001[Music] I'm happy. [Music] Oh [Music] yeah. Heat. [Music] Heat. Heat. Heat. N. [Music] Good afternoon. We will call the meeting to order momentarily and SPS TV will begin broadcasting. Okay. The April 23rd, 2025 board special meeting is called to order at 3:03 p.m. Uh we would like to acknowledge that we are on the ancestral lands and the traditional territories of the Puis Sound Coast Salish people. For the record, I will call the role. Vice President Briggs, I'm here. Director Clark will be joining us momentarily. Director Hersy here. Director Ms. here. Director Ranken here. Director Sarju here. And this is President Top. All right. Uh this evening uh we will be uh re in our special meeting here reviewing the response is or reviewing the scores for our um interviews that we had for our search
002firms. Uh we are joined by assistant superintendent of finance Dr. Kurt Bleman and our contracting services team who has been supporting us this whole time. Thank you so much. Um earlier this month, we began review of proposals um from executive search firms that responded to our request for proposals for our superintendent search process. We completed individual evaluations and then joined together to review and discuss our combined scoring on April 9th. This should all sound very familiar to board directors. On our uh uh on our next step, we selected three finalists. We interviewed those finalists last Friday. It was a super exciting Friday night of spring break. Um, and then in preparation for today's meeting, directors were asked s to submit individual scores for those interviews. Directors who were unable to attend the Friday meeting had
003access to the recording of the um and other materials shared. So, they were able to also score. Um just as a reminder for uh fairness and to comply with state law uh for the evaluation of these proposals, we need to adhere to the following tonight. Uh we need to comply with our conflict of interest and ethics policies. Um the the docuign that uh board staff had us sign at the start of this process. Uh we need to evaluate the proposals based on the criteria we as a board previously set and included in the RFP. Um and finally we need to document our reasoning um through this process for any changing in scores that may happen through our discussion this evening. Um in alignment with all of this process and requirements, we're going to work through
004I think roughly five steps tonight. And I'm going to go through the five steps real fast. a lot of a lot of me talking, but then see if folks have any questions about what this process looks like. And staff, get correct me if I get any of these steps wrong. First, we're going to look to staff here to confirm that they have our individual scoring from the evaluations for each director completed and submitted. Second, once we've got all those individual scores, I'll ask staff to report back to us on combined scoring for the interviews. Third, we're going to look at the scoring. Um, and then our next step will be to move into discussion about why we scored the way we did. Um, after that discussion, we can change our scoring if needed, but we
005will need to document that scoring in writing for the reasons for those changes. Um, finally, we will look at our final combined scoring um with any updates and arrive upon agreed agreed upon firm. And then during today's regular board meeting, we will take actions to authorize a contract with the selected firm. So lot of information there, a lot of like five steps I would say for this special meeting. Any questions? Okay. I I have one quick question. Um it says this is director Ranken, although I'm coming through Evan's phone. Um just for my own confirmation, we're we're selecting uh the the committee to offer the or the firm to offer the contract. Um are all is the contract already I I just want to make sure we have the flexibility to select an interim or
006a permanent superintendent with any of the three firms. Is this the right time to ask that? look to contracting staff. [Music] So the question is, are you locked into hiring a permanent superintendent through this process? The answer to that is no. Is that the question, Director Ranken? Yeah. Yes. Yes. The question would is that the the whichever firm we contract with that that contract would allow us to pursue either an interim or a permanent superintendent with that firm depending on the needs of the board and what happens throughout the process. Uh you are online but I'm seeing shaking heads from procurement staff. Other questions? Thanks. All right, seeing no other questions, we're going to proceed to step one, reviewing our preliminary score. So, first staff, has have you received all scores necessary? We did, and
007thank you to the board for meeting that deadline. Um, then could staff walk us through the scoring sheet and where that leaves us? I think can Ally put that on the screen or someone And while that's happening, just confirm each board member has their scores that they submit. Ed, right? Okay. So, you'll need that if you want to have a discussion later. Uh, do directors who are online have that by email? We will find out in just a second. We're we're we are in the parking lot, so we'll be there in just a sec. Perfect. Uh, can we make sure, board staff, that director Misarrai has his sheet if needed? Thank you. Yeah. And I I'll be there I'll be there physically in like 15 minutes or so, but that'd be great. Staff is having
008a tech issue. So, give them just a moment here and hopefully the suspense. So I can read them if you can't read them on the screen. Yes. Uh, the highest scoring firm from the interview process, compiling all of your scores, was HYA at 72.14. The second highest firm from the interviews was McFersonson Jacobson at 70.29. And in third of this interview scoring was Ray and Associates at 63.57. So, HYA 72.14, McFersonson Jacobson 70.29, and Rain Associates 63.57. Will you repeat that one more time? Sure. HA 72.14, McFersonson Jacobson 70.29, 29 and Ray and Associates 63.57. All right. So, those are the scores. Uh, do directors have any interest in speaking to their scoring or uh this is our opportunity for discussion leading up or leading us to update any scoring if uh if need be.
009Do you want to repeat the scores one more time for Director Ranken? I can. Yes. The scores again are HYA 72.14 listed there at the bottom of the screen. McFersonson Jacobson 70.29 and Ray and Associates 63.57. And that's the compilation of your scores for the interview portion of the selection process. And I see director Miseri has his hand up. So he'll he will kick us off with discussion. Yeah. Um and I don't have any uh strong opinion to I'm not I'm not saying this to to change anyone's mind just to walk through my own score. you know, I first of all felt like I think some of the comments we made during the first round, you know, I felt like any of these three firms would have been great and acceptable. So, I think that
010uh that gives me a lot of confidence no matter what we do that I think uh each of these three had things were distinct that I liked about them. Um so would be happy with any but um but I uh it looks like similar to everyone else picked McFersonson and HYA as as my top two and I think I had the slight edge to McFerson over HYA but have those two very close. Um I'll just say the two things that I liked about McFersonson and there were a lot of things I liked about HYA as well. I liked they um the fact that they have a local person, you know, that they seem to have a little bit maybe not more, but but but just uh for emphasis on the local um uh the local
011framework analysis, and I thought that would be really helpful. And I also really like the um the two-year guarantee framework, even if it's not something that we would ever use or boards. I I don't know how often boards use that, but just like the fact that it's there obviously shows their own confidence in in the work they do. So I I felt good about that firm, but I also felt good about HYA. So um I think like outcome wise would be fine with either one. Other directors, director S, Director Sarju, um to echo what Director Ms. RA he says is my comments are not meant to persuade anybody um of anything. It was my scoring me reading and so my score is my score. Um what I remember from the interviews is that hya and
012I again I could be have missed something because I was also uh the myth of multitasking trying to take care of my 19-month-old grand bean. But what I remember is that HYA was the only entity that actually talked about kids and how the the how important it is to remember that this job is actually about kids. And so um the other that that's why the other two did not I scored everybody the same in terms of could they do the job and their past performance. Um but where they where they left me is there was no mention of kids. So that's my rationale for my scores. Appreciate that. Director Sarju others director Ranken, welcome back. Thank you. Um, uh, yeah. What something I wonder that it doesn't seem like we really need to talk about
013it, but um, the the thing that I struggled with was the scale of numbers. Like I pretty sure we probably all fairly subjectively chose how to um, like what value to it. 40 points out of 40 points like I could have been like two fewer points for that or 12 fewer point like that. So that all that feels a little subjective in a way that I'm not super comfortable with. Um, and I if we had if I had stronger feelings about about it, I might want to dig in more to that of like why h how how we each as individuals used the number the value of the numbers if that makes sense. Um uh but um yeah, I agree with um director Sarju the I also scored the full points on the qualifications and
014the past performance. They all have great track records. They all have a lot of experience doing this. Um I really liked the Ray and Associates approach and their uh clarity around the timeline. Um, but I think that's something that we could talk to any firm about if we had questions about about timing. Um, uh, I also know that, um, a couple other districts in Washington are working with Ray and Associates right now and having a very strongly positive experience. Um, but again, it's it's not something I'm going to Director Hersy. Yeah. So just for clarity on the process for myself, we don't necessarily have to go with the highest scored person, do we? Or are we bound to do that? We are we we have to go with the highest score person. So this is
015our discussion now where we can update any scores that we feel like we need to update. Yeah. Um and uh we can update our own scores here. Uh express the reasoning why after our discussion and then staff will reabulate those scores. That's good clarity. I think that um for me a big piece was just you know if you look at my tabulations um going into it versus coming out of it I was pretty surprised just you have a question Michelle I don't can we challenge Director Sergeant can you use your microphone I have a vision challenge but I feel like I'm not seeing the whole scoring sheet Is that correct for the interview process? Yes. The whole Well, the questions are not included. Yeah. No, but we can't see we can't see the whole thing
016in everybody's score. Yeah, we can. Oh, now she Oh, they just adjusted it. Okay. Thank you. Thank you, Dr. Hersy. Yeah, no problem. No, no issue at all. Uh going into it, um I I was surprised just by the like verbal presentations how much uh I was really impressed by HYA um and McFerson as well. I think going into and I really want to lift up a point that director Ranken said like the difference between those two are negligible. Um, and I initially thought that, you know, them working with other districts in the state was a strength because they kind of know the um landscape of what we were dealing with. On the flip side, there's no guarantee, you know, that by starting up with them and given our timeline and we're a little bit
017behind some of the other districts that we would be getting the most premium applicant. uh if that makes sense. So that's just something to think about. Uh I think that the the major piece for me was the mention and and a little bit of stay during the interviews on uh student outcomes focused governance. um just based on the conversation that I think only one other uh I think McFersonson and correct me if I'm wrong it was a Friday night but I think McFersonson was the only one that actually spent any significant time on it aside from hya um I think that's reflected in the scoring so yeah uh I don't think that I'm particularly moved to change any of my scores I think that we will be in good hands with either Um, I I
018was a little bit more impressed with kind of the given that we have also, if I'm not mistaken, worked with HYA in the past on the community engagement part of the redistricting, right? Am I not am I tripping about that? We worked with HY the last superend. Last superintendent search. Okay. I knew that there was something that we had worked with them on. Um, but the reason that I say that is just like having context for the community already. I think is a benefit and at least having some uh institutional knowledge of like who they need to reach out to. Obviously, we would be giving them additional information regardless of who the firm was, but that's just my two cents. I think that we're going to be successful regardless of who we go with. I'm
019not necessarily inclined to change any of my scores. Um so, yeah. Other directors go to Director Clark. I wasn't sure if we were still doing the name tag up thing, but I thought I would give it a try. So, thanks. I saw Liza in the room and I remembered. So, thank you, Director Ranken. Um, yeah, I actually I struggled quite a bit um scoring between McFersonson, Jacobson, and HYA. Um, I thought I was really impressed by HA's level of detail on their community engagement strategy and it just made it seem so robust and the fact that it was ongoing throughout the process and just didn't have a termination date. But it wasn't clear to me if like it wasn't clear to me and I probably should have asked this as a question like once we
020get into building the profile and moving forward with selecting candidates how the community engagement influences it at that point. So that was confusing for me. Um and so I did score them a little bit lower. Um, and then with McFersonson Jacobson, I I I really thought that Dr. Hershel having, you know, so much experience with Washington State, um, working with, you know, some of our financial partners and also just having that like on the ground systems knowledge of the region that we live in. It's really important because we're not isolated as a school district. we function within a city that functions within a state. Um and so that context can be helpful. Um and yeah, so I struggled and um I think also on the third column, the past performance on similar contracts, you know,
021they all kind of listed similar size districts that they'd worked in. Um and m and some of I think some of them talked about like we learned you know we learned xyz from this search but no one really talked about um the cost control like the things that are actually listed on in this column for us to be scoring. I didn't hear anyone talk about cost control. I didn't hear anyone talking about working with a district that has a $100 million budget deficit. um that has declining enrollment that is going through a leadership change like um and that yeah and then compliance with the performance schedule. So it was hard for me to score in that category because I just didn't have the data that I wanted to have. Um, so I haven't decided yet
022if I'm going to change my scores, but um, just wanted to share kind of what my experience was with the process. Director Ranken, thank you for coming back to me. Um, I, uh, you know, in just reflecting and thinking a little bit more and it's always helpful for me to hear from you all. So, it was it was hard to watch this in isolation, watch the recording, and not have not have my my team my teammates to kind of um bounce stuff off of and and give me a chance to process and hear things. So, I'm doing that a little bit now. Um, I do think uh Rey and Associates was the most frank about the challenges of our timing and what we're facing as a district that they were pretty blunt about there's going
023to be media challenges. There's going to be there's going to be scrutiny at all levels, perhaps even national. um which there's always you know attention when a large district has a new super I mean there's attention when any district has a change in leadership um but they were pretty frank about uh understanding that somebody that they're recruiting is coming in to a budget challenge to an enrollment challenge to a state funding issue you know to all these things um and I felt like they were the most frank about that context um I also think that any of the firms would be receptive to us, you know, talking about how to deal with that. Um, the other thing I really liked about Ray and Associates was that they I think more than the others, I think
024everybody mentioned it, but more than the others, they specifically mentioned that the best candidate is likely not somebody who's looking for a superintendency. that they will actively go and seek out the people and say, "Hey, did you know that Seattle is looking for new leadership? Is that something that you would be willing to consider?" And I think given um given the challenge that we're asking somebody to step into and given the fact that we are off cycle in terms of hiring super like people are finding out now that they did or didn't get a superintendency for the fall. were asking somebody to come in in a awkward time. um uh I guess is sort of a pitch for me for what ended up being my top choice that seems a bit out of line with
025the rest of the board, but more um I just kind of wanted to put that out there that like there we're already in a different challenge than um the challenges that already exist in a superintendent search because of our our kind of offcycle timing. And so being uh cognizant of that, having um the firm that will help support us through that and that is going to actively recruit folks who will be ready to step into this challenge um who may not be looking to move somewhere new, but to say, "Hey, this is this is available and we think you could rise to the challenge and be a great fit. Would you consider it?" Um, I do think that with our timing, that's that's what we're going to have to look for. Anybody who was looking
026for a superintendency for the 2526 school year was applying in January when other, you know, districts did that. So, we just need I So, I appreciated the frankness that Ray and Associates brought to that. Um, I I think that the other firms we could I I don't think they would not be willing to address that. it just didn't specifically come up in the interview. Um, but that's definitely something that I'm thinking about is that this in a lot of ways is not the the standard search just kind of based on the the timing and the and the level of challenge. Um, and I I would be curious if people are willing to share. There's um, and I'm not going to say it, so there's but I am noticing a couple of outlier scores that I'm
027just curious about. Um, that if folks are willing to share what their thinking was, I would I would appreciate the insight. I guess just uh just some based on the numbers up there. There's like uh you know an eight or uh I don't think people have a 37. No, that's just a curiosity. I'm I'm saying I'm not that's a curiosity I have. If there's something that we should be thinking about that that people notice that we didn't notice, I would love to hear that if people are willing to share. go to Director Briggs because she hasn't had an opportunity and then we'll go in order here for those who've who've already who've had a chance to speak. Director Briggs. Oh, I I honestly don't think I have anything really to add to this conversation. I
028I um I don't have strong feelings. I used the exact same logic actually as Michelle and um scored everybody the same in uh the second two columns and then the difference came down to me to vendor approach. Um and HA stood out to me from the beginning because of their focus on children and student outcomes. Um and then also their community engagement strategy seemed really robust. Um, so I'm not I'm not feeling inclined to change any of my scores and that was that was my logic. Director Hersy. Yeah. Uh, so Director Clark's comments actually joged something that I wanted to mention and again I could be, you know, remembering an error here, but I really what stood out another aspect of HYA's presentation that stood out to me is the not only the recognition that
029we're having budget challenges, but also like the mention of uh looking for someone with fiscal acumen that might be different um than the approach that a couple of the other firms had. I don't remember like you know there were at least it wasn't a clear enough connection between us being in a budget challenge and looking for somebody who has not only the experience but potentially specific uh experience in that area that might be useful that stood out. Um, and the reasoning that I have behind uh I don't I I wouldn't I don't know if I would call it a standout, but when I look at the and you'll see this kind of throughout um my score specifically is like if there were two uh instances like I I tried really hard not to give a
030perfect score just because like nobody's perfect. I didn't think that any of them hit the mark completely. But if there were, say for example, if you're looking at my score for the last one, I gave two 20s and a 23. That's because the two that ranked 20 for me, uh, were pretty similar. And I thought out of the best out of them, I thought that HY hit it highest there. Uh, the same is true for my second one. uh between professional and qualifications necessary. I thought that they were all fine, but I did think that um HY and McFersonson were probably comparable whereas uh Rand Associates probably lagged behind those two a little bit. And then there were in terms of community engagement for the reasons that I kind of talked about before. Uh McFersonson
031and HYA were close. The fact that we've worked with HYA before on other contracts gave them the edge there for me. Um and then I ranked Brain Associates what I did because I ranked them what I did. So that's kind of the logic that I use there. Director Director Sarju. My comment is related to something that director Clark said, which I don't think I need to ask her to save her notes. Um, no, I know you do. I said I don't think I need to ask you to save your notes, but the questions that you asked. So, first of all, it would have been a miracle if they had all answered everything that we would have wanted to know, but didn't necessarily specifically ask about. And so the points that you made, I'm not going
032to try to reiterate them. I think are um as you're talking it's like well that is something we would need to clarify as we develop a contract like those outlying questions because all of them didn't answer something for all of us right like that is we can go around the table and so those things that we feel are important and un uh that would be important with anybody we contract with we actually have to ask those questions and make that um part of the contract and the contract deliverables. Um and so as we're as we're talking what I'm hearing is we are what I'm hearing is a curiosity and director Ranken actually put on the table and I said you can't ask that. That's what was my side uh comment to her because it doesn't
033how somebody the the eight and I can't read who the eight is. I don't think it really matters, right? Because the scores are not except for that one. The the scores are pretty similar and we we scored. Yeah. Well, I know, but I mean, I'm talking about the overall score. Um, so if we had an overall score where one was 20 and the other two were 72.2 and then maybe we have some questions. But but part of this is that when you have such a highcoring number, it is there isn't objectivity, right? I I have I have done many and and president top knows this as we built best arts for kids. I created many and I do mean numerous RFPs and I tr we tried to keep the scoring narrow so that it wouldn't
034boggle people's minds. I think when you see a score of 40, how do you objectively break down the 40? Right? And that's how SPS does it. It's not a criticism, but it is a fact that that large of a number doesn't leave room for objectivity, like real objectivity. um and without including what it means that 40 means then it's less left up to us as individual scorers to make sense of what that means to us as individuals. So all that to say is I don't want to get caught up in you know the fact that uh you know Liza scored higher than me on one and I scored higher than her on the other. I think what we as we do this, we need to keep in mind like what is important as we begin
035to contract with people. Um because I don't think we could we could sit out here and talk about this for an hour and I don't think uh we're necessarily going to quote unquote budge on a score that is so drastically different than what we already did um that it's worthy of continuing to churn about. That is my opinion as a director and it's not stated well maybe it's stated to influence us to keep it moving. Um but it's definitely not state I'm not stating that to to influence whether or not anybody changes their score. That's a personal decision. Um so I'll leave it at that. And I will wrap us up here. Um just real fast since I didn't have an opportunity to speak. Um I'm very similar with Director Miseri. My first was McFersonson,
036then then HYA, but feeling very the same about either. I liked the local aspect of McFersonson. HYA seemed a little bit more rigid, but appreciated the their community engagement um strength um which is where sort of Ray and Associates lost me um a little bit in as far as as points go. Um but I'm going to say look now. There's some table cards up, but I'm assume directors have already had an opportunity to speak. Now is the time that we're going to reabulate your score. If you would like to retabulate your score, um, I'll give folks three minutes or five minutes. Oh, yeah. Did Director Briggs, do you have your I think she's left it up from previously. I I never put it up actually. Um, that was the first time I put it up
037and I'm just gonna put it back down. Sorry about that. No, don't be. It's all good. Yeah. Um, does anyone want to retabulate their scores? All right. So, that means that our top scoring firm was HYA. Um and that means that during our regular board meeting we will move forward uh with HYI just uh procurement want to or Yep. can if I can make clarification. So for that was for the interview process hyi hya was the highest scoring since you didn't change anything. I think Ellie if you flip to the next tab they're also the highest scoring when you factor in price and the proposal. So, HYI is the apparent successful vendor here. Um, McFersonson was second and Rain Associates was third. So, HYA was 155.417 total points and McFersonson was 154.601 and Rain Associates
038was 146. So your conversation reflected the fact that they were all very competitive proposals for this process. So President Top, I think that's your recommendation for the board action report is HYA. All right. There being no further business, we come before the board. The reg uh the special board meeting is now adjourned at 3:39. Uh we will join back together at 4. No, we we have to start we are going to go into our regular board meeting at 4. [Music]