001[Music] I'd [Music] like to welcome everyone to the May Elizabeth and Board of Education meeting. At this time, we'll call it to order and I will turn it over to Mr. Van Hus for a moment of silence and pledge to the flag. Thank you. Please stand for a moment of silence. Thank you. Attention. Salute. Pledge. I pledge algiance 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. At this time, it's time to approve consent agenda and regular agenda. Can I get a motion to approve? Motion to approve and a second. Second. All right. Any items need to be moved or discussed at this time? Okay. Seeing none, the items to approve consent agenda and regular agenda.
002All those in favor, please say I. I. Any opposed? And there are none. This time it's time for citizens to speak. We did not have anyone request to speak before the board tonight. So, we'll move on to special recognitions. We very appreciative of the large crowd and the number of students we're able to recognize uh and teachers as well. Um if you haven't been here before, just to let you know, we'll go through these recognitions. Then there will be a time where I'll give you a chance to leave unless you just choose to stay, but we'll let you exit that point and then we'll move on with the rest of our agenda. Okay. So, I'll turn it over to Mr. Van Hus again. Thank you, sir. At this time, I'll call Mr. Colbert to come
003up and he will start off the recognitions. And again, thank you very much for letting us do this. Uh, so again, there's a long list here. And it says like health science students first, but before you do that, if you would allow me quick history lesson for those of us old enough, remember some of these club names have changed over the years. So where it says health science understand we still kind of sort of have a hosa health occupation students of America but a lot of our health science students this year did skills USA they have for the last two years quite simply because the host of conference has lately been falling on spring break so cool we'll just do another one. So as a reminder all the students in CTE at the high school
004are eligible for Skills USA only like the health science students do HOSA and only the A students do FFA but again everybody's eligible for Skills USA. you're going to hear a lot about skills tonight. Uh so again, that's where a lot of this uh does come from. Uh so again, short history on that, but I'll just go ahead and get to some of this. I will go ahead and do one though. Uh we have a FBLA student uh that was not on the agenda, but he uh by the way also competed through skills, but competed through FBLA, qualified for nationals. So I'm gonna go ahead and give this because Mr. Kbinger is not here, but Wesley Taylor is here, I think. Yes, he got in right at the as the bell rang. So, we'll give
005this to Mr. Taylor. And again, he and I joke a lot about cyber security and Bitcoin and some things I don't really understand. He came in second uh in the state for investments and security. Securities investments always get backwards. I'll let him explain the difference on that. So, tell them what you did. Yeah. So, I took a test called securities investments. Um, essentially it asked me questions about uh the broad securities market, hedge funds, mutual funds, 401ks, uh stocks and bonds, all sorts of that matter. And I was just able to uh get to participate in that as uh the sole student in FBA this year, but I got second this year, one place better than my place last year. So, uh super happy about that. But yeah, I get to go to Anaheim in
006July, so hoping to do very well there. Congratulations. Yeah. If if Mr. Cobbert, if you guys will slide right over here, you and Wesley will slide over here and we'll snap a picture real quick. And I will add what he did not. This would be his third time competing on the national level for FBA. So, three years in a row on the national level. Awesome. Awesome. Okay. Okay. But now we can get back to where it said health science students. And by the way, they will mention skills, but they might also mention a couple other things and I don't want to take their speech away from them. I saw Miss Ber come in and there's Miss Doug. I'm going to let them explain both what they did in skills and everything else they've done this
007year because they've been quite busy. So come on up, ladies. Okay. Hello. So, first we are going to recognize the health science students that placed in the top three um in their competition at our state skills USA conference. So, we traveled to Chattanooga in April and these students competed against other students from across the state in their various um chosen competitions. So, we had two that won first place in their competition. Um so, as I call your name, if you guys will step up here, get your certificate and then stand in the front for a group picture. So, the first one was Sarah McCoy, and she placed first place in first aid CPR. [Applause] And the second one was Princess Russell. She placed first place in health occupations professional [Applause] portfolio. And then we had
008some second place winners. Um, I don't think she's here, but Kaylee Shoemake, she actually competed in the business side of of competitions and she placed second in customer service. I think she had some other obligations tonight. Um, all right. And then we had a team, the Health Knowledge Bowl. They placed second place. Um, so that included Cara Carr, Gracie Eastep, Mallerie Odum, and Taylor Witson. [Applause] And we also had a second place finish. Ava George Wilbur got second place in medical math and Tristan Wilson got third place in basic healthc care skills. [Applause] Um, so all of these students, with the exception of Ava George, just because she had other plans, they are all going to compete at the National Skills USA conference in June in Atlanta. So, and there's only one team or individual
009per competition per state at this competition. So, yes. [Applause] Okay. Okay. And then next set of students that we would like to recognize are students that took the cardiovascular services class um which is an industry certification and last week last week they sat for and took their um certified EKG technician test. Um and they worked really really hard all throughout the semester. Um, I'm not gonna say that it came easy because it didn't. There were some tears. Um, there were some frustrating days. Um, there were a lot of days where I probably was not their favorite teacher. Um, but I am proud to say that out of 18 students that tested, all 18 of them passed their certification test. Very proud of them. Okay. Blake Bowman, Abigail Ferguson, Camden Garland. I don't think Cam could
010make it tonight. Hannah Hodgej Cooper Jack, Anna Jenkins, Adriana Jones, Isabella Lewis, Shaylee Matisse, Sarah McCoy, Lily McDuffy, Payton McGee, Kayn Nave, Lily Pervu, Cadence Vanoi, Taylor Witson, Ava George Wilbur and Sadie Williams. Can you what? [Applause] And then the last group of students we have to recognize are the students that this school year um completed nursing education in our CNA program. So we had three in the fall and five this spring semester that successfully completed that. Um and that consists of now at least 59 classroom hours and at least 16 clinical hours in the long-term care facility. Um so these students also worked very hard and completed their their test. So, so far seven of the eight have passed their certification test. We're waiting on one more just because of a scheduling conflict. Um,
011but we have complete faith that he will pass as well. Um, so the first one is Adriana Jones. She's here, Joselyn Julian, and Ava George Wilbur. And then from the spring semester, we have Landon Hughes, Riley Jones, Ally Stout, Taylor Witson, and Haley Williams, who cannot be here either. [Applause] And I just now looked at Miss Foster. Do you want to go? Because she technically is next on the list. So I'm gonna get out of her way because she nodded. Yes. Okay. So I'll be back in a second. All right. Okay, we have two groups to recognize in the theater world as they come up. Go. Good. Okay. Center stage. Should be used to that. Yep. Okay. So, the first I've added one more. The first seven. Yeah. First seven are um are part of
012the forensics team. There are more who could be there who could be who couldn't be here tonight because if you didn't know May is short for mayhem and there's just too much going on and I'll be sure to tell you their events as well. But this is this is called theater forensics and that's really confusing because people think dead people and it's not. It's a it's a forensics like forum. So it's about public speaking and debate. So these are seven of the 11 who have competed more have competed throughout the year. Um, we went to seven tournaments this year on top of district and state. Um, and we've expanded the team and all the ones that I'm going to name off competed at the district level which there are seven schools there and they all
013advanced to state which is a first for us. So, I want to give you their um their name and their event if you'll just step forward. So, Seth Whitehead, he did informative speaking. Uh, Abby Se did pros. Alina Little Pantomime. and Alina is first in the state. Our first first place. So, hooray. Hooray. Yes. Addie Bentley uh with extemporaneous speaking. Hannah Daniels with humorous interpretation and she got sixth place at state. Yes. Luke Carter with TV broadcasting and Gay Blindball in humorous interpretation. Um, the people who are not who weren't who aren't able to be here tonight, Reagan Price uh did poetry and got third place at state. Natalie Smith did improv duet acting. Callie Smith did um dramatic interpretation and Lauraai Townson did storytelling. So that is all of them. If you can give
014them one round of applause. All right. Our lone ranger here is Lauren Watson. um we are busy so we usually don't do all state or all east but that's an option and um Lauren and I saw it and we thought we'd take the opportunity and of course in playwriting Lauren got an all east and all state distinction so let's give her a round of applause [Applause] And my my apologies. When I looked at the agenda earlier, I did not see FBLA. It's on the agenda is EHF FBALA. So, they're in alphabetical order by that. So, oops. Sorry, we already got Won. Let's stick stick back to the agenda. The robotics team has been on the agenda a couple of different times. We've had to cancel because they're pretty busy group. And again, they had one
015other big competition. They're waiting to see those results, but I'll let Mr. Lee come up here now and tell you about all those results. There he is in the back because again, as he walks up here, we kind of sort of do three different robotics. They do the robots fighting in the class just like you'd see in Big Bang Theory because I'm pretty sure Miss Jamie's giving me a thumbs up on watching that. Uh, as well as they did the drone league, which was awesome. And then they did the underwater mate. I forget the rest of the letters. Robot. He'll explain all that here in a second. So, thank you for seeing us again tonight. Uh, I'll try not to get too emotional, but you guys know how I get when I start talking about
016these kids. So, um, it has been an unbelievable year. Uh, I have been, uh, beyond blessed to coach this team. And, uh, as I've gone around the community, people patted me on the back and they've said, "The kids are lucky to have you." Um, I look at it a different way. I'm lucky to have them. Uh, everywhere I went this year and every competition that we went to, people talked about how good our kids were, how special our kids were, how smart our kids were, and the things that our kids could do. And then I had coaches ask me about, "Oh, well, you've got you're competing against teams that are uh from all over the country and and they're magnet schools and they're all these other paid schools and I'll put the kids in Elizabeth
017and city up against any kids in the world because they put the work in, they put the time in, they put the effort in and I feel like we produce the best and uh and this team has proved that this year. So with that being said, uh the way our year kind of broke down, I stood before you uh last semester to tell you that we had won our first RDL regional competition which qualified us to go to the RDL national competition at the beginning of the year this year. And this team uh from what from what I have been able the research I have been able to complete uh is the first team in the modern era at Elizabeth and High School to win a national title. And I present to you the RDL
018national title champions from this year. Uh in that competition they took first place highest team score, the top score award, the presidential award award, first place overall team and of course the national alliance championship. So it was a very good very good season for them. Uh last year this team took the rookie of the year because it was our first first year in competition and to go in our second year and win a national title. I just can't uh I can't express enough how how special the group is and the countless hours that these kids put in after school. And uh I know at times they look at me and they go, "Man, you're killing us." Uh but uh they put in the work for it and and they deserve all the credit for it
019because uh if it's the electrical on the robot or the design of the robot or the design of the boards that we practice on throughout the school, the kids touch and do every piece of that. I'm there to give guidance and they do all the work. They design it and do it from top to bottom. And it's really just remarkable to see the skill sets that they've earned and learned and how those are going to help them in the future. It's just the the skills that they have are are applicable and they're all going to make a lot more money than I do. So, um with that being said, their second competition was uh the Mate ROV competition. That's our big competition uh in the spring. Last year, we did not place in that. It
020was our first year competing and our goal this year was to go and place and we did. We won third place in the regional competition. Uh, with that being said, they had the top pool score at that, meaning the the do part of the competition, get the robot in the water, and what they had to do was uh really quite remarkable. They had to identify shipwreck. They had to remove stuff from the shipwreck. They had to fix all kinds of things underneath the pool. And our robot scored better than any robot in the regional competition. Uh, we learned again this year, our business aspects of things was very good, but we we know where we need to improve. and hopefully we'll stand uh stand before you next year telling you that we're going to a
021world event. That's our goal for next season. But with that being said, I'll give you the kids and get out of your way because I know we've got a lot tonight. Uh starting right to left, uh my only freshman this year, uh Mr. Josh Ashy. He's our JV uh uh pilot and he also heads props and design for us. Josh, step forward that way everybody knows who you are. My sophomores, uh, Holly Holtzclaw was unable to be with us tonight. She's props design and documentation. Nathan Edwards, unable to be with us tonight. Float design, uh, props and, uh, team design. Lucas Gillum, uh, he is a sophomore. He is our head programmer. He's a sophomore, folks. And he can program things like nobody I've ever seen in my entire life. He's really, really special. Uh,
022lead float design and float operator. my juniors, Miss Anna Blackwell. Um, Anna is unbelievable with CAD and 3D design. She's our lead CAD and 3D design, documentation and business process, and she is also one of our incoming captains for next season. She's been elected as one of our incoming captains for next season. Bryson Roland, he's uh this year he was our JV JV robot driver. He'll be on our varsity team coming up for that next year. and he also helped with uh props and design. Xander Jones. Uh I I can't say enough about this young man. Varsity robot driver, varsity ROV pilot, engineering and design, and incoming captain. And uh he's done so many special things so far, and he's got a huge season again ahead of him next year. My seniors, Ariana Bashure, props
023and design documentation. She's going to be attending Northeast State for psychology this coming year. I'm super proud. Kylie Vance Osborne, one of my captains. company CEO, documentation, lead pool technician. She's going to be attending ETSU uh with a sociology major this coming [Applause] year. Cole Wolf, captain, drone pilot, lead engineer, UT commitment on a full ride as an aerospace engineer. [Applause] Grace Woodby, one of the hearts of our team. Um, it didn't matter what I asked this year or when I asked it, Grace always stood up to help me. And from I need this put up to Grace, I don't know how we're going to get this done. And she helped me get it done. Um, very, very special young lady. She was our props manager, design, lead pool tech. She's going to be attending
024Northeast State as a radiology [Applause] major. Caleb Dillo, engineering assembly and diagnostics tech technician. He's got my heart. Uh for those of you that know me, I started off as an automotive mechanic. Caleb's going to be attending TCAT and automotive where he has already uh completed over a semester's worth of work as a high school student. Vic Dupta. Vic's been with me for two years. Props and design. He's another one of those guys that I could depend on to do what I needed him to do when I asked him to do it. He's got a special uh doing a lot with this family business when he graduates. And he's just been a pleasure to have as well. Again, I'd like to thank all of you for the opportunity to coach this team. And uh like
025I said, it's not it's not me that did anything special. They're the ones that deserve all the credit because they put all the work in. Thank you. Do you [Applause] Uh and again sticking with the agenda, next on the agenda is FFA. So Mr. Aen is here and he will explain all the good things they're doing because again they are the numbers have grown in FFA and I tremendously the last few years. So they keep everybody in the building busy. So go ahead, Mr. Well, thank you uh for the opportunity to be here. Thank you to the school board. Uh thank you Mr. Van Hus, Dr. Mitten, Mr. Colbert for your support. My job would be a lot more difficult without your support. So, thank you for that. And I just want to say that
026uh career and technical education is where it's at. Um I I'm just blown away. I'm not surprised by any of this because I work with some amazing people and I have never been more proud to be a CTE teacher than right now. Uh it is an exciting time for our students. It's an exciting time for our community. And so just a shout out to our CTE people. Uh it's been an enormous year in the A department. Um just a couple of things to recap. We've had over 300 uh industry certifications and these are nationally recognized industry certifications that students are able to take with them into their post-secary education or into the workforce. And I do want to say thank you to Mr. Van Hus. The big hurdle sometimes with these industry certifications is the
027cost. They add up when you're doing over 300 of them and he made sure there was room in the budget for that. So, thank you, Mr. Vanheis. Um, nearly 40 of our students have completed college credit either at Northeast State or MTSU and we're very proud of that number. Uh, and I could go on about regional and district contests that we've placed at, but uh, tonight I want to focus on eight students who received what's called the state FFA degree. FFA is very similar to Boy Scouts that you can get, different levels, Cub Scout, Boy Scout, Eagle Scout. In FFA, there's different degrees that you can earn. And the highest level in the state of Tennessee is the state degree. And this opens the door for them to eventually receive their American degree uh if
028they continue uh earning the hours. A lot of community service, a lot of hours that they put in both at the school uh and on their own time. So, we we've got eight students. They all couldn't be here, but there's a couple that are here. If you got your state degree, come on up here. I know there's two. There might have been another one sneak in. Uh but there's eight total. And u tonight I just want to special shout out. Hannah Parlier here. She was our chapter president this year. Uh Mr. Seth Whitehead. He is representing. He's going to the Citadel this fall. Uh we also had Amberllin Grind Staff, Reagan Price, Andrew Mitchell, Lily Walker, Liam Cannon, and Diesel Russell. We've got amazing students and uh again we appreciate your support. [Applause] And for
029teacher recognitions, the first one mentioned here is Miss Katie Duggar. If you want to come back up here. Uh, sorry, I don't have anything actually to give her. Um, but she's being recognized. She was Elizabeth High School teacher of the year. So, since we only have one high school in the district, she is also the district high school teacher of the year as well. Okay, that maybe not be real important. But the next one was the next one she got was the regional. So now she's a semi-finalist for our region and so forth, which is a kind of a big deal because now you're really competing against I forgot how many, but it's in the dozens of high schools around us. So congratulations to Miss Duggar. And again, Dr. Minton is here. He maybe wants
030to add to this. He asked me while the go if I had something to say. I did. But by the way, I didn't even ask you. Did you have something you wanted to say? Thank you. Zoom. and she was also the state award winner last year for her help in community service with all the stuff she does for HOSA. Okay, speaking of which, next Mr. Akin can come back up here because this year he is also a state award winner for the Tennessee Department of CTE and he is the teacher of the year for the state of Tennessee. So he will now get to go to what we call the region. In this case, the region includes kind of like the southeast region K. There's 10 10 states plus Puerto Rico and the Bahamas because
031dog on it they have CTE as well. So last year the state excuse me the regional competition was in Orlando but Miss Duggar did not get to go. Hurricane Lee and everything else got in the way. This year Mr. Aen as a state winner would go to somewhere in Georgia I never heard of Georgia doesn't doesn't sound doesn't sound as nice as where Katie was supposed to go last year. So sorry about that. I don't get to pick these locations, but you've already won the state. So now you're competing against people from again Kentucky, Alabama, Mississippi, South Carolina, etc. So congratulations to Mr. Aen. And by the way, I know Charles Duggar always jokes with me that he watches these things. So I'll look toward the camera. Mr. Aen is one of the reasons why
032Charles Duggar is having such a hard time this week because as we approach graduation, when he gave up those numbers while I go and I counted, I think it's 306. So a alone did 306 industry search. Last year we had 220 total for the school. a had 306 alone and again most of those are again the big value stuff. So if you look at the Tissa funding formula sorry hate make it about about money but Ben has a smiling. So those level three and level two energy searchs he has in the hundreds of those. So just imagine how this is impacting your school not just the money but also for the important stuff the skills that the kids are learning and so forth which is fantastic. Again, the number I threw out long ago when
033I first saw it, I was shocked. But it shouldn't be shocked, but it's such a big number. We've gone from the 2021, which was the hybrid year, sadly, we still remember that, to this year, the 2425 year, he went from 97 students, like 270 students. So, that is a tremendous jump in the number of students that are involved in an agriculture class. So much so that we've had to get extra people to help him teach a. So we've been doing various things with the schedule to make it easier for him because he's very busy doing all the other cool things he is doing. So Mr. Aen, state winner of the year for Tennessee CTE [Applause] folks. Okay. Okay. And the next one on the list, I'm going to read this to make sure I get
034this correct, but uh Chief Barman is here. And again, I I was not military, so I hope I'm saying it right, but chief was the rank I'm supposed to say, I think. Cool. All right. So, as a chief in the military, he is the national citizenship educator, teacher, certificate of merit. So, he has also won our region, not just high school, but cool. He's also the district one region for first place for veteran teachers. And so I have this uh which actually I think he has something similar to this already but uh for a veteran uh congratulations and it just now dawned on me. I didn't even ask Miss Duggar or Mr. Aen if you wanted to say something but they've already talked a little bit. You haven't. You want to come up here and
035say anything else. Okay. Congratulations. Thank you everybody. Mr. Van Hus, thank you for the opportunity to uh to teach our cadets. It's been a pleasure. Dr. Mitten, uh oh, there he is. Thank you, too, sir. Appreciate that. Um it's been a great couple years. We made some good turnarounds with the program and uh thank you for uh I guess putting me in for this and I'm glad I was able to to go as far as I've gone. I think as soon as they see this, you know, if there's some kind of packet or whatever and they see this picture, they're going to be like, "Nah, we don't want that guy." But but anyway, um appreciate it very much. Thank you guys. [Applause] And I want to mention one other thing just we talk all the
036time the best part about Elizabeth and it's the people and it's the people that work with your children and my children when they were here. We always want the best that we can get and people that are passionate about what they do and I think you saw that tonight. But I just wanted to point out that uh I think it was two years ago. I think Meg Foster was a state finalist for teacher of the year. We had Dr. Newman who was a finalist for the state supervisor of the year last year. We had all these people mentioned today. And we also have to mention Dr. Mitten who is also a regional semi-finalist for principal of the year. So I want you to know our commitment is to get the best people to work with
037our kids. And I think you can see that we're doing a pretty good job of that. So congratulations Dr. Mitten. Again, we would we'd love to just say thank you. It is an honor as a board to see what's going on in a system uh that you represent and um so thank you again for all your hard work, all the varied things that are going on uh that our students are being successful in. Thank you to all the instructors. At this time, we will take a short break to let you that need to leave, want to leave, uh, head out and then in about 3 or 4 minutes, we'll begin back. So, thank you all for being here. We got [Music] All right, thank you all. Moving right along. Um, it is time for our
038director's update. U, so again, Mr. Van Hus. All right, great. So, uh, I don't don't have a lot. Um, that was just great. I I I love that stuff. It's just so great to hear all the incredible things that our kids are doing and the investments that we've made trying to give kids uh opportunities to plug in where their interest and passion is and and it's always great to see them succeed. They always represent our community so well. Um construction update. They're actually putting some roofing on the the entire um restroom and entry portion of the facility at the high school is completely under roof now and they'll start on Monday on the main structure and they hope to get uh sections finished in a day if they continue to get good weather. So, they'll
039like work on the the area over the the basketball floor and they'll move the weight room and then the turf area. So, uh hopefully if they get good weather by the end of next week it'll all be under roof. So, continue to move and make progress there. Uh, thanks for those that were able to attend honors day yesterday. It was a it was a great day again, much like what you just got to experience right here. Um, and Mr. Smith was was up there and recognized uh some as well. But, um, just the high school did a great job with that. The band, the chorus was just incredible in their performances and uh, and again, just a chance to recognize students and all that they've achieved. It's just it's just a great thing. It it
040certainly this time of year we're all tired. It's been a long year, but those opportunities just help bring it back to home how how worth how well worth all of our efforts are. So, uh, just again reminder, tomorrow, uh, graduation at Elizabeth and High School, that will begin at 7:30, but we will, uh, we will form up in the media center about 6:30 if you can be there, and we'll, um, get all of our marching orders to make sure that we we we perform as we're supposed to as well, but excited about that. At this point, it's still on for the the stadium. uh you know, we'll continue to watch the weather and and and hopefully we won't make make a have to make a call, but if we're ready, they have the gym set
041up if needed to move inside. So, uh that's all I have to share. All right. Thank you. And now, time for board member reports. Um I don't know if anybody's had a lot of activity in the last little bit. Anybody have anything to report? I know our next big thing will probably be summer law. Probably coming down the pike. Anybody? All right. Move on to city council. Uh Mr. Shimmerly and he has a guest. He may want to double team. They may want to double team. That's right. Keeping straight tag teams. I tell you what, if you didn't have a tear in your eye watching those students come up there, there's something wrong with you. Yeah. I I just And I tell you that every time I come up this podium, how proud I am
042of these kids. And we Richard and I were sitting there laughing. I said, "Don't laugh too hard. Some of these kids are going to be our doctors tomorrow." We're so proud of them. Oh my gosh, this and I told you this. This is why we do what we do. This is why we spend the money that we spend for our system. And it just, if you don't believe it, we need to get everyone in this room and sit what we just went through. Yeah. It is beyond incredible. So proud. It is. And uh not too awfully long ago, I think I was in my car driving down the road and Mr. Van Hus called me and I'm not going to give exact numbers but he asked he threw a number on the table. He said
043Mike I need some money and uh and he had already talked with this you know some other people in the city but uh when he called me my wife said I was a little harsh with it and uh and I did I called him back and I apologized didn't I Richard? I apologize. I did. I was a little harsh, but the number he asked for, I just told him our budget this year is extremely tight as it is most years, but this year in particular, and as a city, we we do not like raising our taxes at all. We're all taxpayers if you live in the city, and that includes every one of us. So, we don't like doing that. We try to live within our budget. Our budgets are tight and they're hard and
044and you want to give your people pay increases. You want to pay your bills and buy your new school buses and new police cars and everything you've got to buy. But, uh, and I did apologize And uh but uh but we did go to work. We went to work on it. We we went to Gatlinburg. Each year we go down for our annual retreat. Mr. Barker was there with us. He's in the crowd tonight. We appreciate him coming. But we sat down and for three days we didn't have any black eyes, but we did have a few hard feelings. Maybe little heart feelings, I'll say. But we worked out a budget. We worked out some compromises and we worked out a token of money that we're going to give you from this day forward. And
045that will go into your budget to help you. Not what you wanted. I wish we had the money to give you what you wanted. What we're giving you, just to give you an idea, it represents onethird of our increase that we're going to have on property taxes. So, what we're giving you is oneird of what we put together. And for us, I mean, it was a lot. So, you know, again, I know it's not what you asked for, but it's the best we could do with the seven of us that were, you know, arguing in the room to come up with some numbers. I can tell you had strong support in that room. There's no question we're gonna get some money. It was just how much money we could give. I wish we could give
046you everything we asked for. Wish we could buy you 10 new school buses this year. If we had the money in the city, we would do it, wouldn't we, Richard? There's there's no question. But thank you. Thank you for the teachers. Thank you for the people you've got in your system. We're just so proud of you. And again, we just wish we could do more for you. Thank you so much. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. I just want to say I don't I don't know. We'll have to go back in the records for Elizabeth and but the number that that that they're prepared to increase our operating budget is probably the largest increase we've had. Oh, I don't know maybe 40 or 50 years. I I don't know. I know for sure it's in
047the last 25 years. So, the fact that they went to bat for us and uh you know, the bottom line is they helped us save some jobs. That's the bottom line. I mean, you can call it whatever you want to, but they helped us save some jobs. So, I know what a stretch that was, and I can't thank you all enough. And I'll be at the next council meeting to to gravel and think as well. But, so it just speaks to the um the support that we have on city council, the people that love and understand what we're doing. And and I knew I knew from the get-go that if they if there was a way to do it, they would do it. And just the fact that they stepped up the way they did
048is just a testament to, you know, I don't know if you've seen the news, but there's some other school systems and city councils that are kind of going at it right now about some things. And I'm just so thankful that that's not that's not what we have. And I knew at the end of the day, whatever they could do, they would do. And that's what they've done. And we're very, very thankful. So, thank you. Thank you. Yes. Anyone else want to gravel? Feel free. You've done You've done well. Thank you. Thank you. Yes. Okay. Now it's time student liaison report. Bittersweet last. Yes. Hudson. Yes. This is my last one. So, um first off, I just like to um update you on some things that's been going on recently. Uh we had our senior prom
049recently and that went very smoothly. Um I know there were a lot of things that we requested this year and all of them um were granted and we had a lot of help from not only teachers but also administrators as well and it was um just an amazing night for all of us and I was really thankful that went well. Also, um we've had recently honors day and the honors banquet. And I've had a lot of people want uh they came and said to me that they wanted to personally thank you for um putting those events on because I mean they they put a lot of hard work in throughout their four years of high school. And for them to have something like that to be recognized at it um it means the world to
050them. They wanted me to. Thank you guys for that. Um you guys have made my job very easy this year. U I've received like a lot of people asking me to talk about um mainly the bathrooms. Um but that's really it. I haven't had many complaints about anything going on within the school system. Um mainly just the type of toilet paper being used in the bathroom. So I think that kind of stands to show that yeah it is important but it kind of goes to show that um everything is being run really smoothly and um all of my fellow classmates are very happy to be within the school system. Um also uh I just want to thank you all personally because um I came in and as a freshman uh I was homeschooled until then
051and I came as a freshman and it was the whole school system was very welcoming. Um, and I just I found it to be a home instantly and I couldn't have wished for a better place to be at for the last four years. And so I really appreciate it and just this year in general. All of you all have been very welcoming to me as well. Um, favorite. Yeah. So I just want to thank you again for this opportunity is something I don't think I'll ever forget. And also tonight we have um Miss Helen Hackett who will be my replacement next year and she's already been telling me about all the big things she's planning to change as well. So big shoes Helen. Big shoes to fill. She's a HME kid. Literally big shoes. That's
052right. I know she's going to um stand in and do a lot of great things. So thank you again for everything and yeah I won't ever forget this opportunity. board. Well, Hudson, we appreciate you. And we have a little certificate here we want to give you and a little card uh from from the board members. And so, if we can just real quickly, let's all slide right down here and let Nicole Is Nicole already gone? Will one of y'all snap a picture for us? Okay. Thank you. It's time to move to the regular agenda. The first item on the agenda is to approve first reading of board policy 5.602, staff time schedules. Can I get a motion to approve? Motion to approve and a second. Second. Okay, Mr. Van Hus. Any discussion there? Yeah. So
053just u just to update you here on this this this particular policy again addresses staff time schedules and we wanted to make sure that the language in there was clear there there are times where as a director may adjust uh schedules sometimes we do summer hours uh you know and streamline some things there. We also for instance on the half days of school you know the first day of school the last half day as well as right before Christmas that will I have the flexibility to allow staff to leave a little bit early on those days. So we just want to make sure the language and the policy address that. So that that is all that's in here. That's on page one page nine. And then uh on the second page all employees are expected
054to be present during all workouts during all work hours unless approved by their supervisor. So, just wanted to clear up that language to make sure that is a way again that uh that shows our staff how much we appreciate that. Y So, okay. All right. The items to approve. First reading of board policy 5.602 staff time schedules. All those in favor say I. I. And any opposed? And there are none. Next item. Approve resolution of the Elizabeth and Board of Education regarding federal projects, budget documents, and amendments for fiscal year 2025-2026 and henceforth. Can I get a motion to approve? Motion. A motion and a second. Second. Okay. Either one there. All right. So, so we talked a little bit about this and I'm going to let I'm going to ask Miss Wilson if she'll
055come up and just briefly explain to you what this does. It's going to streamline some things for the finance department and then she'll she'll kind of walk you through that. We discussed this in the budget workshop last month and this is the resolution that if you approve this then our federal projects budget will be the budget that is in e- plan and those budgets and amendments will be presented to you usually in the consent agenda. So you'll be aware of what those budgets are and they are public information that will allow us to adjust our books to accurately reflect what is approved by the state without having to go through three months of our amendment and two readings with the city before it's an official approval. So approving that not only helps finance, it helps
056all of these guys who have budgets to be able to accurately see what their balance and everything is without having to do a lot of spreadsheet work. And it will also mean that um as you could see in the proposed budget, there's not a federal programs budget. There's just a copy of what we hope will be the approved resolution. And we will no longer have that in our budget document. We'll just have general purpose and food service. Any questions for Miss Wilson on that? No. Thank you for getting that set up. Anything? All right. The items to approve the resolution Elizabeth and Board of Education regarding federal projects, budget documents, and amendments for fiscal year 2025-2026 and henceforth. All those in favor say I. I. Any opposed? And there are none. Next is a big
057one. Approve the 2025-2026 Elizabeth and City School budget. Can I get a motion to approve? motion and a second. Second. Okay. All right. Okay. So, so real quickly here again, just to hit some highlights on this, um you have the budget document in your materials. Um couple of things. First of all, this includes a minimum of a 2.6% increase for all staff. Uh based on the teacher scale, there's there's some higher amounts in there, but the minimum anyone would get in the school system, including uh classified staff, is 2.5%. Um two 2.5, not 2.6, the teacher is 2.6, but staff is 2.5. Gotcha. Um also a couple of other things in here. We Miss Wilson mentioned about the federal programs budget. Also in there on the second line on page two, you'll notice the different
058rates for um the contributions for retirement as well as uh proposed amounts for health care uh for insurance and those things. Um the general purpose budget, you'll notice, is is decreased by around $2 million from last year. A lot of that has to do with some funding that we set aside for capital projects. It's no longer in there. uh plus some of the other things that we've talked about from a from a a revenue reduction uh standpoint. But again, can't thank the city enough for for what they did to help us minimize. There are some position losses um unfortunately, but we again that that helped us minimize that. We have, as you remember back during COVID, we added five full-time substitute teachers, one for each school. uh those unfortunately will be eliminated, but you know,
059we were able to to minimize that only there. I I never like telling someone they don't have a job. That's not something that any of us enjoy, but um unfortunately that's that's where we are. So, also listed on page six, you will see that information. We had some other positions that were added actually last year after the school year started. The Nwonger Foundation had some additional tutoring. They basically received some additional esser funds that hadn't been used at the state level. They were given that. So we're able to hire full-time teachers for the three elementaryaries in TAW to do essentially tutoring for and we focus that on math tutoring. Unfortunately, those are those positions are gone because that grant funding is no longer there. But again, that has nothing to do with our budget. But
060unfortunately, uh those positions will be eliminated as well. Um, so those are the highlights. Again, it's a very streamlined budget from a um, you know, a capital, a maintenance, things like that. We all understand that we're going to have to tighten our belts, but at the end of the day, we're thankful that we, you know, staff cuts weren't more than they were. Uh, again, we talk all the time, people are the most important thing about our organization, and that that continues to be the case. So, thanks to Miss Wilson. This was a tough year to to put this budget together, but thank thank her and her staff as well. There any individual questions about the budget? I just you when you think about transitioning from BP to Tissa and then like you said all those
061extra the er all the amounts and everything that have gone in. I mean, you don't live in that world of working on that, but I can't imagine how difficult it is to make such a large organization work. So, I do really appreciate Miss Wilson and her people. Um, and um thankfully it's not, you know, worse than than it is. So, thank you. I will tell you this, I asked Miss Wilson because I was just curious. So since 2021 from a teacher standpoint uh we've raised salaries uh 29% again when you look at the steps the minimum is almost 30%. It's 29.3% I think at one of the steps since 2021. So, uh, the opportunity to do that again and show our staff that we appreciate them. And again, every time we've, you know, had a
062raise for the teaching staff, classified staff has received an increase as well. So, and again, that's that's a lot attributed to Miss Wilson finding ways for us to continue to do that because it takes everyone that's in the school system to make it run the way it does. So, any comments or questions? Okay. Okay. The item is to approve the 2025-2026 Elizabeth and City School budget. All those in favor say I. I. Any opposed? And there are none. Next item, approve the acceptance of Mr. Daniel Quinn's resignation position of schoolboard member of the Elizabeth and City Board of Education effective immediately. Can I get a motion to approve? Motion. And second. Second. Okay. Um again just again you love for you to talk to Danny his work in another system there are just a lot
063of things going on making it really difficult for him to give his full effort here although this is um you know this is his home his kids were part of this system while still teaches but uh again he felt like it had gotten to be more than he could do and it and do the job maybe that he was elected to do. So, um, any comments or questions there? I just say he, you know, my conversation with Dan Danny, he's obviously very appreciative and we we certainly appreciate his, uh, commitment to the school system for for many years. I think this is is this his year seven or eight? Is that right? This is he's been he's done six and or five and a half six and a half years. Six six and a half
064years. Um, and so he's not he's not leaving mad or upset or anything like that. Uh, but again, I I I appreciate Danny. I've known him for a long time and appreciate him, you know, stepping up for our system. He certainly loves he loves our system. So, and he will be missed, but he's doing a great job where he is. Um, so the item is to approve the acceptance of Mr. Daniel Quinn's resignation from his position of schoolboard member of the Elizabethan City Board of Education effective immediately. All those in favor say I. I. Any opposed? And there are none. Last two items are items of discussion. So this first one is to discuss the process for filling the board member Daniel Quinn's vacancy for the remainder of the term which will expire on November
06530th, 2026. So you have in front of you a document um that basically is just a review. Obviously two or three years ago we went through this process um and so we wanted to be consistent and so this follows what we did um at that time. So you can see members of the community uh city residents interested in filling the unexpired term again must be a resident of Elizabeth and you need to submit a letter of interest either in person or email containing their name address a brief explanation of why they are interested in serving on the board and please submit that to Miss Cindy Walker. Her address is here uh and her email address. Um the deadline for submission will be next Friday um at noon. So interested people would submit that by noon.
066That will give us a week uh to look at those people who have uh submitted interest and then we could have a special call board meeting to fill the vacancy um on May 30th at noon which would be a Friday. So any questions or anything an issue with following those guidelines with the way we did? Do we don't have to make this in the form of a motion or do we? Um I I don't I don't think so. I guess again just are those dates dates that everyone thinks that you can meet. I mean, could could everyone attend a meeting on May 30th at noon to make that? So, Miss Walker will just email us um the the people who have decided to put their name in the hat and like I said, it will
067be for the remainder of that term um which is essentially a year and a half. Um comments or questions? And I have reached out also to Tracy Harris at the election commission to just uh that date if for some reason there was another city election between now and that that time may change but she and I just haven't been able to okay connect yet but if if anything changes on that it won't change what you're doing right now it'll just change how long what the would be all right so any comments or questions about that okay all right we'll move on into the last item. Um, discuss moving the June board meeting from Thursday, June 19th, 2025 to Tuesday, June 17th, 2025. again Junth being a a holiday now and a lot of people are
068out and are off from work and we worried about maybe yeah we're recognizing that day uh here uh within the school system as well with staff. So, it just made sense if everyone was willing to move that to Tuesday the 17th. Um, that that would allow people that are off that day to be able to enjoy the whole the whole day. Yeah. Yeah. Plus, it's just I just think it's the right thing to do, but I'm not on the board. Okay. Well, is everybody good with that? Now, we may need a motion a motion to move that. Yeah, we probably All right. We'll do that then. Can I get a motion to or I I will make the motion that we move the June board meeting from Thursday the 19th to Tuesday the 17th. Uh
069can I get a second? Second. Second. All right. All those in favor say I. I. And any opposed? There are none. We good? I think we are. You want to talk any about July? Um just thinking ahead of July. Um we will have the year scheduled for us at the next board meeting but the first one will be in July and that Thursday is the Thursday most of us will be gone to Gatlinburgg for the law conference. So we just looking ahead maybe to consider moving the July back to Tuesday as well. Uh and then hopefully in August we could get back on our um normal uh third Thursday schedule. So that would move it from July 17th to July 15th. And that would be part as he said part of of what you will
070when you approve the schedule the meeting schedule in the June meeting for July through the rest of the that year. If if if we don't have any objection to that, we'll have that automatically removed. Yeah. So, so and we'll vote on that rather we go to schedule. Okay. So, we don't need a motion. All right. Anything else? Thank you again for being here. Thank you, Miss Wilson, for the budget. Thank you, Hudson, for a wonderful year. And uh we wish you well. Be cool to see what you do in this life. Best of luck in Big Orange Country. Yes. Yes. All right. Can we get a motion to adjourn? Motion to adjourn. Have a good evening. See y'all later. No sir.