001Let me double check. We do. We are live. Okay. All right. I have 550. I will call the meeting to order. If everyone would stand for a moment of silence in the pledge. If you face the flag, 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. Madame recorder, if you call the role. Chair Laura Harrison, present. Vice Chair Jeremy Bernett, here. Keith Actton, present. Michelle Childs, Deborah Thomas, present. We do have a quorum. As everyone knows, this is our work session. So, we will not be voting on any items tonight. Just discussion. Um the public like to speak hearing none. Next item. Uh next item is our report section. Our legislative liaison uh
002is not here. Um the superintendent's report today uh mainly dealt with uh the recognitions which we did right before the meeting. We had some if you weren't since we weren't streaming, we had some students that had some places to get to. So, we uh went ahead and did that a little bit early. Uh next is the uh monthly financial summary um which will be fully prepared for the uh board meeting and uh that concludes the report section. Any discussion or questions for the superintendent hearing? None. Next item. Uh next item is the approval of the agenda which is not uh necessary for a work session as the board knows. Uh this is just where we work through the items. uh on the consent agenda, we tend to default onto the consent agenda. And if any
003board members uh wish between now and the business meeting to move things on to the uh discussion action item uh as you often do, then uh that's certainly appropriate. So uh no approval is necessary, but we can work through the items on the consent agenda at the uh at the will of the board. Um is there any items that anyone wishes to not have on the consent agenda for next week? Um let's start there if so let's just say any let's start there with okay so which number number eight so we would like to move that to item I guess we'll just say number item six and push down. Yeah. So we would be item number six next week. So that would come off the consent agenda and go as item number six next week.
004Any other items anybody would like to have pushed to the regular agenda for next week? Um, I did want to um I'm not not that I want to take it off the consent agenda, but I did want to bring up the schoolboard calendar. Is that that's our meeting calendar, correct? That is the meeting calendar. So, that is a good one for you guys to double check. Laura, you have a history of finding things uh that we may have overlooked in terms of holidays. So, if everybody will take a look at that and see if that reflects the will of the board. Um, the one thing I do I would like to do is I make sure we get a board retreat in November potentially around the time of TSBA since I know we'll all be
005together around the time of TSBA for the annual convention. So, I would like to look at a date around there to have a retreat for us to do an update on our strategic planning items if that would definitely have that for the the business meeting. Yep, that would be great. Any other items on the list consent agenda anybody wants to make note of? All right, Dr. Horn, next item. All right. Uh the next item as we move uh down into the discussion action section. Uh the first item is the approval of the FY2526 budget. And uh I do have a a presentation on that that I'm going to move to. And also let me switch it here on the cameras. All right. Uh so, uh those that are watching the meeting at home, either now
006or after the fact, we'll have the uh um the slide presentation here. Um before I begin, I want to acknowledge Tristan Gaitley Sweat, who is our new uh finance director here in Lakeland School System. I say new, he's been here how many months now? I I lose track. Seven going on eight. seven going on eight. That's why I didn't even guess because it it has just flown by. Uh and part of that is because he's just done an outstanding job. This is the first budget that uh Mr. Gaitley Sweat has been responsible for for Lakeland school system. Uh he was really uh great to work with him. He um he picked up a lot of things from his time with Miss Rosales and took advantage of that overlap and uh really went into a lot
007of detail. I I know that the board will appreciate. He's very conservative in his uh revenue estimates and also in his expenditure estimates. So, he he wants to be sure that we're in a good financial position. So, I appreciate all your work, Mr. Gatly Sweat. And uh he also helped with a lot of these uh well, he helped with all of these slides. So, you'll see uh the information presented in in a few different ways graphically that I I think you'll appreciate as well. So as we start to move through uh some of the details on the presentation themselves and again just for the public um this is in a way the introduction at the work session of the concepts of the budget but I will say that this board has been uh very active
008in the drafts and have given a lot of feedback and uh we'll have the opportunity in the next week uh to continue to get questions answered uh if they would like to and give additional feedback but I appreciate all of their effort. Uh the responsibility for the budget actually is with the executive committee which under policy and state law is the superintendent and the board chair which is Laura Harrison. So uh she was absolutely instrumental uh in getting this budget put together in the first draft. So I madam chair I thank you for your engagement and and foresight there. So uh couple of budget highlights. Uh the first line here is uh almost laughably obvious, but it's almost uh is also I think a thing of joy and something we've been talking about since the
009the inception of Lakeland school system. We will add 12th grade for the 202526 school year. Next year and uh for the first time uh this is a budget for a complete K12 system. So, when we started this school system, a lot of folks said, "We need a complete system. We need a K12 system." Our uh our our website domain is Lakeland K12. At the time, we only had uh five grade six grade levels, but uh now we'll actually uh make that aspirational thought a reality. Uh we want to acknowledge that the completion of a full K12 school system introduces a new set of financial challenges and opportunities for the system. And I want to I want to break that down just a little bit. One of the challenges that we've we've been dealing with since
010we started Lakeland Prep High School in particular is that uh as the board knows and the public may not uh we are funded by both our state funds and by our local Shelby County funds based on the previous year's enrollment. So the budget that we get for funding um for both again the county funds and the state funds are based on the number of students that we had the year before. every year for the last three years and again for next year we've had between I think that first year 165 or so to up to 200 students uh that were coming to our school system needed teachers needed administrators needed support needed textbooks needed Chromebooks needed supplies uh but we were not yet funded for them uh there was a there is a mechanism in
011the state of Tennessee uh for growth funds so you can make up a portion of that, but it doesn't wind up being the entire amount that you would get if you had those students in the building the year before. So, that has been a challenge. This board knows that we've had to plan for the future while using funding basically calculated based on the past. Uh, and in some cases, we'd have to dip into fund balance to do that. Um and I'll just spoiler alert, we are not proposing doing that this year um based on our um our our financial calculations and uh the conservative approach again of this board. U the FY26 proposed budget uh continues the recent trend of significant investment in teacher salaries. That's our that's been our priority for the last several
012years and continues to be so. Uh while expanding the district office and school resources to support an estimated enrollment of 2,646 students, not seven, not five, but 46. It's what we're counting on uh based on the demographer work uh that we get from Dr. Jerome McKibben every year. And he's become with more data he gets increasingly accurate year after year. So we appreciate his forecasting there. Uh I'm going to talk a little bit. expand on what that means in terms of uh expanding district office and school resources. Uh but essentially for the first time we've put together a budget, we've put together a staffing model uh that that is built to deliver on a full K12 system. So uh we we have had to sometimes shoehorn responsibilities into different folks. We certainly uh even under
013this proposal uh everybody in the district office wears many hats and uh we we we have multiple responsibilities that we might not in a larger district. Uh but this is the first time where we have said what would it look like uh to have basically this structure moving forward for some time with only minor tweaks. Um, so hopefully the last set of kind of big, you know, tweaks to that model. Uh, in terms of revenues and and and most of this we're focusing on the general fund, uh, what the board knows is the 141 function. Uh, in terms of revenues, uh, we're looking at an estimated increase of 2.6 million from the previous year, uh, to 32,851 and some change there for next year. Uh to break that down, uh about 18.5 million of those
014dollars come from the state of Tennessee in the form of TISA, which is the Tennessee Investment in Student Achievement, uh that we're familiar with. Uh this is the third year of being funded by TISA. Uh and that is an 11% increase from FY25. Uh it is a total budget increase of 9% for our projected revenues. Uh, in terms of expenses, the expenses, uh, Mr. Gaitley Sweat, if I say something that's just wrong, I want you to raise your hand or speak up because I don't I don't I don't like to be, uh, I don't want to be be wrong in what I'm saying, and I don't mind being corrected, certainly. Um, so this is, as I mentioned, this is a structurally balanced budget u with no budgeted use of fund balance. um which is really
015exciting and that's again in spite of in this case uh not being fully funded based on the t the students that we have. Uh Mr. Gatly Sweat put this together in terms of the different funds. We tend to focus on the the general purpose GP fund uh which again is uh that that those numbers we talked about almost $33 million uh in revenues and expenses but we also just wanted to get you an idea of how it breaks down in terms of federal programs um which is only about a million dollars. We there's a lot of conversation, you know, recently, especially about federal programs and and what that means. But for Lakeland school system, it's it's about a million dollars that we get and we certainly take advantage of it and use it uh to
016help kids. Uh the school nutrition budget winds up being almost exactly the same, right at about a million dollars in terms of uh the the funding that we get from uh those are federal funds in many cases, the USDA funds and then funds that we take in from allocart. Uh we get about $120,000 in state grants. uh the LEAP program, our before and after school care program has a budget of about $280,000. And uh in terms of capital projects, that's the only one where where you'll see that we have more uh expenses uh broadcast for this year, forecast rather for this year um than the anticipated funding from uh Shelby County Schools alone, I'm sorry, uh Memphis Shelby County capital funds uh that we get. And we get those funds on a uh uh basically
017per student kind of pr-rated basis uh along with all the other school systems in Shelby County. Uh this this is a new graph that we haven't shown you, but it won't surprise you just in terms of the percentage of our funding and and where it goes. For the most part in a school system, we pay people. That's our most valuable resource obviously and we're a direct service uh basically institution. So uh there is a smaller percentage uh for contracted services uh about 5.2% for supplies and materials which which seems low when you look at it in the course of the budget but for the most part we're paying folks to do the work and the majority of the people we're paying the vast majority are the teachers that are providing that direct instruction. So uh
018we mentioned our estimated enrollment for next year is going to be 2646. Uh that breaks down to 952 in K4 at Lakeland Elementary. And for next year, it'll be just under 1,700 at Lakeland Prep, which is 5 through 12. I do want to note again, the board knows this. We don't include the uh preschool numbers in most of these budgets because they're not calculated into TISSA, and it kind of throws off some of our um averaging and and and calculations when we use those numbers. However, uh they're obviously a very important part of uh our our group at Lakeland Elementary. They're just they're just not really funded by uh by the state or by the county or uh by much of anybody. We get a small amount of funds as we've discussed uh for those
019students. So, uh the way that those calculations work, we've got uh the TISA base rate did go up to just under $7,300 from $7,75 last year. Uh we are anticipating the continued receipt of our fast growth funds that kind of make up some of that balance from not getting uh paid in real time and then certain outcomes payments that we've uh we're we're growing to anticipate uh based on performance in different areas. Uh we use some realistic revenue projections uh so that we could we could support normalized expenditure estimates. Mr. Gateely Sweat did a real deep dive into uh the historical data of uh revenues and I I think made some made some very um again very conservative estimates um that in some cases kind of estimated down um but particularly local taxing property tax
020and things um and we still wound up with a balanced budget. Uh we did account for up to a 3% inflation on transportation in the highest cost route scenario. So, uh, transportation winds up being, I think, just just about a million dollars as well. Um, is that about right? Yeah. Million two. Million two. Okay. All right. And we we did want to also highlight just in terms of kind of some enhanced graphics our proposed budget revenue by source. And this is all the funds. Uh, so as you can see, the vast majority of the dollars we get are from the state of Tennessee through TISA. Um that's just over $19 million um from Shelby County uh which is uh based on average daily attendance. The state of Tennessee is based on average daily membership um
021uh relative to other school systems in Shelby County is based on average daily attendance. Uh we get over 13.5 million from Shelby County. Uh the city of Lakeland gets us gives us $823,000 is what's budgeted. that is based on the required 15 cent property tax equivalent that uh that the city of Lakeland uh is required to put towards the school system. Uh we have never asked for anything more than the 15 cent equivalent, but I will note that the 15 cent equivalent does does go up as the the property tax collection goes up. Uh from LSS, the these are things basically where we we generate the funds ourselves. That could be through uh uh we we we do get some income from uh the satellite tower at least and in cases where we collect fees
022directly and some things like that. We get uh as we noted uh over a million dollars from the federal government, million dollars from school nutrition and then and then that leap fund budget. So that's the revenue breakdown. All right, some items to highlight in this budget. Uh we are maintaining the uh stipens for hard to staff positions which in some cases have kind of pushed us over the line with some folks uh that that we wanted to come work for us in Lakeland school system and we're in harder to staff areas. Uh I want to note this. I'm very very proud of this and excited for the employees. Uh we have a 0% increase in health insurance premiums for this year. Um probably goes without saying that's almost unheard of for for organizations to not
023go up at all. Um I've been told that the industry standard kind of baseline can be 9%. Um but again based on the uh the interlocal uh health committee um which I happen to be the chair right now at the moment um we're we're uh recommending and have approved in fact a 0% in health insurance premium. So good for our employees. Uh we are going to uh this budget does include the device upgrades that we kind of count on due to our Chromebooks. The Chromebooks do have to be refreshed every 3 years or so. So, that is a different model, but we think it's been a good one uh for us and a cost-effective one. Uh want to talk a little bit about this and just be very clear. We're going to be clear uh
024verbally and in writing. Uh this budget does include bonus payments to all staff. Uh but I am noting here that is subsidiz subsidized by the Tennessee legislature. So, uh this board had to approve a resolution. uh they were basically required to approve a resolution in order to get $2,000 per teacher and teacher is very specifically defined by the uh state of Tennessee based on some legislature based on the legislature based on some legislation is what I was trying to say. Thank you. Uh so as a result of that the the the legislature the legislature uh said these are the teachers that are going to get this extra $2,000 and this was related to the the voucher legislation. So it was part of that uh we have in over the last couple of years started giving
025$1,000 bonus payments to certified and 12 month central office staff and then $500 payments to all other staff. Um there is it is not arbitrary, but there are some folks that would normally qualify for our $1,000 bonus that are left out of the $2,000 bonus. So again, I want to be very upfront. What we are doing is the teachers that get the $2,000 bonus will get the $2,000 bonus. They won't get the $2,000 plus the other thousand for three. That that didn't feel right con uh uh considering some of our teachers were going to just get the $1,000 bonus. So, everybody uh that got the $1,000 bonus last year will get at least that. The teachers that are on that list will get 2,000 and then everybody that's not in one of those categories will
026get 500. We will make that very very clear to the teachers because the timing is is also not Christmas bonus timing for the state money. So, um just that that is what is currently factored into this uh this zero uh you know zeroed out budget. All right. Some additions that we're very excited about. Yes, Mr. Gaitley Sweat. You said 500. The The lower tier is 750. Thank you. Look at me. I'm underelling. Thank you. That was left over. I appreciate that. That's a good correction. The lower tier is 750. So, uh the $1,000 750 and then some would get the the 2,000. Thank you. Uh some other exciting additions. We're going to do another uh 3% increase to teacher salary schedules. Um this this uh continues a recent trend of heavy investment in teacher salary
027schedules. Uh we do have a significantly enhanced school nurse salary schedule. School nurses don't work as many hours as teachers, but it is uh so it's not the exact same amount or nurses and their background and training the equivalent of certificated personnel. And we think it's time and certainly we appreciate everything that our fabulous fabulous school nurses do. Uh there are enhanced school administration salary schedules included in this and I'm going to uh and uh restructured district office organization that's related to that. Um we have for the past several years if I said really put a lot of effort and funds into our teacher salary schedule and we've uh put less emphasis and funds into our administrator salary schedule. So, we're going to do a little bit of a a catching up here as we
028contemplate that full K12 system and what that means for administrators um at the school level and at the uh district office level. So, I'll give some additional detail on that. Uh and we also have some enhanced uh safety measures. Uh we've got an emergency response training that we are spending a fairly significant amount of money on that's going to be for everybody on the staff. Uh it's an enhanced um version of some training that we've done just to make sure that as many people on campus as possible know exactly precisely what to do in the case of a of a threat to the campus essentially. So uh I want to thank Mr. Adler for chasing that down and setting that up. So we're excited about that, too. All right. Uh new positions for fiscal year
0292026. This will be uh the last of what the board's gotten used to over the last three years of having just a ton of new positions um as we've grown. So uh as always, the majority of those positions uh are at LPS on the high school side. Um but we've got lined up and uh and just about filled to my knowledge uh two high school English uh positions, a high school functional skills position, a high school gifted position, two high school math positions. There's a new assistant band director position to support our growing uh band program. Um high school resource um position, high school science, three high school social studies positions, high school special education assistant uh as well as a study hall dedicated study hall assistant and an additional school counselor for the high
030school side. Uh we've got nutrition technician positions that would work both the middle school and high school. Uh and then some uh kind of uh rounding out the other positions, elementary intervention at LEES, uh a shared English learners position. Those uh areas continue to grow. Uh math intervention at the middle school, uh an HVAC technician at uh the central office as we move into the central office positions. That one is uh expected to be budget neutral based on the funds we've been spending contracting and outsourcing with HVAC um company. Uh we are adding a high school instructional uh supervisor which we're actually proposing to be a director of instruction. That would be at the and I'll I'll talk a little bit more about that. Um and that would be at the high school. Uh we
031are proposing a director of CTE and special programs. Uh two more custodial positions. Um a technology systems manager. Uh a finance specialist and a special education specialist. So those are our new positions. All right. As part of the restructuring at the district office, uh, and I want to be clear on this because I think seeing all the new titles might, um, inaccurately accurately lead somebody to believe that we're hiring all these new people for the district office. Uh, so the board is is being asked to approve some new job descriptions and there'll be a few more added uh, as that we've been working through for the actual business meeting. But uh what this slide does is is lays out a little more clearly um what that actually looks like and where those positions came from.
032So uh we have had we currently have a human resources director, a finance director, a technology director, and uh some supervisors, federal programs supervisor, student services supervisor, uh and instructional supervisors. So those same positions are rolling into uh basically new titles that we believe better reflect the responsibilities of these positions in a full K12 system especially considering the amount of growth that we have had as a system uh over the last three years and we'll we'll finalize next year. So our our proposal is uh three chief positions chief of human resources chief of finance and chief of technology. These positions would answer directly to the superintendent's office. Um and uh they they tend to be more on the business side. Uh and they they would not have basically anybody between those positions and me. Um
033we are proposing uh that the supervisors basically be moved into a director strata. Uh we're rebranding or proposing a rebranding of the federal program supervisor into a director of strategic programs. Student services supervisor would be the director of student services and then we would have these uh director of instruction positions. So the only two new central office administrative positions that are being proposed in these budgets kind of new from scratch. These folks don't exist are the director of CTE and special programs and I think logically a 9 through 12 director of instruction. I will note that the uh uh the instructional supervisor for Lakeland Prep has been covering grades 5 through 11, which is a spread that includes an elementary grade, the middle school grades, and three high school grades. So, uh obviously we feel
034like that's something that that deserves and needs to be addressed. uh with the growth of our CTE programs uh and the need for additional reporting throughout the programs. Uh this would pro the director of CT and special programs would provide some support uh for fine arts and for intervention as well as doing some of the data reporting and analysis for TISA. Uh would take on impact aid and several other uh I think important areas. I wanted to give some context for this. I I like to be real upfront. It is very fun to talk about new teacher positions and increasing teacher salaries. For some folks, it's not as much fun to talk about district office. This board has always been uh you know very deliberate about making sure that funds go direct to direct support
035first and uh has has certainly been wary of making sure that we have we don't have too much district office relative to the rest of the budget. Uh what I'm hoping this slide kind of, you know, helps represent is is the idea that the scope of many of our district office positions has grown dramatically over the course of the four years. I don't want that to be be lost on anybody. Um and I picked out some of these areas. They all wind up in that um you know mid to high 40s to 50s to in some case in terms of the budget the 70s range in terms of increases. Uh but you can see here where we started. The K8 was kind of the last year of just uh Lakeland Middle Preparatory School. Um our
036enrollment has gone up 45% and that's all the way up to the projections or is projected to have gone up 45%. our total staff that human resources is responsible for from both in terms of benefits, in terms of onboarding, in terms of uh maintenance and and overseeing you know payroll amounts um has gone up 52%. Uh the managed technology devices that that the technology department is expected to not only manage but monitor and filter and make sure that that students are operating in a safe environment have gone up 56%. Uh obviously this follows the the student enrollment that drives everything. Uh and our general fund budgeted revenues. I mean this is this is hard to think about really uh when you think about 5 years ago. It's a 72% increase. Um there there are the
037scope of what the finance director is is asked to do and monitor and keep up with and uh and keep an eye on has grown significantly. So when we talk about these shifts to chief positions and from supervisors to directors, uh in most cases there's a heightened sense of responsibility, but in some cases it's just as simple as these same individuals are being asked to keep up with more and do more in the course of a day. Uh was asked to kind of give some context to to the uh increases that we're talking about for uh in terms of administrators. So just to just to give some historical context here uh again in the last few years we've really been focused on the teacher salary schedules and um this uh basically this year with the
0383% again brings us up to a 16% increase in the teacher salary schedules and that's over the course of the last three years plus this proposal. So that's really, you know, from the from where we were at the K8 time, our starting salary, and we just did that. So it's apples to apples. That's our 10-month starting salary. Just just keep that in mind. That's not 12 month. Uh we've gone from $45,000 up to almost $52,000. Uh so a 16% increase during that time. Uh just so everybody kind of has a a benchmark here on the directors. Uh at the the director level, which we have had at the district office, that's one we had consistently. uh we have gone 2% 2% 2%. So those those employees didn't benefit from the the 3% bump or certainly
039the on average 7% bump from last year. Uh we are proposing going up 10% which I know looks like a lot but if you look at the bottom in terms of percentage increase it really just more keeps us in line with what we what we did sooner to the teachers. approve these and and and the numbers go up and the numbers go down um in terms of you know uh what we're allocated and they change sometimes but you can see clearly uh IDA part B uh which concerns special education is the largest by far in terms of our funding um you can see that the uh IDA prek um is the smallest. We do get some spa state sped uh prek money. uh the innovative schools uh model grant has been really great for our
040bioem um department and that's where we have put those funds and and that's been some significant funds but uh we also have a number of title and Perkins funds that uh that we spend we receive and spend. Uh a couple other highlights to note. Uh we're proposing no meal price increases for the 2526 school year. uh we think there'll be 196 additional students projected uh in the school system. We're add we are adding positions and increased hours uh to cover the that that senior class especially and a 19% increase in projected revenue based on more students eating breakfast and lunch and uh we are holding steady on our LEAP fees as well. I think that's the the best deal in uh in child care is is our LEAP program and they do a good job
041and we've kept those uh those funds at a minimum uh I'm sorry the the fees at a minimum as well. So that really concludes the overview of the uh of the budget and uh the budget uh certainly is available to be shared publicly and or will be for the um the business meeting and uh the board has had an opportunity to review it. At this time, I'm going to take the take the stream off um the graphic and just see if there are any questions or comments from the board. Board members, any items, any discussion? I just want to make if I could one comment to something, Dr. Pearl since it was the last slide, the prek program, the elite program, my children, I think several of our children probably participated that going up and
042it really was it was incredibly convenient to drop our kids off at the school to have qualified highquality individuals who cared about our kids and I've grown to seen some of those staff have moved from LEAP program to have positions in the schools and to hear that they do really well in the positions they're in in schools. So, I just appreciate that. Thank you for making that comment. And I want to acknowledge our assistant superintendent, Dr. Deloso, who uh oversees that program uh from afar, I guess, but the person that really is the the nuts and bolts of it is Amy Roberts, and she does a terrific job with that, and and thank you for your your feedback there. So, I'll just echo that. The thing that is is so interesting is that we it
043used to be run by YMCA, and I remember when Dr. H said, you know, what if we took this in house? This would be really great when it was the merger and non- merger and all that was in the beginning. And so I think that's one of our programs that has really exploded and been a positive thing for our school system. So I appreciate your vision there for having the idea originally to take that in house. You know, it was not long after we started up and it really and it's done wonderful. It was it was not long after we started off and y'all know I like to give credit where credit is due and I'm not just deflecting it. This is the truth. The first person to say it was Jarita Lockheart. She said
044we should we should look at doing this ourself. Uh, and while I'm acknowledging Jera Lockheart, let me acknowledge Corey Martin who's here in the audience as well and uh, an interested party certainly in the budget and everything else and does a great job. I do have a question. Uh, on one of the slides you showed the uh, the growth in the staff. Was that representative of all staff including coaches or was that full-time staff only? Uh, that's a great question. I'm going to confirm that it does not include coaches as my understanding. Coaches or subs which we hire they're our employees as well. So, understood. It's it's full-time and part-time general staff. Very well. Thank you, Madam Chair. Yes. Um Oh, Dr. Her, if you could go back one slide. There's a new position that
045I'm particularly excited to see added to the high school level. As we've had numerous conversations over the years, and I knew you would be the director of CTE and special programs, someone whose sole focus or primary focus is career and technical education. Um, so I'm excited to see that position added as well. We are too. Good. Thank you. Was that originally supposed to be compliance when you first was it has that morphed? That has morphed and that's one of the Yes. uh behind the curtain uh w with board conversations that was originally um developed as a supervisor of compliance that was going to work solely with the federal programs director. But as we started kind of breaking the job responsibilities apart, we felt like it would be more effective and efficient to split that into
046two positions. And also we wanted to make sure that that CTE portion was emphasized. Um but also we we uh the our federal program supervisor has had a huge spread right uh on her for the last several years. And so as we started kind of breaking that apart, we thought instead of having a huge spread that's two people deep, maybe it would make more sense to section that out um between the people. So yes. Well, and I think that's a a good point, too. So when we were just itty bitty um school system, you took on a lot of these things and then as we added people, they got to be the supervisors, the directors of these different areas. And one thing that I think is lost on a lot of people is how much
047you've been able to seed some things to some people who are specially trained and suited for those positions. And so some of the um some of the salary increases and acknowledgement of those things. And then they're also increased salaries because you are trying to get some of those employees to be 12-month employees which will allow you to do more strategic planning in the summer with everybody on in one place. Yes. Thank you for noting that because that's really an oversight not to mention. uh the the in fact all the none of the supervisors uh were 12-month employees and and and when I say we've been conservative and we have really tried to make sure every dollar that could got into the classroom that even um included being well frankly being the only district certainly in
048in Shelby County that I'm aware of and I'm sure one of very few where a lot of these central office positions didn't even work 12 months. they would they they had dates that they would work over the summer, but it was much more limited. Uh which which frankly kind of limits what we can do. Um as you noted, as we've grown up, anybody that came into any position at the district office had multiple multiple hats and uh in in a way that in some cases could be considered unreasonable, you know, for for somebody to keep that many plates spinning. uh there is a jack-of- all trades, master of none kind of aspect to that. And I think as we've really been able to narrow down the focus of certain people uh in certain certain positions,
049I'll say I think we have much better responsiveness. I'll call out Miss Milspa is here and as we've uh managed to take some things off her plate. I think she and her team have really done just an amazing job at making sure that our responsiveness, our customer service, our proactive information um has really come a long way in terms of the the the staff experience. So you know some of these positions when we say well that that that person doesn't directly work with students but that person works directly with the people that work with students and their ability to get information and have information and make decisions uh with all the information they need uh impacts at the end of the day I think student instruction. So I'm also um excited that you you're contemplating
050another direct director of instruction for LPS. I think that's warranted there with so many more kids and the different grade bands and I think that'll be a huge addition. Thank you. I do too. And I and I also think that's one where we these started as supervisors and have have moved into more of a director. There is going to be more accountability for student performance in those positions uh based on this structure. And I also think it sends a message about the importance obviously of academics and instruction. Um, I think we we need to be working in an environment where instruction is is basically at the same level uh on the salary schedule and on the org chart as uh as as student services or anything else. Well, and you think how do you help
051how do you help kids? Well, you help their teachers. How do you help their teachers? You do that with directors of instruction who can observe them, give them tips, give them steps to, you know, improve their way that they're conveying the information to the kids. And so I'm thankful for that. Help new teachers, you know, right? Help help veteran teachers learn new things, you know, all those things take boots on the ground for sure. And I will say those three position, the directors of instruction are going to remain school embedded. So they will have places they can work in the new district office, but uh the main places they do work uh uh and the the their main headquarters are going to be in the schools. Okay. Any more items? Um I do. So when
052you talk about the dollar amounts with the the general funds that does not include school-based finances, right? This is only so so when you talk about people by SSOs and put into school level accounts at both schools, those are still supervised by the finance director um ultimately uh those audits, you know, roll up to the finance director. Um that when they close out at the end of the year, uh the budgets that they uh that they work with, they all They all have to be supervised to make sure that they follow Lakeland school system and state and federal policies. So yes, thank you for pointing that out. That does not include the uh the student activity funds at the schools. Okay. Which have exploded. Yes, they have absolutely exploded. Excitingly exploded. I won't stay in
053that. A lot of folks raising a lot of money uh to do a lot of things which is great. And so this budget does include still our payments to ACS. Do you have a rough amount because I think we still for the students and that's paid at the end of the school years. Uh that has been paid and uh Mr. Caitly Sweat and I might be racing to see who can get it first. It's probably him. Um I think I have a number here. I I believe for this the this this year the 25 26 school year I think it was no 2425 was $80,360. You want to fact check that Mr. Gaitley Sweat? Sorry I didn't mean to put you on the spot. No, no. So that's the last year with a full class.
054So that that is the payment that includes the um the full class of seniors, the current the current graduating seniors or the current graduating seniors. Y yes. So at that point with the contract in place, we still have to pay funds the way the contract is written, we still have to pay funds to Arlington Community Schools even though they're a lesser amount if any Lakeland students go there. Yes. Was that number the amount paid in this fiscal year for the Lakeland students was $79,63. Okay. I got a little I was close but yes. Yep. 79,000. So yes and I think what we're budgeting for next year Mr. Gaitley Sweat based on the students that we think will remain which $40,000 we budgeted $40,000 which we think is high. So yeah any more discussion hearing? None.
055Um, is it does the board agree to carry this item over to discussion action item number one on next week's agenda? Yes. Yes. Okay. So, this item will be number one on next week's agenda. Dr. Hor. Okay. Uh, the next item is the approval of the 2526 salary schedules uh which uh are in development and uh most of which have been reviewed by the board already, but those will be uh before the board next week as well. Uh those are the salary schedules that basically correspond with the budget numbers that you find in the budget and the position the new pos including the new position or the change title positions I guess would be the right everything would be included. Okay. So um this item will remain number two without objection from the board would
056re remain number two for discussion item for next week. Next item uh next item is the approval of the F these are all budget items the 2526 stipen schedules. Uh we obviously uh this this board invests a significant amount in our athletic and fine arts programs in particular um and uh we annually update the stipen schedule. So our coaches and um those that are responsible for directing the fine arts programs uh their stipens are actually tied to the base um the first year bachelor degree teacher salary schedule. So they go up if we go up 3% on the teacher salary schedule, their compensation also goes up, which I think is a great way to do it and make sure we're we're honoring them as well. So, and I believe the board all has the opportunity
057to review that and provide any feedback to Dr. Horl regarding that. So, this item will stay as number three on the discussion item for next week. And I just wanted to make clarity for the public. Dr. Horl and his team um have sent out multiple drafts of all the information. the board has the opportunity to give feedback and ask for spe more information on specific line items in development of this budget. So this is the collaborative process has been with Dr. Horl and his team as board members review all the items that um they have been submitted and sent out and they'll say well well what about this and ask for more data and then that's kind of how we've gotten to the final budget. So I just want the public to know that it's
058a back and forth process. It's not a set it and forget it process where the board is actually taken the time to go through each one and there's multiple drafts, multiple iterations. Um it's been a very collaborative process which I appreciate. Absolutely. So would you agree Mr. Gaitley Sweat? It is not a set it and forget it process. It is definitely Would you would you agree Miss Milsp? I concur. Okay. So but it's very positive outcomes for sure. I want to say thank this board for being so willing to ask the questions of staff and make make staff look at things differently, positive, negative, move things up and down. Some things go up, some things that go down. And so it's just been a really refreshing experience. Um, and how positive just the feedback and
059the information has been on the things that the board has asked for from what I've heard at least from Dr. Horl. So I I think the staff as well wanted to take the opportunity as we're going through this. Thank you. Well, and connected to that, the format of the presentation was very different and I think it needed to be for this year and I think it's very um public friendly also. So, um you know it kind of explains our thinking as we become full. So, we are going to uh attach that to the agenda as well. The presentation itself was not attached to the agenda previously, but we'll attach that to that. All right. Dr. Hall, I'm going to guess that Mr. Gaitley Sweat had a lot to do with how this presentation looked. He
060had everything to do with how this presentation looked. I contentwise I had some input, but uh the look was all him. Yeah. We'll say thank you then. Yes. Yes. Thank you very much. I I really do appreciate it. I' I've actually enjoyed going through the PowerPoint. So, thank you very much. Um next item. Uh next item uh is lettering. Okay. So, I'll take this one because I asked for this to be put on the agenda. So, I had asked the policy committee to look at potentially creating a policy regarding the lettering as we have rising seniors. Um, they're starting to do their college applications. Lettering is one one way in which a student can be recognized and um stand out, I guess, apart from other people as as I'm sure everybody knows that is dealing
061with the college application process. It is getting more and more and more competitive. So if you have a way in which you can stand out whether it be you know a multi- um what do you call activity person or whether you're doing extreme like a lot of uh community service there's like you're just always looking for ways where we can stand out. So so that was my motivation behind behind asking the committee to look at this. So um they had come up with a draft I shared that with Dr. Hal and he had some great feedback so I was going to give that back to the committee. So, I'd like to keep this on the agenda, but um I don't think the draft is ready yet. So, um with your feedback, I will make sure
062I pass or can you pass it on to the Yes, I pass on to the policy committee and that would be great because I think there's a couple there's questions about um like funding, you know, how that works as far as it's going to be paid out of this account or that account, like how just small details to make sure we get the draft the first draft before it comes for the board. Correct. I so I drafted something um myself before involving the policy committee because I wanted to make sure I was doing it in the right way. So once you send me feedback, you can let me know what my next steps need to be. That would be yes. Got it. Okay. So this will stay on the agenda and even if we if
063we don't have a complete draft by the next meeting with and also would like to get some administrator feedback once we get the kind of those couple of things that you outlined and then be able to get some administrator feedback on those if they maybe have some gotchas or things that we didn't think about. Perfect. That would be great. Um so so I'll keep it here for next week and if it's not able to be finalized for next week then potentially carried over June. Okay. So that's kind of the timeline I was thinking if that works. That works. Okay. Any objection by the board? Okay. All right. Next item. Uh next item is the superintendent evaluation update. I'm happy to speak. You want I can or you can. Either way, you can go ahead. I'll
064let you have Okay. Yeah. U as we discussed uh previously the basically the superintendent contract says that the super the board will work collaboratively on the evaluation instrument. Um I I did it. It's been roughly the same for a long time now. And uh one of the things that I did, I got some feedback from some of my colleagues at AS and just looked at some different valuation models. And one thing I I I'm proposing is just to simplify it. There are a whole lot of questions um in the in the current instrument, a lot of them which I think could be argued are are redundant. So I took basically the general themes and there they're just four questions each in each of the main uh areas and also uh moved the scale back from
065a sixpoint scale to a fivepoint scale which seems to make more sense as I look at it um now. So that has also been submitted to the board members um and I'm am open to your feedback. If it's uh if it's approved by the board um at the business meeting then uh we would turn it around um for um which is three and then four and five is agree and strongly agree. So that really made sense as far as the range changing um because six kind of gave you well it might be a four, it might be a three, it might be a five. You're just I don't know. I felt like it made the range more make more sense to which side of the pendulum you're going to go with. Um but it also
066gave you the opportunity to have a neutral rating too. Um, and then looking at the current evaluation with the new proposed two, um, the main thing I was worried or concerned with or looking at is making sure the domains were the same, make sure we were looking at the relations with the board, looking at the visioning, looking at the things that we push and and talk about on a routine basis with Dr. Hold. So, making sure that all those things were covered as and like Dr. said many of the things when you went through the evaluation instrument it was um very similar the items were similar. It wasn't that it was the exact same statement but some of the things were similar. So um condensing it down uh made it to me it would make
067it easier to do and and more concise. I'm I'm about conciseness and so that's I really like the fact that it's concise and you know this statement all you two or three items may be incorporated in one and it's just one rating item. So those were the the things that I really appreciated about the evalu the changes in evaluation instrument. So just my feedback. I gave Dr. Horl some similar feedback that it simplified it. You don't get survey fatigue as you're going through. Yes. Um, and there were a lot of things that could be combined, which I think this does. And the fivepoint scale is makes a lot more sense. It's what you see a lot more often. So, there won't be a way to compare last year and this year, but you'll have a
068new baseline going forward. Y any more discussion on this item hearing? None. This new baseline after 10 years, we'll start we'll start year 11. Right. Right. Um, so this item will rem remain or this item if everybody's fine with the instrument, this can go on the consent agenda for next week. Is everybody fine with that? Um, since Michelle's not here, you want to maybe um did I don't know if she had any feedback or whatever about it. She didn't have any direct feedback that I recall. Okay. She has opportunity next week to take it off the Yeah, I'm fine with it. One of the consent. So, can you put it as number nine on the consent agenda for next week or I'm sorry, it' be number eight. I'm sorry because we took number eight off.
069So number eight on the consent agenda for next week and she'll have the opportunity if she wants to take it off um at the meeting because I do uh I do go through that when we're going through the approval of the agenda. All right. So next item next item is a review of the policy manual section six second half. Is there any report from the policy committee? Um no but I will have one next week. Okay. So um if they if they find something. Yeah. Okay. All right. So, any other policy items we need to discuss? Madam Chair, I did want to bring up um I'd like for the board members to review um policy 4.403, library materials. Um I've had the experience to be involved as a parent in some concerns around this policy.
070Um we've had another incident recently similar to that and Dr. and I have talked about some things about this and uh my concern is I want to make sure that every employee in the board who is involved in selecting materials that our students see knows it's not just state law. It is the will of the board. It's the opinion of the board that these things are not okay. It's not just a state law thing. Um state law requirements. Um and so my concern is that we review this and make sure that the board's opinion on the matter is also added into this. Um, and then also I'm I'm concerned that we need to make sure that there are consequences for flagrant violations of this policy. Um, and and so in that regard, Dr. H, I
071may be talking with you about having um either TSBA legal or or our legal council look at what we can do cuz when when choices are made to include inappropriate content in the textbooks, it's not okay. I'm not okay with it. Um, and I need to make sure that that message is given to our staff. So, if the board would review policy 4.43, send any um feedback or updates or concerns or anything else you wish to express to Dr. Horl and he can filter it through and related to that content. Um, and we will uh bring if we need to bring anything up or if we have updates or if y'all have wording changes or things that we're going to do for the policy or potentially June, either next week or June. um if you're
072taking the time to talk with TSBA so we get it right before we bring it back. However, and it was not my intent for us to make changes in the next 7 days. So I want I want to start the process, take the time and and Okay. So we'll put that potentially just make a note potentially in the June agenda depending on TSBA feedback and how we can move forward with um recommendations on that. But if the board members would take a look at that policy is is 4.43 403 as it is written in our policy manual, the model policy. No, we actually spent a lot of time and again I'll call out Dr. Deloso. She spent a a great deal of time working with me and some others on uh crafting this policy. Um
073it is not one of those that's word for word TSBA. Um, we wanted to make sure that there were ample opportunities for um uh both the school and the district administration to uh to respond to parent concerns before it got to the board and felt like that was appropriate under the law. But so no, this is this was tailored to um this board of education. Okay. Any other policy items we need to discuss or anybody would like to bring forward for future review? All right, hearing none. Next item. Uh, next item is announcements. Are there any announcements? My apologies. I did we um skip over the job descriptions. Were we going to go through those? Move them down to the bottom. Okay. Did you want to go through them? I thought it was for next
074week's. I made a note. It was for next week's agenda. It is for next week. I think it fits with the budget. So, I don't I I don't know if we want to go one, two on those. Do you want to renumber them? What do you want to do? You see what I mean? If we if if you I was not thinking of including them like in a vacuum, but they're they kind of go with the budget. Do you want to go one budget, two job descriptions? Yeah, I think I think that's fine. Yeah, they could be they could be number two there. And we there will be some additional job descriptions that are added to it. So, I mean, right now you've got uh you know what, eight or nine. Uh there may be
075five or six more that are coming. Again, in a lot of cases, this is retitling and and and changes. We can certainly go over them one by one next time, but we can Do you want them listed individually or you wanting them as a one single item in next week's agenda? Well, I think if you're if you're adding new ones, you want them listed individually. Correct. No, I was saying do you want like see how they're listed as item number eight? So do you want this to be like two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine item on the agenda or is it appropriate to have all one and then just I think like it is here. Okay. Well, there'll be a few more on top of that and we'll add it to the discussion
076action. Okay. Yeah, as item number two. Yeah. Okay, sounds good. So, three would be salary schedules. Yes. Four would be stipen schedules. Five would be lettering. Six would be superintendent valuation. No, that moved to the consent agenda. So there there is no six. Six would be policy man. Policy. Yes. Correct. Okay. Everybody good with that? Yes. Okay. Obviously, anything else that the board chooses to add to the agenda between now and uh the business meeting can just you can let me know or uh and I'll discuss it with the chair and we'll get it added. And I would I'll take the opportunity to make some announcements. I think we have some sports teams playing for in the district or regional playoffs. I don't know if they still call it regional or sectionals or whatever. But
077just um I think that's where maybe Miss Childs is. And I just we we just got an update. May I share that if that's appropriate? Yes. Uh LPS won their first playoff game. This is boys soccer is what this is. Uh 9000. Huge game tomorrow against NBA at Cordova High at 5:00 p.m. So very exciting. Pack the stands. Congratulations to them on their win tonight and good luck for their uh contest tomorrow night. And I think we might have baseball that's still looked at me right there. Never. Um, we won the district last week. We play for the region title this week. If we win that, we have sectionals slash substate, whichever you want to call it. Next week, about the middle of the week, supposed to start on the 14th. If we win that,
078best two out of three, we go to the state. Exciting. So exciting. And you know, for so long, we played like our other sports, we played against guys who drove themselves there and had full beards. So now we uh there's a little more parody on the field now. Um our beard game is weak. Our beard game is very weak, but um you know our muscles and that they're they're growing. They're very Yeah. Well, speaking of Lakeland's finest, we have two of Lakeland's finest here in the back. Uh already signed it. Oh, you got it. Well, they have they have two and they're going to go come see Miss Milspa in the district office and she'll sign your other one that you pick up tomorrow. All right. Is there a motion to adjurnn? So moved. We
079have a motion. Can I make a second favor?