001start this meeting. If you would join me in a moment of silence, a pledge Salute. I aliance 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. [Music] Is that Thank you all for being here tonight this afternoon for our work session. [Music] First thing we need to do is approve the agenda. There a motion to approve. Second. Motion and second. Any discussion about the agenda? Sir none. Those in favor of approving the agenda say I. I. I. Those opposed say no. Guys have the agenda's approved. Meeting minutes from 5:22 and 5267 special call minutes. Need a motion to approve. I move to approve. Motion. A second. Motion and second. Any discussion on the minutes. Being none.
002Those in favor of approving them say I. I. Those opposed say no. The eyes have Madam Secretary. Roll call, please. Miss Stall, here. Mr. Van Winkle here. Miss Nichols here. Miss H. Mr. Davis. Mr. Matthews here. Mr. Cole here. Miss Stout here. Mr. King here. Hell and Davis are not in attendance. Thank you. Our director of school search update with TSBA presentation, Miss Tammy Ganganger. Dr. [Music] Thank you. Can you hear that? Yep. Okay, you're Thank you, Chairman King and members of the board. Uh we're going to pass out while she's passing out the notebooks for each of you. Thank you for asking us to assist uh your board and the search for your new director of schools. We had a total of eight applications which hopefully you all received the email that had uh
003the Dropbox link that had all the application materials in those. Thank you. We also provided a hard copy and I've given that to the board secretary. So there's one hard copy of everything uh as well. We're going to I know y'all are just like students. We're just going to jump right into the finalists and then we'll review the notebook later. Okay. Our job at TSBA was to screen the applicants and select the ones that our committee thought best met the criteria that this board adopted. TSBA does not select your director of schools. We just simply do the leg work and that's what we're reporting on. So, if you'll look in your binder behind tab one, our first finalist that we are recommending is Dr. Rebecca Farley. She's currently your interim and your chief academic officer.
004She's been a former supervisor of instruction here from 2016 to 2020. Former principal at Crab Orchard Elementary 2006 to 2016. Assistant principal at North Cumberland Elementary School from 2005 to 2006. Former teacher 1999 to 2005. She's a graduate of our prospective superintendent academy that TSBA partners with the superintendent organization. She graduated from that. Dr. Farley has six years as a teacher, one year's assistant principal, 10 years as a principal, and five years in the central office. Behind tab one, you'll find her cover letter, resume, and references. And then, of course, you've got the transcripts and all that materials through Dropbox. So, we did not put those in the binder cuz it has personal information on it that we cannot share. So, that's your first finalist, Dr. Rebecca Farley. Our second finalist is Dr. Randy Shannon.
005He is currently the supervisor of college and career readiness and the CTE director in Benton and has been since 2023. He's also a rule 31 general and family mediator and has been since 2011. He's an attorney at law and has been since 2012. He's a former Benton County Career and Technical Center principal and CTA director from 2006 to 2023. He also currently serves as an adjunct professor at Freed Hardman University and has since 200 2002. He's also a former sensor assistant principal Camden Camden Junior High in Henderson County 2003 to 2006. Dr. Shannon has 10 years experience as a teacher, three as an assistant principal, 16 years as a principal, and one year in the central office. And behind tab two, you can find his cover letter, resume, and references. So that is our report
006of finalist from our committee. Thank you. Any questions for board members? I was under the impression we'd have a top three. Was I mistaken? Or up two, three. Up two, three. Okay, that tells me what I need to know. Yeah, any others. There was another name on there that I from the list that you gave us. Um um Michelle Barnett. She was one of the candidates, I guess, that put her resume in. Is there And I'm just saying that because I know she's local from Cumberland County and and has a lot of ties to the communities here. Is there a reason she's not in the top two or three? Our committee selected the ones that they thought best met the criteria. It doesn't mean that all the applicants have excellent qualities, but our job was
007to select the ones that we thought best met your criteria. It doesn't mean you can't interview them, but Okay. Yeah. Thank you. What what have you seen success rates? What what do your success rates look like from boards that select from your recommendations versus going outside of those limits? Well, I'll tell you, we've done, let's see, eight this year. And one county I'll just say who it is. It's public information. Blunt County did not go with one that we recommended. Um, but I think everyone else has taken our recommendation. And guys, it's exactly what it is. It's our recommendation. It's like I said from the beginning, it's your job to pick your next director of schools. But you all hired us to screen the applicants and to provide what we thought and that's what we've
008done. But at the end of the day, it's totally up to you, right? All right. Well, I I'll continue to answer questions, but let's go to the notebook and go to page two. Um, this was the timeline that you all had approved. You have selected as June the 16th, 17th, and 18th as interview dates, Mr. Chairman. Are those dates still correct? That's what we said. I'm not sure that we good now. 17th, we have a conflict with the commission. 18 we get a presentation county commission budget if we did the these dates 16th and the 18th would work 17th one so y'all need to decide I know it's a work session but if you're going to stick with your timeline um you need to decide you've got two finalists and unless y'all are going to
009interview more you'll have to pick another date or other dates but I would suggest you move on because you voted to do this timeline and you want to stick with it. Uh page three, we recommend these procedures that you follow when you're um after you've interviewed the candidates. Number one was TSBA will refer up to three candidates. We normally say no new new names may be added, but it's up to the board. You can do what you want. All board members are to be interviewed in an open meeting. Only school board members need to ask questions of the candidate. You need to ask the same questions for each candidate. If you look in the front pocket of your binder, we created and we also emailed you last week so you could have it early a
010sample interview guide. The interview guide is based on your criteria. So they're not yes or no questions. They're questions that say, you know, what have you done to involve all people in decision making? Those types of questions. So I think you don't have to use them, but it's a good start for you to choose. And we gave you several per criteria, so you don't have to use them all, but it's a good start. I would recommend that you assign each question to a particular board member and that board member asks that same question each night of the candidates. At the end of the process, y'all are going to have to schedule another meeting and I think that was on your timeline whether you stick with those dates was June 20th for you to come back
011and talk about the interviews and then decide which candidate you're going to begin negotiating with. Typically we have more than two, usually have three. But according to this, we think a good process would be if you just interview two, take a piece of paper and give to each board member and let each board member write their candidate of choice and then sign the piece of paper, turn it over to your board secretary, and she will read them out loud because you cannot do secret ballots. Okay? Right? So that's the best process to do it. So somebody that goes first is not waiting to see how somebody else votes. I mean, I'll be honest, that's what happens. This is a good way to do it. It's just write your candidate of choice on a piece of
012paper, sign your name, turn them in, and then read them out loud. We we have found that to work the best. So, and of course, you want to try to always have a unanimous vote for your next director of schools. Then, skipping to page four, that was your criteria. That's what our screening committee used. Before you start the interview process, page five, 6, 7, 8, and nine are all tips on interviewing. Okay? So, it'd be good for you just to at least skim that over before you start the process. And then starting on page 10, there are equal opportunity employment guidelines of questions you cannot ask of a candidate. So, those are 10 through 12. Pages 10 through 12. Page 13, you all can do the interview like you want. This is just a sample.
013On page 13, we recommend when you bring, it doesn't matter if the candidates's local, not local, wherever they're from to kind of do this schedule. It gives everyone in the system and in the community an opportunity to meet the candidates. So, this sample schedule on page 13, the first meeting would be meeting with principles, central office staff. It's a 1-hour meeting. The board does not need to be at these meetings. It's an opportunity for the candidate to say here's who I am. About 10 minutes and the next 50 minutes is for the people in the audience to ask questions and do the same thing with a lunchon with your business and community leaders and then at 3:15 a meeting with faculty and staff and then the actual interview with the board at 5:00. That process
014seems candidates seem to like it and it's a way to involve your staff and your community and let them get to meet the candidate and ask questions because when it comes time for the interview that is strictly the school board asking questions during that meeting. I would suggest you bring food in and have a a small dinner with the candidate. It's just a good way to get to know people a little bit better. And then you can also on page 14, you can pass if you choose this schedule and have these meetings, you can have this candidate reaction form to pass out to people that attend these meetings to let them write their reaction to each candidate. You do not need to tally this candidate reaction form. Just collect them and let board members read
015them. It's nothing that needs to be tallied, reported back at a board meeting. It is simply for you all to see what other people in the community thought about the candidate. Any questions about anything else? You're good. All right. Well, thank you. Thank you very much. You need anything else? Give me a call. I'll be on the road. Thank you again, Tammy. Thank you, Tammy. [Music] Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Item six. So, Miss Thompson um called yesterday and um we were getting ready to go through her PowerPoint and uh she uh told us that she has been notified that she has a 4-hour meeting today with uh representatives from the US Department of Ed. So, she can't be here. Yeah. So, I have her PowerPoint. I'll go through that. Um I I've I saw it yesterday
016and kind of looked over it a little bit. Um I mean it has some pretty good information in it. I will be happy to share this with you all after the meeting. So if you will get us started. So what this says and explains is this is how our federal our title one budget comes to us. So it it it comes to us based on data that's provided each year from the US Department of Ed. Um and it's based on census data and that's 97% of it. Neglected youth, foster children, and temporary assistance to needy families. The overall title one allocations that we get is not dependent upon any local data that we pl that we have. It's all uh from them. Okay. So this is our last uh few years. You can look at
017that uh and see um pretty much we have stayed uh consistent. Uh one exception was uh the per pupil amount for FY22 for 23 which was the school year 2223. Uh there was a little bit of extra carryover there that they did allow us that we had uh here and they did allow us to spiral that down to the schools. Um they do not know the amount of money we will get uh yet for next school year. Uh if you notice the U FY25 and 26 are exactly the same and um because that's what they're planning on. Uh and then you can see the per pupil amount there. Okay. So couple of different methods as to how you can arrive um at um our data sources here locally. Uh we can do that through uh
018free and reduced lunch uh applications uh direct certification and you can see there that the month and year of the data used uh the uh temporary assistance for needy families Medicaid census and a household survey. Now let me explain this right here. The household the household survey. So, because we are a uh CF, is that right, Miss Hamby? C. C and everybody eats free uh lunch, we cannot use the free and reduced lunch forms. However, we can do the household survey. We can send that out. If we send that out, we have to ensure that the information provided is correct. Oh dear. How do you do that? Well, you to as I thought about this, this would be similar to the process for VPK. And what happens when you do VPK is in order to
019make sure that the families are income eligible, they have to give us their tax return. Oh boy. And how many people are willing to do that? Well, not very many. You know, we had over 200 I think and 40 this year register for VPK and we know for sure that over 100 I think over 160 is income eligible. So we know that 160 of those 240 families have have completed that. So um some notes here um which you all can read ensure that if more than one method is utilized all duplicate students are removed. So, if you have a student that I would assume uh would be in the foster care system, but they are on the Medicaid list too, we'd have to remove them for one from one of those. Um, select all methods
020if more than one is used. Uh, we must upload evidence of methods used as to how we identify these students and we have to ensure all personally identifiable information has been removed. the students ID and service code grade in school. What what document provides these guidelines? Is there a document or a I don't think that there's one document from TDOE? She just kind of compiled this because she was going to come and present or was going to try to. So, but were they still using the the Education Act of 1965? That that's a question for her. Yeah. Yeah. I would say seriously they go that far back. Well, that's Yeah, the same is they're using the same one in 2020. In 2022, they were still using the guidelines from the federal government from 1965. Yes.
021I can I can email her tomorrow and ask her that. I'm sorry, but I would have no idea. That's okay. I was just so seriously I mean non-regulatory guidance from the federal government. It's the Education Act of 1965. Oh, I've I've written it down. Okay. And that is to do what? guidance on how to determine whether you use these or not and how to determine how you allocate money to schools. It's a 34 page document. Okay? So, um you can use most in most instances if you don't have the CP, you can use free and reduced lunch. Um and if you use those exclusively, you cannot use the direct certification number times the 1.6 26 multiplier. Um, if you do use that, you also use the direct search report which we've talked about that uh
022that's uh generated monthly and it contains students that's in the foster care or receiving some kind of additional assistance. Um, if there is a combination of schools that qualify for the C, which we have, they will use the direct search list, which we do. Um and then the free and reduced lunch, the multiplier can be used for the C schools. It says if the um Medicare reduced is removed. [Music] Uh the direct certification that is uh provided to all school nutrition departments monthly. um and you have the autonomy to include Medicaid reduced students or not. Um if those students are utilized, you can't use the 1.6 multiplier. So say that again. If if we're using free and reduced lunch, we can't do the 1.6 multiplier. What it says? Yes. So we're not using free and
023reduced lunch, right? No. So you can um and later on she broke it down and showed us what it would look like if we did use the 1.6 multiplier this year. Uh but no, we did not use it this year and I or last year. Correct. So what made us decide not to do that? Um I'm not sure who who made that decision. I'm not sure of that either because I, you know, I'm I'm sorry and I uh but I wasn't part of that decision making. You were over federal programs as CAO. Okay. According to the organizational chart, yes, that did fall under me as well as operations folk. Um and I couldn't tell you when the um consolidated funding application was sent in last year. Um that wasn't something that was discussed. So with
024the data that you provided me um just about what 3 weeks ago I think maybe four that uh fiscal year 25 by choosing not to use the 1.6 multiplier our school elementary schools did not receive $571,000. So my question is is where was that money used? Why was it used there and how did we justify that? So I know when we do receive our title one allocations that we do have set aides that we are required to set aside. Uh you have some for uh homelessness. We have some that we have to include for um family engagement. Uh we have um foster money we have to set aside. There's some money we have to set aside for ESL. And uh we also have a title one and a family engagement liaison. And I know that
025that doesn't um amount to the amount you said. Uh I know that there were some there was one position that was paid partially out of that. Uh another one um maybe that was paid almost 100% out of that. Um, so we have those set aides and then some of that, but then the rest of it, to my understanding, was spiral down. So we went from spiraling, we didn't spiral down 571,000 to the schools directly supporting children. So where's the where's the I guess the justification for that? Was there was there any support data to support that decision? Not to my knowledge. Uh, like I said, I know some of those positions were had been added like just the year before. Was any data analyzed to see what would happen to the children that were supported
026by those monies? To my knowledge, no, sir. So, is that something that we can fix now? So, um, currently, um, the position that was paid 70% has been removed. Uh, that is no longer in our title budget. and uh the one that is 30% at this time had it has not been replaced um that person has taken another job and uh trying to figure out how to best use that money that 30%. So how do we how do we I guess create some accountability as to where this money spent and how it's used and justify changes to that money. How can we do that going forward? I guess is my question. Is there a way to do that? And I'm I'm putting you on the spot, I know, but um yeah, I mean, you know,
027it would just depend on, like I said, the one position is gone. That was 70% out of that. The 30%, you know, we would just have to see. Um and and yeah, you would obviously you'd want to tie it to students and to student data if you could. Um, but you know, like this homeless money, we're required to set it aside. There's so much we have to set aside. So, some of these we can't. It's just a requirement that they make us do. But anything that we choose to do, absolutely, I would want to make sure that we are held accountable for that money. So, I've got some data here that came through Senator Paul Baileyy's office. Um, in fiscal year 23, um, our per pupil expenditure was $774 per student. Our district set aides
028were $7,778. And our optional set aides for foster care were 20,000 and reservations of funds was $10,694. That's fiscal year 23. So starting in fiscal year 24, our district set aides went up to $257,000. Our optional set aside was for ESL was 27,000. Our professional development set aside was $127,000. Reservation of funds was 67,629. And that continues fiscal year 25 and is planned for fiscal year 26. So, why did we have to change that? And do we know how that affected the children that we that we chose to change that for? And I guess the next question would be, what are we going to do to fix that? Okay. Um, I can't, you know, yeah, I probably should know the federal piece of that better than I do. Um, and yes, federal programs did fall
029under the CAO, but I wasn't involved in that, you know. Um, so I can't answer why that set aside was so high. Uh, the professional development money that's divided and it goes to each of the schools. So I know where that money comes from and I know why. Uh, Mr. Dr. Whitmer, do you want to Yeah, I can speak to that. Can you come up to the microphone, please? Is it on? Yeah. Can you guys hear me? Yep. Okay. Yep. Part of the reason that that was said, I'm going to explain as the federal programs director, I do or try to do if it's allowable what my director of schools asked me to do. and I was asked to create two positions and it was reasonable and allowable and and deemed allowable by TDOE. So
030that's why you saw an increase in those areas that that should help explain some of that. That's the 70% position coming out of title one and also the other 30% position coming out of title one. Okay, so that's where part of that set aside is. And as far as the reservation of funds, they allow us to keep some just in case that allocation changes because I know in January when I spoke to you guys, one of the things we discussed is, you know, those are always preliminary and we don't always get final until later. And it's a lot easier to give money later to schools than it is to give it on the front end and then take it away. Take it away. So, so hopefully that explains a little bit why the set aides
031were higher during those years because we have had those positions the last couple of years. Didn't we choose to spend a big portion of set aides in 23 of when the when the per pupil expenditure was so high the reason that was so high that's what Dr. Farley alluded to earlier that was uh when I first came what I was able to do is due to CO we had excessive carryover and I was able to get a waiver and so that's why kind of as a one-time deal I was able to give the schools that excess carryover and that's why that per pupil amount is so high. So that was a real and that was explained to principles very I've got that in writing uh where that was explained thoroughly about hey this is a
032oneshot deal enjoy it utilize it for the students because this is not common we're not going to typically have that kind of PPA in Cumberland County but yes that was a onetime deal that's why that looks like such an anomaly there yes so you can't do that so if you were to do these uh reservation of funds for the next 5 years you couldn't do that again unless we had Oh yeah like our current reservation of funds. Once we get our final allocations, what I've explained and I put it in writing, I want to take that money and that's going to get spiraled back to the schools when we get carryover this year. That's going to get spiraled back to the schools. It's just right now everything is uncertain. As you saw earlier, that zero
033percentage, we don't know what it's going to be. They gave us the exact same amount as last year, but we don't know what that's going to be. Now, fortunately, when you look at the current information that came out, you know, a lot of states are getting cut with Title 1 A, a big cut. Tennessee is not one of those. When you look at that, I sent that chart. I don't know if you guys have seen that or not. I think Tennessee stands to gain about $44 million in Title One funding alone. And so, hopefully, we're going to get a bump. And if we get that bump in Title One, that's where it's going to go. Title One is to support the schools. And that's what we're that's what I try to do. I try to
034funnel as funnel as much money as possible to the schools when we have that opportunity. But we chose not to. We chose to pull 571,000 out 24 fiscal year 25. We chose we had the P the PD initiative included those positions because that was supporting students with those positions. So that's how we can you can put that in that PD initiative. Those personnel directly support students or they touching students every day. They were Yes, they were in school buildings touching. It was about the supporting teachers who were touching students and that's allowable. Yes, it is allowable. But is it effective? And did anybody look at the data to determine if it was effective or not? Yeah, I think when you look at and I don't want to talk about specific names because I don't want
035to do that in front of the board or anything like that. No, we're not going to. But when you look at I think some of the um the data that we have from what those positions were overseeing, yes, we have data to show that it was being tracked and the school level data was being tracked and monitored. So, can you provide that whenever we're making a decision to vote on how federal money money is going to be spent? Can I provide that data? That data was not provided to me. I can not in a public meeting, but I can tell you who that was provided to and we should be able to get that data. Yes, we should be able to get that. I don't have access to that data. But we were funding that
036through federal programs, but that doesn't mean I was supervising that person. Got it. See, I was asked to create that position. It was with federal money. But that doesn't mean that I had supervisory responsibilities over that person. Got it. But you found the money to pay for that position. The money was there to fund that because it was allowable. And the director of schools came to me and asked me to fund it. Yes. It was there after we decided not to use the 1.6 multiplier. No, that the multiplier doesn't change the allocation. The allocation doesn't change based on completely it changes the allocation multiplies the direct search times 1.6 and then you per the per pupil is times is that is that multiple but if you go back and you see the allocation we don't
037have any there's no local data that determines our allocation. You want to go back to that slide? That was the first slide, Miss Dian. Right. See the asterk? No local data is utilized to calculize this count. And this is our title one. How much? So, how do you decide what to send to the school? So, what this is, Mr. Bwinkle, is this is the amount of money that we get from the state and no, none of our local data is determined. Yep. That's the total you get for direct certification and that's the only money you get provided. It's not times a multiplier. I'm talking about what was spiraled down to the schools with the multiplier. So if a school has 400 students that are direct certified and you multiply that times 1.6, that new number
038is now how many PE pupils that you provide that funding for. If you don't multiply it times 1.6, you're only providing that to 400 students. Correct. Yes. So, we chose not to send that to the schools, but that money is still in our county. We still got funded that that money. So, it was still in our budget to spend it on something, just not at the school, right? We chose to do two positions. You just stated what else did we spend it on? But that but the set aside comes off the top and then whatever's left that goes to the school. And so whether it's the direct search or whether it's the multiplier that doesn't change the amount the direct the set aside comes off the top like for homeless for foster for the parent
039and family engagement. And then if you've got that I'll send you this worksheet so you can see what I'm looking at. I'll be happy to look at that. But um but anyway the direct search and the 1.6 that definitely can affect the spiral but it doesn't affect the amount of money that the schools get. that stays the same based on the Well, I know when you think you can continue the presentation and I know there's some information that'll hopefully support that. So, um, Miss Diana, I'm on slide seven and it's the direct search. So, what the 1.6 Six multiplier does it says here that it is to provide an estimate of the percentage of students who would have been eligible for reduced price meals but was not counted in the direct search data. Okay. Okay.
040Miss Diane. So here is the household survey. So uh it can be used if uh for district allocations if it is confident that the survey data are accurate and used consistently with ranking and serving criteria. So um it's on us as I stated to make sure that this data is correct and how we would get that and and prove that. Okay. So, here's school eligibility. So, the main uh this is the main data source the LEA has chosen to identify economically disadvantaged. The data source identified must match the data on the identifying and ranking school page and that's in our e-plans and must be consistent across all schools. And you can see the chart below. It says for clarification. Consistency does mean that the same data must be used by all schools as some data
041sources are considered equivalent. So you can use um the free and reduced lunch if that's an option and or an equivalent would be the direct times the 1.6 six or you can use direct and there's really no equivalent but if you choose to use the direct it must be used for all of the schools. So here is uh our current um consolidated funding application and you've heard us talk about this. You can see this is what we see in our e plan that we have to report all of our stuff to uh to the state. You can see that the povert there's all of our schools listed. You can see our poverty poverty factor. We chose to use um direct search. It breaks down um our uh students or our direct serve students per school.
042And then uh it has the um we don't have a non-public, but that's what line would be. And then it break it tells you what percentage of that school uh is considered poverty. Okay. So if you multiply that times 1.6 here's what happens. So currently with title one funds we are serving 10 schools. We're serving 10 of the 12 schools. We are serving all nine elementary schools and we are serving the Phoenix high school. As you could see, Phoenix was number one on the list with with 83%. Now, if we used the 1.6 at that point, all of our schools would be over 75% at poverty. And if they were, then you would have to um certifi use all 12 schools. So, what that's going to mean is you're taking your pot of money, which
043is not going to change, and instead of dividing that by 10 schools, you're going to have to divi divide that by 12. And you can see the numbers at Stone Memorial and Cumberland County High School are going to be a little bit higher. Do you have the Do you have the document that says you have to do that? It's right here. She gave it to us. I mean, I I all I have, Mr. Van Winkle, is what she's given me. She, like I said, she was supposed to be here, but um this is all I have. No, I can ask her for that document. Yes, please. Uhhuh. [Music] So, if you do the math, currently we're sitting at like 500 um $531, I think, and 10 cents. Um, divided among the 10 schools, if you
044use these numbers, then that per pupil goes down to $3 and something. So every school would you know lose that much per job. So how much how do you determine how much the school gets? How much the school gets? Uh you take um your uh d your direct and the per pupil amount is the amount of allocations divided by the the number of low-income students or your direct search. Is that how the worksheet's filled out? This worksheet, this worksheet does not have a per pupil amount on it. The next one may So you can see there and I know it's small but what they did was they took the number of students in column E and they multiplied that by F which is the amount of this the amount per pupil of the school. So
045it went to 245. I'm sorry I told you wrong. So the per pupil is multiplied by it's multiplied by the the number this is using the direct search times the 1.6. Yes. Okay. And that would um have us we she stated that we would have to serve all 12 schools because we're C. No. because we're over se you are over 75%. All of your schools at that time would rank over 75%. So there must be a new recommendation besides that 1965. Well, I've got that down to ask her and I'm sorry that I don't know cuz per by it it doesn't say that the LEA has to do that if you have schools that are and I think we've not in the past funded the high schools with federal money even though they qualified. They
046do qualify but they haven't reached that threshold yet of the 75%. Based on the data that we have used. So legitimately if you had one school that was 75% you could give basically give that school the entire amount of funding. And if none of the other schools were 75%. Is that what you're saying? No. They have to be served if they're over 75%. They have to be served with title one funds if they're over the only way they can qualify to be served is to be at 40% or higher. But when they hit 75% they have to be served. Yeah, that's the So if the if the funding's based only on direct certification, why would why would 1.6 require you to fund the hospitals then? Because it puts them over when you do the multiplier,
047it puts them over that 75% threshold where they're above 40 right now. I think one's at 48 and one's at 53. Using direct search, when you use the multiplier, it puts them both over 75% poverty when you use because it increases it. That's and the purpose of the multiplier and I've explained this to Dr. Farley. If you have a school that's on the cusp, say because 40% is the threshold, they've got to hit 40% poverty for us to serve them with title one funds. If you have a school that's maybe at 37 38%. Okay. What? That's where that multiplier comes in. You can use that multiplier and get them over that 40% so that way you can serve them with title one. Every single one of our schools qualifies based strictly on the direct search
048data. And with that, to me, no one student is more important than another when it comes to serving. And so I think looking at that direct sort of data and that per pupil amount that gives everybody the same amount per student in poverty per school. So that's why and and again direct serve the way our numbers are every school qualifies that we've been serving it puts them well above the 40%. So why don't we serve the high schools too then? Because it would deplete. Right now, the way it's historically been done in Cumberland County is if you serve the high schools, that pot of money takes a whole lot away from the elementary schools because when you look at the amount of students we would be serving at the two high schools, the the elementary
049schools would have their uh budgets decimated. So, we've made a choice not to fund students that you just said need the money because of a great band or what's what's the decision? That's historically that was what was done in Kerland County is the two larger high schools um well until recently they didn't qualify in the last couple of years we've seen um them actually creep up and now qualify um so they can be served with title one funds but you don't have to serve them until they hit 75%. because as we did we have continued to invest that money in our elementary schools and the Phoenix school has to be served it is above 75%. We don't have an option there and our elementary schools is where um the title one money has been put
050to invest in those younger grades before they get to high schools. So that is absolutely something that can be done. you can absolutely serve your high schools, but your your elementary schools will absolutely have their budgets decimated, which is that's not, you know, that's something that our director of schools wants to do moving forward. I will certainly do what I'm asked to do in that regard, but that's not going to change the pot of money. Do all of our do all of our schools are are all of the schools that we're serving now over 75%. No, it's when you put them in the multiplier that puts them over 75%. So I'd like to see that how the guidelines for that still and see how we're making that decision. The guidelines for that 1960 act of
0511960. I've got it now. First question I got. Okay. Um so and uh here's just an overview of the school eligibility uh what you do and then things that you have to consider. You know, you select a primary measure that will be utilized for deterine determining poverty in your district. And then over there's the things to consider. Determine the amount available to be allocated to schools. Remember, set aides will be deducted and not allocated to schools. Um rank order all schools in the district by percentage of poverty either using uh utilizing ranking or of districtwide or grades span. And if you saw that list uh back, you know, uh Phoenix was up at the top with 80s something percent. After schools with 75% poverty or above are served, first determine whether to rank the remaining
052schools into districtwide grade spans and then determine the amount of funding for each school served. And you know, here's the thing. Um, I know we're into this discussion now. Um, but this we had a deadline that we had to submit it to TDOE, the consolidated funding application. Um, and so we met that deadline. Um, you know, no, you all weren't involved uh in that process. I apologize for that. Uh, you know. Okay. Well, and and I don't care to share the information. We talked last time and I felt bad after I left because we talked about you know is this just um you know just a vote just to be voting and we do have to upload that but that's information that if you are asked by people by your constituents I would want you
053to be able to explain that and that you understand and know why and why the decisions were made and I think we should know why. Yep. So thank you. Mhm. So we had uh information on class size reduction and you know uh a lifelong learner myself I learned something from this. So if you would skip the next two there you go. So um we had talked about looking at class size reduction teachers. So, I gave you data of this year's second, fourth, and sixth grade because my opinion was if you were going to do a class size reduction teacher, you would want to do that in grades 3, 5, or 7. That's typically your harder grades. Well, this is allowable for grades K through three. Okay? So, uh we have to have this evidenced in
054our consolidated funding application. Um for this year, we did not put that in there. Um, and and I hate to say this, um, you know, sometimes, uh, you get comfortable in the things that you've always done, and that's not always the best way. I understand that, but that's kind of how we've operated the last few years. When I was a principal at Crab Orchard, I asked for a class size reduction teacher uh, and was told no. So, that's been a practice that we've done for a long time. So, you know, we didn't put it in the CFA. uh this is a school decision. So the school has to decide that this is how they want to use their title money and for a lot of them they don't even get a h 100,000 some may
055not. So you know when we are talking here and we're talking about a teacher that's unfortunately the amount that we tie to that teacher when you do benefits because that has to come out of there as well their benefits as well as their pay. um the schools are required to submit a school improvement plan which is kind of a reflection of our district improvement plan and this has to be documented in that as well. Um I don't know that it's here or not but you can read there why you have to um the teacher qualifications which you know really sometimes we do have teachers teaching on a a waiver uh but we do usually have the certification documentation showing the teacher is a level three on the latest team evaluation and uh this last one
056here that goes with Tennessee code you can't so if you have a in the K3 three, you can have 20 kids, but you can't have more than 25 in one class. So, if we had two schools and or we had two teachers at one school and one of them had 25 and the other one had 26, we couldn't say we're going to use a class size reduction teacher. That would be on the district to fund that teacher to get into code because we're over correct. We do not meet the state guidelines. But if we had 22 and 23 and we wanted a class size reduction to teacher to get it down to 15 or whatever, okay, we would have to make sure that's in our consolidated funding application. They would the school would have to
057have the money to fund that teacher and it would have to be reflected in their title needs assessment and then they would have to link that to their school improvement plan. But would we have to do that? Would we have to use the CFA money to to use utilize a class size reduction? Could we as a district not just do it and pay for it ourselves? You know what I mean? Instead of using the instead of using the federal money, not use district money. Could we not do that and have a to Well, I think you would have to call it something other than class size reduction. Mhm. And um then you you know that that would be a slippery slope I would think. Um and this is just me giving you my opinion on
058that. Um and I know you all have been given data to determine how you how we would choose a class size reduction teacher, but um I I would just be cautious of giving one school something when you can't do it for all schools, especially in that instance, if that makes sense. So that's what you should use data for in my opinion is it's not it's not all about being fair. It's about doing what's needed for those children. So there there may be some schools that need it and there may be schools that don't. Mhm. And and that's it's kind of what I was thinking. It's just, you know, when you look at the county, and I get that when you when you look at the county, we are so vastly different in all of nine
059of our elementary schools. Um, and there's just lots of things to take into effect. And we all know that you can't always tie everything to data and test scores because typically when you tie when you're talking about data in a school setting, nine times out of 10 you're going to talk about test scores and and sometimes I struggle with tying everything for a second or third grader to a test score. But you do know from benchmarking whether a student can read or not or whether they're meeting this the standards of your benchmarking tests. And you can look at that each year and say, "Hey, we may need some more help at this school because they have 32 kids that can't read. The other school has the same number of students, but they only have 12
060that can't read." Right? And so that that's the that's the type of focus that I'm talking about as far as data goes. And and being it's not about being fair at that point. It's about doing what's right for those students, being strategic with funds. Yeah. But that is the 16 slides that she provided. The other thing that's I guess given me some initiative on this is our third grade reading scores are not where they need to be and they're not improving. So what are we going to do? We're just going to keep doing the same thing as Absolutely not. Right. So, and that's, you know, um I try not to say anymore that I'm only here till June 30th, but Well, you shouldn't. You're one of two candidates. But, you know, um anybody that's been
061in this office uh and that has worked closely with me since we've got third grade test scores, that's what I have said. If I'm fortunate enough to be here after July, we're going to have to look at third grade. That is going to have to be priority number one. I consider that an opportunity for Cumberland County and I consider it an obstacle for Cumberland County schools, but that has to improve. That class size reduction may not be the only answer, but nobody's talking about anything. That's why I brought it up. I agree. I will share this PowerPoint with you all. uh tomorrow morning. Thank you. Yep. You want me to go on? Yes. Number seven is meeting dates. So, uh I think Mr. King maybe had a had some questions asked about why this meeting
062is uh the week it is instead of later on. So this is the time uh that this meeting was set last year when we set those because uh the last week in June in June Mr. Steppp was typically gone for military service. So that's why he had bumped up the meeting. So that's why this meeting is this work session and this meeting is when it is. So, uh, the July date that has been bumped up, I think, uh, if I'm not mistaken, and I don't have these dates right in front of me, but I do believe that the July is on a Tuesday because the uh, the 18th, which would typically be when we have the work session, that is when you all would be to um, summer law. Okay? So, that's why that was
063moved. Um, August were good, September, we're good. Those are the original dates that we had. That's the work sessions the third week and yes, we did because that's for the um fall meeting. Yes, sorry. But September is good. October, we bumped the work session up a week because uh it fell on fall break, but the board meeting remained the last Thursday of the month. And then you have um the work session in November and it's the 20th because the um next Thursday is Thanksgiving. Uh and then that December meeting is typically the first Thursday of the month. The November December is and then January is good. February is good. March uh we bumped the work session up but kept the board meeting the same because that is uh spring break. And then all of the
064rest of them fall correctly. The third for the work session and the meetings the fourth questions. Okay. So you have uh with you or in front of you um we uh wanted to give you one more chance to talk about um budget recommendations. Um the latest draft that we have um it is budget draft 2 as of 52025 520 2025 and we have added a new column in this budget and that is a column that is uh the difference in draft one and draft two. Um, and a little bit of information about that. When we presented the budget to county commission, they wanted us to cut $4 million and come back. So, what Miss Bray has done, uh, there's been a few things that we've cut. Um, you all approved the semibalanced pay scale that
065had a little bit of savings. Um there's a little bit of maintenance changes there as well, but with all of the changes that we made, and I told you this the last time we met the um teacher line, we had a substantial savings there. That's on page five. Uh there was substantial savings there because instead of figuring out figuring it on masters and 10 years experience, we figured it on masters and five. Um, and we have budgeted to the actual for this year instead of budget it to budget like we have in the past. So, we have it's pretty pretty close and pretty pretty tight, but we have managed to cut $4,741,356 from this budget. So, from the last one, nothing. This is still the same as the last meeting that we voted on. There's
066just some little I'll put some tiny little revenues in, but that's about it. So, 17 of the 24, I think, pages of um uh expenditures have at least a reduction of some kind. Now, you know, some of it may not be anything great, uh but some of it is uh substantial. And I just wanted to share this with you because this is what's going to be presented to county commission. We need to make our copies and get it to them. Yes, sir. So, the the last one we voted on, I only showed a $4.1 million savings. I'm just wondering where the other 600,000 came from. And I and I I don't know. I've not laid this this copy on top of the last copy, but it is the same. Nothing else has changed. It seems
067it seems to me when we voted, I might not be remembering correctly, but it seems to me that there was some correction that needed and we voted for the draft that was on the pay scales. The pay scale. So, the pay scales made up that much difference. I don't know about that um that much, but like I said too, she's put some of this to actual. Okay. All right. Not Tim. So, um, any questions, comments? Are you all good with this being presented as it is to county commission? Yeah, looks good to me. Okay. So, um, we met today with, um, three county commissioners and Mr. Matthews, Miss Bray, and, uh, Mr. Carl from Upland's design uh and toured North. So, a couple of things came out of that that county commission is asking for.
068Okay. So, um as you know, we are asking for uh capital. We've moved that to page 28, I think, and we've created that 91300 line for capital projects, which is what the controller asked us to do. So we have asked county commission for their maintenance of effort and the 3.1 for those capital projects. So today we were asked if we would rank in order of importance our capital projects. So, uh, we have those printed out and my my thoughts would be you all ranking those and seeing what's most important. You know, obviously, uh, electrical is on there. You've got some fire alarms and stuff like that that's on there. Um, there's a gym floor on there. There's a track on there. So, renovations is on there. So, if you could um are all these not
069safety related type items. Yeah. So, we're going to rate them and then they're going to do just the top ones that we rate. I mean, it's I'm giving you the information that I was given. Okay. I think that could all be articulated to be considered safety. Yeah. And that's what she said. She said, you know, we want to know um your safety concerns obviously first. Well, of course, we have the engineering reports, right, that list the fours and fives, and these fall into the categories on the from the engineering report that we spent money on. They're all they're all number one. And I'll be happy to say, and that's that's No, that's perfect because that's exactly what they are. All security concerns and Okay, I will tell county commission that on Tuesday. either they're either
070active safety concerns or could potentially be safety concerns or liability concerns. Well, Mr. Matthews was there and he heard the discussion just as well as I did. You know, it is this is not a wish list and yeah, it's a needs list. And my thoughts at the time whenever they were asking for that were they're all number ones. Everything that Yeah, we need help. We just need help. We're just asking. When we walk through those bathrooms at North and you the first one you walk into uh right off the office right there, the sinks are being held up by metal bars welded together and and it it's like I agree really. I mean, you know, we're trying to protect kids and help kids and so I'm I'm 100% behind putting the one by all of
071them and we've already cut our budget back and we have to have the buildings for the kids to be able to go into and have school, you know, and if there's not safe for them to go into, then we're not I'm just full of all kinds of good news tonight with the first presentation and now this one. Okay. Don't shoot the messenger. This is not directed at you at all. I will be happy to go to county commission and say every one of these has a one bomb. That is correct. I'll do that next. Then keeping in mind that this was a recommendation from a couple of the commissioners that showed up today. Right. So we've got a whole county commission of 18 commissioners. Would the engineering report that we money on would having allowing
072access to that providing that to him? Would that be helpful for for them to look at? Mr. Carl was there today from Uplands. I'm just wondering for all the commissioners that are going to be voting on that that weren't there today, you know. So, do you want me to make a copy of that and send it when I send the They're wanting 25 copies of our budget. So, do you want me to make 25 copies of that engineering? I don't think that that's necessary, but maybe one binder that they have access to going and looking at if they if they have questions. about why we're asking for these things because we've again spent good money for the professionals to come in and tell us we know that we need a guess. And one of the
073things that the commissioners pointed out today that is not even on our list as far as capital projects or whatever was when you're walking around North School and you go out the back where which the portables are a whole another issue and I'd love to get rid of those but there's absolutely no fence between our school North School and the rest of the community that's out there. There's no security fence, anything else around an entire community. I mean, that anybody could be in any of those houses and walk right straight into our school and there's nothing we'd know anything about. And that's just I mean, and you're asking us to We have discussed that before, haven't we? Yes. Yeah. Okay. I thought we had. So the next thing that they asked was um to develop
074a list over the next few years of uh safety related maintenance needs. So you know we came back Miss Bray worked on this. So I have a sheet that I can share and I will share with you and we can get you copies. Uh but um looking at what we wanted to do for 2526, Martin Electrical, Homestead Electrical, South Fire, and then for 2627, you're looking at another phase of Homestead Electrical, Pleasant Hill Fire Alarm, and I think she did use the engineering report to come up with these. But um we can get you um a copy of this as well. But you know, I'm just trying to do what everybody asked me to do so we can get this budget passed. Mhm. And this is what I was asked to do today. So that's
075why we did that. Thank you. Well, and that and that was another thing while we were there. I've mentioned this McKenry thing about being able to know exactly what our appliances are wearing out. Yep. And build our budget, build our future plan and things like that. And so, yep. So, you all are good with the budget. Everything's a one on safe on safety for next year. Yes. And Okay. And we'll get you a copy of that other document. Y. So the salary scale that's part of this presentation part part of this agenda budget is it is it the new new one we voted on or is it the old one? So it's the new one you voted on. So the attachment for the agenda is incorrect. Is that what number? Uh hold on let me
076get to it. the budget draft. It's if you scroll all the way down to the bottom of the budget draft, I think I just really wish we could come up with some way to name these budgets and know what it is. I mean, it's wearing me out. So, it's page uh well, it's not numbered cuz down towards the bottom where the salary skills are at for the budget, page 29, possibly. So that's the classified. Kim, are these salary scales the ones that they voted on and current and good to go? That's on the agenda, by the way. This was all attached to the attachment. I'm saying I didn't add this whole entire tax system to part of the budget. So we might need to propose the budget is what I thought. Thank you ma'am. Thank
077you. That's the reason I asked because it's part of the agenda and I right didn't want to so over the wrong side. Correct. Well they get a hard copy. They don't get they don't want to let they want hard copies. Okay. I only have 28 pages in my office, but there's 36. That's my mistake. My apologies. Can Can we change what? So, this is public access, right? Can we change that so that it matches what we're going to present? I mean, if it's approved, I can go in and delete it and reload it. Now, that's up to you. Yeah. I think we need to have what's current. We just approved the budget. So, do we need to make a motion to change or approve the agenda? approve the agenda. Can we make a motion to
078to make the change? Make the change to the agenda. Surely we can. I would think so. If we can vote to approve it, we can vote to change it. Just can get the you can get the question. Yeah. Yeah. You got it. I think we all got on the same page at the same time. Okay. So, one more uh that's kind of attached to budget stuff. While I'm sharing, let me just go ahead and share this. So, uh the SMHS football field work, um Mr. Chapman received that bid the day after the bids were opened. I did call him. He said that they would be starting work on that the second or third week in June. I called him today at 3:46 before this meeting started. They are there. They have been doing some work.
079They have gotten the dimensions and I think of that's the slopes and different things. They have used a sod cutter to measure exactly what they need to do. They have gone in and uh applied more weed killer. And tomorrow they are going to be going back over there and they're going to analyze the sprinkler system. And his exact words, we're waiting on the grass grass to turn crispy. and he assured me that they are Yes, that quote. Um, he assured me that that football field is a top priority. He realizes we're on a time crunch and that they as well as us want that ready for our first games in August. Think crispy lettuce. Yes, there you go. Not crispy crispy. Crispy lettuce. So next I had been tasked uh to come up with some
080uh ways to increase our fund balance to try to arrive at the 17% that county commission is asking us to uh accomplish. Miss Diane, do you realize we have nothing on anything? I do because I'm trying to delete pages off this budget. So, I've come up with some different ways um to do that. Um I can go a little bit off the top of my head. I'm sorry. I'm getting question as fast as I can. So, yes, every person in this school system that works for us is very very important. Very very important to me. Um I don't think anybody in this school system works for the school system for the money that just for the money. I think they work uh because that's their passion and that they love kids and want to make
081this a better place. So with that being said, one of the suggestions and again, you know, kind of the messenger thing here, um to try to figure out ways to arrive at the fund balance to increase the fund balance. So we gotten outcomes money two years in a row. The first year that outcomes money was given, we received around uh $400,000. That money was used for a roof. Board voted on it. Okay. This past year, we received $600,000. You all voted to give every person a bonus. So, a suggestion that I had was every other year alternate the outcomes money. So for year three, outcomes money would go for fund balance. Year four, use outcomes money for bonuses. And again, this is just a suggestion. Uh but that was one way to arrive um at
082trying to get to the 17% that they're wanting us to arrive at. Um, another suggestion that I had was um, obviously any money that's left over to put it in there um to try to estimate and this is really hard but you know to try to estimate to them by April 15th uh, what it would be what our fund balance would look like. Oh, thank goodness. Provide projection of anticipated fund balance for the current year by the April board meeting. That's going to be hard because you all know we've talked about it this year. Our big capital projects come out in May and June because school's out and we can do that. But again, it's going to be an educated guess, right? But again, just trying to come up with some suggestions. Continue to budget
083with close to actuals instead of budget to budget as we have in the past. Try to add to the fund balance at least one and a half to two million each year. That doesn't say try. Well, if you read up it, yes, it does. Cumberland County Schools will try. It does. It does say we'll try. I can bold that and capitalize it if you need to, but yes, it does say try. Um, this would be earmarked for that fund balance bill build. uh continue to place uh an additional balance into the fund balance up to the required amount or two months operating by as specified in the 25 budget requirements. And then there's the one about the outcomes money. And then um some discussion was had about the baker's crossroads. So if we give that
084to them with the understanding if if we need land to build a school, they're going to give that to us. Then okay, that's fine and good. But if you sell that, then you put that money that you get from that into our fund balance. And again, these are just suggestions. This was another um fun activity that I was tasked with doing and I have tried to do it to the best of my ability. Can we just add a line in our budget fund balance 1.5 million? So, if we can do that going forward, why don't we just do that this year? Yeah. just add an extraund 1.5 in there and say that's just going straight to our fund balance and send it to them. So I think we've had this discussion before, but the last
085two years we've met the 17%. The last two years in a row we've met the 17%. So yeah, close 13 million or 12.5 somewhere in there, which is close to the 17%. So, why do we need to try to put 2 million a year in there? That's just my my take on on that bullet point is and I think what they're do and I don't know, but I think what they're wanting us to say is um we want 17% in there the entire time. And when you look sometimes at our fund balance, it does fluctuate a little bit, especially there in May and June when you have those big capital projects coming out. And you know, we have to take part of it back to balance the next year. Correct. When does the state look
086at it? They look at it once a year, right? Correct. Tell them not to look at it till later. So, what's the benefit of having it in there all the time? That's what they're asking us to do. Is this a running fund balance of that amount? Right. So, so we can cover two months worth of expenses should anything happen. So, what's makes sense? So what's ever happened in the history of Cumberland County Schools that we needed two months worth of Yeah. Knock on wood. Is this state requirement? No. It is a it is a request a recommendation by the controller to the county commission and commission and someone asked. It's not a requirement. It's a it's a request suggestion request. Right. So, somebody asked and I think I put that in an email. Um, no,
087not every department is they're not asking every department to do 17% like they are us because our budget is substantially higher than most. Is there a benefit for anyone to have 17% in their day after day? Does anybody know? We have a high yield interest account. So, the county the county has a high yield interest account. Correct. Yeah. So now now we know why we want 17% in there. And is this a request that is going out across the state to all of the school districts? That I'm not aware of. I just know what they're doing in Cumberland County and the departments here. Okay. And it's not for every department here. It's just specific departments because of the budget and ours is substantially larger. But we have I mean we're given a budget to educate
088our kids. And so if we have to constantly take more and more away from that budget to educate kids, we're not doing the service that we need to for the kids. I'm not shooting the messenger, by the way. Thanks. I'm I'm shooting over the messengergers. I was looking to see if there's a camera up there. Um so next is the uh consolidated funding application which we've talked about. Um you all will need to vote on that to approve it. And again you know yes we talked about that that is a requirement but we are wanting uh you all to be informed as to why you know going forward uh things can be done differently when the budgeting and the application process starts but we're not at that point this year. Okay. You want me to
089continue? Number 10 is Ben Lman. So, what we they're asking for here is they're wanting to put one of their little telephone buildings um on Crab Orchard School. Um a few I guess it might even be years ago now, you all voted the board voted to put one on Pleasant Hill. And what this is going to benefit is we will be able to go to Ben Lman for our telephone, which is going to be a substantial savings every month. and we can provide better internet to our families in the Crab Orchard and West areas through this. So, so that's why we need we're going to have to put this little building in there um and make sure that they can have access. So, that's why you would be voting on this next Thursday. Can we
090do that everywhere? They're working on it. They they truly are. Um they're amazing. So, um, at the house, I'm not quite sure where they are not yet, but they're they are working on it. Okay. Next, um, you have some information uh, from McKinstry. Uh, this is the integrated uh, facilities assessment. You should have a handout like this that was sitting at your seat when you came in. Um, and I mean it it's really um great information. Where I would suggest that you go to is the last page. So this is just showing all the savings that we would be correct having from using their services. Correct. And if you look um the year one, that is the exact amount of all of those high priority number one items that we just rate rated. So you
091can see um all of the items there and like um the maintenance and repairs, the 805,000, you know, obviously that initial investment amount. Um and then you can see it's a 3% savings from year to year. or a 3% in uh increase I'm sorry in inflation and by year four you would be in the green guarantee. It's not like our lighting. No, I don't think this is like lighting. Um and then you can see the summary there. Um you know um the initial investment uh the preventive uh maintenance savings um in 10 years and then the net value to the total savings and then the net value to the district. I think this would help tremendously uh with the budgeting and trying to keep up with all of the maintenance. I think it'd be a
092great investment. Yeah. So, and uh I do believe that it is currently in the maintenance budget that you all have approved. Yes. Yeah. It was a line item that we had a long discussion about. Yeah. I know I was here then, too. But this answers a lot of those questions that was in that long discussion. I watched the long discuss had this before before. Sorry, we didn't have this before. I was trying to catch up on what I missed. So, any questions or discussion about this? Okay. So, um student council. So, at the elementary schools, uh if you sponsor student council, you do not receive a supplement. Um and um our stu student council and our beta club as well, but this is for student council uh are active and do many things. And this
093is a proposal by a teacher asking you all to consider adding um a student council supplement to our approved supplements. So, who makes the decision on the supplements as far as who gets how they use them? Who gets a supplement? Like, cuz I I I started inquiring about this today and like, you know, the chess club, they may get a a supplement for whoever sponsors that, but then the archery team, their coach doesn't, correct? You know, so it it it's like it's and the student council does it. Don't they apply for it? That's what I'm asking. I don't know how there there's an approved list. There's an approved list. We have a scale for all of these different jobs. And you're right, there's certain ones that are on it or not. But it's an based
094on your years of experience and how long you've been coaching, whatever, or doing yearbook or dance club or whatever it is. It was developed three years ago by our coaches. Huh. Now who how it determines what what who gets what updated the coach and they do apply for it. It was updated then correct. There was one existing before that but not that was based on years of experience and that went up with however many years kind of like a teacher scale. So where this came from I can explain that um the district has to develop a strategic comp and that's um something that we have to do. So, we were having that discussion about what would qualify and they asked, could we add a supplement for student council at the elementary level? Well, that's not
095what the strategic comp money that the state gives us is for. And there was a teacher in there and said, well, hey, a few years ago, we didn't have a supplement for this. I drafted up a proposal and took it to the board and they voted to put it into the supplements. So I would assume based on that conversation that the final say is you all. Now what I can do is try to find that original document and see what receives supplements. I know some of the sports does uh and some but you know like student council that doesn't in archery that has never received a supplement. Yeah. And they put in hours and hours and hours. Absolutely. Um, but I can try to find you that. And that's and that also brings up another
096thing like even with the um all these school nights that were that schools are putting on and different things now and it's like that they're asking our teachers to stick around and take part in all the all these school nights, but they're not getting paid for any of that. Okay. So, no, they're not. But some things your teachers are going to want to be involved in because that's just something that they've worked with the kids on for whatever reason for this or that. But our teachers do now, uh, this was voted in, I think four years ago, get paid for ball game duty. So, if they have to work a ball game, they do get paid x amount for a ball game duty that they work. And um but are they but if they decide
097they don't want to do be do be do be do be do be do be do be do be do be do be do be there for the school night is that counted against them? I mean because in I don't know any other industry that we that I've ever dealt with in which if you're required to be there at work away from your family that you don't get compensated for. You know what I mean? I would think some of that would job responsibilities and some of it does. Yeah. for for making sure that they're involved and and I I don't know the best way to put it. My mind's not cranking tonight, but to make sure that they're giving the best education to the kids, that they're engaging with the parents because parental engagement is
098a requirement for the teachers. Um, and that's just kind of part of the scope of and sometimes too. So when teachers are evaluated, they're evaluated based on instruction, ba based on their classroom environment, and based on planning. There's also a fourth piece of that and it's called professionalism. And and when you look at that rubric, activities like that kind of fall into that, you know, um I can't speak for what another principal does. Um you know, if a teacher, if we were going to have something and a teacher couldn't come, I would say please let me know. And you know if they said I've got family coming in or I've got a sick child or I've got this, you know, okay, I would make a note of that and and document it. You know, I
099never counted that against someone per se, but it can count for them in that professionalism that they were there and involved beyond what they had to be, if that makes sense. Yes. Because here's the thing. Uh we couldn't afford all of the stuff that our teachers do. we couldn't pay them for all of the extras that they do. And that's what and that's why I'm kind of we're already asking so much of them. And if they're being required to give even more, you know, for these class nights or whatever else that's going on, I mean, when when when do you start stop trying to get blood out of the tournament? you know, that's just and so would the supplement side of all of these other activities, all these other groups and clubs and all of
100that stuff, would that help? Is there some way we could work that into some of those things? That's my question. Just trying to ease the bleeding so much. Yeah. I just think as going forward we've got to, you know, in building communities and everything else, in our schools, um, we need to be investing in our teachers and we need to be investing in our schools and these class nights, which they're great and they're a lot of fun and everybody enjoys them, but at the same time, it's a matter of um, I I just I don't understand how you can be required to be somewhere and not get paid. There's a lot of jobs that require that part of being salary versus Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I don't understand that different from your experience. Absolutely. But we
101can look and try to get you all a list of the supplements. Um huh. So, we'll get that sent out to you in an email as well. Uh the next thing is Ran State. Um an agreement. This is new. Uh Ron State is wanting to send nursing students to work with our school nurses and get practicum hours. We already do that with TCAT. Um and then there's just a list of of that contract. [Music] Okay, questions on that? Okay, so next you have on there is uh Crossroads Academy. Uh you can see the House bill and the Senate bill. So, this goes into effect July 1 and it states that independent daycarees can lease unutilized space from a school system. Um, we have a group that's interested in doing that. Um, I guess a question
102may be what is an unutilized space and and that may be some interpretation and some definitions and clarity that we get. Um, they did operate last year in the United Methodist Church. They served 13 families from uh Brown, Martin, South, and Stone. Uh 12 of those families have committed for this school year. They are a licensed childcare provider with the state, and they can take Cumberland County Schools pre-K students as well as kindergarten through 12 years of age. At the church, when they started this, the school board at that time voted to allow the buses to drop off there. So they had buses that dropped off from Martin and Stone because it was at the Methodist church and that was an area that both of those zoned buses passed. Uh they do have a small
103bus and they did pick up from Brown and South this year. It was started by a retired educator and a current educator. They follow the school calendar and operate Monday through Friday 2:30 to 6. Um they do have a structure with a dedicated time for tutoring and homework help. And this year they did reach out to some of the students teachers in order to make the best of the time with the students. They are wanting to lease a space from the school system that would be centrally located for the next school year and they do want to remain independent of the school system. Um we do have a flyer that they send out to families. There's that. Um, and it's all the information I gave you plus a phone number. And then, um, she added
104the house bill. Um, you know, again, clarification on what's unutilized. There's not very many unutilized spaces in Cumberland County schools. I was just going to say where, you know, Yeah, that's what I what space. I mean, it would be something that would be after 2:30. You know what I'm saying? It wouldn't be like um when she first talked she wanted to to do it here. Well, we are not this building cannot have students in it on a daily basis. It's not scheduled for that. So, that wasn't an option. So, you know, just something centrally located where she would have access maybe to a gym or a playground. Um there's some there's a space we could up a space or two you could probably come up with. So, just food for thought for you to think
105of and know that that they're interested in that. We uh were at Fall Creek Falls this year and when they explained to unutilized space, that's a space that um is obviously not used all day long. We don't have that. Okay. So, that's why I'm saying you might want some that you might want some clarification on what that is. Okay. So, uh summer programming overview. Uh we're doing summer school this year at Brown um and Stone. Uh they're they go by feeder patterns as you can see. Uh any student in rising K through 9th grade. Um there's the uh student teacher ratios. Um and as of June 1st when we started uh 182 students were enrolled at Brown and 197 at Stone. And there is um the amount of money that these individuals are paid and
106the funding uh was provided for school supplies, curriculum resources, um printer usage and transportation and staffing. And that's all done provided to us through the state. And typically they give you the same right now they're giving you the same amount of money they gave you the year before. And I was supposed to give this to you at the May meeting and I did not. I'm sorry but summer school hasn't started at the May meeting. So did we spend all of that money? Uh I think we're going to be pretty close to it if we haven't. We don't send them anything back. You know, sometimes we might buy supplies for the next year to have when we get started because they're not, you know, always that money is not always right there at the time when
107it starts. Now, we don't have anything budgeted for next year. Is that correct, Chris? Correct. For elementary summer school, we took all of our money out of the budget uh expecting to get this again from the state because this is kind of tied to third grade retention. Mhm. So they they provide that because that's an expectation for a child, maybe an opportunity, a pathway for them to go to fourth grade and not be retained. So we may still get funding for it from the state. Yes. Okay. We do have money in our budget for high school for credit recovery. So do you have a balance sheet of that after the after the summer program's over on what we received and what we spent? I can get that. Yeah. Probably can't get that until after summer's
108morning. Yeah, till July. It would probably be the July meeting, but yes, I can get that. Um, and then we have all of these policies. Just a few. We do and I do believe pretty most all of these uh do have a few changes. We have gone based on uh TSBA's recommendation of model policies and most of these do go into effect July 1. So, I'd like to see us do those first and second reading at the next meeting next week. If you'd like to go through them one by one, we can tonight or you can look at them this week and can hit them one at a time. Not during the meeting. Well, and Jennifer White from TSBA had sent all the recommendation ones out. So, and that's what these are. Yeah. As long
109as we're going by 36, we're good. Mhm. They all looked 29 29 looked reasonable. And u Miss Diane uh was able to get all of these together in a time frame of 3 days so we could have them on this agenda tonight. Thank you, Miss D. Thank you, Miss. Yes. Thank you. It's always fun after the legislative session's done, everything's signed, isn't it? Okay. So, next, uh, Miss Hamby would need approval next Thursday of the school nutrition packets, and that is the annual food, non-food supplies, and service bid renewal packet. And there's what all that is. And then there, you all have to approve that we can feed the kids. And that's what we're asking for you to do there for next school year. So item um 18 is just your uh FYI um agenda
110items. A lot of agreements on there and memorandums of understanding. Um, you do have the safe schools counseling data that's included in there. Um, you also have the coordinated school health report which you are required to get. Um, we have a TNTP agreement for SPED. Um, and we have the personnel report for the school system and the nutrition program. Next is financials and uh pretty much that is um schoolwide fundraisers um coordinated school health applied and received the volunteer energy grant. They're asking for permission to accept that. And then uh 143BA is the commodity delivery. And then we're to the end of the year report sales tax and financials. [Applause] Well, this is going to be pretty brief. This is not end of the year. This just as of the end of May sales tax,
111we stood an achieved budget, but we are ahead of prior year about $361,000. I think we will come in right around budget. I don't anticipate that we'll lose $100,000 in the next two months or but it'll be below budget, but that's going to come in pretty close. Um, basically this is our sad month. We don't get any Tissa money. We had less than $2 million in revenues come in just from various grants that we draw down. Our expenditures were $7 million. So that left us a deficit of about $5 million. Like I said, this is just kind of a odd month where we really don't get any of our big money from the state. So, it looks very strange. Any questions? Next is the next is the consent agenda and you can see overnight trips
112and inventory. What items do we have for special call? So, um, uh, we talked about, um, the budget, voting for the final version with the small tweaks that were made, right? And then the change that's why we decided to do that. And then, um, a little awkward here, but, you know, like I don't know when you all are going to interview for the director of schools. I don't know. You know, I not, you know, that's odd. So, there you go. You got that. And did you need the title at the special call, too, or do you No, we can wait till next the board meeting. Yeah, we can wait till the board meeting for that. So, I think those are the only things that we need to do. I was going to say if we've
113already voted on that budget and it's the same, why do we need to vote again? What was it that you that you questioned and we were going to do changing? We were going to remove the salary schedules. That was it. Remove the salary schedules from that. Well, replace it with the current one because it was the prior one that attached an error. Yeah. The but the previous vote was for the budget with the new salary scale. Yeah. Right. We already approved it. It's just it's going to be you have to approve it again, right? Five months have been added now. So, yeah. Yeah. Miss Bray said she'd added a few minor things. Yeah. Okay. I think we're okay with being like it is, but just if anybody had doubt that they wanted to vote, we
114could. So we have anything we need to do on or do we need to discuss the meetings that we need to have the OS or look at our calendar going back to that. Okay. Item request. So are we required to hold these interviews? No, we're we're discussing meeting dates. So back on item seven where this is going to. So when you look at that projected calendar that she gave us, do we do you need to adjourn this meeting and then start your special call so you can do this? Do we need to vote on anything or just do we need to vote? We don't need to vote, do we? To meet and interview. Do we have to vote? We've always just agreed to the dates that everybody's available. Mhm. Yeah. So if that works for
115everybody, we can just discuss it under item seven this week. Yeah. And when when we get through, we can just adjourn, finalize. Okay. You don't have to vote boot. So looking at your calendars. Mhm. Looking what she gave us here. It shows. So we're not going to have a special called. Okay. Not yet. Somebody come someday. Okay. Reading to do right now. We don't have a reason. Okay. [Music] We just want you comfortable. Squirm. [Laughter] Oh, that's okay. It's been a warm seat all night. So the uh calendar that's the one that we had projected had interview dates for next Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday and a our board meeting is Thursday. Mhm. We're supposed to decide and declare after that according to the schedule which would be Friday. I don't see any way there's a
116chance that all we'll be at a meeting five nights in a row. No, please bringing it out like that. I don't think it's a good idea. Well, the three the three meeting dates in a row were if we had three candidates. Is that correct? So, I mean, we only have two, right? I mean, we have to vote if we're going to go ahead and add any additional candidates, right? Or whatever. Yeah. So, as of right now, we just have two that the two that have been recommended that have been recommended. So we could take out one of those three which Tuesday conflicts with the budget commissioner meeting for the presentation. So that one's been eliminated already. So that leaves us with Monday and Wednesday. Okay. Okay. Did we want to go with their recommended um
117process where they come in and do the meetings and before we get to our interview? Oh, was that what she was saying is that they were going to come in and handle all that part. Is that was that was part of that package? No, they don't handle it, but they just recommended that is a process. This is their handling, right? Right. Mhm. Okay. So, you know, when we're talking about dates, if we're going to go with the process that they recommend, then we need to make sure that that works. for running them through meeting with central office staff. We want to do the community lunchon, meeting with faculty and staff, and then our interview is the final step and then dinner. She mentioned we wouldn't have to be there for all the meetings. Yeah, she
118said the board wasn't involved in Right. But we need to make sure if we're setting those dates that if we're going to follow this process that it works for central office and staff and everything that needs to be included in their day. Okay. On the plateau. So talking about the process. So if we know [Music] about the vote, having somebody travel here and going through the interviewing and going through all the process when we pretty much have a All right, stop laughing out there. I see y'all. I'm trying to be politically correct stating this and I'm not doing a very good job of it. I'm just questioning why. I mean, we have to go through. Do you know what I'm saying? Okay. Well, then start talking, people. Don't leave me up here all by myself.
119I mean, so am I wrong? Like, say something. I don't think you're wrong. Okay, I know where you're going with it. Thank you very much. But I also feel like we've put money for something, which we probably shouldn't have. and are working with TSBA and they've got two candidates that they've referred to us which Dr. Farley is one of the two. Um so for me I mean I understand where you're coming from. Oh I know where you're coming from too. Yeah. but to follow through with the plan that we have in place. That that would be my recommendation or my preference just to keep like I said, keep the p plan in place, everything out in front for constituents. We're looking at the two options that have been recommended, professionally recommended to us and and
120then because we already know what the community is going to say. They don't want anybody outside. What dates and time if we follow just say it sorry roughly this time schedule is it the 16th and the 18th that works best for central office as far as their timing for this cuz this wasn't something we considered earlier but okay is if the 16th and 18th work for us to do our piece of it then um the executive committee could work with. Do we need to do we need to run those dates by the candidates as well? Well, we I guess we give these to TSBA and then they they check with them. Okay. And hopefully either one will be available on one of those two dates. The 16th, um I may or may not be able
121to be here right at 5. I do have a prior appointment that day that I am hoping that I will be back well in time before that, but I may or may not be a little bit past that one. But that's the only the questions are chosen for us. We can give you some later on in the process. That would be great. If we need to adjourn from this and start with a special call to make decision, we can do that. Do we need to make any? Well, I don't want to get too far into wheat and discussing details about true. Okay. All right. Oh, okay. So, um, if we adjourn this and go to the special call, we'd be voting on whether we're we're going to do this entire process or not. Yeah. and
122talking about and the dates that we're giving to TSBA to modify those or to do something different. Okay. What was that? Jason went home cuz he's your reporter. Yes. So, he went home. So, I guess I guess Miss Diane could record the meeting. You're recording. Thank you. other duties as a signed, right? As long as he doesn't care. There you go. We'll make sure he does them and you don't have to. Okay. So, all right. We're journing this. Well, the board is to adjourn and discuss in the next meeting. Yes, sir. That's appropriate. Okay. So, any questions from the media? Are you kidding? This meeting is a journal.