are there for four or five days, the cheapest which is without transportation or without um the additional care is $180 a week, whereas the it can go up to $240 a week. So somewhere around $700 to $1,000 uh a month for a family. So just wanted that information out there because I know I don't think it was stated during the discussion, but just so we know the cost for a family to get that. And I do know for a fact that a lot of the preschools in the area do advertise that to families in terms of going

126to kindergarten that hey, you can either spend this much money to have kindergarten at Pet Manor or just spend this much with us and keep your kid where they're at. And that I think leads into some of those enrollment issues as well. So going to let that be known. Thanks. >> Thank you. >> Any other citizens comments? Leah Bacon Manor Township and I promise this one will be short. I am excited. It's kind of directed at people that are left have left now, but um the half credit courses that are on the agenda for next month. Um I am very very excited to see the one entitled uh global trends in modern history. Um myself as a student when I was going through school would have loved to take that course. um for my own

127kid. I would love to have that course available. Um and just for for Penmanor students at large, I feel like my entire social studies experience and same as what I've seen when I've been following any students including my own through the social studies experience, there's always so much to study early on and like the end part of whatever history curriculum it is always gets squished and we never seem to talk about those last 50 years of history. So, I'm excited of the idea that there could be a class dedicated to that. So, thanks. >> Thank you. Any other comments? >> Anything else for the good of the board? um without going into the details of the specific um incident, but with all of the um things that was stated publicly around the issue in the

128cafeteria, could you just touch on what policies and practices are in situations that so there can be some clarification within the community with what our current polic is and and that I mean just >> in regards to >> in in regards to the student the the police action due to this due to a student theft of you know not looking for the specifics but what is our policy because it's not a onceanddone thing as I understand it. I your letter was was great. I appreciate you sending that out. Um, but I just think with all of the nuances around what is what is our exact policy on situations like that or practices. >> So, first off, in all of our cafeterias, no student is ever turned away from receiving food. And that that is one

129aspect that uh that is important because uh and it's not just a cheese sandwich. It is they have the opportunity as long as what they choose has three of the five necessary items to be considered a lunch they can have that. So no student is ever turned away. Uh but in in the case where a student is deliberately taking items then there are ramifications for that. >> Thank you. But it's not a first time there's >> typically no unless it's an excessive amount. >> Correct. But over time period, the administrators in all of our schools are watching, our cafeteria workers are watching. And they're seeing it sometimes not in so much a student doing it, but they're seeing it in their say inventory like what's put out, what's paid for, what's not. Uh but then

130typically our administrators are watching and you have students go through or pretty obvious when a student leaves the cafeteria serving areas without having gone through the line. Right. And then as far as there are state regulations around free and reduced lunch um for free lunch for all students. What what would what's the state uh what's the state percentage for a school district to reach before all students get free lunch? Isn't it like a little over 50% or >> No, actually 25%. But you only get reimbursed at 1.6 times. So we could give free lunches, but we can't get fully reimbured for all of them. So, it had been 40%. There is discussions about raising that back up again. >> And then also the cafeteria, a lot of the funding goes into the programs that allow

131us to purchase equipment through the funding through the school lunches or you >> So, every cent that comes into the cafeteria has to be spent on a cafeteria related expense, >> right? So, we bring money in through the cafeteria, then it can buy ovens that break down is and and those types of things without having to go back out to necessarily >> the taxpayers, >> right? We're we're fortunate in that are we do have a positive revenue stream that we can do that. >> Thank you. >> But any student is is able to have breakfast for free. That's a state program. Yeah. Great. >> Okay. >> Thank you. >> Anything else for the good of the board? >> I certainly want to wish all candidates who are running for offices best of luck tomorrow. Be

132a big day. Polls open at 7, close at 8. Results probably by 10:30 as we are getting ready to say goodbye to two of our colleagues here at the table for sure. Um, you know, we'll celebrate the two of you next next meeting. Um, but good luck to everybody running for offices tomorrow. And with that, we'll adjourn the meeting.