001Hi, I'm Christina Win. I'm the director of communications here at Austin ISD. And so I'll just take you through um a little bit of the beginning of the presentation and then uh Matias should be here uh shortly. So here is the agenda. We just had our principal welcome. Um and we'll go through some review of the meeting norms and the purpose. Um we know these are really difficult conversations and a lot has been going on. a lot of new ideas have come about and so that's why we're really here to hear that feedback and make sure that any decision we make in that released plan on Friday is inclusive of the voices by everyone affected. Um, and so we will provide that overview of the campus specific proposed changes. And then really the majority of
002this time is going to be Q&A with the superintendent. And we also have our assistant superintendent of elementary schools, um, Jennifer Pay over here, and we have the executive director, um, Sandre McWills. And so, um, I will work to get y'all, um, to that Q&A as quickly as I can. So, here are the meeting norms. um we have visited um many campuses and have um shared these norms with them. So um again acknowledging that these are not easy conversations but we really want to focus together on like hearing each other, hearing your feedback and then figuring out how we can incorporate that into the plan. Um honor each other's time um to get to make sure that we are able to get as many questions as possible. like we would love if you could try
003to limit to one minute um to make sure that we can get your questions answered and we can get as many questions answered in this time. Um honor each other. So making sure that we're respectful, honor the process. Um again, like we will do our best to answer every single question. There may be um answers that um we don't have yet or we're still working through. I I think a lot of that is like with our transition plans um that will need to be continued um to work on. And so um just making sure that we honor the process and then intent and impact um honoring the space and voice, staying solutionoriented and then embracing that transparency and empathy. Um and that goes back down to the um difficult conversations like we are we all
004care about the students here in Austin ISD and I think if we can all come to it with that understanding it'll be very helpful and those are the um norms in Spanish. So again um we are here uh to respond to questions via the comment card. um your principal did give us some of your questions already so we can um answer them again gain that shared understanding of the proposed changes and then figure out how we can incorporate that ahead of um the final document that will be posted Friday and then voted on by the board on Thursday next week. Okay. So at the center of this whole plan is to ensure every family has access to an excellent neighborhood school. Um we know we have amazing schools in Austin and we want to be
005sure that um every student has access to that. And so really we are trying it with this plan to get our students in the best possible learning environments. So, the the plan that we're here to talk about today is um as many of y'all may have heard on October 3rd when we released the initial plan, we talked about in having Oak Springs close. Here's our superintendent. I was just starting to talk about the plan, but if I don't know if you want to take over or you want me to keep going. >> Yeah, I can talk about it. >> Here, why don't you? So, uh, I apologize for being late. I'm running. Um, so appreciate your grace. Uh, so, um, as Christina was saying, uh, the plan, uh, as originally developed, um, by the administration
006included, uh, Oak Springs moving fully into Blackshere. Uh, one of the things that we were trying to address as part of this plan, and forgive me if it's already been said, were kind of several things. Did you talk about kind of feeder pattern alignment? Can you talk about those things? Okay. Well, one of the things that we had to absolutely consider were uh turnaround plans in those schools that had uh accumulated a series of unacceptable accountability ratings. And in this case, uh we know that there's been lots of great work um in many of our schools, but there's been changes in accountability. There's been um you know, challenges with how the school district supports our schools. And ultimately we need to break these accountability chains and there are only a few ways in which you
007can break these. The state of Texas says that you have six ways that you can do it. Uh accountability uh um kind of turnaround plans are built after a second year. So let's say that a school receives an F and then another F. Then after the second consecutive F, they have to develop a turnaround plan. Typically in a um a kind of more familiar uh kind of setting, you would have a year to create the plan and then in year three, you would implement that plan and then you would have two years to ensure that you broke the accountability chain and that means getting a C or better. What happened in TW this year is that because of lawsuits in the state of Texas, we had 23 accountability drop or get released in the spring
008of this year. And then we had 24 and 25 drop on the exact same day on August 15th. And so within five months, we had three years of ratings hit. And so, uh, what that, um, h what occurred is a compression of all these plans having to be submitted. So, lots of schools did not have the ability to actually build a two-year turnaround plan, have a year to um, develop it, and then implement. That was kind of just out the window, right? And that occurred throughout the entire state of Texas. It is happening everywhere. And there are hundreds and hundreds of schools uh, that are kind of in this um, kind of situation. And so there are six different things that you can do to um to break a uh six different strategies that you
009can use in your turnaround plan. You can uh reassign the school which is you take the students and reassign them to an A, B or C school. You can uh restart the school. Uh that is you come in and you have certain uh requirements for staffing. Uh and you have to prove that the principal had previously demonstrated the ability of turning around a school. That's what we call a district managed restart. You also have a chartner partner, a charter partner restart. This is an 1882. This is similar to what we have seen at Mendes. uh it is a model that we don't really like um very much. We prefer to control how we educate our students, but that is an option that you can use. Uh you also have um new school or new campus.
010Uh and this would be taking like a middle school and turning it to an EC8 or turning a middle school into a 6 through 12. Like you could do that. Uh you also have a um a school improvement model which is where you're really being intentional about the supports you're providing but you're not kind of in a situation where you have to make a more aggressive uh intervention and that is really uh for those schools that you've seen tremendous progress. You're probably year two not a year three. Uh and then lastly there's just a closure like you can just close the school. And so one of the things that we uh had to acknowledge is that given where Oak Springs was, we needed to make sure that uh we were responsive to the turnaround plan.
011Uh and whenever we do this, we look at well which one of these um strategies is best for us as a community, as a school district, and one that we know we can actually execute so that we can break the accountability chain. And after going through uh a lot of analysis, uh we determined that moving Oak Springs to Blackshere uh and then having the students combine uh and providing the supports, additional, you know, content interventionists, instructional coaches, uh you know, those types of supports would allow us to break the accountability chain. So the student the combined student body would then take the STAR test uh next year and then based on those accountability ratings uh would break Oak Springs um uh chain. So that's how it works. And so that's how we arrived at this
012uh solution, this draft plan. I also want to be really really clear that we at the same time we were looking at underenrollment in an area. We were looking at uh programs. We look at demographics of the student populations to ensure that if we're going to make a disruption, we're really understanding, you know, where we need to provide supports so that we're focusing on our students and doing it in a way that aligns with our values. So, that's how we got to the initial draft plan. Since then, uh, as I've been committed to from day one, um, I absolutely want to make sure that feedback from our community is incorporated into the plan. uh everything that we've done um I hope that you would see in our work whether it's the bond work the tax
013rate elections just how we work in general we are always trying to incorporate community voice and one of the things that we heard as we were um sharing this plan with our community was that um there was a desire to explore having Oak Springs come to Blackshere have black shear um and the schools combined line and then at a later date move back to Oak Springs. Uh, one of the driving kind of forces I would say behind that idea though it did come to me from community was the fact that students would end up in a fully modernized facility, right? Which what we know is the way that you educate students now is very different than than the way we used to 40, 50, 60, 80 years ago in some cases. And so, uh, as
014of right now, the Oak Springs bond project is paused. Um, you know, as we go through these processes, we have to really think about ensuring that our, um, community investments follow the students. And so, if Oak Springs was to close, we would want those dollars to to follow the students um, as they metriculated through the school system. So, that's why we paused it. And so we wanted to have a conversation with the Blackshirt community after we heard those ideas from others in the collective community to um just kind of share with you what was occurring. I also want want to be really really clear that the board vote on uh next Thursday on the 20th is to um reassign the students from Oak Springs to Blackshere. uh that is still going to be the recommendation
015because collectively what we're doing is combining attendance boundaries, right? The where the school resides in that attendance boundary isn't necessarily something the board has to vote on. Uh that is more work of the administration. The board is is required by law to approve boundary changes. That's that's one of their core functions. Boundaries, budgets, hiring a superintendent. uh it's very very kind of well defined what their their kind of purview is and so um I I want to be really clear like there won't be an answer today right there's not we're not going to leave this meeting there's going to be more conversations uh but I wanted to create the space to ensure that all community voice got into the work uh we made adjustments if we needed to uh but the vote on Thursday next
016Thursday is really to to codify the turnaround plan which includes Oak ings student population moving to Black Shear. What occurs after that uh I would say needs to get resolved fairly quickly but isn't um required to be incorporated as part of that vote. So want to make be really kind of if hopefully that makes sense and I'm happy to to clarify. I will say that um maybe some trustees or maybe some community members would like it to be part of that vote but it doesn't have to be. Uh just so you know I'm totally transparent about all the things. All right. So, I said a lot there. Um, is there anything you want me to >> No, I think that's um good. If we we can start with Q&A. I can bring it around. Um,
017since I have a wireless mic, you have to stay with the wired mic. Um, >> that's fine. >> So, if I have any first volunteers. Okay. Oh, and sorry, uh, if you can please speak into the mic because we have interpretation and recording in both English and Spanish. Um, hi, my name is Emily Flowers and we just had a quick question for you. Um, I think one of our main concerns is we um have been very excited about welcoming the students from Oak Springs um and joining the two schools together and being able to welcome them. And I feel like that takes time and preparation and we're like ready to go. So, we don't want to like sit back and kind of just like wait. Are we welcoming them? Are we not welcoming them? And
018then I guess another concern is I have heard that Oak Springs is a much smaller school um even when it will be complete. Um and the woman that talked last time, I'm sorry I'm forgetting who she was um but I know she mentioned building school camaraderie and just like um I guess like togetherness and community. And if we're combining to then separate again, I don't feel like that's accomplishing that. I feel like kids are going to be building friendships, connecting with teachers, connecting with everyone, and then being divided again. >> Yeah. No, great question. So, I'm I'm gonna try to answer it in a way that I think I heard it because I may not have heard I want to make sure I'm answering the right question the right way. Um, so that's fantastic. Like,
019we want our schools, we're all one big school community. We want our schools to welcome all of our students. I mean, that's that's exactly how we should be approaching it. Uh my recommendation to the board is going to include Oak Springs coming to Blackshere. Uh that has to occur. There isn't the ability for us to submit a turnaround plan to the state of Texas that will be accepted unless we do that. If that makes any sense. I one of the questions that I've been asked is could Blackshere go to Oak Springs and the state of Texas would not accept that um turnaround plan because from their perspective you're taking a C school and moving it to a school that that hasn't met accountability. So that's a big hard no for the state of Texas, right?
020And we understand why. Um now uh when you come together and just to be clear, we've done this in the past. We want you all to be a combined school. We do not want two schools in one two two programs in one school, right? These are all our students. We love them. We we we they this is one big community. We we need to be that way. Um the time and whatever future decision is made is important because we want our community to plan together for whatever is next. But plan together I think is the most important part. um we are not going to ultimately end up with two separate schools. I would not be able to support, you know, Oak Springs coming to Black Shear and then Oak Springs moving back to their building.
021And one of the main reasons is is that collectively in parts of Austin, this is one of those parts, we just have lots of empty seats. And so in an effort to reduce the cost that we have as a system and ensure that every student gets what they need, we have to kind of reduce the number of empty seats we have collectively. Um which is why uh at the end of this there there really needs to be one school. You know where it ends up and what it looks like is really going to be end up based on the feedback and conversations that we have with you and the community regarding the size. So um we have a there are different sizes of elementary schools that we have. Uh we have um a traditional size
022which about 520 students. We have a larger size which is about 620 and then we have like a jumbo. I don't have another way to describe it but this would be like a doss or maybe a manaka where you're getting 700 800 kids. um because of um where Oak Springs is um they're uh tightened a little bit because of um the way the site is situated when you think about the back side of the property. Um but we um feel confident that the combined student population will fit in that school. Uh that is not a concern of ours. I've tested it. Um I've overseen these designs. I'm very confident it'll work. uh one of the things that we would want to do is to rethink the final design components. So let's say at the end
023of this there's an agreement. Okay, maybe we want to go back after a couple years because we still have to construct it, right? It's not built yet. Um what does it need to be? How does it need to be different? The design scheme, you know, the visual arts, uh and you know, the all the work here. um what would need to change at that facility to embrace that learning experience? Like we could do that. We have the ability to do it. Um how do you honor the legacy of each community? We've done that. You know, we've done that with um Norman Sims. Those are two separate campuses that came together. They actually moved together first and then they moved back into the new home as one combined school. Uh we had it with Mets and
024Sanchez where it was a little bit different where they moved together. They moved back to the the new school but they decided to keep the history of Sanchez and didn't feel collectively that the Mets history um needed to move forward with it where Norman Sims it was really clear like we wanted to have both. So all of that is really worked out with you all. What I would say is if we were to move forward, you know, depending on what it ended up being, um I would um reissue contracts to the designer and to the general contractor, have them begin to engage with the collective community to make the refinements necessary so that it welcomes the whole um and and that can be that can look whatever it needs to look like. Uh so so
025we have that ability. It's it's unique. The other thing that comes up is is what would happen to the Blackshirt building because I want to be honest like one of the reasons that we moved this way opposed to the other way or do a restart was because the historic nature of Blackshire, right? It's a historic building like we we it's a historic site historic for many reasons. Uh, and after kind of spending time with community, it's what I it's been shared with me is there are lots of other things that would be acceptable um that we've done elsewhere in Austin. Like we've done an early childhood center at Peas Elementary School, which is another historic building. Uh we can do kind of all sorts of different programs. It doesn't have to be one thing or
026the other. Ideally, it's educational purpose. Uh but it really depends on what the community needs as a whole. So hopefully that was answering some of those questions. Um >> and oh go ahead. >> Yeah. >> Hi again. >> Hey. >> So um I'm a parent to two former Black Shear students. Um one's currently at Macallum and one at Keeling. So couple concerns. AISD had the underlying accountability data for 2023 2024 a year ago in August. This wasn't a surprise and there could have been planning for the last year based on the underlying data without having the actual letter grade for over a year. That's the first thing. >> Can I respond to that or you wait? >> I'll wait. I'll wait. I'll wait. >> Thank you. Um so you mentioned breaking the account the accountability
027change is the focus here and that's a surface level problem because the root cause of this is that students are not being provided with consistently with highly effective teaching with high quality instructional materials and with high expectations within a strong school culture. All of those are essential. >> Oh yeah I agree. And then AISD, you in particular have said that strategically placing highly effective teachers in schools that need them the most is not what quote AISD does. >> Uh so historic >> cultural competence is considered to be more important which what you told me and that's a false choice because both can be true. You can have a highly effective teacher who is also culturally competent. So my question, regardless of where our students from Oak Springs or Black Shere go, what are you going
028to do to ensure that we have highly effective teachers, high quality instructional materials, and high expect high expectations no matter what? >> Yep. So um I I have different thoughts on some of those comments. Um the first thing I would say is uh it is not all about accountability. Just to be clear, I've never said that. I am saying that if I do not break the accountability chain, the district as a whole um may introduce a risk that takes away local control. So, it has to be part of the consideration and has to be part of this. If we ignore it, I promise all of you and anybody that'll listen to me, that puts us in a difficult situation downstream. And you can look at Fort Worth and what they didn't decide to do two
029years ago that they would have otherwise at this point wish they would have done. I'm not going to allow us to get there. The other thing I would say is you asked about you know the underlying data on 23 24 and 25. So I want to recall I want everybody to understand where we were in 2223 23 24 and 2425. Uh we came into a system together right 2223 accountability. We had three superintendents that year. I'm not sure if people remember that. Uh we had um our our staffing rate was around 84%. Now it's at 97%. We hired 26 principles that year. Uh this year we hired five and I knew where all of them went. Our attrition rate between title one and title one schools was 22%. Now it's 2 and a half%. And
030and I share this because I want people to I want our community to know that we have been moving the system in a way that aligns with who we are. At the time when 23 24 and 25 when we knew where we were, we knew that we had work to do. We didn't have students on grade level. We didn't have aligned curriculum which is a big issue. We're running 15 different curriculum in Austin ISD. And who does that hurt? It hurts students who have high mobility rates. Students who are moving because rent rent increases by 20%. And they're going from one school to another, a different scope and sequence, they go in and then we don't have the ability to support them. So that was a huge issue. So in 23, and I'm saying this
031because I I I responded because it seems as though we haven't been doing a lot. We have been moving this huge system and there's evidence that it's working. So in 23 uh when we first came together we uh went through a procurement process. We um procured HMH for K12. We for the first time in like six years actually procured consumables. So instead of having teachers having to go to the to the photocopy room, we actually had things that we could distribute to our students. They could use and they could touch and they could work with. Uh we did that through this spring semester. I mean sorry through the summer. And then in 23 24 what were we working through the TA agreed order that thing that was going to take us down. I don't remember
032I don't know if we remember that but that was the thing that was going to cause the state of Texas to come and take us over. So we had this huge issue that we were working through. So we um then turned around our ERP system which is the foundation like platform that we used to manage all data and then on top of that we build multi-ter system support. So, for the first time in a very long time, I can tell you which students are on grade level, which ones aren't across the entire system. And two years ago, we couldn't do that. And that's that's that's wild, but we could not do that two years ago. So, then you think about, well, what do you what do you learn from that information? Well, now you know,
033you know, which students need tier two or tier three interventions. You understand um what you need to procure as far as curriculum to ensure that uh the um supports are there. We went after a tax rate election to bring content interventionists because we had schools that had 40% of their students that needed tier three interventions. Like all these things were coming together and we actually adopted curriculum h high quality uh high quality instructional materials. We've been persistent in how we're using it and we're tracking how it's being used. We gave a presentation just a week and a half ago that showed the adoption rate and the use over the last three semesters and it's gone from 55% to 82%. And so what that's done is it's gotten us to increase our early literacy um outcomes
034and early numeracy outcomes in a way they haven't moved for for years. Um and so in 23 you had 30s. In 24 you had 29. In 25 you have 23. Next year you're going to have a fraction of that. So I want to be really clear like we have been working really really really hard. You have to have an improved climate and culture before you can take anything on hard. I think we've done that and you see that because staff are it's hard work but um we're seeing like movement into the system opposed to out of the system which is very different than three and a half years ago very very different when we had a fear-based culture. Uh so yes we had information but if we would have acted in a way that drove
035outcome movement only it wouldn't have been who we are and that's what I worry about and so like you can so you can let's there have been models like drill and kill model is something I always said if you have a school and you have middleofar data and it shows that your students are not on grade level you can do things to get the students to be successful on the star test right like you see that happen all throughout the state of Texas. That is not who we are. Like we want a sustained system that does it the right way. So the grade is important, but how you get the grade and ensuring that sustained over time is more important. And so we decided and our board agreed that what we're going to be doing
036is looking at like long-term system improvement. And so because of the lawsuits, because of the uncertainty and what was going to be shared, because of all the things that we were doing, we knew that we were moving. we knew that we needed to go um and the way that things got released, you know, it it created kind of pressures in the system, but I don't want anybody here to think that we haven't been working really really hard and there's evidence that it system is responding uh without a doubt. Um and so regarding highly effective teachers, that's a term the state uses. I don't like to use that term. Um there are lots of teachers that can be identified as highly effective and there's different ways to describe what that looks like. uh the state wants
037to make sure there's correlation between uh you know your teachers um observations and how they're evaluated at the end of the year and student outcomes in their classroom, right? That's how they kind of align. I will tell you that for a long time in Austin ISD, we didn't even have a a way to to align that and measure it. So, so like I said, so, so, so now that we have that um and we know how many teachers have um the tenure, how many are TI TI designated or nationally board certified, I will tell you that years ago I looked at certain verticals and you had students have a first year teacher three years in a row like you cannot have that happen in our system. But if you have attrition rates the way that
038we did, you had staffing rates the way we did, you're going to have it. And so we've been combating that have all the inputs and outputs in this in the summit of data demonstrates that the system is responding. Um could we have done more? I I think that you could always do more. Um do I believe that uh in order to get the the ratings or if I was kind of playing that game if we would have if we would have aligned with who we are? Probably not. Um so that's the balance. I'm happy to share more, but I just there's been a lot that this school system has taken on. Um, and I'm just really proud of like the teachers and the principles because you don't see turnover the way that you did before.
039You don't. Um, and that's something I think really that we should really be proud of. >> Okay, we have our next question. >> Hi, I'm Laura Dela. I'm a current parent at Black Shear. Um, I think I spoke last Saturday, so nice to see you again. >> Nice to see you. >> But, um, I think we have great teachers here in our school. Um I think that [clears throat] they've demonstrated that you know our schools rated C and from the work by our teachers and our students um that accountability chain was already broken here. >> Y >> and so through their work um you know this campus that's 134 plus years old wasn't closed by the state. Um so they're carrying forward that legacy. So my question is when we have a campus that's shown
040success in breaking that chain, why take students and move them here where success has been demonstrated and then move us all somewhere else during that three-year period that we have to maintain an accountability level. How is incorporating additional turmoil, additional change for the students and the teachers and who manages the new building process? Who's going to be coordinating the education of the students during the TAP? So, we're moving the students here and joining together. And I understand that that's a requirement. Um, it's, you know, we're we're very open to that and we understand that that's a struggle for everybody. It's going to be a change and we're open to welcoming students. Um, and we recognize that schools, all schools that are closing are really grieving and it's a real much more of a struggle for
041them. But then to take, you know, go through that one year transition for everybody and then the next year go through another huge transition. That's two years into a three-year accountability period. And then you have one more year. So where does that put us? um you know for the students, for our teachers, and how does that set everybody up for success so that looking three and four and five years out, we're not right back here. >> Yeah. No, great question. So the first thing I would say is UM [applause] so I want to be really clear. You say you're saying you you like there's no decision. There's no plan. Like that's that's why we're in this process to talk about what that looks like. I just want to be really clear like I haven't, as
042I've said before, I want to listen, understand, and make an informed decision. That's what this is about. So, I don't want anybody to leave here thinking that there's a decision being made. This is really um based on feedback that I've heard from others in the same community. So, that and I'm I'm committed to doing that. Um, as far as uh other students coming into a school, I I would I would say that there are great things happening in all of our schools. There just are. Um, and what we think about whenever we have to go through a disruption like this, where can we keep the student body together, right? It's always going to be preferable to have one whole school merge with another versus have a school get split up. So, that's one thing. So,
043two, the state of Texas, uh, you know, strongly believes that if y'all been doing great things, keep doing those things, you know, and if you have a a school that is working through the accountability chain and is going to an A or B or a C, kind of leave let them keep doing their thing, right? Because it's it's the same school system. It's the same school district, same trustee, same superintendent. Um but this school um based on a variety of different things in the past or maybe a lack of resources you know elsewhere um just has been able to be successful in this way and so uh that gives um kind of more flexibility to how that staffing plan ultimately comes together. uh if it ends up being if it wasn't the situation um if
044it let's say that it was a a school that's going through a restart, that's when you really have pretty strict requirements regarding the percent of teachers in core instructional areas that are highly effective. If you're going from a a school that is um working through the accountability chain and going to an higher performing school, which is what you have here, there's a a lot more flexibility because the state doesn't want to disrupt all the great things that are already going on, right? But we acknowledge that we need more support because you have more students, right? And they have different needs. Um, and so that's how we're we're we're tackling it. It's not um and the other thing I'll say is transition is is uh needs to be uh addressed. And the way that you do
045it is by planning. Um, and that's why you're never going to see me make a decision in the spring semester. I try to make it as early as possible. I think clear is kind. Um, I cannot take away planning time from our families and from our staff. And so my hope is that, you know, whatever we decide to do as a community, we um create the time, bring communities together, and then plan it out. I have the frameworks and the structures and things that we need to consider, but the details of that should be built out by you all um and and the Oak Springs community and the collective community. uh regarding transition period time. I mean that school has paused so the construction hasn't progressed and by law I'm required to execute the turnaround
046plan until the chain is broken. So it's not like I could you know start the plan and then not complete the plan and move you back. Like we'd have to really ensure that the students had met accountability from the state's perspective. the tap had been executed and at that point, you know, you can move um if we wanted to back to a new the new school. What we don't want to do is to not understand that because if we're if we're going to move back, then I want construction to continue, right? If I if I don't, then I need to stop, right? And then reallocate the funds and continue on the path that we are. So So that's how it would work. Um so it wouldn't be I think a year in a year. I
047think you have probably two in one just because that project is slowed down. We'd have to restart it back up and then get back underway. Um and then design correctly to en ensure that both communities are welcome and see themselves in the building. That's so that's how it would work. >> Okay, I'm going to come to you and then you and you and then right back here. So, and then I'll continue. >> Yeah. Um, but just kind of piggybacking on that question, right? So, what consideration as we're talking about like necessary disruption versus additional disruption because that's what I I think it makes a lot of sense the part uh for the 2627 school year, right, to have the schools consolidate here. But what consideration is being given? Um, and I think what I'd been
048reading it was slated for the 27 or yeah 27 28 year that they would be looking at moving back, but even two years out, right? Um, what what consideration is being given on that additional rup uh disruption and how it will impact that turnaround plan and has consideration been given to that? And then my other question is, and I'm so sorry, um, but you know, a modern building is one type of infrastructure that can help students learn, but there's also the professional and the community infrastructure that's already in place here. So I guess has has it is it being considered you know the importance of that infrastructure on the success of the students and if a modern building um actually merits rebuilding that. >> Yeah. So um one of the reasons that No, it's a
049great question. Uh, one of the reasons that we are modernized facilities, modernizing the facilities is a couple. First is the general operating expenses that we that we have as a school system. Um, given how old we are, I mean, we're just we're just old. Things break all the time, you know, and those improvements come out of our general operating budget. Uh, so, you know, in some years they spend 124 million on rental chillers, replacing electric, like, you know, just things that aren't capitalized. So they have to come out of our operating budget. And so in 2017 and 2022, we said, you know what, instead of spending, you know, $12 million or a million dollars like, you know, every single year depending on the campus, let's really think through how to modernize the space because if
050I can um get rid of all the deferred maintenance, right, then my cost per year goes down. And that's the same the same dollars that I'm using for teacher salaries and for programs, the same bucket of money. And so that was the general philosophy. Um, and I also want to be really clear that there are things um that older schools just don't have. And I I want to be really clear like schools are so much more than a building, right? It's you can have an incredible school in a sea of portables. That happens. That can be fine. But the reality is over time there are other things that you want to make sure you do have. You want to make sure you have light that goes deep into the building. You want to make sure
051that the air quality is at a certain level. You want to make sure that safety and security requirements meet the oblig the expectations of the school system. So, you know, security vestibules, lines of sight, you know, like all the things that that you would want to see in a in a in a school at given the content context we're in um is incorporated into our designs now. And so when you think about students and kind of what students need um to be successful, we always think about shelter, we think about food, we think about lots of things, but you know, if your HVAC system isn't running, like it's really hard to learn. If if this, you know, if water's not running, this happens. You know, it's it's really difficult. Uh but also, does a student
052feel safe? And safety is community, right? Like that's 95% of it. Um but the building also contributes and right wrong or indifferent you know with 116 buildings we do have instances every single day that the chiefs and I mean chief of police and our SRO's work through and um over time you know in the next 50 years right you want to get to a place where the system as a whole is just has the infrastructure to support your students wholly in a way that they couldn't have been supported 50 years back because it's not n 2025 versus you know 2050. It's the building from 19, you know, like 1910 or whatever versus where we're going. So that that's really what it is more than anything else. It doesn't mean that, you know, we can't have
053incredible schools and old buildings. It happens all the time. It just means as a system um the goal generally is to to move in this way. Now, could you do a huge renovation and do all these things? Sure. Um what it really limits you is the um the corridors, the widths of the building, the setbacks, uh just the things that you have now. Um but it doesn't mean that one's better than the other. It's just as a system if you continue to operate really really old buildings everywhere. It just it it really hammers you. So that's that's just generally speaking kind of what it looks like. Um and then the disruption piece. I mean, to picky back off what the um the person in front of you said, uh I think that's where we just
054have to work through it if we go that way, right? I mean, that's really what it comes down to. I'm not going to present something that doesn't work unless y'all's voice is in it. Like, I'm just not going to do that. Uh maybe you can clarify or help me understand a slightly bigger picture moment here of >> so like consolidation started happening because of the enormous budget deficit >> and in the process we're resolving tap like performance plan. So here's my my actual question is >> okay >> can you tell us how finishing one building moving a school finishing that building and then moving a school again is cost effective and >> yeah sure >> meets the goals that we're trying to >> yeah so >> achieve here >> so um so so to be
055clear um there are so many pressures in AISD right now like I just y'all Well, I mean, just to be honest, I have accountability pressure. We have pressures from our response to TA read order. We have budget challenges. The federal government, the way that that title 2, title three, and title four dollars have been impacted over the last year have caused me to make very like challenging decisions that impact our ability to support our students, right? That's just your job. >> I No. No. I get that >> but I don't I mean it's but for me it's it's like I have to think about 50 years. I mean that is what we're trying to do. We have to think in terms of 50 years. So when we talked about what we're doing as a system
056I had to address the accountability risk which we're talking about here. I had to address the surplus of seats which we have in this area. I had to align feeder patterns which has caused lots of frustration throughout our community. But at the end of the day you have aligned feeder patterns in West Austin. You don't have in East Austin. I have middle schools in East that go to four or five high schools. That doesn't happen at Merkerson. Doesn't happen at O'Henry. It doesn't happen at Gitzky. They go to one high school. So if you don't fix that in 50 years or in 20 years or in 10 years, you don't look back and realize all the harm and disruption that's caused because you had the opportunity to address it. You didn't. The other thing we
057had to make sure is program alignment which doesn't really impact this area as much but our our um district-wide um dual language programs like they were intended to serve emerging bilingual students and the city has grown and families have shifted and and now we have schools that have 14 21 22 and 44% emerging bilingual students is moving in the wrong direction and by law 89th legislature said that Matias school districts you're going to have to ensure that you have a certified teacher in every classroom right Now, 12% of our teachers are on alternative certifications. And so, if I'm going to have to get to a point where I have to pull a teacher because I have emerging bilingual students here that require a teacher, where am I going to pull them from? I'm going to
058pull them from the program that has the teacher but does not have the students. And so, that's going to put those programs in a difficult position in a year or two, which is what I'm trying to do now is position those programs to be sustainable for years to come. And I would say lastly, addressing our transfer policy. So, I just want to really clear those are the five things. And if you did any one of them in isolation, then you would not have the same solution, right? Uh so I just wanted to like put that out there. I know Christina covered it, but for me it's really really important we talk about it. So how does it save um funds over a period of time? Because you said that's one of the things that contributed
059to it, and it is, but it's not the only thing. I just described many others. Uh the a one-time disruption in cost is different than like cost in perpetuity, right? So people will say, "Matias, go sell properties, right, to to do to up offset the budget." The reality of it all is I can sell a property for $20 million and there'll be a drop in the bucket. What we need to do is to reduce our overall cost because that cost is reoccurring year over year over year. At the same time, I need to pay teachers more. At the same time, I need to put more money into our students and and support them and recognize that every student has a different need. And so there will be a disruption. It occurs whenever we merge schools.
060that occurs when we build schools there. This summer you are going to see more movement of students than the last 144 years because we're building the 2022 bond program and you have almost I think eight or nine schools coming online. So they're going they were out of school, they moved to a portable village either on-site or off-site and now they're moving back to the new school. So this happens all the time in Austin ISD. It happens all the time. Um, but what we have to think about is five years, 10 years, 20 years because, you know, we are in the forever business, but I cannot um I I cannot shy away from a short-term disruption if it ultimately stabilizes the district long term. Uh, and and that's really what all this is about. Um, so
061if you you know, and I I will hear sometimes, Matias, well, you may lose students because of this change. And my argument is, okay, well, how many students are not coming to Austin ISD and are going to a different school because they don't think they have a strong neighborhood school in their neighborhood, right? We know those numbers. They're going to charters or maybe they're going to a different school all across town. Like, why do they feel like they have to do that? We should be able to provide the resources so that that school is supported and and becomes a strong, thriving neighborhood school. They're already strong, but for whatever reason, based on decisions the district made in years past, they haven't been able to meet accountability. So, it's it um I I know you're probably
062wanting a more precise answer is like prove to me that this is works and this doesn't work. You know, I'm a systems person. I think about the whole I have 70,000 students um 116 campuses. You know, a lot of things that are all kind of working together, but at the end of the day, we have schools that do not have the resources that they need to be successful. And I don't I don't have enough to spread. >> Can you boil it down? This is not a costaving measure. the success of the program. >> I would say it's a stability of the entire organization like all of these cut together but some reduce costs some require a slight increase in cost over a short period of time but at the end of the day the net
063is a reduction in cost for sure because you have fewer empty seats. We have 20,000 empty seats right now. That's 3,000 seats larger than the Moody Theater. Uh the Moody Center. I haven't been to it, but that's, you know, that's that's that's that's what it is. So, it's it's a lot of seats, and they're not all like in one area. And if I and if I did only close schools that had low numbers of students, then it would all be in East Austin. And that's what we're we're trying to avoid is is that kind of like weight that one community carries over the other. >> Hi, my name >> Oh, here. Sorry. >> My name is Mark Coparo. I'm a parent of two students here at Blackshere and uh you seem extremely confident that the
064new construction at Oak Springs can do this. My question is why wasn't it part of the initial plan and why did it occur spontaneously at a community meeting I think that was on a week night sometime and second part of that question was it designed to prevent us from doing what Maplewood did which would which is effective because I feel like this community could put out save black cheer concerts and save black share signs and I respectfully you you know you're you're asserting that this can be done but you've I've not seen any evidence that this school can maintain that the the new construction can do this and again why was it not if if you're so confident that it can be done why was it not a part of the initial draft plan >>
065so I so the first thing I I would say is you're I I I don't do that. Like I don't try to overthink how a community is going to respond. I mean, community shows up how they want to show up and I I love however a community show chooses to show up, I'm going to be there. I mean, that's just how I am. Um I don't compare one school to another. Uh I I I just that's just not who I am. Um now talk about confidence. Um my confidence is not that this could work, the existing plan can work equally as well. I want to be really clear like I I I don't necessarily um feel as though I'm trying to change something that that I don't already have confidence in. This plan came to
066be because I felt very strongly that the current plan could work and and so to so I know you're about to shake your head, but let me finish this comment. The the feedback >> confused about which plan you're talking about, right? So the original plan October October 3rd and then the 31st which included Oak Springs moving to Blackshere that was the plan that I feel very confident in that plan. I feel like it would work. I feel like it it it would ultimately do many many incredible things for this school community and this school district. Period. And as I said before like I am committed to exploring any idea that comes up period. And I can tell you precisely where this idea came up. It came up when I was at the um uh with
067Reverend Lans at the East Side committee meeting, but I'm just sharing with you >> I I I mean, >> you know, it was not >> I'm just sharing with you where it came from. I I I'm honestly telling you like this happens throughout the city where ideas come and I would say, "Okay, if that's something the committee wants me to explore, I will explore it and we will go through it together." And that's what this is about right now. This is me doing exactly what I said I would do and telling my board and telling our community we're going to go through this process. Um did I look at it the other way? I I did. But the problem is is I cannot move Black Shear into a um a school that had historically not
068performed right. So from a turnaround perspective, right, it wouldn't work that way. Could it work if both schools were high performing and we just had to do a consolidation? Yeah, it could absolutely work. And so that that I think coupled with the fact that I had heard for a very long time that the black shear um school historic in nature building and everything else was something that needed to be considered allowed me to get comfortable with that plan because it broke the accountability chain. It reduced the number of seats in the area and honored what I had heard which was, you know, the Black Shear um school is historic and it needs to be, you know, um maybe supported or evaluated in that way. They used to be a consideration. That's how we ended up
069there. And it wasn't until community came out and told me Matias, think about it this different way and that's what we're doing now. So that's just the honest truth. Um and so I don't know was uh and so this is just about listening and hearing and and then >> well I do hope you're hearing that you know my family and my children. >> Okay, >> understood. >> We have um one right here. I'll come back here and then right over here and then Okay. Hi, thank you very much for being here uh today, Matias. My name is Edna. I have my husband and I have two kids here at Blackshere. We are also very big fans of public education and AISD as well. I know that you are in a very difficult position um and
070that your job is not envied by anyone. So um I my com my question is also somewhat of a comment but something that I do want you to address. Um much like Jennifer said at the start of the meeting, we as a community here in Black and I hope you see the entire community here, including our amazing teachers, our principal, uh parents, supporters in the neighborhood as well. Um we're here because we want you to understand the community that we have and it's not just um about uh the building or things like that, right? We want to welcome Oak Springs. We want them to become a part of our community um in hopes that you're right 5 10 15 20 years down the road that AISD is successful and AISD especially in neighborhoods that have
071been neglected on the east side is successful right so we want to continue that I do think that um the your idea about short-term disruptions versus long-term disruptions I completely understand that as a systems person myself right but I would like you to consider um the disruption that comes from in some ways moving a community here, which we want. We want them to stay here, and then moving everyone back to a new building, what the impact that has um in terms of disruption for you have a transportation plan that may have already been figured out and then you have to reverse it in another way and it might not serve people within this community to go back the other way. If you have a plan that works and that has been working for one, two,
072three years, you have teachers who are in the classrooms that they're known, teachers that are dedicated to the students and community here. And to lift that all back and then put it into a new facility and a new building, I'm not sure that that counts as a just a short-term disruption. To me, it seems like it would also be much more of a longer term uh disruption. And so for me at at least and I think I I some of the other community members echo this as well. We I understand consolidation. We understand consolidation. We're underenrolled. Kids don't have resources. Teachers don't have re resources. We need to consolidate in order to to be able to do that. And I highly believe in that and think it has to be done. But I think it
073should also be done in a thoughtful manner in terms of not just short-term long-term disruptions, but thinking about how those actual disruptions where you say this is a short-term run disruption that will have a a better long-term impact. thinking about the other way where is if we don't have that disruption in the in the first place even though it's a new building and all these things are there things we can do to minimize that short-term disruption and still have that long-term positive effect 15 20 30 years down the road >> I mean >> you know I I mean it was well said what you and I appreciate you you know commiserating with me on the all the things that we're working through. Uh it is real. Um you know, I love this city. I love
074this school district. Uh we're trying really hard to get it right. Right. When when no one is doing us any favors. Um is kind of what I feel like. Uh so, you know, I think the my response I guess generally is um you know, we have we have evidence and you know, of us being able to do pretty incredible things well if we plan together and execute. And I would say for me, you know, I'm here precisely at this time in Austin ISD to ensure that we execute in a way that we haven't in the past. To agree to order, MTSS, I mean, all the things. Um, and we've seen lots of moves happen in Austin ISD. And I think that's why the idea didn't seem so foreign when it was proposed to us, right?
075We've seen huge elementary schools move off site. You know, that happened at Brentwood. They went to web. I've seen, you know, two schools leave both schools and go to another school combined and then move back to the to the brand new school. I've seen um just about every iteration of it, you know, and and so I Yes, it's a disruption. Is it something that we can work through? I believe that we could and I we've seen that occur over the last couple years and it's happening right now. I mean, we have schools that are not at their home campus and will not be for a couple years. Um and and we just work through it. it's important that we have our principal and we have our staff like all buy into the plan. But that's
076right, you have to agree on the plan and you have to ensure that it's executed with fidelity. Um, and so, you know, I think it's a consideration. Um, it is something that we definitely take to to to heart. Um, but in some cases we we just have to do it. Uh, and we've demonstrated that we can do it. And so that I will kind of go back to the team and we'll talk about is this is this different or something that we need to do differently here if we go down this path which again there's no decision no recommendation. Um I'm happy to explore that. Um but I just want to be really honest like like there there are there's one two I think there's four schools right now that are not even on their
077own home campus right and they're they're far away and several of them will be combining and coming back and they're thriving you know so I I just like it can be done. Um, I feel like it it can be done. Um, maybe I need to reassess if it can be done here. Um, but you know, we have evidence that it can be done, >> right? And I don't doubt that it can be done. together isn't necessarily the right thing. >> That's fair. >> Okay, we have another question. >> Well, hello. My name is Martin Crey and I'm uh also a parent of a child here and um I like many of us in here. Um don't envy your position. We thank you for taking the time to come out and and listen to us. Um
078Edna was very articulate in what she said and um I'm going to try not to be redundant but maybe perhaps put a finer point on it. Um, Blackshire as you see is a community of uh faculty, staff, uh, you know, educators, the staff that support them, all the programming, and then of course the parents themselves that both support, um, the teachers and of course our own our own kids. And I know there was talk of the culture piece and um you know of of this building as a building, but um I'd like you to give consideration to where this building is located um and for how long it's been here. There are people who are part of the Black Share family who have been part of this uh of this institution for 40 or 50
079years. They live in this neighborhood. They walk here. um they have ties to local institutions that are part of what makes this facility and this school um what it is and and and and and helps us to thrive the way the programming is um supported of course at the district level but also by um much of um the local institutions nearby um the historic university that's next door that's a very welcoming um partner to this school just take into consideration the actual neighborhood context of this historic building and location. Um and and consider how these disruptions um could impact not just the families but the programming the entire um just the feel of what makes Black Shear Black Shear and Black Shear kids Black Shear kids. So, um I don't know how else to or
080how more articulate I can play I I I I can make the point, but um Black Shear's historic nature is not just how long it's been um in this particular spot, but the fact that it is in this particular spot. [applause] Hi, John Flowers. I'm uh my daughter is in pre-K here at Blackshire. I've got two questions, hopefully pretty easy ones for you. Um they're for more short term for the plan for next year. Um the first one is the second d or I guess the draft plan came out, official paperwork basically had the attendance boundaries getting adjusted in kind of two ways. one from uh actual consolidations like Oak Springs coming into us where we're essentially getting the retired tenants zone and also certain places switch certain neighborhoods switching between schools. Um the kind
081of postdraft update that came out last week said a lot of that was getting paused and we kind of have both affecting us. We have obviously the Oak Springs area coming into Blackshire. We also have like areas from Matthews and Zavala etc also coming in. So is it is all of that is half of that being caused and we're only getting Oak Springs or we still getting other areas as well? Yeah, it's a great question. So, uh, what I've been doing is working with the team and, uh, looking at the boundary changes that are absolutely necessary to be responsive to the turnaround plans and the programmatic moves. Whenever we did a comprehensive, and we're still going to do it, y'all, just to be clear, like we're still going to go forward. Um, that work is
082not stopping. uh but when we did it comprehensively we created kind of ranges and we said you know as a healthy for a healthy system you want to be between 85 and 95% utilized and so there were lots of boundary changes and those boundary changes for elementary schools had to line up with middle schools and line up with high schools to ensure beater pattern alignment and so um what I told the team and what I instructed and what I what I reviewed since uh are the changes required to support the turnaround plan in this case it's Oak Springs to Blackshere and that is really the extent of the boundary change for the vote that is being completed on November 20th. Um, you know, when we pick that work back up, which we are going to
083do in very short order, um, we're going to begin to uh address all the other changes. Um, I I'm not confident I can get it to December. I know the trustes that have asked me about that. Um, so it it'll likely be a little bit longer. Uh but but that's the kind of the extent of of the work and and the reason we're able to do that is because you know we were trying to balance the entire system but if we make some moves like this you may get to 96% or 97% which is 2% higher than the target rate. Um, but at the end of the day, you know, that's based on reside and you know the number of students that transfer in, the number that transfer out, the enrollment number, and then after
084I review all of that, I'm very confident that it it works given the fact that even if we're over by 2%. Does that make any sense? Uh, the other thing that I will say is for our calculations, we use um permanent infrastructure, not portables. Right now, we have 440 portables in Austin ISD representing over a million square feet. Uh our newest portable is like 32 years old. We have some that are 60 70 years old. Uh they're meant to be short-term solutions. And so for a short term um I'm willing to use them to help ensure that we have the capacity to make any of these moves work without having to make the other offsetting move work. Does that make sense? Yeah. So it sounds like only not the second half but the first half
085went back to >> Okay. I >> that was only one question. You said a couple of questions. >> Uh yeah, the other one's hopefully pretty easy. um the for the Oakidge community that is coming over here. I know it's obviously a much bigger effect on sorry a much bigger effect on them. Um but I know I've I've heard that a large concentration of them live very close to the school like within walking distance and also don't really have reliable transportation. Technically we're within the 2-m boundary where transportation doesn't have to be provided. So I I think as a community we probably push to provide transportation for them to help account for that move. >> Yeah. Well, and and uh so I appreciate you saying that because uh that that is one of the things that
086was shared initially about, you know, why maybe the combined school should end up there. Um because of the student needs of the of the population that is really close to that school. Um and so we, you know, we always think about like, you know, which student is going to be adversely impacted to a greater degree because of their lived experience. Um and so that that is really one of the things that allowed me to continue to explore this and really lead to this conversation here. Uh but yes, we can absolutely add transportation. We've already committed to doing it. Um you know, for for the swings for the move from Oak Springs to Black Share, uh it's within the two miles. Um but we certainly recognize uh that we just, you know, we need to provide
087more support and we can do that. We have the ability to do so. I have the authority to do so and we're doing it and that's going to be in the plan. >> Okay. I have five on deck. So, one, two, three, four, five. So, I'll let >> Hey, my name is Mo Buchell. We met out back there. Sorry if this was addressed before. I was uh trying to direct people in the front. >> Yeah, sorry. I was like I was like rushing in. I was like, where's >> Yeah, no, it's all good. Um uh so you mentioned, and so forgive me if this was addressed before I came in, but you mentioned uh that, you know, obviously a lot of this is because of an enrollment crisis in the district, right? Um, and uh,
088I'm curious if you've considered the impact of closing a school like Black Shear that has such like a great reputation for navigating like a lot of the uh, the challenges and complexities that are happening on the east side right now. I mean, Black is a school that's really stood out. It does great by its students. When you close a school that's doing that, does that threaten to dissuade more parents from enrolling in AISD? like is could that be kind of actually uh counterproductive when you're trying to attract people to the school district? >> Yeah. So, this is something I've been now I've been in Austin ISC, believe it or not, like seven and a half years. Um been in this role now almost three years, first year's interim. And one of the things that I'm
089always um kind of grappling with is how to um extrapolate or arrive at numbers that I can depend on for an assumption, right? Because our trustees asked for it like Matias, you know, if this happens, what is going to be the impact to your budget? Uh and my response and my response to you is going to be um first, we don't want any family to leave, right? But we want families to do what's best for their student. And I do believe that, you know, Austin ISD provides the best public education in in Austin, period. And we have evidence of that as especially given our scale. Like we we do some really incredible things and we have um depth and we have resources that many other schools can't provide. And and that is, you know, really
090important that we protect that. Um will students move? Will they leave? Uh I get this sometimes and I'll I'll hear Matias, we did a survey of our families and 60% are going to leave. Um, and just to be really honest, I've also received surveys four years ago when we went through similar changes. And I I know that that wasn't what ultimately happened. Um, and I also know that there are lots of um times when community will leave and then come back or actually go back into the system when once there's a break in the school in the um kind of vertical team like let's say elementary school breaks uh is consolidated and perhaps they leave. But we have seen that what really anchors our school our school system is our high schools. And lots of
091families end up coming back. And so um we do uh account for it by way of um of a sensitivity analysis on our financials and say okay we lose x amount of students here um what might that look like? The counterposition, this is something that I am really honest about, is what would families do if you had thriving schools that are high performing in areas of Austin that haven't had them? Because there are parts of our city right now where many of the students who reside choose to not come to Austin ISD. And why is that? Well, I mean, one of them is the reasons is that the school is not identified as high performing because a lot of families, you know, they don't know what we what I know or don't know how beautiful
092the school is inside necessarily or the great things happening. They see this letter grade and they make a decision and and families are busy. Like, I understand that. And so if we're able to actually pull the resources to ensure that every student gets what they need and we already have evidence the system is responding and your schools improve, which that we're already improving. I just gave stats about how we're improving, then you would expect to get a lot of them back. Like one of the things that I would argue is Martin now having access to Keeling, all the students who are not choosing Martin, I would expect that to increase because now they have access to Keeling. And that's one of the things that we're doing as part of this plan. So, as a whole,
093when 70,000 students, there's there's students that choose to leave, there's students that choose to come. I want to make sure that we do everything possible to attract families. Um, so yes, we do talk about it. We do localize it and we say, "Okay, what could the impact be here?" Um, but as a whole, I'm not able to support everything. That's the honest truth. Um, but if we do it well, we should have strong neighborhood schools. And if we do that, then we would see an increase in students. Um, again the challenges that we have like we lost 2,000 students over 2,000 students this year. Had nothing to do with performance. It had nothing to do with gentrification. It had to do with immigration. We lost two over 200 students. They're in they're in the Rberg
094area. Like that entire student we lost families who did not immigrate to Austin and we lost some that decided to leave. That is a huge huge number and like largely is greater than anything we would see as part of these moves. So, so there are things happening that I'm having that we are having to work through that um or you we couldn't have I would if you would have told me last year that we would have seen that there's no way I would have believed it. Uh not to that degree but something changes at the federal level, immigration changes or the response from the federal government changes and then you see this impact. So, it it it's a long-winded answer to say we model it, we track it. Um, when I hear things, sometimes they
095work. I sometimes they do come to fruition, sometimes they don't. Um, but if we can improve our entire system, my hope is that more families in Austin select Austin ISD. Um, so I don't know that was but that's that's just like the honest truth. >> Okay. I I do want to do a quick time check. We are about 14 minutes from the end of the meeting, but because we did start a little bit late, I'm going to add like 10 minutes on the back end if that's okay with you. So, um, I'll come to you and then have >> I'll try to be quick. First, I'd like to invite you to our 135th anniversary that is happening in February at the school. We're very excited. >> Please come, please bring your staff and help us
096celebrate the legacy of the school. And I'd like to channel onto his comment about the place-based identity of this campus. We are right next to our H.B.CU. We have amazing teachers here in these halls who've graduated from there. We are also right next to Keeling. I'm so glad you brought that up. We have little brothers and little sisters here at the school. The middle schoolers come down and they get their siblings so that working families can keep working and those siblings can help take those younger kids home. Third, we're right next to Carver Library, and that is a really, really important third space for our community where students can go without their parents who are working. We are working-class neighborhood. So, please take into account that placebased identity of our school. And then second, I'm
097going to say we've been waiting with baited breath and trying to be kind. We have been told to not complain, but we're seeing that the schools who are complaining are getting your ear. We are seeing that the schools who raise money, the schools who protest, the schools that have money are going to stay open and our school, we don't have the time to make this change. We are welcoming them with open arms for this turnaround plan and we need the time. Our teachers need to get ready. We need those funds. We need plans in place and we will be successful with that turnaround plan because I believe in our leadership. I believe in our teachers and I believe in our community. But we can't do it if you keep changing the script on us. It's
098not going to happen. >> Yeah. So um I want to be really clear like that's not how this works. I I that's not who I am. Um just not uh there are lots of voices all over the city of Austin. There's our uh our board and I are very committed to being like true to who we are, our north star and and just be diligent about the work because on Mon on Friday when we upload our documents, you're going to see closures, 10 closures that are very much still have communities advocating. And so just I just be really really clear like that's not part of this, not what this is. um when we when I decided to slow it down, it's because I am 100% committed to doing exactly what we're doing here. Like I
099I need to listen and I need to ensure that every idea is thoroughly vetted. And when it comes to turnaround plans, there are limitations because the state of Texas, the requirements, how close I've been to them, when it comes to programmatic moves, the um the foundation of the why is very clear, like you know, all of those things are able to progress. The the ones that were very difficult were the countless boundary changes uh and the like number of committee meetings that we've had to get that right and the balance enrollment. like those are those are just different types of um factors contributing to those closures and so you know there are three schools not all of them have the same type of kind of voice maybe is the way that you know so I
100want to be really clear that's not who the board is that's not who I am um if if there needs to be a conversation about you know all the things that I can share with anybody everywhere about how we are staying true I'm happy to have that conversation but I'm I'm not going to allow like that to even creep in because that's just not who we are like we're just not that we're not that board. We're not that administration. Um, you know, and uh I don't know what else to say. Like that's just not what this is. Um I I want to do a good job. I want to make sure I'm listening to community voice. Uh this could this could be done so many different ways. I mean it's it's done in other parts
101of the state very very differently. Um I love this school district. I I love our community. I'm going to be here if you're here. Um and I want to listen. I want to improve and I want to refine. And at any point if I think that the voice is not getting in in the way that I need it to, then I'm going to slow it down. And that's what this is. But the work's going to continue. There will be additional consolidations. There will be boundary changes. I'm not going to leave my time here as a superintendent without having a line feeder patterns in Austin. That is the thing at the end of the day, if we get that right, you look back in 20 years, 50 years, it will have a huge impact in the
102city. Um, and I never would have thought we'd be able to tackle it. I mean, I just wouldn't. So, anyway, just wanted to share that. >> Okay. All right. Uh, my name is Sherwin Patton and uh, I debated on whether I was going to ask a question or not, but I I wanted to share a little bit of something. So, I grew up in this community and still live in this community. My mother taught at Blackshere. My mother went to Blackshere. My mother went to Houston Tillerson. graduated from Houston Tillis. So did my father. And so the reason why my mother taught at Blackshire at one point in time was because there was no other option until schools were integrated in which she was able to teach at other schools after that. And so after
103that she taught over at Lee Elementary Schools once schools were integrated. But we still lived over here in East Austin. My grandfather bought that property that I now live on in 1930. When he bought that property in 1930, my father passed away and uh you know a few years back and the the whole community decided that they were going to do a mural. I think it was led by Caitlyn and some others. And there's a mural of my father and some other people who lived in that community that's still there now as an educator in this community. What my mother did was she made sure that every child that lived in this community had an option. They had an alternative to everything else that was going on around them. So she tutor and she looked
104out for all the children in the community. So now what I do is I chase the children who are in this community and make sure that they all have options and I give them the support that they need. And that's what my organization does because I'm living out what I saw my parents do, not because they had a choice, because they had to. And so when I look at the community, you know, I I'm I'm glad to see um the the community the way that it is now that I get the chance to meet all these new people, but it looks very different from when I was a child. It looks very different now. Thanks to um the fact that I have some great neighbors, our end of the block is very different than every
105block in this area because we kind of where they hang out and they they schedule stuff and they invite me and I show up sometime. But I say all that to say, um I spend a lot of time down at Oak Springs because I'm chasing the children. And I understand um from looking in the room that that the demographics has shifted a little bit. And so I'm running after the children because I'm trying to make sure that they have the same types of options that were afforded to me because my mother and others sacrificed. And so when we talk about um the consolidation, I I don't want it to be this us versus them that we're talking about. This is really all of us as East Austin coming together because that's what East Austin was
106all about. It was about us as a as a people trying to survive and trying to make sure that we did better than survive that we could actually have a chance to succeed. And some of the best and brightest have come out of this community. And so, uh, with that being said, I I think that one of the most important things, and here comes my question. It is for us to have information about one another, not based upon what we're hearing, but building relationships because I feel like we we may make some decisions in a vacuum if you're not careful. If we're not careful, we'll make a decision without being informed because we won't know the people who are directly impacted. And I'm not talking about uh just people at Oak Springs. I'm talking about
107people in this community. And so what I would like to propose and like to ask um uh Superintendent and thank you for having all of these meetings. Is it possible for us to have a gathering, a few gatherings of Oak Springs and Black Shore community so that we can actually sit down, learn to know each other, talk and come up with a solution for East Austin because this is not a decision about what's going on further east or over here because it was never like that in this community. It was always about East Austin and East Austin has a rich history of having to stick together. And so we cannot have a us versus them dichotomy because if we do it will not look like the East Austin that we're saying that we're celebrating right
108now. It will not look like that. I'm telling you, Houston Tillerson is across the street and Houston Tillerson is trying to reach this entire community and even beyond. and they're trying to make a a path for success for primarily black and brown students. And what we're talking about right now is a group of black and brown students who will feel like they're being displaced because they were promised something. They were promised something new and they rarely get anything new. And so what I'm saying is that we just need to find out how we can come together and listen to everybody's voice. And my my my question for you is would you help us to provide a would you help and provide a space for that to happen and then come in and listen to that
109group together and if are we as a community willing to do that because if we don't I'm telling you what will happen is it'll feel like something done to a group of people because I'm listening. I live on this end of the block but I'm frequently on that end of the block. I grew up on this end of the block. This is all I knew was this end of the block. But I hang out a lot on the other end of the block. And I'm saying that if there's not a conversation, what it's going to feel like is something being done to people versus something being done with people. So, Superintendent, back to your my question. [clears throat] Will you will you create a space where we can all come together? [applause] >> Yeah. So,
110um, of course, you know, I I think, uh, you know, like I'm committed to to ensuring community comes together to inform, you know, what what is the best solution. Um, but I'm always going to be really honest about what I can and can't do, right? And we've had that conversation. I've had lots of conversations in the community about, you know, could we do this, could we do that, could we do that? And I'll be honest, like, these are things I can't support, but these are things that I can, and here are the reasons why. Uh so absolutely I I welcome the opportunity to bring community together and provide a space or or do what I can to facilitate um you know and and and I'm I'm happy to to participate and and I want to
111be really clear like the vote that's coming up is about like step one a right it's it's truly being responsive to turnaround plan. Um there may be expectations um you know about what included, what's not included, but it's really about you know breaking the turnaround plan. I mean creating the turnaround plan and having us break the accountability chain which does include Oak Springs coming to Black. Um the steps after I think there's plenty of there's opportunity to have that conversation together. >> Okay. >> Um I don't so much have a question but I told my kid that I would just let you know this so I'm going to do that. >> Oh awesome. Uh we're new to Blackshere this year. We've been in this community exactly 12 weeks. Uh due to various circumstances, my kid
112has this is his third school. Um when he walked in this building the very first time, the way he lit up was unparalleled. There is life in these walls and it's not something that can be replaced or rebuilt somewhere else without mass amounts of effort and togetherness. And even then, I don't know. But my son wants you to know that this building, the literal building, the people in it, the walls, the art on the walls, all of it makes him feel safe. and he has never left another school that he's been at more excited or more engaged or more ready to come back tomorrow. And that's it. >> What you want? What you want? Thanks for sharing that. >> Hi, I'm Abby Burnham. Um, my daughter is in prek here. My older two children are
113at Zavala. My oldest was at Brook Elementary um which closed when he was in prek4. I am a teacher at Macllum High School. I'm a former board um education Austin board member. We've sat meetings together and I just want to I you know I heard I keep hearing empty seats, empty seats. I've heard all about empty seats for all of my children's education now for all of the east side communities. And I just have a couple of observations and maybe not so much questions, but um one is that you talked earlier about how the kids come back to us in high school. They tend to come back to us in high school. Those empty seats return at the high school level. They all fall into place. But I have run a little social experiment in
114my household this year because again, my daughter is in preK4 here. And we chose this school um because partially of the great advocacy of Miss Bell, but because Zavala doesn't have afterchool care. So when Brook was closed and we were, you know, absorbed into a new community and welcomed with opened arms and told that afterchool care would be coming to the east side, it did not. And we had a four-year-old who could not stay at Zavala because she did not have after school care. And so we have these communities and these beautiful programs and all of these things in place, but if we don't recruit them at the early levels, if we don't look at those empty seats starting in preK3, preK4, then we are doing a disservice to the enrollment in our school district,
115which then causes these fun financial problems. And so there there is so much beautiful community that happens here. And we've heard all night about community. I've seen two wonderful communities and and I'm not going to, you know, I I can tell you that my daughter will be staying at Black Shear for the rest of her elementary school education, even though I will be routing kids to all different schools on the east side because she is a part of this community already. And so, not only does AISTD need to do better with engaging with families to stay within their communities, to build within their communities, to stop taking their students across district to other communities to start their education because they'll stay there. But that's going to help us build our enrollment and fill those empty
116seats. And if we're not looking at it at those earliest ages when kids fall in love with schools and fall in love with who they're around, then we're really missing out on a core part of our population. And that is that is I I wish that that you know I know that they're coming back at high school, but I think we really need to look at it from that early age. >> Yeah. No, no. So, just to be clear, um and I very much appreciate that comment. Uh I I our prek program, our our elementary schools, you know, they we have such strong programming, you know, in many areas. It's one of the anchors. But we see the biggest disruption is rising sixth graders, fifth to six, just a kind of funky time. um you
117know students you know our middle schools we haven't quite figured out how to how to support our middle schools in a way um that is balanced and ensures that our students get what they need one year transitioning in one year transitioning out so two things are happening I I yes to the um ensuring that students move into the system because we've found that once they find a loving welcoming school prek prek 3 pre-K4 and continue on like we keep them they stay with us so there's a lot of work to be done there I don't disagree uh We revamped our um enrollment uh platform. We're try we have to get organized and do it in a way that we haven't done in the past. Um I will say that one of the things we struggled
118with and this is like a kind of a larger conversation for the last three years. It's been urgent urgent urgent urgent urgent like like the work around the important um and the things that are truly going to sustain us uh has has been hard to execute because all these huge things you know TA greeted order you know budget you know we think about like the the work around um accountability like these are consuming massive resources and it's all the same people there like there no more people like in that doing this work it's all our principles and executive directors and myself and our teams So that is exactly where we want to go and I agree with you. But I also want to say that you can it's the the the the denominator the total
119number of students in Austin has shifted. Uh so yes we the capture and the number of students can increase but the sheer number of students that are in Austin has changed. We have more density but the density that we're seeing is you know studios. It's onebedroom condominiums. you know, you're not seeing lots of three-bedroom and two-bedroom uh units come online, and that's really where you see the the student yield, and you're not seeing in places that are affordable. You know, that's just not happening. And so, uh the reality is that you see charters closing, you see lots of or you you've seen closures in other surrounding school districts that have lots of wealth. Um it is truly a function of just affordability, but we need to do a better job of capturing and supporting our
120students who live here now. And I and I agree that we're not doing as good a job as we could. It is an area of focus for me. It's an area of of intense focus. I would say moving forward. Um I would say the reason I haven't been able to contribute all a lot of time and energy into that space is because of like literally what we've been working through like for the last 24 to 36 months. It's been brutal. >> Um but yeah, that's that's what we're doing. Um and and the goal is to like do these hard things but do them together. You know, I I got to keep us together. That's like my number one focus. It is hard. These changes are hard. Um, but we're an incredible school district and we're
121doing incredible things and I will not allow us to be Fort Worth. Like that's not happening. Um, so you know, I appreciate that comment and you know, thanks for driving all over town. I >> I know what that's like. It's brutal. >> Okay. Well, uh, we do have our interpreters that are kind of winding down, so I want to be sure we get one of our Spanish speakers who wants to ask a question. Oh yeah. What's that? Good evening, Matias. I I am a custodian here. I've been here for nine years and we are a family. All the kids here know me and we are very proud to be a family here and everything that I hear from all the parents here is that we want to keep being a family and being a community.
122>> Yeah. No, that's Uh, gracias. I mean, so, so, um, I, for those of you that know me, I will say and I will continue to say that every single person in Austin ISD contributes to the educational experience of our students. And um you know I I would say that our custodians, our bus drivers, our food service workers are like the foundation of our school system. You know, you keep our students safe and have eyes and know them in a way that very few do honestly, especially at our bigger schools. Our food service workers sometimes see 50 60% of the student population and no other educator does that. and our bus drivers welcome our students, you know, when they may have had a really difficult day or night. And and so I just want you
123to know like what you're doing here at Blackshere at Black is exactly what we want. We love you. I'm so happy that you're with us. Um you are part of what makes Blackure a family. Uh and and just so thank you. Thank you. That's exactly what we want. >> [applause] >> Hi, I'm Rachel. I have two kids here at Black Shear. I really appreciate you taking the time to talk with us. I um I appreciate the work that the district has done. We we've been following along. Um the the plan we saw October 3rd um was holistic and it was ambitious and I think we all are on board with those goals. Um, I think that fast and decisive action is a huge selling point. I know it makes it harder. It makes it harder
124for everyone to feel like they've had a voice, but it's change is painful. We want to get it done fast, right? And and so I think a lot of the anxiety you're hearing from us around the possibility of a few years down the line um moving campuses is based on wanting to embrace our new community and move forward. Um and you know, you talked about some of these other campuses moving back and forth and we know it's doable. It it's not ideal. Um, and we know some of our families here are here because they didn't want to put their kids through going to Mets and Sanchez and um, back and forth. Um, and and so it really, you know, we've we've been very focused on uh, getting more families, right? We we we want a
125bigger school. Um and uh I I think every you know year if not every month that that people have that uncertainty it it makes them choose something else right it makes them choose where they know their kid can stay. Um so I think that's that's one um thing that we feel really strongly about is like we want especially with the tap right it's a challenge we are very uh optimistic and confident in our teachers and our leadership team >> um about our ability to succeed but we really think that that that cloud overhanging of like a future move would really impede that success. >> Um you can tell like this school is old. It's but it's wellmaintained. Miss Bell takes care of us. You see the beautiful mural behind you. That's an investment from the
126community in >> in our campus. You walk past the school stage in our in our playground. These are the investments, you know, um that the community has put into the school and they're not easily moved. Um and um the you know one one thing that I really appreciate about the original plan is how holistic it was. And if if the decision if if Oak Springs location was the historic campus that didn't need a turnaround plan when you were when you were making that holistic plan, it would look different. And so it's really hard to think about would this would the black share moving to Oak Springs fit into that be the plan if that was your starting point, right? Uh for example, the the campus um rebuild, as I understand it, the the target enrollment
127was like 375, which is not the same as what you said a standard elementary school campus. So when we talk about operating efficient schools, they're a little bit bigger. um and uh and our arts programming, you know, we we we have the space for that. Um and and that's really important to our community and it's been really successful in helping us be a thriving campus on the east side that's been attracting and keeping people in the district and even drawing people from other districts. Um so I guess that's not all a question, but I I wanted to um thank you really for the work. We appreciate you taking the time to talk with us. We appreciate you listening to Oak Springs and I want you to know that our community is not only excited to
128welcome Oak Springs, like we're actively having WhatsApp conversations about can we move our pickup soccer game and like meet new friends, right? And like start building those relationships. So, um, thank you [applause] me again. I do have a a comment because I'm looking at a TEA score and so I'm looking at 23 for black. for uh relative performance. Uh the school got a C for closing the gap. It got an F. Let's see. What's the other one? For reliable performance, econom economically disadvantage. And this was for 23 as well. There was an F for closing the gap. There was a D. Okay. Uh for Oh, I may have said the same thing for um Okay, let me go to 25. So, I'm sorry you all. I thought I had it in order. >> Do you
129want principal to answer? >> No, I need you to answer. I don't need >> No, no, not answer. Like get the numbers so you don't have to fill them up. No, I haven't. Uh, okay. And so for 25, the relative performing for economically disadvantaged was a D. And for closing the gap was a D. And so my question is because I let me preface this first. First of all, I attended Oak Springs to third grade because it went from kinder to three. Uh we stayed in Glenn Oak which was under which is underneath Pleasant Valley the bridge in that area with urban rem renewal we moved on Angelina and so I was here at Blackshire for two years and so you're right there's a lot of history at that school because not only did I
130attend Blackshire so did my mother and so did my grandmother when it was Gregory town school. So, there's a lot of history here. And my grandmother was born in 1899. Okay. So, there's a lot of history here. The reason I read the the scores or the the grade is because we're bringing Oak Springs over and so we know that their grades for economically disadvantaged is probably similar to Blackshirt. So my question is how because I'm having a hard time trying to see how we are really trying to uh lift up academics for student. I I'm I'm really trying to grasp it because I honestly believe you have a good heart. I really do. I believe you're a good person. I believe you mean well. However, I'm just not getting that peace. So you can bring
131them over. They're going to uh consolidate with what's here right now. And the resources are going to do what? Because I don't expect the school to go from a C to an F. I don't expect it to go from a C to a D. It can go from a C to a B. It can go from a C to an A. But it cannot decline. And then I have one more thing because Bernardet Webb and Dolby did a restart. Could you not do a restart with Oak Springs because you don't know as of yet what their score is going to be? You could do a restart as well. Yeah. So, um, so start with the last question first. Um so the there are multiple things that we're having to address at the same time and
132Mr. Bradley, we've talked, you've shared, we've had conversations around, you know, accountability, seats, feeder pattern alignment. I mean, you know, transfer policies, like all the things. The reality of it all is that there are empty seats in this area. Um, and could you restart uh Oak Springs? You could. uh a restart uh for those who who don't know, I think maybe I said in the beginning is you turn over the principal most likely because the principal has to have demonstrated the ability to um move a school from a a D to a a B or an F to a C. Um the educators uh have to be 60% uh highly effective. Again, that's a state term, not Matias's term. Uh and that includes uh elements of an ACE model. So ACE is really what they
133refer to now as a restart. The state changed the kind of the note the verbiage that they use. And so you want to have typically three years of experience. your outcomes have to be correlated to uh your um performance or be TIA designated or be a board a nationally board certified teacher which means that all the other staff um you know would have we'd have to evaluate who's there now see who could stay because the state won't allow us to submit a plan that doesn't meet that criteria and then we would have to hire staff that met that criteria and place them in Oak Springs. Um and so could that be done? it could be done. Uh the the challenge that we have is, you know, when we look at comprehensive plans, which is what
134we're trying to do as a school system, you still have excess seats. And so in the event where you can solve multiple challenges with with a solution, we we aim to do that. Um and so you can restart it, but you would still have the same number of seats met across this area. And again, right now, I can't afford, we can't afford to give every student what they need. And so, we're trying to find like where can we find these efficiencies so that over time we can get there. Um, so as far as like academic performance, um, you know, there are lots of things that contribute to a school's accountability rating. Uh, y'all know that it changed in 22 to 23. We saw significant shift. We saw shifts here in 22 23. There's a huge
135downward shift. We've seen 20 point swings in some areas because of how this assessment just changed. Um we had I forgot how many um B schools that went to Fs, but I think it was 16. Uh so there's a lot of movement. So 23, 24, and 25 when you think about what we're going to do. Well, first uh well, we're going to really look and make sure that all the students have the resources they need. Um you know, we make sure we're going to add content interventionists. We're going to add instructional coaches. Uh, one of the things that we're also likely be doing is adding an assistant principal. Um, you know, when you bring the student populations together, you need to provide more support. Uh, assistant principles typically are the um kind of the partner
136to the principal who's overseeing uh special education, making sure our ARS and IEPs. So, we're providing more support. We then look at the school as a whole and work with each school community and say, what do we need to add as far as wraparound services? We know that students in parts of Austin need more, not just what's in the classroom. I think there was a comment around after school care. Um, we make those adjustments. So, we have a framework for all of it. We've allocated funds for all of it. Um, the rigor, you know, the way that we assess um and track performance. Uh, so assessments throughout the year. Uh, making sure that we're very clear and that we see the rigor in the classroom because at the end of the day, we have to
137have high expectations for our students. Doesn't matter the color of your skin. You have to have high expectations and the rigor better match. Um I can tell you that I've dissected schools in Austin ISD and I look at and that they'll tell me Matias we're going to get a C. Matas we're going to get a C. And I look into the data and I realize um once I get into it that the rigor for campus A versus campus B which is reflected in the in the material that the students are completing is very different. Very different. And so that type of um autonomy hurts us because you get to a place where you are bringing the expectation down to meet the students ability instead of doing what's required as far as interventions and the supports
138to meet the rigor that we have to have. So that's a big point of frustration for me. It's a big really point of disappointment for me like managing the school system. We've been here for a long time but we've adapted bad habits in some cases. The problem is is that whenever you create that baseline foundation, the argument against it is that you're taking away autonomy from a school because autonomy is something that lots of schools like to have. Um, so we are building off the great things that are already happening here at Black Shear, providing additional supports, working with both school communities, working with the principal to ensure what is the academic plan going to be specifically to welcome those students. And then we've committed budget items to ensure that we actually resources and get
139it done. um it'll move. Um there is no doubt in my mind. I do expect it to increase. Um I'm not going to be part of a system that is not moving us in the right direction. Uh so that's how we would do it. And and all of that's kind of laid out. The other thing um that's been really helpful for us is we've actually partnered um with uh a technical partner and we've created lighouses uh and observation um schools. And so what this is is we as a school district over the last year have changed our approach uh in how we support instruction. Our principles need to be the academic leaders in the school, right? that what was happening in years past and I'm not I don't want to belabor this but we would
140take our teachers and we take them all to central office or we would take them to a place and we provide professional development and then they would go and they would instruct and they would you know align their instruction with the curriculum but what wasn't happening was the coaching kind of in real time because the principal wasn't always getting that same professional development and support and um that created a huge dis like impact in our system. So now uh as your principal can tell you is that we have been really intentional in ensuring that our principles are the instructional leaders of their campus. So when they're observing, when they're having conversations, they're always thinking about what can I do to ensure that this student gets what they need to be successful. Um and that's something
141we flipped on its head. It wasn't like that two years ago. It is a complete shift and it's working. It's working very very well. Uh so that's why it's really important that um we all come together with the leadership here and and build that plan together. Uh but again we we have tools. Oh the so back sorry I'm digressing back to the lighthouse and observate in um and laboratory lab school. So what we're doing here is we're having one school um be the lighthouse school and then have six schools around it and we do instructional rounds where we go and observe um and it's not staff it's principles. we get principles together and say, "Hey, what is happening in this school? Uh let's go have a conversation. Let's talk about what we saw, what we
142didn't see. Let's break it down and then let's kind of go back to our own schools and then come back in that sharing model throughout the year." It's proven to be very successful. That's why you're seeing early literacy and early numeracy numbers move the way that they are and they're moving quicker in areas where we have higher numbers of students who've been historically reserved. Um because I my argument is that you can have high performing schools but they're performing in spite of the instruction that's occurring in the classroom. Uh and you see that in parts of town because the students already come in on grade level, right? Um you know what we need to demonstrate is growth that our students are are getting on grade level and growing no matter if they're coming in on
143grade level and they need to go grow beyond it or they're coming below need to get back on and then grow. So so our our approach is very very different than what we've been doing the last two years. Um actually last three years. uh the principles and you know uh Jennifer Pace and others can speak to it probably better than I can but um we're doing a lot differently and that's what I expect to happen here. We'll break it for sure. I'm very confident we'll break it. People ask me all the time, do you feel like this plan will derisk the school district? I think it would for a variety of reasons whether it's budget accountability allow us to allocate more resources, special education. Um so I am confident that it would move us in
144the right direction holistically. still got to do the boundaries which we're going to get done and it's not going to take forever. I promise you like that is gonna happen. So anyway, thank you Cheryl. >> Well, we are uh quite a bit over time and I want to respect everyone so y'all can get to times and dinners and all of the things. Um so I don't know if uh you have anything else. You've you've said a lot tonight so I think we may be okay. Um but in case y'all want anything. Okay. >> Thank you'all. >> Thank y'all so much. I appreciate it.