Carrollton-Farmers Branch ISD - Regular School Board Meeting - 3/5/2026

001I call this premeating beef briefing of the Carolton Farmers Branch ISD Board of Trustees to order at 6:00 p.m. on March 5th, 2026. The purpose of this premeating briefing is to conduct a briefing session with administrative staff regarding the posted agenda item for the regular board meeting scheduled at 7:00 p.m. tonight, March 5th, 2026. For the record, board members present are Kim Brady, Iliana Garza Rojos, Marjorie Barnes, Carolyn Benvdas, Paul Gilmore, Randy Shackman, and myself, Cassandra Hatfield. The next item on the agenda is audience for guest. Persons who wish to speak during audience for guest must have submitted an electronic form for this purpose prior to 1 p.m. And we do not have anyone who wishes to speak at the premeating. And so we'll move on to administrative reports. Dr. Alder, do you have any

002reports by administration? >> Yes. So our first report is item 5i. and it is the renewal of a document management system that was started in 2020. So I've asked Carla Settle just to give an overview of that docu document management system. So Miss Settle, >> good evening. Um Docu is uh the parent company for our laser fish software. uh it operates basically all the digital sphere of our student record system. Um the the main focus of it is our student documents uh that we refer to as the cumulative folders uh with record like report cards, health forms and the disciplinary records. It also is highly integrated with all of our other systems uh like the T-Rex system with the state as well as our uh frontline teams. Um this uh initial investment in the system

003uh occurred in 2020 at about $600,000 and so we have an ongoing renewal cost of 171,000. Um we recently uh finished scanning all of our student records. So we have achieved digital status. Uh so this is a a an optimization strategy that started a long time ago that we've finally realized um a very efficient system that allows everything to stay very digital and get out of paper. >> Awesome. Thank you, Miss Settle. Uh board members, any additional comments? Yay for digitalization. Thank you very much. >> So, Miss Settle, I just want to clarify. So since this was um implemented in 2020, neither you or I were here. So we don't have a list of probably what vendors were looked at at the time, right? >> No. Um a previous CFO um >> implemented the system

004along with um Well, yeah, neither you or I. Very few people were here. >> Thank you. Okay. Thank you so much, Miss Settle. So the next item um is item 5K. Um approve or consider approve purchase of Chromebooks. So, I've asked Miss Dr. Stout, sorry, um to give us an overview of Chromebooks and and a timeline. So, Dr. Stout, >> thank you, Dr. Eldridge, soon to be Dr. Hatfield and members of the board. Got to click my little present button down here. There we go. um some data regarding the Chromebook purchase. Um there was some some questions asking about some data. So uh we have a replacement cycle for our infrastructure and our hardware. We have a replacement cycle for um teacher laptops. We try not to use them beyond five years because their service

005degrades. However, uh Google has been very generous with the lifespan of the Chromebooks. If you'll notice the column on the right, the AUE, that is when automatic updates end or expire. Um, and so they will run their AUEs on devices for over seven years. Um, and so this is uh co an example of the models that we currently have in service. Our philosophy for our student Chromebooks is if it still works, we're still using it as long as they're in decent shape. Um, because again, Google continues updating them for so long. Uh you'll notice that the most recent model that we have been purchasing over the last couple years is good through 2033. We predict that it will be a hardware failure that makes us replace them rather than having to update software. Uh the

006lower two number well the the two that are below the the G9s and the G8s were large purchases that occurred during COVID. Um, and then we have some older models that are still in service. And so we would like to replace some Chromebooks um to round those older ones up, particularly the ones on the bottom row that were purchased prior to 2018. Uh there's a handful of them that we're rounding up. We're also concerned about issuing a device that is set to expire in 2027 to a secondary student who may have that device for years. Um, so uh we also had a request for some information about our repair data. So far this school year, we've had a little bit over 6,000 tickets. Um, of those tickets that were entered since August, we have deprovisioned

007um close to 1,200 devices. Again, that's when the hardware is to the point where you it cannot be repaired any longer. Um, the fees that we have collected for those 6,000 tickets. We have a sliding scale and so all of our fees that we charge for the devices are um at or below our cost. There is no labor charge on them and those fees are uh cut in half for free and reduced students. They are completely waved for um students that are in receiving special services where they they have an IEP for their device. Um and our uh Mckin Vento students, those are zeroed out if they're and then also the campus works with the families too. they either do payment plans or they um will wave parts of fees or let students do community

008service to to work them off as opposed to collecting money. Um our total unpaid balance of fees right now is just over $61,000. That goes back to 2023. Um and we do a push every spring and every fall to get those fees back. Um, and then for students, the secondary students that have unpaid fees after summer school is over, we disable their devices for the summer because they're no longer using them instructionally and then we turn them back on again before they come back to school. We also are sending par regular uh reminders of families that have um overdue fees through parent square. Uh the next slide I wanted to um do some I wanted to address the verbiage that is in the request. Uh typically we have a specific quote and say we need

009to order x amount of devices and we want to pay this much according to that quote. The one before you tonight for your for your consideration is actually a do not exceed. And there are a couple of reasons for doing the DNA. Um, Microsoft Copilot made me that little cartoon demonstrating the situation that's happening. We are finding um, vast increases in memory prices. In some cases, they've gone up by 200% in the past 12 months. And that's because you may notice on the news that there are a lot of um a lot more adoption of AI tools that is very memoryheavy and a lot more uh a larger number of data centers coming on board um online throughout the state and throughout the country. They use the same type of memory that we do that

010that go into these student devices just obviously vastly larger quantities. And so one of the unintended consequences of that is that the smaller chips, so those the smaller memory um components are limited because there is not as much of a benefit to companies to make the smaller ones with a a lower profit margin. Um we al are also experiencing a shortage in the Intel processors that we install in the Chromebooks. got an email today that they're looking at at least a 12-week turnaround. In addition, because the prices in memory are increasing so much, our quote window um when we go out for quotes, we are now getting a 7 to 14 day quote. So, if you don't put your PO on, they can't promise the pricing. Um and then they also are quotes often have

011a contingency up to 20% built into them lately. Um and then I already addressed the turnaround times. So, those are some fun facts about uh what how AI is impacting our our student devices. So, we will get a refreshed quote if the the agenda item is is um approved tonight. We will do a a refreshed quote. We're hoping to get 650 devices and um order them immediately and then they will be in in time for summer where we often find several hundred devices during summer cleaning that need repair um that were not reported during the school year. And so these will help us um these new ones will will help us be able to issue fresh clean devices to the kiddos in the fall. So, and I I'd be happy to take any questions that

012y'all may have. >> Thank you so much. That was a lot of new information. Board members, any questions? Uh just thank you for your diligence in the replacement cycle, but then also using them if they still exist. Do you anticipate that we're going to need to raise the cost for repairs next year due to the increase in cost of devices? >> We're collecting data right now. Um actually our uh Jean Carlo Espanol, the director of client services has added in our ticketing system um where the technicians are putting in the time and the actual cost of the parts. And because we'd like to calculate and see labor, sometimes these repairs take up to an hour and a half. and um see where the break even is on the device. And then we also purchase all

013of our repair or all of our hardware and whatnot. Um we actually our technicians, we have HP certified repair technicians. Um and so as we gather data, we'll make our decisions on on what because we also don't want to gouge our families. um make decisions on what to do with those. >> Great. Thank you. That's great information, Dr. Alage. >> Um Dr. Stout, the new MacBook Neo came out today and it's the competition to the Chromebook. So, we might want to look at that. >> Um keep moving along. But I do have to brag on your um technology department. I was at a campus and uh it was at a middle school and there was a student and he was the only one without a Chromebook. And I said, "Well, why are you not using

014your Chromebook?" and he goes, "Well, I gave my login away to my friends, so I got locked out." And so, I love that we monitor all things and that we keep track of what our students are doing. So, I have to brag on you all for keeping track of what our students are doing. I know >> that child. Yes, >> he's he told me right away. So, anyway, so our next report is from Corey um Blackburn, item 5M, and it's um regarding the furniture at RL Turner High School. And lots of things are happening at Turner. So, Mr. Blackburn. Thank you and we look forward to your presentation. >> Good evening, President Hatfield, Dr. Eldridge, members of the board. It's good to see everyone. Just a few notes on the furniture purchase uh being considered

015tonight. This supports about 55 classrooms being renovated, some teacher planning spaces, athletic spaces, student commons, the cafeteria, and the library. So, quite a bit of furniture as you can imagine. And Turner is going to be pretty amazing when it's done. They finally got most of the steel up. It's kind of hard to see. Well, you can't see much of any of it from the street, but it's coming together and it's moving right along. So, we're happy with the progress and I'm happy to answer any questions. >> Thank you. Board members, any questions about the furniture, Miss Brady? >> I'm happy to hear that's 55 classrooms. I think it was listed as library and our I'm like, "Wow, that must be some phenomenal furniture for the library." So, 55 classrooms was a good number. Thank you

016very much. >> Any additional questions? All right, Dr. Aldridge, any additional reports? >> Um, I had asked Mr. just to talk about the elections real quick, but he had an emergency today. So, I'm glad you're here, Brian. And if you will um talk about the elections, it's it's item 5G and H. >> Dr. Eldridge, President Hatfield, members of the board. I just want to thank you for the opportunity. I always get the exciting topics here, the exciting agenda. So, I want to try something a little different. So, I want to flip it. I'm going to start with questions. And I anticipated what questions you might ask. So, I'm going to ask the questions and then answer them and see how close I get. So, why do we have a contract? And we have a contract

017so we can split the work, divide it up so that the the counties have all the operational responsibilities because it's too much work for any entity to be able to do. And next question is is are these contracts unique? No, they are not unique. example is Dallas County has uh 44 political subdivisions that are participating in the May 2nd election and they all have the exact same contract that you will be considering tonight. How much does it cost? Well, we don't know. Not yet. It's determined at the end. It's all at the end and it's settled up. And it's interesting on how the cost was determined. We do have an estimate for Dallas County 195,000. And you might ask, well, how does that compare to prior years? And it's challenging to compare because the way

018the cost is determined on how many political subdivisions are participating in our attendance zone or our boundaries and then that that is divided by how many registered voters we have. So then you have a cost per voter and then that's again multiplied to determine the cost. Are there any important dates? April 2nd is the last date to register or change your address. April 20th to 28th is early voting. May 2nd is election day. And I would like to take this opportunity to commend the board for your insightful yet intriguing questions. >> Thank you, Mr. That concludes administrative report. >> No, no additional questions will be permitted. Anybody have any questions? >> I I was going to have a qu Mr. Merch, we actually have more questions, Mr. Shackman. in addition to uh your qualifications for

019humor. Um first of all, is there any way that we can get Denton County to give us breakdown of the way the vote goes? Dallas County gets us under votes and what Denton has never done it and it's ridiculous. Secondly, uh can we guarantee that these contracts are going to make sure we get provided an actual copy of what the ballot will be prior to the elections because it hasn't always been that way. >> Yes, sir. So, the response to your first question is is you've asked this question before and we for several years now we've contacted Denton County and they just tell us it's because of their system. they're unable to do that. I will reach out to them to see if there's been any change or if there's anything they can do to

020u provide that breakdown. >> They are currently using the same system as Dallas County. Now, it may be a different version, but if you look at the results in the reporting, in theory, they look the same. >> And let me uh correct what I said. It wasn't the system, it's the software of the system. And yes, the uh we will have copies of the ballots and that will occur on March 13th. Okay. >> Thank you. >> You're welcome. >> Mr. MSH, when you said it's going to occur on March 13th, is that the ballot testing? >> Yes. >> Is that for both counties? >> That's just for Dallas. We're still waiting on Denton. >> When we get the dates, can you please provide that to the board? >> Yes, ma'am. >> Okay. I know that

021several of us have gone before to watch it um in action and to also test it just because of cumulative voting. We want to make sure that it appears the way we expect it to appear. So um once we get the dates uh we try to coordinate to make somebody make sure somebody could be there. >> All right. Apparently I did not anticipate enough questions. >> Thank you Mr. MH. All right. Um board members uh we will move to our next agenda item which is item four. Does anyone have any additional questions regarding the consent agenda? All right, seeing none and hearing none, we none. We've reached the end of our agenda and the time is 6:18 p.m. and we are adjourned. Do you want me to use this mic for the dice? I mean

022for the Let's go. >> I call this regular meeting of the Carolton Farmers Branch ISD Board of Trustees to order at 7 o'clock p.m. in a very energetic and exciting boardroom tonight. It is March 5th, 2026 and is 7 o'clock p.m. Board members, district staff members, and members of the audience, you are free to join me in standing as Rob Lane provides a message followed by the leading of the pledges by Marjgerie Barnes and the leading of of the US flag by Marjorie Barnes and Paul Gilmore leading the Texas state flag. >> You join me in prayer. Your gracious heavenly father, thank you so much for your presence being with us tonight. And Lord, we ask for the business at hand that you would give much wisdom and discernment. Lord, we thank you for all

023those that'll be recognized earlier this uh later this evening. And as they are recognized, Lord, we just want to thank you for providing them the abilities to thrive. Lord, as we all gather here, we also ask Lord that you would bring peace into the Middle East and all the conflict that is in uh the entire world. Thank you for your grace and for your mercy. We love you. In Christ's name we pray. Amen. Well, there is nothing better than starting a board meeting with a room full of excited people about schools. And it must be spring break in the air. I have a feeling that's what y'all are really talking about is let's get through this uh crazy weather this week and uh enjoy spring break. So, welcome to our March board meeting. As a

024district, we dedicate all of our efforts and resources to our goal of high expectations for all. The board uses this goal to guide every deliberation, decision, and action. As elected trustees, this board is responsible for providing oversight, setting the strategic direction of this district, and ensuring accountability, all in service of student achievement. You will witness us conducting our work in open session except for specific items that may be conducted in close session as permitted under Texas government code section 551 commonly known as the open meetings law. These items typically involve personnel matters consultation with our attorney or real estate transactions. As we move through the agenda tonight, it is important to remember that we are in the business of supporting kids. With that in mind, we ask that everyone present res model responsible, respectful, and

025constructive behavior as this models the behavior we expect of our children. For the record, board members present are Kim Brady, Iliana Garza Rojos, Marjgerie Barnes, Carolyn Benvitas, Paul Gilmore, Randy Shackman, and myself, Cassandra Hatfield. We constitute a quorum and may conduct business on behalf of the district. Our next agenda item is item number two, our special presentations and recognitions. And I will turn it over to Miss Rodriguez. Good evening, President Hatfield, esteemed board members, and Dr. Eldridge. Through our partnership with Chick-fil-A Trinity Me Mills, I always say meals. I don't know. Chick-fil-A Trinity Mills, we honor those who demonstrate excellence with the CFB Champion Award. This month, we are proud to recognize Becky Porter with the H Heartland Church as our March CFB champion. They are a vital partner to our district, consistently supporting our

026students, families, and campuses. Their annual Giving Hope Christmas event provided clothes, toys, bikes, and and more to over 150 CFB ISD families this past December. Throughout the year, they also donate food and supplies for campuses and recently supported the CFBISD giving house with 150 pairs of Nike sneakers, socks, and toys for our students. We are deeply grateful for their generosity and commitment to the CFBISTD community. Please join me in congratulating our CFB champion, the H Heartland Church. Remaining board members, would you like to stand? Now for our student recognition. Carolton Farmers Branch ISD is proud to recognize our outstanding student artist, Glennice Chassin Moran of Ted Pulk Middle School. Her artwork, The Great Chicken Escape, has been selected for inclusion in the Texas Art Education Association's Youth Art Month Spring Exhibition. Throughout this month there,

027this prestigious statewide exi exhib exhibit showcases exemplary prek through 12th grade student artwork from across Texas at the Bulock Texas State History Museum in Austin. CFBISD is proud to celebrate Glennice's artistic achievement and her representation of the creativity and excellence found across our district. Congratulations to Glennice. And if the family You're amazing. And that concludes tonight's recognitions. It takes a village to raise a child and we're so thankful for the Heartland Church and all of our faith-based leaders for their commitment to supporting our kids and our schools. And congratulations. Um, your artwork is going to be in the museum, they say. So, that's so exciting. Um, and you have a wonderful teacher and we're just so thankful that here in CFB we can offer great fine arts programs that allows you to be well-rounded and

028have received that recognition for the great work you do. So, congratulations. All right. Um, our next item on the agenda is the president's report. And so, um, for tonight, I just want to make a few announcements. One, uh, we have some of you that actively follow our agenda items. And so I wanted just to make a note that you will notice that on this month's agenda I did omit the committee reports. That was intentional because this is the business meeting and one of the transitions I'm making is we're going to do our committee reports in the work studies. And so it is not that we don't want to inform the community of what's going on. Um the work studies allow for us to have a deeper conversation and really focus on um having a more

029dialogue related to ongoing things. So we're going to move those to the work studies. And then um the filing period for schoolboard candidacy closed on Friday, February 13th for this year. There there are two seats up based on the rotation stipulated in board policy BBB local. Four candidates have filed. And as a reminder to the community, we use cumulative voting here in CFBISD. And so that means that um through cumulative voting uh this year you can cast two votes and you can choose to cast your votes any way. So that means you can cast two votes for one candidate, you can cast two votes, one for two different candidates, or you can choose to only cast one vote or cast no vote at all. So you get lots of choices here in CFBISD based on

030our voting mechanism. And so we just want to encourage everyone and ensure that you look at the school district website, cfbisd.edu/elections. And there you'll find information about early voting, which begins on April 20th and ends on April 28th. And election day is on May 2nd. So, be sure to take note and uh vote because it is our right in this democracy and we want to make sure that everybody has the opportunity. Well, thank you. Um, and I think that is all for my announcements tonight. So, next we will move on to item 2C, which is district's announcements. And I'll turn it over to Dr. Eldridge. >> It's allergy season if you didn't know. I think we have a lot of tissues up here if anybody needs one. But um allergies are here and the full

031moon's here and everybody's ready for spring break. So, but we still have a couple more weeks. So, I want to if you are a member of our first annual community ambassador program, would you please stand because I see some of you out there and I'm so excited that Yay. These are our community ambassadors and it was not homework for them to be here tonight. They chose to come here. So, thank you all for being here. Our um last week, I don't know even what day it is, but a couple weeks ago, our first community ambassador meeting, our community ambassadors got to experience being at Early College High School and seeing exactly what we do, and it was a great visit and and I'm so thankful you all give your time to be a part of

032that. Um the second thing I want to say is our FFA. And so, I know Mr. Gilmore, you put a lot of time in our um RL Turner FFA students. They they did so well at the Fort Worth stock show and rodeo. They got um a grand championship in the rabbit division and first place finishes in breeding goat categories. And I just think if you have never understood FFA, it is such a great discipline for our students. It's a great responsibility and it shows so much discipline and dedication and I am just so proud of RL Turner. Um, also our Turner AAT students, which is our communication and animation, they were the UIL state sec they competed in UIL in animation and they earned first place for the second year in a row. So that

033is just huge accomplishments on what our students are doing. Um, we had our prek little prek you don't realize little prek kids now come to big school. And so we had our first event at Loscolinus Elementary and I want to thank our student services department. And I think Liz was still here. And thank you Liz for all of you doing such great work at the prek showcase. And I want everybody to uh thank PTA. PTA extravaganza was well attended. And thank you all for all the work you do for our school district and the training and um the investment in our students. Um and last but not least, I want everybody to give us good intentions because next Tuesday is our HB visit and we plan on winning. So, we're in the top five. So,

034thank you all. >> Thank you, Dr. Eldridge. Our next agenda item is item 2D, which is an update from PTA. So, I'll turn it over to Miss Hullman. >> Sorry, we got awards today. >> Hi, Dr. Eldridge, President Hatfield, and esteemed board. I'm Stacy Hman and I am proud to serve as the president for the C CFBISD Council of PTAs for a couple more months. And we currently have 5,67 members. We're at 91% of members from last year. If every school got 18 more members by the end of the year, we'd increase above what we did last year. That's another award. We like awards. Um, anyone can join PTA at join uh www.joinpta.org or you can become a CFBTA champion member by joining all the PTAs or high school feeder pattern at cfbpta.org that's still

035open. You can keep getting members all the way to the end of the year. And for those of you here from the different PTAs, there are awards every month that you've gotten the list. They're posted and we give them out extravaganzas. you can keep getting awards for your school, which is fun. You get little things to post on your social media. Um, I want to thank everyone who came out to our spring training extravaganza and a special thanks to our community sponsors. They have really helped us this year um in putting on the different things we do for the PTAs. So thank you to Alpha Graphics, First Burst Dental Kids, LDAT Tutors, Kuman, Addison, RFB, RBFCU, Galliant, and LJ2. Um, and also thank you to those that came to our straight talk webinar uh for

036raising the AI generation. We did it virtually. We had great representation from the administration. and we had it, we had counseling services, we had some community members to talk about um the AI generation and and how to benefit our students from it. Um we are going to be posting the slides and the um virtual event from both of these things on our website shortly. All of our um panel members that came to talk to us have agreed to answer questions postfact. So, if you have questions, you go on our site, you watch it, you have questions of our experts, they're happy to field those and we'll get answers back to everyone and post them in a in a common place on our website. Um, we have some program updates. We'll be hosting a schoolboard candidate

037forum on Monday, April 6 at Nancy Wattton Center in part partnership with the AAW. Doors will open at 6:30 and we'll start promptly at 7 o'clock with the forum. Um the event there's an event uh posted on the Facebook page so you can RSVPC event and there's more information on there and all four of the candidates will be there as well. On April 15th we'll be hosting our lifetime member celebration again at Nancy Watton Center. Please remember to submit all the campus lifetime member award winners from your local campuses so that we can make sure to invite them and recognize them at our event. Um, for campuses offering alumni scholarships, we have a link where you can submit yours and it's kept on the council web page. We work with the counselors at all the

038high schools. So, all five high schools will have send their seniors to our links for all of the scholarships from elementary and middle schools and the high schools themselves will also have council scholarships that our seniors can apply for. Um, our council delegate election meeting will be held here in this room next Wednesday at 12:00 p.m. and the new council officers will be voted in for the next school year. Um, each month we have a PTA challenge. So, our March challenge is steam curiosity across science, technology, engineering, arts, and math. It'll uh and then our last challenge of the year will be in April and it's equity every day. So create creating a culture of belonging. So for those of you here from the different schools, think about those challenges and what events you can

039do at your schools and then apply before the deadlines at the end of the month and you may be recognized here in the following month. And that's what we're going to get to tonight. Now, um I have the honor of presenting the February challenge winners, which was random acts of kindness, changing the world one smile at a time. our primary school winner um had a kindness celebration and the ranchy cheerleaders which is their high school feeder showed up and helped them celebrate u by giving a special performance. So congratulations to Freeman Elementary. They're making their way up. They didn't sit in their assigned seats. They're not supposed to be in the back. And then for our secondary school winner, they were showing love by treating staff to treats, students to snacks, and they had a

040therapy dog to love on. And congratulations to Ranch View High School. Okay, D. So, we have two very special awards to present today. Uh, Texas PTA has something called voice for every child and that is associated with how many members you have versus how many students are at your school. We have two schools in our district that have achieved platinum level. That means they have at least one PTA member for every single student at the school. Um, and so we're going to present them with a beautiful banner that we got from Texas PTA. This is a huge achievement. They'll be recognized on stage at the launch conference this summer. And I want to start with fourth time winner Country Place Elementary. just show you what this looks like. I didn't want to unfurl it because

041I didn't want it to get ruined, but that's what it looks like. And then for the third time, Rosemeat Elementary. They brought a big contingent. >> I want to thank you for your continued support. Uh we get some of the best support in the entire state and I'll say that every time. We are the only council in the entire state that gets a monthly place to present PTA news. And thank you for that. And thank you the administration for always supporting us and everything. Together we are PTA. >> I think uh former board president Les Black would say we can't do school without PTA and that is um 100% true. So uh we're so thankful for our PTA and how much they invest in our schools and also in our community members that want to

042lead and support our schools. Um, and it takes all of us together. And congratulations to all our award winners and thank you to them for hosting a schoolboard candidate forum so we can make sure that everyone is well informed ahead of the election. All right, our next um agenda item before we transition to the next agenda item. Everyone is welcome to stay for as long as you would like tonight. We also know we have students in the audience that may have homework to do and want to go home or have dinner. And so we're just going to take a brief pause and allow anyone that would like to step out of the meeting to step out before we continue. But everyone is always welcome to stay for the entire time. All right. Our next agenda

043item is audience for guest item number three. Persons who wish to speak during audience for guests must have electronically submitted an online form for this purpose prior to the deadline and closing at 1 p.m. today. As of the posted deadlines, we had four submissions to address the board. So, I'll uh share a little bit about our procedures. So, our procedures include that each speaker is allowed to speak one staring audience for guest. Speakers designated as a stakeholder will be allowed a maximum of three minutes and speakers designated as non-stakeholders will be allowed a maximum of one minute to address the board as dictated by board policy beed local because the board wants to hear from as many of you as possible while also keeping the meeting running efficiently. If you have a group of more

044than five people who wish to prot to present on a particular viewpoint on a topic, we ask that you appoint one person to speak on behalf of your group. Please remember that the board cannot deliberate on any subject that is not included on the agenda item for this meeting. Board members will listen to comments and will not respond or answer the questions with the exception of the board president who may respond with facts based on policy beed local. Recognizing that students are at the heart of our work here in the district, we ask that speakers model the respectful and constructive behavior we expect of our students. Please keep your comments civil and courteous. Avoid profanity and personal attacks. Refrain from discussing students who are not your own child. Yelling, disruptive behavior, or discriminatory remarks will

045not be permitted. In the event that your comment in the adjudgment of myself, the presiding officer, constitutes a complaint or a charge against an employee or officer, it may be necessary for me to interrupt you and ask you to stop or direct you to proceed with the school district's formal grievance procedures. If a speaker is seeking board resolution on a specific complaint, that concern should be addressed using the district's official grievance process, which can be found online and include policies GGBA, FNG, and GF. Grievance forms are also available on the district website. In compliance with the Texas Open Meetings Act, I will remind you that the board will not respond to the public and will only address agenda items when they are listed on the agenda. The timer will be shown on the screen in

046front of you and you will begin when you arrive at the podium to speak. So our first um speaker tonight is Mary Levelvel. Good evening. Um I'm Mary Levelvel and I have the privilege of chairing the CFBISD Educational Foundation. We're a nonprofit founded in 97 to provide resources to the schools that our tax dollars simply cannot cover. And I'm here to share a few quick important updates. First, last month, our foundation was honored by the city of Carolton as one of its outstanding community organizations. To whomever organ uh nominated us, thank you. Truly, you humbled us and reminded us about how deeply this community believes in our schools. And if it was you, please let me know who you were so I can thank you. Second, two opportunities to get involved which require time and

047not money. One is our EF student scholarship applications close March 10th, 5 days away. We expect more than 400 student applications. We need volunteers to read and score these outstanding students. We provide the training and the rubric. And if you have younger children, especially middle schoolers, this is a great way to see what's ahead for them as they approach high school. If you're interested, contact me, our website, um, or Donna Wald, and we'll make sure you get in contact with our chairman of scholarships, which is Victor Johnson. Second, we're accepting applications for community members interested in serving on our board. We're a working board, which is a polite way of saying we roll up our sleeves. If you care about public ed and want to make a tangible impact, we would love to meet you.

048We'd love to have you serve with us. And finally, and yes, this is one ask for funds. We are seeking sponsors still for our annual teacher of the year celebration. This dinner honors the incredible educators who shape our students every day. Last year, proceeds from this event allowed us to provide $1,000 in Great Start grants to every campus. This year, we would love to do even more. Jan Rug of Atmas Energy and I are serving as co-chairs and sponsorship information is on our website or just find me. I'm around. And again, thank you for supporting our students, our teachers, and our community. >> Thank you, Miss Levelvel, for the updates. Our next speaker tonight is Liz Mendoza. Liz Mendoza. Okay, we'll move to the next speaker, Dave Jimenez. Good evening. My name is Dave Jimenez.

049I'm here tonight to offer some clarity um on the federal education freedom tax credit uh that was mentioned at the most recent board work study session. Uh during that session there were mentions of vouchers available from the federal government for families with students in public schools. There are no vouchers for public schools. Uh more on that later. I feel this requires clarification because accuracy and clarity matters especially when families make decisions based on what they hear in this room. So what this actually exists of as of today in July 2025, Congress created the federal education Freedom Tax Credit, the first federal program of its kind, and Governor Abbott has stated he intends to opt into that program, which is a requirement. This program does not provide vouchers to families or to the district. It offers

050individual taxpayers a dollar for-doll federal tax credit of up to $1,700 for individuals or $3,400 for married couples filing jointly when they donate to approved nonprofits called scholarship granting organizations or SGOs. Those SOS pull the donations and award scholarships to eligible students. Families don't receive the money from the federal government, nor do the districts. They apply to the a nonprofit and the amount depends on entirely on the organization's funding and mission. So, a few facts on uh that the community should know about this uh this tax credit. It has it. We know it's it's out there. It's not quite launched yet. No family can apply until January of 2027 at the earliest. Scholarship amounts are not guaranteed at any fixed dollar figure. They depend on how much each SGO collects. Elig eligible families must earn

051less than three times the area's median gross income. CFBISD does not yet have an SGO. The federal government has not yet released the approval process to establishing one. I believe our community should establish one, but the infrastructure to do so um has not uh been clarified or doesn't exist as of yet. This is entirely separate from um Senate Bill 2 and the ESA voucher program. Um completely different thing. It's a federal thing. Um if the mechanism, the amounts and the timing of of these programs are miscarged, it can it creates confusion and false expectations that um the board and administration can be held accountable to, which is why I decided to speak up about this. Um, I'm also quite passionate about vouchers, which I'll share for with you all in a moment. Um, I would

052respectfully ask that when new federal or state programs are discussed at future board meetings or work studies that we we make sure we're clear about that. Um, and that we provide the community with as much context as possible. >> Mr. Jimenez, your time is up. >> Okay, great. >> Thank you for your comments tonight. >> Our next speaker is Nicholas Ornelis. Nicholas Ellis 1117 East Vandergrip Drive, Carolton, Texas 750006. Agenda item 5, renewal of the document management system. Vendor is Docunav Solutions. What is their service? Pretty self-explanatory, but I'll read from their website highlights. Docunav has helped dozens of school districts move away from costly physical record storage policies by implementing the proven and easytouse document management solution. This ensures accurate and secure data collection while creating a reportable database of all form data collected.

053This reduces errors with easily scan and index all current student folders. Um, this improves security, reduces the risk associated with transporting folders from campus to campus, helps with tracking complete audit history of when a document was created, when it was changed, what changes were made, who made the changes, etc. The renewal date for this contract is uh this month, I think in two days um for 2026 to March 7th of 2027. This is the third year of a contract. That means they were under contract last year which is March 7th uh 2025 to March 7th 2026 and then the beginning or the initial year of contract service was March 7th 2024 to March 7th 2025. Uh this is perplexing um due to a couple reasons, but there I had a records request uh that pertains

054to a date range that begins in September of 2024, 5 to 6 months after purchasing the docu services. Yet, uh your lawyer said that due to the time frames, there will require going through archived paper files and documents to retrieve information requested. Um this will take a voluminous amount of hours and labor. So this may cost um a lot of money. Um also uh there was a handwritten stayaway agreement that was uh composed in October of 2024. Again, same date range. Um there was no documentation anywhere. So which who's wasting the money? Are we purchasing or renewing a contract with a obsolete service because we don't know how to use it or it's out of date or is it our employees that are not documenting correctly because we're wasting money somewhere. We're either paying an

055employee to not do their job and obstruct a service that we're using or we're paying for a service that does not work. This is the third board meeting that I've asked for. What do you constitute as a complaint? I need an explanation or the entire district whether it's on the website or you will be liable for Mr. Your time is up. Thank you for speaking tonight. Your time is up. >> Thank you. That concludes our audience for guests this evening and we will move on to our next agenda item which is our non-action items for discussion. Um a very important conversation. Um board members, do we need to take a recess? No. Five minutes. >> Five minutes. All right. Um we're going to take a break. It is 7:33. We'll rem return at 7:38. All

056right, the time is 7:37 and we are back in open session and we are moving forward with uh item number four which is our first and only actually tonight non- action item for discussion our financial update. Dr. Eldridge, would you re introduce the item? >> I got you. Okay, so we're having a financial update tonight. And if you were here for premeating, you heard Mr. Mur talk about how much the elections cost us, which is another um financial impact that you know, we're not given any money to fund elections. So, as we talk about money, we we do everything we can to work with what we have and our first priority is our students. So, as you look at this, it we're I just want to thank every department and every campus for how hard

057they work on monitoring spending and what counts for kids. So, with that, Miss I'll give it to you. >> Well, good evening, Dr. Eldridge and President Hatfield and our esteemed members of the board. Uh the challenges we do face as a district uh have definitely been discussed at length, but today I'd like to review some of the concrete action the district has taken this year so far to mitigate our revenue challenges driven by declining enrollment and how we are going to face our budget realities for the future. to be very direct about what the district is facing. The single largest challenge facing our budget is projecting student enrollment. Enrollment has declined a little over 6% this year and since this slide was published, it has decreased about 16 more students. We anticipate approximately $9 million

058less in revenue, not to mention all the other factors like increased recapture that's related to our funding formula. That's our current reality and we have taken steps this year to mitigate that revenue deficit. Right now we are in the middle of statistical analysis for next year and we could be looking at enrollment for the 2627 school year anywhere from our projected 21,561 students down to all the way to potentially 20,000 students. And why is this happening? We've identified several key drivers. Uh we have demographics where we see falling birth rates that are directly impacting our kinder kindergarten cohorts. We see increased pressure from charter schools and neighboring districts. Uh not to mention uh future impacts of education savings accounts and how that will affect um parent choice. Um there's also the economics of our communities.

059We have aging neighborhoods and shifting migration patterns that affect uh how many families with small children or school-aged children live within our boundaries. And then of course, as I mentioned before, the rising Robin Hood obligations that um are fueled by increasing property values and declining enrollment. This is our reality and superintendents and CFOs across the state are expected to predict student enrollment and plan for staffing for that enrollment and then hope that their predictions materialize to achieve the revenue target. You know, this part of the job used to be pretty relatively easy and reliable you because it was just a little bit of math, right, and statistical analysis. Um, but as we look back, we used to have a very incremental change year-over-year. Um, I can't state this often enough this year how wise it

060was of the board of trustees to take action to consolidate campuses when you did. Um, no one could predict the sharp decline that we've uh experienced this year. Um, not not to mention the statewide public school enrollment drop, but our district could have been in a much worse situation had action not been taken when it did. You know, we can't control birth rates or the broader economic trends that affect our enrollment, but we can control how we respond to them. And with education savings account portal currently accepting applications, the district could potentially see the same kind of decline that we did this year. And it would be imprudent not to plan on a significant impact because this isn't a temporary blip. It's a pattern that we need to address with urgency. So when I mentioned

061reliable math before, these are the tables that we used to use to trend out our enrollment when it was a little bit more predictable. Trending downward, yes, but incrementally. So over a longer timeline, you could respond incrementally. Trend methodology used to return a pretty reasonable enrollment estimate, but you also have to consider cohorts now. And if you look, for example, our 2122 kindergarten class cohort, it started out at 2,000 students. And as you see, um the enrollment through the years, we've seen how that enrollment shifts through the grades, you know. So, we have to look at how each grade level experiences um significant losses and where we might be losing students as they progress through our system. This data informs our retention strategies and helps us target our resources where they have the greatest impact.

062And still because of our funding formula um when you average all those scenarios we have to apply our attendance rate so that we can inform our ADA uh projection which is the biggest data point. you know, dipping below 20,000 average daily attendance for the first time in the district's history is our reality. And just a reminder that while enrollment is easier for us to, you know, remember, that's an easier concept. We are funded on the average daily attendance and that affects when the dis when students enroll in our district and how often they attend. So, we want them early. We want them enrolled on the first day of school and we want them to have every chance to attend every day and it is an important piece of transparency to remind the board of the

063assumptions that we use to build revenue projections. uh we had a significant shift during this year and so I wanted to just kind of put before the board an example of how that um assumption changes for the 2627 budget. uh you know and if you remember we predict revenue in August when we adopt the budget and then we review and monitor these assumptions all year long to be able to predict how we will and this is the actual word settle up in September with the state um administration's role is to notify the board when material and significant changes occur throughout the year. So this is why we bring it at this point in time after the fourth six weeks because um average daily attendance is not going to get much better in the last two

064um marking periods for attendance. So um it's important to be transparent especially about these numbers because they form the foundation of all of our planning for revenue. So I mentioned before we're projecting uh 21,500. That's definitely down from where we um think we will end up this year at 22696. So um a little bit about average daily attendance. We are going to predict or project at at a bare minimum uh a six a five to six% decline to under 20,000 students. And we are going to keep refining this projection. Uh we are studying our data. We are studying our attendance trends, but I did want to um lean in a little bit and recognize the hard work of our student services department. Um between their tribunal efforts and their u recruitment and attendance efforts, we

065have seen an increase in the percent of attendance of our student population. So that's that is a move in the right direction. um all of these uh related uh assumptions when it comes to 2627 related to property value growth. That's an estimate because we don't have uh preliminary preliminary values yet. But this is a sample of what the tax rate would look like for next year. Obviously, we are going to adjust this and update this as we go along through the process. Uh and I did want to mention that these are conservative assumpt uh assumptions. We're not banking on miracles. We're going to plan on good data and prudent forecasting. Um, but I the board does need to be aware that there is some debate between TEA and the comproller on our frozen levy. And

066um I was at the Tasmo conference last week and so we got a little bit of an update that there are active discussions between the two agencies over a compromise on some conflicting guidance that the comproller gave our CADs. And that has a direct effect on the additional state aid or like we like to call it hold harmless funding that will impact um this current year and next year um for both the general fund and the debt service fund. Um I don't have a resolution for you yet, but uh I will keep you informed. Um and then related to recapture, um because our enrollment did decline, we're projecting um an increase in recapture for this year up to $12 million. And if our enrollment continues to decline and our property values continue to rise, you

067can see that it has that inverse uh reaction and an increase and recapture for um 27. And that's just the fiscal reality of Texas school finance. So uh looking uh where we are mid year, I wanted to make sure that the board stayed aware of a few factors in each one of the board approved budgets. Um, in the general fund, we we have already talked about um the major factors impacting revenue, but in the next slide, I'd like to share with you a little bit more detail about the actions we've taken to mitigate that impact. Um, but enrollment uh fluctuations do have an effect on the child nutrition fund. Um, shout out to Kristen Hess who has previously implemented before the school year started uh a conservative staffing model and uh strategic scheduling so that

068that's able to help her keep her staffing costs down um while her meal counts might fluctuate. Um and then again on the debt service side, while you rarely see changes or a need to amend the budget, um that frozen levy debate does have an impact on that additional state aid and that was factored into the plan you heard from u Mr. Honey last last summer when we adopted the new debt service plan. So um that that is just an important um note to to keep in the forefront of your mind. um because the debt service impact could have a potential impact on the first rating and so that's why it's um an indicator to watch. All right. So I wanted to really um recognize how very hard administration has been uh working um and to

069mitigate the effect on the significant general fund revenue deficit that's related to our decline in enrollment. Much of this work is ongoing, but it is completely appropriate and um timely to recognize the work of Dr. Smoskus and her h and her team in HR and the work they've done to optimize staffing during unprecedented unprecedented times. You know, holding on to those staffing ratios and closing positions when possible have decreased our position roster by 44 positions just this year at a savings of almost $3 million. Additionally, the strategic holding on filling vacant positions and redistribution of some of those responsibilities this year will result in about $5 million of savings um in the in the payroll budget. And if you remember earlier in the year, we took our property and casualty insurance renewal out to market

070instead of going with the co-op bid. And so we also netted $1.3 million in reductions in our premium and the effort that every budget manager or anybody who supervises a time card has taken a laser eye to overtime and extra hours this year. Um the latest report from uh Miss Rebecca in payroll that she shared this month uh shows that we have saved over $635,000 in reduced overtime and extra hours just this year. So trustees, our staff is working very diligently to ma mitigate the revenue lost with the student uh student loss. Um and we're not done yet. other collaborative works in action. Um because all ideas of optimization are on the table, including further refinement of those staffing ratios to respond to our enrollment realities. We are ranking and ordering all of our expenditures

071through the lens of the priorities established for us. In the arena of optimization, we are also exploring a fiscy year change which will provide some operational efficiencies while giving a one-time increase to the fund balance. This is a heavy lift for the accounting department, but it does provide benefits to students when principles are able to execute those expenditures to be first day of school ready. And the proposed 10-month year would be for this coming year 2627, but the campuses wouldn't realize that efficiency until next summer. That's just the TEA rules. Um, we expect to put that before the board for consideration at the April board meeting and there will be lots more to come regarding that. Um, but there is a lot of work that and that is going into investing in retention and recruitment.

072And so once we receive our preliminary values in April, all of this work will be culminated in a preliminary first draft of the budget by the May work study. And at that point, we can discuss compensation scenarios and make a decision regarding our largest investment, our staff. So, a little bit about where we're headed. And I wanted to give you um a draft projection. And these are these numbers are really rough, but I I wanted to demonstrate what a fiscy year change does to fund balance there at the bottom. It does give us a small bump to stay at 3 months fund balance. Um, which is one of the board goals. Um, but it's not a financial strategy. This is just a one-time bump in fund balance. and the work still has to happen to

073decrease the budget deficit and and get to a balanced budget state by 2728. Um, you know, we did realize $9.8 8 million in savings this year. And that has made a significant dent in a complex situ uh in a complex solution and it's difficult to turn a ship as large as a $300 million expenditure budget quickly, but we are making significant progress. This draft is not our reality. Um we can't control property values and the all the unknowns related to enrollment. Um and while significant barriers are exist to reach a balanced budget for 2627, every effort is being made to get there. As we look ahead to the road um towards budget adoption, we've reached the midpoint of our current year and we've shared some of the actions taken to mitigate those significant revenue deficits.

074And in the next month, administration will wrap up our work with non-personnel budgets and begin those conversations about compensation scenarios for the May work study. Um, as I mentioned, the budget draft will be ready um because we'll have uh those preliminary values so that you can properly inform your decision about uh compensation in June. Uh statutoily all of this uh becomes very um solidified after certified values are received on July 25th and then the budget and tax rate would be adopted in August. And at this time I appreciate the opportunity and I would h be happy to answer any questions. Thank you for the detailed presentation, Miss Settle, and um not only for sharing our reality, but also showing uh the tremendous amount of work that you guys are doing to mitigate and right-size things

075um given our current constraints. Board members, questions or comments, Miss Brady, I just want to say thank you for all of your hard work, all of the district's hard work, all of y'all working the staffing and the student the ratios. And I know y'all are working really hard to save us some money. And this is so horrible. I mean, horrible. The legislature is so horrible that they are making all of these rules and policies and laws that we're not getting tax credit now from their property values. We're eliminating uh tax people taking too many taxes or none at all. So, when that happens, schools don't benefit. So, just so you'all know, and I know it's great, and especially if you're over 65 or you get some of those credits and your tax bill set zero

076this year, just know that we're that's money we're not getting. So, I know this is really hard and you guys have done an amazing job of trying to reduce all of everything. I know I know it's hard. Um, I did have one question on the tier one entitlement, and I know you've explained that before, but could you just briefly explain it again, a tier one entitlement, how how that exactly works. Okay. So, um the tier one entitlement is at the most basic level is 6215 6215 per student. Um and then there's some weighted funding in there. Uh you remember the slide with all the colored lines. Every one of those lines come with a little bit of additional weighted funding. Um, and so the tier one entitlement per student looks different in different districts based

077off the student population and their characteristics. Um, in CFB, our tier one entitlement is averaging out to a little bit about uh $10,50 uh per ADA. Um and currently I think um what we've been sharing with our our team and and um our staff members so that they have perspective, we are spending about $13,000 per student. So we're outpacing our spend. Um, tier 2 is um a result of when the district voted additional pennies for the tax rate to support the schools, but um because of the property value increases um a lot of that gets wiped out with recapture. >> Thank you. Additional questions. >> Okay. Well, I have a Go ahead. No, go ahead. Okay. Um, so when you talk about position control versus staffing ratios, can you explain the difference between those two

078or the similarities? >> Absolutely. Um, position control, if you can think of it as, um, the list of positions that we have in our budget. Um, staffing is who's in that position, right? Um, so if we have um, we we try not to put too much of a hold on the budget if if the position isn't needed. So that's where the 44 um position reduction is really impactful. Um but then if there's no one in the position, there's no one on the staffing side, um you know, obviously that that creates savings too. Uh staffing ratios are a little bit um more of our guiding rubric of saying um we are going to make sure we maximize every classroom. say in elementary we make sure that there are 22 students in a class for every teacher

079um up through Miss Hulcom you can remind me if I think it's fifth grade right when we go to 25 right and then when you get to secondary um it's a little harder because they don't stay in the same room all day so um we do kind of an average between um 26 to one or 28 to one we're moving we're moving to a a more strategic uh staffing ratio for the secondary level. So that is what is guiding our decisions on how we allocate that position budget per campus. Um staffing ratios are not only applicable to campuses, they are applicable to departments as well. So for instance, I'll use my own department as an example. um as as expenditures constrict, right? Um the volume might not be there. Um and we have to make

080sure that um we have the same kind of volume of work to justify every position. Um so we evaluate that as well. So it's departments and campuses are both subjected to staffing ratios. Um TASBY is a great resource and that's a lot of where we get um our advice from. >> Wonderful. Thank you for clarifying that, especially the fact that we're um maximizing what's staying as close to the student as possible while also ensuring that we're looking at administration too um and really finding a balance um because the workload shifts no matter where it is. And I really appreciate the attention to detail on that. >> Your turn, Miss Garas. Thank you so much. Thank you for your presentation, Miss Settle. Um, this is really hard information I think for our community as well to

081be able to reflect on it. It is very difficult to hear this because it's coming down the pipeline, but we are not the only district that is in this position. Is that correct? >> That is very very much a true statement. Um I was on a call um yesterday or yeah yesterday um with some other um larger districts and and statewide we just had a new um update for where enrollment uh landed um at snapshot in October and the entire state saw $120 million decline in compensatory en um funding and that's based off the statewide um decline in students. And so, but North Texas has been hit um probably, you know, I don't want to say more than our fair share, but a fair share, especially in this area because we do have a large

082presence of charter and private schools. And now we have a new one called micro schools. So, uh lots of competition. Um and and so when enrollment shifts and and you know we want to staff for for every student we hope to come back we have to face the reality that you know they might go try something else for one year but in my experience they almost always come back. >> That's fair to say that. Okay. So, I just want to make a quick comment about this. Um, just because I think sometimes our community does need clarification in general about what what's coming or what has happened or I I'm going to read just a little a little something. As we look at the district's financial outlook, it's clear that many school districts across Texas, including

083CFB, are facing what can only be described as a growing public education budget crisis. Rising costs for transportation, utilities, insurance, and employee compensation continue to increase while the state's basic aotment, the primary funding for public schools has not kept pace with inflation or the real cost of educating students. At the same time, districts are being asked to meet with an increasing number of unfunded mandates, requirements from the state that districts must implement without receiving the funding necessary to support them. These mandates add additional pressure to already strained budgets and force districts to stretch limited resources even further. This puts districts in a very difficult position. As the community can see, we've been left trying to balance budgets and maintain high-quality programs without the levels of legislative funding necessary to support today's educational needs. I'd like

084to thank the staff of CFB, everybody, principles, our teachers who are truly committed and show up for our kids every single day. I encourage our board to continue advocating strongly for adequate legislative funding and relief from unfunded mandates so that districts like us can continue supporting students, families, and employees without facing ongoing financial strain. Our district employees are doing their part every single day. Now it's our time for the state to do its part, which is fully fund public education and stop placing additional burdens on our schools without the resources to meet them. Thank you, Miss Settle. I appreciate your presentation. >> Thank you, Miss Garza Rojas. Um, Miss Settle, I think one thing that I know we've gone over this before, but it might help in the next presentation to also potentially share some

085of the underfunded and unfunded mandates um with the community again because as we launch into the board um identifying our legislative priorities, I can tell you guys that our intent is to align them to our goals and our guard rails, which means that if we have a goal to get kids reading on grade level at third grade and math on grade level at third grade and then fifth grade and then college and career, military ready. Our legislative agenda is going to align to that. But the community needs to also understand that there are underfunded and unfunded mandates. I'll give you an example. While the state did increase the safety aotment this year and increase the amount to pay for our um security uh specialist in the campuses, which 100% are necessary, I want them on

086campus. I believe in that. It does not fund their salary still. And so when Miss Settle says that um we're getting I think you said 10 about 10,500 but then it's costing us 13,000 per child to educate them that includes things like underfunded security specialists and realistic costs that are happening on our campuses every day. Now the flip side of that is we will provide a high quality education for our kids in this district and that is evidenced by the state of the district we just had where we see that we are up for HB school district of the year. You saw fine arts tonight on fine display. You heard about our athletics. We are producing well-rounded children here in CFB and we will not stop and this is our year to go to the

087state and we are going to be asking our community to join us. And so you can anticipate, I'm going to be very bold right now and say that this board will be in the community this fall asking for your help and educating you on how to support us because we're going to the capital. Anybody going with me, >> Miss Settle? Thank you very much. Sorry, we might have just gone to church in the school district. So, with that, um, board members, any additional comments or questions? All right, let's get to work for kids. Um, our next agenda item is the consent agenda, everyone. Uh, the consent agenda is a mechanism that we use to approve a number of routine items together with a single vote. These are our business items. In compliance with the Texas

088Open Meetings Act, a the public notice for this meeting includes a list of all consent agenda items and the board has been provided ample information about these agenda items in advance. Prior to taking any action on the consent agenda, board members may request withdrawal of individual items for clarification or discussion. Um board members, do I have any additional any items to be removed from the consent agenda at this time? All right, seeing none. Um, board members, do I have a motion regarding the consent agenda? Mr. Shackman, >> I move that we approve the consent agenda as presented. >> I have a motion from Mr. Shackman. I have a second from Mr. Gilmore. Is there any discussion? All those in favor? And any opposed? By a vote of seven in favor, zero opposed. The motion carries.

089Our next agenda item is item number six, items for discussion and/or action. Uh we did not have any items removed from the consent agenda, so we will skip item 6A and pro proceed to item 6B. Item 6B is our targeted improvement plan for MCORE Elementary. Dr. Eldridge, will you please introduce the item? >> I'm just thankful that you didn't like start uh hammering the gavvel. I Anyway, it was a Thank you so much, Miss Settle, for your presentation. Um this next presentation is regarding Mcquarter Elementary. Um they were put on a targeted improvement plan for instruction and achievement and I can't brag enough about Loose. Loose, she is the principal and um her hard work, her smile. It's her first year at that campus. Um u we closed central but we kept loose because she's

090a key to all of our students and it it's great to visit Mutter. There's so much energy there and even though they were put on a targeted plan in a year that she wasn't there, it it could the accountability system is like the finance system. It's another thing that um that it could be one student that didn't achieve or whatever it is. But Dr. Julian's going to present their plan, but I can tell you Luc is already doing more work than what the plan says. And I have no doubt that all those students are learning and they're smiling at the same time because of you and your staff. So, thank you so much for being here, LSE. And Dr. Julian, if you'll take it away. >> All right. Good evening, Dr. Eldridge, President Hfield, members

091of the board. So, as I came up this morning, I couldn't help but think about what um Tam and Joey say before every meeting, right? What is the purpose of public education? It's to improve student outcomes. And I'm excited to share this plan because I think it gives some insight into not just what's the goal, but how do we accomplish that goal of getting those outcomes? This is our strategic roadmap to ensure that every student at McCorder Elementary has access to highquality instruction and the supports they need to achieve academic excellence. In Texas, we have two separate sets of measures for accountability, a state level and a federal level measure. Both systems have three levels of support, associated actions, base, moderate, and intensive. The state's A throughF accountability system consists of three performance standards, acceptable,

092needs improvement, and unacceptable. McCarter is currently identified for needs improvement due to multiple years of a Dlet rating. The federal accountability labels focus on specific student groups. The three levels of identification are targeted supports, additional targeted supports, and comprehensive supports. The federal measures look at student performance and growth on STAR across various student groups. Similar to the state measures, multiple years missing a target for a group triggers escalating levels of intervention. McCarter is identified for additional targeted and supports the middle level. Each level of the intervention, both federal and state, requires specific actions required of the campus, the district, and the board. As I previously shared, McCarter's action is development of a targeted improvement plan or a tip. More detailed information regarding accountability measures and calculations is available on TEA's website at tea.ex.gov and campus

093specific accountability scores can be located at texaschools.gov. Finally, specifics regarding McCarter's targeted improvement plan are included in their campus improvement plan. And I believe you received a copy of the plan submitted to the state in your board book. A targeted improvement plan involves conducting a needs assessment which was completed and submitted. The next requirement is stakeholder engagement which Miss Sodto Deeus has already exceeded the required actions. And next we're required to have a public hearing regarding the tip which was conducted earlier this evening. And last last but not least, the tip must be approved by the board. A targeted improvement plan or TIP is a strategic school improvement blueprint mandated by the TEA and it is also a mechanism that allows us to access additional resources and state level support systems. Although McCarter was not

094officially designated as needs improvement through state accountability until August of 2025, the campus's federal identification last year allowed us to proactively begin developing this targeted improvement plan last year. In addition to the district and board supported resources, McCarter along with Sheffield and Pulk received support through AASO grant focused on strengthening instructional leadership because strong tier one instruction is foundational to school performance. A portion of these funds support our partnership with Relay GSSE to build leadership capacity through more effective observation and feedback practices. This work enhances not replaces the existing curriculum, instructional resources and per personnel and supports. Due to this identification, we are required to develop and submit a plan outlining how we will address performance gaps. This presentation highlights our strategies to improve academic outcomes. One final note, Nicole Greenleaf, the district's school improvement

095officer, was unable to attend this evening. However, Nicole works specifically with the McCarter leadership team, providing support and ensuring compliance with all aspects of the plan. Transparency with our data is the cornerstone of our growth. This year's academic targets were developed in direct collaboration with region 10 using a deep dive into last year's star data to ensure our path forward is both evidence-based and intentional. While these figures represented our specific targeted improvement plan milestones, we remain steadfast in our commitment to the broader board goals reflected in our campus improvement plan. And please note that the goals set as part of the tip are generally lower than the goals established in our campus improvement plan. We view the tip goals as the floor, not the ceiling. As part of our plan, we have placed a significant

096focus on our instructional leaders, including campus leadership and our campus-based instructional coaches who are absolutely crucial to the success of this work. We operate under the firm belief that the quality of instruction cannot exceed the quality of our leadership. To support this, we are proudly partnering with Relay GSSE to sharpen our coaching practices. Miss Sodto Deeus and our campus relay coach meet with meet with Miss Greenleaf weekly for intensive sidebyside coaching. In practice, the campus has implemented a tiered feedback system that provides staff with weekly, bi-weekly, and monthly feedback based on specific needs. This ensures our newest or most struggling teachers receive coaching or feedback every single week, while our most experienced educators are supported with feedback at least monthly. To keep this process streamlined and maintain high levels of accountability, we maintain a campus

097observation and feedback tracker. This tool allows us to ensure that the real-time coaching provided by your leader is clearly visible in student work and accurately reflected in our campus's data. To make the coaching process more tangible, let's look at how we actually track and use our data. On this slide, you'll see the campus observation tracker. This is the live document where every coaching interaction is logged and the campus can ensure each teacher is being provided with coaching support each week. As of February, there were 871 classroom visits. This is the perfect opportunity to shout out the tireless work of both the campus administrators as well as the instructional coaches who prioritize classroom instruction each and every day. An additional function of the tracker is that it allows us to see trends across grade levels and

098ensure that the high leverage action steps that are identified during our coaching conversations are being implemented in the classroom. These coaching feedback meetings, which are recorded each time and uploaded into campus's folders, are collaborative sessions where teachers and leaders review lesson observation film and discuss the high leverage action step to improve instruction. After the action steps are identified, the instructional coach follow up with classroom teacher and provide real time feedback while in the classroom. Our instructional foundation is currently built on HMH for reading and investigations for math. These core programs are essential to our daily classroom success. To support the instructional efforts that we have established a culture of high frequency collaboration. This begins with grade level PLC meetings weekly on the course in the core subjects reading, math, and science, engaging in specialized sessions

099four to five times per semester. To ensure intentionality at the start of each instructional cycle, teams are provided a half-day planning session known as McCarter University prior to each new unit in reading and math. Throughout this process, administrators and coaches facilitate deep dive discussions centered on student data and strategic instructional planning. Finally, student progress is monitored through a comprehensive assessment plan designed to catch gaps in real time. This includes standard unit assessments, monthly ISEP monitoring for reading and math to track foundational growth, and MAP assessments to provide a broader view of student achievement throughout the year. McCarter is committed to a proactive approach, ensuring we don't wait until the end of the year to identify when a student needs extra support. By leveraging powerful platforms like Branching Minds, Progress Learning, and Amira, we monitor student

100progress in real time, allowing teachers to immediately recognize challenges and craft personalized intervention plans. We are incredibly grateful to the school board for approving these highquality resources. They provide our students with the seamless access to of the standards to bridge foundational gaps while simultaneously accelerating their overall instruction. To ensure sustained growth, Mcquarter follows a rigorous schedule of key milestones and continuous professional development. This process is anchored by ongoing feedback loops, including weekly observation and feedback tracker reviews, as well as monthly relay one-on-one coaching for leadership. Additional coaching is provided by Matt Pope around culture, system, and instructions. And our wonderful multilingual department has partnered with Carlen Thomas, who works with campus teachers to support language development. To maintain alignment with district's expectations, we conduct quarterly nine-week data meetings with the district team to evaluate our

101progress towards specific milestones and adjust adjust strategies as needed. Our instructional focus remains centered on high lever practices through continued training in the fundamental five with specific emphasis on framing the lesson and maximizing time in the power zone. These practices ensure that every student understands the objective and that teachers remain actively engaged in the instructional space. We are proud of the work being done in Mcquarter and are confident that these systems will lead to the meets and master's performance that our students deserve. Mquarter Elementary was identified for an additional targeted supports and targeted improvement plan in 2526. The current plan addresses these areas. instructional leadership, observation and feedback, progress monitoring, and intervention and curriculum planning. I'd like to clarify briefly that while McCarter was the only campus identified for school improvement in 2526 accountability, McCarter

102is not the only campus in CFB that has a targeted improvement plan for this year. You might recall that last year we were able to apply for and receive the lasso grant based and based um on the grant along with McCarter Sheffield and Pulk Middle School were also included in the grant application. Part of the grant process is to submit a targeted improvement plan. So to be clear here, Sheffield and Pulk were not identified for school improvement for the 2526 school year. However, these campuses do have a targeted improvement plan that addresses the same areas. Nicole Greenleaf works equally with all three campuses. One final note, during our recent region 10 walkthroughs, McCarter Elementary was asked, "How's the data looking?" And our response was, I think, was fair, right, Hope? We were like cautiously optimistic.

103So, that's where we're sitting right now. While I've had the pleasure of standing before you this evening and sharing the targeted improvement plan, I want to honor the real heroes of this work. The staff, the students, and the parents of McCarter Elementary. Led by Miss Stois and her trusty sidekicks, Sarah Sanchez and Matt Smith, this campus has shown tremendous grit, perseverance, and put forth tremendous effort, hours and hours of hard work. These educators are truly making the difference of the lives their their students lives in our community. This is an action item. It is recommended that the board approved the targeted improvement plan for McCorder Elementary for the 2526 school year. Thank you for your time and attention as we reviewed the tip. Are there any questions or areas where we can provide more clarity?

104>> Thank you, Dr. Julian. Board members, any questions or comments? It's really hard to ask strategic questions when you answer them all because I literally have four here that I sat and planned and you answered them all. >> All right, that's good. That's really good each other. That's good. >> Um that um a thank you for you guys' hard work to share the information with us because it's things like this that brings the work to life for us that helps us have confidence um and be able to explain to the community the great work that's happening. So, thank you. Thank you for your leadership on this campus. Um I fully recognize that transitioning to a new place is very challenging when you pour your heart and soul in a campus. Um but it is clear

105I think I even saw a um an article this week come out on social media and somewhere else from the district about the transition. And so I just want to really thank you for your leadership and I can't wait to see the growth in this campus. Change takes time and we understand that. But when we have systems and structures in place and culture um represented in our superintendent's goals and values um it's going to make a difference for kids and ultimately that meets and masters is exactly what we want because we want our kids to be able to go where they need to go. So thank you guys very much. We appreciate it. Uh board he did mention that this item is marked for additional action. So I would venture to say the board would

106wish to take action. Was there a motion on this item? Miss Barnes, >> I move that we approve the targeted improvement plan for McGuarter Elementary. I have a motion for Miss Barnes. Do I have a second? I have a second for Miss Brady. Is there any uh additional questions? All right. All those in favor? Any opposed? By a vote of seven in favor, zero opposed. The motion carries. The work was already in progress, but we approve. All right. Our next agenda item is item 6C, which is our TASBY policy update 126. Uh, Dr. Aldrich, could you introduce this item? So, policy update 126 was the largest um number of policies sent from TASBY this year. And so, it has taken time to get all of the um recommendations and I want to thank the governance

107committee for all the hard work you all have done in reviewing all these policies. And so with that, I'm going to let there's two things to this. There's the update and then we'll pause and do the AE local. So Dr. Smallus, try that again. >> Got it now. All right. President Hatfield, Dr. Eldridge, and board of trustees, as Dr. Eldridge mentioned I'm here to talk to you about update 126 and then we will proceed into the AE local changes that uh have been proposed in front tonight as well. So let's get started. So as Dr. Eldridge mentioned uh this was the largest update in the history of TASBY and uh there were over 24 um changes all in these areas. I'm not going to read all of them, but an artificial intelligence, cyber security, developing

108a parent portal, etc., etc. You all received the sideby-side comparisons of each of those policies with all of the proposed changes. And so, with that, I want to share with you how we get to where your policies are presented. So after a legislative year, TASBY takes all those changes and they start looking at our policy and proposing all of the local changes that need to be developed from that. Then the district receives those policies and someone from the district known as the district representative, which is myself, then takes those policies and I share it with our district leaders and I have them look at all of the proposed changes by TASBY to see if it aligns with what we're currently doing in the district. And then what we do is we give those policy changes

109to our governance committee consisting of President Hatfield, Vice President Brady, and Trustee Barnes. and they met to review all of the proposed changes from administration. And a huge shout out to y'all because that's a lot of work and being the largest policy change this uh TASBY's ever seen, that was a lot of work on that governance committee. And then once that happens, then they bring me back together and we discuss all of the changes that have come before you tonight. During that review, the governance committee discussed and determined that our grievance policies that we currently have in place, DGBA for the employees, our FNG for parents and students, and the GF for community, has already been met through the current policy, and we're going to continue to move forward as pre as the uh current

110policy is in place by being exempt under our district of innovation. And so, a huge shout out again to our governance committee. That was a lot of work and uh thank you for that. And so it is the district's administrative recommendation to approve TASBY's recommended changes in update 126 as presented with the exception of the GGBA, FNG and GF and we will retain its uh we will retain our current grievance policies by through the district of innovation. Any questions on that? >> Thank you board members. Any questions? I will just share on behalf of Miss Brady and Miss Barnes. Um when she says we met for two months. So the process that we went through is we were given a spreadsheet with the side by side with what the changes were. Administration had already gone

111through them and they had compared everything on their end and then we said don't meet with us. We're going to meet alone and we're going to read all these things. And so we read them all and we carefully went through and if we had questions about any of them or concerns about any of them, we documented all of that and then we gave it back to administration and then we had a meeting and we were able to work through those to ensure that the changes that are made in policy that we the board or the governance subcommittee on behalf of the board really understand the ramifications including some of those are going to require some regulations be developed. Um, and that is one thing that was very important to us is we were balancing what

112is in policy and what are we saying versus in our local policies versus what is the administration going to do as a result and put in regulation which is a procedure. So we have board policy and we have procedures. We do not have district policy. We have board policy and we have procedures. And we are really working on that as a district to make sure that it's very clear the difference between the two. And so I really want to thank administration because they've been also training with TASBY on um policy versus regulations and procedures. And so we're really tightening that up and making sure that we have a system and structures in place. Um and Miss Brady and Miss Barnes, we had great three-hour meetings um and lots of great discussions. So board on behalf

113of the governance subcommittee, we want you to have confidence that what you received in front of you has been vetted by the subcommittee um before it came before you tonight. So, any questions of my colleagues from the for the subcommittee? All right. So, with that, this item is marked for possible action. Does the board wish to take action? Miss Barnes? And I might recommend we read it like this because of the exclusionary policies if possible. Yes, it is actually. Um, yes, it is. All right. Uh, I would like to make a motion that we approve uh TASBY's recommendation of update 126 local policies with the exception of DGBA local, FNG local, and GF local. CFBISD will retain its current grievance policies. >> All right. I have a motion for Miss Barnes. Do I have a

114second? I have a second for Miss Brady. Is there any discussion? All those in favor? Any opposed? By a motion of seven in favor, zero opposed. The motion carries. Our next agenda item is AE local. Um and I believe I do you have anything on this one or I'll take this one? Well, I was just going to all I was going to say very importantly that um this proposed change is one that I must say is a testament to the commitment of the school board and it's focused on the student outcome. So, I don't know if I stole your thunder there, uh, President Hatfield, but working with again President Hatfield, President, uh, Vice President Brady and Trusty Barnes, and sitting in these work study sessions and listening to the great conversation focused around our student

115outcomes and how you all want to um, reflect those goals within a board policy speaks volumes to the work that are um, you're expecting of us and the commitment that you have for our students. So, thank you for that. So, there you can have it have the floor now. you're good. Um, and this, like she said, reflects the work that we've been doing over the last several months in the work studies. And I think the major, um, only major change you could see is a, we're putting it in policy. So, we are saying as a board, this is our expectation formally, even though it's already in our uh, board goals, but we are adopting it in policy. And very proud of this year, our board set a fourth goal, which is fifth grade mathematics. So,

116um, fifth grade math is a very important point where students can in successful completion of fifth grade, they're able to select a advanced mathematics pathway in middle school and high school, which means that we will have students that are better prepared to take um coursework that can help them advance to national merit scholars can have different pathways for college. And so, this board identified that that was a strategic thing for us. So, not only are we focused on third grade reading and math, we're also focused on fifth grade mathematics. and then college and career readiness o ultimately. And so we are adopting board policy AE local potentially tonight um with the expectation that we carry those goals forward through 2030 and then um whoever is in place in 2030 will get to set some new

117goals in board policy. So with that um I'll entertain a motion. Miss Brady, >> I make the motion to approve AE local as presented. >> I have a motion for Miss Brady. Do I have a second? I have a second for Miss Garza Rojas. Is there any additional discussion? All those in favor? Any opposed? I vote to seven in favor, zero opposed. The motion carries. Thank you very much for your presentation and I'm happy to move these policies forward. All right. Our next agenda item is the um potential purchase of campus perimeter fencing. Dr. Eldridge, could you introduce the item? >> So, not only are we focused on student outcomes, we are also focused on student and staff safety. And one of the things we've identified is um perimeter fencing. And so, Mr. for more.

118We'll give an update on campuses um that need fencing and the ones that have it and how important it is in our student world to keep our kids safe. So, Mr. Moore, >> thank you, Dr. Eldridge, President Hatfield Trustees. Um yes, tonight this this focuses specifically on uh the request is for Blandon's elementary uh perimeter fencing. However, there's more of a scope like the title slide says, it's the elementary fencing update in general. um thought that tonight it would be good to go through Blandon specifically and then kind of touch back on the overall project and how we got here because over the course of the next 12 months or so you guys are going to see these projects come in likely on the consent agendas. Uh and so you can reflect back on this

119project and and um think about what it was that that we brought here tonight to kind of explain it all. So the um the project origins kind of how we got here um really the the funding came about through our consolidation. And there was $131.5 million for the four campuses that we consolidated. And so we came to you all in November with that bulleted list there on the bottom with how we could redistribute those funds, of course, the middle school renovations, the prek bolt-ons. Uh and then down at the bottom, the 11.5 million specifically for the elementary fence upgrades. Um so why did we bring elementary fences to you? For us, it really had a lot to do with with a standardized fencing profile um and the means to correct it. We looked at 22

120of our campuses uh as part of this evaluation. So, it was 21 elementary campuses and our CDA um that we really looked at with regard to that standardized fencing profile. I want to pause on that number for one second because there's a few more I want to throw out and if I threw them up there, I thought it would be a little more confusing. I actually think I can explain them a little bit better than distracting you visually with all these figures. But of those 22 campuses, we actually have eight schools that do have a standardized fencing um uh profile. Our five campuses in Irving and three of the four campuses in Farmers Branch. They have the specifications of the fence with rod iron, six-foot non-scalable crash bar egress from the inside. Um and we

121were able to put those eight fences up as part of our TIFF funds over the course of the last two years. So if you are at Stark, if you are at Mclofflin Strickland, Lavalita, Los Kolinus, anything in Irving and Farmers Branch with exception to Farmers Branch Elementary because that's part of the bond construction project. Those are the fences in the campuses that actually do have a fencing profile. Now the 13 that I'm going to run through here shortly, those do not have this fencing profile. And so that's what we were wanting to look at. And you see that bulleted list there, just a couple that I wanted to hit on that we looked at for the for the for the non-standardization, the the materials inconsistencies. Some have chain link. Um some have wood, some rely

122on um perimeter fencing of the residential areas. The materials are are it's like an uneven durability, uneven maintenance. It's it's tough to maintain from that. with regards to the consistency of the materials. Um there's incomplete coverage versus the full perimeter coverage. Some of our campuses it's partial country place. You'll see on here in a second um there's fence along the sides and then we rely on neighbor residential fences and then you get to a point where someone's driveway they didn't want to put the fence up so the fence runs and you've got a gap between that all the neighborhood kids fold down their driveway and come onto the countryplace property. Um, and then really with the proximity of the risk, we've got, you know, we're in a metropolitan area, lots of lots of bridges, lots

123of storm runoff. So, you'll see some of that in here, too. But those are there three of the primary that we looked at with regard to the to the non-standardization. Um, so we're going to look at the 13 including Blandon U that's that's up here for tonight. Uh, and kind of talk through what it is that we're looking at and what you'll see. We've shared all of these um layout designs with the campus principles to ensure that what we were um suggesting works into their plans. Uh and so they've all seen these and we've worked with them and adjusted. We'll start with Sheffield. There's a couple in here you're going to see like Sheffield. If it is green, that means that there's a fence there that is compliant. It meets the standards and the specifications.

124Sheffield's newer, of course, so it's got areas in the fence that are non-scalable and and they meet height requirements, but there's a couple of reds there that we're going to build into the existing fence and join that up. No sense in tearing down a perfectly functioning fence. Um, so we can make it work. Mckame, you see that stretch there on the left side of the screen? That's George Bush. And so that's an entire stretch of the wall along the service road. And so that's non-scalable. The north portion there, we're going to fence that in. And then down at the bottom, there's a a large storm runoff down there that collects a lot of water. There's a lot of water running through there last night. So, we're going to put a fence up along that bottom

125there as part of the the differing um environmental pieces that I'd mentioned. Mcquarter, lots of area we can incorporate there and take advantage of that spread of land. Um, good. We've talked about good a couple times. It's really got some interesting playground layouts. It was a a very compact site. Of course, it was built while the existing structure was there. So you can see on the right side of the campus and at the bottom of the campus, those are the the playground areas. We'll fence those in. We went ahead and um did a layout with that parcel of property um and and uh within the plans on that. We still got time to look at that, but right now we've got that roped in or fenced in rather because the campus does utilize that that

126parcel of land there at good. um Country Place. I'd mention that it's it's a it's one of the most vertical sites that we have. Um at the bottom, you can kind of see in the middle of that image, that's the pool. There's a pool next to it as well. So, that's the residential area. There's two gaps in the fences and um so we rely on that and the neighbors, they like to see into our our our playground area. So, there's no fence there. There's no burden on them to put one up, but we're going to we're going to fence that in to keep our playground in. Um the CDA, that's a large piece of property, but they don't need that much space. You know, they've got little bitties there. And so we uh visited with

127the campus and uh they don't need as much area. So that fence is not going to be quite as encompassing. Thompson, again, take advantage of that that roll off down by the by the by the creek area. There's some space there we can work with. Riverchase is another one that's got the green. That's MacArthur on the left side of the screen. And so that's the Valley Ranch. um um homeowners association fences that are there, they're brick, they're rowd iron, they do meet the specifications that we need. Uh and then that north side, that northern portion of the of the layout that's actually a retaining wall that goes into that neighborhood. It's more than 10 ft tall, so it's it it meets our needs as well. And so we will join the fence there. Riverchase has

128a small ornamental stretch on that that red portion that's on the left side of the screen. That's about a 3 to 4ft fence. It's just ornamental. So, we're going to have to remove that and put a put a uh 6ft fence up there. Rainwater, lots of space that we're going to be able to take in at the Rainwater campus. Davis and Kent, much the same. Uh going to be able to to put the fences up and and make more effective use safely of the space that they've got there. Kent's an example of working with the school and the principal. Um they they utilize an area on there that we did not know they utilize. So, we're going to be able to take in some of that area for prek on that the small toward the

129right of the screen. And then Rosemead much the same. Take in a lot more space. And then Blandon, I will say disregard the green on Blandon. Bllandon's the first one that we did u and so we weren't quite colorcoded to that point. So that green means the same thing as the red because Blandon is a school that has no fence. And that's why it's proposed tonight um to be the first one that um everything that you see along the most exterior perimeter on the north, the west, and the south that's reliant entirely on residential fences, uh wooden fences, chain link fences. And so we're going to put a fence up there. Um and then we'll we'll bring it in there around the side. You can see the gates and the easements. And so, you know,

130all of these will have double swing gates. Um, all of them will take into consideration the what the what the principal shared with us where we could accommodate uh and the fire lanes as well. And so again, tonight's to approve the purchase specifically for Blandon. Um, you'll see more of these coming over the next uh 12 months with the remaining projects. Um and then just a general overview of the project itself about 60 days from start to finish depending on the weather of course uh once we begin with the projects. And so with that I will take any questions you have. >> Any questions board members? >> Well thank you for making an efficient use of our time so we could have this presentation and then put it on the consent agenda from now on.

131Um lots of interesting I didn't know all these facts about our fences. So thank you very much. Yes ma'am. Um board members, this item is marked for possible action. Does the board wish to take action? Mr. Gilmore, I make a motion that we approve the purchase of perimeter fencing for Blandon Elementary. Delegate authority to the superintendent or her designate to execute purchases and contracts in the best interest of the district. Item 6E. >> All right. I have a motion for Mr. Gilmore. Do I have a second? I have a second from Miss Benvitas. Is there any discussion? All those in favor? Any opposed? By a vote of seven in favor. The motion carries. Zero opposes. All right. Our next agenda item is item 6F, which is consider approved miss school days and low attendance waiverss.

132Uh Dr. Eldridge, could you introduce the item? >> So, as you all know, we had um four missed school days with the storm um recently. And so we have two things to um ask for approval tonight. One is to approve the miss school days, which we have two of those because the other two were care covered by our bad weather days. And then our low attendance waiverss, we're allowed to submit a request to TEA. Um anytime our attendance is 10% below what it was the last year at this time. And so with that, I'll give it to Dr. Smalus for all the details. Thank you so much. >> All right. Thank you again, President Hatfield, Dr. Eldridge, and board of trustees. As Dr. Eldridge mentioned that um I'm here tonight to request and have the

133board approved the miss school days waiver and the low attendance waiver. And as uh you recall back in January, we missed four days of school. And uh did you know it was called wintertorm fern? Well, winter storm for winter storm fern uh caused us to miss four days of school. And uh TEA requires no longer days of miss, but now it's instructional minutes. And that's 75,600 minutes. And so if you look at this visual, it'll really help you understand. We had enough minutes in our uh the academic calendar adding the five minutes starting on February 9th to cover two of those days that we missed. then the district can go to the go to tea and request waivers for two of the other days. So we have to use two days with our banked instructional

134minutes and then go to the state for waiverss but the waivers have to be approved by the board and so with that um we are asking for the board to approve the two additional waiver days. In addition as Dr. Eldidge mentioned earlier as the at the beginning. Um we went down 10% on two of those days around those bad weather days. And when we do that, we can ask for low attendance waiver requests. And the benefit of that is that it excuses the ADA from our funding and it allows us to be able to remove those days from the ADA calculations when it's projecting for funding. And so that is another waiver that we are asking from the school board. So, um, this is our recommendation is to for the school board to approve the

135miss school day waiverss and the low attendance waiver as presented. >> Miss Brady, you have a question. >> Oh, you want to make a motion? Okay. Well, I have one question. Sorry. So, I know we're we added the five minutes to the day and the students are on minutes, but the teachers are on days. Is that correct? >> That's correct. >> So, do the teachers have to make up the days or do we have to approve anything to consider? Nope. It's all about the instructional minutes. >> Okay. So, our teachers are not going to have to come in on bad weather day either. >> That is correct. >> Great. Is that going to be communicated to them? >> Yes. >> Wonderful. All right. Any Miss Barnes? >> I also have a question just for clarification.

136Uh so this extra five minutes through the end of this year is not also going to be starting in August of next year for an added five minutes of the school day. We will be going back to our original end times. >> That is correct. >> Thank you. >> Great question. Any additional questions or comments? All right. Miss Brady is itching to make a motion. >> I'd like to make the motion that we approve the miss school days waiver and the low attendance waiver as presented. I have a motion, Miss Brady. Do I have a second? I have a second for Miss Garza Rojas. Is there any discussion? All right. All those in favor? Any opposed? By motion. Seven in favor, zero opposed. The motion carries. Woohoo for not having to come to the um

137I think it's Easter weekend. We're not going to have to guess Good Friday. All right. Um our next agenda item is item number seven, close meeting as authorized under Texas Government Code, including but not limited to section 551.071. 071 consultation with attorney 551.072 real property 551.074 personnel matters 551.076 security devices 551.082 school children district employee disciplinary matter or complaints 551.0821 personally identifiable student information and 551.3084 investigation. Items 7A and 7B will be considered together um in close session. So pursuant with sections 551.074 and 551.082 082 Texas Government Code discussion regarding notification to the Texas Education Agency Educator Certification Division of contract abandonment by teacher Leah Simmons and 7B which is the same uh with contract abandonment by teacher Lisa Cerna. The board will now move into closed session. Audience members, you are welcome to stay

138in the audience while we move into close session. We will be back at some point. Um but we are now um in recess uh moving to closed. It is 8:48 She's so nervous. >> Okay, we are back in open session as the time is 9:08 p.m. Um, we are on item 8A. uh consider possible action regarding notification of the Texas Education Agency Educator Certification Division State Board of Educator Certification of contract abandonment without good cause by Leah Simmons. Dr. Eldridge, it is recommended that in accordance with Texas Education Code section 21.210C and 19, Texas Administrative Code 2.4914J, 4914J. The board approve a finding that no good cause exists for Leah Simmons abandonment of her 2-year term contract of employment abandonment of her position and attempt to resign from Carolton Farmers Branch ISD without consent of

139the board or designate on January 16th, 2026, which was after the 45day penalty pre-resignation deadline and less than 30 days before the first day of instruction for the 2526 school year. It is recommended that the board submit a written complaint with the information required by 19 Texas administrative administrative code 249.14J to the Texas Education Agency Educator Certification Division State Board for Educator Certification seeking sanctions for Leah Simmons abandonment of employee contract. >> Thank you, Dr. Eldridge. Board members, would anyone like to make a motion? Miss Brady, >> I move that the board render a finding in accordance with the Texas Education Code section 21.210C. 2110C2 and 19 administrative code 249.14J. That no good cause exists for Leah Simmons, a teacher on a two-year term contract, abandonment of her employment contract, abandonment of her position, and

140attempt to resign from the Carolton Farmers Branch ISD without consent of the board or designate on January 16th of 2026, which was after the 45day penalty-free resignation deadline and less than 30 days before the first day of instruction for the 2526 school year. I move that the board authorize the board president to submit a written complaint with the information required by 19 Texas Administrative Code 249.14J to the Texas Education Agency Educators Certification Division State Board of Educator Certification seeking sanctions against Miss Leah Sim Leah Simmons, a two-year term contract teacher for abandonment of her employment contract with Carolton Farmers Branch ISD. >> I have a motion for Miss Brady. Do I have a second? I have a second from Miss Benitas. Is there any discussion? All those in favor? Any opposed? By a motion of

141seven in favor and zero opposed. The motion carries. Our next item is item 8B, which is uh consider and possible action regarding notification to the Texas Education Agency Educator Certification Division, State Board of Educator Cert Certification of contract abandonment without good cause by Lisa Zerna. Dr. Eldridge. >> It is recommended that in accordance with Texas Education Code section 21.210C 2110C and 19 Texas Administrative Code section 249.14J. The board approves a finding that no good cause exists for Lisa Cerna's abandonment of her two-year term contract of employment. Abandonment of her position and attempt to resign from Carolton Farmers Branch ISD without consent of the board or designate on January 20th, 2026, which was after the 45day penalty free resignation deadline and less than 30 days before the first day of instruction for the 25 26 school

142year. It is recommended that the board submit a written complaint with the information required by 19 Texas Administrative Code 249.14J to the Texas Education Agency Educator Certification Division State Board for Educator Certification seeking sanctions for Lisa Cerna's abandonment of our employment contract. >> Thank you, Dr. Aldridge. Do I have a motion? I have a motion for Miss Barnes or Miss Barnes. I move that the board render a finding in accordance with Texas Education Code section 21.210C2 2110C2 and 19 Texas Administrative Code 249.14J that no good cause exists for Lisa Cerna, a teacher on a two-year term contract, abandonment of his her employment contract, abandonment of her position, and attempt to resign from Carolton Farmers Branch ISD without consent of the board or designate on January 20th, 2026. 6, which was after the 45day penalty-free resignation

143deadline and less than 30 days before the first day of instruction for the 2025 2026 school year. I move that the board authorize the board president to submit a written complaint with the information required by 19 Texas Administrative Code 249.14J to the Texas Education Agency Educator Certification Division State Board for Educator Certification seeking sanctions against Lisa Cerna, a two-year term contract teacher for abandonment of her employment contract with Carolton Farmers Branch ISD. I have a motion for Miss Barnes. Do I have a second? I have a second for Mr. Shackman. Is there any discussion? All those in favor? Any opposed? By a vote of seven in favor, zero opposed? The motion carries. Our next agenda item is item nine. Comments from board members regarded posted agenda items. Board members, is there any comments about tonight's

144posted agenda? Seeing none and hearing none, we are move at the end of our agenda and the time is 9:30 9:13 p.m. and we are adjourned. Members, before you leave, I have a thank you card for the culinary team that hosted the grassroots